by Bob Kaufman
HERE IS A REBEL, ONE LARGE, MONSTROUS REBEL, WHO FIRST TEARS DOWN HIMSELF, AND SNEAKS LIKE FIREWORKS INTO THE PATHS OF OTHERS, HOPING TO EXPLODE, OFTEN SHOWERED, EXISTENT TO THE END.
EVERY TIME I OPEN MY BIG MOUTH
I PUT MY SOUL IN IT.
IT TAKES SO MUCH TO BE NOTHING,
TO SHROUD THE MIND’S EYE
FROM THE GAUDY THEATER
OF THE HEAD.
FALLNESS NOON OF THE MIND
CLUTTERED WITH DISCARDED FANTASIES
NERVE PANELED CORRIDORS OF IMAGINATION
OPENING ON HIDDEN UNIVERSE
GLIMPSED IN THE ECHO
OF A SCREAM.
SCENE IN A THIRD EYE
on the gray shadow of the darkened city
in lost photographs of other sad visions,
ferrying images of transient ecstasies,
pains, private sadnesses, hid
in smoky towers, secret pockets in clandestine
nations.
what? pushed into hungry mouths of crowded buildings
retains its form, reason is too unreliable,
memory screwed into hoped-for visions, desire,
twisted beyond recognition, detected in echoed
sound.
shouting crossviews from worn cliffs, dug down
in the wake of violent earthworms, blinded in
refracted corkscrew glares, from coppery phantom
silhouettes of fake existence, pinned into air, stuck in
time.
NOVELS FROM A FRAGMENT IN PROGRESS
RETURN TRIP SEATED ERECT ON THE SINGING TRAIN IN DELIBERATE ATTEMPT NOT TO FALL ASLEEP, USE OF IMAGINATION TO AVOID SWAYING PEOPLE, UNREAL VISIONS OF MURALS ON RED RESTROOM FLOORS, SLEEP URGE GETTING STRONGER, SCREWING UP THE EYES TO A PERFECT BREAST, ROUGH STOP, STRONG WISH FOR EROTICISM DEPARTING NATIONS CARRYING BIG PAPER BAGS, WONDERING ABOUT THE DENTS IN BOXER’S FACES, REJECTION OF THE SEXUAL ASPECT OF SWEAT, PICTURE OF THE MOTORMAN AS THE MYSTIC FERRYMAN, HIS FACE WOULD EVER BE DESCRIBED IN NOVELS, AWARENESS OF MUSIC OUT BY THE WHEELS, SERIOUS ATTEMPT TO WRITE SONGS, SURPRISED AT MY OWN NAIVETE, AMUSED BY SOUNDS LIKE ONE I CAN’T WRITE, APPROACHING STATION, EYES OF SLIDING DOOR, WAITING FOR IT TO OPEN, MORE PEOPLE, ANOTHER STOP. IT ALWAYS HAPPENS, BRING THIS OFF WITHOUT ANNOYING. ALWAYS WATCH THEM GET OFF BEFORE THE BIG EVENT, I ALMOST GIVE UP AT TIMES LIKE THESE. HOW TO SAVE IT. REPETITIOUS FRUSTRATION, NOW, MYSTIC HOURS WITHOUT LOSING A GRIP ON MY SANITY & FREQUENTLY, WOMEN REALIZE MY CONCENTRATION TO MASTER THIS TRICK, WILLING TO RIDE PAST THEIR DESTINATION.
SECONDLESS
Secondless, minute scarred, hourless, owless, sourness, flowerless, for a statement, FOR GOD
the Pygmies are ECSTATIC.
FICKLE TIME GONE FROM TIME INTO TIMELESSNESS,
Sometimes are tickless times,
BILLIE HOLIDAY, UNFUNNY LAUGHTER TIME & HOT WORLDS
FRECKLED TROPHY TIME
slanted & faded cloudy times,
white stain powdery rock times,
MOUTHMARKED ROCKLESS TIMES
Morning times, salamandered time,
MINUTE AGES OF TIMELESS TIME & CLOCKLESS CLOCKS, & COCKLESS COCK.
