Wallace Stevens on Obamacare

*
Most contemporary USAPO are presumably in favor of the USA having a national health service similar to that of Canada and Europe et al,

with insured coverage for all—

if the Poetry Foundation took a poll of USAPO, wouldn't you expect most of them to vote yes to this proposition—

Life, we know, consists of propositions about life,

as one of our greatest poets has informed us—

might we also learn something from him regarding this question of universal health care?

He did issue a position paper about it, actually,

in the form of this sonnet on p. 200 of his 1954 Collected:

IDIOM OF THE HERO

I heard two workers say, "This chaos
Will soon be ended."

This chaos will not be ended,
The red and the blue house blended,

Not ended, never and never ended,
The weak man mended,

The man that is poor at night
Attended

Like the man that is rich and right.
The great men will not be blended . . .

I am the poorest of all.
I know that I cannot be mended,

Out of the clouds, pomp of the air,
By which at least I am befriended.


*

Why FoxNews hasn't cued this crap up for its blowhards to spoutificate on, is a puzzle—

It's all there: the rich, the right, (the rich are right and the workers are wrong),

the great men

(you know: the billionaires whose untaxed offshore-loot is funding all the rightwing propaganda reichdoms)—

the great men must never slack their fated duty of upholding capitalism

to ever waste a dime on

"the weak man," "the man that is poor," the "workers"——

And me! Me!? I'm the poorest of them all! (can't you just hear Bill O'Reilly whinnying this out with glee?)—

I know that society cannot be mended, that collective salvation is evil . . .

—But then of course at this end-point of Stevens' poem

the spinners at Fox would have to misreport and mystify his atheistic conclusion

that no cure for our ills will mercifully fall from God pomped up there in the clouds,

although the air (the terrestial air!) is friendly to us—

*
Say there, you twain two, you fine husk-fellows shearing the hedges round my mansion, care for a cup of Darjeeling?  I can't "befriend" you of course,

and I can't use my high position in the insurance industry to advocate public-subsidized health coverage for all,

the idioms (you don't understand what 'idioms' means, I know) surrounding the class distinctions inherent in our society

can never be breached by any heroic linebreaks wielded from Brecht or Neruda or Eluard or any of those unmendable unmentionable Marxists, I'm afraid.


*

"Any evaluation of Stevens . . . must somehow be able to accommodate . . . astonishing linguistic richness on one hand and an impoverishment or hollowness of content on the other. [... ] [T]he inner hollowness of this verse will tend to return . . . in those moments in which it becomes (momentarily) clear that Stevens' 
only content, from the earliest masterpieces of Harmonium, all the way to the posthumous [poems], is landscape. . . ." —Fredric Jameson


*
I'm like the poorest of all, ephebe effendi, I ain't got no god buhu to panacea my soul (got no soul, either)—

unlike you religion-opiated masses I got no Lourdes, no faith healer to mend my pain,

you should be pitying me, not me you—

you think you got it bad, look at me:

I have to find my nepenthe, my ether in mere air, in nature—

I'm the poorest of all, never mind my mansion on the snazz side of town, my penthouse office suite,

ho, what are you poor weak workers with no health insurance complaining about, anyway!  What's your problem, parvenu?

///

Das Wort

*
the selections from Heidegger gathered in "On the Way to Language" (1971) include a fascinating lecture about Stefan George's "Das Wort"—

here are a few translations, followed by the original:


*
The Word

From dream or distance, I would bring
to my land's border some strange thing,

then wait until the grey Norn came,
and from her well fished out its name.

Then I could take good hold of it,
and now, all round, it flowers bright.

Once, from a voyage blessed with luck,
I brought a fragile gemstone back.

She looked and looked and said: 'It's clear
there's no name waiting for that here',

whereon it slipped out of my hand,
and never came to grace my land.

I learned the rules through suffering:
where no word is, can be no thing.

(trans. Sheenagh Pugh)


*
The Word

Wonders from dreams and from abroad
I carried to my country's port,

But for the names I had to wait
Which in her depths were searched by Fate.

Then I could hold them in my hand
And now they blossom in this land ...

Once I returned from such a tour
With a small treasure rich and pure;

She searched for long but had to tell
That no such thing slept in her well;

At once it vanished from my hand
And ne'er this wealth entered the land ...

So, sadly, I became aware
That things are not if words aren't there.

(trans. Kai Arste)



*
The Word

Wonder or dream from distant land
I carried to my country’s strand

And waited till the twilit norn
Had found the name within her bourn—

Then I could grasp it close and strong
It blooms and shines now the front along . . .

Once I returned from happy sail,
I had a prize so rich and frail,

She sought for long and tidings told:
“No like of this these depths enfold.”

