The New Creatures




I

Snakeskin jacket
Indian eyes
Brilliant hair

He moves in disturbed
Nile Insect
Air

II

You parade thru the soft summer
We watch your eager rifle decay
Your wilderness
Your teeming emptiness
Pale forests on verge of light decline.

More of your miracles
More of your magic arms

III

Bitter grazing in sick pastures
Animal sadness & the daybed
Whipping.
Iron curtains pried open.
The elaborate sun implies
Dust, knives, voices.

Call out of the Wilderness
Call out of fever, receiving
The wet dreams of an Aztec King.

IV

The banks are high & overgrown rich with warm green danger.
Unlock the canals.
Punish our sister's sweet playmate distress.
Do you want us that way with the rest?
Do you adore us?
When you return will you still want to play w/ us?

V

Fall down.
Strange gods arrive in fast enemy poses.
Their shirts are soft marrying cloth and hair together.
All along their arms ornaments conceal veins bluer
That blood pretending welcome.
Soft lizard eyes connect.
Their soft drained insect cries erect new fear, where fears reign.
The rustling of sex against their skin.
The wind withdraws all sound.
Stamp your witness on the punished ground.

VI

Wounds, stags, & arrows
Hooded flashing legs plunge near the tranquil women.
Startling obedience from the pool people.
Astonishing caves to plunder.
Loose, nerveless ballets of looting.
Boys are running.
Girls are screaming, falling.
The air is thick w/ smoke.
Dead crackling wires dance pools of sea blood.

VII

Lizard woman
With your insect eyes
With your wild surprise.
Warm daughter of silence.
Venom.
Turn your back w/ a slither of moaning wisdom.
The unblinking blind eyes behind walls new histories rise
And wake growling & whining the weird dawn of dreams.
Dogs lie sleeping.
The wolf howls.
A creature lives out the war.
A forest.
A rustle of cut words, choking river.

VIII

The snake, the lizard, the insect eye
The huntsman's green obedience.
Quick, in raw time, serving stealth & slumber,
Grinding warm forests into restless lumber.

Now for the valley.
Now for the syrup hair.
Stabbing the eyes, widening skies
Behind the skull bone.
Swift end of hunting.
Hug round the swollen torn breast & red-stained throat.
The hounds gloat.
Take her home.
Carry our sister's body, back to the boat.

A pair of Wings
Crash
High winds of Karma

Sirens

Laughter & young voices in the mts.

Saints
The Negro, Africa
Tattoo
Eyes like time

Build temporary habitations, games
& chambers, play there, hide.

First man stood, shifting stance
While germs of sight
Unfurl'd Flags in his skull

And quickening, hair, nails, skin
Turned slowly, whirl'd, in
The warm aquarium, warm
Wheel turning.

Cave fish, eels, & gray salamanders
Turn in their night career of sleep.

The idea of vision escapes
The animal worm whose earth
Is an ocean, whose eyes is its body.

The theory is that birth is prompted
By the child's desire to leave the womb.
But in the photograph an unborn horse's
Neck strains inward w/ legs scooped out.

From this everything follows:

Swallow milk at the breast
Until there's no milk.

Squeeze wealth at the rim
Until tile pools claim it.

He swallows seed, his pride
Until w/ pale mouth legs

She sucks the root, dreading
World to devour child.

Doesn't the ground swallow me
When I die, or the sea
If I die at sea?

The City. Hive, Web, or severed
Insect mound. All citizens heirs
Of the same royal parent.

The caged beast, the holy center,
A garden in the midst of the city.

"See Naples & die."
Jump ship. Rats, sailors
& death.

So many wild pigeons.
Animals ripe w/ new diseases.
"There is only one disease
And I am its catalyst,"
Cried doomed pride of the carrier.

Fighting, dancing, gambling,
Bars, cinemas thrive
In the avid summer.

Savage destiny

Naked girl, seen from behind,

On a natural road

Friends
Explore the labyrinth

- Movie
Young woman left on the desert

A city gone mad w/ fever

Sister of the unicorn, dance
Sisters & brothers of Pyramid
Dance

Mangled hands
Tales of the Old Days
Discovery of the Sacred Pool
Changes
Mute-handed stillness baby cry

The wild dog
The sacred beast

Find her!

He goes to see the girl
Of the ghetto
Dark savage streets.
A hut, lighted by candle.
She is magician
Female prophet
Sorceress
Dressed in the past
All arrayed.

The stars
The moon
She reads the future
In your hand.

The walls are garish red
The stairs
High discordant screaming
She has the tokens.
"You too"
"Don't go"
He flees.
Music renews.

The mating-pit.
"Salvation"
Tempted to leap in circle.

