Paragraph0=I guess what I mean to say to you is that I have always felt that I don't want, or am afraid, to make choices in my life, but rather prefer the EMOTIONS to make them for me, whatever one might decide "emotions" are, finally. I'm as comfortable thinking they are exterior to what I, even incorrectly, call my body and its relations, or can be corollary emanations of them. They might flare behind me brightly like scarves, like the scarves that decapitated Isadora Duncan -- "affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein famously quipped -- when a trail got caught in the spokes of a wheel of the car she was driving in and snapped her neck. Or they might be kept close to the heart, in private, the nesting bird in the breast, to which one turns only on occasion and without causing anybody to notice: in annoyance, or in sorrow. A poem without "fuck" in it is like the proverbial day without sunshine, as Stefan not quite as famously said. The relevance of his remark with what I am writing now might never be clear, but I thought to include it anyway, showing my love for you is not just brain matter in the platonic undercurrents of my psyche, but is as well a pact of desire body and "soul," imagining I have one. &Paragraph1=I know what I mean to write right now is that I often feel I don't like, or want, to make changes in my life, but instead that I need PASSIONS to obviate them for me. But I doubt the "passions" are a terribly modern concept this day and age. I am as happy thinking they are exterior to myself, like goons I could meet at a park who ruin a pleasant twilit night, the gnats playing with my hair on the dry softball field several Narragansetts past returning. In reaction, I elect my body a situation, and I am simply an emanation of it. It might flow behind me like princely dandruff, like the flock of dandruff that humiliated me in grammar school -- "affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein might chime in -- as a seborrheic scurf hung on the spokes of the wheel of my maturity, making this growing man a mere blip on the sexual screen of puberty among my funky, female friends. They were a car driving away snapping my neck. They are near to my heart, in private, the bird interred in my chest, the cooking turkey in the holiday oven of the self, which one turns so as not to cause another bird to burn. A poem without "fuck" in it is like a summer's day without rain, if for a second you hold yourself to love. &Paragraph2=I have something to say to you, but I am trying to write the words down quickly, about making changes in the way I write, since I need BEING to enact WRITING even when merely TYPING, since, however "posthuman," I need SOUL. I'm not sure "soul" is a sexy, chic concept finally, unlike "Cheetohs," a modest American food as malnutritious as it is suitable for framing smashed on a wall. I am happy thinking they are not inside a stomach. I like goons, Narragansetts, the proverbial days of fucking, and Battlestar Galactica. Pretentiously I call soul a SITUATION, and I am simply an emanation of it: an animated dandruff I mean to find affirming, as Gertrude Stein opined: "Affectations can be dangerous." But she was a prissy hiccup on the prepubescent sexual screen of puberty among my funky, female friends. They weigh on my heart, proverbial chicks in my chicken breast, the cooling turd in the Frigidaire patent of the self, to which one turns without making anything else stir. A poem without "fuck" in it is an odorless, plain Jane day without pain, but not if you lease yourself to love. The Byronic racer of the psyche flips into gear as I write this. In service stairs the sweet corruption thrives, a poet said. &Paragraph3=I have something to write, but I don't know how to start. It is about making changes in the way I write, since I know you will read this -- a change in reading. I need SEEING to back WRITING especially when "typing," since, though more modern, more robust, than earlier releases of myself, I need traffic with my past. I need STABILITY. I am not sure "stability" is a terribly modern concept finally, unlike "Cheetohs." I feel suitable for framing smashed on a wall, but this realization is, uh, limiting. I like goons, Narragansetts, Debussy, sex, and Battlestar Galactica. Battlestar Galactica, the new one, is a situation, and I am only an emanation of it, confirming Gertrude Stein when she pedantically observed: "Affectations can be dangerous." She was a ludic prude, despite very true, on the homosexual screen of prepubescent tomfoolery among my funky, female friends. It lolls in my soul like a proverbial cholesterol in the arteries of my chicken breast, a pellucid turd in a recently patented alphabet soup, causing no one an omen, foretastes of cruelty. A poem without "fuck" is like a day without sex, if the provincial racist charges to special effects. In service stairs the sweet corruption thrives, uh. &Paragraph4=I have something to, uh, write but, uh, yeah, I don't really know how, uh, how to say this but, uh, it's about making, uh you know, changes in the way, since I know you will, uh yeah read this, like I need BEING, uh, reading, I don't know man, even WRITING, since, uh, though modern, robust, like earlier releases, dude I'm STOKED, myself. I need my, yeah er, past? I need stability (woah). Haha, I am not sure stability is so cool, like "Cheetohs." Dude, I feel framed, smashed lol on a wall, but this realization is, uh, proverbial? Narragansetts now! Debussy, sex, and Battlestar Galactica now! I