CONCRETE POEMS
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[ ___________ ]
BONSAI
The Princess Colliery, North Sydney, N.S.
Starting in the elevator you have to duck. The door slams.
OK, says the miner, and that starts our fall,
so I cannot fathom what that word means to him.
Down
dark
panic
restraint
death
collect
panic
water
is
running
cold over
all sides of the shaft
down
down
down, stop.
Here is a cavern, Clementine.
Stop. Be polite and talk with this man
who has worked here and cannot remember fear.
My soul is coal, and black, a hole,
a hole is where I am, dark,
not where I should be.
So talk with him, coward.
Yes, I see, every day, mm hm.
Boys. Yes, very careful. Well.
Is that so?
The seam runs out on an angle of fifteen degrees,
six miles under the ocean, two to four feet high;
big rooms off to the side, excavated to same height,
a trolley takes you four of the six miles,
riding backward with head in lap—
on account of the very low clearance— yes,
wouldn’t want to break your neck,
You walk the last two bent over.
Company had to close on account of travel time.
Pity.
Going up we take a trolley ourselves
and get the feel of steel track
a foot beneath the ass, steep.
This is the way the coal comes out,
and the miners. Cool.
The bogie clanks along behind
to derail us if we try to slip back.
Even the safety features petrify me.
Amen and never again. Good bye, Princess.
London Underground
There
are
subway to,
stops risen
I never
have
English
accents underground.
I understand,
don't
Trains mind,
jiggle my
my of
hand, cradle
the
to
the wobbling.
edge lines,
of of
sleep, ends
the rumbled.
Moles jumbled,
meant everything's
more Now
once.
Tunnelling, I’ve met Australians.
Self-Portrait In Bermuda Shorts
Here I am in a pair of plaid shorts
that might have, at one time, been
long pants, which would help explain
the ragged edges, smiling because the
sun is out like the lower half of my knees.
Oh, nothing could please me more than
this, that my knees and the sun are getting
out, and I make it a splendid moment by simply
focusing on a few facts. The wind is blowing too.
The Exclamation Point (!)
I don’t like the exclamation point unnecessarily,
but a friend does, and writes page after page
of wagging affection, wherein
he has dropped,
every three or four lines,
that great broken turd of excitement,
the exclamation point!
I don’t like stepping in it with my eyes,
being told This is it!
the time to rejoice! or feel the irony!
the moment to find, with the sole of my soul,
in the grasses of his egregious insights,
where countless examples lie!
the exclamation point!
! ! ! ! !
However, I am very glad for his letters.