Personal Orphics

SONNETS TO ORPHEUS I.3

Ranier Maria Rilke
transl. Stephen Mitchell

A god can do it. But will you tell me how
a man can enter through the lyre's strings?
Our mind is split. And at the shadowed crossing
of heart-roads, there is no temple for Apollo.

Song, as you have taught it, is not desire,
not wooing any grace that can be achieved;
song is reality. Simple, for a god.
But when can we be real? When does he pour

the earth, the stars, into us? Young man,
it is not your loving, even if your mouth
was forced wide open by your own voice-learn
to forget that passionate music. It will end.

True singing is a different breath, about
nothing. A gust inside the god. A wind.



THE SONG

Every shaman has his song that
takes him away. There have been
descriptions of how a person first
hears his or her song, walking
along a seashore or being in a
forest. There's this experience and
from then on he's overtaken.
-- Joseph Campbell

Gaelic oran
A song; this is for auran, from the
correct and still existing form
amhran, Irish amhran, Middle
Irish ambr‡n, Manx arrane; from
amb, i.e. mu, about, and rann?
Irish amhar, Early Irish amor,
music. Cf. Irish amhra, eulogy,
especially in verse. Cf. amra
Cholumcille), panegyric.


I first recall the song on
Jacksonville Beach when I
was three years old, sitting
between the sea and my mother
& rapt in a strange middle
music between her voice and
the surf's, a soft drone warm
and moist and smiling overhead
with miles of blue beyond
and below. The birthmark was
still visible then, that heart
with an arrow through it red
above my left nipple: that
beach day was his altar, as
he played in his mother's lap
and rode the waves on a
tunny's back and sang of salt
immersions on a brilliant
plashing bed. The full moon
was in my father's eyes as
he spread my mother on some
night in '56: Their marriage
was brittle and doomed, but
useful to that old progenitor
throned in the sea who came
back to claim me on that
summer beach in 1960.
Actually, his (her?) song was
on my lips when I was born
-- so my parents say -- a smiling
humming tune: water music,
the sound a fountain makes
spilling depths in the merriment
of the sun. The Well I found
beneath my ear and behind
the facts of history is His:
The lover who went under
to sing of chasms and
bright scree between our
isle and eternity's. Such
music cannot pay my
mortgage nor help a drunk
nor mint a better husbandry
of this home: But like a
breeze, it courses through
all the topside motions
of a life in 2003, a song
whose words are just out
of reach, lost in the sea's
collapse behind my mother
on a summer's day so
long ago. I'll name them
yet, or their strange wet
fossils of salt revelry.
Forget all calls to poetry,
that warped & silly career.
This is ball-soak, day-shit,
everything lost to all
we now can't help but see.
A well's deep plumage
is this song's old voyage
a birthmark's long throat
doing brine homage.



BIG TOAD

When I was three
my family
vacationed
at Cape Cod:
I recall only
vague shadows
& that buttery
halflight of first
memories:
But there is
a photo of
me sitting
by a tree
playing a
ukulele to
a frog in a
yellow bucket:
I named him
Big Toad
and sang to
him with my
toy uke: Music
for that swart
appendage
apart and
with me,
a tadpole
longing that
swam so
wonderfully
below: I knew
the pud was
loved and sang
of the big world
it swam through:
Everything was
connection back
then, soft light,
the sound of my
mother's voice
wrapped in
the surf and
breeze: those tiny
songs I found
so easy to sing:
A dolphin's weave
on a bright
cresting wave
carrying me
us here:




FENDER MUSTANG

Winter Haven, Florida
winter-spring 1971

I.

I was 14 when
my friend Steve and
I decided to get
into a band like
Led Zeppelin,
do cool stuff,
get all the girls
We begged our moms
to get us guitars.
For two weeks
we cruelly jammed
that button of love
and guilt in them,
saying how having
a guitar was all
we ever really wanted,
how we would
work extra chores,
vacuum rooms,
clean dishes, etcetera.

