THE CANTOS

Pound wrote The Cantos on toilet paper I wrote this on a broken phone Whiskered, squinting, curls flown Am I the poet or the man alone I got off the red board and had a girl Fist on the headboard, her dad was home She went down like a wolf on the fold God help me if I cast a stone The Book of Five Rings, the razor's edge Said I'd be her second if I ever left The bell rings and I'm baptized in sweat The rings round my eyes like the ring round her neck I looked for gods at the windowsill They never came but the half gods will I snapped the neck and I made the kill No use waiting for an angel's trill The mind lies, the body doesn't The body dies, the spirit doesn't The spirit flies from a kind that doesn't Mary cries for the one that doesn't I fled from fowlers with my shoulders bare I spread my wings and it broke the snare I saw this ball when I rode the air They laid their tripwires everywhere How many candles have I put on the cake Since I was the eagle and you were the snake Since I was Elvis and you were the Colonel Since you were illegal and I was eternal When you die will your spirit soar Will you wear wounds, will you rattle bones Will your heart pound neath your cherry floors Will you face Peter at his plywood door