am a, uh, a situation, and I am only, uh, also a byproduct, uh like in chem lab, dude, oh, uh, like in the MATRIX. Like, confirming Gertrude Stein when she shit-facedly confided: "Affectations can be dangerous." She sucked, but was so right. And I'm gay and prepubescent, uh, yeah! You are a funky, fertile friend. You loll in my soul like cholesterol, HUNGH! in the arteries of my breast-patient self, HUNGH!, causing no hurt, no pain, uh, yeah like I LIKE you. A poem without "fuck" in it, cool. What are you doing now? Want to, uh, hang out in the service stairs at Steinart? I read books by John Ashbery there, huh. &Paragraph5=I have something to say to you, uh, yeah. But I'm really not good at talking about things, uh. Duh. I suck. I like barely know how to make anything happen, uh, no. Changes, you know, in the way I live, you know, like I need BEING-IN-MY-LIFE to know what to say about life. I don't know, writing... sucks. It's hardly modern, robust, like fighting wars or traveling. I'm not excited about life, myself. I need a past to enliven my present, you know? I don't need stability AT ALL. I'm not sure stability should (like Cheetohs) even be legal. (Haha). Sipping from a very large glass of very inexpensive Vendange Chardonnay, dude, listening to Debussy and writing this, uh, I feel alarmed. But this realization is the proverbial sperm on an analyst's clock, and I am only an afterthought, like I can't believe this is happening to me. SOO Roy Lichtenstein. Like in the MATRIX. Like, haranguing Gertrude Stein when she pathetically jibed: "Affectations can be dangerous." She's a good writer. I'm alive and celibate. You're fertile. But you loll in my soul like an Adderral, pump in my ribs like stale cigarettes: the self. Yeah, I like you. Poems should not use the word "fuck." Want to read John Ashbery at Steinart Hall? &Paragraph6=I guess what I intended to impart to you at our last meeting is that I have felt something for you I don't crave, if that means anything -- it does to me. I cannot like what I crave, that is my Catholic curse. I make decisions, declarations of independence, true, but that's the need of these emotions to determine ME for whatever one might decide my SELF is in the end. Does this make sense? O damn blast my intellect! I'm as happy thinking you are exterior to whatever realistically is my body, but you are also an emanation of it -- of that, I'm quite sure. You trail behind me lightly like scarves, unlike the sashes that dispatched Isadora Duncan ("affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein erroneously let slip) but more ribbons of thought: intent, synaesthetic sorrows, the elixir of memory. You are nearly HEART, but divorced from it. Poems without torques are the stuff of dissertations, while a poem that turns with carnival festivity is like a "proverbial day of sunshine," as Stefan Gislason wrote to me in an email the other day. The relevance of this to what I am writing now is unclear, but I include it just in case. Emails never use the word "fuck." Do you want to read Berryman with me at Faunce? &Paragraph7=I hate the Fibonacci sequence. I tried to tell you this last time we met. I feel it has nothing to do with you, have FELT this for you, if that means anything -- it does to me. I'm a Catholic curse -- a breast man. Mandelbrot? No. A paucity of independence? True. But that's the need of these emotions to determine ME for whatever one might decide my FIX is in case that it matters. It matters. End. Does this make sense? I am no intellect. I'm as happy thinking you are inside me as I'm inside your BLAH, get it? You are also an emanation of it -- uh, like a parasite. Uh, not. Duh. You flutter about me like gaudily-colored scarves in an NY breeze -- "affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein fatuously harped -- a skein of delirious, animated hype... my type. You have my heart but I suck at it. Yeah. Poems are the moss of dissertations, while poems that turn on Stefan Gislason's proverbial sun... nope. The relevance of this to what I am writing now is too clear, but I gloss it just in case. Emails fuck with the brain when you least expect it, know what I mean? Emails fall like rain on God in a john when there is nothing to read. I am vetting my prose for you to weed. Care to analyze Hopkins at Hillel? &Paragraph8=Where are you? YOU BETTER NOT BE SLEEPING WITH AN ELECTRONIC WRITER OR I WILL KICK YOUR ASS. Fibonacci, Mandelbrot, all a crock of shit. I tried to tell you this last time we talked. I feel it has nothing to do with my Catholic curse -- a tits and ass woman, that's what I am. Talan Memmott? Alan Turing? No... The need of the emotions to determine ME for an entire afternoon, what more does life require? Not AI: certainly in bed when it matters, this make sense. I am all intellect: as happy thinking you are nothing but numbers inside me as I am a barcode rubbing against a government spy satellite. You're an example of this -- a paragon of sexual script, but a code nonetheless. Uh, still ill. You flatter me, frankly, kind of like gaudily-colored scarves in a Providence April breeze -- "affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein once gripped -- sprites of Flash-animated webby hype... my kind of trite. You have my heart but I flail at it, for you are fondling it with your platonic toenails. Uh huh. Poems are often written for theses though feces often plays its role, as do doctoral dissertations. Emails by Stefan Gislason... irrelevant, like what I am writing now. I gloss it for