CLIFTY DRIVE

above Credibility Gap, still

straddling the prolonged hours' thousand
turrets, dimmed to the worst (overhead

th'gloom in its curtains), & still
when you consider

how th'ordinary embracing garment of foam
that looks just like another cheap carpet

holds out against th'sharpest edges
of those fishwives (ourselves

Th'Whatever), who look just like farmers
hauling it all over their ancient

invented Frauds
which look like ploughshares

you will begin to get the Idea
somewhere along th'road
some'm misrepresented, either Truth
has no nostrils, or, big ole rocks over your head

like clouds, some mood of excrement) when
th'Steel Wall which looks certain-
ly like a carpetbagger's hot air of tricks

is folding up before your eye balls
staring & look like they're stuffed
as plain as can be,

or some detached
constellation suddenly assumes Th'Shape of
wonders that write all tales

stolen by a thief who looks just like
your own daddy telling you it's
for your own good! he's doing it

in the end apparently hocking your best shirt
to buy you a still pair of socks
to celebrate his birthday
some'm sure smells

still, the two figurative grave-diggers
tucking you into bed & helping you
say your prayers if you should wake

before you're dead, "I pray the Lord
my purse don't take," & telling you

the story about them two ancient bitches
Evil & Good who split th'World in two

"This half for you & this half for
me," pocketing it themselves much to our woe

--they are the only beings who never weep
because the world is an onion cut
down the middle of each one of our skins

their fingers capturing our outer peeling
only--the bulk of our Winter's wispy words,

Summer's singing Sun, September
with Fall's lapels, May's plumed
with smiles falling off away from us

at the start of youth: the priests assuring us
it's only the outer skin that gets scrapped

mostly upon th'kneecaps from
all our material crawling Knock!

Knock! "Who's there?" It's your niece,
Sir! Nonsense: I have my knees right here
with me... Be a soul! they say

& send one dollar up Our Way
for instructions (night &

day (the fly's light heritage):
º: the postage we will pay :º

hi Oh The merry O
A-hunting we will go

and then you go on & capture the next fold
of loose skin of the onion world
with watery eyes staring into maturity & next

the following skin of Loss & so on & on &
so on & on taking the Infinite Loss of skin
up to some definite point or sin
padlocked in its proportions

when you have left the bulk Nothingness
behind, but admirably trained & virtuo-
so fingers ten
which can say their Amens
much quicker'n a cock can take a hen, then

Nothing at all then or somewhere else than
then: I mean something else than I ^[sic]
which is the fold that finally gets scrapped ²¹²

(I said, not scraped but scrapped) from
its spiritual crawling --soundless, breaking
the barrier Principles constructed by
inexorable Patience with the key-
stone Routine dropping from meantime
like some sandwich, from waiting (lashed

by a soundless stick), from the brave's
unavoidable syllables, the coward's shuddering
drinks, from Challenge's jangling dashings,

from th'darling squadrons of Love, from
What's tangling tensions and th'lawless
illusions of That, from, from the Gap
between them, from up there in-
credibility Gap!

from where nothing's supposed to be
since nothing at all we see
O my O me! Poing! without ping
(for this is no game I sing
of ping-pong ) It is my Self-Song

& I am trying to make it
as loud & long as I can
without break-
ing the rime... I give up!

(it's time)