This is a program of poetry and songs for three voices and chorus.

 

Cast:

The Poet – or, First Voice

The Squabbler – or, Second Voice

The Girl / Mary Magdalen – or, Third Voice

The Chorus of Disapproval

 

With:

The Patchouli Girls String Ensemble

And

The boys of Rhubarb Valley BSA Troop 13

 

The program opens with a short Overture during which The Squabbler appears first as an enormous effigy.

 

The Poet takes his position, and other cast is assembled as the Overture ends. When The Poet begins to read the introduction he does so quite timidly, causing an enormous uproar of hilarity among the Chorus. As the speech progresses, however, The Poet gains courage and his rising conviction quells the laughter.

 

Poet:

 

I want to live in Rhubarb Valley,
find a sexy old lady,
raise goats, smoke weed,
and feel again the kiss of peace on heavy eyelids.
In afternoons unburdened by want of anything
my soul's mouth will eat what we grow,
the slow motion hay balers doing their dance
and the men of the village cutting their crop circles.
There is a stone block of friendly stores
which are full of beautiful things of little value to the world.
There I can get a real hair cut, and blow the dust
off a box of 44 year-old Jello.
I hear a chainsaw and I smell the summer fires,
and the dogs are barking over the hill.
All my neighbors are health food junkies
and I am a Jesus freak, but we burn the same incense
which smells like myrrh.
This makes Mary Magdalen think about death,
and we discuss these things as she while she rubs my back
in the sun, sometimes naked it thought;
with words like 'a pond that holds no water is not.'
The comfort of the sudden chill breeze is the warmth
of gathering her arms around myself,
and I kiss the hand that presses on my forehead.
And there is no rhubarb here - which is mysterious.
But I know I want to die in Rhubarb Valley,
find a sexy old goat, raise ladies,
throw the world across the green grass,
feel again the kiss of peace on heavy eyelids
in afternoon sun.
Things dissolving one by one.

  

Come up and see me. We do this every day.
Nearby is a meadow of bones
of all the children who ever died
before they were born.
We give them a home, and we raise them in our garden.
Golden-haired and happy, in summer dress, they run
across the grass with arms wide and shout
I love you!
to everyone still buried in the sorrow.
And it's Christ that freed them,
the virgin sacrifice.
Come up and see me. We'll light a fire and sit around,
and burn our Polaroid's of former lovers and our tiny plastic telephones.
The air is heavy with love and sweet smelling smoke
like the eternal summer of being very young.
And someone will always go skinny dipping,
and someone else will tell jokes till the judgment comes.
(I am at one point a ruin guarded by ravens,
and in the next moment, a husband holding
your purse and your sword while you shop.)
Come up and see me. Do whatever you want.
Live with me. Kill me. Take all that I own.
Ridicule the size of my cock.
But come up and see me, and talk until dawn,
until war is done, until weeping stops.

 

Squab:

Until the Lord God drops in on Rhubarb Valley,
radiant in deeply remembered starlight.
Four faces like the revolution of earth revolving,
each of them serene and fusing to one.
He makes souls and planets from nothing but thought
while poets struggle with dust;
His body of matter, and also of none,
seen only by the Rat and Mole us
who return afterward to our rowing.
And music comes with Him and voices beyond,
the veil temporarily torn between times,
whether piping or laughing, or crying is unknown,
But there is with Him Our Saviour besides,
with His bow made of radium, a body like mine.
The arrows from that quiver, numerous as bugs,
have hit every mark. We were born into love,
and our corn fields will ripen in time to be cut.
God alone knows why He makes us this wise,
but this is the faith of the workers in life,
and this is the faith of the workers in life.

 

Poet:

 

Beyond the crumbling stone wall
by the warning signs,

By where the ravens gather,
there am I sometimes,

Wondering what far-flung stone
carries my final thought,
knowing the birds will begin with my eyes.

Next, my ears, and the easy-to-nibble
fleshy parts of me.

Birds not unlike men,
for I have such longings:

I want to devour you,
your belly fat,
your inside-out secret scar of open flesh,
your knothole leading to your hidden nest,
its leafy flaps.

And though one day they will have such pleasure with me,
it seems the ravens don't want me today.

The crumbling wall shields me, the signs read "Keep away!"
But the ravens don't want me today.