Negroes riot.

Fear the Lords who are secret among us.
The Lords are w/ in us.
Born of sloth & cowardice.

He spoke to me. He frightened
Me w/ laughter. He took
My hand, & led me past
Silence into cool whispered
Bells.

A file of young people
Going thru a small woods

They are filming something
In the street, in front of
Our house.

Walking to the riot
Spreads to the houses
The lawns

Suddenly alive now
W/ people
Running

I don't dig what they did
To that girl
Mercy pack
Wild song they sing
As they chop her hands
Nailed to a ghost
Tree

I saw a lynching
Met the strange men of the southern swamp
Cypress was their talk
Fish-call & bird-song
Roots & signs out of all knowing
They chanced to be there
Guides, to the white
Gods.

An armed camp.
Army army
Burning itself in
Feasts.

Jackal, we sniff after the survivors of caravans.
We reap bloody crops on war fields.
No meat of any corpse deprives our lean bellies.
Hunger drives us on scented winds.
Stranger, traveler,
Peer into our eyes & translate
The horrible barking of ancient dogs.

Camel caravans bear
Witness guns to Caesar.
Hordes crawl & seep inside
The walls. The streets
Flow stone. Life goes
On absorbing war. Violence
Kills the temple of no sex.

Terrible shouts start
The journey
- If they had migrated sooner

- a high wailing keening
Piercing animal lament
From a woman
High atop a Mt. tower

- Thin wire fence
In the mind
Dividing the heart

Surreptitiously
They smile
Inviting - Smiling

Choktai
Leave!
Evil
Leave!
No come here
Leave her!

A creature is nursing
Its child
Soft arms around
The head & the neck
A mouth to connect
Leave this child alone
This one is mine
I'm taking her home
Back to the rain

The assassin's bullet
Marries the King
Dissembling miles of air
To kiss the crown.
The Prince rambles in blood.
Ode to the neck
That was groomed
For rape's gown.

Cancer city
Urban fall
Summer sadness
The highways of the old town
Ghosts in cars
Electric shadows

Ensenada
The dead seal
The dog crucifix
Ghosts of the dead car sun.
Stop the car.
Rain. Night.
Feel.

Sea-bird sea-moan
Earthquake murmuring
Fast-burning incense
Clamoring surging
Serpentine road
To the Chinese caves
Home of the winds
The gods of mourning

The city sleeps
& the unhappy children
Roam w/ animal gangs.
They seem to speak
To their friends
The dogs
Who teach them trails.
Who can catch them?
Who can make them come
Inside?

The tent girl
At midnight
Stole to the well
& met her lover there
They talked a while
& laughed
& then he left
She put an orange pillow
On her breast

In the morning
Chief w/drew his troops
& planned a map
The horsemen rose on up
The women fixed the ropes
On tight
The tents are folded now
We march toward the sea

Catalog of Horrors
Descriptions of Natural disaster
Lists of miracles in the divine corridor
Catalog of fish in the divine canal
Catalog of objects in the room
List of things in the sacred river

I

The soft parade has now begun
On Sunset.
Cars come thundering down
The canyon.
Now is the time & the place.
The cars come rumbling.
"You got a cool machine."
These engine beasts
Muttering their soft
Talk. A delight
At night
To hear their quiet voices
Again
After 2 years.

Now the soft parade
Has soon begun.
Cool pools
From a tired land
Sink now
In the peace of evening.
Clouds weaken
& die.
The sun, an orange skull,
Whispers quietly, becomes an
Island, & is gone.

There they are
Watching
Us everything
Will be dark.
The light changed.
We were aware
Knee-deep in the fluttering air
As the ships move on
Trains in their wake.
Trench mouth
Again in the camps.
Gonorrhea
Tell the girl to go home
We need a witness
To the killing.

II

The artists of Hell
Set up easels in parks
The terrible landscape,
Where citizens find anxious pleasure
Preyed upon by savage bands of youths

I can't believe this is happening
I can't believe all these people
Are sniffing each other
& backing away
Teeth grinning
Hair raised, growling, here in
The slaughtered wind

I am ghost killer.
Witnessing to all
My blessed sanction

This is it
No more fun
The death of all joy
Has come.

Do you dare
Deny my
Potency
My kindness
Or forgiveness?
Just try
You will fry
Like the rest
In holiness

And not for a
Penny
Will I spare
Any time
For you
Ghost children
Down there
In the frightening world

You are alone
& have no need of other
You & the child mother
Who bore you
Who weaned you
Who made you man

III

Photo-booth killer
Fragile bandit
Straight from ambush

Kill me!
Kill the child who made
Thee.
Kill the thought-provoking
Senator of lust
Who brought you to this state.

