The Roominghouse Madrigals Read Free Page A

THE PREACHERS
    Beware The Knowers.
     
 
    Beware
    Those Who
    Are ALWAYS
    READING
    BOOKS
     
 
    Beware Those Who Either Detest
    Poverty Or Are Proud Of It
     
 
    BEWARE Those Quick To Praise
    For They Need PRAISE In Return
    BEWARE Those Quick To Censure:
    They Are Afraid Of What They Do
    Not Know
     
 
    Beware Those Who Seek Constant
    Crowds; They Are Nothing
    Alone
     
 
    Beware
    The Average Man
    The Average Woman
    BEWARE Their Love
     
 
    Their Love Is Average, Seeks
    Average
    But There Is Genius In Their Hatred
    There Is Enough Genius In Their
    Hatred To Kill You, To Kill
    Anybody.
     
 
    Not Wanting Solitude
    Not Understanding Solitude
    They Will Attempt To Destroy
    Anything
    That Differs
    From Their Own
     
 
    Not Being Able
    To Create Art
    They Will Not
    Understand Art
     
 
    They Will Consider Their Failure
    As Creators
    Only As A Failure
    Of The World
    Not Being Able To Love Fully
    They Will BELIEVE Your Love
    Incomplete
    AND THEN THEY WILL HATE
    YOU
     
 
    And Their Hatred Will Be Perfect
    Like A Shining Diamond
    Like A Knife
    Like A Mountain
    LIKE A TIGER
    LIKE Hemlock
     
 
    Their Finest
    ART
     

4:30 A.M.
     
     
    the fields rattle
    with red birds;
    it is 4:30 in
    the morning,
    it is always
    4:30 in the morning,
    and I listen for
    my friends:
    the garbagemen
    and the thieves,
    and cats dreaming
    red birds
    and red birds dreaming
    worms,
    and worms dreaming
    along the bones of
    my love,
    and I cannot sleep,
    and soon morning will come,
    the workers will rise,
    and they will look for me
    at the docks,
    and they will say,
    “he is drunk again,”
    but I will be asleep,
    finally,
    among the bottles and
    sunlight,
    all darkness gone,
    my arms spread like
    a cross,
    the red birds
    flying,
    flying,
    roses opening in the smoke,
    and
    like something stabbed and
    healing,
    like
    40 pages through a bad novel,
    a smile upon
    my idiot’s face.
     

The Simplicity of Everything in Viet Nam
     
     
    man shot through back while
    holding robes of a young priest
    who looks like a woman,
    and here we hang:
    moon-bright
    neatly gloved,
    motorcycles everywhere, bees asleep,
    nozzles rusted,
    climate awry,
    and we shake our bones,
    blind skin there,
    and the soldier falls dead,
    another dead soldier,
    the black robe of a young priest
    who looks like a woman
    is now beautifully red,
    and the tanks
    come on through.
     

The Night They Took Whitey
     
    bird-dream and peeling wallpaper
    symptoms of grey sleep
    and at 4 a.m. Whitey came out of his room
    (the solace of the poor is in numbers
    like Summer poppies)
    and he began to scream help me! help me! help me !
    (an old man with hair as white as any ivory tusk)
    and he was vomiting blood
    help me help me help me
    and I helped him lie down in the hall
    and I beat on the landlady’s door
    (she is as French as the best wine but as tough as
    an American steak) and
    I hollered her name, Marcella! Marcella !
    (the milkman would soon be coming with his
    pure white bottles like chilled lilies)
    Marcella! Marcella! help me help me help me ,
    and she screamed back through the door:
    you polack bastard, are you drunk again? then
    Promethean the eye at the door
    and she
    sized up the red river in her rectangular brain
    (oh, I am nothing but a drunken polack
    a bad pinch-hitter a writer of letters to the newspapers)
    and she spoke into the phone like a lady ordering bread and
eggs,
    and I held to the wall
    dreaming bad poems and my own death
    and the men came…one with a cigar, the other needing a
shave,
    and they made him stand up and walk down the steps
    his ivory head on fire (Whitey, my drinking pal—
    all the songs, Sing Gypsy, Laugh Gypsy, talk about
    the war, the fights, the good whores,
    skid-row hotels floating in wine,
    floating in crazy talk,
    cheap cigars and anger)
    and the siren took him away, except the red part
    and I began to vomit and the French wolverine screamed
    you’ll have to clean it up, all of it, you and Whitey !
    and the steamers sailed and rich men on