The Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan (37 page)
Read The Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan Online
Authors: Alice Notley
She is a muse
gone but not forgotten
50
STATES
state of grace
the milk state
Oregon
stateroom
state of anxiety
hazy state
estate
statement
Rugby Kissick state
Florida
the empire state
disaster state
the lightbulb state
soup state
Statue of Liberty
state of no return
the White Bear state
doped state
recoil state
Please state your name, address, occupation
the German shepherd state
bent on destruction
state
the farmer state
state of no more parades
the tobacco state
statesman
stately
state prison
stasis
status
static
station wagon
State Flower
state of innocence
ambition state
North Carolina
Jasper’s state
the united state
big state
state your cause
income state
jump the gun state
Roman nose state
manic depression state
hospital state
speed state
calculated state
gone forever state
the body state
the death body state
In New York State
in ‘Winter in The Country’
at night you write
while someone
(Alice) sometimes sleeps & dreams;
awake she writes
22.
I dreamed you brought home a baby
Solid girl, could already walk
In blue corduroy overalls
Nice & strange, baby to keep close
I hadn’t thought of it before
She & I waited for you out by the door
Of building, went in
Got you from painting
Blue & white watercolor swatches
We got on a bus, city bus
One row of seats lining it & poles
It went through the California desert
Blue bright desert day
In the country of old men I said
pretty good
& tho I live there
no more
“you can say that again.”
Pretty good
.
It takes your best shot,
to knock off whatever,
so, we take our best shots,
it gives us a boot or two
we just do it
we wouldn’t know what to tell you
if our lives depended upon it!
Anne?
but Anne’s already talking
across from me across my life
across the mailman’s
locked box,
over the mailman
I mean
where a woman is alive
a mailman her friend
as you all know
having met the man at the Met
introduced by Vincent,
& loved by Joe:
Joe’s introductions go on,
the tongue, the ears burn on Memorial Day
at Anne’s turn:
Dear Mr. Postman:
Please take this from me
to me.
I’m delivered without a hitch
to myself
I’m a woman in the Prime of Strife
I speak for all you crazy ladies
past & present
& I say,
NO MESSAGES
Nothing can be helped. Nothing gets lost.
Blink
the eye is closed
& I am asleep
blink
the eye is open
& I am awake
in the
real
wide-eye world nothing gets lost