Sunday, January 6, 2013

YOU DON'T HAVETA EVEN MOVE

and it comes
ta ya;
finds ya;
uncovers ya:
feelings,
thoughts,
ideas,
inside the clothing
of letters
pirouetting
in your brain,
arranging themselves
(poorly or not)
into something
that seems
to make sense,
yet never really does.
After fucking
a million babes,
imbibing a million bottles,
shooting a million bags,
swallowing a million pills,
firedandhired and firedandhired again
from a million jobs,
and outlasting
world class pricks
of parents
by fading
their cruelty
masked by indifference
by being brokered
by millions of authors
and texts,
singers
songs
musicians
of magic,
and doctors
and dealers
shrink-wrapped
or pre-shrunk--
you no longer
have to do
a goddamn thing
to get invaded.
Your own parade,
wheeling and dealing
through a muddied
and muddled landscape
will, like a magic lantern,
dance behind your eyes.
It's your very own Grand Guignol,
pinwheeling through your wreckage
turning your psychopathology
into an art.

There is alchemy
still, still
to be conjured, still
to be amazed.
After all the bridges
you thought burned
or purposely fractured,
there lives those
who give a shit
about your breath
that wraps a life
around your words.
Most of you
I've liked
more than I cared to admit;
but the miracle is not "like"
or "love"
but "desire"
now
toward the finish.
I've read that the best of days,
are sometimes the first,
sometimes the middle,
and even sometimes the last;
I wanted then to believe
but didn't.
Yet now,
being offered passion
by my Mexican love
at 65
is more precious
than it was for me
at 20.
There is less of me
to kill,
of course,
but more minutes yet
to conquer
and enjoy.
Those older fucks
who sit
breathing on my words
might be justifiably jealous
at the gods
who have graced me.
They must make
their own peace.
For it has taken me time,
a very long time,
to learn things
which were quite simple,
but eluded me
for so long,
like saying:
I love you,
without it being brokered
by a drink
a drug,
or distance.
That has been
the slowest in coming,
but the big
and stubborn ship
is turning
into port.
I must let the captain
navigate, while I
make sure
the furnace
is stoked
and fed.
I must discipline
the crew,
make passengers
feel welcome. Like them
I'm but a tourist,
but a tourist
who no longer
longs
for a home.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2013