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  • Sign Language

               An Interpretation of the Paintings of            Robert Rauschenberg            for Ray Kass      There is a bird in a box,      the wildlife caged                  but all around,                  the life of the painting,                              wild      wild,      painting with disordered letters,                  the ordering      the dis                  ordering,…

  • Protocol

    I wanted to begin with perfectly simple things, things that were indivisible, safe from analysis. Without knowing it, I tried for years to write protocol sentences. My mistake was to think that such dregs, even had I reached them, were what I had to say, its "true" form, my "real" meaning. "John joy now." "John…

  • Marvin Gardens’ Revenge

    So there he perched, a poor sad slob of a young failure, Marvin Gardens, Ph.D., pondering in the deadest center of his ambiguities. Two years past, to the day, he had assessed his life from that identical spot – the large stuffed chair in his small study (not yet, then, had greyish stuffing begun to…

  • Driving America

    Outside the barracks of the city & the fountains of the suburbs lit up with private yellow lights, kitchens of self, bedrooms of despair, women in white slips pulling down shades, newspaper blown down airshafts like dead souls. Inside the park trees drip green in the dark, unseen lilac flows, pines zig zag, birches rear…

  • The Pakistani’s Daughter

    Is lingering by the door With a younger sister Listening to my music. Oh come into my parlor Blush and promise to come again Should I say, “My need is great,” Or “My father married a girl much younger,” Or, “I saw you in the Moka having a milkshake.” Oh why should I, old enuf…

  • Nine Country Poems

    (1) A lot of sky litters my view of home — oh Missed one, lost      Helium balloons spill off the horizon            & knock me backwards Jeolousy is too easy, this easy I miss      a better sentiment, ballooning pride could accomplish      Homesick for your hands, I miss the fragrance of my labors in them: devilish…

  • Contributors’ Notes

    EDITORIAL BOARD Directors Peter O'Malley DeWitt Henry Coordinating Editor James Randall Editorial Staff David Gullette Paul Hannigan William Corbett Katha Pollitt Art Director David Omar White CONTRIBUTORS ALBERTINE is currently building his own dome in Griswold, Connecticut. He studied under Minor White, graduated from Rochester Institute of Technology, is working on his Masters at M.I.T….

  • The Poem of Disintegration

    Look at me. Turn around. It’s four — thirty Saturday afternoon & this sick loose light that’s coming through the window wants to fall apart. It’s time for me to leave; & Christ, love, if I’ve got to go, this is the time. Pick up the books & help me divide the dishes, the glassware,…