-- someday thru the dream wall
to nextdoor consciousness
like thru this blue hotel wall
-- millions of hotel rooms fogging
the focus of my eyes --
with whatever attitude I hold the cotton
to my nose, it's still a secret joke
with pinky akimbo, or with effete queer
eye in mirror at myself,
or serious-brow mein
& darkened beard,
I'm still the kid of obscene chance await-
ing --
breathing in a chinese Universe
thru the nose like some old Brahamic God.
O BELL TIME RING THY
MIDNIGHT FOR THE BILLIONTH
SOUNDY TIME, I HEAR AGAIN!
I'll go to walk the street,
Who'll find
me in the night, in Lima, in my
33'd year,
On Street (Cont.)
The souls of Peter &
I answer each other.
But -- and what's a soul?
To be a poet's a
serious occupation,
condemned to that
in universe --
to walk the city
ascribbling in
a book -- just accosted
by a drunk --
in Plaza de Armas
sidestreet under
a foggy sky, and
sometimes with no
moon.
The heavy balcony
hangs over the white
marble of the Bishop's
Palace next the Cathedral --
The fountain plays
in light as e'er --
The buss & the
motorcyclists pass
thru midnight, the
carlights shine
the beggar turns
a corner with his
cigarette stub &
cane, the Noisers
leave the tavern
and delay, conversing
in high voice,
Awake,
Hasta Manana
they all say --
and somewhere
at the other end of
the line, a telephone
is ringing, once again
with unknown news --
The night
looms over Lima,
sky black fog --
and I sit helpless
smoking with a
pencil hand --
The long crack
in the pavement
or yesterday's
Volcano in Chile,
or the day before
the Earthquake
that begat the
World.
The Plaza pavement
shines in the electric
light. I wait.
The lonely beard
workman staggers
home to bed from
Death.
Yes but I'm
a little tired of
being alone . . .
Keats' Nightingale -- the
instant of realization
a single consciousness
that hears the chimes
of Time, repeated
All night, w/ Ether, wave
after wave of magic
understanding. A dis-
turbance of the field
of consciousness.
Magic night, magic stars,
magic men, magic music,
magic tomorrow, magic death,
magic Magic.
What crude Magic
we live in (seeing trolley
like a rude monster
in downtown street
w/ electric diamond
wire antennae to sky
pass night café under
white arc-light by
Gran Hotel Bolivar.)
The mad potter of
Mochica made a
pot w/ 6 Eyes & 2
Mouths & half a Nose
& 5 Cheeks & no Chin
for us to figure out,
serious side-track,
blind alley Kosmos.
(Back in Room)
How the strange to remember anything, even a button
much less a universe.
'What creature gives birth to itself?'
The universe is mad, slightly mad.
-- and the two sides wriggle away
in opposite directions to die
lopped off
the blind metallic length curled up
feebly & wiggling its feet
in the grass
the millepede's black head moving inches away
on the staircase at Macchu Picchu
the Creature feels itself
destroyed,
head & tail of the universe
cut in two.
Men with slick mustaches of mystery have
pimp horrible climaxes & Karmas --
-- the mad magician that created Chaos
in the peaceful void & suave.
with my fucking suave manners & knowitall
eyes, and mind full of fantasy --
the Me! that horror that keeps me conscious
in this Hell of Birth & Death.
34 coming up -- I suddenly felt old -- sitting with
Walter & Raquel in Chinese Restaurant -- they kissed -- I alone
-- age of Burroughs when we first met.
Hotel Commercio
Lima, Peru
May 28, 1960
Table of Contents
My Alba
Sakyamuni Coming out from the Mountain
The Green Automobile
Havana
Siesta in Xbalba
On Burroughs' Work
Love Poem on Theme By Whitman
Over Kansas
Malest Cornifici Tuo Catullo
Dream Record
Blessed be the muses
Fragment 1956
A Strange New Cottage in Berkeley
Sather Gate Illumination
Scribble
Afternoon Seattle
Psalm III
Tears
Ready To Roll
Wrote This Last Night
Squeal
American Change
'Back on Times Square, Dreaming of Times Square'
My Sad Self
Funny Death
Battleship Newsreel
I Beg You Come Back & Be Cheerful
To An Old Poet in Peru
Aether