Michael McClure: Songheavy (Last Breath Poem)

SONGHEAVY

    

LAST BREATH POEM

After watching human

efforts to save the self-beached

pilot whale at Rockport.

Many times the large dolphin

reversed their efforts and

returned to the strand.

TWO TON QUALIA-BEING:

globe head

SPIKE TEETH

all being-receptors

RECEPTORS

CONCEIVED

BY

QUALIA

a

l

i

v

e

LIVING

resonation

*x~X~X~x*

MEAT

RED-BLACK

inside

is

every where

RESONATING

slick black

on

sea edge 

;;;';;;';''';;

MOEBIUS

BULK

BREATHING

HULK

this way

OF

LIFE

CEDING

IS

IT

the way

CON

SCIOUS

NESS

VAST

HEART

ALL BODY

SHAPE

songheavy

VOICE

to imagine

self-spired

SPOUTED

i

n

s

p

i

r

e

d

death-self

(DEATH SELF)

FREE

to swim

in

non-ever

FOR

EVER

all

bright

AFIRE

five trillion per nanosecond

neuron linking

in the POD

WHAT THREAT --

OR FEAR

--OR

DISEASE

--OR

? ?

LEADS   NO   WAY

to

follow

we laugh

together in the torch

of wetwave darkness

nothing

NOTHING NESS

needs

this

LIFE

and

now

we are gone

A

TOOTHED

SMILE

SMILE

IN

THE

WAVE

LAP

________

________

THIS

PROUD

RED AND BLACK

MEAT

LOVE

HEARING-VOICE

TREMBLING

TO GO

[N.B.  A poem, above, that recalls another, “For the Death of 100 Whales,” performed some sixty years ago at the famed Gallery Six reading in San Francisco – a continuation & advance by a poet still at the height of his powers. J.R.]