luck: Hopkins is love. &Paragraph9=Where are you, now? Driving, parking, now? You better not be sleeping. I have something to say to you, now. And will kick your ass if you are sleeping. Fibonacci, Mandelbrot, nothing for now -- all a hoax. I tried to tell you this last time we talked. I feel it has something to do with my Christian lust -- a tits and ass gal, that's what I am. Parasite? No. BEING is all I need to determine ME for an August afternoon, there is nothing more: life retires. Queerly, this make sense. I'm no intellect: as happy thinking you are not numbers but text INSIDE me as I am a poem rubbing against a fireman's crotch. You're an example of this -- degraded script, poems breathed into a crowd. Still... contagious. I flatter you, true. This poem is like an obstinately-patterned scarf in a New England gust -- "affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein once toasted -- a voice lashing out against the hype. You are kin to my light. You own my heart as I disown my past: STABILITY you fondle with your able perspective, keen sight. O fiction written for an undergrad thesis, be an email now from Stefan Gislason... smugly irreverent, if terrible luck. I am RAPING for you to BECOME. I'm waiting for you to return my Hopkins. &Paragraph10=Who are you? Are you sleeping? I have so many questions, but you curl next to me like an unsweatered cat: I can only hold your shoulders, await for you to resurrect. I have some hoax I hope to reveal: that I've tried, but cannot, THINK. It has little truck with my suburban prejudices: my lusts -- a tits and ass man, that's what I am -- pathetic. BEING that though not wanting to BE, for just a single afternoon: life retires when I sleep next to you, I can barely speak. Strangely, you make no sense: you sleep. I'm all disease: as happy thinking you are numbers and text, a weather clouding all my vectors, my present tense. You're a gospel -- a gilded message -- "X" marked "contagious" because it violates ME. This poem is one such example: scarves in a syntactic breeze -- "affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein stupidly hinted -- a voice laughing at my type. You gasp when I bite. You fondle my ass with your acid trust, your bleeding cut. Fictions written as serial emails move like worms through a decaying gut, asking for the check: literate smut. I am retracing these words for you to arrive between them: I want you to awaken, to become. I'm waiting for you to RESUME, like Hopkins after his death. &Paragraph11=I am out of patience. WHEN are you? You have no right to not be here when I am swamped with criminal misgivings. I do not have answers, you have questions: we are sorely vexed. I can only hold your shoulders, wait for you to awaken: our shadow grave. An UNurban luxury. The extreme austerity of an almost empty mind, our only remorse: thinking. That is what I am -- the letters clutter and fall into the bathetic "infinite," a booby prize for those of us vaguely anxious, "unstable." You ask me to stop taking my pills, you remark that life retires when I sleep next to you, you can barely speak: you die. I'm all cause, but you are no reaction, all obviating rumors and paralyzed reflexes, an emotional whirlwind that sabotages my defenses. So I sit, still, my texts "contagious" because all your diseases are fatal: they choke. This prose for example. As Gertrude Stein preternaturally averred: "affectations can be dangerous." She had it right, you shirk at my thesis. You soil my heart with your toxic distrust: you are greedy for a butt. Emails I sent to Costa Rica to ask and beg you, careen like sin through an honest gut. I want these words to ARRIVE you between them. I want them to WRITHE, and free your life. &Paragraph12=I wander the island, inventing it. This small, secretive bay just below what was once the caretaker's cabin. Wrought-iron poker, grass, the caretaker's son soiling the ruins. A boat, two girls upon it, coming in off the lake, slowly toward the shore. One girl standing forward, fashionbook-trim, in tight gold pants, frowns down over her shoulder at her sister: the tiny muscles by her ears tense and ripple. The sister, whose name is Karen (she wears a yellow dress, beige cardigan over it) remains in the boat as the one in gold pants disembarks. I guess what I mean to say to you is that I have always felt that I don't need, or want, to make such choices, even as an island swims before me, thwarting the idle contexts of these words: I am happy thinking they are not internal to my body, my skin, but emanations. Like the scarf that snagged Isadora Duncan an easy death ("affectations can be dangerous," Stein quipped) when it got wound in the wheel of her roofless car, this island drags me deeper into something else: writing. It is like the proverbial night without stars, revealing a love for you that is not simply a matter for the meager sovereign of my island, but brings us further into the verity of text. &Paragraph13=I deposit shadows and dampness, spin webs and scatter ruins. A guest cabin, a porch, a tattered screen door. The girl who wears gold pants disembarks, watches as the other girl picks up a yellowish-gray rope from the bottom of the boat, tosses it to her. A tall slender man, dressed in slacks and a white turtleneck, leans against a stone parapet smoking a pipe. He believes he heard a motorboat come to the island. A wrought- iron poker lies in the grass as the caretaker's son deposits redolent love letters in the bathrooms: he shits everywhere. I guess what I want to