Stranger Music

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send an exile’s perfect letter

to an ancient hometown friend

I chose a lonely country

broke from love

scorned the fraternity of war

I polished my tongue against the pumice moon

floated my soul in cherry wine

a perfumed barge for Lords of Memory

to languish on to drink to whisper out

their store of strength

as if beyond the mist along the shore

their girls their power still obeyed

like clocks wound for a thousand years

I waited until my tongue was sore

Brown petals wind like fire around my poems

I aimed them at the stars but

like rainbows they were bent

before they sawed the world in half

Who can trace the canyoned paths

cattle have carved out of time

wandering from meadowlands to feasts

Layer after layer of autumn leaves

are swept away

Something forgets us perfectly

PARASITES OF HEAVEN

ONE NIGHT I BURNED

One night I burned the house I loved,

It lit a perfect ring

In which I saw some weeds and stone

Beyond — not anything.

Certain creatures of the air

Frightened by the night,

They came to see the world again

And perished in the light.

Now I sail from sky to sky

And all the blackness sings

Against the boat that I have made

Of mutilated wings.

1960

I SEE YOU ON A GREEK MATTRESS

I see you on a Greek mattress

reading the Book of Changes,

Lebanese candy in the air.

On the whitewashed wall I see

you raise another hexagram

for the same old question:

how can you be free?

I see you cleaning your pipe

with the hairpin

of somebody’s innocent night.

I see the plastic Evil Eye

pinned to your underwear.

Once again you throw the pennies,

once again you read

how the pieces of the world

have changed around your question.

Did you get to the Himalayas?

Did you visit that monk in New Jersey?

I never answered any of your letters.

Oh Steve, do you remember me?

1963

SNOW IS FALLING

Snow is falling.

There is a nude in my room.

She surveys the wine-coloured carpet.

She is eighteen.

She has straight hair.

She speaks no Montreal language.

She doesn’t feel like sitting down.

She shows no gooseflesh.

We can hear the storm.

She is lighting a cigarette

from the gas range.

She holds back her long hair.

1958

FINGERPRINTS

Give me back my fingerprints

My fingertips are raw

If I don’t get my fingerprints

I have to call the Law

I touched you once too often

& I don’t know who I am

My fingerprints were missing

When I wiped away the jam

I called my fingerprints all night

But they don’t seem to care

The last time that I saw them

They were leafing thru your hair

I thought I’d leave this morning

So I emptied out your drawer

A hundred thousand fingerprints

Floated to the floor

You hardly stooped to pick them up

You don’t count what you lose

You don’t even seem to know

Whose fingerprints are whose

When I had to say goodbye

You weren’t there to find

You took my fingerprints away

So I would love your mind

I don’t pretend to understand

Just what you mean by that

But next time I’ll inquire

Before I scratch your back

I wonder if my fingerprints

Get lonely in the crowd

There are no others like them

& that should make them proud

But now you want to marry me

& take me down the aisle

& throw confetti fingerprints

You know that’s not my style

Sure I’d like to marry

But I won’t face the dawn

With any girl who knew me

When my fingerprints were on

1966

A CROSS DIDN’T FALL ON ME

A cross didn’t fall on me

when I went for hot dogs

and the all-night Greek

slave in the Silver Gameland

didn’t think I was his brother