BY JAN HAAG

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

The Desolation Poems

Poetic Forms Used in English

#100 TERSANELLE

3-25-98

Black girl, dogging me, chanting her voodoo rhymes, that sound like two big men and a crime. Bland-faced, smile-faced, solo, no common clue. I resist with heart, mantra, frozen time, her hostility, chants, her grunting moans, rhymes, that sound like two big men and a crime. Sun filtered world, no transmutable tones from slithering malice, her hovering, her hostility, chants, her grunting moans, Hawks ascending in visible whistling spit. I wheel as a crow to free my ears from slithering malice, her hovering, well scrubbed, flaming, intentional, bright tears. "Don't you spit at me!" "I ain't never did spit!" I wheel as a crow to free my ears and my sight from vehement spite to rid -- black girl, dogging me, chanting her voodoo. "Don't you spit at me!" "I ain't never did!" Bland-faced, smile-faced, solo, no common clue.

#101 GLOSE

3-26-98

"...poems of sounds so pure and liquid
travelers cross deserts with them..."*

Syllables to paint the world's glory, from ensorceled brain to tongue they slid secreting in both song and story poems of sounds so pure and liquid they shimmered in the mind-locked pool, water crystallizing into gem, melting so subtly, slow and cool travelers cross deserts with them.

#102 ITALIAN MADRIGAL IN TERZA RIMA

3-27-98

The blind children of our television's age of scorn for human life, and especially death -- they see not the consequences of their rage. They shoot to kill, to eliminated all breath, not knowing fragile bodies once stopped will lie silent forever in the still arms of Seth. Who is Seth? They, not old enough to descry life and evil, death or eternity's tax, sit incarcerated in cells and defy the tears that rise from the ignorance that racks their hearts as children unable to face facts -- wanting home and mother's dinner, their small wage, wanting to wander fields, laugh, to smell the sage.

#103 RONDEAU

3-28-98

Let intuition lead us through the dark of the imagination's gentle park where the extraordinary wit of light prevails to shine within appalling night and frighten away the ominous bark that marks the frozen heart thumping, quite stark in contemplation of the smallest quark, in exultation of gathered insight. Let intuition lead us like high, trilling birdsong that we might hark the evanescence of music's path, mark each newborn act, transmute it into rite like the high wind lifting, gliding each kite. Let intuition lead us.

#104 SICILIAN OCTAVE II

3-29-98

The ancient Chinese were obsessed with fine writing; Hindus are ensorceled with sound, sonorous speech; Tibetans enhanced their land's visual charm citing Om Mani Padme Hum on mandala, rock reach, on thangka, stupa, choten, stone -- lighting paths with Siddham, Gupta, Lentza to beseech the winds, the Gods, the trees without indicting earth's initial capacity to teach.

#104 SICILIAN SESTET II

3-29-98

The southern boy gripping the old black man's hand. a flash on tv as fast as rela on a State visit to the slaves forefather's land, tripping down steps suited, together, bella, the fragile ex-prisoner, the harassed man, love for each other, Clinton and Mandela.

#104 SICILIAN SONNET

3-29-98

The ancient Chinese were obsessed with all writing; Hindus are ensorceled with sound, sonorous speech; Tibetans enhance their land's visual charm citing Om Mani Padme Hum on mandala, rock reach, on thangka, stupa, chhorten, stone -- lighting paths with Siddham, Gupta, Lentza to beseech the winds, the Gods, the trees without indicting earth's initial capacity to teach. The southern boy gripping the old black man's hand. a flash on tv as fast as rela on a State visit to the slaves forefather's land, tripping down steps suited, together, bella, the fragile ex-prisoner, the harassed man, love for each other, Clinton and Mandela.

#105 SICILIAN QUINTET

3-30-98

The sick dread of childhood bobs in the mind like dark swollen rivers where sunlight evokes the hidden places. Where one cannot now find the sources of the dread, the terror provokes the hideous awareness of the blind.

#106 TERZA RIMA

3-31-98

Within the envelope of my joyous heart I keep the sealed letter of your sad harms hoping the warmth of its pulsing beat will chart a new calligraphy, new runes, new charms, elevating your mood to spontaneous delight, in thoughts to over-write alarms, making a palimpsest as full, glorious as the twiggy tracery writ over by blooms sparking the world with springs notorious sweet smells, sweet scents, filling all the gloomy rooms with new patterns on new wrought, intricate looms.

#107 SENRYU

4-1-98

The vacant whirlpool The lively mind-pool of man Vortices vanish.

#108 BLUES STANZA

4-2-98

Oh I will live content on the back porch of hell among the milk and the shoes. On the back porch of hell I'll polish up heart and soul until the knell. Whose to say "Yes?" Whose to say "No" today? Nobody pushing, nobody pulling today. I'll settle right here until I get under weigh.

#109 LONG MEASURE

4-3-98

"...compline? It's a time of day in a breviary, I believe, a mediaeval time of day, no doubt."

