The Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan Read online

‘the picturesque

  common lot’ the unwarranted light

  the fever & obscurity of your organisms . . .

  on what grounds shall we criticize the City Manager?

  So Going Around Cities

  TO DOUG & JAN OLIVER

  “I order you to operate. I was not made to suffer.”

  Probing for old wills, and friendships, for to free

  to New York City, to be in History, New York City being

  History at that time. “And I traded my nights

  for Intensity; & I barter my right to Gold; & I’d traded

  my eyes much earlier, when I was circa say seven years old

  for ears to hear Who was speaking, & just exactly who

  was being told . . . .” & I’m glad

  I hear your words so clearly

  & I would not have done it

  differently

  & I’m amused at such simplicity, even so,

  inside each & every door. And now I’m with you, instantly,

  & I’ll see you tomorrow night, and I see you constantly, hopefully

  though one or the other of us is often, to the body-mind’s own self

  more or less out of sight! Taking walks down any street, High

  Street, Main Street, walk past my doors! Newtown; Nymph Rd

  (on the Mesa); Waveland

  Meeting House Lane, in old Southampton; or BelleVue Road

  in England, etcetera

  Other roads; Manhattan; see them there where open or shut up behind

  “I’ve traded sweet times for answers . . .”

  “They don’t serve me anymore.” They still serve me on the floor.

  Or,

  as now, as floor. Now we look out the windows, go in &

  out the doors. The Door.

  (That front door which was but & then at that time My door).

  I closed it

  On the wooing of Helen. “And so we left schools for her.” For

  She is not one bit fiction; & she is easy to see;

  & she leaves me small room

  For contradiction. And she is not alone; & she is not one bit

  lonely in the large high room, &

  invention is just vanity, which is plain. She

  is the heart’s own body, the body’s own mind in itself

  self-contained.

  & she talks like you; & she has created truly not single-handedly

  Our tragic thing, America. And though I would be I am not afraid

  of her, & you also not. You, yourself, I,

  Me, myself, me. And no, we certainly have not pulled down

  our vanity: but

  We wear it lightly here,

  here where I traded evenly,

  & even gladly

  health, for sanity; here

  where we live day-by-day

  on the same spot.

  My English friends, whom I love & miss, we talk to ourselves here,

  & we two

  rarely fail to remember, although we write seldom, & so must seem

  gone forever.

  In the stained sky over this morning the clouds seem about to burst.

  What is being remembering

  Is how we are, together. Like you we are always bothered, except

  by the worse; & we are living

  as with you we also were

  fired, only, mostly, by changes in the weather. For Oh dear hearts,

  When precious baby blows her fuse / it’s just our way

  of keeping amused.

  That we offer of & as excuse. Here’s to you. All the very best.

  What’s your pleasure? Cheers.

  Quarter to Three

  “who is not here

  causes us to drift”

  wake up, throat dry,

  that way, perpetually,

  “and why deprived unless

  you feel that you ought to be?” and

  “Clarity is immobile.” And, “We are hungry

  for devices to keep the baby happy . . .”

  She writes, “My hunger creates a food

  that everybody needs.”

  “I can’t live without you no

  matter who you are.” “I think.”

  I write this in cold blood,

  enjoy.

  A Little American Feedback

  Yes, it’s true, strategy is fascinating

  & watching its workings out of, its

  successes & failures, participating even,

  can be amusing at times, but

  Lords & Ladies do express

  the courtly elegance, the

  rude vulgarity, only truly

  in the self’s own body-mind’s

  living daily day-to-day the living

  Self-contained containing

  self-abandonment as self is

  eyes as they caress or

  blaze with particular hate, say, at

  living being thought while a particularly

  self-engrossing mind-game going on is

  still, & only, one pronoun temporarily

  haranguing the others while

  the rest of One’s self waits, truly

  impatiently, for blessed natural savagery to arrive,

  and finally save the party, by ordering

  the musicians to resume their play

  & the dancing picks up once again.

  Boulder

  Up a hill, short

  of breath, then

  breathing

  Up stairs, & down, & up, & down again

  to

  NOISE

  Your warm powerful Helloes

  friends

  still slightly breathless

  in

  a three-way street

  hug

  Outside

  & we can move

  & we move

  Inside

  to Starbursts of noise!

  The human voice is how.

  Lewis’s, boyish, & clear; & Allen’s, which persists,

  & His, & Hers, & all of them Thems,

  & then

  Anne’s, once again, (and as I am) “Ted!”

  Then

  O, Lady!, O, See, among all things which exist

  O this!, this breathing, we.

  Picnic

  The dancer grins at the ground.