say to you is: there are antechambers to everything I want to say to you, and these are them. That I beg patience as I track this island in correspondence your imagination might not glean the cruxes of, as letters thwart the easy commune of these words. I am happy knowing they are my skin. "Affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein was heard to have quipped, just as the man, the caretaker, never trusts what he hears, but DEDUCES an aura. A sound drags me: writing. It is like the proverbial day without rain: my love for you that is not simply a matter for the meager sovereign of evening, but casts us deeper toward the aftermath of sex. &Paragraph14=I put it there. Has he heard a motorboat come to the island? The caretaker's son observes their approach through a broken window of the guest cabin. I put him there. He is stocky and dark, muscular, hairy, with short, bowed legs. His long hair slips down his back, his genitals hang thick and heavy below him and his buttocks are shaggy. I did that. Where are they? his small eyes seem to ask. The girl in gold pants? Yes. The other one, Karen? Also. They are sisters. I brought them out here, as I did the rope, snakes, poker. I put those redolent love letters in the bathroom: his shit. My work is complete. I guess what I want to say is: what puts you here puts words behind you. To say be YOU, these must be them, also. Thus, I beg patience as I track this poem, like a serial TV show, or a "Fantasy Island," if you'll forgive a bad pun. Off balance allusions wend through the blanks between words -- you might not attain the meaning: blanks thwart meanly a lucid passage of prose. I am happy knowing nothing, as Gertrude Stein said it: "Affectations can be dangerous." I put her there: Stein, the caretaker, the two girls. It's the proverbial NTH day of creation but my first birth. I swerve into the path of love. &Paragraph15=Squeamishly, she touches it, grips it, picks it up, turns it over. Not so rusty on the underside -- but bugs! MILLIONS of them! She drops the thing, shudders, stands, wipes her hands several times on her pants, shudders again. A few steps away she pauses, glances about at everything near her, memorizing the place probably. She hurries up the path, sees her sister already at the first guest cabin. (A guest cabin, a porch, a tattered screen door.) A tall slender man, dressed in slacks and a white turtleneck, leans back and smokes a pipe. He has heard a girl's voice shout "Karen" after a motorboat cut its engine. The caretaker's son limps into the ink dark shadows. I guess what I want to say to you is: there are antechambers to everything. "Affectations can be dangerous," Stein joked, but antechambers have their use, just as chamber pots repose in the shadows of early novels. As the caretaker trusts what he reads, he hears -- what I write never trusts what is said but is his ear's quarry. (A sound drugs me.) What is it that our friend Stefan, infamously, once remarked: a poem without "fuck" is like the proverbial day without sun? Love is never a matter for the eager analyst of the word, if that matters. &Paragraph16=Squeamishly, he touches it, grasps it, picks it up, turns it over. Not so rusty on the underside -- but bugs! MILLIONS of them! He drops the thing, shudders, recoils, wipes his hands several times on his pants, recoils again. Many feet away he stumbles, in fact, hurries up the path, sees Karen nearly at the first guest cabin. (A guest cabin with a tattered screen door.) A tall slender woman dressed in tight golden pants, a flouncy blouse, leans backward into the kitchen, but quickly returns. He hears a voice shout "Karen." Is it hers? The son of the caretaker shrinks into the dampened shadows, insanely alert. I guess what I aim to prove is, there are inverses to everything: black turns to white with one sweep of the keys. "Affectations can be dangerous," Stein pouted, but reversals have their uses, just as spaceships doze in the shoulders of hovering Venus. As the caretaker trusts what Karen reads, he hears -- what I write never blames what is written but is an ill ear's verity. (Sound seduces me.) What is it that Stefan -- tall guy with famous hair -- once replied: a poem without "fuck" in it is like the proverbial wine sans bread? Love is not a subject for the seminarian of vision, but lies within. &Paragraph17=Squeamishly, she touches it, grips it, picks it up, turns it over. Not so rusty on the underside -- but bugs! MILLIONS of them! She kisses the tip -- POOF! "Thanks," the Knight says, smiling down at her. (The caretaker's son retreats deep into the mottled shade of a bush.) She drops the thing, shudders, stands, wipes her hands several times on her pants, shudders again. She kisses it -- POOF! Before her appears a tall man, slender, handsome, dressed in dark slacks, white turtleneck, jacket, smoking a pipe. (The caretaker's son, genitals heavy below him, eyes aglitter, slinks into the speckled umbrage.) A motorboat cuts its engine. A girl's voice shouts, "Karen!" What I want to say is: there is a counterpoint to this story we hear, just as product spoils our appreciation of trash or creation our need to destroy. T.S. Eliot wrote: "Poets ought to know as much as will not encroach upon their... necessary laziness." (Frankly amended.) Or as a chamber pot reposes in the shadows of early novels, the caretaker's son seems to be viewing us from the prick of a hero's vantage. "Affectations can be dangerous," Gertrude Stein (frankly repetitive) joked about death, but poems never