What the Woman Lived, Selected Letters of Louise Bogan, 1920-1970, 1973, p.90

In the mediaeval part of the day in echos, darker, larger, rough hewn, in shadows of Venetian squares, but further back, back -- enough! Directly preceding the Gothic of Chartres, Amiens -- long faces, spires, hooded eyes, stone -- falls the night shade, the cumulative effect of the fires.

#110 ECHO VERSE

4-4-98

They dismissed me from the top priority in hell. My sins were small, even when I felt quite well enough to gad and carp and caw. As a curlew, sharp beaked, is found on shore, so, at sea, all birds who are are enough.	In hell Enough Is Enough
Nor were angels keen to see me arrive in heaven. Their nets were out for certifiable, pure gold, too. But base metal, as a human is, they cried: "Let be!" So cry curlews, pelicans, and cormorants: "Let be!"	In heaven Too Let be Let be

#111 ENGLISH SONNET II
THREE SICILIAN QUATRAINS AND A HEROIC COUPLET

4-4-98

#112 SPENSERIAN SONNET

4-5-98

#113 SEPTET

4-6-98

#114 ITALIAN SESTET II

4-7-98

#115 LONG HYMNAL OCTAVE

4-8-98

Confusion rides my every thought. I twist in the night, I reel in the way. I would howl from the cliffs, wring the sky wrought with lightning, hurl my rage, and say unimaginable sorrows, hard fought, scrubbed, rinsed, dug up and buried decay. And yet the light still shines on the yacht of each new voyage launched each new day.

#116 LONG OCTAVE

4-9-98

Do all man-made beauties contain a heart of evil, built over pain, capturing glories of nature's wealth for private gain, approval's lure, dazzling the heart of love to remain ensnarled by outer show, impure foundations returned by charity's stealth, saying to the others of earth, "Endure"?

#117 SHORT HYMNAL OCTAVE

4-10-98

#118 HENDECASYLLABICS

4-11-98

Dus la phab, "to fall into time" (Tibetian)

Down the clear straight passage of "might-be" surges the density of "is." Timelessness free falls into time. The known event now emerges as action; "will" that waited as "was" will cease yet ever be -- seen, unseen. Holography, real as vision, dissolves when the last piece disappears from the pool of eternity.

#119 HENDECASYLLABICS II

4-11-98

Dus la phab, "to fall into time" (Tibetian)

Hover outside of time with dreams, with hopes free to be or not be, choosing not as spring might once have sought to be other than she now is. No choice tenders the shining light of sun, moon stars. Wind, rain move across the world avoiding webs of spiders entangled threads restaining febrile choice and the choiceless leach of seized time.

#120 HENDECASYLLABICS III

4-11-98

Dus la phab, "to fall into time" (Tibetian)

Hover outside of time with dreams, with hopes free to be or not be, careful with spring urges once willed beyond harmony seeking to see no choice tenders the shining light of sun, moon stars. Wind, rain move across the wild world to chime webs of spiders entangled threads which pontoon febrile choice and the choiceless leach of seized time. Down the clear straight passage of "might-be" surges the density of "is." Timelessness free falls into time. The known event now emerges as action; "will" that waited as "was" will cease yet ever be -- seen, unseen. Holography, real as vision, dissolves when the last piece disappears from the pool of eternity.

#121 ADONIC, SAPPHICS

4-12-98

Sun's rise, moon's set, rain's wild lees, dew drops, sea's calm -- where will thunder rumble to fall from lightning skies and shake the earth's mild desire to rest in characteristic bliss, untroubled, blameless, quite still in green, blue atmosphere, clouds, winds with its longing known, lost? Come again pale star, ride across the world's bright imagination. Creatures, blue born, immanent, doomed to walk, die deviant from stars structure. Pre-set cyclones, grace of energized planet's, spinning past fired Cassiopeia, bow to Ma Andromeda, cater wishes, transit hopes, fears, all strange sighs, boundless echos clean of substance, dazzlingly, gifted, garnished habitablely.

#122 ADONICS

4-12-98

Limitless Shiva cried in Adonic splendid lament, sheer agony, knife struck doom, as unable Proserpine snatched for winter's somatic season's cool spell, dearth, drama's soft death knell. Venus sets weeping.

#123 HYMNAL STANZA

4-13-98

My mother sleeps beneath the peach azaleas, fired until ash, ruddied by the sun's last reach. Circling, the bird's are shrill. My father lies beneath the cherry blossoms, bowing, weeping, his powdered, white bones mealed, fairy food now from perishing. His son is above the ground, speechless and staring into space his wits have gone astray, ghostless he studies spider's lace. The Holy Ghost has visited me, the birds, the fairies. Infinite unusual space surrounds the bee. The glowing sun stays lit.

#124 DOUBLE ACROSTIC

4-14-98

Another   day   begins  in   the   life   of    Anna.
Nighttime has passed and the rains are soon to begin.
Nature  shifts  her  head eager to  seek out the sun.

