Better Than Truth
after Ghalib
By William Dennis
(Page 4)
The Rest of MeGlacier is not so cool, or the storm so sweeping; What is this one of great power and small feeling? That which loves must have gone up with the rest of me; What’s left, stirring the ash, you might think of keeping? I know you not just by doubling your pulses; Real heart’s blood shines in the eyes with their reddening. Repent like a desert father after paradise, A glass of which, last night, I found in your keeping. I may borrow the seal for my stationary; If not, I’d go out with the trash in the morning. |
The Sinner AsideFree, straight– her ballistic stride; Where in her heart might I hide? Clerics and constables called, Find this guerilla can hide. Mary’s son works miracles; For my pain, who will provide? My words and tongue both cut off; It’s hers to speak, mine to bide. Rattle and clang, I talk on; As I mumble, God on my side. Fold closed the hearing to ill; Step over offense—quick stride. Give gifts from your forgiveness; Walk with the sinner aside. Samson had only his strength; Solomon only was wise. Senile now, Ponce de Leon; What goals to seek and what guide? Among chaff and ergot, Bill, Why fix blame, when not surprised? |
Sweet-ToothHonor sky-clad, like a saint, I can have no shame; Embarrassing bishops, fluttering nuns the same. For my sweet-tooth, pawning alms bowl and rosary; It’s long since the card on a heart-shaped box bore my name. Given place to stand, I’d prize avaricious earth For how it treasures that to which I still lay claim. In my absence, who taught her generosity? Before we beg, she scatters kisses to us lame. Her absent-minded heart spares me her dicing wit; She’ll keep full many a promise, forgetful of blame. |
I May Not CallYour other lover wears your bracelet everywhere With your name for anyone to stare at if they care. Lovely and loveable, but sophisticated, so! Even encouraged, I could not loosen her hair. And when my angel beckons, I will surely rise; Surely, I may not call you. You, love, may not care. The impenetrant eye, which can not see the wind? Who casts veils? The great slope, turning and lifting airs? Frank! Heart is a weed I can not grow or uproot; The worst things promote growth, and nothing makes it fair. |
Wail BackUrged, he may speak for himself; he’s a man, she knows, My foe, but my messenger to where I can’t go. The Moriah won’t heed my call, but, sure, she’ll come; I wail back at the Banshee, till time comes to go. My health? Have I lost my prosciutt’? Well she may ask; My tongue’s in the bag with the cat, as she well knows. Rhetoric: the question holds its answer; I’m mad? When I plead, she asks. But why fight? Who cares? Who knows? People say our Bill is not actually wicked; But they dislike tripping on bits of his ego. |
Dress for the Mirror
I’m a boy clutching my kite on the maidan grass, Wide-eyed as Persians and camels caravan past. I plump down on Solomon’s throne when I feel like; I’ve worked the Messiah’s miracles since a tyke. Five Latin words dispel illusion from the bread; I walk the market sorting words out in my head. Such great mountains hide in desert at my approach; The river casts itself forward with my reproach. Truth told, I dress for the mirror, why wouldn’t I? The handsome ghost dwelling there seems pleased, to my eye. I can talk birds out of the air, when there are birds; I can coax wine out of the jug, when I lack words. When faith tugs my button, impiety takes my sleeve; Finished in the Kaaba, I face the Church as I leave. I found joy in union, assured it never dies; Now, because of last night’s love, death stares in my eyes. Eyes still work, though tongue lies withered and hand inert; A glass of wine and pretty waitress could not hurt. He turns east when I kneel, holds my purse while I pray; William wears greatness quite modestly, I must say. |
The Seraph’s PowerThere are desire’s thousand exclusive categories; My life has been many things, but told in too few stories. Adam was made to leave Eden by shame, the seraph’s power; But I was the more disgraced, when driven from your bower. Who wants his name immortalized in verse should come to me; For with my pen I shame myself by worse than that each day. This time around the drink is attributed to my name; The age arrives for augurs, time the cup of Jamshed came. In great love I lose the distinction between life and death; She whose look I live for is the savage who seeks my life. Forgetting which leg to limp on, I still need sympathy; But his clutched bosom is always more blanched by dark cruelty. Ayatollah! Is ‘ia Sophia still shaped like a cross? Don’t look here; I may also show my origins in loss. The tap room has a door – inside the deacon is not seen; I saw him, Bill, on coming out as he was going in. |
In Spite of AllMy stain has set in spite of all solutions: It neither fades nor grows new convolutions. Do you gather for prayer those who detest me? Crows congregate, praising the owl’s constitution. Where can I stand to meet your elusive gaze, Whose kind heart spares me fatal recognition? Mockingbird’s scold only charms the boys closer; Robbing the nest is their final intention. I welcome rumors that she will come today; Though my single chair offers spare reception. Who was it, Poseidon, risen against me? My pennies each bounced off the fountain’s foundation. We are loaned our life, which I must soon give back, Short principle and interest in reparation. No tidy dressing will staunch this flow of blood; No work can stand on this destroyed foundation. Is it love or common mugging of the heart, Which commits this ugly crime against affection? "Bill, say something funny," is what women tell me, To whom I’m in debt for today’s recitation. |
Open-MouthedWith three generations for dreams to be actualized, Our children’s first children’s first love will be realized. With moralists and the moral-less coiled to strike, My poem is my grief as it comes to be satirized. With love content, still, I fumble the phone when you call; To cloak lust in love, what pose is to be advised. With rumor this much more reliable than the mails, I need not write to you for help for you to be apprized. With the mantis stag, youth and age are both offered up; I, too, hope thus in one single embrace, to be prized. With even spring’s worst showers so brief in this desert, Storms leave me open-mouthed and not to be satisfied. With death as the great benefactor for whom you wait, God’s sake, Bill, wake up, unless you like to be surprised! |
Mourn For My WifeMy heart or my heart-burn, my liver or life? I’ll serve as a mourner and mourn for my wife. I keep it a secret, the sound of your name, The same as you hide where you’re spending your life. Pedestrian pleasures you shared seemed so tame: New dance-steps and kisses to add to his fame. They think I feel lucky to stay home alone; I groan, thinking soft on old loves I can’t claim. I walk just a bit with each friend that I own, And never get anywhere far from my home. I’ve promised my life and my money away; They say that devotion is all that I’ve shown. I always get lost in my thoughts on my way To visit my dream, to hear what she might say. The reach of my grasp serves to measure my friends, Whose ends, long and short, you all meet every day. |