Last Bender

Vulcan   his grief erupts by the molten cul de sac for dying seams of rose and burlap wipes the weeping stitches clean and hammers out the mailed sleeve turned from injured silk to infernal suit   below the bursting ingot blows the silver chestplate smokes against the anvil charred and broken the mortared saint [...]

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE           I slipped the waitress fifty bucks, paid the check and left her pausing for contractions, delivering plates with the help of other waitresses. The way to David Watts’s house was still a mystery; I asked for directions from some guy at a gas station who insisted we were there for the fishing. [...]

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR             In a series of identical rooms I was handed back my clothes, keys and wallet, but not the guns. I signed blurry forms and endured the removal of the U and thunderbolt from my hand. It left behind a faint white scar. “A souvenir of your stay in Tudor Caravan,” the [...]

  Pax Americana   Silenced not by laws By guns or bricks or accolades, Insensate to all But the self-selected music This creature creeps around In its abyss of mirrors, while Sorrow’s police stand guard, Army bright, their stellar shields Held high, petrified in triumph.

The Rice Economies   By Francesca Bray   Basil Blackwell Ltd 1986   http://www.amazon.com/Rice-Economies-Francesca-Bray/dp/B001Q1YHAG/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233256698&sr=1-6     Just as any study of Vietnam in some way begins with Chinese written sources, any understanding of Vietnam must begin with rice. And the book on rice I started with is Francesca Bray’s The Rice Economies. Bray is not [...]

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE           The cell was a cage in the middle of a large white tiled room; it was a cage in a tank. Three people sat under the blinding lights. There were no beds or chairs. At one end was a metal pail.           I entered the cell and they shut the gate. The [...]

  Tantra   Today count pearls in the game tomorrow your teeth. There will be no new dames in your life married man stiffen your resolve my friend spelunk the familiar hole evasive detail creates novelty ejaculate collects in the cup of her hand she secretes doesn’t squirt no spooge accumulates absorb thought through the [...]

Belly Song   watch them belly grow some with meat some with child but boy girl watch them grow   some in hunger some in wroth they writhe in slumber watch them belly grow   those in sloth those in time watch them belly grow   in shame blow billows made of frost and grime [...]

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO           The Guernsey town David and Wanda Watts lived in is called Tudor Caravan. On the PaCificATolL Rd. it’s called Exit 49.           They weren’t kidding about the Tudor either. Every third house was sided with recycled vinyl stucco-and beam panels, even crappy, two-bedroom bungalows. And the stores had wooden signs that said [...]

Robert Herrick 1591-1674   Herrick is a poet I have loved since my early twenties, but I’m not sure how I found him. Perhaps in a Norton Anthology? Or Ezra Pound’s ABC of Reading? Who knows. He’s often crossed with his emotional opposite, austere old Herbert. I admire Herbert as a poet, but I love [...]