The Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan Read online

  Ooops! No, not that. I mean all

  We really wanted to do was jazz yr mother

  Fight off insects & sing a sad solitary tune

  On the excellencies of Bristol Cream

  Six dollars a bottle Praise The Lord

  TED BERRIGAN & RON PADGETT

  30

  The fucking enemy shows up

  interstices

  bent

  Grey Morning

  Rain

  Coming down

  Outside her

  Windows

  I can be seen inside

  the drops

  of rain

  falling

  limping

  This girl in mind.

  Things to Do in Anne’s Room

  Walk right in

  sit right down

  baby, let your hair hang down

  It’s on my face that hair

  & I’m amazed to be here

  the sky outside is green the blue

  shows thru the trees

  I’m on my knees

  unlace Li’l Abner

  shoes

  place them under the bed

  light cigarette

  study out the dusty bookshelves,

  sweat

  Now I’m going to do it

  SELF RELIANCE

  THE ARMED CRITIC

  MOBY DICK

  THE WORLD OF SEX

  THE PLANET OF THE APES

  Now I’m going to do it

  deliberately

  take off clothes

  shirt goes on the chair

  pants go on the shirt

  socks next to shoes next to bed

  the chair goes next to the bed

  get into the bed

  be alone

  suffocate

  don’t die

  & it’s that easy.

  The Great Genius

  The Great Genius is

  A man who can do the

  Ordinary thing

  When everybody

  Else is going crazy.

  Poem for Philip Whalen

  (About Emily Dickinson)

  What about Emily Dickinson?

  DEAD FINGERS TALK

  I’ve got a lot of things to do today.

  For example write this poem.

  She’s Terrific.

  Now, this poem is to say that

  period?

  colon?

  space??

  Lord I wonder just exactly what can happen oh Hello, Pill . . .

  It’s a terrific spelling problem there’s two kinds of L’s (on the typewriter)

  and that is a good example of the way some people

  think

  (NOVEL)

  This here now is what I’m trying to say. It’s a sonnet. A kind of formal BEAN

  SPAS

  M

  She goes all over the place, eh?

  ROOT RAINBOW HA-HA

  She’s so fine:

  You Didn’t Even Try

  Heroin

  FOR JIM CARROLL

  (2) photographs of Anne

  80 years old

  lovely, as always

  a child

  under an old fashion

  duress

  A Bibliography of Works

  by Jack Kerouac

  A white suit

  and a black dress

  w/high-necked

  mini-skirt

  strolling

  two by two

  across a brown paper bag

  above The Relation Ship

  Warm white thighs & floating bend gia pronto

  my heart is filled with light

  al curry

  this

  Life

  that is

  one, tho

  the Lamps

  be many & proud & there’s a breeze sort of

  lightly moving the top

  of yr head

  & I’m going

  way over

  the white

  skyline

  & I’ll do

  what I want to

  & you can’t keep me here

  No-how.

  & the streets are theirs now

  & the tempo’s

  & the space

  Anti-War Poem

  It’s New Year’s Eve, of 1968, & a time

  for Resolution.

  I don’t like Engelbert Humperdink.

  I love the Incredible String Band.

  The War goes on

  & war is Shit.

  I’ll sing you a December song.

  It’s 5 below zero in Iowa City tonight.

  This year I found a warm room

  That I could go to

  be alone in

  & never have to fight.

  I didn’t live in it.

  I thought a lot about dying

  But I said Fuck it.

  Tough Brown Coat

  TO JIM CARROLL

  Tough brown coat

  Tie with red roses

  Green cord vest

  Brown stripes

  on soft white

  shirt

  white T-shirt

  White man,

  Tomorrow you die!

  “You kidding me?”

  Babe Rainbow

  Light up

  smoke

  burn a few holes in the blanket

  Burn a few holes in the Yellow blanket

  burning

  smoking

  reading

  It’s Important

  It’s important not

  to back out

  of the mirror:

  You will be great, but

  You will be queer.

  It’s a complication.

  Dial-A-Poem

  Inside

  The homosexual sleeps

  long past day break

  We won’t see him

  awake

  this time around.