Kill hate
Disease
Warfare
Sadness

Kill badness
Kill madness

Kill photo mother murder tree
Kill me.
Kill yourself
Kill the little blind elf.

The beautiful monster
Vomits a stream of watches
Clocks jewels knives silver
Coins & copper blood

The well of time & trouble
Whiskey bottles perfume
Razor blades beads
Liquid insects hammers
& thin nails the feet of
Birds eagle feathers & claws
Machine parts chrome
Teeth hair shards of
Pottery & skulls the ruins
Of our time the debris by
A lake the gleaming
Beer cans & rust & sable
Menstrual fur

Dance naked on broken
Bones feet bleed & stain
Glass cuts cover your mind
& the dry end of vacuum
Boat white the people
Drop lines in still pools
& pull ancient trout
From the deep home. Scales
Crusted & gleaming green
A knife was stolen. A
Valuable hunting knife
By some strange boys
From the other camp across
The Lake

I

Are these our friends
Racing & shuddering
Thru the calm vales of parliament

My son will not die in the war
He will return
Numbed peasant voice of Orient
Fisherman

Last time you said
This was the only way
Voice of tender young girl

Running & speaking
Infected green jungles

Consult the oracle
Bitter creek
Crawl
They exist on rainwater

Monkey-love
Mantra mate
Maker of brandy

The poison isles
The poison

Take this thin granule
Of evil snakeroot
From the southern
Shore

Way out miracle
Will find thee

The chopper blazed over
Inward click & sure
Blasted matter, made
The time bombs free
Of leprous lands
Spotted w/ hunger
& clinging to law

Please
Show us your ragged head
& silted smiling eyes
Calm in fire
A silky flowered shirt
Edging the eyes, alive
Spidery, distant
Dial lies

Come, calm one
Into the life-try

Already wifelike
Latent, leathery, loose
Lawless, large & languid
She was a kingdom-cry
Legion of lewd marching
Mind-men

Where are your manners
Out there on the sunlit
Desert
Boundless galaxies of dust
Cactus spines, beads
Bleach stones, bottles
& rust cars, stored for shaping

The new man, time-soldier
Picked his way narrowly
Thru the crowded ruins
Of once grave city, gone
Comic now w/ rats
& the insects of refuge

He lives in cars
Goes fruitless thru
The frozen schools
& finds no space
In shades of obedience

The monitors are silenced
The great graveled guard-towers
Sicken on the westward beach
So tired of watching

If only on horse were left
To ride thru the waste
A dog at his side
To sniff meat-maids
Chained on the public poles

There is no more argument
In beds, at night
Blackness is burned
Stare into the parlors of town
Where a woman dances
In her European gown
To the great waltzes
This could be fun
To rule a wasteland

II

Cherry palms
Terrible shores
& more
& many more

This we know
That all are free
In the school-made
Text of the unforgiven

Deceit smiles
Incredible hardships are suffered
By those barely able
To endure

But all will pass
Lie down in green grass
& smile, & muse, & gaze
Upon her smooth
Resemblance
To the mating-Queen
Who it seems
Is in love
W/ the horseman

Now, isn't that fragrant
Sir, isn't that knowing
W/ a wayward careless
Backward glance

July 24, 1968 Los Angeles, The United States, Hawaii


The Lords

Look where we worship.

We all live in the city.

The city forms - often physically, but inevitably psychically - a circle. A
Game. A ring of death with sex at its center. Drive toward outskirts of
City suburbs. At the edge discover zones of sophisticated vice and boredom,
Child prosti- tution. But in the grimy ring immediately surround- ing the
Daylight business district exists the only real crowd life of our mound,
The only street life, night life. Diseased specimens in dollar hotels, low
Boarding houses, bars, pawn shops, burlesques and brothels, in dying
Arcades which never die, in streets and streets of all-night cinemas.

When play dies it becomes the Game. When sex dies it becomes Climax.

All games contain the idea of death.

Baths, bars, the indoor pool. Our injured leader prone on the sweating
Tile. Chlorine on his breath and in his long hair. Lithe, although
Crippled, body of a middle-weight contender. Near him the trusted
Journalist, confidant. He liked men near him with a large sense of life.
But most of the press were vultures descending on the scene for curious
America aplomb. Cameras inside the coffin interviewing worms.

It take large murder to turn rocks in the shade and expose strange worms
Beneath. The lives of our discontented madmen are revealed.

Camera, as all-seeing god, satisfies our longing for omnisciece. To spy on
Others from this height and angle: pedestrians pass in and out of our lens
Like rare aquatic insects.

