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May. 30th, 2004 08:39 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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greatpoetryLarry Levis
There Are Two Worlds
Perhaps the ankle of a horse is holy.
Crossing the Mississippi at dusk, Clemens thought
Of a sequel in which Huck Finn, in old age, became
A hermit, & insane. And never wrote it.
And perhaps all that he left out is holy.
The river, anyway, became a sacrament when
He spoke of it, even though
The last ten chapters were a failure he devised
To please America, & make his lady
Happy: to buy her silk, furs, & jewels with
Hues no one in Hannibal had ever seen.
There, above the river, if
The pattern of the stars is a blueprint for a heaven
Left unfinished,
I also believe the ankle of a horse,
In the seventh furlong, is as delicate as the fine lace
Of faith, & therefore holy.
I think it was only Twain's cynicism, the smell of a river
Lingering in his nostrils forever, that kept
His humor alive to the end.
I don't know how he managed it.
I used to make love to a woman, who,
When I left, would kiss the door she held open for me,
As if instead of me, as if she already missed me.
I would stand there in the cold air, breathing it,
Amused by her charm, which was, like the scent of a river,
Provocative, the dusk & first lights along the shore.
Should I say my soul went mad for a year, &
Could not sleep? To whom should I say so?
She was gentle, & intended no harm.
If the ankle of a horse is holy, & if it fails
In the stretch & the horse goes down, &
The jockey in the bright shout of his silks
Is pitched headlong onto
The track, & maimed, & if later, the horse is
Destroyed, & all that is holy
Is also destroyed: hundreds of bones & muscles that
Tried their best to be pure flight, a lyric
Made flesh, then
I would like to go home, please.
Even though I betrayed it, & left, even though
I might be, at such a time as I am permitted
To go back to my wife, my son -- no one, or
No more than a stone in a pasture full
Of stones, full of the indifferent grasses,
(& Huck Finn insane by then & living alone)
It will be, it might be still,
A place where what can only remain holy grazes, &
Where men might, also, approach with soft halters,
And, having no alternative, lead that fast world
Home -- though it is only to the closed dark of stalls,
And though the men walk ahead of the horses slightly
Afraid, & at times in awe of their
Quickness, & how they have nothing to lose, especially
Now, when the first stars appear slowly enough
To be counted, & the breath of horses makes white signatures
On the air: Last Button, No Kidding, Brief Affair --
And the air is colder.
(from Winter Stars, University of Pittsburgh Press, 1985)
There Are Two Worlds
Perhaps the ankle of a horse is holy.
Crossing the Mississippi at dusk, Clemens thought
Of a sequel in which Huck Finn, in old age, became
A hermit, & insane. And never wrote it.
And perhaps all that he left out is holy.
The river, anyway, became a sacrament when
He spoke of it, even though
The last ten chapters were a failure he devised
To please America, & make his lady
Happy: to buy her silk, furs, & jewels with
Hues no one in Hannibal had ever seen.
There, above the river, if
The pattern of the stars is a blueprint for a heaven
Left unfinished,
I also believe the ankle of a horse,
In the seventh furlong, is as delicate as the fine lace
Of faith, & therefore holy.
I think it was only Twain's cynicism, the smell of a river
Lingering in his nostrils forever, that kept
His humor alive to the end.
I don't know how he managed it.
I used to make love to a woman, who,
When I left, would kiss the door she held open for me,
As if instead of me, as if she already missed me.
I would stand there in the cold air, breathing it,
Amused by her charm, which was, like the scent of a river,
Provocative, the dusk & first lights along the shore.
Should I say my soul went mad for a year, &
Could not sleep? To whom should I say so?
She was gentle, & intended no harm.
If the ankle of a horse is holy, & if it fails
In the stretch & the horse goes down, &
The jockey in the bright shout of his silks
Is pitched headlong onto
The track, & maimed, & if later, the horse is
Destroyed, & all that is holy
Is also destroyed: hundreds of bones & muscles that
Tried their best to be pure flight, a lyric
Made flesh, then
I would like to go home, please.
Even though I betrayed it, & left, even though
I might be, at such a time as I am permitted
To go back to my wife, my son -- no one, or
No more than a stone in a pasture full
Of stones, full of the indifferent grasses,
(& Huck Finn insane by then & living alone)
It will be, it might be still,
A place where what can only remain holy grazes, &
Where men might, also, approach with soft halters,
And, having no alternative, lead that fast world
Home -- though it is only to the closed dark of stalls,
And though the men walk ahead of the horses slightly
Afraid, & at times in awe of their
Quickness, & how they have nothing to lose, especially
Now, when the first stars appear slowly enough
To be counted, & the breath of horses makes white signatures
On the air: Last Button, No Kidding, Brief Affair --
And the air is colder.
(from Winter Stars, University of Pittsburgh Press, 1985)
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Date: 2004-05-30 03:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 05:18 pm (UTC)I drove through Hannibal--Twain's boyhood home--last year on a cross-country trip. This reminded me so much of that--the lazy, lost feel of the little town on the Mississippi, the loneliness of the river beneath all else...