Being little men
in houses forsaken
by fathers,
our moms
broke down as we
knew they must
and took us
to the music
store in Winter Haven
to pick out
rental guitars.
After a long wistful
scan at the Caddys
on the top rack-
Strats, Rickenbackers,
Flying V's, Les Pauls
-I lowered my sights
to the rental rack
below and fell in love
with this red Fender
Mustang. It was
a kid's learning
guitar, a cheapo
Strat clone
probably cranked
out in Japan:
ah but it was
also cherry red
like Corvette coupe,
like the dark
wet insides
of a girl's mouth.

That Mustang was
my first real purchase
on puberty, no longer
the fat kid imprisoned
in his room but
newly-tall and skinny
and ready for the world,
ready to rock.

The guy who taught
me to play was
some longhair
who loathed my
kiddie taste for
Grand Funk Railroad
and Black Sabbath,
but since it
was the best
inducement to
practice he
grudged me
three minutes
to puzzle the riffs
to "Are You Ready."
I sat there
as he transmuted
radio dross
to living gold.
Playing the
riffs put me
onstage somehow,
as if the chords
were the first
words of a
new language.

At the end of
the lesson I unplugged
my Fender from
the teacher's amp
(so big and ballsy
compared to that
whippet of an amp
I had at home)
and laid it back
in its case.
The inside of
the case was
a plush blue velvet;
midnight blue
and cherry red
felt like all
the magic erupting
around me those
days, shimmering
pool water and
full fire moons by
the lake and
the blue eyes
of all the really
popular girls,
impossible to reach,
impossible to resist,
my heart impeccably red.

III.

Back in my room
at home I'd go
over the riffs again
and again, plugged
into that tiny amp
& sworn to play low.
Practicing guitar was
one of the first necessary
evils I learned,
that patient start from
the easiest beginning
and then working
through to the end
of the lesson in
that dreary Mel Bay
Guitar System book.
And then I'd head
into the songs
I wanted to play,
going through them,
taking time to smooth
the rough parts.
I remember practicing
the ligature for "Ride
Captain Ride," learning
my first solo note for note.
Playing it & feeling
in my hands something
forming harder than
the lines of my
biceps when lifting
wieghts. Ripe with
the scent of orange
blossom and Boone's Farm.
Thrilling to make
music sure
to thrill girls.

I tried it out:
Derinda one
of the neighborhood
girls who'd visit
when my mom
was out
sitting on my bed
while I cranked that
amp and muscled
"Are You Ready."
Afterwards I
lifted weights
and then wrestle with
Derinda on my bed,
our tongues soon
engaged in a
splashy battle royale,
my hand trying to work
its way down
the top of her
t-shirt to get
to her big breasts
which were always
too far away.
I sorely needed
practice in
everything
in the world.


IV.

Two weeks after
Steve got his
guitar he lost
all interest in
it, surer at
playing football
and riding his Stingray
bike through
the subdivision.
But I remained,
less sure
in anything else,
lifting that
Fender Mustang
from its blue lap
feeling all the latent
power in it, my fingers
at its strings so potent
with longing.
Playing all the cool music.
Getting all the pretty girls.
Ravaging the world.



EPIPHONE 12 STRING

Chicago,
summer 1972

For my 15th
birthday my father
served up a
champagne break-
fast and gave
me Alice Cooper's
School's Out
and an
Epiphone 12
string guitar
that came in
a case lined
with gold plush.
What a thrill
to pluck
that sonorous
pearl from
its shell:
the mother-
of-pearl inlay
on the neck,
the heavy wide
body, each
string an
octave or double
of its pair.
A guitar is
a fence of
taut harmonies.
Each chord
I strummed
on that Epiphone
an orchestral
cry to God,
rich and sonorous
and thriving
with delayed
splendor.

The cover
to School's Out
was some
graffiti- and
gum-cast
school desk
that opened
to reveal
the record
wrapped in
a pair of
pink cotton
panties.