And straight it vanished from my hand,
The treasure never graced my land . . .

So I renounced and sadly see:
Where word breaks off no thing may be.

(trans. Peter D. Hertz)



*
The word

Miracle of distant or dreamless
I brought my nation to hem

And waiting until the gray norn
The name was born in her --

Top access can find me tight and strong
Now blooms and shines it through the mark ...

I once term after good ride
With a rich and delicate gem

They looked long and gave me kund:
"So nothing sleeps here at a low base"

What is my handle entrann
My country and never won the treasure ...

So I learned the sad disclaimer:
No ding is where the word gebricht

(trans. Google)

*
Das Wort

Wunder von ferne oder traum
Bracht ich an meines landes saum

Und harrte bis die graue norn
Den Namen fand in ihrem born—

Drauf konnt ichs greifen dicht und stark
Nun blüht und glänzt es durch die mark ...

Einst langt ich an nach guter fahrt
Mit einem kleinod reich und zart

Sie suchte lang und gab mir kund:
''So schläft hier nichts auf tiefem grund''

Worauf es meiner hand entrann
Und nie mein land den schatz gewann ...

So lernt ich traurig den verzicht:
Kein ding sei wo das wort gebricht.


Stefan George, 1919.


/

Considering the devotion given it by Heidegger, it seems strange this poem doesn't appear in any anthologies of Modern German Poetry in English translation, at least not in the ones I've seen.  Indeed the latest such, Hofmann's 20th Century German Poems, includes no verse at all by George.

///

how bad?

see this tweet:

Damon K @dada_drummer

1 h

  

picked up Bill Knott's 500-page Collected Poetry at a shop - asked the price - & was told he had left them there free for interested readers

/

over two months ago i sent ten copies of my collected poetry book to "Berl's Poetry Bookshop" and asked them to give the book away free to anyone interested,

two months ago—  two months and as this tweet shows, they still have copies of it left—

which just proves what i've said here many times— no one wants my books even for free—

in two months there weren't ten people visiting Berl's Poetry Shop who would accept a free copy of my collected poems—

my books are so bad i can't even give them away for free—

///

drafts/roughs/unfinished

SHOWER

It is the pretext/duty/charm of the hero to depict

their origin as unknown, or everywhere—

as if the name of a town would smash

that statue down.  Streamers from the parade

that enlivened/knicked out/chiseled his profile still flicker around

its pedestal, their papyrus duplicity

[Needing martyrdom to live, I multiply

the papyrus duplicity of my hero—

duplicity is my hero]—[its numbers

always add up to the theme of the

Double [?] ] [ Outside the rain pours all fours

on the fields that spread like search

patterns but find only more of us. 

Depictions.  We might atone by

using schoolmates for our self

portraits, but otherwise remain sole. 

Simplifying[singularity] is the word I need here

in the normal bleep-sense of its daily

use, a warning-voice evident [in its attempt

at censorship.]  Oppressive enough, but 

can you remove enough details to

make your life immune to autobiography,

[when all the words skipped by readers

make a better picture than one's own

narrative.  The problem of the empirical—

the "crumbs of raisinbread in the coat

pocket," to quote Benn, the coat itself—

are unsolvable except through love of

the contingent, meaning the sacrificible,

the stuff you can easily throw away—

That's why the grounds out there are

surface of earth deep, why each of its borders

pretends to be elsewhere.  Pretense is

[The premise of the hero always required

To depict his or her origins as timeless.  As

Elsewhere.  Distant as abandoned rooms

Narrating their cobwebs, relating to which

[     ] us to stride centerstage and gawk

Multitude-timeless at engravings passed

Among the lucky attendance that thrives

By dispensing shares of continuity that

Never yield spare enough for you or me—

Everything left out of the text is always

Too legible, the expository details

Anchor their disparities by spreadsheet

Tactics, the way amid raindrops we hold up

Our inbetweenities with an umbrella.]

Outside the rain pours all fours on

the fields that spread like search

patterns but find only more of us. 

Depictions.  We might atone by

using schoolmates for our self

portraits, but otherwise remain sole. 

Simplifying is the word I need

in the normal beep-sense of its daily

use, a warning-voice evident, though

the old problems of the empirical—

the "crumbs of raisinbread in

the coat pocket," to quote Benn—

are unsolvable except through love of

the contingent, meaning the sacrificible,

the stuff you can easily throw away—

That's why the grounds out there are

surface of earth deep, why each of

its borders pretends to be elsewhere. 

Premise of the hero always requires

him to regard his origins as timeless.

