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Collected Poems 1947-1997

Allen Ginsberg



  ALLEN

  GINSBERG

  COLLECTED

  POEMS

  1947–1997

  Collected Poems 1947–1997 is a compilation of the texts of

  Collected Poems 1947–1980, White Shroud: Poems 1980–1985,

  Cosmopolitan Greetings: Poems 1986–1992, and

  Death & Fame: Poems 1993–1997.

  The Estate would like to express gratitude to Eliot Katz for his dedication and assistance in preparation of this manuscript, Danny Mulligan at HarperCollins for attentive coordinating, and Jeffrey Posternak at the Wylie Agency for his tireless intermediation.

  Contents

  COLLECTED POEMS 1947–1980

  Author’s Preface, Reader’s Manual

  I. EMPTY MIRROR: GATES OF WRATH (1947–1952)

  In Society

  The Bricklayer’s Lunch Hour

  Two Sonnets

  On Reading William Blake’s “The Sick Rose”

  The Eye Altering Alters All

  A Very Dove

  Vision 1948

  Do We Understand Each Other?

  The Voice of Rock

  Refrain

  A Western Ballad

  The Trembling of the Veil

  A Meaningless Institution

  A Mad Gleam

  Complaint of the Skeleton to Time

  Psalm I

  An Eastern Ballad

  Sweet Levinsky

  Psalm II

  Fie My Fum

  Pull My Daisy

  The Shrouded Stranger

  Stanzas: Written at Night in Radio City

  After All, What Else Is There to Say?

  Sometime Jailhouse Blues

  Please Open the Window and Let Me In

  “Tonite all is well”

  Fyodor

  Epigram on a Painting of Golgotha

  “I attempted to concentrate”

  Metaphysics

  In Death, Cannot Reach What Is Most Near

  This Is About Death

  Hymn

  Sunset

  Ode to the Setting Sun

  Paterson

  Bop Lyrics

  A Dream

  Long Live the Spiderweb

  The Shrouded Stranger

  An Imaginary Rose in a Book

  Crash

  The Terms in Which I Think of Reality

  The Night-Apple

  Cézanne’s Ports

  The Blue Angel

  Two Boys Went Into a Dream Diner

  A Desolation

  In Memoriam: William Cannastra, 1922–1950

  Ode: My 24th Year

  How Come He Got Canned at the Ribbon Factory

  The Archetype Poem

  A Typical Affair

  A Poem on America

  After Dead Souls

  Marijuana Notation

  Gregory Corso’s Story

  I Have Increased Power

  Walking home at night

  “I learned a world from each”

  “I made love to myself”

  A Ghost May Come

  “I feel as if I am at a dead end”

  An Atypical Affair

  345 W. 15th St.

  A Crazy Spiritual

  Wild Orphan

  II. THE GREEN AUTOMOBILE (1953–1954)

  The Green Automobile

  An Asphodel

  My Alba

  Sakyamuni Coming Out from the Mountain

  Havana 1953

  Green Valentine Blues

  Siesta in Xbalba

  Song (“The weight of the world”)

  In back of the real

  On Burroughs’ Work

  Love Poem on Theme by Whitman

  Over Kansas

  III. HOWL, BEFORE & AFTER: SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA (1955–1956)

  Malest Cornifici Tuo Catullo

  Dream Record: June 8, 1955

  “Blessed be the Muses”

  Howl

  Footnote to Howl

  A Strange New Cottage in Berkeley

  A Supermarket in California

  Four Haiku

  Sunflower Sutra

  Transcription of Organ Music

  Sather Gate Illumination

  America

  Fragment 1956

  Afternoon Seattle

  Tears

  Scribble

  In the Baggage Room at Greyhound

  Psalm III

  Many Loves

  Ready to Roll

  IV. REALITY SANDWICHES: EUROPE! EUROPE: (1957–1959)

  POEM Rocket

  Squeal

  Wrote This Last Night

  Death to Van Gogh’s Ear!

  Europe! Europe!