So my mom's
old admonition
there's more
to life than
a bed, a babe
and a bottle
of booze
rung true on
my 15th birthday
when I
I got a bed
of strings,
a babe's banner
and a bottle
of champagne
thrills. That's
my mom and pop,
the Alpha and
Omega of
all beliefs.
My father
favored such
initiations, and
he's gifted me
with many
guitars over
the years
despite the
difference each
inserted between
us. Every tool
I have come
to use was
handed to
me by him
only I had
to dirty and
diss them all
before they
could be
of much use.

2.
That Epiphone
proved a wise
choice of guiatr,
for it was not
made to rock:
Each chord was
too sacchyrine,
and soloing
was like swimming
in 10-40
weight oil, the
action hard
and high.
But strum
a major chord
in the sanctuary
of my father's
church and Oh!
Sweet Jesus! That
Epiphone was
sublime: plus
a perfect substitute
for the organ
we couldn't
afford to
hire an organist
to play.
And so
that summer
I inherited
the gig of
choir accom-
panist, learning
the repetoire
of folk hymns
with a motley
of earnest if
never tuneful
voices.

Our songs
were something
new and fresh
after so many
years of buckle-
down losses,
and thus
from the ashes
of that mission
church some
spark returned
where it
should not have.
I played "Sing
My People" and
"I Am The Resur-
rection." The
folk Doxology
which we sang
while two
ushers walked
up balled dollars
and scattered
coinage to
the front
where my
father stood
with arms
wide & smiling.

Our music
burned with
all we wished
despite so
many many
imperfections.
That Epiphone
so hard to tune
with twice the
possibilities
of wandering
off -- such
dissonant tunings
I pioneered! --
and the small
gauge octave
strings were
always snapping
in the middle
of those Christian
songs I spiritedly
flogged, always
striking Mary
McKeever in
the face
and spanking
her off-key warlbings
into a second
of pure pitch
before she regained
her paradisal
disharmonies.

I was the
kid sitting in
a ragtag choir
in a mission church
that on Sundays
was littered
with old sick
drunk poor
forgotten
forgettable Chicago,
a church
so meek
to require
massive transfusions
of suburban
cash from
the Chicago synod.
And yet when
I opened that
guitar case
to pull out
my Epiphone,
the sanctuary
seemed flooded
with gold plush
hope -- faith
in things unseen
rising on
the wings of
viciously
heartfelt song.

WORDS AND MUSIC

Autumn 1975
Spokane, Washington


I returned to
college & fine
early autumn
days there
(cool mornings
& shattering
blue afternoon
skies) having
come through
a city craze
and sex daze
-- a man,
finally, at 18,
with rugburns
to prove it --
to enter the
co-ed Creative
Writing Theme
Dorm. Things
started well
enough: a girl
downstairs
came calling
and for a a
week we drank
coffee & smoked
& talked all
about our
childhoods,
loves and
the craft of
writing (as
if we knew).
She seemed
so natural a
progression
for me, now
a man & ready
for the world:
yet in seven
days she
lost her taste
for me and
turned elsewhere,
leaving me
only with a
couple late
kisses and too
much talk
inside my ears:
And as soon
as it had
opened me
I found myself
Ziplocked back
into my
great isolation,
spinning sides
of Genesis'
Lamb Lies Down
on Broadway
& drinking
way too many
beers & looking
at night's
erasure in
the window.
Playing songs
on my cracked
J45 in the
raw split
between wonder
and jilted
thunder. My
old friend John
was now deeply
married: he'd
gotten what he
desired, and
in having shrank
away from our
jackal pack
of dispossession:
We still played
the songs but
he shared their
center with his
woman. How
many guitar
mates have I known
to break their
lutes for love?
There's a
different god
for satiation
-- goddess if
you will --
Ceres of the
mowed gold
grain, Circe
of the island
bed: the dolphin
god sings of
such inclusions
only from
the rim: eloquent
in love because
unloved: to
the satiate
are silent
as the dead:
It was during
that autumn
that I resumed
writing prose
entries in my
journals, missives
to myself --
conversational,
not charged --
the proper medium
for lack's
lamentations:
perhaps I had
been inside myself
long enough
to start talking
or bitching at
myelf, sharpening
the edges of
my exclusion
with despondent
glyphs. I wondered
how one who
had so seasoned
in New York
and then
stepped down off
the virginal
porch to
pour his seed
into a woman's
ready smile
could find
himself now
facing off
inside the same
old same old
walls of fear,
stripped of
any sense
of accomplishment
or confidence.
Hating the
world in
which I had
resumed, madder
and more silent
than ever on
the surface. Taking
it out in full
measures on
the page, beyond
enraged, the
dolphin one
quite happily
engaged.

