Furnacy End of This Hollow Rope

Read that ▲ out loud.

William Gass describes his tunnel, his project, page 163. Only now is he starting to dig. I know you're too smart to have a clean conscience. Still, let Gass interrogate you. Lordy, when you laugh wince recoil in self-recognition. You will stare at the hole the hole has left.

I wish I'd taken The Tunnel, the punniest, angriest, funniest I've ever to Maine. I could have read it out loud - when Earthgirl was painting on the trail I could have wandered off to a rock, when Earthgirl was painting off in kayak I could have read aloud on porch. Here, I read this out loud, quick, look around, see there are no witnesses, try it:

• Or not. I read better loud than silent.
• Wait. You need a copy?
• Bog-face.
• The coming of the post-Liberal era.
• While you watch torture porn.
• Satan endorses Clinton.
• Full-Panic Mode! It's Politico, so... but one of my Hillaryite Colleagues is happy-dancing, convinced the next two debates will TKO Trump. I said, w the Clintons - how much fair, how much unfair, ymmv - there is always another shoe-to-drop the second it looks like clear sailing. HC said, Trump Trump Trump Trump. It started to rain. Hard. Today was Farmer's Market day in Red Square. I said, in past election years here the Hilltop Student Republicans and the Hilltop Student Democrats would have been tabling Leavey Center, Red Square, Main Gate, everyday in September, October. There would flyers up in the Library of debates, rallies. Signs in dorm windows. There's nothing. HC said, I don't understand, don't they know it's their future? I said, of course they do. Rain amped to pouring. She's gonna win, HC shouted, running off without an umbrella.
• Why no one is talking about SCOTUS.
• Unpacking "alt."
• Did you know there was a prison work strike?
• Old weird and new weird.
• KM4.
• Gravity's Rainbow, page 256.
• Two hours of Trish Keenan (Broadcast) songs.
• 50 best ambient albums of all time? 
• On Fleetwood Mac's Mirage. I don't love all Fleetwood Mac (all versions), but I do love Buckingham's Fleetwood Mac songs. I'm stupid for Buckingham's music. His birthday in four days, lots of his music then.
• UPDATE: copyright killed the Buckingham. I laugh at your copyright.

THE FUTURE OF TERROR / 5

Matthea Harvey

If there were gamebirds in our gables,

shouldn’t we shoot them ourselves?

Thus we went glass-faced into glory.   

We had our hearts set on staying here,

so our steps seemed more hesitation

waltz than straight-ahead tango.   

We danced the hokey pokey on holy days—

put your left arm in heaven, your right leg in hell

and in the hubbub of shake-it-all-about,

we didn’t hear the hoofbeats. The illuminati

spoke to us over the intercom via interpreters.

Meanwhile we had iodine dribbling from

our wounds and itch mites in our blankets.

Ours was not a job to joke about.   

In the lantern-light, the lawn speckled

with lead looked lovely. We would live this

down by living it up. My pile of looseleaf

was getting smaller—I wrote in margins,   

through marmalade stains, on the backs of maps.   

I put a piece of mica in the microwave and before

the explosion it made the mirage I’d imagined.

I was hoping for a noticeable increase in nutmeats

or a one night stand in the oubliette. I outwept

everyone at the pageant, even the children

from the poorhouse playing possum.

We studied the protocol for astronaut removal

the minute we saw his spit hit planet earth

on the spaceship window. But though the scandal

reverberated round-the-clock, we had to let it

slide. He was up there turning somersaults

while we spun ever-so-slowly below.