Hugh Fox, US
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Verse
Not To Be
During the whole concert using
the program to
calculate the life-spans of the composers.
Vivaldi - 63
Frescobaldi - 60
Handel - 59
Mascagni - 82
Then afterwards over café latté, de-caf, of course,
“I’m really curious about what killed them off so
young, Verdi, 1813 to 1901, he made it to eighty—
eight, my Aunt Matilde made it to a hundred and
four, which would give me another twenty years,”
her marveling at the Cavalleria Rusticana miracle-whip
snow concerting down outside in the streetlight.
For A Moment
Sandwiches of soft, almost
cotton—
sockish bread, the beef sliced soft
and pancakeishly, wrapped in breaded—
pliable onions, a little frappé, all the
couples, grandmas-grandpas, kids-grandkids,
friends in the café germanish-polishish—
englishish-swedishish-irishish, almost
spring sun, our waitress a dietetics major
in her biochemistry-physiology phase,
as if
OUT THERE
wasn’t there at all...
I.(IN) P.
(PEACE)
The desert east of L.A., I
finally find
them, the names barely readable with
dust, neglect, her dead twenty years,
him 33, a little cactus, the whole place
unattended , "The All Children's Grand
Opera, violin, piano, painting (Allegro ma
non tanto), even the toughness, here I
am seventy-six and (Intermezzo adagio)
still turning it out (L'istesso tempo), an
inner calm, every morning glad I made it
through the (Finale, alla breve) night.
Borders
The starving, sick, homeless
Kenyans,
supple, soft, buddhist-calm faces and
Madames Middle Class at the supermarket
coming in like they’re on the way to murder,
be murdered, at night the doors superlocked,
chained, security on, watch-dogs ready, and
still....”They’re even stealing trees, what’s
next?,” looking out the back window of the
dining room down at the forests, rivers,
swamps, no line between Mine, Thine or
Anyone Else’s until the trucks/motorcycles
roar over the hill
in front.
The Greatest
Power In The World
Murder across the
nightbreakinlivingbyherself street,
she was $341/month Cadillac, the catalpa-oak-ivy
neighborhood a block from the three times a night
(Canadian) train, from $65 to $30 an hour,
MADE IN anywhere but here, we used to take Wonder
Trail walks down by the river, "Look at that water,
right out of the tap...God...,"four murders last summer,
"You shouldn't go out jogging alone, even during the day,"
between the deer and wild turkey dirt road hills,
Caesar's
Gallic
Wars.
Remembering
1.
Janis J.
Wanting to bring it (the hair, devil-may/angel- may care
sniff-gulp under dose beatitude) all
back,
as if it were
gone,
then ("I may not
say goodbye in the
morning, I've got this
Tumor Board at
seven.")
realizing
that I'm
already
stone
(night) fall
dawn
rise
stabilized
into my own kind
of Cheerios-Irish-
Creme-sub-lingual Melatonin
satori.
Remembering
2.
Edith Sparrow/Piaf Vie en Rose
Rien de rien/ no regrets
remembering her in street-singer spread-legs
Monmartre
and then both of us
ascending our own
(pass the needle)
ways,
not wanting it to ever pass into
ultra-violet
finality
still melting flakes inside
us (“I won’t sing if I’m not wearing my
cross.”)
believing that last breaths
are first breaths of a whole new
satori.
Slyph tree
fall
rebouncing if
not
here
then there’s a
eternity
of sylph
satyrs
just over the
sun-dusk
mountain of
divine
invention
The Valley of
Neander
Getting new windows in the
TV/family room
so the winds don’t bug you during the late
night news, new shoes after callused areas
begin to bug you from lumps in the old shoes,
the right hair-dye, just the right kind of
Perugian vinegar, the right dark (rice) chocolate
to fight heart attacks, the right vitamins-minerals
without additives, the right mattress that doesn’t
just support but caresses you all night,
the perfect belt-fit, pants-fit, high definition
TV, the right double-chocolate muffins and
right sofa, slim-trim lap-top...
20
200
2,000
20,000
years
later.
Je Revien/ I
Become
Could be
je revien
broken windows/doors
les oiseaux
robbing Lane Bryant
sauvages
and then killing
le fin d’hiver
five women
le soleil
into the classroom
que caresse
marketplace
ma face
fifty dead
l’espoir
border into
le vieux champagne
Amorite
retourner
Israel
de nouveau
ou je ne peut pas
souvenir
territory
rien plus
God
que le moment
on the side of the
actuel *
anihilated
* I become the wild birds, the end of winter sun that caresses
my face,
hope, the old country, to go back again where I can’t remember
anything more than the present moment.
File as
originally
sent
JE REVIEN/ I BECOME
Could be
je revien
broken
windows/doors
les oiseaux
robbing Lane Bryant
sauvages
and
then killing
le fin d’hiver
five women
le soleil
into the classroom
que caresse
marketplace
ma face
fifty dead
l’espoir
border into
le vieux champagne
Amorite
retourner
Israel
de nouveau
ou je ne peut pas
souvenir
territory
rien plus
God
que le moment
on the side of the
actuel *
anihilated
_______
* I become the wild birds, the end of winter sun that caresses
my face,
hope, the old country, to go back again where I can’t remember
anything more than the present moment.
A Weekend
A weekend of David
Copperfield, Oliver
Twist, Rachmaninoff’s Sonata Number 2,
Poulenc’s “Les Soirés de Nazelles,” rose
tea at Anne’s in her swamp, a visit from
I’m-just-two-courses-away from-my—
psychology-master’s daughter, Marcella,
lots of whitefish and crab cakes, the
first night’s straight-through sleep in
two months, e-mails from 60’s word—
giants grown rickety but still giants, the
sun saying “Soon, soon,” wanting to
live it all over again, as if the first time
around were just a rehearsal.
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Read
Additional Poems by Hugh Fox
Hugh Fox—Free
Verse: Solitude, Meditations, Unchange, Awarenessing,
Creating, Now (# 140), Back To, Now (# 141), Finally, The
Right, Normal Exotic, Dreamland, Spring Dusk Pomeranian Walk,
To Terror Or Not To Terror, Life-Drawing Class, Economics,
Debussy
Hugh
Fox—Prose:
A Little Pencil Magic
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