Monday, May 25, 2015

Born One-Hundred Seven Years Ago Today




DOLOR

Theodore Roethke

I have known the inexorable sadness of pencils,
Neat in their boxes, dolor of pad and paper weight,
All the misery of manilla folders and mucilage,
Desolation in immaculate public places,
Lonely reception room, lavatory, switchboard,
The unalterable pathos of basin and pitcher,
Ritual of multigraph, paper-clip, comma,
Endless duplicaton of lives and objects.
And I have seen dust from the walls of institutions,
Finer than flour, alive, more dangerous than silica,
Sift, almost invisible, through long afternoons of tedium,
Dropping a fine film on nails and delicate eyebrows,
Glazing the pale hair, the duplicate grey standard faces.


*Six poems below the fold.



THE SURLY ONE

Theodore Roethke

1

When true love broke my heart in half,
I took the whiskey from the shelf,
And told my neighbors when to laugh
I keep a dog, and bark myself.

2

Ghost cries out to ghost–
But whose afraid of that?
I feel those shadows most
That start from my own feet.



ROOT CELLAR

Theodore Roethke

Nothing would sleep in that cellar, dank as a ditch,
Bulbs broke out of boxes hunting for chinks in the dark,
Shoots dangled and drooped,
Lolling obscenely from mildewed crates,
Hung down long yellow evil necks, like tropical snakes.
And what a congress of stinks!—
Roots ripe as old bait,
Pulpy stems, rank, silo-rich,
Leaf-mold, manure, lime, piled against slippery planks.
Nothing would give up life:
Even the dirt kept breathing a small breath.



JOURNEY INTO THE INTERIOR

Theodore Roethke

In the long journey out of the self,
There are many detours, washed-out interrupted raw places
Where the shale slides dangerously
And the back wheels hang almost over the edge
At the sudden veering, the moment of turning.
Better to hug close, wary of rubble and falling stones.
The arroyo cracking the road, the wind-bitten buttes, the canyons,
Creeks swollen in midsummer from the flash-flood roaring into the narrow valley.
Reeds beaten flat by wind and rain,
Grey from the long winter, burnt at the base in late summer.
-- Or the path narrowing,
Winding upward toward the stream with its sharp stones,
The upland of alder and birchtrees,
Through the swamp alive with quicksand,
The way blocked at last by a fallen fir-tree,
The thickets darkening,
The ravines ugly.


NIGHT JOURNEY

Theodore Roethke

Now as the train bears west,
Its rhythm rocks the earth,
And from my Pullman berth
I stare into the night
While others take their rest.
Bridges of iron lace,
A suddenness of trees,
A lap of mountain mist
All cross my line of sight,
Then a bleak wasted place,
And a lake below my knees.
Full on my neck I feel
The straining at a curve;
My muscles move with steel,
I wake in every nerve.
I watch a beacon swing
From dark to blazing bright;
We thunder through ravines
And gullies washed with light.
Beyond the mountain pass
Mist deepens on the pane;
We rush into a rain
That rattles double glass.
Wheels shake the roadbed stone,
The pistons jerk and shove,
I stay up half the night
To see the land I love.



THE WAKING

Theodore Roethke

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.   
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.   
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?   
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.   
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Of those so close beside me, which are you?   
God bless the Ground!  I shall walk softly there,   
And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?   
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;   
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Great Nature has another thing to do   
To you and me; so take the lively air,   
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.   
What falls away is always. And is near.   
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.   
I learn by going where I have to go.


EPIDERMAL MACABRE

Theodore Roethke

Indelicate is he who loathes
The aspect of his fleshy clothes, --
The flying fabric stitched on bone,
The vesture of the skeleton,
The garment neither fur nor hair,
The cloak of evil and despair,
The veil long violated by
Caresses of the hand and eye.
Yet such is my unseemliness:
I hate my epidermal dress,
The savage blood's obscenity,
The rags of my anatomy,
And willingly would I dispense
With false accouterments of sense,
To sleep immodestly, a most
Incarnadine and carnal ghost.

3 comments:

  1. the first poem by roethke, with its reference to 'immaculate public spaces', reminds me that i have formed the intention to visit the library of congress, which i have never used as a library patron, although i did attend a talk on its premises once

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1_nB7VymU8
    http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2002/02-147.html

    while at the LoC i intend to read marilyn johnston's 'red dust rising', the chapbook of her poems mostly about 'nam - her husband's a vet of that war

    it may be that the poem by her i posted here a few days ago - 'Before Igniting' - is included in that - or maybe not - i'll have to see

    i have good news and bad news for her about her book at the LoC -

    the good news - the catalog says it's there and available to readers

    the bad news - the catalog is confused about who wrote it - although my friend IS marilyn e. johnston, contrary to what the catalog states she is NOT the same person as marilyn e. johnston 1949 - , author of 'silk fist songs' and 'weight of the angel'

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  2. Replies
    1. on first?

      my friend marilyn elaine johnston, maiden name greene, who was born in 1947

      - priority of birth

      and whose book was published in 2004, compared to 2008 and 2009 for the other ms. johnston

      - priority of publication

      here's one of her poems again - some people like this sort of thing:


      Before Igniting

      He enters the room, smelling of smoke
      from the burning brush pile out back,
      his eyes red like the glowing embers.
      This is the moment when I see it all—
      the fire fights that wake him in the night
      and the roughened hands
      that carried an M16,
      his friend’s body,
      the weight of all that’s unspoken.

      And even now,
      when he lies back after work,
      the Vietnam soil coats him,
      red layer upon layer—
      trailing behind as he treads carefully
      through the mine field
      of each day.


      Marilyn Johnston

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