Canto XXII

 

No cure for birth and death other than to enjoy the interval

                                                            —George Santayana

 

piece of resistance began in Maramures

flesh of thigh to buttock dimpled         rain

coursing through the hills like heavenly

 

waterfalls        or curtains of water shimmer

hitting oil drums rimshots hitting gutters spouts

flowing cement coloring grey worms squirming

 

along the grassy margins their oblivion will

crackle in the sun later ants too will crackle

along the porcelain tile along the margins

 

hilfe    lemon-lime walls tile roofs shutters

tagged back until the cyclones

squall not a word she-wind mother

 

voicebox image-stealer videophone iphone

picture-taker soul-stealer camera obscura

phone sync sent photo stealer b&w matte

 

ban zum ban zum ban zum ban

as blankets or rugs or throws or wraps

like that woven but not words just

 

feeling ban zum then woven or embroidered

IP all over or even printed sufficient

to feeling ban zum like a drug shot

 

through with lime green sparkles

a key lime soda sprinkled over ice cream

or lime tart covered in whipped cream

 

in Prahova Valley we find evidence of hunts

banquets palaces contests or quests or jousts

and laundry perils at the river

 

monsters on the beach threats shores

like Krispy Kreme vs Dunkin Donuts

chocolate battles glazed dough extra

 

virgin virgin bathed in olive oil EVOO

got a talk show too got a 30 minute

recipe for you got a simple packet of goo

 

love leads to birth birth leads to love

danger leads to shore shore leads to danger

baby loves the beach beach loves the baby

 

Cape Cod crowded with babies Truro mobbed

by babies babies dancing on our lime green graves

Puritans robbing our caches stealing our Tin Tin

 

Dasius found fossils in a bear cave and knew

god could not have invented man 30 centuries

before knew that the Danube must have shifted

 

time after time and even the Fagaras must have

risen and fallen many times if Dasius could

tromp through Glod now with his legions

 

or onto the Danube Delta or to the beaches

of the Black Sea where vacationers

would stare in disbelief at the SPQR

 

offer the centurion sweet bread made of walnuts

raisins and wheat offer Saturday morning

cartoons and the calming wine made

 

from the feteasca neagra but Dasius has no

calm and must march against the people

though Christian he has his orders

 

he makes a desert and calls it peace

we call it Age of Empires and play the margins

Oprichniks and Spahi and Abus Guns

 

they call it the Kingdom of Romania

and build churches to celebrate Ottoman’s

defeat as Zeus to Allah to Christ

 

sin seems as like rebellion

or seems transgression taking

the god’s power and tendencies

 

god may steal but man may not

god may murder but man may not

god may commit adultery with Mary

 

but man may not Mary may not

troth to god      troth only to god

jealous god but man mustn’t covet

 

god may conceal but man mustn’t lie

god may shift between male and female

but man may not god may birth

 

out of wedlock but man may not

god does not give fire man must

discover it god doesn’t give water

 

to Voronet that things might be better

understood through the imitation

of things present rather than absent

 

though the lack of appearance

might better illuminate the existence

of these things RE parsimonious

 

exposition vs ACTION where in the feast

is devoured entirely and then recompensed

by regurgitation THEREOF exit and entrance

 

explicitly shown and the afterlife

alluded since flesh must be governed

by either desiccation or corruption or worms

 

squirming along the grassy margins then diving

deep into our lemon-lime corruption into our

heavenly waterfalls ban zum we venture

 

to the new Europe unlike the old Europe

new rules like ways to slaughter or milk

a cow like ways to hire and fire

 

New Europe where UNESCO World Heritage

sites blossom and glaciers melt and goats

rule and peasants lurk around my Mercedes

 

trip from planet to planet and find abomination

or as Dubyah sd/ “Columbia carried in its

payroll classroom experiments from some

 

of our students in America” men and women

dead on pallets preserved as though they

never met violence yet were poisoned

 

or poisoned themselves sacrificed to some

unnamed deity  back to the Tower of London

speakerphone attached to the cellphone

 

voicebox image-stealer videophone iphone

picture-taker soul-stealer camera obscura

phone sync sent photo stealer b&w matte

 

hilfe    Holiday Spice captured in clove

and cinnamon Candlemass Sofitel hotel motel

sleepy Lancaster Road problems with gypsy

 

cabs Waterloo undue attention French suspension

French MODEL ala Robespierre ala duck

ala orange avec Lewis            sync sent 1939

 

rebellion and dolor and Rules of the Game

death of the pilot down to earth as return

to RAILS si si qui qui Mistress Zoza huzza

 

feeling ban zum then woven or embroidered

IP all over or even printed sufficient

to feeling ban zum like a drug shot