Yoga powers. To make oneself invisible or small To become gigantic and
Reach to the farthest things. To change the course of nature. To place
Oneself anywhere in space or time. To summon the dead. To exalt senses and
Perceive inaccessible images, of events on other worlds, in one's deepest
Inner mind, or in the minds of others.

The sniper's rifle is an extension of his eye. He kills with injurious
Vision.

The assassin (?), in flight, gravitated with unconscious, instinctual
Insect ease, moth- like, toward a zone of safety, haven from the swarming
Streets. Quickly, he was devoured in the warm, dark, silent maw of the
Physical theater.

Modern circles of Hell: Oswald (?) kills President. Oswald enters taxi.
Oswald stops at rooming house. Oswald leaves taxi. Oswald kills Officer
Tippitt. Oswald sheds jacket. Oswald is captured.

He escaped into a movie house.

In the womb we are blind cave fish.

Everything is vague and dizzy. The skin swells and there is no more
Distinction between parts of the body. An encroaching sound of threatening,
Mocking, monotonous voices. This is fear and attraction of being swallowed.

Inside the dream, button sleep around your body like a glove. Free now of
Space and time. Free to dissolve in the streaming summer.

Sleep is an under-ocean dipped into each night. At morning, awake dripping,
Gasping, eyes stinging.

The eye looks vulgar Inside its ugly shell. Come out in the open In all of
Your Brilliance.

Nothing. The air outside burns my eyes. I'll pull them out and get rid of
The burning.

Crisp hot whiteness City Noon Occupants of plague zone are consumed.

(Santa Ana's are winds off deserts.)

Rip up grating and splash in gutters. The search for water, moisture,
"wetness" of the actor, lover.

"Players" - the child, the actor, and the gambler. The idea of chance is
Absent from the world of the child and primitive. The gambler also feels in
Service of an alien power. Chance is a survival of religion in the modern
City, as is theater, more often cinema, the religion of possession.

What sacrifice, at what price can the city be born?

There are no longer "dancers", the possessed. The cleavage of men into
Actor and spectators is the central fact of our time. We are obsessed with
Heroes who live for us and whom we punish. If all the radios and
Televisions were deprived of their sources of power, all books and
Paintings burned tomorrow, all shows and cinemas closed, all the arts of
Vicarious existence...

We are content with the "given" in sensation's quest. We have been
Metamorphosised from a mad body dancing on hillsides to a pair of eyes
Staring in the dark.

Not one of the prisoners regained sexual balance. Depressions, impotency,
Sleeplessness... erotic dispersion in languages, reading, games, music, and
Gymnastics.

The prisoners built their own theater which testified to an incredible
Surfeit of leisure. A young sailor, forced into female roles, soon became
The "town" darling, for by this time they called themselves a town, and
Elected a mayor, police, aldermen.

In old Russia, the Czar, each year, granted- out of the shrewdness of his
Own soul or one of his advisors' - a week's freedom for one convict in each
Of his prisons. The choice was left to the prisoners themselves and it was
Determined in several ways. Sometimes by vote, sometimes by lot, often by
Force. It was apparent that the chosen must be a man of magic, virility,
Experience, perhaps narrative skill, a man of possibility, in short, a
Hero. Impossible situation at the moment of freedom, impossible selection,
Defining our world in its percussions.

A room moves over a landscape, uprooting the mind, astonishing vision. A
Gray film melts off the eyes, and runs down the cheeks. Farewell.

Modern life is a journey by car. The Passengers change terribly in their
Reeking seats, or roam from car to car, subject to unceasing
Transformation. Inevitable progress is made toward the beginning (there is
No difference in terminals), as we slice through cities, whose ripped
Backsides present a moving picture of windows, signs, streets, buildings.
Sometimes other vessels, closed worlds, vacuums, travel along beside to
Move ahead or fall utterly behind.

Destroy roofs, walls, see in all the rooms at once.

From the air we trapped gods, with the gods' omniscient gaze, but without
Their power to be inside minds and cities as they fly above.

June 30th. On the sun roof. He woke up suddenly. At that instant a jet from
The air base crawled in silence overhead. On the beach, children try to
Leap into its swift shadow.

The bird or insect that stumbles into a room and cannot find the window.
Because they know no "windows."

Wasps, poised in the window, Excellent dancers, detached, are not inclined
Into out chamber.

Room of withering mesh read love's vocabulary in the green lamp of
Tumescent flesh.

When men conceived buildings, and closed themselves in chambers, first
Trees and caves.

(Windows work two ways, mirrors one way.)

You never walk through mirrors or swim through windows.

Cure blindness with a whore's spittle.

