mistaken again!
Your indifference! my enthusiasm!
I insist! You cough!
Lost in the wave of Gold that
flows thru the Cosmos.
Agh I’m tired of insisting! Goodbye,
I’m going to Pucallpa
to have Visions.
Your clean sonnets?
I want to read your dirtiest
secret scribblings,
your Hope,
in His most Obscene Magnificence. My God!
May 19, 960
Aether
11:15 P.M., May 27
4 Sniffs & I’m High,
Underwear in bed,
white cotton in left hand,
archetype degenerate,
bloody taste in my mouth
of Dentist Chair
music, Loud Farts of Eternity—
an owl with eyeglasses scribbling in the
cold darkness—
All the time the sound in my eardrums
of trolleycars below
taxi fender cough—creak of streets—
Laughter & pistol shots echoing
at all walls—
tic leaks of neon—the voice of Myriad
rushers of the Brainpan
all the chirps the crickets have created
ringing against my eares in the
instant before unconsciousness
before,—
the teardrop in the eye to come,—
the Fear of the Unknown—
One does not yet know whether Christ was
God or the Devil—
Buddha is more reassuring.
Yet the experiments must continue!
Every possible combination of Being—all
the old ones! all the old Hindu
Sabahadabadie-pluralic universes
ringing in Grandiloquent
Bearded Juxtaposition,
with all their minarets and moonlit
towers enlaced with iron
or porcelain embroidery,
all have existed—
and the Sages with
white hair who sat crosslegged on
a female couch—
hearkening to whatever music came
from out the Wood or Street,
whatever bird that whistled in the
Marketplace,
whatever note the clock struck to say
Time—
whatever drug, or aire, they breathed
to make them think so deep
or simply hear what passed,
like a car passing in the 1960 street
beside the Governmental Palace
in Peru, this Lima
year I write.
Kerouac! I salute yr
wordy beard. Sad Prophet!
Salutations and low bows from
baggy pants and turbaned mind and hornèd foot
arched eyebrows & Jewish Smile—
One single specimen of Eternity—each
of us poets.
Breake the Rhythm! (too much pentameter)
… My god what solitude are you in Kerouac now?
—heard the whoosh of carwheels in the 1950 rain—
And every bell went off on time,
And everything that was created
Rang especially in view of the Creation
For
This is the end of the creation
This is the redemption Spoken of
This is the view of the Created
by all the Drs, nurses, etc. of
creation;
i.e.,—
The unspeakable passed over my head for
the second time.
and still can’t say it!
i.e. we are the sweepings of the moon
we’re what’s left over from perfection—
The universe is an OLD mistake
I’ve understood a million times before
and always come back to the same
scissor brainwave—
The
Sooner or later all Consciousness will
be eliminated
because Consciousness is
a by-product of—
(Cotton & N2O)
Drawing saliva back from the tongue—
Christ! you struggle to understand
One consciousness
& be confronted with Myriads—
after a billion years
with the same ringing in the ears
and pterodactyl-smile of Oops
Creation,
known it all before.
A Buddha as of old, with sirens of
whatever machinery making cranging noises in
the street
and pavement light reflected in the facade
RR Station window in a
dinky port in Backwash
of the murky old forgotten
fabulous whatever
Eternity,—
with the RR Sta Clock ring midnight,
as of now,
& waiting for the 6th
you write your
Word,
and end on the last chime—and remember
This one twelve was struck
before,
and never again; both.
……………… I stood on the balcony
waiting for an explosion
of Total Consciousness of the All—
being Ginsberg sniffing ether in Lima.
The same struggle of Mind, to reach the
Thing
that ends its process with an X
comprehending its befores and afters,
unexplainable to each, except in a prophetic
secret recollective hidden
half-hand unrecorded way.
As the old sages of Asia, or the white beards of Persia
scribbled on the margins of their scrolls
in delicate ink
remembering with tears the ancient clockbells of their cities
and the cities that had been—
Nasca, Paracas, Chancay & Secrecy of the Priests
buried, Cat Gods
of all colors, a funeral shroud
for a museum—
None remember but all return to the same thought
before they die—what sad old
knowledge, we repeat again.
Only to be lost
in the sands of Paracas, or wrapped in a mystic shroud
of Poesy
and found by some kid in a thousand years
inspire what dreadful thoughts of his own?
