Bye to Everything

Farewell, Foolish Objects

I've lain in bed all day but
I’ve written one poem and up I'm now looking out the window
And like a novelist might say drunk
The clouds are coming at me like scullery maids with dish pans and bed pans in their hands
Something that holds a gritty, dirty water
But, I'm a drunken non-novelist but in clear shape now here sits the bottle of beer
I’m warmly thinking in a kind of foam-shaped idle fancy working closely
But all I can stoke up are squares and circles which do not fit
So oh well monsieur
I'll tell you the truth again
In bed I, read another article on D. Thomas
And someday I'll get lucky and sit around and buy a French horn and a tame eagle and I'll sit on the porch all day
A white porch always in the sun
One of those white porches with green vines all around and
I will read about Dylan, and D. H. until my eyes fall out of my head for eagle meat
And I can play the French horn blind

But even now it gets darker, the evening's singing tonight
It's bones down here or the stars up there
Somebody rattling the springs in Denver so another puker can be born
I think everything is a sheet of sun and the best of everything is myself walking through it
Wondering about the pure nerve of the life-thing going on
After the jails, the hospitals, the factories, the good dog, the brainless butterfly
But now I'm back at the window- there's an opera on the radio
And a woman sits in a chair to my left
Saying over and over again, "BROCK GROSH GROT"
And she’s holding a book in her hand: How to Learn Russian Easily
But, there’s nothing really you can do easily
Live or die, or accept fame, or money, or defeat, it's all hard
The opera says this, the dead bird, the dead countries, the dead love
The man shot because somebody thought he was an elk
The elk shot because somebody thought it was an elk
All the pure nerve of going on
This woman wanting to speak Russian, myself wanting to get drunk
But we need something to eat
"GRIME CYAT GRIME MEAT" says the woman in Russian, so I figure she’s hungry
And we haven't eaten in a couple of hours
"GLOM BLAYM TURKEY PLARK IM PARK" she says
And I walk over and put on my pants and I'm going out to get something
The forests are far away and I'm no good with the bow and arrow,
and somebody sings on the radio, "Farewell, Foolish Objects"
All I can do is walk into a grocery store and pull out a wallet and hope that it’s loaded
And this is about how I waste my Sunday
The rest of the week goes better because there's something or somebody telling me what to do
And although it seems madness, almost everybody is doing it whatever it is
So now if you'll excuse me- she's eating an orange now
I will put on my shoes and shirt and get out of here

It'll be better for all of us