2.
That autumn
I came to know
how much words
and music
paired and split
in me as I
lumbered out
poems & songs.
They were all
bad, each too
freighted with
the pompous
pout of the other:
I hadn't learned
(or refused to)
that song travels
light with words
and that poetry
prefers to fret
the music with
its own serifs.
My poems sinking
with untuneful
outre art-rock
and my songs
too literal
to fly. It was
a miserable
fall for me,
isolate as usual
and darkly
depressed, stung
as I was by
the irony of
a heart open
to all but
the world.
Nothing good
of it went
down on paper
nor passed
through my
guitar. For
classes I
boned up on
Kant and Hegel
and History's
sad sashays,
beer cans
rattling beneath
my bed as I
tossed an
underlined, wrote
notes and farted.
Afterwards drinking
a beer & putting
lines down in
my journal
like skeins
of ice leading
back to the
center of
my labyrinth
where I
just wanted
out: giving
up as usual
at the same
desponded
omphalos
& shutting
the journal &
pulling out
my J45 and
hurling chords
at cruel angels
who laughed
ghost-tittery
within the
dark soundhole
I was drowning
in all
my brainy,
briny metaphors,
contradicted too
sharply between
love of
words and
passionate music:

3.
I wasn't the
worst poet in
the dorm; I had
grand latencies.
Some gals on
the first floor
wrote fluff
about Love
Forever Yours
in the crashing
surf of rhymed
quatrains. Across
the hall Paul
at 40 penned
long & glorious
returns to
high school
dances back
in '63:
I had written
enough to
know how
lines should go
down on paper,
though I could
not hedge my
knack for
morbid excess
& loathed
revision.
A couple of
guys on my
floor though were
really hitting
their stride:
Mark and Bill
who wrote fine
sustained stretches
of Roethkean light
in blowsy wheatfield,
sharp as their
re-sharpened pencils
in sifting through
the pile to
find what is.
Mark and Bill
somehow understood
the place for
words and
humbly joined
them well,
working so
much more
patiently at
the same
grim fire.

There were
also far
better musicians
in the dorm:
Joel who so
powerfully brought
voice to a
muscular rhythm
guitar: he could so
perfectly mimic
the great ones
that he strangled
his own songs:
or Terrie who
wrote such great
songs out
of the hammer
and claw of
her normal
losses in love:
Both had
song nailed
where I so
loosely struck:
Neither had
worse or
better loves
than I: neither
said much
on the page:
So in the
sprawl of art
that generated
in that dorm
I lived most
purely in
the red
seam between
words and
music, in
love with
both &
damning each
with the other:
that's the way
I made each my
own: why to
this day I
create such
monsters as
this Breviary,
hurling words
like the conductor
of a river, trying
to sing a Name
I can't recall,
mimicking
the waters' roll,
trying to trace
her body with
this infernal
pen, this angelic
plectrum.