It’s a horrible, lonely experience. And
Gregory’s letter, and Peter’s …
7:30 P.M., May 28
… In the foul dregs of Circumstance
‘Male and Female He created them’
with mustaches.
There ARE certain REPEATED
(pistol shot) reliable points
of reference which the insane
(pistol shot repeated outside
the window)—madman suddenly
writes—THE PISTOL SHOT
outside—the REPEATED situations
the experience of return to the
same place in Universal Creation
Time—and every time we return
we recognize again that we
HAVE been here & that is the
Key to Creation—the same pistol shot
—DOWN, bending over his book of Un
intelligible marvels with his mustache.
(my) Madness is intelligible reactions to
Unintelligible phenomena.
Boy—what a marvelous bottle,
a clear glass sphere of transparent
liquid ether—
(Chloraethyl Merz)
9 P.M.
I know I am a poet—in this universe—but what good does that do —when in another, without these mechanical aids, I might be doomed to be a poor Disneyan Shoe St
ore Clerk—This consciousness an accident of one of the Ether-possible worlds, not the Final World
Wherein we all look Crosseyed
& triumph in our Virginity
without wearing Rabbit’s-foot
ears or eyes looking sideways
strangely but in Gold
Humbled & more knowledgeable, acknowledge
the Vast mystery of our creation—
without giving any sign that
we have heard from the
GREAT CREATOR
WHOSE NAME I NOW
PRONOUNCE:
GREAT CREATOR OF THE UNIVERS, IF
THY WISDOM ACCORD IT
AND IF THIS NOT BE TOO
MUCH TO ASK
MAY I PUBLISH YOUR NAME?
I ASK IN THE LIMA
NIGHT
FEARFULLY WAITING
ANSWER,
hearing the buses out on
the street hissing,
Knowing the Terror
of the World Afar—
I have been playing with Jokes
and His is too mighty to hold
in the hand like a Pen
and His is the Pistol Shot Answer
that brings blood to the brain
And—
What can be possible
in a minor universe
in which you can see
God by sniffing the
gas in a cotton?
The answer to be taken in
reverse & Doubled Math
ematically both ways.
Am I a sinner?
There are hard & easy universes. This
is neither.
(If I close my eyes will I regain consciousness?)
That’s the Final Question—with
all the old churchbells ringing and
bus pickup snuffles & crack of iron
whips inside cylinders & squeal of brakes
and old crescendos of responsive
demiurgic ecstasy whispering in streets of ear
—and when was it Not
ever answered in the Affirmative? Saith the Lord?
A MAGIC UNIVERSE
Flies & crickets & the sound of buses & my
stupid beard.
But what’s Magic?
Is there Sorrow in Magic?
Is Magic one of my boyscout creations?
Am I responsible? I with my flop?
Could Threat happen to Magic?
Yes! this the one universe in which
there is threat to magic, by
writing while high.
A Universe in which I am condemned to write statements.
‘Ignorant Judgments Create Mistaken Worlds—’
and this one is joined in
Indic union to
Affirm with laughing
eyes—
The world is as we see it,
Male & Female, passing thru the years,
as has before & will, perhaps
with all its countless pearls & Bloody noses
and I poor stupid All in G
am stuck with that old Choice—
Ya, Crap, what Hymn to seek, & in
what tongue, if this’s the most
I can requite from Consciousness?—
That I can skim? & put in words?
Could skim it faster with more juice—
could skim a crop with Death, perchance
—yet never know in this old world.
Will know in Death?
And before?
Will in
Another know.
And in another know.
And
in another know.
And
Stop conceiving worlds!
says Philip Whalen
(My Savior!) (oh what snobbery!)
(as if he cd save Anyone)—
At least, he won’t understand.
I lift my finger in the air to create
a universe he won’t understand, full
of sadness.
—finally staring straight ahead in surprise
& recollection into the mirror of
the Hotel Comercio room.
Time repeats itself. Including
this consciousness, which has seen
itself before—thus the locust-whistle
of antiquity’s nightwatch in my eardrum …
I propounded a final question, and
heard a series of final answers.
What is God? for instance, asks the answer?
And whatever else can the replier reply but reply?
Whatever the nature of mind, that
the nature of both question and answer.
