Winter Sky: New and Selected Poems, 1968-2008

WRFC

162 f r o m g o u r d s e e d w r f c My forty-nine entries to the Name the Call Letters Contest won me seventeen albums, but not the movie camera. Under various names—Xenia Zed, Mrs. Jarvis Helms, Lothar Tresp, Matthew Barrick— through two contest weeks, carrying a pack of blank postcards, mailing them from different bars around Athens: The Chameleon, The Frogpond Lounge, The Last Resort, Friends, finding anagrams in drunktalk, winsome, raunchy, four-letter conundrums: WIND REALLY FONDLES COWS WENCHES ROAR FOR CHASTITY WRITING RARELY FEELS COMFORTABLE WHAT REACHES FROM CHINA Thomas Wolfe made lists of what he had to eat, who he slept with, towns and cities, menus, casual sex. The I Ching says there’s nothing wrong with casual sex. A girl I met in a bar in Norfolk threw the coins to ask. WHICH ROOM’S FOR CHEATING WHO RUNS FOR CHEESE WIMPS RUN FOR CONGRESS WEAR RATTY FUR COATS WITH REVERENCE FOR CUCUMBERS WE’RE RUNTS FROM CAMILLA • • • 163 f r o m g o u r d s e e d You see people walking by the ocean picking up shells and shark’s teeth to put in a dish on top of the counter in the kitchen. WIDE RUNGS FEEL CONFUSED WHIPPING RUINS FAT CHILDREN WALLY’S RICH FINGER CREAM WILD RHINOS FLATTEN CABBAGES WHARF RATS FORGET CHRISTMAS There is no end to that either, the only sound, the sound of their bare feet in sand. WHICH RAT FEELS CUTE WILL ROGERS FAILED CHILDBIRTH WARTS REVEAL FEMININE CHARACTER I keep saying friends I’ve never met are looking for me. With the ocean on one side and buildings on the other they come up behind. In my dream they say, None of it’s clear. All of it’s drunk. We consciously don’t judge how far down the beach we’ve walked, or why. WITHOUT REASON FISH CHANGE WE RADIATE FLIRTATIOUS CHARM WOPSIDED RED FOLDING CHAIRS This wandering the bars to find initials willing enough to be a sentence is throwing one collected handful after another, a writing class from years ago, 164 f r o m g o u r d s e e d people you run into, any random assemblage, back where they came from. And each of us gets an award for doing so, a tiny leather mail pouch, worn on the left breast. ...