Lessons in Darkness

Peter Gizzi

Those notes are fetching（迷人的） 

 when they touch the ear. 

 It's true, there are more tears 

 in sand than water. 

 "Come out and play," 

 the song's refrain 

 in my head, my sawdust showing. 

 My heart, your eyes 

 is what the day made. 

There, the notes, the song, 

 the besidedness to live 

 on Saturday, to walk out, 

 wanted to, right out the frame. 

 The sadness, gas pumps, 

 sunshine on oil, 

 that crow overhead 

 destroys the picture. 

 Everything faking it so badly. 

What's so wrong about the real, 

 so off with clarity, 

 dumbfuck, shirttail-hanging 

 scatter-brained word. 

 Shattered-pane world? 

The whir of the camera inside pictures 

 but we want the voice to lift, 

 don't we, across the mini-plaza 

 to where? How about 

 pulling taffy（太妃糖） for a living 

 or a rabbit from one ideal-ology 

 to another. That's the trick 

 isn't it, parallel lives? 

You know, here a dumpster 

 there a Dane. On the street 

 I see birds, bricks, clouds 

 I see a friend getting into her car 

 I see myself in the puddle I see. 

 And even if we pray to remain 

 unabated（不减弱的）, a minor chord 

 can sometimes reconnoiter 

 the most distant thoughts 

 camouflaged in lace and literature. 

O western wind let's not 

 decorate the light with roseate diadems, 

 plumbago（石墨） shadows in the rushes. 

 Haven't we heard enough 

 from the birds, their annual trips 

 and cross-talk? Listen. 

 The arc of a rocket 

 is louder than a rainbow.