In Rome, prostitutes were exhibited on roofs above the public highways for
The dubious hygiene of loose tides of men whose potential lust endangered
The fragile order of power. It is even reported that patrician ladies,
Masked and naked, sometimes offered themselves up to these deprived eyes
For private excitements of their own.

More or less, we're all afflicted with the psychology of the voyeur. Not in
A strictly clinical or criminal sense, but in our whole physical and
Emotional stance before the world. Whenever we seek to break this spell of
Passivity, our actions are cruel and awkward and generally obscene, like an
Invalid who has forgotten how to walk.

The voyeur, the peeper, the Peeping Tom, is a dark comedian. He is
Repulsive in his dark anonymity, in his secret invasion. He is pitifully
Alone. But, strangely, he is able through this same silence and concealment
To make unknowing partner of anyone within his eye's range. This is his
Threat and power.

There are no glass houses. The shades are drawn and "real" life begins.
Some activities are impossible in the open. And these secret events are the
Voyeur's game. He seeks them out with his myriad army of eyes - like the
Child's notion of a Deity who sees all. "Everything?" asks the child. "Yes,
Every- thing," they answer, and the child is left to cope with this divine
Intrusion.

The voyeur is masturbator, the mirror his badge, the window his prey.

Urge to come to terms with the "Outside," by absorbing, interiorizing it. I
Won't come out, you must come in to me. Into my womb-garden where I peer
Out. Where I can construct a universe within the skull, to rival the real.

She said, "Your eyes are always black." The pupil opens to seize the object
Of vision.

Imagery is born of loss. Loss of the "friendly expanses." The breast is
Removed and the face imposes its cold, curious, forceful, and inscrutable
Presence.

You may enjoy life from afar. You may look at things but not taste them.
You may caress the mother only with the eyes.

You cannot touch these phantoms.

French Deck. Solitary stroker of cards. He dealt himself a hand. Turn
Stills of the past in unending permutations, shuffle and begin. Sort the
Images again. And sort them again. This game reveals germs of truth, and
Death.

The world becomes an apparently infinite, yet possibly finite, card game.
Image combinations, permutations, comprise the world game.

A mild possession, devoid of risk, at bottom sterile. With an image there
Is no attendant danger.

Muybridge derived his animal subjects from the Philadelphia Zoological
Garden, male performers from the University. The women were professional
Artists' models, also actresses and dancers, parading nude before the 48
Cameras.

Films are collections of dead pictures which are given artificial
Insemination.

Film spectators are quiet vampires.

Cinema is most totalitarian of the arts. All energy and sensation is sucked
Up into the skull, a cerebral erection, skull bloated with blood. Caligula
Wished a single neck for all his subjects that he could behead a kingdom
With one blow. Cinema is this transforming agent. The body exists for the
Sake of the eyes; it becomes a dry stalk to support these two insatiable
Jewels.

Film confers a kind of spurious eternity.

Each film depends upon all the others and drives you on to others. Cinema
Was a novelty, a scientif- ic toy, until a sufficient body of works had
Been amassed, enough to create an intermittent other world, a powerful,
Infinite mythology to be dipped into at will.

Films have an illusion of timelessness fostered by their regular,
Indomitable appearance.

The appeal of cinema lies in the fear of death.

The modern East creates the greatest body of films. Cinema is a new form of
An ancient tradition - the shadow play. Even their theater is an imitation
Of it. Born in India or China, the shadow show was aligned with religious
Ritual, linked with celebrations which centered around cremation of the
Dead.

It is wrong to assume, as some have done, that cinema belongs to womenn.
Cinema is created by men for the consolation of men.

The shadow plays originally were restricted to male audiences. Men could
View these dream shows from either side of the screen. When women later
Began to be admitted, they were allowed to attend only to shadows.

Male genitals are small faces forming trinities of thieves and Christs
Fathers, sons, and ghosts.

A nose hangs over a wall and two half eyes, sad eyes, mute and handless,
Multiply an endless round of victories.

These dry and secret triumphs, fought in stalls and stamped prisons,
Glorify our walls and scorch our vision.

A horror of empty spaces propagates this seal on private places.

Kynaston's Bride may not appear but the odor of her flesh is never very
Far.

A drunken crowd knocked over the apparatus, and Mayhew's showman,
Exhibiting at Islington Green, burned up, with his mate, inside.

In 1832, Gropius was astounding Paris with his Pleorama. The audience was
Transformed into the crew aboard a ship engaged in battle. Fire, screaming,
Sailor, drowning.

In 1832, Gropius was astounding Paris with his Pleorama. The audience was
Transformed into the crew aboard a ship engaged in battle. Fire, screaming,
Sailor, drowning.