 

Squab:

 

On the one side of the valley is a deep, fearful place
called the Darkly Ravine. From there, the chief of the wild dogs -
Snarl is his name - teaches his race the way of the beast.
His friend is the dark, beautiful queen who lives on East Hill,
(if so true a thing as friendship can be the case between these two).
When they are together moonlight and frost frighten the spirits
of departed lost thoughts that were begun but never finished,
characters in novels I still haven't written. A cold wind whips
and the church bell is a hellish howl reverberating with it.
Many a night I have put the gun against my head in my fever,
and all the ladies who live in my bed scatter to other minds in fear.
I pull the trigger. The dark queen comes with her lover in collar;
she tells me, "No one is permitted to die here, my creator,"
and the bullet is mysteriously stopped by her finger.

 

Song: Lord of the Loved, performed by The Poet in Cowboy hat:

 

Well, my love life is done,
opportunity gone,
The boundaries of that fearful dominion
have dissolved,
and I'm large like a god
speaking wisdom from above.
My crown may be battered and broken
but I'm the lord of this Land of the Loved.

One morning I woke
without heartache or longing
I answered my phone
It was loneliness calling
In her quivering voice she told me
that it was the end.
My only regret is recalling the scent
of her ghost stealing most of my bed.

Though I haven't been Lord of this Land
for too long
And my detractors still cry out
that I am a fraud
I mercilessly crush all rebellion
with the force of my laws.
I'm trapped in this terrible silence,
helplessly floating above the Land of the Loved.

All my minions are crawling
to pay their respects,
but I can't give them back
all the hearts that they wrecked -
Take these wizened hands into your own and I'll do the rest.
My palms are old, cracked, and callused,
but I'm the Lord of this Land
with his hand on your breast.

  

Girl:

 

No other planet has walls of skin like these,
such fragile, toughened drumskins over bone.
From foetal transparency to the parchment of tombs,
the pulse drumming quickening in creative impulse
and quivering in answer to every cracked door.
It's skin stretched over the whole consciousness
that changes every moment so beauty is not permanent,
but brilliant and sad, perfected by imagination -
imperfect perfection forever rising in aspiration.
Once, a short time ago, the sun-filled minds of those
who inhabit these caves built monuments of stone
to the eternal beauty of truth, and truth they worshiped.
Why now do they worship nothing but their dying walls of skin,
and build meaningless monstrosities to love their money in?

 

Squab:

 

I see you on Main Street
in that shirt that says New York
With the other man's baby on your hip
and that wide smile

Once I saw you naked
through the doorway from the back
And I saw that mirror you just painted
Your reply to my attack

was gracious even grateful
And you screamed and then we laughed
For those three days on Main Street
we were going hand in half

In the morning I rise the way sweat does
from your skin in the sun
From the bed you were in
fully clothed only once

I say Hello to my God with you in my eyes
after I have slept curled in your little tuft
with my large longing
And that's how it was

 

Girl:

 

Moon and sun, once worshipful,

Now measured like flour and sugar,

Both hang there at once,

Like the shy ones at a party -

 

Poet:

 

Forgotten friends who ask, “Remember us?”

 

Girl:

 

The Queen of Heaven,

on her floor of stars,

looks down on us and clicks her tongue with love

like mothers do when we get tattoos,

or those infected piercings

shaped like the sun,

shaped like the moon.

 

Poet: (aside)

 

As if life doesn’t give us wounds enough!

 

Girl:

 

In my heart I will hug close to me

The tumult and confusion of my thought

As if it were a child broken by fear,

Comforted by a rocking motion.

And we are all of us children here

Under the sun,

Under the stars,

And under the moon,

Waiting for that delicious batter to be done.

 

 Song: Her Slippers, performed by The Poet:

 

When I got out of the Army
she was suddenly upon me
like a made up name.
I traveled with her to the shadows.

Our friends were an apology
for things beyond controlling,
like a hurricane.
Their voices rattling our windows.

And we went to many parties
where the people were not like us,
but they loved our ways.
Those Jewish girls who play the cello -

they were laughing.

And the wreckage of their frizzy curls
was knotted up like parachutes
caught in the trees.
Above their beds the soldiers dangled.

And you know the wine was flowing,
and the burning stem was glowing.
We stepped off the train
into the million nameless stations.

And some of us were soldiers
who had left our wives and children.
They forgot our names.
Our minds are branded by their faces.