  The Lion for Real

  The Names

  At Apollinaire’s Grave

  Message

  To Lindsay

  To Aunt Rose

  American Change

  ‘Back on Times Square, Dreaming of Times Square’

  Laughing Gas

  Funny Death

  My Sad Self

  Ignu

  Battleship Newsreel

  V. KADDISH AND RELATED POEMS (1959–1960)

  Kaddish: Proem, Narrative, Hymmnn, Lament, Litany and Fugue

  Mescaline

  Lysergic Acid

  I Beg You Come Back & Be Cheerful

  Psalm IV

  To an Old Poet in Peru

  Aether

  Magic Psalm

  The Reply

  The End

  Man’s glory

  Fragment: The Names II

  VI. PLANET NEWS: TO EUROPE AND ASIA (1961–1963)

  Who Will Take Over the Universe

  Journal Night Thoughts

  Television Was a Baby Crawling Toward That Deathchamber

  This Form of Life Needs Sex

  Sunset S.S. Azemour

  Seabattle of Salamis Took Place off Perama

  Galilee Shore

  Stotras to Kali Destroyer of Illusions

  To P.O.

  Heat

  Describe: The Rain on Dasaswamedh Ghat

  Death News

  Vulture Peak: Gridhakuta Hill

  Patna-Benares Express

  Last Night in Calcutta

  Understand That This Is a Dream

  Angkor Wat

  The Change: Kyoto-Tokyo Express

  VII. KING OF MAY: AMERICA TO EUROPE (1963–1965)

  Nov. 23, 1963: Alone

  Why Is God Love, Jack?

  Morning

  Waking in New York

  After Yeats

  I Am a Victim of Telephone

  Today

  Message II

  Big Beat

  Café in Warsaw

  The Moments Return

  Kral Majales

  Guru

  Drowse Murmurs

  Who Be Kind To

  Studying the Signs

  Portland Coliseum

  VIII. THE FALL OF AMERICA (1965–1971)

  Thru the Vortex West Coast to East (1965–1966)

  Beginning of a Poem of These States

  Carmel Valley

  First Party at Ken Kesey’s with Hell’s Angels

  Continuation of a Long Poem of These States

  These States: into L.A.

  A Methedrine Vision in Hollywood

  Hiway Poesy: L.A.-Albuquerque-Texas-Wichita

  Chances “R”

  Wichita Vortex Sutra

  Auto Poesy: On the Lam from Bloomington

  Kansas City to Saint Louis

  Bayonne Entering NYC

  Growing Old Again

  Uptown

  The Old Village Before I Die

  Consulting I Ching Smoking Pot Listening to the Fugs Sing Blake
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  Zigzag Back Thru These States (1966—1967)

  Wings Lifted over the Black Pit

  Cleveland, the Flats

  To the Body

  Iron Horse

  City Midnight Junk Strains

  A Vow

  Autumn Gold: New England Fall

  Done, Finished with the Biggest Cock

  Holy Ghost on the Nod over the Body of Bliss

  Bayonne Turnpike to Tuscarora

  An Open Window on Chicago

  Returning North of Vortex

  Wales Visitation

  Pentagon Exorcism

  Elegy Che Guevara

  War Profit Litany

  Elegies for Neal Cassady (1968)

  Elegy for Neal Cassady

  Chicago to Salt Lake by Air

  Kiss Ass

  Manhattan Thirties Flash

  Please Master

  A Prophecy

  Bixby Canyon

  Crossing Nation

  Smoke Rolling Down Street

  Pertussin

  Swirls of black dust on Avenue D

  Violence

  Past Silver Durango Over Mexic Sierra-Wrinkles

  On Neal’s Ashes

  Going to Chicago

  Grant Park: August 28, 1968

  Car Crash

  Ecologues of These States (1969–1971)

  Over Denver Again

  Imaginary Universes

  Rising over night-blackened Detroit Streets

  To Poe: Over the Planet, Air Albany–Baltimore

  Easter Sunday

  Falling Asleep in America

  Northwest Passage

  Sonora Desert-Edge

  Reflections in Sleepy Eye

  Independence Day

  In a Moonlit Hermit’s Cabin

  Rain-wet asphalt heat, garbage curbed cans overflowing

  Death on All Fronts

  Memory Gardens

  Flash Back

  Graffiti 12th Cubicle Men’s Room Syracuse Airport

  After Thoughts

  G. S. Reading Poesy at Princeton

  Friday the Thirteenth

  Anti-Vietnam War Peace Mobilization

  Ecologue

  Guru Om

  “Have You Seen This Movie?”