  The mildest of alchemists will save him.

  (Note random hill of chairs). & he will prove

  useful to her

  in time. The ground to be their floor.

  like pennies to a three year old,

  like a novel, the right novel, to a 12 year old,

  like a 39 Ford to a Highschool kid

  like a woman to a man, a girl

  who is a woman

  is her self ’s own soul

  and her man is himself

  his own

  & whole.

  Addenda

  & I can’t buy

  with submission

  & tho I feel often

  & why not

  battered

  I can’t be beaten.

  But I have been eaten, 7 times

  by myself

  & I go my way, by myself, I being

  by myself only when useful, as for example,

  you are to me now,

  to you.

  Narragansett Park

  Inhabiting a night with shaky normal taboo hatred and fear

  and a steep diagonal body

  Peculiar and beautiful language correspond to my ordinary

  tension

  The major planets are shifting (shivering?) but out of my

  natural habit,

  Self-kindness,

  I play them

  something Nashville something quality

  and there is the too easy knell of the games chapel

  The tempting scornful opposite

  Cathedral virus and goof immunization:

  The curves of the Spirit are not very interested in

  the conq
uest of matter.

  Color is the idiot’s delight. I’m the curves, what’s

  the matter? or

  I’m the matter, the curves nag:

  Call it Amber, it doesn’t ride nor take to rider

  Amber it doesn’t make me want to pray, it makes me see color

  as we fail to break through our clasped hands.

  Carrying a Torch

  What thoughts I have of where I’ll be, & when, & doing what

  Belong to a ghost world, by no means my first,

  And may or may not be entertaining; for example

  living in a state of innocence in Kansas.

  They hardly compare to when, passing through the air,

  it thinks about the air.

  Just as, now, you are standing here

  Expecting me to remember something

  When years of trying the opposite of something

  Leave that vision unfulfilled.

  Mostly I have to go on checking the windows will but don’t break

  while you get on with taking your own sweet time.

  It’s like coming awake thirsty & hungry, mid-way in dreams

  you have to have;

  It stops or changes if you don’t get up

  & it changes, by stopping, if you do.

  You do. Because you’re carrying a torch. A sudden circular bath

  of symbols

  Assails the structure. Better turn on the overhead light.

  A Note from Yang-Kuan

  You stay in the Mental Institute of your life.

  God sees dog—in the mirror. In this city

  Below the river, my private life is of no interest,

  Though allowed. For example, it would be nicer to kiss

  than to shoot up.

  Visual indifference is a growth. Used. Was used. Useful.

  A new way of appreciating has arrived?

  Should be a ride at Disneyland. People

  Have basically split. And the heart flutters.

  Stunned, the metrics & melody of

  The multiplication tables, I am a father, watching,

  Tho poor, her broad thoughts, this local lifetime.

  Here I shall be with it but never of it.

  Being nothing in front of no-one again.

  Work Postures

  The rain comes and falls.

  A host of assorted artillery come up out of the lake.

  The man who knows everything is a fool.

  In front of him is his head. Behind him, men.

  Few listeners get close. And

  “Love must turn to power or it die.”

  This is a terrible present.

  “Is this any way to run a Railroad?”

  Flashing back 7 years I hear, “you will never go

  any place for the second time again.”

  It’s hard to fight, when your body is not with you.

  & it’s equally hard not to.

  There is the dread that mind & body are One.

  The cruelty of fear & misery works here.

  Excursion & Visitation

  The rains come & Fall.

  Good grief, it’s Le Jongleur de Dieu!

  A gun wheels out of an overcoat.

  It’s I will fight. But I won’t rule.

  So, pay, and leave. So, when the light turned green,

  She went. “I’ve gone

  to get everything.” A Voice—

  “to reappear in careers?” Un-uh.

  These are the days of naming things?

  Watch my feet, not my answers.

  Oh, good grief, it’s Le Jongleur de Dieu!

  He’s the godson of the ghost-dancers!

  On Earth we call The Sea of Tranquility “The North Atlantic.”

  And a voice once locked in the ground now speaks in me.

  Everybody Seemed So Laid Back in the Park

  Marie in her pin-striped suit singing

  “Where Have All The Flowers Gone?” in German

  Not alfalfa covers the ground of Lilac Park.

  “C’mere for a second!” shouts the invisible

  Old lady. She crosses the park in a hat of nylon.

  Marie falls down, still singing.

  I see a woman with a baby running.

  Two Africans in turbans wiggle their hips.

  Marie cries & yawns for her audience.

  Marie lights an envelope with matches.

  Frisbees fly in the hot sun.