GIG ONE

Spokane, Washington
Late Summer-
Early Fall 1979

How flip we were
about completion,
as if it was too
distant to ever
take seriously:
Slick Richard played
three gigs, and
they were like
stag wounds of
our eventual
demise: We
just weren't good
enough, or we
just couldn't like
each other well
enough, or we
just liked the
parties so much
more than the work,
or we unleashed
far more than
any of us knew
how to serve:
whatever the case,
three gigs form
the tale of a
local band who
could never rise
far enough from
their basement dreams:
Gig One was an
End of Summer Party
at Steve's girlfriend's
parents' house while
they vacationed
in Europe: mansion
enought for Spokane
with a basement
ballroom: big enough
for a proper
kegger: We were
nervous and couldn't
hear shit (no
monitors): We
banged out
Cheap Trick
"Hello There"
in cubes of
personal and
faint peripheral
fury: Hello
there ladies
and gentlemen
hello there
ladies and gents
are you ready to rock
are you ready or not
Some door opening
within us as
the partiers
cheered &
the beer flowed
like gold wheat
through the room:
We for once
played together
unleashing the
beast: "Dirty Weekend,"
"Whole Lotta Rosie."
"Tie Your Mother
Down," "Respectable":
Take a break,
highfive, get some
more beer, slither
through the
glistening
labial lips
of the room
O fulcrum
of desire:
Second set
and we're
tight and
thundering
& chicks
are up dancing
in front of
us to Rod
Stewart's
"Dirty Weekend"
You book
the hotel
I'll pack the
bags honey
You call
the airlines
I'll call the cab
Well when
you return
ramblin all
your plans
just tell your
mother that you're
stayin with friends:
A guitar is
the key
to the sugar
suite just
watch those
chickies swirl
like tongues
around our song:
I'll bring the
red wine you
bring the ludes
your mother's
doctor must be
higher than you
we'll hang a
don't disturb
sign outside
our door
I'm gonna rock
you till
your pussy's sore
After the set
we partied all
night on speed
and pot and beer
liking each other
for a change
high-fiving and
planning the
work ahead -
gotta get an
agent, gotta
get more PA,
gotta add more
songs gotta
gotta gotta:
I got the girl
who danced
all night for us:
We took a swim
in a chilly pool
in the blue
washes of dawn:
Up in someone's
bedroom I
peeled back
her black bathing
suit to suck
on her cold
brown lumpy
nipples, my
tongue igniting
her darkmotherfire:
O plunge and plunge
I'm gonna rock
you till your
pussy's sore:
Afterward I
talked on
about how this
was just the start
and man we were
gonna kick ass
but she had
fallen asleep:
Fucked up
now fucked
by the number
one rock god
of the night
she had completed
her transit
of the party:
So had I, though
I would have told
you to get fucked:
No stopping now,
I thought, the
dark crashing hard:



LAST GIG

Central Florida
In mid-July 1986

Innocent Thieves
rose & fell
at Rock Against
Racism: I have
three sources for
the story--my
journal, a
video of the
gig & a
review in Calendar
magazine by
then-music critic
Thom Duffy
(he's with Billboard
now): This poem
refracts from those
triangulating
beams of what
Innocent Thieves
felt like onstage,
what the camera
saw, and how a
journalist observed
a local scene one
hot night in July
1986: Though our
band had been at
it in some way
or another for
six months we
still weren't
ready for the
stage: George had
practiced with us
but a few times:
Paul just wasn't
getting his piano
parts and moved
stonily between it
and his sax:
I was rough on
riffs I reached
for beyond my
skill: Rick had been
with the band for
only a short
while: But we
went for it
anyway knowing
some stage time
would do us all
good: We collected
at an American
Legion in south
Orlando on an
afternoon gnarly
with hard storms
taking our turn
with the other
bands to set our
gear up onstage:
Everyone cordial
but Jesus all the
other bands were
hardcore punk,
fresh juvenile
faces smashed
with nihilist
angst: Us the
aging rockers,
ikons of a passing
age, asshole
Uranus steppin'
lightly round the
progressive scythes
of smartassed
Kid Kronos:
Some storm in
full fury above
while the bands
barked out power
chords & bang
bang banged on
drums: We split
after that to change
& eat, each going
our own way, back
to our separate
armoror's halls
where we prepared
in our own ways
for the battle
we would soon
engage: Me back
in that tiny hot
garage showering
then roostering
my hair, slipping
into tight black
jeans & a black
dago t & elegant
black shortsleeved
shirt with leapard
spots on the front
(from Dana): All
the disorder &
loneliness of that
apartment coming
to fruition in
that moment as
I readied to walk
out for the work
all this was poor
preparation for:
Drove to Bailey's
to have a Bloody
Mary and another:
the musician with
the big hair
heading for his
gig: Drinking
to feel loose-
limbed in my
lumber, lanky
& sleepy where
I could easily
pass on the fire:
Drove back down
to the hall through
rain now steady,
a drowning wave:
Inside a curious
melange of
skinheads &
the rest of young
Orlando, geeky
& stylish preppy
& cowpokish:
We were fifth
on the bill,
so we stood at
the bar in the back
drinking beer while
punk bands hurled
their two and
a half minute
invectives at
the mosh pit:
The style of those
bands was a
uniformly slow
metalish start
which stopped
in its plod
for two clicks
of the drummer's
sticks and then
dashed maniacally
toward a none-too
-soon death: Song
after song it was
the same: Declared
Ungovernable had
a drummer in
a red Mohawk
and a singer with
massive spikes
sticking out every
which way: Cmon
yew dicks yew
cunts, get off yer
asses n start
dancing, yew
fuckwads he growled:
a few sheepish
skins left the shadow
ranks of their
periphery to
assemble in
the pit, most
in fatigues and
jackboots, traipsing
about in dainty
trance for the
early slow part
of the song,
plugging in
suddenly as the
tempo changed
to glance off each
other ever more
soundly till at
the end of the
song they hammered
& whacked
like jackals:
The seekers 'n'
gawkers who came
because the show
had been plugged
on WXXL 106.7
(an oily top 40
FM station),
watched from
their own uncertain
shadow, bemused,
scared, fascinated:
In back of all
that I drank
my beers apart
from the rest
of the band, bored
and ashamed:
We don't belong
here, partially
because we aren't
ready, but mostly
because there's
no one in this
crowd who looks
much like anyone
we'd care to
reach with our music
-- -Slam dancers and
Michael Jackson
dolts: All wrong, I
thought, my ears
ringing from the
noise & my
head fuzzy
with booze: But
we heed up there
anyway after the
3d band
finishes,
setting up our
gear quick and
nervous: We launch
into ''Face
of Fire," a mean
choppy number
where all of our
problems become
evident: the PA
system is fucked,
can't hear anything
on the monitors,
Shawn's guitar
impossibly out
of tune, George
wandering off
on drums, and
me playing too loud
& distorted: We
look odd, too:
(I'm watching
the video here)
Paul at the left
in white slax and
a purple jacket,
Rick then Shawn
in jeans and
sleeveless t's,
George in a
runner's getup
(shorts & sneakers),
and me far right
some gangly
Rod Stewart
caricature:
We try to
concentrate, arrow
closer in to each
other, recoup what
is obviously lost
in the confused
noise: Horrible to
us but we get a
surprising ripple
of applause after
wrenching to
that song's end:
Maybe they're just
relieved we aren't
so punk: On to
"Ball and Chain,"
Shawn dropping
his guitar in
disgust when
it goes even
further out of
tune then playing
the singer, which
he does best
anyway: Shawn
and Rick have
been in so many
bands that coping
with whatever
onstage catastrophe
is no big deal:
Shawn thrives on it,
really, he is most
and best onstage,
performing, a
singer's singer,
bopping smartly
to his songs:
Me, I'm up there
just trying to relax,
sweating bullets,
my licks awkward,
nervousness
running a lead
pipe up my spine:
Wrestling with
larger angels
is one thing but
so obviously losing
to them onstage
is another: We play
Rick's song and
his soft pop
