PRESENTATION
Let us
not
sleep. Having come this far away on nerves,
On passion of puppets, prayers so less than saintly, let us not relax
Or we disintegrate. Let us rise and see the many mansions prepared
for us,
Take the tour, and if anyone asks questions, the word is PAX.
There should be forms and questionnaires, we may be told to leave
All cameras and umbrellas in the entry. We have been subjected to
a lot,
With others' fingers where our own belong only in secret, lights in
our noses,
Lenses on our spinal cord and brain. And questioned, "Do girls make
you hot?"
We'll come clean. In fact there are things we'll insist be told about us,
And if the scales (there are always scales) do not balance exact,
'Ve'll throw on a couple of bayonets, hand grenades or cartridges,
Claim benefit of doubt for post-bellum bonus in the face of facts.
What do they add up to, our weight at birth, our parents' age
Or previous marriage or affairs, our first sun-yellow rompers
With the band of ducks, or first blue
~ailorsuit
with the fly in front,
Or how we said
Wee Willie Winkie
from the stairs in night jumpers?
We have not made children of our own. 'Ve have left our names
Only on trunks of willows under whose flaunting hanru we learned
love,
And on so-called Honor Rolls knee-deep in canna lilies in town parks.
Oh, life has been fair, we met squarely, we both wore the gloves.
But take our final profile and let us wander where we would:
If
I seek Orpheus, is there hope I may succeed, meet Chopin whom I
lik~,
Meet Edward Munch with smoking candle on a bridge?: these raw
O.D.'s
Of course I'll soon slash off, and bloom in silks and laces from Van
Dyke.