May's kissing winds  will dominate the wet, the warm.
Arise    dear    Anna    and  consume  your   banana.
Nothing  will  prevent   variety's   graceful  swoon.
Nowhere  to hide from the  princely day's gusty boon.
Intense,  more   magic  than   the  wandering   Magi,
Numinous gifts are  brought by her dance to the fern,

Goddess  Anna,  enigma,  pale  princess, green  frog.

#125 QUATRAIN II

4-15-98

Cut into an apple. Fail to eat it all. Discard it at your peril. Brown is the fleshed blood of the red apple, dried, still suitable to be pie-d.

#126 COMPOUND ACROSTIC

4-16-98

Mistress Ann reaches into her seventies Ascending slowly, gracefully, one by one. Numinous energy emerging to rev Nascent ascents of the spiritual eye. Intuitive stretching for teaching to learn Not to falter on the cool, tree bordered taut Ground which shows unquestioned, fidelity's way, Answering the great soul, the sphere, the mango Nutrients blessed by the sun, the falling rain, Nature's rocks rounding - the path of an Essene.

#127 ANGLO-SAXON PROSODY

4-17-98

Songs for the singers, sighs for none salvation sings simply for one Symphonies of splendor stagings for the moon's silver lore Powerful singular sensed beauties caught and shimmering, silence for the trees

#128 AE FRESLIGNE II

4-18-98

Isle of Manx in Irish Sea peopled by the Celt and Gauls -- my ancestors whiteish be they hear dirges, lais and calls. Druids they were and Druids they be until time runs out. While boiling blood and fluids mine old prosody, puns doubt the persistence of the sod, telescope their hopes on stars, bow to kiss earth for their God, swear by the vengence of Mars. But lasses and laughing lads know their loves and know their style of Asian moms, roaming dads loosed from the drop of that isle.

#129 HEROIC SESTET II

4-19-98

The adjective survives to describe blue and yellow, the noun can do the job as well, like red. Any color both noun and adj will, like jello, tell tales of sky and lemon, blood -- and bread is white or brown or, at times, blue spotted mold. Penicillin can be gotten from the old. Colors range through every shade, hue and light. Words cover the spectrum equally as well. Would you rather eat a noun and verb by sight or gobble cheese and butter, smell the smell of biting an apple full of spurting juice? In dieting a word can be of use. Remember the preposition, the participle, the adverb and the tax on syn as well. What a feast for eye, ear and brain to tipple: drink up color, drink up sound. Words will quell the thirst, the appetite, the passion for the chocolate, sugar, the spiced and bloody gore.

#130 ALBA

4-20-98

I longed for night, dreaded bright, cruel day. I had prayed for my shining knight, kept men away. Years gathered deep, like intricate, turfed, green lawn bedewed with magical mist against dread dawn. My prayers were answered, my hopes were richly fulfilled, My knight arrived and my days were mown, weeds killed. We lived in the dark, desperate for day to be gone as the light shone across the park at pale dawn. His wife was at home, his heart was vowed to me. Our love couldn't meet the day, couldn't be. In his quandry, like a young, brutalized, torn fawn, he let death come into our bower as dawn.

#131 ALEXANDRINE COUPLET

4-21-98

A dark and gloomy day, pigmented by the moon -- who failed to set, who failed to leave, who would not swoon into the thickness of the night, into the cloud that dark, with glimmering rim, invited like a shroud of sacrilegious candles lit to shine along the way of strange behavior, odd, eccentric, strong and motivated, misalignment, across the dune which even the isolated, lonely, haunted loon forsook, and pushed its dark head into the lake, bowed by the shocking ineptitude of time banging and loud -- ended inevitably in darkness to prolong what would otherwise end with a resounding gong.

#132 STANDARD HABBIE

4-22-98

A mouth of salt to cure the world's ills -- it burns the gums, the tongue it kills like bright fire filling the ancient gills. Excessive brine will forever end all brain trills except for the sign of the dove and friendship's pure trust. Consider your advice's thrust before you bestir the torrid gust of change, of the new. Perhaps its best to lie in dust sanschance to rue the cure of the salt, the cure of the tongue since one has for ages quite clung -- especially when one was quite young -- to ways of the land, not ways of the sea once we were strung mortal on the sand.

#133 BLANK VERSE

4-23-98

The unstable moon in the splenderous sky wakes even the birds at night with shifting light, with its promise of day, its tease of illumination. O be not the moon, don't wake me from night's dreams, dark promises. I am fragile in light, have sought through life to reflect the midnight sun. I have won considerable peace in being asleep, in running, silence, avoiding bird song and amorous flight. O moon, stand perfect, still, bright, but don't wake the birds, don't wake me.

Copyright © 2000 Jan Haag
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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

ALPHABETICAL INDEX BY FORM

POETRY FORMS USED IN ENGLISH

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

INTRODUCTION + HAAG'S BIO

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