Collected Poems 1947-1997 - Ginsberg Allen - Страница 227
- Предыдущая
- 227/287
- Следующая
Student Love
The boy’s fresh faced, 18, big smile
underwear hangs below his shorts, he’s a kid
still growing
legs strong, he hugs me, steps away—
In twenty years thick bellied,
bright eyes dulled with office work,
his children’ll pout in the
bathroom—
Better get in bed with him on top of me now
laughing at my pot belly
before decades pass, bring our bony skulls whispering
to the hospital bedside.
July 31, 1984
The Question
When that dress-gray, gray haired and gray-faced
goblin took charge of me then inside the gate,
which closed behind me for a couple years,
I was still cheerful exceedingly
cheerful nodding out (hadn’t slept for days),
cheerful because taking part in real life
action again, two serious gentlemen
at my shoulders in a night-colored car which
special for me rolled across December’s bridge,
cheerful because I’d yelled out in the street
that this one and that one should be notified,
cheerful because I thought the adventure
a minor excursion, but cheerful also,
because such a gray such a small Uncle
I’d never seen yet, he however
wasn’t cheerful, was reassuringly
bored bananas, boringly signed for
my delivery and boringly
turned my seven pockets inside out,
then with a wooden face confiscated
handkerchief, pocketknife, bunch of keys,
next indifferently requested my belt
and examined personally whether
my underpants operated with string,
yawned apathetic patting me down,
last nearly napping asked for the laces
that wagged lighthearted from my shoetops—
“I can’t walk like this”—he shrugged a shoulder.
Left hand holding my pants up, spellbound by
this unprecedented situation, yet
still cavalier I bowed deep presenting
him with the shoelaces in my right hand.
“What’s the point anyhow? I really don’t
intend to hang myself”—I assured him
lighthearted. “You don’t?” he questioned. … “Why not?”
On his sallow face neither mockery nor hate.
That was when the fear caught up with me.
Istvan Eorsi
Translated with author by A. G. September 5, 1984
In My Kitchen in New York
for Bataan Faigao
Bend knees, shift weight—
Picasso’s blue deathhead self portrait
tacked on refrigerator door—
This is the only space in the apartment
big enough to do T’ai chi—
Straighten right foot & rise—I wonder
if I should have set aside that garbage
pail—
Raise up my hands & bring them back to
shoulders—The towels and pajama
laundry’s hanging on a rope in the hall—
Push down & grasp the sparrow’s tail—
Those paper boxes of grocery bags are
blocking the closed door—
Turn north—I should hang up all
those pots on the stovetop—
Am I holding the world right?—That
Hopi picture on the wall shows
rain & lightning bolt—
Turn right again—thru the door, God
my office space, a mess of
pictures & unanswered letters—
Left on my hips—Thank God Arthur Rimbaud’s
watching me from over the sink—
Single whip—piano’s in the room, well
Steven & Maria finally’ll move to their
own apartment next week! His pants’re
still here & Julius in his bed—
This gesture’s the opposite of St. Francis
in Ecstasy by Bellini—hands
down for me—
I better concentrate on what I’m doing—
weight in belly, move from hips—
No, that was the single whip—that apron’s
hanging on the North wall a year
I haven’t used it once
Except to wipe my hands—the Crane
spreads its wings—have I paid
the electric bill?
Playing the guitar—do I have enough $
to leave the rent paid while I’m
in China?
Brush knee—that was good
halvah, pounded sesame seed,
in the icebox a week—
Withdraw & push—I should
get a loft or giant living room—
The land speculators bought up all
the square feet in Manhattan,
beginning with the Indians—
Cross hands—I should write
- Предыдущая
- 227/287
- Следующая