Obama poetry

I'm exceedingly happy Obama's been re-elected. I was moved by his 2008 Inauguration to write the following poem (from my Bridget Bird collection). In honour of his recent election victory (and more particularly in honour of the man himself), I'd like to post it here. I wish President Obama four more years of justice, fairness and a deep respect for differences everywhere in the world.

 

Word!

_____________________________

   

INAUGURATION

 

How much like Lincoln’s it’d be (to judge by the proud walk),

 if after a dusting of salt on the brow,
he’d be placed between scripture leaves, or on a throne
  sitting bony-kneed by the potted groves
                                                                of Lahore or Kenya,—

 And winds in a reflecting pool how much calmer they’d be
  if presidentials before him
had worn pastoral robes instead of pendent scarves,
  and shiny crystals over the Congress
stopped tipping their light (for once!) to the toothy lords
                                                                                     of Virginia

And how those Irish smiles would finally cease smiling

  (and keep plates clinking)
if toasts frozen at eye level and one too many stately balls
  & collars, straps that’ve lost their starch
were a prelude to council or a good night’s sleep
 

And light, unflappable a bird as he is, springing to the hoops,

  how nicely he’d give us back the sky
(if anyone that slim or equable or cool could,
  in robes or a Tux)—
                                                             his dear unflappable sky

Autumn verse (from "Goodbye to Soul")

I on a majolica morn, saw
  myself flung scurrying over a world, I solus
     & afraid to jump--

& a squirrel's half-slit eye try fly
                                                through me!

Felix metaphysicum

Proposition 1

To suffer feral space,

                                    as
I have

                                    as
  the moth sheds and
  flames dim,

                                    as
  even horripilant geese
  fly,
                            as

  groundable, hard and
  brunal life is                            

                                    as
  ants misidentify sky
  & fail to agree if
  it's sky at all

-- silly fallibilist ant!--
                                  

What nudged this man-monist into
 the Ditch, anyways:

• the resistance of open arms
• the oily bead in a frog's leal eye
• the christ in every shivery post-dream?

Ach!
         I spit on any or some 'You' or 'there' as
         having no
                        Ital 
                             at
                                all

                                    

Felix in a mood for some sabre-rattling

"But this heaven, namely the firmament, is corporeal"
                                                                              (Origen)


Who doesn't try debarring the moon
                                                    these days?

And Jubals, that are commonplace, that
  clack as they grin, of course,
                                    & who always mean  to

          --meaning-monkeys!--
                                                      why, they're the worst


Was it not the whole, and not some "part-world"
                                                                 I fell into,
  for you?

Look--

             Pert idealists and amigos know that
             Two, with the other below
              educing and joyful,
               made One
                   solus
                     horripilant (as the geese fly)
                       sky-affirming
                         cheer!
                           
                       
There was no part-world, none that I could ever see