voice is lost
in howling mix:
He plays the same
solo on his Strat
and doesn't risk
anything and
it sounds great:
I leap all over
the neck of my
blue Hamer
Phantom, trying
to wail, botching
enough to make
Rick glare at me:
The next song is
mine - "Best
Losers in Town" -
-that "hit" song
my vocal coach
reworked for me
into a bouquet
of schmaltzy
pop hooks snarled
in metalish grinds:
"Beast of Burden"
sung by Michael
MacDonald, except
when I sang it,
hoarsely, my
diaphragm became
an iron wall
round my belly:
Rick and Shawn
sing harmony but
the pretty lattice
can't hide the
ruination inside:
Launching into
a solo I know
in my sleep
my hands flutter
and fail like a
plugged duck:
By the time
I finish the song
I'm feeling
defeated: Rare the
moment when I
stood onstage
looking out
rather than
looking on: To
look out on eyes
that size me
as I sized bands
onstage as fitting
or not: Feeling
now pinned
by that indolent
gaze & judged
unworthy in
my motions
& I agree, feeling
them not false but
awkward & self-
conscious: How
foolish I was for
believing I
belonged on this
side of the stage:
A flying boy
with cirrus dreams
inept & mottled
on the stage of
the real so
unable to
measure up
to those stones
my father raised:
A dessication
of spirit shrinking
& shirking the
notes as the set
collapsed round
us: Resolving into
the resolute angst
of Aw Fuck It,
admitting the
defeat of not
measuring up
& finding in
an annihilate
sigh the wings
of abandon:
Who the fuck
cares? Especially
on this night?
In this band?
For this crowd
of punks and
pussies? So
just unsheathe
the loathing of
it all and feel
it limn my
moves, my solos:
Crank that fucker
up & to hell
with fitting in or
pleasing these
assholes: Lift up
from that sorry
ass stage out of
that Legion hall
to join the
beggar angels
flitting about the
balconies of storm,
up where the air
is free as Mary
Poppins sang
with Jane and
Michael Banks
& even their
dour now happy
father, oh, let's go
fly a kite:
Sky bartender,
serve me up some
of that white
lightning: And
so I play through
the rest of the set
with the ease of
a suicide at
his last party:
The playing
always much
better when you
give up hope:
I switch to
keyboards on
"Touch Too Much"
and our sound
seems to congeal
at last (was it
simply subtraction
of a diseased
guitar?): I bobbed
and weaved and
danced over the keys
and Rick hopped
up and down to
the beat while Shawn
smiled, languishing
over his notes:
Even Paul seems
to be getting into
things, nailing
his sax solos
with something
resembling fury:
We sound like
some cross between
Squeeze and Roxy
Music: stylish
bubblegum with
an axe to grind:
Then it's "Lonely
Town," our studio
piece, and we play
it well, hitting
all the notes:
It's the only song
where my guitar
parts fly past
Shawn: Meant as
fills, support,
they're too bladed,
too confident, too
exquisite: Shawn
must feel likewise
because at the end
of the song as I
solo the sweet
lyric turns he
starts mimicking
hitting me:
In jest? I was
out of that band
in two weeks:
But we got our
best applause to
that song: Even
Skins smile: Shawn
made some joke
about Quit That
Rock Shit and
watching the video
I know now he
meant me: Next
we launch
"Scarin' Me," real
confectioner's pop
here, Beatle-ish:
A couple of fat
girls get up to
dance: We finish
the set with
"Down Down Down"
our only co-written
song, the one
with that lingering
progression in
the middle I solo
through which I
can't manage
(again), sweat and
booze and
frustration
finishing off
the rest of what
ever I brought
to the stage
that night: We drive
to a cluttered finish
and it's Goodnight
everyone, we're
Innocent Thieves:
Drifters in a lonely
town & me going
Down, Down, Down:
We heed back to
the bar toweling
sweat thorough
an envelope of
indolent indifference
which moments
before had been
hard applause:
Oh well, drink
up boys: Damage
the headliner
punk bend sets up,
friends of Shawn's,
three synths and
drums: Ten
minutes into
their set one
of the slamdancers
slams askew
into some geek's
girl and the
real fighting
begins: Skinhead
pummels geek
to the floor:
Chair flies across
room: More fights
break out like
lightnings of
a storm: Then the
whole room conflates
in fire with curses
and fists and debris
and shrieking girls:
Shawn tries to get
the baud to stop
but the singer
sez shit man,
this ain't nothing:
This is rock
against racist
violence, not
violence per
se: Chanting,
the skinheads
phalanx out
the door then
suddenly reappear
with fists flailing:
Au obvious clash
of cultures: Cops
arrive, then
fire trucks and
paramedics:
some blood on
the floor (not much),
someone's glasses
stomped into
starbursts of
shatter: I downed
a last couple of
shots of whiskey
from the bar and
sneaked out of there
with just my
guitar, leaving
the bend to pack
up: No honor
among Innocent
Thieves: A bit of
real rock n roll
Thom Duffy
enthused in
his Calendar
review the
following week:
He thought
the energy of
slam a wonderful
& pure antidote
to what we
played (only
our band name
was mentioned
in the review):
And the violence,
ah heck, that was
just overrated
punk abandon:
So my only
media notice
as a guitar player
was for what
happened when
I wasn't playing
what turned out
to be my last gig:




