"gustavus" poems
Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore —
No doubt you have heard the name before —
Was a boy who never would shut a door!
The wind might whistle, the wind might roar,
And teeth be aching and throats be sore,
But still he never would shut the door.
His father would beg, his mother implore,
'Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore,
We really do wish you would shut the door!'
Their hands they wrung, their hair they tore;
But Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore
Was deaf as the buoy out at the Nore.
When he walked forth the folks would roar,
'Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore,
Why don't you think to shut the door?'
They rigged up a Shutter with sail and oar,
And threatened to pack off Gustavus Gore
On a voyage of penance to Singapore.
But he begged for mercy and said, 'No more!
Pray do not send me to Singapore
On a Shutter, and then I will shut the door!'
'You will?' said his parents; 'then keep on shore!
But mind you do! For the plague is sore
Of a fellow that never will shut the door,
Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore!'
Dec 12, 2013
Dec 12, 2013 at 12:46 AM UTC
**I
February
Einbahnstraße in a
night of black arrowheads/jazz, obliteration perfume/
the twinkle of your
eyes which are engulfed
by youthful nymphs
Fur-lined sable coat
& I
in a jean jacket, hair styled back/
the perspiring windows of Paul Gustavus
open to reveal alizarin (death of day)
velvet curtains
(an appetite for moonlight &
mirrors) the reverberation
echochamber settles over us infused
with alcohol and tea leaves
Basement seclusion,
Deutsch in every direction
Woodstove heat/harsh truths exist in
a Blue Rose of cackling ash, left
disentangled ... duskdancer and copperhue-rooftop Saharas
billowing madly
conversation as a
room full of isolation, lip -
eye, breath -
hairline/drifting to attic enticement,
bedsheets ruffling like
a winged dove
(insertion/devotion)
I am a North American phantom speaking through written paragraphs
& on my second drink a voice
persuasively licks my thigh/come up from the uneven ground
*"feed the moon
relinquish fear
-blindness & burden, parish your
anticipation for fire"*
II
In my restlessness later on, I realize
all I can do is keep my head
high, mimic hope, mimic strength knowing we are
but one brief collision of beautiful
time purposed to split off again
towards a chaos larger than
ourselves.
Remembering The Woman in The Dunes..
"There was a drooling wolf...there was the sun. And, somewhere, he knew not where...there must also be a storm center and lines of discontinuity"
our own repitition of love & labor, warding off the deathhand which always comes back around
... How far do we have to go for lasting tenderness?
III
March
Australian sand/I erase my flesh
in Summer fruit/the air is thick,
I have stopped wearing leather
With iron humility
I task myself to
tillling a steeple into
a breaking cloudbeam
Feb 19, 2018
Feb 19, 2018 at 3:03 AM UTC