Times of many colored afternoons,
WHEN MORNING BECAME A STRANGE HOSPITAL, & DE-TIMED THE NEEDLESS DREAM,
time’s brilliant alcoves, unbelled,
where brown shadows, snap like slivers
of widowed icycles . . . iced cycles . . .
pale times of riding the crippled horse,
to untimed farthest dry lips of the mind,
hazy latitudes of desperate hours, flattened
into stretching landscapes tickless cinemas,
technicolored on silently curved screens
of the mind.
BROKEN BY QUIET BLACK LAKES & NERVY GEYSERS & NOTHING CONTINUED.
A GREAT PAINTING IS HUNG UP ON THE SKY.
THE ARTIST HIDES IN A JUNGLE OF WRECKED CLOCKS.
[DARKWALKING ENDLESSLY]
DARKWALKING ENDLESSLY, THESE ANGUISHED FLOORS OF EARTH
THROUGH RAINFULL SEASONS OF THE MIND, PAST THE FOAMING
WAVE OF BROKEN INTO AND ENTERED EYES, RIDING BLACK HORSES
TO THE THIN LIPS OF THE MIND. IN A YEAR OF BREAKING
APRILS, I COME TO THAT PLACE THERE. MY SOUL IS MOONBURNED.
MY BODY A SINEWED HURT FOR ALL THE NOTHING THAT I AM,
THE NOTHING THAT IS ALL MY MINGLES OF AFRICAN HAIR.
SPEAK FOR ME. I WEAVE THE WINDS AND KISS THE RAINS,
ALL FOR LOVE.
I DREAMED I DREAMED AN AFRICAN DREAM. MY HEAD WAS A
BONY GUITAR, STRUNG WITH TONGUES, AND PLUCKED BY GOLD
FEATHERED WINGLESS MOONDRIPPED RITUALS UNDER A MIDNIGHT
SUN, DRUMMING HUMAN BEATS FROM THE HEART OF AN EBONY
GODDESS, HUMMING THE MELODIES OF BEING FROM STONE TO BONE
AND FROM SAND ETERNAL. BLUE RAIN FALLING IN SOFT EYEDROPS
FROM NUDE BODIES OF DANCING PLANETS, BEATS OF SCIENCE
PLAYED ON VIBRATED TEETH OF OPEN-MOUTHED AFRICAN HARPSICHORDS.
VENUS, THE STAR JAZZER IN TRANSIT, ON FLUTED BARS OF BLACK
LIGHT, DANCING IN THEATERS OF BIRDS STREAMING BEAUTY’S NAME
BEYOND THE BELTS. MAHOGANY GOLDFISH BLOSSOM IN THICKLY LOADED
SKIES DOWN FROM THE INTIMATE DISTANCE BY A RIVER WHERE PEACE
IS GREEN IN THE FOUNTAIN, ROSES DISAPPEAR INTO EACH OTHER.
THE SUN AND THE MOON CREATE THE BALLAD AT ITS SOURCE, AND
ALL THOSE FIRES OF LOVE I BURN IN MEMORY OF.
HIGHER THAN THE TALLEST PEAKS
DEEPER THAN THE STEEPEST CLOUDS
FARTHER THAN THE FARTHEST SEAS
STANDS THE SERENE KINGDOM OF THE TRULY FAIR
WITH HER IMMORTAL CHILDREN OF
THE MIND.
THE GREAT ROSE OF TIME TURNS SLOWLY.
THE DREAM FLOWN ON WINGS OF SILVER BELLS, BEYOND HARPOONS AND SCREECH OWL,
GONE FAR ON BEYOND BEYOND.
THE DREAM IS ON THE HEIGHTS AND RISING.
[I WANT TO ASK A TERRIFYING QUESTION]
I want to ask a terrifying question,
“What time is it going to be?”
That Sunday never came,
He lied, speaking in tongues,
Hot walking New York, in smoky Januaries,
My back is moonburned,
And my arm hurts,
The blues come riding,
Introspective echoes of a journey,
Truth is a burning guitar,
You get off at Fifty-ninth Street forever.
[THE TRAVELING CIRCUS]
The traveling circus crossed the unicorn
with one silver dollar & pederasty eyes.
If i can’t be an ugly rumor i won’t be the good time had by all.
