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Poetry || SubmissionsFive Poems by Richard FeinName droppingIn order to answer Adorno's question,'can there be poetry after Auschwitz?' Yevtushenko counting bones at that cavernous ditch, Carolyn Forche recounting hacked-off ears at the dinner table, Dylan Thomas in his later years refusing to cry for a child buried in debris--- and as Alan Ginsberg directs, an Iraqi Kurd properly postured for deep breathing, sitting like The Buddha in lotus, in serene stillness against a burnt out village hut, after deeply inhaling the almond sweetness effused from an accurately aimed cyanide gas bomb. The perfectionistOn the seventh day He rested,put down His heaven-high quill, held up His star-speckled parchment, beheld His handiwork and saw that it was good. Saw that it was good. And He lay down, but could not sleep. And on the eighth day rose and on each day henceforth rose and, like any driven author, He revised. Cetacean creedSuppose our fantasies about them were true,they really had refined their songs into a melody of words, and merged their herds into tribes, invented politics, became aware of death, and finally yearned for a faith. All their feelings would be expressed lyrically and through the flux of pressure waves. Comrades would swim in tight formation. Soon a whale messiah, a supreme bard, would call the wayward, singing that none should swim alone, each should buoy the other in his slipstream. In a world of motion, this messiah's call would travel the deepest currents across the oceans, and all whaledom would gather and be swayed as he moved, and be anointed by the gentle touch of his fluke. The common prayer, a breach into the air. They'd feel the winds which by their creed would sail upward to the inverted blue sea. The clouds would be worshipped as the sprays of ancestors. Purgatory would be the rocky shore, the shoals pressed hard against their breasts in a world where hardness was unknown except at the end of their lives. But their bard would see beyond the dry terrain to the most distant shore where the heavenly sea curved down to the land. He'd sing of their loved ones who had washed ashore, those ancestors who crawled on earth, their sins scraped away by sand and stone till they reached the horizon of the heavenly sea. There they'd rise again, swimming upward, breaching, spouting, filling the air with clouds, while below those left behind would swim together with their bard. In their world the living and the eternally living would swim in tandem across parallel seas. The arthritic radical contemplates his caneIt either is or isn't,but now upon long pondering it's definitely neither, or both, or something in between maybe. Certainly it's not in focus, if it ever was, if there ever was a focus, if there ever was an it. A malady of aging eyeballs perhaps creeping cataracts, myopia, or very bad eye strain. The world's firebrand has spent a lifetime kicking ass, but the cheeks became tighter or tougher, or too many hard-asses moved to the head of the line. Priorities must now be rearranged, mend your sore toe. Endure Epsom salts and hot water, rather than police hoses spraying cold jets of water. Turn off the news. Dial easy listening. Listen to mood music instead of anthems. Rip the banner off the pole, and use the pole as a cane, if it fits your now stooping posture. And if doesn't buy a cane that fits. And if the price is too exorbitant, protest. Gather the similarly exploited. Smash barricades with wheelchairs if need be. Be nonviolent but bombard the cops with empty Geritol bottles if negotiations break down. The daughter's versionBeyond the door our father's shouts were loudest of all,his voice so familiar, his words too clearly understood. We huddled close to mother, all she could do was sob. The two strangers, those unwanted guests, watched -- unmoved. Out there our father bargained by offering us as virgin goods, ripe for taking in return for the "inviolate sanctity" of his guests. The mob went blind with lust. When father finally returned, mother looked at him once, no more. Our father, tall as a temple column. When we were girls how we'd run to him when he'd open the door. We'd climb, kiss, and hug him. But that evening our past was cut. Mother cried salty, salty, tears. Next morning the maelstrom. For our sakes mother fled with him so far but no farther. Her legs rebelled. Turning she sat down still as a stone. The ash covered her. "Mother, Mother, get up, we cried." No use. She wouldn't turn even to look at us. To look at us, she'd have to look at him. Sodom was hellish even before that day. But even in hell there's a camaraderie among the damned. And not all hated us, or were hellish. There were children who played tag by our door, and the mothers who watched over them. Their screams we also heard in the searing wind. Those two unwanted angels, their inventory was incomplete. Only the men were counted, and we, we . . . Sister pass the wine; we have no father now. But let's hug him once more. But not kiss. Let's keep our lips from him, always. Sisters don't worry. The God of our great uncle is sated and silent. Everyone, everything is ash, even sin. Sisters pass the wine, we'll make him drink. When he rises from his stupor we'll tell him. Let him pray to Sodom's destroyer for forgiveness. Let's use him as he used us. Let's do a pantomime of love, and bear unloving sons. Richard Fein can be reached through bardofbyte@aol.com Today's Situation
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