Pool

The moon leant down, her fingers kindling
the lips of each little wave of the pool,
blue O, with watery fire, til it said 'oh' or 'Oh'.
Tight in the grip of its meniscus the water bound
forms of drowned moths, that wings
outflung, soddenly stalked our gleaming abdomens-
we beat them back in fear and disgust.
From somewhere in the yard there came a light.
How our feet were magnified in the water's glass!
There by the hose head the underwater wrinkled.
Another, flat like a snake run over
Pin-pricked like arteries themselves, shot piddlng arcs
and the night ran on and we ran back onto the stoop
our ankles now stuck with sticky blades of grass
as new-moon colored bands of pale convolvulus,
white un-ringing yellow bells a-swinging,
raced slyly about the cornice of the house.
Everywhere the lawn was alive with little frogs
'Let us in, let us in', all at once shouting.

poem by Morgan Michaels
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Buddhist Hell

Its own dark hills and dales
Make Dante's version look like a putt-putt
Whereas its flames make Hell's own plain
Seem snug as an electric blanket
And though, condemned there, you can get sprung,
So can you, thanks, from Purgatory.

Keep me, Lord, from a place
Where there's no parole, no peer-jury, no
Lawyers, phones (even a broken one) or leave;
Where it was nobody's fault but your own.
Just forget the insanity plea
You are guilty, guilty, guilty.

Why, a list of its offences
Include some of my favorite sins.
By it's tenets I have already earned
Eons of time writhing in its coils;
Nor can its multiplicities-eight, in sum,
Make me very eager to convert.

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poem by Morgan Michaels
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Eye-Openers

Regarding God and His relationship to the world
There are only two possibilities:
Either He became bored with His creation
And moved to a different part of town
Convinced he could do better in the new-
(In which case mankind
May as well be whistling Dixie
And the wars will continue-
The killing of our supposed enemies
For the sake of our supposed friends):
Or He dispersed Himself into His creation
Living now in the breast
Of every sentient thing, even worms;
We can never know definitely, of course
Reason tottering on the brink of Intuition
As it surely does and must surely do.
But enough of the Humeian diatheses-
Frankly, having enjoyed an easy upbringing
And never, so far, suffering physical mortification
(Knock on wood, Saints preserve, Heaven forbid)

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Seven Basic Machines

'First the pulley. With these window-washers haul
themselves up to the tip-top or drop'.
'Yes', she said, with minimal interest. 'Next'.

'Then there's the lever. Useful for prising treasure'.
'Very well, she said, 'but I can't tell you how I try
never to pry'.

'Well, there's the wheel. Often invented, excellent for gliding
singly, in tandem, in trio or more'.
'Of course', said she, 'and number four'?

'Um', I said, starting to perspire,
and giving my brains a wrench-'the plane, if you desire'.
'I've never been inclined. Continue please'.

'The wedge', I said, recalling that
a wedge could not be beaten for
dividing night from day and dog from cat.

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poem by Morgan Michaels
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Venus

'Venus! It's you! '
'You recognize me? '
'Anywhere! Is that your Meryl Streep look? '
'Very funny.'
'How did you get here? '
'Why, I took the train. It's the fastest way, you know.'
'But you're naked! '
'Oh, so I am. One should always travel comfortably, I believe.'
'You can't just go walking around town naked! -
not in January, anyway. Even you! '
'Don't be such a prude.'
'I'm not a prude! You'll catch pneumonia. You'll get arrested! '
'Nobody complained.'
'Look-you can wear your clothes lightly, but you can't go naked.'
'In my part of the world everybody does.'
'You're too much. That was a long time ago. Things change! '
'What do you mean, change? '
'Well, nowadays we've got-
'Got what? ...'
'Religion!

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John II

Knowing it was, in liklihood, the start
of a life-long obsession, a collector's fate-
knowing the buyer would be back, better informed,
for the Horst, the Ritts, the George Platt Lynes.

I recall your immaculate white shirt
your spiffy hound's-tooth blazer,
your perfect features, gone to seed,
your carefully combed hair, your lop-sided smile;

Your trousers, sharply creased,
your loafers shined and heeled like new-
you looked like something out of Gianni Schicci.
How you loathed bitter American cultural isolationism.

You knew all the good restaurants in Chelsea
and some that were not so good;
your openings entwined the best of politics and esthetics;
you moved on only when the market dried up.

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Buddhist Hell II

Listen, now. There's a Hell
For killing (includes mosquitoes)
A Hell for thieving (not for me!)
A Hell for sexual deviants
A Hell for liars (excludes tactful omissions)
A Hell for drunks;

Oh, and here's something-
A Hell for those holding wrong opinions-
Be careful what you say, though-
It lasts ten-thousand years and burns like-well, Hell;
And a Hell for murderers lasting a whole kalpa-
Don't even ask what that is.

You may return as a marmot,
A coyote, a rat, an eel, or a snake, take your pick,
And for sundry misdeeds
Be crushed, impaled, boiled, quartered, sawn:
A sort of pre-Wolfenden existence-
So count your pebbles carefully, and choose.

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In The Museum 2

water, air and sunlight fused infallibly into one lovliness,
water, air and sunlight invented by the deity
and dubbed by Him His best creations:
a feast for the eyes, therefore for the heart-
how the young museum goers
pushed each other out of the way, obscured each other's views
to what-take photos? Why,
instead of looking, enjoying, reflecting...
taking pictures?
do they think a camera capyures Nature better than a man's hand?
Maybe they mean to look later, when they have more time-
Why?

Is it more important to record that you've seen something
than to practice the mere exercise of understanding?
Slowly the cabal of naifs disperses, chattering.
Slowly the cabal of naifs moves on
without one among them beginning to see the first thing
of the item they've come so far to observe-
surely a dark age has come upon us:

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Swans ll

Guiltless-they
never flustered me
but like an actor in a play
I fed them corners of the crusts of bread
and tufts of candy cotton, pink and green
thrown on the solvent scene
all the which they gratefully retrieved
and upright, thanked me dumbly and received
with gracious nods and blue shakes of the head.

All so very,
supernumerary
called by names beknown to all
to whom they were distinguishable
by which they alone were summonable
aquamarine, a dozen dozens
paddling doughtily in tandem
brother by brother, cousin by cousin
or alone by preference at random.

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John

Your eye was like a deep mountain lake
a nestle of blue, say, rimmed with leaf-green
over which clouds passed, reflecting,
though a boring person turned it instantly gray.

Behind it was a quarter-mile track, a whole gym,
around which towel-clad thoughts raced
every day, non-stop, effortlessly
toward an imaginary finish line

and it quickly resumed its cerulean hue
at the prospect of a sale. A sale!
provided the buyer knew just how much he was spending
relative to the worth of the purchase,

or, again, maybe, at some instance of human charm
(not rare in your specialized shop)
some bright, cute, knowlegeable kid,
for example, who pretended to know more than he did.

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poem by Morgan Michaels
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