Sagesse, by H.D. (10)

Or is it the great tide that covers the rock-pool
so that it and the rock-pool are indistinguishable

from the sea-shelf and are part of the sea-floor,
though the sea-anemone may quiver apprehensively

and the dried weed uncurl painfully
and the salt-sediment rebel, "I was salt,

a substance, concentrated, self-contained,
am I to be dissolved and lost?"

"it is fearful, I was a mirror, an individual,"
cries the shallow rock-pool, "now infinity

claims me; I am everything? But nothing";
peace, salt, you were never useful as all that,

peace, flower, you are one of a thousand-thousand others,
peace, shallow pool, be lost.

barred

barred, cage-like
tremulous.

how was it that someone else thought of 'clotted' yesterday before me?

yesterday i:
"lived in a tangle" (r. ducornet)
in a:
"knot of twinging turf" (y.winters)
in the:
"clotting cold." (y. winters)

frozen ice-in-air, dissapointment
said sang-froid blood cold
break it off like brittle
frozen yet not always so frigid
anger
steam that evaporates in front of my own mouth
i never realized that anger could be packed into words like clay
like thrown clay that is laced with small stones.

i remember throwing some of the most beautiful raw rough red clay vessels
they rose magically in my hands because the clay was so loose in itself
like sandpaper too
the small stones cut my hands
so quickly i didn't feel it happening
until after when i was running them under cold water in a dirty classroom sink.

the new wet vessels
stood on the wood-grain folding table like slumped soldiers
like melting towers
like crennelated and pierced desert formations.

i tried to explain to my class how they were supposed to represent moorish north african architecture
with its seamless push between earth and structure
sacred signs whitewashed on walls
rock adobe bone dried clay
mudded

my teacher attacked my technique
said they were not big enough
he wondered aloud if i had what it takes for a challenging undergraduate art program.

he said i lacked discipline.
then shuffled off in clogs
that were too big for him
making his legs contort inwards to hold them on his feet
trailing chalk and clay dust behind him.

he watched quietly as i packed the vessels into the back of my car.

quartz

tangled postings sheets sun on sheets. anger, at what? starting again today, getting in the right frame of mind today, already out of sorts... dreams of barking dogs, something else that woke me shocked awake (can't remember). tired of cold, tired of bed, tired of frozen lungs.

my shoulders are tired of remaining as hunched, bird-claws clenched, ribcage breath...

i know i need to adjust the surroundings, change to new, escape!

even the screen is flecked with ice.

i see helicopters and sun, they are towing the plane that flew into the hudson yesterday. i can't see this, but i know it is happening. the plane looked like a small bird that flew into the water... and people standing on the wings, like children, or penguins clustered. what is it that allows us to connect with anonymous tragedy, almost tragedy, the what-if or almost-was. i usually sit over the wing, i usually sit in the exit row. i wonder if i would have been able to lift the plane door and throw it , heavy, into a cold sea. i like to think that something like this "wakes me up" or "reminds me what is important". what it really signifies is a disconnect in my own life-- the desperate need for me to plug back in to my own life-- bone intimacy and ropes of hot blood. we only have so many rituals that allow us to feel alive, like animals i suppose.

i'd like to feel my body in the early morning desert sun. i'd like to feel shafts of light around my face, my skull, to bathe myself in a landscape that is mostly dust but crystalline-- solidified shell but translucent,

quartz.