Labberneck

Canto 27

Big bad Angels we are who watch
the shit fly on the third rock–
we’re like candy butchers or bad dads

our syringes are full of darsana
potent creatures roam freely among us
we do not eat them & we do not feed them

In the beginning, Hilda bore two sons
Seem and Be. Be came Seem
and Seem Be came. Hilda saw Rus

intervene Be and Seem, so Be sign
und sight and Seem stark und zum–
zoo aus der Hund gesucht.

In the beginning, Hilda bore zwei
daughters, Zelda and Inge then came
Mark and Dollar who had Slav–

intervene Mark und Inge so Zelda
gesucht Dollar and VW made
Jetta und Tiger played golf–

ja oder sein gefunkt gedank
–baby, this ain’t happen to Paris
not the one in Texas, neither

this ain’t happen au pied de cochon
nor is it be in Minsk much less Qom
Goma where it be sorry to see

that’s the length and breadth of it
the lack and the loss . . . come down
like hail, please, Ava Gardner, look here

bring your friend with the Golden Arm
bring Shorty, too, bring your friend who fly
the plane & bring imperialists with plenty

o’ dough & bring the AID who cure the AIDS
but please leave you little babies at home
you may take some of ours if you please

though baby say ma ma & pa pa take it away
cause Arizona was not a state until 1912
wonder how that happen . . . Does that seem

right to you? Woman create life?
Not that we’re jealous, far be it
drift aways from E. Congo across the lake

to Hotel Rwanda . . . Woman live here, too!
Someone keeps calling from Colorado
but I won’t answer the phone

and they won’t leave a message–
someone calls again from Florida
but I don’t answer

and they won’t leave a message
Addddddis Abbbbbaba put your jazz
on my phone put your dubbbb on bbbbub

There’s no-follow-through and we fall
into a negative feedback loop–
I should create a new memo

“Hello, you reached me but me no hear.”
Or, here . . . how to differentiate?
uncertainty . . . not a game & not a gain

sitting on your pile of cash in your Vermont
barn deep in the Wooden Age where maple
syrup is the most valuable stuff

free from usury’s ties
war makes heroes and wads of booty
and many wives who seem to be the riches

like Cameron, Riley, Katherine Brewster, Allison,
Lena Headey and Princess Leia and Sarah and Todd
which means death, “How’s Wolfie?”

Wolfie is, of course, Hitler’s knickname
and makes Arnold look ironic as the Prussian
automaton which is what the film’s about

now we can vote for our leader who succeeds
by failing as we are all failures and wonder
what it was all about . . . accumulating wealth

if that’s what it was was it the orchard
giving apples for cider because we let
them all fall and just gathered them up

hard cider or Applejack and oysters because they
clean the estuary and can be gathered
and mushrooms and potatoes and snails

1912 . . . flexing his brown biceps and swinging
the hammer everything looks like a nail
sharp end up

the editorialists jibber about secret ballots
while rivets get going because bunches
of muscles squeeze off pulsating bits

forearms pulsing along shivering even into belly
fat while the columnists jabber about union
bosses who bullshit NLRB honchos

because their blue suits have grease stains
on the elbows and knees: “Honey Boy has a new
red tie,” likened to what? Marxists?

One size fits all when it comes to ties
not so with work boots that morph into spondees
“Shut up, slut!” I said and regret it, today

but then I was afraid of sex (were all little boys?)
video games can’t teach you how to fuck
so I said, “Shut up, slut!”

Put the fizz back in the fizzy water
Put the prime minister back in the P.M.
The Anglican Minister back in the A.M.

the duck in the press & the cuvee in the cru
the tide in the Thames, the soporific in the quilts
and the goose in the gander

just because it’s your orientation doesn’t mean
you have to quit Wall Street
just because bizness gives you hives

doesn’t mean you can’t unionize
Marx won’t call you a counter revolutionary
cause he’s dead . . . Get up and organize

start with your rank and file
executives aren’t elected & won’t fire themselves
to help you up . . . goons are gone with Marx

but China still gets going
stumbling over the bodies sprawled in Lawrence
crimson from Harvard shitbirds agonized

by laborers who earned 10 cents an hour
American Woolen Company bayonets . . . Ramey
shoots and Lopizzo beats Smolskas

Roses and sheafs of wheat loom over Merrimack
where is our sadder? where is our Dylan?
Why he’s on the list, we’re not sure–

We watch everything under heaven
Some of us have even forgotten heaven
and returned to the Wooden Age