Out of some simple part of me
which I cannot use up
 I took a blessing for the flowers
tightening in the night
like fists of jealous love
 like knots
no one can undo without destroying
 The new morning gathered me
in blue mist
 like dust under wedding gown
Then I followed the day
like a cloud of heavy sheep
  after the judas
up a blood-ringed ramp
into the terror of every black building

Ten years sealed journeys unearned dreams
Laughter meant to tempt me into old age
 spilled for friends stars unknown flesh mules sea
Instant knowledge of bodies material and spirit
 which slowly learned would have made death smile
Stories turning into theories
 which begged only for the telling and retelling
Girls sailing over the blooms of my mouth
 with a muscular triangular kiss
ordinary mouth to secret mouth
Nevertheless my homage sticky flowers
 rabbis green and red serving the sun like platters
In the end you offered me the dogma you taught
 me to disdain and I good pupil disdained it
I fell under the diagrammed fields like the fragment
of a perfect statue layers of cities build upon
I saw you powerful I saw you happy
 that I could not live only for harvesting
that I was a true citizen of the slow earth

Light and Splendour
in the sleeping orchards
entering the trees
like a silent movie wedding procession
entering the arches of branches
for the sake of love only
From a hill I watched
the apple blossoms breathe
the silver out of the night
like fish eating the spheres
of air out of the river
So the illumined night fed
the sleeping orchards
entering the vaults of branches
like a holy procession
Long live the Power of Eyes
Long live the invisible steps
men can read on a mountain
Long live the unknown machine
or heart
which by will or accident
pours with victor's grace
endlessly perfect weather
on the perfect creatures
the world grows

Montreal
July 1964

I once believed a single line
 in a Chinese poem could change
  forever how blossoms fell
and that the moon itself climbed on
 the grief of concise weeping men
  to journey over cups of wine
I thought invasions were begun for crows
 to pick at a skeleton
  dynasties sown and spent
to serve the language of a fine lament
 I thought governors ended their lives
  as sweetly drunken monks
telling time by rain and candles
 instructed by an insect’s pilgrimage
  across the page – all this
so one might send an exile’s perfect letter
to an ancient hometown friend

I chose a lonely country
 broke from love
  scorned the eternity of war
I polished my tongue against the pumice moon
 floated my soul in cherry wine
  a perfumed barge for Lords of Memory
to languish on to drink to whisper out
 their store of strength
  as if beyond the mist along the shore
their girls their power still obeyed
 like clocks wound for a thousand years
I waited until my tongue was sore

Brown petals wind like fire around my poems
 I aimed them at the stars but
  like rainbows they were bent
before they sawed the world in half
 Who can trace the canyoned paths
  cattle have carved out of time
wandering from meadowlands to feasts
 Layer after layer of autumn leaves
  are swept away
Something forgets us perfectly

We meet in a hotel
with many quarters for the radio
surprised that we've survived as lovers
not each other's
but lovers still
with outrageous hope and habits in the craft
which embarrass us slightly
as we let them be known
the special caress the perfect inflammatory word
the starvation we do not tell about
We do what only lovers can
make a gift out of necessity
Looking at our clothes
folded over the chair
I see we no longer follow fashion
and we own our own skins
God I'm happy we've forgotten nothing
and can love each other
for years in the world

I had it for a moment
I knew why I must thank you
 I saw powerful governing men in black suits
I saw them undressed
in the arms of young mistresses
the men more naked than the naked women
the men crying quietly
 No that is not it
I'm losing why I must thank you
which means I'm left with pure longing
How old are you
Do you like your thighs
I had it for a moment
I had a reason for letting the picture
of your mouth destroy my conversation
 Something on the radio
the end of a Mexican song
I saw the musicians getting paid
they are not even surprised
they knew it was only a job
 Now I've lost it completely
A lot of people think you are beautiful
How do I feel about that
I have no feeling about that
 I had a wonderful reason for not merely courting you
It was tied up with the newspapers
 I saw secret arrangements in high offices
I saw men who loved their worldliness
even though they had looked through
big electric telescopes
they still thought their worldliness was serious
not just a hobby a taste a harmless affectation
 they thought the cosmos listened
I was suddenly fearful
one of their obscure regulations could separate us
 I was ready to beg for mercy
Now I'm getting into humilitation
I've lost why I began this
I wanted to talk about your eyes
I know nothing about your eyes
and you've noticed how little I know
I want you somewhere safe
far from high offices
 I'll study you later
So many people want to cry quietly beside you