vulgar are words avoiding life. &Paragraph18=Squeamishly, she touches it, grips it, picks it up, turns it over. She kisses the tip -- POOF! "Thanks," the Knight says, smiling down at her. A motorboat cuts its engine. The girl's voice shouts, "Karen!" Karen passes deftly through the house as if familiar with it. The girls have gone. "Oh Karen, it's so very sad!" She hears someone call her name. Saxifrage and shinleaf. The caretaker's son squats joyfully above the blue teakettle, depositing... a love letter. "Mmm." She sticks an iron poker between her teeth. "How did you know to kiss it?" he asks. "Call it woman's intuition," she says with a shrug. I never get a chance to say this: there is chaos within this production, for words jut out like kamikaze luddites, intent on thwarting our parsing's slow action -- amply "paratactic" in modern parlance, if deaf to what we call function. "Poets only know what does not encroach upon a necessary laziness," Eliot (sort of) said. The caretaker's son, genitals warting, shrugs. Two girls play "chopsticks" on a green, grand piano. Stein: "Affectations can be dangerous" Gertrude Stein griped about scarves, but poems not at some point pedestrian vulgar are songs void of words Fards. A girl in gold pants -- comas &Paragraph19=The bay once possessed its own system of docks, built out to protect boats from the rocks along the shore. Silver fish as thin as fingernails fog the bottom. Bedded deep in the grass near the path to the first guest cabin lies the wrought-iron poker, long, slender, with an intricately worked handle. The rust that clings to it is a warm orange. The main house is a mansion from which extends a kind of veranda or terrace high out on the promontory giving a spectacular view of the lake. The mansion has many rooms cluttered with debris. Fireplaces and a musty basement, wasps' nests, a grand hexagonal loggia and bright red doors. A green grand piano, its wires pulled. I never get a chance to see quite as clearly as I do now the frame of our geography, for syllables joust, projectiles, or reek in their corners, dismaying us. Like kamikaze luddites, we charge through the glass beyond intention, frankly, or ON something, yet hardly emoting. Intent on warping being's dim action, poets are lazy. Two poets play "chopsticks" on grand pianos but can't screw in a light bulb. Stein: "Affectations can be dangerous," but of other things she did not tell. Old songs are idle echoes, like anthems penned on a desert isle. &Paragraph20="Karen!" the girl in pants calls from outside. (She has just kissed the iron poker?) She bounds up over the rotted second step of the porch and opens the screen door. Karen, about to enter the kitchen (where she saw the caretaker's son?) turns back, smiling. "Karen, I -- oh, GOOD GOD!" (She's discovered the gifts of the caretaker's son? No.) "Judas God!" (Now she has.) She shrieks: "About a hundred million people have gone to the BATHROOM in there!" (Earlier, did she not gush: "They even had ELECTRICITY"?) And do they see a green grand piano? I think (intent on warping being's thin fiction?) I am next. I am next to your body now, waiting for you to call. (Others are simple who, vulgar, merely talk.) One can't screw in the dark so we play on pianos or doze in the shadows of credible novellas. (Of other things, did she not tell?) "Affectations can be dangerous" I seem to remember (did I not ever know?), as was once said by a writer who recoiled from fact. (I suck at remembering: was it HER intention?) Planning to dissemble I retain very little, like the genital's son whose cares are unknowing. What I want to say is: I'm a fount of forgetting. In service stairs the sweet corruption thrives, a poet sang. &Paragraph21=In service stairs the sweet corruption thrives, a poet sang. SOMEONE GOES AROUND THE ROOMS AND DRIVES HIS FISTS INTO EACH WALL, SHATTERS EVERY WINDOW, BECAUSE HE WANTS TO HURT. WHERE HAVE ALL THE PRINCES GONE? BUT IT ISN'T THOSE WHO PINE AFTER THINGS THEY WANT OR NEED OR EVEN DON'T NEED AND TAKE THEM AS THEY PLEASE, IT'S THE PEOPLE WHO DESTROY, DESTROY BECAUSE... LUST! THAT'S ALL, KAREN! AND THEY'VE PULLED THE STRINGS FROM THE GRAND GREEN PIANO! AND THEN THEY WENT TO THE BATHROOM ON IT ALL! IT'S A SAD PLACE. SAD, AND YET ALL TOO RIGHT FOR ME, I SUPPOSE. (The girl in gold pants is waxing philosophical.) WHAT I MEAN TO SAY IS, I'M SO MISERABLE. AND YET SOMETIMES I BELIEVE THAT I CAN DRAW. CALL IT AN ODD, SEMI-PRECIOUS URGE. I AM SIMPLE AND VULGAR -- JUST LOOK AT MY GOLDEN PANTS, FROM WHICH I HAVE HOPED FOR YEARS TO BE DISINTERRED. AN AUTHOR OR PRINCE, A KNIGHT OR COMEDIAN, MIGHT COME WHO COULD FIDGET MY SLIM LEGS FROM WITHIN THEM. I WANT TO DRAW HIM (but he's not on the island) OR FREE HIM FROM THE CELL OF A MAGIC WROUGHT- IRON POKER (yes, he is the object). IT MIGHT MAKE ME SEEM AN UNDEFINED WOMAN, AND "AFFECTATIONS CAN BE DANGEROUS," I SEEM TO REMEMBER. BUT IT'S SOMETHING I WANT TO DO, SO I'LL DO IT. &Paragraph22=I guess what I am trying to say to you is that I've designed an island: you are now on it. I've put there a faltering old mansion, a goon who walks around without his pants on, a few objects with curious Freudian resonances (a snake, a spider, not to mention a wrought-iron poker) and a tall, slender, if a bit smarmy man who wears a turtleneck sweater, jacket, and smokes pipes (and resembles not a little porn publisher Hugh Hefner circa 1969, the year that I was born in). "In service stairs the sweet corruption thrives," the poet Ashbery wrote (iambic pentameter) in his poem "Pyrography." I