Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Turmoil in a Morgue

Negro,
Chinaman,
White servant-girl,
Russian woman,
Are learning how to be dead,
Aided by the impersonal boredom
Of a morgue at evening.
The morgue divides its whole
Of dead men's contacts into four
Parts, and places one in each
Of these four bodies waiting for the carts.
The frankness of their decay
Breaks into contradictory symbols
And sits erect upon the wooden tables,
Thus cancelling the validity of time.
In a voice as passive as slime
The negro speaks.
"Killed a woman: ripped her skin.
Saw her heart floating in a tumbler of gin.
Had to drink her heart because it wouldn't leave the gin.
Because I wanted to reach all of her
They ripped my flesh.
They wanted to reach all of me
And their excuse was better than mine."
Cowed baby painted black,
The negro sits upon fundamentals
And troubles them a little with his hands.
The beautiful insanity
Of his eyes rebukes
The common void of his face.
Then the Chinaman speaks
In a voice whose tones are brass
From which emotion has been extracted.
"Loved a woman: she was white.
Her man blew my brains out in the night.
Hatred is afraid of color.
Color is the holiday
Given to moods of understanding:
Hatred does not understand.
When stillness ends the fever of ideas
Hatred will be a scarcely remembered spark."
Manikin at peace
With the matchless deceit of a planet,
The Chinaman fashions his placid immensity.
The Chinaman chides his insignificance
With a more impressive rapture
Than that of western midgets.
His rapture provides an excellent light
For the silhouette of the negro's curse.
Then the white servant-girl
Speaks in a voice whose syllables
Fall like dripping flower-juice and offal,
Both producing a similar sound.
"I made a neat rug for a man.
He cleaned his feet on me and I liked
The tired, scheming way in which he did it.
When he finished he decided
That he needed a smoother texture,
And found another lady.
I killed myself because I couldn't rub out
The cunning marks that he left behind."
Impulsive doll made of rubbish
On which a spark descended and ended,
The white servant-girl, without question or answer,
Accepts the jest of a universe.
Then the Russian woman
Speaks in a voice that is heat
Ill-at-ease upon its couch of sound.
"I married a man because
His lips tormented my melancholy
And made it long to be meek
And because, when he walked to his office each morning,
He thought himself a kindled devil
Enduring the smaller figures around him.
He abandoned me for German intrigue
And I chased him in other men,
Never quite designing him.
Death, a better megalomaniac,
Relieved me of the pursuit."
Symbol of earth delighted
With the vibration of its nerves,
The Russian woman sunders life
Into amusing deities of emotion
And bestows a hurried worship.
Then the morgue, attended by a whim,
Slays the intonations of their trance
And slips these people back to life.
The air is cut by transformation.
The white servant-girl retreats to a corner
With a shriek, while the negro advances,
And the Russian woman
Nervously objects to the Chinaman's question.
The morgue, weary housewife for speechless decay,
Spends its helplessness in gay revenge:
Revenge of earth upon four manikins
Who straightened up on wooden tables
And betrayed her.

Submited by

Saturday, May 14, 2011 - 14:19

Poesia Consagrada :

No votes yet

Maxwell Bodenheim

Maxwell Bodenheim's picture
Offline
Title: Membro
Last seen: 13 years 23 weeks ago
Joined: 04/27/2011
Posts:
Points: 345

Add comment

Login to post comments

other contents of Maxwell Bodenheim

Topic Title Replies Views Last Postsort icon Language
Poesia Consagrada/Biography Maxwell Bodenheim Biography 0 3.574 05/14/2011 - 14:51 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Mind is a Little, Clandestine Pastel 0 2.155 05/14/2011 - 14:47 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Criss-Crossed Ringlets of Hair 0 2.432 05/14/2011 - 14:46 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Cheeks are Spent Diminuendos 0 2.364 05/14/2011 - 14:45 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Breast is the Bridal Couch of Our Stillness 0 1.922 05/14/2011 - 14:45 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Body was Puzzling 0 2.236 05/14/2011 - 14:44 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Body Is a Closed Fan 0 2.142 05/14/2011 - 14:43 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Your Arms, in Faltering Crescendos 0 2.492 05/14/2011 - 14:42 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Young Woman 0 2.324 05/14/2011 - 14:42 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Young Poet 0 2.008 05/14/2011 - 14:41 English
Poesia Consagrada/Love Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : You Have a Morning-Glory Face 0 2.287 05/14/2011 - 14:40 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : You Draw My Heart about You 0 1.952 05/14/2011 - 14:39 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : You Are a Well Sprayed with Cool Rubies 0 2.135 05/14/2011 - 14:39 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : The Wrinkled Grimaces of Eastern Skies 0 2.253 05/14/2011 - 14:34 English
Poesia Consagrada/Meditation Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : When Spirits Speak of Life 0 2.520 05/14/2011 - 14:33 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : When Fools Dispute 0 2.071 05/14/2011 - 14:32 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Whenever a Love Dies Within You 0 1.959 05/14/2011 - 14:31 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : We Met Upon Nearby Hill-Tops 0 2.221 05/14/2011 - 14:31 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : We Blew a Luminous Confusion of Thoughts 0 2.119 05/14/2011 - 14:30 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Vaudeville Moment 0 1.790 05/14/2011 - 14:29 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Upon an Arched Sarcophagus of Pain 0 2.318 05/14/2011 - 14:28 English
Poesia Consagrada/Meditation Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Uneasy Reflections 0 2.007 05/14/2011 - 14:28 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Two Women on a Street 0 2.101 05/14/2011 - 14:27 English
Poesia Consagrada/General Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Two Walls, Dizzy with Rain-Touch 0 2.484 05/14/2011 - 14:26 English
Poesia Consagrada/Sonnet Maxwell Bodenheim Poems : Two Sonnets to My Wife 0 2.315 05/14/2011 - 14:25 English