OLD MASTERS
For T.T.
Behind the curtain on Christmas Eve my mother’s voice merges with Bishop’s: “The art of losing isn’t hard to master / so many things seem filled with the intent / to be lost that their loss is no disaster.” Mother’s voice is as soft as the softest rain: “Watch now, how men will lose their one chance to kiss the alabaster of my face.” Widows and lesbian lovers “Lose something every day. Accept the fluster / of lost door keys, the hour badly spent. / The art of losing isn't hard to master.” “— Is she at home or not,” the horny men ask, but hers is not the task to answer to the charge of forgery and fidelity in life and in disaster. “I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster, / some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent. / I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.” The sounds get intense, and men’s excitement turns into a disaster. “This is a disaster,” they all shout. “Every year the same thing. It’s Christmas for Christ’s sake, indulge our lust, for once, and be a sport.” But “No,” she says, with Echo as her partner, practicing the art of losing even faster, one art which I am made to see as she refers once more to some disaster: “ — Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture / I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident / the art of losing's not too hard to master / though it may look like (Write it!) a disaster.” “I’m listening,” I say, “But if it is as if it looks like it, like a disaster, then why do I have to write it, when those intended for, this writing of disaster, go back to eating, or opening their windows, disgruntled so by their fail to muster, or is it master, you?” “— Don’t move,” I say, “I’m painting you as implacable. Me, as lightness of touch on your lips, so that the one you’re waiting for will come at last. At last."
Behind the curtain on Christmas Eve my mother’s voice merges with Bishop’s: “The art of losing isn’t hard to master / so many things seem filled with the intent / to be lost that their loss is no disaster.” Mother’s voice is as soft as the softest rain: “Watch now, how men will lose their one chance to kiss the alabaster of my face.” Widows and lesbian lovers “Lose something every day. Accept the fluster / of lost door keys, the hour badly spent. / The art of losing isn't hard to master.” “— Is she at home or not,” the horny men ask, but hers is not the task to answer to the charge of forgery and fidelity in life and in disaster. “I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster, / some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent. / I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.” The sounds get intense, and men’s excitement turns into a disaster. “This is a disaster,” they all shout. “Every year the same thing. It’s Christmas for Christ’s sake, indulge our lust, for once, and be a sport.” But “No,” she says, with Echo as her partner, practicing the art of losing even faster, one art which I am made to see as she refers once more to some disaster: “ — Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture / I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident / the art of losing's not too hard to master / though it may look like (Write it!) a disaster.” “I’m listening,” I say, “But if it is as if it looks like it, like a disaster, then why do I have to write it, when those intended for, this writing of disaster, go back to eating, or opening their windows, disgruntled so by their fail to muster, or is it master, you?” “— Don’t move,” I say, “I’m painting you as implacable. Me, as lightness of touch on your lips, so that the one you’re waiting for will come at last. At last."
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Comments
PS. Apropos of the reference to 'eating' in the poem: the reference suddenly makes me realize that your poet-speaker appears to refrain from eating anything but words, as opposed to the the addressee of the poem, who not only returns to plain food consumption, but also to opening windows in order to give the house a proper airing. A very delicate moment in the poem: the poet eats words and regurgitates words, while someone else consumes food and produces flatulence ("All that is solid melts into air" (K. Marx)), so that windows must be opened (a hell of a stinker!). All of which gives me the chance to ask you: how is your diet coming along? carrots only, right?! or are you simply beyond even such a frugal consumption of food?
XOXOX
Bent