Paterson: Book II, Chapter I, p. 57-58 (II)

Eisenstein’s Heavenly Man (II)

The film is a nickel

And worth it:

Eisenstein’s heavenly man.

“The meat is rotten!”: Vakulynchuk's corpse

Ice on the inside of a window: Alma-Ata

“Госуда́рственная пре́мия СССР!”: Moscow

Ca-ROCK-ithy, C-ROCK-ithy: 4 December, 1930

“Think of them as frescoes in motion!”: to Frida Kahlo

Whisps of chilled air: Alma-Ata

Strike!: Strike

“A film without equal in cinema!”: Joseph Goebbels

One hundred thousand dollars: py6 2,746,800

The numbness of a cheek: Alma-Ata

Fingers curling along the edge of a mattress: Alma-Ata

Iris out: Alma-Ata

In the morning, Rising: 11 February 1948


KMC 8/4/11

Paterson: Book II, Chapter I, p. 57-58 (I)

Eisenstein’s Heavenly Man (I)

Fifty feet           

On a silver screen //      

Eisenstein’s:      

HEAVENLY MAN.

The meat is rotten!

(Strike!)

The quarters unkempt!

(Strike!)

The wages unfair!

(Strike!)

The blood unjustly spilled!

(And in a darkened

room, eyes reflect light
and Tell: 
everything is shadows
moving faster
than they should be.)

Paterson: Book II, Chapter I, p. 58

(Priapus!)

Priapus!

Come and let me

have a look at you.

I'll not stare

at the obvious--

          the enormous,

          swollen,

          tired phallus;

                    the rises of strains

                    in the muscles 

                    of your forearm;

                              the purple bend

                              of awful skin;

                              the long-wished-lost

                                        weight.

I'll not share

your story broadly--

          the fetal curse

          of a jealous 

          goddess;

                    the chasing through fields

                    of Other-claimed 

                    flesh;

                              the thwarting,

                              (hilariously)

                              of an angry, stubborn

                                        ass.

I'll not mock

the life of verdict--

          the building

          in you    

          of the unspeakable thing;

                    the want

                    of love

                    or the thrust of it;

                              the longing

                              for finish,

                              and the prayer for

                                       ends.

          Rather, I'll wait.

          I'll look you over,

          with my own two eyes,

          and see you blink.

          Who would have guessed

          it would take your presence

          to undo you?

          Who would have expected

          the weight of too much of you

          would be the weight you could not bear?

         The envy, friend, is yours.

         Stand up (as if you could not);

         rise,

         and get out

         of my sight.

KMC 8/4/11

Paterson: Book II, Chapter I, p. 55

A Song for Nothing; or, "Rafters"

[horns enter]

Chorus of thousands:

arpeggiated risings, fallings

to a sound.

Let's sing, goddammit;

let's shout til the mother
fucking roof rises,
until it quakes

from the grey-dusted I-beams

posting up from the floor;

Let's sing until bolts rattle

in their holes

and hundred-year old washers

bounce on their foundings

 like makeshift tambourines;

until metal winks and shimmers

in radiating rooflight,

and silvered steel hisses out

the harshest cymbaled Cs:

                     SSSSSSSSS--

Let's sing, you sons of bitches;

let's roar from our bellies

with full-lunged, full-

throated, fucking

full-bodied gutsongs;

let's shout until pressures unknowable

push out against the walls

of our skin;

until sound itself vibrates

our bones,

our fingers,

our teeth,

until something threatens

and will

burst, tear, rip

out of us,

splitting us each

down our alchemical

middle--

Let's break, crowd of crowds;

let's swell, rise, and part

down our seam;

let's climb in walls

of mother-fucking water,

riven as the Red Sea,

hemisected as our own 

grey matter;

let's, let's build

our song of everything

until it opens,

it unzips itself,

it spills itself out

of our split-husked selves,

pouring from the hives of us

like a swarm of 

unbelievable bees,

Oh, oh, my god:
            LISTEN--

Take
this,
Jesus Christ,
please take
it;

take it
and keep 

taking.

KMC 7/2/11, 7/10/11