We are thin and we are cold,
We are hardly in the world,
and the preachers pray.
When she gets on her knees it's anything

but Holy.

And the Ferris wheel is turning
where the bus stops in the morning,
and we stop to shave.
Her perfume shouts above the midway,

shouts a warning.

And she was a Patchoulli girl
who lived in several closets
on a Welfare claim,
protected by her neighbors whispers.

Her apartment smelled like popcorn
and we feasted on raw oysters
'till her preacher came.
She went to Heaven in her slippers.

 

Girl:

 

Love walks in the wild,
is perfume clinging on the
children's cheeks, the kiss
forever burning in the wildwood
tear-streaked, not with sorrow
faces brightly turning towards
the sky, the ragged happiness,
the hungry clouds. This bliss

sings on crickets' legs and wings
in the hot night of the cicada
with noses pressed against the screens
smelling of dust and of vanilla,
sings epic tales of living things
to the wide open eyes,
to the wild baby Christ, his dreams.

The deep woods and its many trails,
the distant lands, the sailboat's sails,
the sassafras crumpled in the hand,
the childish hope before the end -
Love makes Shalt Nots become the Canst
in happy, breathless strides across the grass,
and it perfumes every sorrow, hence

the child will understand.

 

Song: I Live By The River, performed by The Poet:

 

I return now to the little niche
that she and I found on the bridge
where while the river flowed
beneath our feet we kissed enfolded
in the motion of the river
in the current to the ocean
with this small song meandering
through pastures of devotion
And she guides me to her belly
with a hand that says Come here
and she spreads across my valley
with her flood of sunlit hair
And then we talk for hours
but my arguments are powerless
She flows on with the water
like Ophelia and her flowers
and I never got the time to say
Be all my sins remembered
I clung to her like flotsam
like a wet extinguished ember
And after she was gone away
you say I never left her
And now she guides me hither
to the bridge and to the river
And I remember all the sunflowers
her blue dress and her sandals
the shopping malls and changing rooms
the problems that I handled for her
head is on my pillow
and my hand is on her breast
In my imagination
I can taste her morning breath
And I look down into the water
and I wonder can I join her
as one by one I drop the things
that I have purchased for her
And they flow down in the floodplain
in the current to the ocean
And they include a diamond ring
and this song of devotion
And the contents of the pocketbook
that she had left me holding
And baby willows from the trunks
have fallen and are growing
on the river's banks and eddies
where my words are overflowing
And a statue of the Virgin
who ascended into Heaven
And a tape that I have made
of all the songs of my resentment
And this little tirade of all
the things we might have done
if she had stayed
here in this little niche
where I stand ruined on the bridge
for hours as the moment slips
And I
live by the river.

 

Chorus:

 

We will come up to the empty white house on the hill
We will be playing oldies in a stolen automobile
We will be very hopeful that the owner isn't home
We are in a mood for mischief but we have no wish to kill
We will open all the closets, we will unmake all the beds
We will look through every window at the sunset, and then
We will leave without a reason and be gone without a trace
We will come back in another life and do it all again
We will come back in the next life, invite the human race
to dance with us as darkness comes, child, woman, man

 

Enter the Boys of BSA Troop 13, and The Squabbler, dressed as Scoutmaster.

 

Squab:

 

Time was
we roamed in cigarette butt-hunting freedom
the after midnight roads and talked of women,
their soft parts and their curious eyes,
and with flashlights explored the tent's walls.
We found what was good in half empty beer cans
and we helped ourselves to things left on dashboards.
The world was ours, and the lights of the town unknowing,
and the one fat policeman in bed. In the morning
we shared a happy conspiracy of glances and yawns
hidden under our hands. And we had faced the dawn.
We said, "If we were old and you were a girl then
I would have to be your boyfriend."

Time was
that dirty magazine we stole smelled like Autumn,
like its hiding place under the log by the pond.
And years later, when I turned, she wasn't wearing her shirt,
and it hit me like waterbugs, like dirt, like wet earth,
like wrinkled-up paper and mold.
And everybody burned leaves by the side of the road
in those days when the world still made some kind of sense.
And I'd like to invite you all home to sleep in my tent,
but I can't - we're grown-up, we don't do that.