  “Try it again.”

  A very pale orange is sitting under the baby birds.

  The community lightens, five o’clock, lifting my heart

  to a place.

  A Meeting at the Bridge

  He was one of the last of the Western Bandits.

  “A fellow like you gets into scrapes.

  “Gets life. Spends most of it in jail.

  “You gotta make a stand somewhere.”

  I guess. “You smell of disinfectant.”

  I guess. “Your kind

  Drift from nowhere to nowhere, until

  They get close. No telling

  What they do then.” Yeah, I guess that’s just about right.

  “Do you fish?” No, I just go down and look at the water.

  “Pretty, ain’t it?” Is it? No, it ain’t.

  It ain’t pretty. It’s

  A carnival. A pig-sty. A regular

  Loop-de-loop . . . (spits) I need some shoes.

  “I Remember”

  I remember painting “I HATE TED BERRIGAN” in big black letters

  all over my white wall.

  I remember bright orange light coming into rooms in the late

  afternoon. Horizontally.

  I remember when I lived in Boston reading all of Dostoyevsky’s

  novels one right after the other.

  I remember the way a baby’s hand has of folding itself around

  your finger, as tho forever.

  I remember a giant gold man, taller than most buildings, at

  “The Tulsa Oil Show.”

  I remember in Boston a portrait of Isabella Gardner by Whistler.

  I remember wood carvings of funny doctors.

  I remember opening jars that nobody else could open.

  I remember wondering why anyone would want to be a doctor. And

  I still do.

  I remember Christmas card wastebaskets.

  I remember not understanding why Cinderella didn’t just pack up and leave,

  if things were all that bad. I remember “Korea.”

  I remember one brick wall and three white walls.

  I remember one very hot summer day I put ice cubes in my aquarium

  and all the fish died.

  I remember how heavy the cornbread was. And it still is.

  To Himself

  Now you can rest forever

  Tired heart. The final deceit is gone,

  Even though I thought it eternal. It’s gone.

  I know all about the sweet deception,

  But not only the hope, even the desire is gone.

  Be still forever. You’ve done enough

  Beating. Your movements are really

  Worth nothing nor is the world

  Worth a sigh. Life is bitterness

  And boredom; and that’s all. The world’s a mudhole.

  It’s about time you shut up. Give it all up

  For the last time. To our kind fate gives

  Only that we die. It’s time you showed your contempt for

  Nature and that cruel force which from hiding

  Dictates our universal hurt

  In the ceaseless vanity of every act.

  —LEOPARDI

  (TRANS. BY TED BERRIGAN, GORDON

  BROTHERSTON, & GEORGE SCHNEEMAN)

  Whitman in Black

  For my sins I live in the city of New York

  Whitman’s city lived in in Melville’s senses, urban inferno

  Where love can stay for only a minute

  Then has t
o go, to get some work done

  Here the detective and the small-time criminal are one

  & tho the cases get solved the machine continues to run

  Big Town will wear you down

  But it’s only here you can turn around 360 degrees

  And everything is clear from here at the center

  To every point along the circle of horizon

  Here you can see for miles & miles & miles

  Be born again daily, die nightly for a change of style

  Hear clearly here; see with affection; bleakly cultivate compassion

  Whitman’s walk unchanged after its fashion

  Heloise

  When I search the past for you

  Without knowing why

  You are the waiting fragments of this sky

  Which encases me, and

  What about the light that comes in then?

  And the heavy spins and the neon buzzing of night-time?

  I go on loving you like water, but,

  Bouncing a red rubber ball in the veins

  In wind without flesh, without bone, and inside

  The drowsy melody of languish, silence:

  And inside the silence, one ordained to praise

  In ordinary places. And inside my head, my brain.

  You have made the world so it shall grow, so,

  The revolutions not done, I’ve tucked the earth

  between my legs, to sing.

  Southwest

  We think by feeling and so we ride together

  The child who has fallen in love with maps & charts,

  The last, the sole surviving Texas Ranger, cajoling

  Scheming, scolding, the cleverest of them all. What is there to know?

  Questions. The very rich garments of the poor.

  The very rack & crucifix of weather, winter’s wild silence

  In red weather. A too resilient mind. The snake

  Waiting under each back. Not to forget to mention the chief thing:

  Underneath a new old sign, a far too resilient mind;

  And the heavy not which you were bringing back alone,

  Cycling across an Africa of green & white, but to be a part

  Of the treetops & the blueness, with a bark that will not bite.

  The fields breathe sweet, as one of you sleeps while the other is fuming

  with rage.

  Is he too ill for pills? Am I gonna ride that little black train