am attracted to you as I am to the girl with gold pants, that is obvious. I am attracted to the fly in the sun and to the laughter you animate the smarmy man in the turtleneck with as he is being drawn, depicted as he is a stocky moron who refuses to honor his drawers. This I am trying to impress upon you: to love's to err, and in error we are one, though the future, thus, is not so much a moving forward as moving through, like scarves tossed in the breeze, joint boredoms simultaneously (as Ezra Pound once wrote) "exquisite and excessive." So speak to me. ("Affectations can be dangerous," as Stein once prophesied.) &Paragraph23=Once upon a time there was a beautiful young Princess who in tight gold pants made the author of novels and poems write a fairy tale instead that involved a dashing if not very smart Knight and a hirsute if somewhat clever, lustful Caretaker's Son who steals the Magic Poker which he could do because his father's connections were strong and shows up on the day the tournament for the Princess takes place and so he points the Magic Poker at her golden haunches saying VOILA so the pants fall in a puddle on the floor while the Princess rebounds by kissing the Magic Poker producing a Knight in gleaming white and navy blue armor smoking a pipe who smites with his sword the runt of a suitor but a wee bit too soon for she is now a widow (this Princess of the kingdom) as she married the runt the moment she was freed. I guess what I mean to say is that my body is just one manifestation of what I feel for you the other makes sense only in story something manifold with many voices clinging to its coil weaving in and out brightly like scarves rolling you inside them though finally not too ready for the revelation of your words and the body that you offer once you lunge from behind them oh my spurious affectations! &Paragraph24=How can anybody dislike CHEESE? If you don't mind my pushing this question further: does sanity yet exist in New England, in Little Belknap's head for example, he who deigns not take his cheese even with his spaghetti (the two DO go together), he who, without a touch of foreign blood, yet manages a curb on all the subtle decencies, those on which I depend and can barely survive without: cheese, cheese and more CHEESE! Hate Roquefort, dislike cottage cheese, rarely tolerate Camembert and Brie, and am neutral about Limburger (this last of which I've only tried once at Whitehead's a year ago this spring). I guess what I mean to write presently is: cheese. That made by Kraft -- the common, vulgar variety -- I have always felt I want, or need when I cannot make purer choices, when Rhode Island rises before me, retarding the ample gravity of these words. I am happy thinking cheese is internal to my body, my skin, my emanations, like the scarves that caught the dancer Isadora, compelling her to an early death ("affectations can be dangerous," the poetaster Stein humorlessly parried) when it tangled in the spokes of a horseless carriage. Providence drags ME deeper into writing, but it's cheese I lately love. &Paragraph25=Sonia, I am writing this under an appreciable mental strain, since by tonight I shall be no more. My supply of the "drug" which alone makes my life endurable, cheese... I'm joking of course, seeking to cheer you up in your subpar city. But how (again) can anybody dislike CHEESE? Little Belknap, that odd fellow, was by here again today and was recalcitrant. We are very much in agreement on other things -- beans for example. Not many doors away, on the other side of Willoughby St., is a restaurant that specializes in home-baked beans. A serving of beans is fifteen cents, with pork, twenty cents. Belknap, without a touch of foreign blood, and who can enjoy a potato in fried form and Postum, nonetheless remains this figure of the tyro when concerning the fine decencies: cheese, cheese, and more CHEESE. What I mean to write to you is: New England is mine, and it owes me a living, and the idea of you in New York with migrant cretins is driving me insane. Affectations can be dangerous, this I know heartily, so I do not write in order to inflate undue desire for my presence. You engage me deeper into my writing -- the Dagon swims before me, fish of hate. Though it's cheese I love, it's you that I am craving. &Paragraph26=I am writing this since I may not write again, as by tonight I shall be no more. Ampoules of that which alone is a mind's balm, my sense of self... I'm joking, no SELF reveals itself at any time of my writing, and that's a relief. I am brashly trying to enliven your mind with my thoughts on life, as how (again) can anybody dislike HEALTH? Little Belknap, a dwarf, but with a normal-sized skull, is no paragon. Of vegetables, I like peas and onions, can tolerate cabbage and turnips, am neutral toward cauliflower, and have no deep enmity toward a carrot, will dodge parsnips and asparagus, shun string beans and brussel sprouts and venomously abominate spinach. I like rhubarb... Belknap, with a drop of Asian blood, likes Postum but recoils at these opinions. Why bother? "Affectations can be dangerous," as Gertrude Stein, the expat's expat, loopily expressed, and though New England is blind and blows me off, New York with its miscreant hordes only lures the white race into miscegenation and passivity. This I believe heartily: I write to instigate an appetite within me for your scent. You drag me deep into story, as the Dagon masticates on humanity before me. Let me lure you to fate, though the ruse be