 

Poet:

 

One day will come
a reckoning, a prophesy,
a storm of hungry throats,
And the names are called.
A voice will hammer out
of a shy and withered cloud
raining children down
the silent windowpanes,
while the playground swings
in this winter-torn town
When the names are called.
Men with real jobs,
with faces like rats,
and motorcycle racing
soda pop thoughts of
their next blow job
and their next heart attack,
And their names are called.
Lovely dreamers will be
pulling in their nets,
with their rainbow longing
in the bloody aftermath
for the flavor of sex
and for Friday night fish,
And their names are called.
Dead girls out walking
like Bibles on the march
away from their stepfathers
sleeping on the porch
on that photographic day
of the army and the arch,
And their names are called.
When the telephone is ringing
inside the empty house
for the workers of our wonders,
leave a message, we are out,
And our names are called.

 

Chorus:

 

Here come the warm clouds. Here come the soft ones.

Here come the ladies with their babies and their guns.

Here come the happy dead shouting in the searchlights.

Here come the needles from the distant mountain’s eye.

 

Here come the angels. They are nude and crying out,

      Black like Bibles that are flying.

Here come the workers of our wonders and the dreamers of our dreams,

      Joyfully plunging to their horrible demise.

Here come the bodies whom we loved; let the coffins open up

      And the ash clouds swirl into the sky –

 

Here come the clouds that look like elephants, the clouds that look like bunnies.

Here come all the pretty memories from everybody’s mind.

 

Song: The Beast, performed by The Patchouli Girls

 

The hills lie still, the giants are sleeping
who lay down for a rest so long ago,

The cornfields will yield to the graveyards
for every horse you counted on the road.

Love lasts until the hills awaken,
and shake the tiny people from their homes,

Our hearts are filled, we slumber naked
while night surrounds our little house with ghosts.

Come quickly to the darkened window,
Come quietly my darling, do not speak -

Our love dies too in every morning,
Come softly while the beast is still asleep.

 

Squab:

 

Time was
We lit a campfire in the house of children's gravestones.
The lady who lived there had collected them.
Someone later tore it down to build a plywood condominium.
We had acorn fights
and we conversed with living saints and witches
wearing nothing but the rotting earth,
And now my only wish is to return
and be a witness,
to hear again the piercing screams that start the summer season,
- the million tree toads in their trees -
To splash barefoot in the darkening streams.

But time went by,
and weightless minds defined the weight of reason.
And for a time before I came here I believed them,
until the day I was compelled to name my demons,
and I replied, "Our name is Legion."
So now the rivers flowing out of Eden come together here.
This dream of dust made solid with ideas,
a swirling mass of dust expressed as mountain, earth, and sky.
And all the stories I have ever told myself were lies.

 

Poet:

And the Lord God drops in on Rhubarb Valley,
christening this garden of lamented moments with His kindness,
listening to Mcgee and Molly laughing on the wireless.
Throughout the long days the neighbors come by
and everyone says something hilarious.
God finds us
adjusting our dreams and lighting our fireworks,
and the thunder it brings is our love and our violence.
Quicken Thou me with life

And now let it inspire us.

 

Song: This Dream of Dust, performed by cast

That's Litany we're listening to. Arvo Part and the Estonian Chamber Orchestra and Chorus. Arvo Part was just named the recipient of the 2008 Leonie Sonning Music Prize. That's nice for him, isn't it? It is good to have Danes like you. Previous honorees include Igor Stravinski and Miles Davis.

They had this thing they used to do. It was tricky, but they had a lot of practice. They would try to cleave you in two, and while you were still alive, pull your lungs out and sort of 'wrap' you in them. The Danes, that is. It's nice they've moved on to awarding music prizes.

I see there's a new Arvo Part release. I must have it. I'll go to any lengths. Click on Buy.

There was a girl I knew in school. Her name was N. She was bald. Cute. She reminds me of the boys in Junior High trying to hit the urinals from the wall. No fooling, they stood about six feet away from the urinals, backs up against the wall. There was one fellow who was doing that when Sister Juggernaut barged in to the bathroom to see what all the giggling was about. That's what we called her - Sister Juggernaut. Well, this fellow was so taken aback by her sudden entry into the Boys' sanctum that he turned and snapped to attention when she shouted his name. Pissed all over her. What did I do to deserve to see such a beautiful thing?

What does that have to do with N? Well, N. tried doing the same thing at a party. But N's a girl, so...