A certain terror is more rare to me than desirable
than publishing two volumes of my suicide notes,
there are too many lanky baseball players,
newspapering my bathroom floor, and too much
progress in the burial industry, let’s go back,
to old-fashioned funerals, & sit around &
be sad, & forgive one another, & go outside
to bury the bottle, & borrow stiff handkerchiefs,
& help load the guy in the wagon & flirt with the widow,
& pretend not to see all those people sinking
into subways, going to basketball games,
going to those basketball games.
A certain desirable terror is more desirable to me than rare
than the thought that i could die right in the middle of
sexual intercourse, & with my new all-purpose transistor
blanket go right on pumping away, with no emotional letdown
if you stop, you’re dead, the jakov syndrome, tell the kids,
don’t mess around with the light switch, tell them they’ll be shocked
if they unplug daddy.
A terror is more certain that’s rare, & more desir
able.
THERE ARE TOO MANY UNFUNNY THINGS HAPPENING TO THE COMEDIANS.
Why don’t the monasteries serve hot & cold hero sandwiches &
all kinds of split pea soups, & bring the guys to the village
once a week to get laid, & make them stop printing all those fat
books with god’s picture on the cover,
& all that subway mystery stuff.
A certain desire is more rare than terror,
than that happy shop, home of free association,
where i breakfasted with the suicidal rabbi,
& the world’s champion padlock salesman, who
wore impeccable seersuckers, & whose only
oversight is cannibalism, & who is someday going
to eat himself and get busted if he stays in the flesh game.
All bicycle seats beatified & take on appearance of north poles, other things
certain are real to me, but what is so rare, as air is a poem.
It’s all right real, it’s just god playing dirty jokes again,
that was the old universal gin mill story, with chopin &
amelia earhart floating down the suez canal with dueling pistols
in their hair, as the great symphony of fish play beethoven’s teeth.
TRANSACTION
TO BREAK THE SPELL OF SUNDAY
I OFFERED THE GANGSTER A SILK EAR
AND FIRST COPIES OF FAMOUS HOROSCOPES.
HE DEMANDED AN UNWRITTEN CONTRACT
WITNESSED BY A GYPSY QUEEN.
BLUES FOR HAL WATERS
My head, my secret cranial guitar, strung with myths plucked from
Yesterday’s straits, it’s buried in robes of echoes, my eyes, breezeless bags, lacquered to present a glint . . .
My marble lips, entrance to that cave, where visions renounce renunciation,
Eternity has wet sidewalks, angels are busted for drunk flying.
I only want privacy to create an illusion of me blotted out.
His high hopes were placed in his coffin. Long paddles of esteem for his symbol canoe.
If I move to the stars, forward my mail c/o God, Heaven, Lower East Side.
Too late for skindiving and other modern philosophies, put my ego in storage.
The moon is too near my family, and the craters are cold in winter,
Let’s move to the sun, hot water, radiant heating, special colors,
Knife-handle convenience, adjacent to God, community melting free.
Eskimos have frozen secrets in their noses and have chopped down the North Pole.
The Last Buffalo will be torpedoed by an atomic submarine, firing hydrogen tiepins.
God is my favorite dictator, even though he refuses to hold free elections.
I worry about the padlock I painted on.
My hair is overrun with crabgrass, parts of my anatomy are still unexplored.
No more harp sessions for me; I am going to hell and hear some good jazz.
Do you hear the good news, Terry and the Pirates are not really real.
If you value the comfort of your fellow worshippers, don’t die in church.
Why ruin our eyes with TV, let’s design freeways after dinner tonight.
He might have lost some friends, but Jesus could have made a fortune on that water to wine formula.
History is the only diary God keeps, and somebody threw it on the bonfire.
The day of the Big Game at Hiroshima. The moon is a double agent.
This year the animals are holding their first “Be kind to people” week.
The Siamese cats will not participate and will hold their own convention in Egypt. The civilized world fears they may attempt to put Pharoah back in place on the throne.
For God’s sake, Hal, jam the radio. Trip them with your guitar.
A TIGER IN EACH KNEE
White tiger I hear your
Hum on the drone
Flowing on beds of
Fresh snow on springs
Flowing back to the nether
source,
The truth is an empty
bowl of rice
Those cathode men who cage
you shall melt
In the summer sun,
For they are ugly bars
Who echo the sting of
Unholy rivers in their dried cracked
Bed.
WALK SOUNDS
Soft noise, where crystalline sap dwells.
