“Poet”
Are you he
Who’d silence his high vanity
If to despise
The telling of his only eyes
Ere make
Mankind his proud mistake?
I am he
Whose lies
Sing the truths they disguise.
*
“Lighting another cigarette”
Lighting another cigarette,
Passing the window, I see the axe,
Blade buried in a log in the woodpile,
The handle up to lay hold—
How long
Have I been counting whispers
Of trees of grasses of the wintry sea?
*
“Again, in again most now”
Again, in again most now
And even only now
As once, as only: weather
Brooding, lifting blazier things.
Spring. Therefore in now again
Upfall of every unconcluded, open
Known: tamed cat
A-crouch now, savage. Good, good
Necessary, O you are, you gentled
Evil: evil as this
That keeps these windows to
These slept-to things
Intact, yes good
In this again need tear
Again need put sleep down
Now, yes, again love need.
_______________________________________
Corrupted into Song: The Complete Poems of Alvin Feinman by Alvin Feinman is available via Princeton University Press.