At one point she was keeping a 16 year-old lover whose claim to fame was that he had killed his father. A real playboy of the Western World. People are interesting. I like people.

Sister Juggernaut turned into a nice little old lady. Either that, or I grew taller. She was beaming at me during a School Reunion a year or two later - beaming up at me. It was strange. It meant that change happens and I was dying. Because change happens I will die. So will you.

She was five by five - five feet high by five across. She was a square, or really she was a cube. One day she and I will join hands in the ocean of limitless possibilities which looks like Space, and fly. We will fly, Sister Juggernaut and I. We will float past the great blue whales and funny fish with several eyes in the endless sea of Space. She becomes like a little girl, and I become a little boy. Because we were, and are. Who are we to God who cares not for our differences? We are children - in this case sister and brother - in our proper state.

But when the asteroid hits the earth - sometime between a million years from now and next Tuesday, apparently - we won't have to worry about being pissed on. I don't suppose we'll be worrying about global climate change, either. Can you imagine what would happen if the climate ever stayed the same? Stability has never been in the nature of the earth. Change is the nature of the earth, constant change. The important things dissolve. They become nothing, or they become something else.

The penultimate expression of Judeo-Christian civilization is not to die in your bed, surrounded by your friends. Surrounded by your prize-winning Kewpie doll collection. A nice car. Preferably - you know, for a guy - the most important thing is to still be able to get an erection.

Meanwhile, a soldier dies young, long before he becomes interested in treating his erectile dysfunction. He's lived his life in the service of something greater than himself, and he is therefore worth ten thousand of you. And me. A short life of meaning vs. a long one of uselessness, and either way, life is eternal. The Squabbler would say something like that, were he here.

So I can rip tracks from CD's now. That's important. My son and I were watching Bad Day at Black Rock yesterday, day before, whenever. On the computer, that is. That's important. The girl on the 24-hour news channel had reported with a smile that the asteroid would hit us any time soon. Then we cut to a commercial for some sort of erectile dysfunction medicine because it's very important we can still screw when we're useless and about to be struck by an asteroid. We can also buy a Lexus. That's an option too. But I'm looking forward to that. The asteroid, I mean. I've never seen an asteroid before. I've seen a chicken on my car, and I've seen a fat boy in a house frame, and I've seen a girl who could piss pretty far. I'm thinking if she took aim at the asteroid she might deflect it so it would hit Mars, or something.

Man, you've got to keep me away from those damned news channels. My observations are obvious ones. Anyone can make them. Anyone can look at that and see what I see and say what I say. About them.

About us.

But I like this piece - Litany. It's very simple. Arvo Part is one of my favorite composers of late. I was introduced to this composer's work because of a rummage sale. I found this CD for 50 cents - bought it. I had no idea what it was.

 

   

Join me in listening to this 1940 broadcast of the Johnson's Wax Program with Fibber McGee and Molly.

Whilst listening to this I am re-reading some old posts, old but relatively recent - just going backwards, yes? They're pretty interesting.

Just playing with my new toy. I'm reminded about how fragile things are, things like teeth, eyes, computers, cars. Thinking of Dick Van Dyke saying "Water under my new car? I'll sue!" My son already had MSN Messenger popping up on the screen at start-up when I turned on my new computer this morning. I said, "MSN Messenger on my new computer? I'll sue!" After all, it was overloading the old system with such junk that eventually slowed it down to the point where the old thing was no longer usable. Why can't they just E-mail each other - my son and his friends who live down the block, that is? Why not just knock on their doors, baseball glove in hand, and say, "Can Jimmy come out and play?" Why not, indeed. Well, enough of my griping.

Speaking of griping, Adrian Belew is a phenomenal guitarist but he can't write a decent song, leastaways not without complaining lyrically about the apparently infinite number of people, places, things, ideas, and principles that he allows to control his life. Typical... Great guitarist. He's better when he does a little sampling, skips the writing, just plays that thing.

Who can remember the model name of the car Van Dyke bought? - Some high performance mid-life crisis car, a Testerossa or something? It was really a very funny program.

For very funny programs see also Fibber McGee and Molly right here later tonight. Fibber tries his hand at directing. Directing what I don't know. I haven't previewed the program and I don't believe it's one I've ever heard.

Well, until then, happy day to you!