A permanent sizzle

But he who looks down from above
sees only long slender hooks hanging down from the oil lamps.
Excerpt from a translation of the poem, “A Night of Nihilism”, by a contemporary Chinese poet, Yan Hen, that I stumbled at here.

The power from above is a frayed
Silence, boutiqued on rosebuds,
Premised on huge stone steps, looking

Down at long slender hooks; the oil lamps
Have yet to burn a permanent sizzle, the
Calves of flame are tender, need rub & hue.

Notes from Monrovia – I

These are some wordspills from the last few days in Monrovia, Liberia. More detail, perhaps even more clarity, to follow.

I

So you have the sense of a
   long now, the perhaps of               a fire, a
                         Truce, axiomatic

Burn, the cut of a thousand
      the but of another
      sense of another
      calm of 

Tooth, axe,
       postulate of norm
       pestilence   harm of your unknowns

II

the pin of an inconsistent
    raw
                        ness - the
                        pine of ferment its disdain
    for
    all that isindolent
             isincohate

III

The sense of being a toy or a
    hound as a new world spills - dregs of 
                                  myinkpot

Tagore/Kabir XIII. X

This is my fifth post in the Tagore/Kabir series.

To be blind to all
     but X
To be exfoliated 
     of X
The retributive
     was X
Whence the unknown
     is X
Where the X itself is
     not X

Here’s Tagore channeling Kabir

II. 37. angadhiyâ devâ

  O Lord Increate, who will serve Thee?
  Every votary offers his worship to the God of his own creation:
    each day he receives service—
  None seek Him, the Perfect: Brahma, the Indivisible Lord.
  They believe in ten Avatars; but no Avatar can be the Infinite
    Spirit, for he suffers the results of his deeds:
  The Supreme One must be other than this.
  The Yogi, the Sanyasi, the Ascetics, are disputing one with
    another:
  Kabîr says, "O brother! he who has seen that radiance of love,
    he is saved."

Let’s count the ways

Let's count the ways the dead ravine
    Speaks; let's

Dine with hampsters and speak ill of
    Their fathers;

Let's see what's in store for the red
     Pillage of my

Ink tying throbknots with yours; let's
     Turn this eye

And go blind.

When you speak dissent

Doubt is never green
Doubt is never green; it
Can pose as a subtle shade

Of green, but the facade
Stops in two seconds; the

First instant you re-create
The mill of worry; in the second

You forget the question that
Raises the head of the hound.

The bull of an unwant
The bull of an unwant, the hull
Of fear, stroke of morn, hurry!
Call the vet, the cat of a million
Anchors needs play but won’t,

Can’t; the subterfuge of reason,
the stroke of morn, the hull of
Fear, hurry! the white of your
Eyes is lulled, void, seeks red.

When you speak dissent
When you speak dissent you strike a
Chord with deep, you

Mingle with the ecstatic component of
Hyperbole and reduce

It to mean, to song, when you speak
Dissent, you call the

Fire in netherworlds to answer, to respond
In repose, resplendent.

The structure of verse
i. The possibility of pain is an epistemological
boon ii. A permanent fire burns my hand,

and it sizzles iii. Deem the thread inviolable,
the threat inveterate iv. Cast a net that crowns

the sense of the ineffable v. The sensible is but an articulate corollary

The terrifying responsibility of action
The terrifying responsibility of
Action willing

Science to matter and verse to
Argument, parting

Seas into neat countables and un
Nameables, wishing

With tables, minutae, verbal and
Occular –

Tagore/Kabir XIV: the hue of hubris

This is the fourth post in the Tagore/Kabir series.

You seek the hue of hubris in
The pine flavor of sky and you
Call it I; you rest in the palm of
Wilful Sky and try, try and call it
I; you bring me the pulp of a paper
Cut sluiced and threaded with dread
and call it I; there are many I’s, no?

The original representation of the even more original

II. 56. dariyâ kî lahar dariyâo hai jî

  The river and its waves are one
  surf: where is the difference between the river and its waves?
  When the wave rises, it is the water; and when it falls, it is
    the same water again. Tell me, Sir, where is the distinction?
  Because it has been named as wave, shall it no longer be
    considered as water?
  Within the Supreme Brahma, the worlds are being told like beads:
  Look upon that rosary with the eyes of wisdom.

And here’s a useful tangent
The way you create a deliberate lilt
In the fabric

And let the hazelnut fry your brain’s
Abruptness,

Its thrust into being another, its voltage
Of stammer

And becoming, walking; this stroll through
A laugh and

Hammer.