  Milarepa Taste

  Over Laramie

  Bixby Canyon to Jessore Road (1971)

  Bixby Canyon Ocean Path Word Breeze

  Hum Bom!

  September on Jessore Road

  IX. MIND BREATHS ALL OVER THE PLACE (1972–1977)

  Sad Dust Glories (1972–1974)

  Ayers Rock/Uluru Song

  Voznesensky’s “Silent Tingling”

  These States: to Miami Presidential Convention

  Xmas Gift

  Thoughts Sitting Breathing

  “What would you do if you lost it?”

  Who

  Yes and It’s Hopeless

  Under the world there’s a lot of ass, a lot of cunt

  Returning to the Country for a Brief Visit

  Night Gleam

  What I’d Like to Do

  On Illness

  News Bulletin

  On Neruda’s Death

  Mind Breaths

  Flying Elegy

  Teton Village

  Sweet Boy, Gimme Yr Ass

  Jaweh and Allah Battle

  Manifesto

  Sad Dust Glories

  Ego Confessions (1974–1977)

  Ego Confession

  Mugging

  Who Runs America?

  Thoughts on a Breath

  We Rise on Sun Beams and Fall in the Night

  Written on Hotel Napkin: Chicago Futures

  Hospital Window

  Hadda Be Playing on the Jukebox

  Come All Ye Brave Boys

  Sickness Blues

  Gospel Noble Truths

  Rolling Thunder Stones

  Cabin in the Rockies

  Reading French Poetry

  Two Dreams

  C’mon Jack

  Pussy Blues

  Don’t Grow Old

  “Junk Mail”

  “You Might Get in Trouble”

  Land O’Lakes, Wisc.

  “Drive All Blames into One”

  Land O’Lakes, Wisconsin: Vajrayana Seminary

  For Creeley’s Ear

  Haunting Poe’s Baltimore

  Contest of Bards

  I Lay Love on My Knee

  Stool Pigeon Blues

  Punk Rock Your My Big Crybaby

  Love Replied

  X. PLUTONIAN ODE (1977–1980)

  What’s Dead

  Grim Skeleton

  Ballade of Poisons

  Lack Love

  Father Guru

  Manhattan May Day Midnight

  Adapted from Neruda’s “Que dispierte el leñador”

  Nagasaki Days

  Plutonian Ode

  Old Pond

  Blame the Thought, Cling to the Bummer

  “Don’t Grow Old”

  Love Returned

  December 31, 1978

  Brooklyn College Brain

  Garden State

  Spring Fashions

  Las Vegas: Verses Improvised for El Dorado H.S. Newspaper

  To the Punks of Dawlish

  Some Love

  Maybe Love

  Ruhr-Gebiet

  Tübingen-Hamburg Schlafwagen

  Love Forgiven

  Verses Written for Student Antidraft Registration Rally 1980

  Homework

  After Whitman & Reznikoff

  Reflections at Lake Louise

  τεθνάκην δ’ όλίγω ’πιδενης ϕαίόμ’ άλαία

  Fourth Floor, Dawn, Up All Night Writing Letters

  Ode to Failure

  Birdbrain!

  Eroica

  “Defending the Faith”

  Capitol Air

  Appendix for Collected Poems 1947–1980

  Notes

  Epigraphs from Original Editions

  Dedications

  Acknowledgments

  Introduction by William Carlos Williams to Empty Mirror

  Introduction by William Carlos Williams to Howl

  Author’s Cover Writ

  Index of Proper Names

  WHITE SHROUD: POEMS 1980–1985

  Acknowledgments

  Porch Scribbles

  Industrial Waves

  Those Two

  Homage Vajracarya

  Why I Meditate

  Love Comes

  Old Love Story

  Airplane Blues

  Do the Meditation Rock

  The Little Fish Devours the Big Fish

  Happening Now?