love. &Paragraph27=I'm writing: Hershey's sweet chocolate is one of my favorite nibbles. I'm drifting aimlessly beneath a scorching sun. I'm no more, in nearly any form. Vials of that which alone is my heart's tomb, my soul's menace... I'm joking, you know: coco is not so much my disease (unlike cheese) though it provides a relief from this black tension. I'm merely trying to angle my imagination with these notes on health, as how can anyone frankly disregard FRUIT? What an unsubtle condition, what an attitudinal FAUX PAS, what a mental divorce! Little Belknap, himself a joke, but with a nominal investment in the NORMAL, recalled: he likes peas and onions, cannot humor cabbage and turnips, is neutral toward cauliflower, but doesn't tolerate parsnips and asparagus at all, which (in THAT case) is as it should be. With a drop of Indian blood, Belknap likes bagels and Postum, but recoils at jellies and jams. What do I mean? What was it that Christopher Smart said: Affectations can be dangerous? Or was that Stein, the Jew? Though New England is lurid and it snows in July, New York with its mixing minions only divides the white race between the haves and have-nots, and I'm thirty-four with no job skill. Am I too old to love? &Paragraph28=Sonia... Sonia... Sonia... you are great. But, as for jam or jelly, I am your utter opposite, for I enjoy it so well that I pile on amounts thicker than the bread that sustains them! Only joking. I'm drifting aimlessly beneath a scorching sun. I'm no more. I am coursing and free. Capsules of whatever it is that is my bastard being's substance (unlike cheese) does not do me justice, perverts my sexuality with these notes on love, as how can anyone frankly disregard BED? What a tragic condition, what an attitudinal JE NE SAIS QUAS, what a venal hoarse call! Little Belknap, he the poet and dissembler, but with a nominal investment in the ARMY, said: he prefers peas and scallions, cannot stomach salmon and pike, is ambivalent toward broccoli and masculine destiny, but can't provide the time of day to beets and celery, as (in this latter case) is cool, primarily. He has a drop of Spanish blood but requests lattes and Postum, and recoils at cappuccinos and espressos. I mean... what? What was it Ashbery wrote: "Affectations can be dangerous?" Or was that a young Stein, yet to pen novels? Though England dreams, New York with its colored proletariat keeps me awake with its nightmare of equality. Oh democracy. &Paragraph29=Sonia... Sonia... Sonia... the change happened while I read. There was very little I could do: you are great. As for jam, jelly or cheese, I am your utter slave, for I enjoy what you write so well, I pile on slabs of my being immenser than the page you bred (breed). That sustains me! I'm not joking. I'm drifting breathlessly beneath a cappuccino sun (no kidding), I'm no more than a course without fee (it's near the truth). Pills of whatever I take as my special psychotherapy (unlike virgins in tow) can do me justice, corrupts my homosexuality with pregnant notes from above, as how can anyone accurately canonize TEXT? What a comic condition! What a Borgesian, uh, whatever. What a viral Morse code! Tiny Belknap, he the born tin prophet, but with a tendency toward PHOTOGRAPHY, farted: he prefers peas and scallions, hates Scandinavian Benedicts, is ambivalent toward girls and boys, but can't agree the sun acts upon the sea, the time of day on leeks and parsley, for (in this first case) the moon has a DISEASE. He has a splash of Croatian blood (he vomits with an accent) but digs lattes and Bloody Marys, like a fey ray. I say: yeah. "Affectations can be dangerous"? (Stein?) Or: nightmare on Decency Street. &Paragraph30=I saw protruding from the nasty mud an unending pain. Sonia, the changes happened in bed. On the third morning I saw soil dry enough to walk upon with ease. There was nothing I could do: you ARE, again. As for ice cream, my favorite tastes are vanilla and coffee (the latter difficult to find outside New England), and my least relished common flavor is strawberry. You are my one salve: I have said that the unbroken monotony of the rolling plain was a source of vague horror to me, for I enjoy how you deign to castigate me, to aim insult into my abdomen. That sustains me! I'm not drifting, but I'm not the same: a voice flung. Breathlessly under a modicum of sun (no kidding), I'm coursing, panting, sweating. Whatever I imbibe as my paltry pharmacology (like viruses in pills) affects me NICHTS, affirms my duality with random piano notes like that idiot John Cage. How can anyone truly gamble talents? What a cosmic retaliation! Belknap, never good at pontificating (he has a big head) prefers scotch and olives, pursues girls and boys, but can't see the word martyrs sex. He has a splash of foreign blood, denies the basic decencies: "Affectations can be dangerous" (G. Stein). The neighbors think I'm atrocious. &Paragraph31=Protruding from the mud: a plinth. The script was a language of hieroglyphics unknown to me and unlike anything ever seen in books, consisting largely of conventional aquatic symbols such as fishes, eels, octopi, crustaceans, molluscs, sharks, whales and the like. Sonia, I'm not kidding: the woof warped in bed. Grotesque beyond the imagination of a Poe or Bulwer, they were damnably human in outline despite webbed hands and feet, shockingly wide and flabby lips, glassy, bulging eyes, and other features less pleasant to recall. Sonia, the swill swellt timely. On the third morning I found soil hard enough to trek