two poems by Ariana Reines


Blue Palestine

Only one grass whistles out the tooth of my horse
And the moon drops fast behind the fences
And the wheat lolls back
And waits for death

I could see the sea from where I was
My mesh hat shone blue

The jagged cheek of Gibraltar
Solid, sucked in the mouth and never melting
Where my dog’s warm underleg soothes the whetstone
I speak of it thusly
I say it thusly
I lisp its name into the curl of wall stained dark in the impression of
        my mouth

Only one grass whistles out the tooth of my horse
And the moon bends back
And the wheat lolls back
And opens its stomach
And waits for death

I soak it in my black water
It seethes in bags I have hung up among the rafters
It seethes in bags of amber and jasper transfusions
Flower liquids in cellophane pouches
Streaked with goo clots of plastic soldier sun

When the pitcher is poured out the length of my tongue
And ten vats of grease ignite in unison

Only one grass whistles out the tooth of my horse
A too-tight phylactory
The moon bending back
The wheat lolling back
Scrollboxes clattering on the stone
Jugs of gasoline and jugs of sand

I threw my coat on the sea
The velvet sea
My coat spread
My coat spread
It was the blue of the top of the column of milk
Its soaked embroidery
It was the ditty two winds whined into the anus of night
Skating along the floor of the brook
Are leaves and ice. Devolving on the brook floor
It is only one little one. One blue shard of pale Palestine.
The wineskins are pricked
Goats’ udders banged sore
Where mica lodges in the mucus house

Where my velvet is sucked down
Where the cheek blows thick with sleep to be brushed by the sea
Blue Palestine
Wrung swan neck in oil
Tasseling dirty day with rocks that fly and fly and fall and fall and
        fall.

The moon bends back
And the wheat lolls back

A cracker whitens on the tongue of the hanged man
My velvet is sucked down the sea
The sea wall is chipped blue
The clock of Palestine
Gulls’ salt beaks
Iron drums soldered shut and stuffed with salt cod
An anvil of rammed earth in the form of a baby belly button
Hair raised on the hat of the imperatrix
Embossed forever in her brass annal

No grass screams against the foot of my horse
No rock whinnies down the side of the sea
No scroll staves off the reeds quivering in my rib wall
And no algaes quiver
And no frogs belch out the tablet over the song of my purchase of
        night
Blue Palestine
Red sucker bloody on the bib of the world
Blue Palestine
Ice tray soaked in solid sun

———————————————————————–

Beauty

            Je suis belle, ô mortels! comme un rêve de pierre
           (Baudelaire)

These poisoned sensations have to be
Accepted if they’re to be
Overcome. Looking
Up calories on my phone

Not that I’m counting 
Don’t even like numbers
It’s something vestigial
It comes in bad minutes

To teach my body something’s in control
Something little & unholy, wrong idea
Of information, chiseling a transparent minute
Into myself with the afterimage of a form

If I did this kind of thing
On the bigger machine it’d be
Worse. Worse
Things than this are bombing

The world. A terrible
Fate is coming to power tomorrow. I’m reading
The early poems of Sherman Alexie. Desolation
Of secular life. I remember the luxury of speculating

All mystical traditions grew up
In the souls of a disciplined few
Turned in on themselves while under
Occupation by tyrants. That was then. This

Morning I could see one comfort: to become rock
Hard. Could imagine one comfort:
To have become rock. I had no
Imagination. I had his. I had theirs. “Formalism

& grammar are ways to be thin…” masochism
Merely thought of, the idea of a calorie
Most boring way to feel womanly doing itself to me
This morning I was panicking, burning, I was desperate

Scanning the body of my bedfellow
Its beautiful cheeks & chin
& long smooth abdomen
My silence growing fat like an old fruit

Still making me sick
It makes me sick I longed
For the wrong thing
I longed for death. I dreamed of stone

sent by hand

19 January 2017

Two more poems by Denise Levertov


The Springtime

The red eyes of rabbits   
aren’t sad. No one passes
the sad golden village in a barge
any more. The sunset   
will leave it alone. If the   
curtains hang askew   
it is no one’s fault.
Around and around and around
everywhere the same sound   
of wheels going, and things   
growing older, growing   
silent. If the dogs
bark to each other
all night, and their eyes   
flash red, that’s
nobody’s business. They have   
a great space of dark to   
bark across. The rabbits   
will bare their teeth at   
the spring moon.

—————————————————————-

Seeing for a Moment

I thought I was growing wings—
it was a cocoon.

I thought, now is the time to step   
into the fire—
it was deep water.

Eschatology is a word I learned
as a child: the study of Last Things;

facing my mirror—no longer young,
         the news—always of death,
         the dogs—rising from sleep and clamoring   
                and howling, howling,

nevertheless
I see for a moment   
that’s not it: it is   
the First Things.

Word after word
floats through the glass.   
Towards me.

Scotophili

In the Annals of Everlasting,
I saw your eyes shining
like forest jewels
that I had forgotten how to ponder.

In the Book of No More,
were your words
which would not leave
me when I woke.

For a time I put the books away.
The annals stood unconsulted.
The wind ripped each day away as it passed
leaving me to see each morning anew.

The sun grew and grew.
What joy!
And every morning, I approached
the grasses and we shared in prayer.

Yet still I knew.
How starkly it stood –
that absence by my side
with which you used to play pretend.

And now the trees looked sickly and hidden.
The hissing fury of untouched shadows,
and how they grew and grew
as I pretended I could not see them.

Some Nanao Sakaki poems

If you have time to chat,
Read books.
If you have time to read books,
Walk into mountain, desert and ocean.
If you have time to walk,
Sing a song and dance.
If you have time to dance,
Sit quietly,
You lucky, happy idiot.

Soil for the legs
Axe for the hands
Flower for the eyes
Bird for the ears
Mushroom for the nose
Smile for the mouth
Song for the lungs
Sweat for the skin
Wind for the mind.

In the morning
After taking cold shower
– what a mistake –
I look at the mirror.

There, a funny guy,
Grey hair, white beard, wrinkled skin,
– what a pity –
Poor, dirty, old man,
He is not me, absolutely not.

Land and life
Fishing in the ocean
Sleeping in the desert with stars
Building a shelter in the mountains
Farming the ancient way
Singing with coyotes
Singing against nuclear war –
I’ll never be tired of life.

Now I’m seventeen years old,
Very charming young man.
I sit quietly in lotus position,
Meditating, meditating for nothing.

Suddenly a voice comes to me:
“To stay young,
To save the world,
Break the mirror.”

Upon the blooming plum twig
         a warbler
               wipes his muddy feet

How lovely
         through the torn paper window
                — the Milky Way

Grasshopper, good singer!
         Take care of my tomb
                when I die

LET’S EAT STARS

Believe me, children!
God made
Sky for airplanes
Coral reefs for tourists
Farms for agrichemicals
Rivers for dams
Forests for golf courses
Mountains for ski resorts
Wild animals for zoos
Trucks and cars for traffic tragedies
Nuclear power plants for ghost dance.
Don’t worry, children!
The well never dries up.
Look at the evening glow!
Sunflowers in the garden.
Red dragonflies in the air.
A small child starts singing:
“Let’s eat stars?”
“Let’s eat stars!”