A Sulfur Anthology by

Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Wesleyan
Published: 2016-01-28T16:00:00+00:00

CLARK COOLIDGE

Section III from At Egypt

III.

I see the blank wall coming back in lighter and lighter tones

that and the thought of nobody’s lap, phantom stance

walking the low struck hills of Egypt, Mars

cats crying still by nightlong gravels rolling

as the lope I enjoyed pulling the camel head past the rubble piles

trumpet through nervous head the papyrus strain, a quick

and blurred and blue at the top and creaking miles of paper stairs

here my name is Benchmark James, English geologist

of fluorescent sets and spare time, counting by camel sticks

and the jam in the helicopter flask, train tea and lots of still chicken

the bones of a musical score all over the mastered land

as I camp down by the soft shafts with wig hat of an indigo

and unbelievable saturate of dress at the soft paint sunset

I’d said I’d have to see it all again by moon

by any artifice at all to inch in and stretch out

the remnants under

As if to see

It leads you

He slides

Then, Peter is the name of the man with none

toilet seat cover like a tombstone, touch it

morning bricks, a more careful bric-a-brac of dreams?

buses in lumps and worsted space

and the man is telling me, spinning, he says …

but does this thing work?

It is out

No, it’s not

His thought

This thought taken from the bus we have hauled, all Cairo

of wrapped cars, the ones of metal numbers under woven hemp skin

it says, chemicals for modern building, precipitate rending

the banana verandas, thought to go but now it’s back

collapsed to new slant cement slab porches

an asteroid will hit the Twinky coffee shop

balancing tiles of Center street, withdrawn of its meat

in djellaba hands, beneath carapace awnings, the pajama boys

and a pregnant chartreuse at bus wait, prongs of firework

those guys lay up on lashed frameworks, paint RADAR

at housetop, place to wait on a morning myth

or astronomic aim, huge minarets toy with

a swallow shadowing the cement side in contract beeps

as the world announces the world, to Christ Car Wash tip

pronouncing Wimpy among the oculist witnesses of heavy women land

passed by a dice truck and then the zoo goes by, zebras!

This is the sky lot of coffin arms, the monuments

limestone politicos, their resting hands on sphinx pates

or hand-dipped candle palms, yellow headed statesmen

poor, what else but meditate? at the Club Beak

or Nautique Hellenique, Nileside, straw bedside

a volume of Coins of the World in Danger of the Lipton tea board

and busted windows of the planetarium dusty flat hat spin

I see the rainy stars iron by, arrow by hot plate

this bus has a lariat, the Nile its fill of floating beans

seagulls service Man With Head, lions guard the bridgehead

they’re digging a Metro in Cairo Center, day and night in the hole

the white rubber boots

Things of it said

Dropped down to tip

Rock at leaded him

Diorite and alabaster, serpentine marble

limestone painted pink to resemble granite

source pink granite, sandstone terminal

carnelians of the pebbles, lapis from elsewhere

And the black onyx is the eye

of the hole in your finger

and the turquoise a moist closet

amethyst a liquid sweet gives the throat a tug

twinge of gold toe caps in the silver

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.