Abandoned rooms narrate their cobwebs,

time to stride centerstage and gawk

multitude-timeless at engravings passed

among the lucky audience that thrives

by dispensing shares of continuity

which never yield enough for leftovers—

Everything left out of the text is always

too legible, the expository details

lacking which the reader is forced to

/// 

drafts/roughs

(AFTER GOETHE’S WANDERERS
NACHTLIED II)

Hear all the hilltops lapse
Until each copse of trees
Drops so still and the air
Sleeps when the birds cease
Their songs: slowly, down-eased,
The forest stops and naps.
Where is this place? Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.


Hear all the hilltops lapse
Until each copse of trees
Drops still and silence saps
Every birdsong the air
Can nest: slowly, down-eased,
The forest stops and naps.
Where is this place? Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.

Hear all the hilltops lapse
Until each copse of trees
Drops so still that the air
Sleeps and the birds repair
From song: slowly, down-eased,
The forest stops and naps.
Where is this place? Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.



Hear all the hilltops lapse
Until each copse of trees
Drops so still the air saps
The sound and then birds spare
To sing: slowly, down-eased,
The forest stops and naps.
Where is this place? Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.


Hear all the hilltops lapse
Until each copse of trees
Drops so still that there
Is scarely an air
Left for the birds to share
Their songs: slowly, by degrees,
Like you the forest stops.
Where is this place? Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.


Hear all the hilltops lapse 
And then each copse of trees
Drops so still that the air
Sighs when


Drops so still and the air
Fall silent as

So thick with sleep it saps
birdsong.

/

Hear the hinter hilltops
and now each tree-copse
hush when the wind drops
below a breeze, as
slowly the wing-flaps
of birds through the air
and their song ceases—
listen: not a sound.
Has it here been found,
that longsought Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.

/
Is it at last found
/
Has it now/here been found,
that longsought Nowhere?

/
and then the wing-flaps
of the birds lose sound,
and all their songs cease
to bruit the air:
Slowly, by degrees,
like you the forest stops.


///// Perhaps it's now been found,
that longsought Nowhere.
Tear up your maps.



Hear the hinter hilltops
and each crop of trees


and how each tree copse
hushes when the wind drops
below a breeze, as



Hear how the hinter hilltops
and then each copse of trees
hush when the wind drops
below a breeze, as
finally the wing-flaps
of birds through the air
and their song ceases—
listen: not a sound.
Has it now been found,
that longsought Nowhere?
Tear up your maps,
uncork that flask of schnapps.

and have another swig of schnapps.

lean back, have a swig of schnapps.

have another mug/jug of schnapps.

hoist your stein/wineskin of schnapps.

///

drafts of unfinished poems

[

I fell in step with the graveyard,
altering my pace to its spacing of stones,
halting where it held itself aloft
for the tableture of time.  My feet

were tricked into this terpsichore,
tortile, tense, like trying to dance
with Mount Rushmore.  The memorials
seemed wallflowers, a lastchance prom

as I stood at last in stride of stasis
begging each slab to be my deb
my date: their names filled my waltzcard
with time's promised twist.  Stumbling

I tripped their choreographed epitaphs;
I bopped those highschool-hop deaths.

/

Wetdream radiators hiss through the slum-room
I sublet deep in the depositions of dilettante;
flags I shoplift from the United Nations Building
drape each icky splinter of my lap; lame ledgers
caress me; every inventory of reality ends up
recap; my overdue rent has Croesus nervous;
defunded as regularly as ash-trojans and assass-
ination rumors how routinely I lie, my lips
rent by hyena-starved laughter; my warts want
to go public; poop-pills slither me slower than
sandpaper eels; this ennui confers no libration
final enough to accord yours; adolescence n'est
ce pas; hot savior bullseye bait, another giant rind
of nose tongue; all futures rinse away unless they
use atrophy shampoo; icicles clutching at pigtails
plunge past phone-thin panes; my navel's diarrhea
chops my wig off: pincer earpods pierce home.

///

top ten list of new poems I read in 2013

I can't do a top ten list of 2013 poetry books unless it was

Top Ten Poetry Books Published in 2013 Which Might Have Been on My Ten Best List If I Could Have Afforded to Buy Them,

but thanks to the internet I did read some outstanding poems, ten of which are listed here in no particular order because each of them is a "best" in itself:

"Rope" by Rose Kelleher
"An hour is not a house" by Jane Hirshfield
"Installation" by Helen Humphreys
"Government Spending" by Patricia Lockwood
"Crane" by David Yezzi
"Elegy for a Small Town Psychic" by Morri Creech
"A Novel" by Sampson Starkweather
"The Butcher's Apprentice 1911-1914" by Adam Kirsch
"At the Sewannee Writers' Conference, I Go Looking for Allen Tate's Grave" by Christopher Bullard

"Fancy" by Jehanne Dubrow

///