Louis Armand, from DI/ODE
DI/ODE prompt
from DI/ODE
CCCXI
(after Brian Birchall)
obscurity & clarity being common
viewpoints
relating to, & relating w/, the
invocating
symbol, narrative & theme, about “-isms”
& the hermeneutic “as,” or the kind
of truth
time becomes through public relations,
i.e. post-mortem, yet w/ composure,
composed,
a “person” of “character,” flattered before
flattened, each the penultimate
obscenity
in the eyes of the other, like the
untrans
latability of metaphor, virtue or the
politics
of the self-made, all being correct but
manifestly untrue, the way a stranger's
mind
is always sleeping in yr head, setting
off
dialectical melodramas whenever “the
thing”
comes home to face the music.
(3.6.2023)
CCCXIII
rum days & the stink wafting in off
the trans
atlantic garbage pile sets lice on
edge.
scanning empty space for the detail
that slipped away / like a footnote
marked
“classified” blocking the shower grate.
walls heave & groan w/ the weight
of a sea straining to overpower / the
way
a nation wrestles w/ its conscience.
nights of crude symbolic melodrama
leave you drained. unsure if the
counterattack
has already begun or the tactical re
treat has reached an impasse. amidst
the smoke & fog of war / a leopard
creeps
through underbrush in full view of the
thermal-image duplicator. the scene is
ar
ranged, a cruel mouth for a crueler
month, a body undulating w/ microbic
life
marked unsafe. well any moron can part
a sea
in their sleep but only the true-
of-heart show sympathy for the lice.
how once on the fire-escape of a Harlem
ten
ement a vision of William Blake
appeared
& the blue hand of Shiva wringing
a brown dishrag sky / if the
flesh-made-word
is also a bombshelter / if a poem is an
ark
against a savage tide (one savagery
outdoes another) (for we had beauty on
our side).
CCCXV
to quote the eternal Madam
Wittgenstein, about that
of which y’re bone ignorant, keep yr
trap shut.
every night for an encore an airraid
siren.
y’ve got to be a hard nut not to crack
on command,
the way a hypnotist dredges up the
suggestion
long-submerged & suddenly yr
running naked
in the street, screaming IT’S THE END
OF THE WORLD
to fanatical laughter from the carriage
trade.
the visualisation of G.O.D. is nothing
but a disaster.
have we supplanted ourselves in the
scheme of things?
receipt of stolen property is
punishable by 10 years
under section 188(1)(b) of the Crimes
Act 1900.
unless y’re the state. well what good's
a voice
w/ a soaked rag stuffed down yr throat
in the middle
of the night? choked on a crumb from
the negotiating
table, going hungry’s an inalienable
right.
CCCXVI
breathe. don't try to put yr thoughts
in order.
yr doppelgänger's sitting on the steps
intently observing yr exit rituals.
“kunststruck,” you say, like an
annoying guest
who plays the same partytrick twice.
everything cld just as well be
expressed
in silence, the way silence is. tonight
yr eyes
are magnets, glitched inalienables,
meaning “overly prone.” attachment
to worldly things as opposed to
otherworldly
“things.” as sure as there are ears on
a
bat, for example, the potential for
mutiny
even in the most withering compliance.
a lifelong archipelago of missed
affects dot-
dash-dot against the horizon, being
that region in which timeliness
extinguishes
itself. yr uninvited attentions wander
off
whenever y’re not looking, or they
aren’t & you only seem to be. on
one side
Magellanic Clouds on the other a
smeared
cataract indicates the view back is
still there
over the next hill, where it promised
to be.
CCCXVII
Daniel Ellsberg died (+16.6.23) &
lately Ken Bolton
has been moved to speak ill of dead
poets
& the war dead keep adding-up like
bad coin
in circumdubious Free World economy.
pointless to compare the vocal range of
who at the top-of-their-lungs scream
day & night
to cries & whispers in a lost
submarine.
portraits of unclarity deem us
incidental
to mirrorworld subterfuge as a
combedback toupee
or a scalpcollector’s grin reading
between
eyelines & smeared toothpaste hello
beautiful!
well today's another day & bells
& whistles
& a hot wind blowing yr brains out
in weather too heavy to think under
anyway
though love's always a consolation if
you can afford it.
CCCXIX
solstice comes & the world has
moved on
from social injustice BILLIONAIRE
ENEMA LOST AT SEA trumps 500
DROWNED MEDITERRANEAN REFUGEES
but Europe long before homo
sapiens’ false start was already “civil
ised” -- the long march of mis
information's child & abortive coup
d’
états played on a carousel whose
happy endings turn out unwell.
tomorrow's
headline sez
y’re
better off
dead
/ but will that
be
so comforting / then?
—Louis
Armand