  In My Room

  Green (grass)

  A white house brown

  mailbox

  (Friendly pictures)

  TELEVISION snow

  (that’s outside)

  No-mind

  No messages

  (Inside)

  Thanksgiving 1969

  Ann Arbor Elegy

  FOR FRANNY WINSTON D. SEPT 27TH, 1969

  Last night’s congenial velvet sky

  Conspired that Merrill, Jayne, Deke, you & I

  Get it together at Mr. Flood’s Party, where we got high

  On gin, shots of scotch, tequila salt & beer

  Talk a little, laugh a lot, & turn a friendly eye

  On anything that’s going down beneath Ann Arbor’s sky

  Now the night’s been let to slip its way

  Back toward a mild morning’s gray

  A cool and gentle rain is falling, cleaning along my way

  To where Rice Krispies, English muffins, & coffee, black

  Will make last night today. We count on that, each new day

  Being a new day, as we read what the Ann Arbor News has to say.

  Song: Prose & Poetry

  TO ALICE NOTLEY

  My heart is confirmed in its pure Buddhahood

  But a heavy list to starboard

  makes me forget

  From time to time.

  Breath makes a half turn

  Downward & divides:

  it doesn’t add up

  2 plus 2 equals 1: It’s fun, yes,

  But it isn’t true, &

  I can’t love you

  this way.

  2.

  So, what’ll I do, when you

  are far away

  & I’m so blue?

  I’ll wait.

  & I’ll be true some day.

  3.

  That’s all well & good. But

  What happens in the mean time?

  Wake Up

  Jim Dine’s toothbrush eases two pills

  activity under the clear blue sky; girl

  f
or someone else in white walk by

  it means sober up, kick the brunette out of bed

  going out to earn your pay; it means out;

  bells, ring; squirrel, serve a nut; daylight

  fade; fly resting on your shoulder blades

  for hours; you’ve been sleeping, taking it easy

  neon doesn’t like that; having come your way

  giving you a free buzz, not to take your breath away

  just tightening everything up a little; legs

  pump; head, wobble; tongue, loll; fingers, jump;

  drink; eat; flirt; sing; speak;

  night time ruffles the down along your cheek

  Erasable Picabia

  The front is hiding the rear

  The heart of a man

  is not as great as an amphitheater

  Spinoza is the one who threw a pass to Lou Spinoza

  There is no death

  there is only dissolution

  love of hate

  is totally great

  me, I disguise myself as a man

  in order to laugh

  I have always loved

  a serious jackoff scene

  infantile paralysis is the beginning of wisdom

  everything is poison

  except our meat

  Flowers and candy make my teeth ache

  The most beautiful and most noble

  of men are queers

  get the pussy

  mystical explanations are dopey

  Aunt Winnie fingers the thunder to learn,

  so that we have left everything aside

  but not as a cloud mind steps beside

  the slow reservoir

  now it is all of this, the pink bulbs included,

  which means we have “protected ourselves”

  by forgetting all we were dealt

  BY TED BERRIGAN & JIM CARROLL

  In Bed

  I love all the girls

  I’ve been in bed with

  I even love those

  who preferred not to do anything

  once there:

  Tho it seems to me now

  they were nuts!

  (the latter)

  in bed.

  Easy Living

  TO DAVID HENDERSON

  I hope to go

  everywhere

  in good time:

  Going’s a pleasure,

  being someplace

  & then

  Many Happy Returns

  But Africa,

  I don’t know

  all that heat

  all the time

  even when it’s raining

  all the time . . .

  I’ve always found heat

  constant heat

  difficult

  to get inside of

  & not to mention

  impossible to avoid . . .

  You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.

  That’s true.

  Go now / Pay later

  Equally—You can do anything you want to.

  Yes, I know that.

  But Africa:

  well, I do know one thing

  for sure:

  It would be tremendous

  Africa

  going there

  to go there with

  David Henderson!

  (Just like Pittsburgh).

  Like Poem

  TO JOAN FAGIN

  Joan,

  I like you

  plenty.

  You’d do

  to ride the river with.

  I take these tiny pills

  to our love.

  Plenty.

  Then I drink up the river.

  Be seeing you.

  Peace

  What to do

  when the days’ heavy heart

  having risen, late

  in the already darkening East

  & prepared at any moment, to sink

  into the West

  surprises suddenly,

  & settles, for a time,

  at a lovely place

  where mellow light spreads

  evenly

  from face to face?

  The days’ usual aggressive

  contrary beat

  now softly dropped

  into a regular pace

  the head riding gently its personal place

  where pistons feel like legs

  on feelings met like lace.

  Why,

  take a walk, then,

  across this town. It’s a pleasure

  to meet one certain person you’ve been counting on

  to take your measure

  who will smile, & love you, sweetly, at your leisure.