ONE LOVE,
ONE SONG

Singing cannot much avail
unless the song wells from the heart,
unless it's noble love you feel.
My singing's then supreme. For, bold
in the deep joy of my love, I hold
and still direct my mouth, my heart,
my eyes, my understanding art.

-- Bernart de Ventadour (12th cent.)
transl. Jack Lindsay

My love for you and this song
are one in this singular travail
across the empty, gorgeous sea.
Though my ways seem
pathless, I follow my heart
which knows the way
through the wilderness
of waves, seeing with
eyes we share the deeper
darker path of love, an
ache as low as the moon
hangs high over that
silver, abyssal tide.
Our love cannot be
requited though nothing
else will do than that
day or night when
we'll merge at last
and dream and drift
off together into an
endless, clear blue space.
No matter all the
mortal loves that failed
to find you. No matter
all the instruments I've
blunted in my dowse
and reach for you -- penis,
guitar, pen, boat-prow.
No matter this ocean
of ink that grows
between us, filling
the hallows of your
every departure (or
were they all mine?)
with angel-burning tears.
All that matters is
the pure note welling
in my throat with
clarion and halcyon
desire, lofted over that
crystal thalassa like
a breast of pale blue milk
or the lucence of that
afterglow which brimmed
a few beds on a few
nights along this lifelong
row to you. I'm just
another luckless troubadour
marked from birth to
ache and sing to you,
my lady of royal blue seem.
Perchance today I
sing well enough of you
to stir you from your dream.
Smile for me just once
on whatever shore you
now walk. Bless these
penny verses with with
glint of your pure silver.
Kiss me once just over
the crest of the wave
I send to you from
the bottom of this art.

PASSIONATE MUSIC

That passionate music -
How it erases the one
who meant to ride it,
godlike, on a dolphin's back.
Love is not personal
though it wakens in a face.
The sweetness of an idea
blooms redolent in
a shared history,
but this music passes,
like spring. And then what?
Trapped in vernals
of I and Thou, I cannot
write poems. It is only
by taking wing
over the embedded
pair that I have any
measures to sing. Not
that the lovers care
for anything more than
their sighs, their sweet
fricative margins.
Oh well -
on this goes.
Eros now husband
to Psyche. Groom of
orchards far beyond
any bed, I waken
and hunger and surrender
to these words. Forget
that passionate singing,
for it can never end.



SONNET TO ORPHEUS 2.29

Ranier Maria Rilke
transl. Stephen Mitchell

Silent friend of many distances, feel
how your breath enlarges all of space.
Let your presence ring out like a bell
into the night. What feeds upon your face

grows mighty from the nourishment thus offered.
Move through transformation, out and in.
What is the deepest loss you have suffered?
If drinking is bitter, change yourself to wine.

In this immeasurable darkness, be the power
that rounds your sense in their magic ring,
the sense of their mysterious encounter.

And if the earthly no longer knows your name,
whisper to the silent earth: I'm flowing.
To the flashing water say: I am.