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On the Ground
By Fanny Howe Graywolf Press
Copyright © 2004 Fanny Howe
All right reserved. ISBN: 1-55597-403-1
Chapter One
ON THE GROUND Satan fell behind, it was a taxi's shadow where Man put his foot on the sidewalk
His mouth covered mine and he was gone
Italo once said a kiss on the mouth is a sign of betrayal and pointed at Judas in the painting
(his muscular hand, his brush)
There was an ache in the canvas he had speared himself
That was the day when rain fell until twelve outside the studio and twelve months before that shadow
Not a rink but ashed-over ice Rain on a windshield, a green light
Apartments made of dirt, neon hangers outlined in the cleaner's window
I think proximity is the abyss between God and us because
every fabric of my body is trying to know why saying
I love you in a time of extremity is a necessity
Dreams before waking are eyes into the future where there is no Zurich but an alphabet
beginning with Z so go away before I ask to know
what you mean about wanting to go
Terrified of being the first? of being dirt?
Of being ambushed or embossed? Personally I want to batter my way out of this cage of psychology
and get to the longing I really know about
Morning dusk-his figure furry
Threads of gray hair
and outside, a world without a leader Oil and land mines
lonely words scurrying to work
If the dark bricks hide criminal life so does each body
dedicated to maintaining power by suppressing its delights
Inside this egg the walls are lacquered blue
Creamy tones of windowsill and slat. Dawn from hell on up
I hear a rooster deny, deny, deny or is it Man
Lies smell in every detail as the light increases in this shell
Maybe the end of the world happened long ago A whirl as quick as Judas breaking his neck and every sound is an echo
Poor love in the order of existence
subsists on passivity inside this skin where pain has cut a pattern
and a red heart's a little devil speared by its own hand
and brain of this stranger- is it mine or its own-and its skeleton?
Can I toss them aside like an armful of sticks and set out as a feeling to find Hana and Issa across the night
Happiness has become unbearable so don't stay with me
Ilona said this from the hall
Doors are here for both ways of walking
The split bed and bodies facing where two unanimities make a positive zero
She was hoping to die into Hans so I left her house
I thought I was happy and said to my friend
It's because we are together
The blushing hills were rusty its nerves as icy as his sleeves
Doll's hair, snow like artificial Elimination of detail, a day to be grateful
He had broken parole
with speed-thinning strides a horse passed by without a saddle
A body never forgets The lens is turned on its own tremendum
Only blocks away-tubes, needles, straps at the physician's prison
No sign of reflection, just blood and bone trying to incorporate meds into atoms
When the body escapes without identification this is its identification:
Chunks of moonstone smoothing a curb Honey night snow in the city
She swept up my hair from the linoleum floor and shook out the sheet
A rouge along the shades and drinks to be drunk
In transit, in transit, in stations and camps
little white spots wobbled from wall to phone
Star-lashes batted
-it was truck lights exiting the pike and other war zones
Farther wars report on us:
an arsenal of artworks and theories that contribute to the power of the military
"Beware of the fruits of your labor!"
My father was a soldier who was smaller than my son
when he returned as a ghost.
I begged him to stay with us but he said: "Not until you come to life."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from On the Ground by Fanny Howe Copyright © 2004 by Fanny Howe. Excerpted by permission.
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