PHILOSOPHICAL VISITATION 37

Why can’t you be like a Central Committee,
Or be Euclidean?

“Different from Rimbaud, I don’t even know the secret of my own
Sideshow."

Her wedding ring finger with the white circle of skin at the base
Trembled.

“You see, I am trying to get out of a language
That sneaks binary oppositions into our consciousness.”

Have you ever considered being a Tennyson or Parsifal
And seeking the Holy Grail?

“I once believed in Mermen and Mermaids.
I even believed in the narratives spoken by tea leaves.
But it was revealed to me in a dream
As interpreted by my Jungian analyst
That such tales were trapdoors.”

I heard you have perverse taste, for you do not like
The Vatican, jazz, blues, tattoos, or regiments.

“I adore dulcimer music
If played by a musician
With long, straight, white-gold blonde hair.
But something must be done about the ‘old language.’ ”

Something must be done about “old men” like you.


PHILOSOPHICAL VISITATION 38

All
The foppish, dandified and
Coxcombical classes are
Compelled

Due to obfuscations and obsessions
Of fatalism and fashion
This season

To build a Noah’s Ark
Place in backyard
By the swimming pool surrounded with roseate
Tiles
And by the silver-plated cook-out grill.

But after a diligent search of all archives and Egyptian caves,
The blueprint
Could not be located.
The Ark must be authentic, not a surmise.
A surmise
Would be blasphemy
And mean banishment.

So those driven to be au courant
Look at their wristwatches and see tears
Instead of numbers.

PHILOSOPHICAL VISITATION 39

On an Easter Sunday, a group of us,

Those with wounds that would not heal,

Was out searching for the Holy Grail.


We came across bodies sprawled out on the pulverized sea-urchin sand
Of a beach where the water changed colors
From turquoise to azure.

The bodies were still and resembled corpses
Each corpses wwas nude and wore dark glasses.
Each one
Has a flock of toy, metal ravens by his sides.
The toy raven when wound up would peck
On shoulders, chests, breasts, arms and legs.

This elaborate and expensive arrangement
Was organized to simulate the state of being dead.
No expense was spared to make the scene as realistic as possible.

The people pretended to be corpses pecked by ravens
Had found all pleasures that society invented to be boring.

We heard the clicking of the toy raven’s metal gears
As we walked by these naked people
In our search for the Holy Grail.

A majority of our group gave up
Their search for the Holy Grail,
And joined the corpses.