Saint Memory (the full version)
I am the basement
And the cellar door
The upside-down
Attic stairs
The plaster crust
In the banded lathe
The looming Disaster
That only god could made
I am a cloud of dust
The crunch of ice
Underneath our feet
On a forced retreat
From ambush and defeat;
I am the furnace
That almost blew
The windows that rattled
The frost ferns
On the peeling mullions
& unforgiving sills
I am the tears of onions
I am the sour & the sweet;
I am the pills
Mom swallowed
I am the fish and the gills
I am full of shit and hollow
I am a time bomb in a capsule
I am the secret wish that thrills
I am Theo Frey enraptured
I am just the other day;
I am the thermostat
We cannot touch
The pewter pot, the painted plate
All mementoes on the hutch
I am your ally and your crutch
I am made of all these things
The bed, the bath – the furnishings
The overstuffed chair
& the ottoman where
We first sensed Her, everywhere
I am the long-looped
Drooping curtains
I am whatever we dare
Under certain circumstances
I am flirtatious dancers
And I am the pole
Round which She twists her trade
I am the boogers you hid
Under metal desks in second grade
And the hole
Where sewage goes
('Round which the richest
Crabgrass grows);
I am the socks and shoes
And underwear
The boots, the brace
The old bookcase
I am the cake &
All confections
Able baker's use
I am everything
With no direction
We think we knew
I am all that we eschew
As well the things
We'll never see and do
I am what we never owned
And all we ever wanted
That wasn't in the home
I am the darkest hours
Our haunted Soul
Has not forgotten;
I am the dry, the wet
The sty in the eye
The first pet that died
I am whatever's rotten
The truth in every lie;
I am the heartbeat
With its diamond totem
I am the stark relief
Of a shocking yellow gingko
In late Autumn;
I am a fellow fallen leaf
Scuttling cancrizans
Across a naked street;
The landscapes painted
By the Barbizons
Who found belief in observed things
I am the lowest of low
As well the creme d'elite;
I am the roof peak
And the pointless
Pointed bricks that
Constitute the chimney
In disuse
Too, I am the Nabisco
Brand antenna
Strapped to the smokeless flue
Abused by weathers we once knew;
I am Satellite TV
I am the cricket
And the Jiminy
I am the frequency
I am the delinquency
I am whatever
We can recall
With any decency
I am you
And you are me
We are all that's left;
A whorl of impressions
Sensations sans intentions
A map bereft
The palimpsest
And topography
We are the hagiography
Of Saint Memory.
