Forgiveness

The mind skitters, its one rudder Being its own voice. The great Fascist poet taught me free verse. Trying to concentrate on “The forgiving Of an unforgivable crime” in a lecture By Emmanuel Levinas, I drift into Keely Smith being Cherokee. “The desire for vers libre,” says Pound In his hectoring way, is “quantity Reasserting itself after years Of starvation.” Reading that, I Got the idea—just like in music, Longer is different from higher. Like with long “ee”s, And it was called “quantity”— I could hear it. The third syllable Longer, the first one stressed by pitch: Bitterness. Cherokee. Popinjay. I don’t pretend I was thinking About the Trail of Tears or any other Unforgivable crime. I was thinking About how well she imitates Louis Prima’s pelvis-forward walk, mocking The magic of it while singing like An angel in a prom dress, and how Great it would be to write something That funny and impassioned. The cadences and quantities Of his “Exile’s Letter” break my heart As a ritual of truth, the remote Spoken ceremony of atonement. At the same time, I scorn That nostalgic celebration of drunken Friendship among exquisite Diplomats of an ancient ruling class. Starvation a figure of speech! The airy dynamo of song