Robert Baker, an Edinburgh artist, while in jail for debt, was struck by
The effect of light shining through the bars of his cell though a letter he
Was reading, and out of this perception he in- vented the first Panorama, a
Concave, transparent picture view of the city.

This invention was soon replaced by the Diorama, which added the illusion
Of movement by shifting the room. Also sounds and novel lighting effects.
Daguerre's London Diorama still stands in Regent's Park, a rare survival,
Since these shows depended always on effects of artificial light, produced
By lamps or gas jets, and nearly always ended in fire.

Phantasmagoria, magic lantern shows, spectacles without substance. They
Achieved complete sensory experiences through noise, incense, lightning,
Water. There may be a time when we'll attend Weather Theaters to recall the
Sensation of rain.

Cinema has evolved in two paths.

One is spectacle. Like the Phantasmagoria, its goal is the creation of a
Total substitute sensory world.

The other is peep show, which claims for its realm both the erotic and
Untampered obser- vance of real life, and imitates the keyhole or voyeur's
Window without need of color, noise, grandeur.

Cinema discovers its fondest affinities, not with painting, literature, or
Theater, but with the popular diversions - comics, chess, French and Tarot
Decks, magazines, and tattooing.

Cinema derives not from painting, literature, sculpture, theater, but from
Ancient popular wizardry. It is the contemporary manifestation of an
Evolving history of shadows, a delight in pictures that move, a belief in
Magic. Its lineage is entwined from the earliest beginning with Priests and
Sorcery, a summoning of phantoms. With, at first, only slight aid of the
Mirror and fire, men called up dark and secret visits from regions in the
Buried mind. In these seances, shades are spirits which ward off evil.

The spectator is a dying animal.

Invoke, palliate, drive away the Dead. Nightly.

Through ventriloquism, gestures, play with objects, and all rare variations
Of the body in space, the shaman signaled his "trip" to an audience which
Shared the journey.

In the seance, the shaman led. A sensuous panic, deliberately evoked
Through drugs, chants, dancing, hurls the shaman into trance. Changed
Voice, convulsive movement. He acts like a madman. These professional
Hysterics, chosen precisely for their psychotic leaning, were once
Esteemed. They mediated between man and spirit-world. Their mental travels
Formed the crux of the religious life of the tribe.

Principle of seance: to cure illness. A mood might overtake a people
Burdened by historical events or dying in a bad landscape. They seek
Deliverance from doom, death, dread. Seek posses- sion, the visit of gods
And powers, a rewinning of the life source from demon possessors. The cure
Is culled from ecstasy. Cure illness or prevent its visit, revive the sick,
And regain stolen, soul.

It is wrong to assume that art needs the spectator in order to be. The film
Runs on without any eyes. The spectator cannot exist without it. It insures
His existence.

The happening/the event in which ether is introduced into a roomful of
People through air vents makes the chemical an actor. Its agent, or
Injector, is an artist-showman who creates a performance to witness
Himself. The people consider themselves audience, while they perform for
Each other, and the gas acts out poems of its own through the medium of the
Human body. This approaches the psychology of the orgy while remaining in
The realm of the Game and its infinite permu- tations.

The aim of the happening is to cure boredom, wash the eyes, make childlike
Reconnections with the stream of life. Its lowest, widest aim is for
Purgation of perception. The happening attempts to engage all the senses,
The total organism, and achieve total response in the face of traditional
Arts which focus on narrower inlets of sensation.

Multimedias are invariably sad comedies. They work as a kind of colorful
Group therapy, a woeful mating of actors and viewers, a mutual
Semimasturbation. The performers seem to need their audience and the
Spectators - the spectators would find these same mild titillations in a
Freak show or Fun Fair and fancier, more complete amusements in a Mexican
Cathouse.

Novices, we watch the moves of silkworms who excite their bodies in moist
Leaves and weave wet nests of hair and skin.

This is a model of our liquid resting world dissolving bone and melting
Marrow opening pores as wide as windows.

The "stranger" was sensed as greatest menace in ancient communities.

Metamorphose. An object is cut off from its name, habits, associations.
Detached, it becomes only the thing, in and of itself. When this
Disintegration into pure existence is at last achieved, the object is free
To become endlessly anything.

The subject says "I see first lots of things which dance... then everything
Becomes gradually connected."

Object as they exist in time the clean eye and camera give us. Not
Falsified by "seeing."

When there are as yet no objects.

Early film makers, who - like the alchemists - delighted in a willful
Obscurity about their craft, in order to withhold their skills from profane
Onlookers.

Separate, purify, reunite. The formula of Ars Magna, and its heir, the
Cinema.

The camera is androgynous machine, a kind of mechanical hermaphrodite.

