Tuesday, June 29, 2021

CID CORMAN ~

 

Cid Corman

                                             June 29, 1924 ~ March 12, 2004

_______________



for all

poets


At the shrine

on the altar

not one relic


but in one way

or another

I remain.





A LORD will dismount

at the imperative of

the cherry blossoms.





DON'T LET the poet

get you down

when he rages


His letter kills but

his spirit

resuscitates.





AN


effulgence

a glory

a subtle


insistent

falling a

lucid rain


a torrent

guttural

clear and shrill


a run of

color con-

fused and con-


fusing a

sky full of

them! Alone


on the downs

on a bright

windless day





NOTRE DAME


Where Roman law made aliens bend

Stands a church, original, vital,

Like Adam once, all nerve and mettle,

Muscles aquiver at the end.


From outside you see the inner plan:

Flying buttresses forestalling

That mass from breaking against those walls

Upholding the vault's outstretching strain.


Labyrinth, impenetrable wood,

Soul of Gothic's rational abyss,

Egyptian might and Christian meekness,

By slim reed  oak, by plumb line — lord.


But the more, fortified Notre Dame,

I studied your immense example,

The more I thought: one day I too will

Build from meaningless a dream.





TU FU is long dead.

Leaves have fallen —

leaves will fall.


Every

thing in his words

on a far lookout.





MAKING

of rock. Letting as

Michelangelo


does the prisoner

becoming the rock

escape.





MOVED — three blocks up

and around in

a row of old


houses under

the bells of St

Stainslas and


cherry blossoms.

Must go get a

sink stopper and


a curtain rod —

if life is to

be tenable.





HERE I am

like a leaf

falling or


fallen. Point-

less as one —

as any —


all. Holding

mother's hand

though she's gone.





WE COME out

in the end

at the end


beginning

to see where

the stars are.





THE HILL

beyond the

gate


the temple

almost

mist.




__________________________

from TU

Cid Corman

The Toothpaste Press

1983