upon. There was something: MYSELF. Vast, Polyphemus- like, and loathsome, it darted like a creature of nightmares to the monolith, about which it flung its huge, moist, scaly arms, the while it bowed its hideous head and gave vent to a stereograph of certain measured sounds. "Affectations can be dangerous" moaned a plangent G. Stein, and Belknap, being an Albanian American, confirms my guilt with fanciful falsetto. I cannot think of the deep sea without shame at the nameless things that at this very moment are crawling, floundering on its warm, phlegmatic bed. Thus, my preference for ice cream. &Paragraph32=DEAR HOWARD: OH, HOW MY ARTICHOKE HEART QUAKES -- BUT THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEAN. WHAT I MEAN TO WRITE IS... USELESS. I AM NO PEN TO YOUR POE-BRAIN. NOTHING IS OBVIOUS, BUT LENTILS, WHEN PROPERLY PAIRED, PROVIDE ITS DINERS AMINO ACID EXTRAVAGANZA. HOWARD, I'M SERIOUS: MY TENDER BUTTONS WILT IN YOUR STEAD, I AM AT A LOSS AT HOW TO COOL DOWN. FEARING FOOD IS UNFOUNDED, PERHAPS LITTLE BELKNAP HAS YET TO FORK THE CHOICEST CHEESES? THE FAIREST FROMAGE? AS FOR GLASSY, BULGING EYES AND SIMILAR OUTWARD FEATURES: NEW YORK IS MINE, AND IT OWES ME A LIVING, BUT I HAVEN'T SOLD A HAT IN FOUR WEEKS AND WILL HAVE TO SHUT THE MILLINERY. "AFFECTATIONS CAN BE DANGEROUS" SAID A GADFLY (E. NESBIT?) BUT SHE OBVIOUSLY KNEW NOTHING OF FASHION WEEK. SPLENDID SUPPERS NECESSITATE DEPTH, AND DEPTH ISN'T REALIZED BUT IN THE DEEPEST REDS... BUT RED WAS LAST SPRING. MY SWEET HOWARD! (LET ME START AGAIN.) WHAT I MEAN TO SAY IS: DESSERT COMPLETES A MEAL. I ALLOW MYSELF A SMALL DESSERT ONCE A WEEK (FOR I WANT TO STAY, AS THEY SAY, petit -- THE FRENCH HAVE A WAY WITH WORRIES). SEND ME YOUR LATEST WEIRD STORIES, BUT NO MORE GRIEF ABOUT IMMIGRANTS: SOME OF MY BEST FISH ARE GREEK. AND, ALTHOUGH IT IS BEETS I CRAVE, THE BEST SOUPS ARE GREEN. &Paragraph33=Sonia... Sonia... Sonia... thanks for the cheese (which I'll not eat, because it's Greek) and thanks for the letter which I'll reread for the next week (until the cheese doth wilt in my heart, which is weak). Fond of sausage -- most especially the old fashioned baked or fried sort. Like fowl -- but only the white meat. Dark meat I can't bear, but I think you know that already (and I'm not talking about immigrants, green or yellow or Lebanese, much as it freeze my liberalism). Really favourite meal is the regular old New England turkey dinner, with highly seasoned dressing, cranberry sauce, onions, etc. and mince pie for dessert. Yum. (Did I just type "Yum"?) Let me start again... I wander Rhode Island, inventing it (after all, I AM Providence), find poetry in the common, vulgar way neighborhoods shoot up, procreate, or decay. You say it's my Poe-brain -- it is really a love for the horror of life, how it plies my gut... into writing. I'm writing to say plainly: this is my love for you, you make a Spring of me, and though "Affectations can be dangerous," as Gertrude Stein says, you must understand me: I don't despise the Greeks, but the Cape Verdian population makes me crazy. And you are Sonia Greene. &Paragraph34=Sonia... Sonia... Sonia... thanks for the cheese (which I'll eat, because you are Sonia Greene) and thanks for the letter which I have read many times this week, in Greek, Ukrainian, French, and, yes, Portuguese. I've even read it in Jewish (I am a completist.) However, still fond of sausage. One cannot change one's stripes. Yummy. (Did I just type "Yummy," too?) Let me start again... I wander the island, inventing it -- I AM Providence, and find poetry in the coarse, aching way the neighbors ask me for money. You say it's my Defoe-brain -- I am nothing of an islander if I am not IMAGINATIVELY alone, a lantern-jawed, Edwardian Crusoe. Maybe, maybe. "Affectations can be dangerous" I'm well aware (yes, that's Stein), but it is also an addiction to the high horrors of life that emerge only in a pristine solitude, a type that is rare, found only in the bleeding of history into rot that is New England. I'm even beginning to like Cape Verdians, and the tattooed sorts that stumble down Empire Street can almost make me desecrate my celibacy. (I am kidding.) I am writing to write floridly: you are my crisis, my one, and hence, my dilemma: you make a Spring of all, and I've a sun of mud. So, let's get married. &Paragraph35=I guess what I mean to say to you is that I have always felt that I don't need, or want, to make the decisions in my life but rather that I need DEEP HUNGERS to determine them for me whatever one might decide "hunger" is in the end. I have, as is my predilection, often compared them to slimy fish, or to alien, ghastly creatures that have inundated my sensibility, humiliated my consciousness, and rendered towns and villages hells of mindful corpses. As our friend Stefan Gislason (not one of the dead) succinctly wrote: "a poem without ?fuck' in it is like the proverbial day without sunshine" (yes, he's a mensch). But I'm not joking: I like Cape Verdians, and being with you in New York, while brief and trying, was cloud nine for THIS mensch (who is dying). Sonia, a cancer has breached my throat. My affectations, never wholly safe, have betrayed me to dangers. I'm an artist without a net, and now, without you, have barely enough to eat: anxiety snares, rats claw at my intestines, I have paralyzing dreams. I made seventy-five cents on my latest story, and though I'm being paid to edit, carpal tunnel slays my wrists, and I have little to cash but cliche. I love you, Sonia Greene. Til we meet in the Cave...