ODE
To The Present Generation 77
Out of the pool of Time we brought
the scowling Monument:
It had effectively fought
the ages' scouring Argument
& survived ... And not because it had
Truth, Beauty or Such on its side
but that it was clad
in The Future's hide
reading:
... You're only young Once
but you are Old all the time
and, friend, this is the Song of
The Ultimate Generation! ( No doubt
written for the One after that One)
without end or reason if there's enough ROOM
someone always comes by breathing the nuances of
his own boundless Grief, which settles
an infinite stone upon the bottomless
sands you can see're so damn clean all the way to
Depths of almost (a Sea, th'profoundest almost)
a World almost a Cosmos almost too much for
fathoming IF there is sufficient room so
Soul's long Waste of entrances is never denied
One Final & yet Glorious Admission where the
Horizon marks the limits of Sufficiency
One is surprised inside The Burning Bell of
things coming along too well --As it stops cold
to toll the cracking journey of an
artificial Wing's (yet all too mortal) negative
flap mixing up a beautiful mental formula
pharmaceutically & incidentally, let me
add this (a fact well known by fools,
cretins & imbeciles): "It was the evolution of their
earth that changed their land," that (nothing
justifies Power better than the power to justify
it) --Check it out! & incidentally, let me
just add this, Why is the Pentagon in the shape
of a nut? Do you know &
& do you know & do you
ever even give it a thought? I mean, old boy,
six million Jews all baked in a pyre
& not a single tear from a goy! ( O, and
what you're looking for is Always
(in the last place you look) incidentally,
let me add this --Mixing it up (a beautifully
pharmaceutical formula): Had Christ hailed
from Bristol, His magic spell for resurrecting
Lazarus might've been You better get up
old boy, or they'll plug you!...) so nothing
surprises me, not even that people who do not
even know how cardboard's made can tell you
what's God! --Let nothing surprise you & in-
cidentally, let me just add this: In the Image
of God comes that cookie, O Man! to state:
"He had His Sodom & Gomorrah & we have our
Hiroshima & Nagasaki" In the Image of God
& incidentally, let me just add this: Which came
first, the chicken or the egg? mixing up a
beautiful formula pharmaceutically which finally
blows up in our face because we've added too many
distractions... Abandoned to the full consent of Th'Many
one folds upon oneself the grim position of restraint
amongst th'criers who seek the freedom to silence us all
... and what moves us towards Hell is but the similarity
of its walls to Heaven's (from the outside): keep in mind
that it's as hard to get out of Hell as to enter
into Heaven--While a dim memory supplants the
scalding Actuality & dead cinders
our former tears become words windstrewn
& dryly reminding us of Whom we have been
The Many and Why! Look now!!! (Things say wordlessly)
for just how brief an instant does life crack
The Mirror of Existence so completely encircling
& surrounding us, shrouding us, blockading us,
enveloping us & encircling & besieging us,
defining us, delimiting us
... so Now: Hurry! and
Hurry! Hurry! Look NOW beyond Yourself
& now! Do! Right now! right straightaway!
Now!...
Existence patches itself up
soon enough! ...
I looked: It was
(& let The A w a k e n i n g !
me just of life-Spring! its Gush
add this: captured jessamine guarded
If cocks in a harbor's pardon
never had & the apothecary priest O
any hayre cautionary sparrow Sunshine!
how come then DETONATED!!! Dawn's
God gave erratic plans of splattering
every wavelets & the pizzicati
last one dews the blazon-Birds praised
of'em a Praised! the Winds where the
comb?... unsteady & wretched hedgerows
of cour- Burst! joyously apart into th'weeds O
se only Song! the herdsmen-mountains
pharma- drank peacocks the milks of
ceutic- Morning whilst dissipating mists
ally speak- of rapidly-disintegrating
ing you fleece (Darkness) shrieked over
understand) the antlers of The Hills
And, "This is The Song of The Ultimate Generation,
friend, and" ... Eye must peer into The Door
ajar & check HOW NEAR to understand HOW FAR
--In other words, the difference between The Real
and The Symbolic is only a technicality, you know:
Matter understands the difference soon enough
but in The Human Mind the difference is a little hazy,
I mean, and if The Government's going around saying
"all the jews must be done away with,"
Jews certainly better start feeling a bit uneasy
even if no Jews have as yet been gassed--Because in
the Human Mind the difference between The Real
The Symbolic is only an infinite stone settling
to the bottomless sands of Almost [and Almost and
Almost] the sounds of Wings silent awakening
Solitude from its Slumber, & sad & angered at
thusly having been disturbed (for Nothing, Solitude's
liable to throw a brick) at the merest "suggestions of
Wings" silent & let me just add this (incidentally):
entire companies of soldiers have given up their lives
O, so heroically (of course) trying to rescue a
twenty-bucks banner from the enemy & this is
something they would not risk the whole company to try
[to rescue but a single sacred human life (naturally)
otherwise The Whole POEM might just go KABOOM!
right in our faces], incidentally, while we are trying
ever so desperately & if possible: even cautiously
mixing up a beautiful formula pharmaceutically (of
bloods & clay) that we can bring out of the muddy
pool of Time like some Monument O life, O life, O life,
O life! that highlights all our Good by
enveloping in such Dark--This is The Song of The
Ultimate Generation, friend,
Only moments remain!
Everything shakes with Awe!
All of The Good of earth we saw
by Evil was explained!
Flowers for miles perish! in flames!
[And] All crimes reign sublime!
[But] Sympathy is the fancy of its fame
and Justice is the privilege of Time
But Sympathy's
th'fancy of its fame
and Justice is
the privilege of Time
