When it’s your dice or mine, all
or nothing,
that she be there in all her splendour
(Charles Olson) reminding me of how warm the pavement could be
at night in Ocean Park the summer of 1975
released on your own recognizance . . .
A damsel in distress drifts past, unseen,
her sad tattoos & pedicure,
3:45 p.m., back of Taqueria Vallarta, knowing every step
including the slide & pivot & exactly where that might take you
as sunlight filtered down thru the sweet summer smog
on a re-direct from aliens who were handing out sun glasses
& Love is not a dream returning she said
It will never leave us when it goes
7.
“Do you know at the offering of which libation
the waters become endowed with a human voice
and rise and speak?” (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)
From the beach it looked like Victory at Sea conditions out there
Sky the color of a sea stone cradled by the drizzle tide
Everything wet, trembling, waiting for you to make the next move
The haze of smog that lingered in yr veins
all summer long when the seaweed was in bloom
& you were bending like a palm tree in the breeze
I still have the photograph & the scars
& the silkscreened cover art in full color
(even black & white)
The light the air as yet unbruised
They call me Pagliacci but my real name is Mr. Earl
