Friday, December 21, 2007

The Weeping


(seasons greetings to Robert and Daria)

That you weep and in weeping
are both the mother and child

mother of that difficult delivery
child of that difficult birth

that you are me and I am you
given to a relation of difficult
sympathy sympathy of the "God-

head" who can never be both
whole and created except when
we pray except when we attend

letters sympathy of the whole
for its creation these broken

shards of Being their radiance
sympathy of that which turns

to its creator as a broken thing
with the never-assembled never
all-known whole when you said

this that you were both mother
and child weeping I almost cried
for difference when you say

such things I die into life
sympathetically difficult tonight

the voices of plastic snow flakes
lit-up receded when "we" was

similarly difficult walking
the broad sidewalk together
with no hand to touch us just

the apprehensions of “otherness”
without eyes to commence
what sight sees when we can’t

what site what cant in eyes there
is no ‘disinterest’ except when I

is interrupted larger desires begin
Self with a capital “s” everything

had the look of interior actually
being exterior the train platform
felt narrow and was narrow in

fact from all the body could feel
thereby tell the plaster peeling
off the wall a wreck with history

so history itself was also us so
touched and the whereabouts of

words the wherewithal of all words
we couldn’t taste were doubts

there are forms that do Express
ionism better ‘say saying’ cry
a cry of exile we are given to

the difficult births of this season
the “holiday season” one should
not say Christmas this is not

a Christmas card one should
not for the far-flung difficulty of

every light plastic or not the
ground of which being should not

purchase this isn’t 'epic' nor is it
ordinary the way those flakes
don’t fall given to their reproducible

sense forms which continue of
every consumer conscience the
economy which gives us I wanted

to cry for them too since they
are also created plastic is also

a product I wanted to cry for
them as we do for us alone and

the coffee house with its good
intentions that wasn’t you and
the duplexes and other houses

one normally doesn’t see in the
city that wasn’t you and the little
restaurant with its organic

foods that wasn’t you all such
intimacies and good intentions

that must amount to something
if only what they exclude in this

season of the undead when one
tailors their pants with their
shrinking bones in this season

when one suffers distantly the things
the sensations of the world war
didn’t bring home the reduced

numbers of a body count cele
brated as peace distractions from

another brewing war so we were
before it the "you" and "the camel"

the camel and us both I hope we
are not merely being eschato-
logical nor should our sympathy be

reduced to season’s greetings
anything that could be gained
by wishing alone as you recognize

this sympathy our tears are a
susceptibility to everything would

countersign us counteract in a
friendlier fire of 'pure means' become

body we wanted to know what a
'subtle body' could do welcoming
of antigens adieu supple to any

thing might otherwise destroy it
its real power in listening attuning
and adapting so I hear these guns

far away as unreal as they are here
in my head and become them

a buzzing of bees want their friend
ship to destroy me to not do

this world any further harm these
tears this cry was the cry of every
antinomy given to ‘weeping as not

weeping’ a ‘remains’ when we
should not be "I" any longer
we seek such Charitas in ducts

gusts of every brief madness fever
that heals we seek this Charitas

in guns will have no other site than
to be revealed by veils becoming

eyes torn at them what potential
tears you and I you as you me as me
in difficult sympathy susceptibility

"ever-lasting" 'perceptual eternity'
liveforever my tears and die outside
make them a sign of life and no

longer death-affirming grasp this
preanimate means which was ‘my

life’ whether genetics or the face
one would lose to save "highness".

1 comment:

meaghan schwelm said...

Hi Thom, I never got to tell you how beautifully felt I find "The Weeping" to be every time I read it. It has a strong sense of a thoughtful/critical kind of empathy that recalled for me a favorite chapter in The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard dealing with "the myth of inside and outside". Also, shortly after I read it around the holidays I was reading an article in The Guardian online about camels dying in large numbers for as yet unknown reasons in Northern Africa and the Middle East. It is possibly because they are no longer used exclusively for transportation, but also for milk and meat. I haven't found any more information yet. -Meaghan