Conditional Poetics

The poets of my time are muscular. They eat Capitalism for lunch and fight to digest it much as wild dogs keep down their food by staggering. The poets are staggering in the alley between the old fisherman’s church and what used to be the Bowery in lower Manhattan.

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It is hard to hold Capitalism down; difficult to breathe; nearly impossible to hold one’s head up. No one is less admired than a ruined dog. Even so the poets wave their diplomas and their grants and awards as if they were selling programs at a ball park. Surely someone will admire a poem. 

 

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Mise en scene: three or four poets retreat to an abbey and try to make a go of interpolation. The grounsman comes around with a sack of potatoes; tells them they’re still Capitalists.

 

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Electricity cam make a poet look taller. I know a poet who rubs himself with a cat’s skin imported from Helsinki. When he feels tall enough he goes to a fine restaurant.

 

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The poet next door looks up from the newspaper. He sees a girl’s bonnet, a yellow hat floating between the poplars. Because he is a poet he thinks he must know what this means. It is terrible really to suspect it means nothing. 

 

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The poets have been on the sea. They’re mercantile poets. They carry goods and hold tight to what remains of their instincts. Meaning or no meaning there must be money. Poetry in our time is tromp le oleo and  there must be poems on the shelves.  Poems with which you can butter your bread…Of course then you have to keep the stuff down. The poet who can hold the most Capital in his gut is the winner and  gets invited to Washington. 

 

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They have been eating money the poets. They appear very strong. It is hard to walk or concentrate with money inside you. Of course this is when traditional forms come in handy.

 

S.K.