Monday, September 01, 2003

I don't know if he was familiar with Pessoa, but in his
early book License to Carry a Gun, Andrei
Codrescu writes different kinds of poems under several
pseudonyms--including that of a Black Militant.

   "Radiant Silhouette IV

Frenzy softens the air.

The hardly used desire was posted on the outer panel
of the blackboard sky. Beneath rows of illustrated
fragments, someone whispers and someone listens,
and no one agrees on how many were in the bed between
one and one equals all the hours you have known or
imagined knowing another.

The inside of the walls got sticky, and tiny spots of
pink paper floated toward the rain spattered clouds.

I followed feathers down flagpoles

I stood on trains,
 sat across from
  and beside

I traced the little wigs of a tarnished button,
 and started eating the perfumed crumbs
  left out for the leper of milk

I licked peeling canisters
 until rain trickled out of
  my mouth and pockets

I counted the insect vowels missing from the slag heap

I inserted a strip of imitation fur into the Book of Neon

After he tied her on the bed, she handcuffed him to the stove.
Dark aquamarine light slipped off the rounded edges of the
upturned venetian blinds, dropping into mirrors fastened
at the corners.

An old movie flickered on the outer border of their gnawed platform."

--John Yau in: The Open Boat ed Hongo (1993)

A manifesto by Mark Amerika.

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