In his retort the alchemist repeats the work of Nature.

Few would defend a small view of Alchemy as "Mother of Chemistry," and
Confuse its true goal with those external metal arts. Alchemy is an erotic
Science, involved in buried aspects of reality, aimed at purifying and
Transforming all being and matter. Not to suggest that material operations
Are ever abandoned. The adept holds to both the mystical and physical work.

The alchemists detect in the sexual activity of man a correspondence with
The world's creation, with the growth of plants, and with mineral
Formations. When they see the union of rain and earth, they see it in an
Erotic sense, as copulation. And this extends to all natural realms of
Matter. For they can picture love affairs of chemicals and stars, a romance
Of stones, or the fertility of fire.

Strange, fertile correspondences the alchemists sensed in unlikely orders
Of being. Between men and planets, plants and gestures, words and weather.
These disturbing connections: an in- fant's cry and the stroke of silk; the
Whorl of an ear and an appearance of dogs in the yard; a woman's head
Lowered in sleep and the morning dance of cannibals; these are conjunctions
Which transcend the sterile signal of any "willed" montage. These
Juxtapositions of objects, sounds, actions, colors, weapons, wounds, and
Odors shine in an unheard-of way, impossible ways.

Film is nothing when not an illumination of this chain of being which makes
A needle poised in flesh call up explosions in a foreign capital.

Cinema returns us to anima, religion of matter, which gives each thing its
Special divinity and sees gods in all things and beings

Cinema, heir of alchemy, last of an erotic science.

Surround Emperor of Body. Bali Bali dancers Will not break my temple.

Explorers suck eyes into the head.

The rosy body cross secret in flow controls its flow.

Wrestlers in body weights dance and music, mimesis, body. Swimmers
Entertain embryo sweet dangerous thrust flow.

The Lords. Events take place beyond our knowledge or control. Our lives are
Lived for us. We can only try to enslave others. But gradually, special
Perceptions are being developed. The idea of the "Lords" is beginning to
Form in some. We should enlist them into bands of perceivers to tour the
Labyrinth during their mysterious noc- turnal appearences. The Lords have
Secret entrances, and they know disguises. But they give themselves away in
Minor ways. Too much glint of light in the eye. A wrong gesture. Too long
And curious a glance.

The Lords appease us with images. They give us books, concerts, galleries,
Shows, cinemas. Es- pecially the cinemas. Through art they confuse us and
Blind us to our enslavement. Art adorns our prison walls, keeps us silent
And diverted and indifferent.

Dull lions prone on a watery beach. The universe kneels at the swamp to
Curiously eye its own raw postures of decay in the mirror of human
Consciousness.

Absent and peopled mirror, absorbent, passive to whatever visits and
Retains its interest.

Door to passage to the other side, the soul frees itself in stride.

Turn mirrors to the wall in the house of the new dead.


An American Prayer

Do you know the warm progress
Under the stars?
Do you know we exist?
Have you forgotten the keys
To the Kingdom?
Have you been borne yet
& are you alive?

Let's reinvent the gods, all the myths
Of the ages
Celebrate symbols from deep elder forests
[Have you forgotten the lessons
Of the ancient war]

We need great golden copulations

The fathers are cackling in trees of the forest
Our mother is dead in the sea

Do you know we are being led to
Slaughters by placid admirals
& that fat slow generals are getting
Obscene on young blood

Do you know we are ruled by T.V.
The moon is a dry blood beast
Guerilla bands are rolling numbers
In the next block of green vine
Amassing for warfare on innocent herdsmen
Who are just dying

O great creator of being
Grant us one more hour to
Perform our art
& perfect our lives

The moths & atheists are doubly divine
& dying
We live, we die
& death not ends it
Journey we more into the
Nightmare
Cling to life
Our passion'd flower
Cling to cunts & cocks
Of despair
We got our final vision
By clap
Columbus' groin got
Filled w/ green death

(I touched her thigh
& death smiled)
We have assembled inside this ancient
& insane theatre
To propagate our lust for life
& flee the swarming wisdom
Of the streets
The barns are stormed
The windows kept
& only one of all the rest
To dance & save us
W/ the divine mockery
Of words
Music inflames temperament

(When the true King's murderers
Are allowed to roam free
A 1000 magicians arise
In the land)

Where are the feasts
We were promised
Where is the wine
The New Wine
(dying on the vine)

Resident mockery
Give us an hour for magic
We of the purple glove
We of the starling flight
& velvet hour
We of arabic pleasure's breed
We of sundome & the night