  A Public Poetry

  “What You Up To?”

  Maturity

  “Throw Out the Yellow Journalists of Bad Grammar & Terrible Manner”

  Going to the World of the Dead

  Irritable Vegetable

  Thoughts Sitting Breathing II

  What the Sea Throws Up at Vlissingen

  I Am Not

  I’m a Prisoner of Allen Ginsberg

  221 Syllables at Rocky Mountain Dharma Center

  Fighting Phantoms Fighting Phantoms

  Arguments

  Sunday Prayer

  Brown Rice Quatrains

  They’re All Phantoms of My Imagining

  White Shroud

  Empire Air

  Surprise Mind

  Student Love

  The Question

  In My Kitchen in New York

  It’s All So Brief

  I Love Old Whitman So

  Written in My Dream by W. C. Williams

  One Morning I Took a Walk in China

  Reading Bai Juyi—I. II. III. IV. V China Bronchitis VI. VII.

  Transformation of Bai’s “A Night in Xingyang”

  Black Shroud

  World Karma

  Prophecy

  Memory Cousins

  Moral Ma
jority

  The Guest

  After Antipater

  Jumping the Gun on the Sun

  Cadillac Squawk

  Things I Don’t Know

  Notes

  COSMOPOLITAN GREETINGS: POEMS 1986–1992

  Acknowledgments

  Preface: Improvisation in Beijing

  Prologue: Visiting Father & Friends

  You Don’t Know It

  On the Conduct of the World Seeking Beauty Against Government

  Hard Labor

  Velocity of Money

  Sphincter

  Spot Anger

  London Dream Doors

  Cosmopolitan Greetings

  Fifth Internationale

  Europe, Who Knows?

  Graphic Winces

  Imitation of K.S.

  I Went to the Movie of Life

  When the Light Appears

  On Cremation of Chögyam Trungpa, Vidyadhara

  Nanao

  Personals Ad

  Proclamation

  To Jacob Rabinowitz

  Grandma Earth’s Song

  Salutations to Fernando Pessoa

  May Days 1988

  Numbers in U.S. File Cabinet

  Return of Kral Majales

  Elephant in the Meditation Hall

  Poem in the Form of a Snake That Bites Its Tail

  Mistaken Introductions

  CIA Dope Calypso

  N.S.A. Dope Calypso

  Just Say Yes Calypso

  Hum Bom!

  Supplication for the Rebirth of the Vidyadhara

  After the Big Parade

  Big Eats

  Not Dead Yet

  Yiddishe Kopf

  John

  A Thief Stole This Poem

  Lunchtime

  Deadline Dragon Comix

  After Lalon

  Get It?

  Angelic Black Holes

  Research

  Put Down Your Cigarette Rag

  Violent Collaborations

  Calm Panic Campaign Promise

  Now and Forever

  Who Eats Who?

  The Charnel Ground

  Everyday

  Fun House Antique Store

  News Stays News

  Autumn Leaves

  In the Benjo

  American Sentences

  Notes

  DEATH & FAME: POEMS 1993–1997

  Acknowledgments

  Foreword

  New Democracy Wish List

  Peace in Bosnia-Herzegovina

  After the Party

  After Olav H. Hauge

  These knowing age

  C’mon Pigs of Western Civilization Eat More Grease

  Here We Go ’Round the Mulberry Bush

  Tuesday Morn

  God

  Ah War

  Excrement

  New Stanzas for Amazing Grace

  City Lights City

  Newt Gingrich Declares War on “McGovernik Counterculture”

  Pastel Sentences (Selections)

  Nazi Capish

  Is About

  The Ballad of the Skeletons

  “You know what I’m saying?”

  Bowel Song

  Popular Tunes