Tree bark houses, tree bark shoes.
Long green journeys, into sounds of death.
Cries of who blows, who blows, who blows,
Rings of raindrops, on damp streets.
Quietly disappearing, in fearmottled night,
Sweeping over asphalt mesas, to long gutters,
Where gray birds lie, gone time is buried,
Safe from hideous laughter, babblings,
Of sidewalk fools, tongues straining,
Flicking, on steps of air, nervously.
Glowing blue, black, blue, black,
In the shapes of night.
WAR MEMOIR:
JAZZ, DON’T LISTEN TO IT AT YOUR OWN RISK
In the beginning, in the wet
Warm dark place,
Straining to break out, clawing at strange cables
Hearing her screams, laughing
“Later we forgot ourselves, we didn’t know”
Some secret jazz
Shouted, wait, don’t go.
Impatient, we came running, innocent
Laughing blobs of blood and faith.
To this mother, father world
Where laughter seems out of place
So we learned to cry, pleased
They pronounced human.
The secret jazz blew a sigh
Some familiar sound shouted wait
Some are evil, some will hate.
“Just Jazz, blowing it’s top again”
So we rushed and laughed.
As we pushed and grabbed
While Jazz blew in the night
Suddenly we were too busy to hear a sound
We were busy shoving mud in men’s mouths,
Who were busy dying on living ground
Busy earning medals, for killing children on deserted streetcorners
Occupying their fathers, raping their mothers, busy humans were
Busy burning Japanese in atomicolorcinescope
With Stereophonic screams,
What one-hundred-percent red-blooded savage would waste precious time
Listening to Jazz, with so many important things going on
But even the fittest murderers must rest
So we sat down on our blood-soaked garments,
And listened to Jazz
lost, steeped in all our dreams
We were shocked at the sound of life, long gone from our own
We were indignant at the whistling, thinking, singing, beating, swinging
Living sound, which mocked us, but let us feel sweet life again
We wept for it, hugged, kissed it, loved it, joined it, we drank it,
Smoked it, ate with it, slept with it
We made our girls wear it for lovemaking
Instead of silly lace gowns,
Now in those terrible moments, when the dark memories come
The secret moments to which we admit no one
When guiltily we crawl back in time, reaching away from ourselves
We hear a familiar sound,
Jazz, scratching, digging, bluing, swinging jazz,
And we listen
And we feel
And live.
ARRIVAL
Bitter rose blood from dead grapes,
Miniature rivers, flowing on cracked lips.
Old men fighting death in secret corners,
Time rushing wildly through terrified streets.
Odors of laughter reach the nostrils,
Pure poetry from the mouths of children,
Waves of dark flames ba
tter the dawn.
The crawling day arrives, on skinned
Knees.
LIKE FATHER, LIKE SUN
Come, Love,
Love, Come,
Sing a river, Federico . . . García . . . Lorca . . .
In Sarah’s tents a Gypsy moon . . . Godless Spain’s burning noon . . .
I wrote my first poem in brown gravy, my best friend was a green candle,
Orleans . . . New Orleans . . . the bend in the river cleaves to the sky . . .
Louisiana, named for a broken sun king, bequeathed to a star jazzer,
Miro . . . the flowers are still up there on that wall, stem, petal, all,
Their roots playing the silences, between Babatunde’s drumbeats,
Feeding pongee petals to green breezes, flying in darting wonder.
Crane, the flowers have crossed your bridge, beyond, beyond; gone far on
When the wind is blowing through my hair, I cry breath, its coolness loves.
The great rose of time turns on her redding breast, Pocahontas’s here,
The land is Apache, Kiowa, and Sioux ranges.
Colorado brings a horse.
The white tiger’s horn growls—the drone, the man he killed who caged him . . .
They are ugly bars, who echo the sting of unholy rivers, zoos of death,
The poet in Easter-faced boots, walks from my chest, mystic bloodfruit.
Be the hum in the cluster.
Muddy Mississippi flowing to the thickly hooded skin, cross the bar,
Andean the Delta counts the teeth in the Buddha’s smile, vanishing directions,
Whispers, the great rain forest grows mahogany goldfish, Africa’s stolen babes,
Coming from ages of impalement, ages wet with dryness, awesome of soul.
Their right eye is a sun, their left eye is a moon.