A cross didn't fall on me
when I went for hot dogs
and the all-night Greek
slave in the Silver Gameland
didn't think I was his brother
Love me because nothing happens

I believe the rain will not
make me feel like a feather
when it comes tonight after
the streetcars have stopped
because my size is definite
Love me because nothing happens

Do you have any idea how
many movies I had to watch
before I knew surely
that I would love you
when the lights woke up
Love me because nothing happens

Here is a headline July 14
in the city of Montreal
Intervention décisive de Pearson
a la conference du Commonwealth
That was yesterday
Love me because nothing happens

Stars and stars and stars
keep it to themselves
Have you ever noticed how private
a wet tree is
a curtain of razor blades
Love me because nothing happens

Why should I be alone
if what I say is true
I confess I mean to find
a passage or forge a passport
or talk a new language
Love me because nothing happens

I confess I meant to grow
wings and lose my mind
I confess that I've
forgotten what for
Why wings and a lost mind
Love me because nothing happens

In the Bible generations pass in a paragraph, a betrayal is disposed of in a phrase, the creation of the world consumes a page. I could never pick the important dynasty out of a multitude, you must have your forehead shining to do that, or to choose out of the snarled network of daily evidence the denials and the loyalties. Who can choose what olive tree the story will need to shade its lovers, what tree out of the huge orchard will give them the particular view of branches and sky which will unleash their kisses. Only two shining people know, they will go directly to the roots they lie between. For my part I describe the whole orchard.

I stepped into an avalanche
It covered up my soul
When I am not this hunchback
I sleep beneath a hill
You who wish to conquer pain
Must learn to serve me well

You strike my side by accident
As you go down for gold
The cripple that you clothe and feed
Is neither starved nor cold
I do not beg for company
in the centre of the world

When I am on a pedestal
you did not raise me there
your laws do not compel me
to kneel grotesque and bare
I myself am pedestal
For the thing at which you stare

You who wish to conquer pain
must learn what makes me kind
The crumbs of love you offer me
are the crumbs I've left behind
Your pain is no credential
It is the shadow of my wound

I have begun to claim you
I who have no greed
I have begun to long for you
I who have no need
The avalanche you're knocking at
is uninhabited

Do not dress in rags for me
I know you are not poor
Don't love me so fiercely
When you know that you are not sure
It is your world beloved
It is your flesh I wear

You do not have to love me
just because
you are all the women
I have ever wanted
I was born to follow you
every night
while I am still
the many men who love you

I meet you at a table
I take your fist between my hands
in a solemn taxi
I wake up alone
my hand on your absense
in Hotel Discipline

I wrote all these songs for you
I burned red and black candles
shaped like a man and a woman
I married the smoke
of two pyramids of sandalwood
I prayed for you
I prayed that you would love me
and that you would not love me

I met you
just after death
had become truly sweet
There you were
24 years old
Joan of Arc
I came after you
with all my art
with everything
you know I am a god
who needs to use your body
who needs to use your body
to sing about beauty
in a way no one
has ever sung before
you are mine
are you one of my last women

He studies to describe
the lover he cannot become
failing the widest dreams of the mind
& settling for visions of God

The tatters of his discipline
have no beauty
that he can hold so easily
 as your beauty

He does not know how
to trade himself for your love
Do not trust him
unless you love him