& yet one wants to live
in a single universe
Does one?
Must it be one?
Why, as with the Jews
must the God be One?
O what does
the concept ONE mean?
IT’S MAD!
GOD IS ONE!
IS X
IS MEANINGLESS—
ADONOI—
IS A JOKE—
THE HEBREWS ARE
WRONG—(CRIST & BUDDA
ATTEST, also wrongly!)
What is One but Formation
of mind?
arbitrary madness! 6000 years
Spreading out in all directions simultaneously—
I forgive both good & ill
& I seek nothing, like a painted savage with
spear crossed by orange black & white bands!
‘I found the Jivaros & was
entrapped in their universe’
I’m scribbling nothings.
Page upon page of profoundest nothing,
as scribed the Ancient Hebe, when
he wrote Adonoi Echad or One—
all to amuse, make money, or deceive—
Let Wickedness be Me
and this the worst of all
the universes!
Not the worst! Not Flame!
I can’t stand that—(Yes that’s
for Somebody Else!
Yet I accept
O Catfaced God, whatever comes! It’s me!
I am the Flame, etc.
O Gawd!
Pistol shot! Crack!
Circusmaster’s whip—
IMPERFECT!
and a soul is damned to
HELL!
And the churchbell rings!
and there is melancholy, once again, throughout the realm.
and I’m that soul, small as it is.)
HAVE FELT SAME BEFORE
The death of consciousness is terrible
and yet! when all is ended
what regret?
’S none left to remember or forget.
And’s gone into the odd.
The only thing I fear is the Last
Chance. I’ll see that last chance too
before I’m done, Old Mind. All them
old Last Chances that you knew before.
—someday thru the dream wall
to nextdoor consciousness
like thru this blue hotel wall
—millions of hotel rooms fogging
the focus of my eyes—
with whatever attitude I hold the cotton
to my nose, it’s still a secret joke
with pinkie akimbo, or with effete queer
eye in mirror at myself,
or serious-brow mien
& darkened beard,
I’m still the kid of obscene chance awaiting—
breathing in a chinese Universe
thru the nose like some old Brahmanic God.
O BELL TIME RING THY MIDNIGHT FOR THE BILLIONTH SOUNDY TIME, I HEAR AGAIN!
I’ll go to walk the street,
Who’ll find
me in the night, in Lima, in my
33’d year,
On Street (Cont.)
The souls of Peter &
I answer each other.
But—
and what’s a soul?
To be a poet’s a
serious occupation,
condemned to that
in universe—
to walk the city
ascribbling in
a book—just accosted
by a drunk—
in Plaza de Armas
sidestreet under
a foggy sky, and
sometimes with no
moon.
The heavy balcony
hangs over the white
marble of the Bishop’s
Palace next the Cathedral—
The fountain plays
in light as e’er—
The buses & the
motorcyclists pass
thru midnight, the
carlights shine
the beggar turns
a corner with his
Who’ll find
cigarette stub &
cane, the Noisers
leave the tavern
and delay, conversing
in high voice,
Awake,
Hasta Mañana
they all say—
and somewhere
at the other end of
the line, a telephone
is ringing, once again
with unknown news—
The night
looms over Lima,
sky black fog—
and I sit helpless
smoking with a
pencil hand—
The long crack
in the pavement
or yesterday’s
volcano in Chile,
or the day before
the Earthquake
that begat the
World.
The Plaza pavement
shines in the electric
light. I wait.
The lonely beard
workman staggers
home to bed from
Death.
Yes but I’m
a little tired of
being alone …
Keats’ Nightingale—the
instant of realization
a single consciousness
that hears the chimes
of Time, repeated
endlessly—
All night, w/ Ether, wave
after wave of magic
understanding. A disturbance
of the field
of consciousness.
Magic night, magic stars,
magic men, magic moon
magic tomorrow, magic death,
magic Magic.
What crude Magic
we live in (seeing trolley
like a rude monster
in downtown street
w/ electric diamond
wire antennae to sky
pass night café under
white arc-light by
Gran Hotel Bolívar.)
The mad potter of
Mochica made a
pot w/ 6 Eyes & 2
Mouths & half a Nose
& 5 Cheeks & no Chin
for us to figure out,
serious side-track,