Give us a creed
To believe
A night of Lust
Give us trust in
The Night

Give of color
Hundred hues
A rich Mandala
For me & you

& for your silky
Pillowed house
A head, wisdom
& a bed

Troubled decree
Resident mockery
Has claimed thee

We used to believe
In the good old days
We still receive
In little ways

The Things of Kindness
& unsporting brow
Forget & allow

Did you know freedom exists
In a school book
Did you know madmen are
Running our prison
W/in a jail, w/in a gaol
W/in a white free protestant
Maelstrom

We're perched headlong
On the edge of boredom
We're reaching for death
On the end of a candle
We're trying for something
That's already found us

We can invent Kingdoms of our own
Grand purple thrones, those chairs of lust
& love we must, in beds of rust

Steel doors lock in prisoner's screams
& muzak, AM, rocks their dreams
No black men's pride to hoist the beams
While mocking angels sift what seems

To be a collage of magazine dust
Scratched on foreheads of walls of trust
This is just jail for those who must
Get up in the morning & fight for such

Unusable standards
While weeping maidens
Show-off penury & pout
Ravings for a mad
Staff

Wow, I'm sick of doubt
Live in the light of certain
South

Cruel bindings
The servants have the power
Dog-men & their mean women
Pulling poor blankets over
Our sailors
(& where were you in our
Lean hour)
Milking your moustache?
Or grinding a flower?
I'm sick of dour faces
Staring at me from the T.V.
Tower. I want roses in

My garden bower; dig?
Royal babies, rubies
Must now replace aborted
Strangers in the mud
These mutants, blood-meal
For the plant that's plowed

They are waiting to take us into
The severed garden
Do you know how pale & wanton thrillful
Comes death on strange hour
Unannounced, unplanned for
Like a scaring over-friendly guest you've
Brought to bed
Death makes angels of us all
& gives us wings
Where we had shoulders
Smooth as raven's
Claws
No more money, no more fancy dress
This other Kingdom seems by far the best
Until its other jaw reveals incest
& loose obedience to a vegetable law

I will not go
Prefer a Feast of Friends
To the Giant family

II

Great screaming Christ
Upsy-daisy
Lazy Mary will get you up
Upon a Sunday morning

"The movie will begin in 5 moments"
The mindless Voice announced
"All those unseated, will await
The next show"

We filed slowly, languidly
Into the hall. The auditorium
Was vast, & silent.
As we seated & were darkened
The Voice continued:

"The program for this evening
Is not new. You have seen
This entertainment thru & thru.
You've seen your birth, your
Life & death; you might recall
All of the rest -- (did you
Have a good world when you
Died?) -- enough to base
A movie on?"

An iron chuckle rapped our
Minds like a fist.

I'm getting out of here
Where're you going?
To the other side of the morning
Please don't chase the clouds
Pagodas, temples

Her cunt gripped him
Like a warm friendly
Hand.

"It's all right.
All your friends are here."

When can I meet them?
"After you've eaten"
I'm not hungry
"Oh, we meant beaten"

Silver stream, silvery scream,
Impossible concentration

Here come the comedians
Look at them smile
Watch them dance
An indian mile

Look at them gesture
How aplomb
So to gesture everyone

Words dissemble
Words be quick
Words resemble walking sticks

Plant them
They will grow
Watch them waver so

I'll always be
A word-man
Better than a birdman

But I'll charge
Won't get away
W/out lodging a dollar

Shall I say it again
Aloud, you get the point
No food w/out fuel's gain

I'll be, the irish loud
Unleashed my beak
At peak of powers

O girl, unleash
Your worried comb

O worried mind

Sin in the fallen
Backwoods by the blind

She smells debt
On my new collar

Arrogant prose
Tied in a network of fast quest
Hence the obsession

Its quick to admit
Fats borrowed rhythm
Woman came between them

Women of the world unite
Make the world safe
For a scandalous life

Hee Heee
Cut your throat
Life is a joke

Your wife's in a moat
The same boat
Here comes the goat

Blood Blood Blood Blood
They're making a joke
Of our universe

III

Matchbox
Are you more real than me
I'll burn you, & set you free
Wept bitter tears
Excessive courtesy
I won't forget

IV

A hot sick lava flowed up,
Rustling & bubbling.
The paper-face.
Mirror-mask, I love you mirror.

He had been brainwashed for 4 hrs.
The LT. puzzled in again
"ready to talk"
"No sir" -- was all he'd say.
Go back to the gym.
Very peaceful
Meditation

Air base in the desert
Looking out venetian blinds
A plane
A desert flower
Cool cartoon

The rest of the World
Is reckless & dangerous
Look at the
Brothels
Stag films
Exploration

V

A ship leaves port
Mean horse of another thicket
Wishbone of desire
Decry the metal fox




Back to Eternal Songs/The Lizard King