After years of instruction, –for Bob Bailey<\/p>\n <\/p>\n From the other side unusually delicious night not day then did not know the voice <\/p>\n \t \tfor John Fitzpatrick<\/p>\n We call stones elders<\/p>\n \t firm & fluid \t endless clear stream journey their cobbling hellshops <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Seventeenth Blow After years of instruction, application, effort, and further study of the masters; after years of slow but steady progress in my so-called art and modest success that comes from isolated acts of recognition paid me by those who took an hour from one day; after years of worry and wonder at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[371,372],"tags":[375],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\n
\napplication, effort, and further
\nstudy of the masters;
\nafter years of slow but steady
\nprogress in my so-called art
\nand modest success
\nthat comes from isolated acts of recognition
\npaid me
\nby those who took an hour from one day;
\nafter years of worry and wonder
\nat the state of cultural production
\nversus the individual voice,
\nthe national resource of understanding
\nescaping like neon from a broken sign;
\nI had finally arrived at the place
\nwhere nothing is written.
\nShazam! What a relief.
\nI watched the tide go out,
\nthe bread rise,
\nand took pure pleasure
\nin the middle school musical adaptation
\nof The Lion King<\/em>. Genius
\nre-scaled to chaff
\nI was released from
\nrigors of the gratuitous,
\nunyielding, heroically
\npoised in the absolute
\nmode of change
\notherwise known as Time.
\nPracticalities filled my day.
\nI paid bills when due,
\nreplaced the head of my Sonicare
\nevery three months,
\nand, when they were away,
\nsigned for my neighbors’ packages.
\nHelping my wife in the garden,
\nthe garden became sole location
\nof my process. I read books again
\nwithout envy, only awe.
\nAnd nothing I experienced
\nwas put to any use
\nexcept to the degree that
\nin the moment
\nI could feel it and
\nfeeling it
\nlet the feeling drift away
\nlike a zeppelin heading back to Europe.
\nI developed a habit
\nof adding
\nFuck the Right<\/em>
\nto the end of all my letters
\nin a font called 12-point Nightbloom
\nand I went without fear
\nof non-sequitur, everything
\nI touched seeming like a form
\nof Nature, as of now
\nthe old saying
\nif I don’t see you in the future
\nI’ll see you in the pasture
\nhow that equals fountains
\nand that eagle, for instance,
\nflying across the threshold span
\nof this open sliding door
\nis \/ in truth \/ far away
\nas a buoy unmoored from its trap
\ntraversing the overpass
\non a single stream of air
\ngiving unending shape
\nat the end of my pipe
\nto a globe of molten glass.<\/p>\nFragrant Harbor<\/h5>\n
\nmy son calls he has
\narrived he\u2019s fine
\nhe has eaten something <\/p>\n
\nthat we cannot get
\nhere it is the same
\ntime there only<\/p>\n
\nwhy was it I
\nwho woke reaching
\nsquinting at the light<\/p>\n
\nwas his voice sounding
\nso much my own how
\nit crossed over.<\/p>\nStone Ode<\/h5>\n
\njagged sharp scintillate
\nobdurate kindness
\n\t\t hold heat,
\nare cold in cold,
\nshow wear, and know
\nhow to wait
\n\t along creek bed
\nwith time \tto enter<\/p>\n
\naway from
\n\t\t poetry precincts<\/p>\n