I dream
Whitman's ghost is in the new air around me
not the figure in the workman shirt
not the settled legend
but the electric and naked poet
drunk with this thing oxygen
dancing atom Whitman
fresh from the oily steam of the wharf
and the ca-lak a-lak of trolleys and typesetters
the coal-dusted womb of Brooklyn
all the way to now and here
he climbs from ordure in the cart
his wheels move god's manure
pushed with grunts and the sweet sweat of beautiful men
I rise from the wheely chair
my modern wheels that get me know-where
on a plastic carpet protector round and round
and his laugh starts in the roots of his holy head
his laugh bends and flexes the unknown parts
and leaves his sweet lips to curl my own
we wheel in wheels into the cirrus of love
above the cumuli of recycling drench and parch
beyond the nimbus of rise against and wreak
past the hail and forked spark of human correction
to forget anger's predictable climate
to the jetted stream of love
the fish scales and sky hooks of love
the pure d blue of love's truth and presence
of which he still sings o atomic paper o sooty pigment
and his great hand holds mine
in more than this and he waits until I am
trembling with all his parts
all rancid and cleaned parts of all things
my body electric and he leans in
as we drift over rooftops and I listen:
know these are still the same o best beloved
I sing still of all work and all work
even the sit and spin of now
it was always so my song was a refutation then
and now again I refute ignoble and disconnected
we are not alone
we are not the warning label or
the ad in the corner of the screen we are more
we are the holy effort of plain and ordinary
we are sex on the forest floor and
the spurt and couple and cupped jaw
and the friction as we move along
and it has not changed
awake! every new child awake!
all of all is still here nothing is diminished
your love is still love in new clothes
in the cellar of unreason there is a particle'd light
among the cold stars there is vast blue oxygen
waiting for all of me and all of you
I am what is in you and you in me
not before not after but now
now now now
and sly Walt beaming Walt ecstatic Walt
takes me home covered in blue
stardust ice pollen hair ordure
and settles me next to my sleeping wife
stay alive while you are alive
he whispers
remember the broken and dying and wet their brow
he murmurs
I open my eyes and the air dances in thousands
I lean in slowly slowly to listen to her
every inch is the progress of history
and her breath is the work of the universe
Whitman's ghost is in the new air around me
not the figure in the workman shirt
not the settled legend
but the electric and naked poet
drunk with this thing oxygen
dancing atom Whitman
fresh from the oily steam of the wharf
and the ca-lak a-lak of trolleys and typesetters
the coal-dusted womb of Brooklyn
all the way to now and here
he climbs from ordure in the cart
his wheels move god's manure
pushed with grunts and the sweet sweat of beautiful men
I rise from the wheely chair
my modern wheels that get me know-where
on a plastic carpet protector round and round
and his laugh starts in the roots of his holy head
his laugh bends and flexes the unknown parts
and leaves his sweet lips to curl my own
we wheel in wheels into the cirrus of love
above the cumuli of recycling drench and parch
beyond the nimbus of rise against and wreak
past the hail and forked spark of human correction
to forget anger's predictable climate
to the jetted stream of love
the fish scales and sky hooks of love
the pure d blue of love's truth and presence
of which he still sings o atomic paper o sooty pigment
and his great hand holds mine
in more than this and he waits until I am
trembling with all his parts
all rancid and cleaned parts of all things
my body electric and he leans in
as we drift over rooftops and I listen:
know these are still the same o best beloved
I sing still of all work and all work
even the sit and spin of now
it was always so my song was a refutation then
and now again I refute ignoble and disconnected
we are not alone
we are not the warning label or
the ad in the corner of the screen we are more
we are the holy effort of plain and ordinary
we are sex on the forest floor and
the spurt and couple and cupped jaw
and the friction as we move along
and it has not changed
awake! every new child awake!
all of all is still here nothing is diminished
your love is still love in new clothes
in the cellar of unreason there is a particle'd light
among the cold stars there is vast blue oxygen
waiting for all of me and all of you
I am what is in you and you in me
not before not after but now
now now now
and sly Walt beaming Walt ecstatic Walt
takes me home covered in blue
stardust ice pollen hair ordure
and settles me next to my sleeping wife
stay alive while you are alive
he whispers
remember the broken and dying and wet their brow
he murmurs
I open my eyes and the air dances in thousands
I lean in slowly slowly to listen to her
every inch is the progress of history
and her breath is the work of the universe
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Marilyn Sands
Linda Treiber
David McClain
koshersalaami
Patty Kane Horrigan
tg within
Salon.com
Comments
Last night i read aloud to her from Leaves of Grass, "Song of Myself". She fell asleep first, as always, and I did, I leaned in and listened to her breath. Then I wrote this, quietly scribbled in a moleskine.
That moleskin contains magic! This piece is EXCEPTIONAL!
I always seem to find little lessons in your poetry. It's all so beautiful, but I like the lessons best. Thanks Greg.
dancing atom Whitman
fresh from the oily steam of the wharf
and the ca-lak a-lak of trolleys and typesetters
Time travel by breathing. A sleeping beauty muse, electric even in repose.
*looks around*
Yep, I thought so.
Maybe we can send that to Michelle Obama?
She says Sax Playing on the Oval Rug Is fun.
Oops
Great
Thank
Greg C
You should be the tenured matchmaker Cupid.
Greg Cupid
No act Stupid
Love as brother
Acute pain do its
You refine readers
You can read a parlor
You serve ice cream cone
Some peeps turd dunkers
huh
Some creeps go duck bowling
Jerks remain quirky as duck pin
Some people are pain to duck crap
They be goons and a police private
Greg Correl may be like some of us
We roam globe looking for woman
Never give up looking for a humor
If we get a broke humor bone wee
Woo Wow. Ay anticipate a woman
`
If I/we rant and vent we do banter
We get no 'baby' because no money
I go search in Sauna for humor gal
She thinks male humor gas odious
goofy
Thanks
Happy
Sunday
Ice
Cream
Parlor
Wow!
Wee!
Always
Wonder
Take
Pain
Away
Grace
Gifts
Thorn
Beauty
Inspire
Aspire
Greg Correll ah!
You Forgive me
Love thy neighbor
You inspire stinky
You transcendent
Stinky Snoop Pew
Pew is sit in sauna
You get in trouble
Sit on cedar wood
Smell lavender Ay`
Later? Keeper Ah!
the metaphors of
"above the cumuli of recycling drench and parch
beyond the nimbus of rise against and wreak
past the hail and forked spark of human correction
to forget anger's predictable climate"
and the wisdom of
"...we are the holy effort of plain and ordinary
we are sex on the forest floor and"
and, well, all of it, really. :)
Congratulations on the cover. Most deserved.
Lezlie
Buffy
♥
CONGRATULATIONS!!!
I spent yesterday struggling to work through pain, spent the late afternoon at the hospital, came home to this. ah. bliss, is this.
To have a written-while-unconscious love poem to your wife rise. A hundred generations of yentas, my wife's ancestors, stopped their clucking at me for once, finally: sure, she married an artist, and all he gave her this year was a poem – but it got an EP!
OUR poem. Deborah's and mine, Walt's and mine, and a poem from all poets on os and without – sooner or later the world always asks us to say, or listens in spite of it all, because poetry has the last and lasting word on everything, yes?
Thank you.
rated with love
"all of all is still here nothing is diminished
your love is still love in new clothes"
Man I love it... thank you
r