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---- word biscuit ----
-- strong turtle edition --
02-13-96 - ray heinrich
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just for valentines:
< 4meta4s4urluv >
---------------------------
< clothes to my heart >
the rubbing of your love
has pilled
the polyester slacks
of my heart
- - -
< no shampoo either >
i refuse the collar
i prefer to scratch
at the fleas
of your love
- - -
< my dusty heart >
i would clean my heart
of this sorrow
but i cannot bear to loose
the dust-bunnies of your love
- - -
< the cookie of my heart >
when the cookie of my heart
burns
on the baking sheet
of your love
will you scrape my bottom
and eat me anyway?
- - -
--------------------------
< fingers, eyes >
you
your face turning
paused
not seeing me
i
almost ready to meet you
am raising my hand
counting my fingers
finding
still the same number
then
your face resumes turning
soon
you will see me
and
my face
and
i will be shaking your hand
feeling your fingers
finding still the same number
and each one
yours and mine
will be busy greeting
the other
but you know
fingers are like that
now eyes
now we start
on eyes
- -
about love, but in reverse:
< holocaust >
i call myself ray heinrich
and i am a german
and the german i am
is part jewish and part nazi
so
some of my relatives
were busy
killing the others
and i
am left mixed
so when
i visit
the holocaust museums
i see the thin
naked bodies
of some of me
forced to bury
what the others
are shooting
point-blank
forcing the next of me in line
to bury me
and then the next
and then the next
and then the next
and then the next
forcing me
to take off my clothes
why not humiliate me
why not humiliate me
before killing me?
me
shooting me
point-blank
luger
9mm
side of the head
i watch this happen
i take pictures
so
later
someone
can engrave them in granite
in
miami
at
the holocaust monument
and i
can walk through it
and see
these pictures
there
they are each of me
telling a six-millionth
of the horror
and
here i am
one side of me
killing the other
to get votes
to get money
to get jobs
and now i see
it doesn't
have to be germany
it doesn't
have to be history
- - -
< life >
continues for miles
anywhere i stand
- -
< concrete >
a condominium on the 23rd floor
one with a balcony
is NOT the place
for a poet
or even someone who pretends to be
a poet
you see
there is a sliding glass door to the balcony
and you open it and walk six feet
to the railing which is three feet high
and look down
23 floors
to
pavement
concrete with gravel
that gives it
a little texture
makes it
seem hospitable
but
from 23 floors up
it
is just as hard
as life
- - -
< through the window >
the shadow of the building
moves
as the sun
forms it into the hand of a giant clock
grabbing the day
and pushing it to one side
- - -
< the purpose of poetry >
poetry gives words
a place to go
poetry can save you
from work
and relatives
and love
and suicide
it saved Sylvia Plath
for years
and then
it helped her
poetry gives artists
who can't draw
a place to paint
and novelists
who can't write
a place to speak
and for me
something to write
while waiting
for something to read
- - -
< only the mirror >
the room has lost most of its furniture
we make a list
but soon the list is gone
it seems
that only we are left
then
i can't find you
now
there's only the mirror
- - -
< deep kiss >
you and i
the first time
kissed
deeply
i felt it
on my mouth and breast
between my legs
you were still mixed
with the far away
the different smells
the skin of your shoulders
spread my legs
- - -
< the dead on my block >
the dead
on my block
have borrowed
wheelbarrows
to haul the spirits
of their last possessions
if i could see them
there would be many
golf clubs
and an occasional
toaster
- -
< no monkeys, no elephants >
no monkeys
no elephants
that leaves room
for a lot
but
you're already complaining:
where are the monkeys?
the elephants?
- - -
and getting back to valentines:
< the first sign of spring >
the first sign of spring this year
was your poem about the first sign of spring this year
i was
of course
pleased
with your line about the first flowers
and how you compared them to the start of your orgasm
how you viewed spring
as one
long
glorious
fuck
- - -
p.s.
i have some free time in april
maybe i could drop by
bye for now
-ray
**************************************************************************
(and all this stuff is (C) 1996 ray heinrich)
END
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