#frederickseidel

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“You need a danger to be safe in.” #frederickseidel #american #poet #readafuckingbook #oogabooga https://www.instagram.com/p/CIx_rhShw4M/?igshid=dtcadce6fehy

[poemdaybook]

Victory by Frederick Seidel

Nothing is pure at 36,000 feet either. Even in First, there is only more. The wing is streaked By the jet engine's exhaust. Sometimes I stand outside a toliet Which is occupied, staring out A window somewhere over Malaysia at dawn. I am the wing, The thing that should be lift, Soiled by power. Make no mistake about the heat. It also has to eat. It eats the fuel it's fed. It eats the air. It eats the hair. It eats what's there. The jungle devours me with its eyes which are Screamed skyscrapers of plasm. I said dismal. I meant passion. The sky unfreezes me alive. There is heaven the mainland. And there is heaven the island. There is the warm water of heaven between. The minister of defense bull's-eyes on the helicopter pad With security all around wearing a curly wire into one ear. Code-named Big Fish, he likes Eau Sauvage. To be there ahead of him wherever he goes. There is heaven the novel, and heaven the movie. Below you is the sky at 35,000 feet. Above you is the muezzin until it ends. I have the lift, but think I ought to land. The blank eye of the sky muezzins the faithless to rise And face the heat And urinate and defecate and eat and act Another day. I wish I knew your name. Powerful forces have built a road Through the jungle. Muslim apparently Women fully clothed are apparently allowed to expose in the lucky Warm water with their brown kids sporting like putti flying fish. Quiet on the set, please, thank you. The actors are rehearsing. My penis is full of blood for you Probably won't win her hand, But you bet Susanna the movie has to pull in the Elders. She has designs. She was designed to. She is audience response questionnaire--designed to Get them to feast their eyes. They're sitting in the dark and certainly They're in the dark about The lights will go on and the vile will be caught by a questionnaire. Jungle covers an island in the South China Sea. The interior is the first step in. Perpetual summer sleeps with sixteen kinds of snakes. My penis is full of love for you starred In a road movie with Dorothy Lamour and The beautiful bay Used to be a breeding ground for sharks Where we're swimming now. The head Of the British fleet, here for the joint Naval exercises, told me he remembered it well, charming man. The Steadicam glides everywhere. Holding its head in the air like a King Cobra. The ecology Of the island is fragile, but the second airport will never be built. This isn't Acapulco 1848 about to Big Bang. You step into the jungle and it's thick. You step into the warm water and it's thin. But nothing jiggles the Steadicam. The poisonous viper is authorized to use deadly force Only on the jungle path to the waterfall above the golf course. Someone has seen a ten-foot lizard Near the set. Someone was seen feeding a monkey Bananas. The set itself is a subset of itself. A jungle set in the jungle. Islam is aerosolized into the atmosphere, Coating the jungle scenes with time. St. Agatha is the martyr whose breasts got hacked off, But in the movie they don't. The breasts that don't get removed Anticipate the replenishing monsoon. God is everywhere you're not. And you are everywhere. I wish I knew your name. Congestion in the brain is cleared. By the tropical haze which mists the coconut palms And by the horrible heat of heaven. Oddly sudden Mountains rise right out of the sea, jungle-clad. Hairy Angels are friendly, but not too friendly. Palm trees can mean Palm Beach, But where the monkeys are semi-tame We are semi-saved. I never sleep on planes, but woke Belted in, seat upright, table stowed, To the roar of the reverse thrust, Semi-saved. I undressed into the ocean Surrounded by securtiy and businessmen talking into cellular phones. The jungle is within. The jungle also comes down To the heavenly warm water lapping the sand. The jungle is the start and the jungle is the end. The jungle is behind. The jungle is ahead. Ahead of me is heaven.

-- Frederick Seidel (Going Fast, 1998)