BY JAN HAAG

POETRY + ESSAYS + MUSIC + TRAVEL + FICTION + TEXTILE ART

INTRODUCTION + HAAG'S BIO





The Desolation Poems


Poetic Forms Used in English





#i ACROSTIC I

1987

A CONSCIENCE ACCOUNTING


Curiosity eaten migrants, a cantata
of old velvets of darker-than-mossy-green shroud chic
nacerous white baby's breath sprays in cinematic
spots down below the delicacy where mixed seco
candle wax drips tears with running blood. Mystical Mu
illuminates grotesquely bubbling phenomena.
Egregious energies scorch pitiful flesh of taut
neti neti Indians who survived a mini
creation blast to become iniquitous, fine-drawn,
each-hand-out, kindly people, toothless, smiling, trembling,

aggressive. In horror I shrink from long, hermetic,
crumpled fingers picking swollen limbs or quickly go,
coining reasons. Or not. Beneath my bosom-clutched purse,
only just breathing, knowing I am he and he sees,
under my pale urgency, the horror which panic
negligently accepts as living proof that, "Si, si,"
times advance and feelings blow to proportions too fine.
I hide beneath the crumpled, verdant velvet where non-
noisy babies breathe, eaten by curious antic
gruesomeness, gently languorous, loathing you and me.




#ii AE FRESLIGNE I

1987


Down in the valley aglow
where the bees buzz and bumble
onomatopoeia Joe
meows with a tummy full

searching for his kitty cat
when everyone knows in town
the soft, flying pitty pat
has hid in its bed of down.




#iii ALCAICS I

1987

FUNDRAISING


Foregoing laughter, rhyming and reasoning,
for longer lengths of time and for specialties,
four hidden maidens marched while singing
furtively, slid to a halt and stood pale.

Five under fifty greeted and grumbled to
free what would have been silently salient.
Few famous, famished fortunes fumed or
furious, frowning sat sadly silent.




#v AWDL GYWYDD I

1987

ADMONITION


In the sweat, in the anger,
don't demur to the musk's scent.
Surrounding ocean plates crack,
a light blue smack violent

enough to create the dawn,
do not think the fawn only
a violet fingered skull
mossy and full, life merely

a sense of rapture schooled to
hold and woo the pain. When it
drops tears, weep for the earth's hurts.
Eternity flirts to fit

each yielding joy to some old
groove, remolding anger for
creaks and whacks, pure light lessons
to seem like puns with gold ore.




#vi BALLAD I

6-30-85


After she met with love and regret,
she sighed the day long.
She mooned in the night, a beautiful sight,
so softly singing this song.

During the day, she slept by the way.
Her trials and her tears made her strong,
a beautiful sight in the dead of the night,
so softly singing this song.

At dawn she would croon goodbye to the moon,
laugh with the sun, beyond wrong
she sat late in the dusk, scented by musk,
so softly singing this song.

As the season went round, she altered her gown,
a new love for her came along.
Now mother and daughter sit by the water
so softly singing this song.




#vii BALLADE I

1985

CENSER


We lay in the red and gold light
of warped moired silk shades to shun
the curious, also the night,
nibbling flowers, thinking it fun
to admit we acted as one
in the dark, sanctioning wild schemes,
inhaling the incense cotton,
the thick-scented smoke of old dreams.

On a pale pallet under bright
dawn, while the immaculate sun
kept walled reality in flight,
we smoked out hope, making her run.
Not old enough to be clean, none
too happy with life or sweet creams,
we blotted the quip and the pun,
the thick-scented smoke of old dreams.

We rose after hours in tight
spaces, tracing the fuming gun
of hard candy fancies, a kite,
a drum; nowhere a buttered bun,
even for breakfast. Like Trajan,
we began to hide behind teams,
wondering why we'd only won
the thick-scented smoke of old dreams.

Now we stand at midday, all's done
and old, knowing stark, silent screams
can do nothing, only beckon
the thick scented smoke of old dreams.




#viii SICILIAN SESTET I

5-19-87


The roads run straight into the lake. Down deep,
five feet or more beneath the water, salt
shifts, filling its subtle grades, blue-green. Leap
awy, avoid the coming tide, foam, malt,
the doom that inch by inch, silent, will seep
through any fissure, shatter each small fault.




On April 18, I998, I started going through the old poems remaining in my possession and punching them into notebooks. I had remembered only doing about the first seven forms in The Book of Forms in and around 1987. However, I found quite a number of poems in various forms. Some titled with the Form Name and others not titled with the Form Name. As I find them I will add them to the Intro or Appendix of the Desolation Poems. The numbering does not necessarily follow the chronological order of the poems, for some are dated and some are undated. But most, I think, were written in Texas between 1985 and 1987. I'll just catalogue them into the Desolation Poems as I pick them up.

Jan Haag
April 20, 1998




#ix TERZA RIMA SONNET I

3-31-87


There are so many houses in my past
and well banked highways round the cities' streets
and lonely houses where the cows would fast,

where daffodils I've nodded to and wheats
with golden sheen stood tall. There were fifteen
thousand pale dawns where the sun rises, greets

the sky, the earth, receding night and, lean
as a copper disk, arcs high across the day
and stands quite still to mark the mean.

Then moves on by and, with good luck, there may
be ten thousand blue, glorious, pure dawns
more under spring's pear leaves, autumn's array.

You must pray for the new born spotted fawns,
for the little white daisies in the lawns.




#x HAIKU I

3-31-87


The skeeters shadow,
obsidian set in light,
interrupts the frog.




#xi TRIOLET II

5-21-87


Sorrow and freedom are as light
as the kiss of a peacock's wing.
Grace, iridescent, lifts the night.
Sorrow and freedom are as light
as the blue-green and blue of sight
within eyes gold and shimmering.
Sorrow and freedom are as light
as the kiss of a peacock's wing.




#xii TRIOLET III

5-21-87


I grieve for my mother being gone.
I feel great freedom after her flight.
Lying under the trees on the lawn,
I grieve for my mother being gone.
I see life's grace going on and on,
observe the heart growing erudite.
I grieve for my mother being gone.
I feel great freedom after her flight.




#xiii TRIOLET IV

5-21-87


Grief pierces my heart for those who have died and will die.
My spirit soars in freedom, lightened by those it lost.
Not taught in love, I've only known to count costs and sigh.
Grief pierces my heart for those who have died and will die.
Lighter and lighter my spirit rises to defy
concealed boundaries, hidden struggles, defiance storm tossed.
Grief pierces my heart for those who have died and will die.
My spirit soars in freedom, lightened by those it lost.




#xiv HEROIC SESTET I

5-19-87


There is no sky. The clouds in white have hid
the dome, the blue, the immensity, width, distance
the height, the depth. We thrust steady amid
the miasmic veil all shot with hope, a glance
from God, a whisper from the galaxy.
We'll triumph by persistent jets, you'll see.




#xv ITALIAN SESTET I

5-19-87


The clouds have touched the mountain snow with lakes
of deep and humid blue. The sky kisses
the tips of trees, straight, tall, dark, reaching heights
to scratch the cotton clouds with tender rakes,
and down along sheer cliffs, wild abysses
condense its sun bright days to awesome nights.




#1





Copyright © 2000 Jan Haag
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Jan Haag may be reached via e-mail: jhaag@u.washington.edu





ALPHABETICAL INDEX BY FORM


of



POETRY FORMS USED IN ENGLISH




BY JAN HAAG


POETRY + MUSIC + ESSAYS + TRAVEL + FICTION + TEXTILE ART

INTRODUCTION + HAAG'S BIO



21st CENTURY ART, C.E. - B.C., A Context