  And if

  she turns your head around

  like any other man,

  go home

  and make yourself a sandwich

  of toasted bread, & ham

  with butter

  lots of it

  & have a diet cola,

  & sit down

  & write this,

  because you can.

  Hall of Mirrors

  TO KRISTIN LEMS

  We miss something now

  as we think about it

  Let’s see: eat, sleep & dream, read

  A good book, by Robert Stone

  Be alone

  Knew of it first

  in New York City. Couldn’t find it

  in Ann Arbor, though

  I like it here

  Had to go back to New York

  Found it on the Upper West Side

  there

  I can’t live with you

  But you live

  here in my heart

  You keep me alive and alert

  aware of something missing

  going on

  I woke up today just in time

  to introduce a poet

  then to hear him read his rhymes

  so unlike mine & not bad

  as I’d thought another time

  no breakfast, so no feeling fine.

  Then I couldn’t find the party, afterwards

  then I did

  then I talked with you.

  Now it’s back

  & a good thing for us

  It’s letting us be wise, that’s why

  it’s being left up in the air

  You can see it, there

  as you look, in your eyes

  Now it’s yours & now it’s yours & mine.

  We’ll have another look, another time.

  Ann Arbor Song

  I won’t be at this boring poetry reading

  again!

  I’ll never have to hear

  so many boring poems again!

  & I’m sure I’ll never read them again:

  In fact, I haven’t read them yet!

  Anne won’t call me here again,

  To tell me that Jack is dead.

  I’m glad you did, Anne, though

  It made me be rude to friends.

  I won’t cry for Jack here again.

  & Larry & Joan won’t visit me here

  again.

  Joan won’t cook us beautiful dinners,

  orange & green & yellow & brown

  here again.

  & Thom Gunn & Carol & Don & I won’t get high

  with Larry & Joan here again

  Though we may do so somewhere else again.

  Harris & John & Merrill won’t read

  in my class, again.

  Maybe there’ll never be such a class

  again:

  I think there probably will, though

  & I know Allen will follow me round the world

  with his terrible singing voice:

  But it will never make us laugh here again.

  You Can’t Go Home Again is a terrific book:

  I doubt if I’ll ever read that again.

  (I read it first in Tulsa, in 1958)

  & I’ll never go there again.

 
Where does one go from here? Because

  I’ll go somewhere again. I’ll come somewhere again, too,

  & You’ll be there, & together we can have a good time.

  Meanwhile, you’ll find me right here, when you

  come through, again.

  People Who Died

  Pat Dugan . . . . . . . . my grandfather . . . . . . . . throat cancer . . . . . . . . 1947.

  Ed Berrigan . . . . . . . . my dad . . . . . . . . heart attack . . . . . . . . 1958.

  Dickie Budlong . . . . . . . . my best friend Brucie’s big brother, when we were

  five to eight . . . . . . . . killed in Korea, 1953.

  Red O’Sullivan . . . . . . . . hockey star & cross-country runner

  who sat at my lunch table

  in High School . . . . . . car crash . . . . . . 1954.

  Jimmy “Wah” Tiernan . . . . . . . . my friend, in High School,

  Football & Hockey All-State . . . . . . car crash . . . . 1959.

  Cisco Houston . . . . . . . . died of cancer . . . . . . . . 1961.

  Freddy Herko, dancer . . . . jumped out of a Greenwhich Village window in 1963.

  Anne Kepler . . . . my girl . . . . killed by smoke-poisoning while playing

  the flute at the Yonkers Children’s Hospital

  during a fire set by a 16 year old arsonist . . . . 1965.

  Frank . . . . . . Frank O’Hara . . . . . . hit by a car on Fire Island, 1966.

  Woody Guthrie . . . . . . dead of Huntington’s Chorea in 1968.

  Neal . . . . . . Neal Cassady . . . . . . died of exposure, sleeping all night

  in the rain by the RR tracks of Mexico . . . . 1969.

  Franny Winston . . . . . . . . just a girl . . . . totalled her car on the Detroit–Ann

  Arbor Freeway, returning from the dentist . . . . Sept. 1969.

  Jack . . . . . . Jack Kerouac . . . . . . died of drink & angry sicknesses . . . . in 1969.

  My friends whose deaths have slowed my heart stay with me now.

  Telegram

  TO JACK KEROUAC

  Bye-Bye Jack.

  See you soon.

  A New Old Song

  FOR LARRY FOR CHRISTMAS