Sitaram
kickbox
Part One
Black, chilled, high, wavering extension,
Straight, stretched out and away, away,
Onward, lured by words which sing
"Crawl forth, crawl forth!
Time has come to this!"
Muscles have strengthened, cells built, nerves arranged.
Do not ask why, but when,
There is only below.
All of before was chewing, chewing outward.
And then the break, the rush, pushing.
Hundreds and hundreds pouring over,
But with no identity, no one image to grasp
And then the catching, killing, and consuming
Constant clutching out at space, the urgency
Capture, suck dry, cast away.
Then eggs, eggs, the laying of eggs.
The quest for warm dry corners.
The building, the placing, the leaving, always leaving.
But here, to this place,
Black, chilled, high, wavering extension,
There is only to touch, to hear, to smell, to taste
And to touch it tastes good
And there is no smell, for here it is wind blown clean
And the sound is too far to be heard
There is only quiet.
And these are the only image, identity
To cast out and away feels good,
There is nothing beneath.
To fall is a new sensation.
To become so light, so light to be carried away,
Is peace
And there is no need for thought.
Part Two
Out from light
Four jewels fell
Down from a chain
Around the neck and rained
Over the stomach,
Onto the thighs,
Into the darkened curl
Of soul and cell.
No sun shown.
No eye, no sight
Of skin or teeth
Or body showed.
One was a sun jewel,
Touch brought light;
There was no need of sun.
No love lived.
No mind, no head
No hair of head
Or ear enclosed.
Love was a jewel,
One touch fulfilled;
All else was unnecessary.
No sperm swam
Or ovum fell
From glands to foreskin
Or in thighs,
No tickle of dividing cell,
No death rattle,
Or decay whisper,
Two jewels set in janus gleamed,
Birth joy, death sorrow;
There was no need.
No morning, afternoon, or evening rolled.
No fall of years or eons snowed
On sweet, forgetful generations.
Touch possessed.
Possessing, these four jewels surpassed
The patient links
Of needs and fulfillments.
Mere position filled all needs,
All needs but those of the whole;
The burden of the conceptual.
Chain diffusing,
Light effused,
And there was no need of jewels;
The gem sun dawned.
Part Three
She woke at the end of dark
And stood in space,
To see the yellow pushing through the red.
And she re-heard the slide and cry of birth
And felt the first breath break upon her face.
She smelled the yellow pulsing into white
And tasted those first forms her heart beheld,
The nipple of the trees, green lap and leg,
The lips of leaves around her hearing head.
And, swelling up, the white became her mind,
And pondered those first peeking hairs of summer,
The tickling faint of warm, pink flesh to flush;
She spoke the blush that murmured on her breast.
Staggering, chin tipped up,
The glare became an echo
And she recalled the paring plums
Who split to tiny eyes, they loved
As no small seed could flower at her feet.
Turning, her squint became the roots uprooting,
Far from all in the shadow cast flung down;
She dreamed her wishes, fantasied her grief.
Finally, still again she stood.
Finding the yellow sinking through the red.
out she touched delicately;
Blind, she moved on.
Part Four
Evening in my mind.
My thoughts are a candle flicker in my head.
Wind and twine around, surround, encompass, thoughts
Dead yellow in your color!
The night vine's leaves are crawling up my eyes,
Bearing every flower of my touch.
Rise, leap, lick, dull flame,
Their stamens and their pistils, sputter forth
Sweet pollen and the egg cell, tubules
To creep down into my life!
Soul, O Soul, dear dormant seed,
Progeny and sustenance and hope,
Lay still and soft and sleep.
Steep, small thoughts.
Melting mellow tallow, now I feel
The essence of my garden.
Taste my fruit and lay beneath my tree!
Rain down, kind darkness!
Rain down and wet my leaves,
That I may sleep but yet not see,
Rest and yet stir,
Grow and not know
But wake grown.
Part Five
These are the finest moments of myself,
The soft, quite comings together
And the sparks I feel.
The long gray look down a line
To the first, farthest dawn that I can see.
The peace, the raging, singing peace within my bowels
And the still, white, deathless thread
Stretched out across my mind!
Sing, thin thread!
Sing of all my fathers and their sinewy prides!
Sing of my humble mothers and their venous breasts sucked dry!
In and in, unravelling the delicate lace of age,
Define my tapestry!
Tell me each link of my lineage, each knot, and fray.
But most of all
Teach me your wisdom that I may knit one more.
Part Six
The body is a commodity to be spent
For pleasure and pure joy or for achievement
The heart has just so many throbs in its folds
That pulse oblivious of time and intent.
The eye sees only that whereon it is turned
And grows dull and aching upon words as stones.
The honest chest shrinks upon worry or contentment
And the skin grows idle and dries independent of the will.
Life is a slight imbalance of age upon youth,
Which sends us up a hill and down again,
Whose summit we owned once and called Reason.
Living, which wears things out with use
Whose very pieces nature gave immunity to change;
The large as the good is hard-put to stay intact.
To cherish either is to conserve it
But to respect it is to put it to good use.
Humble time finds its own occupation and diminishes
Only to be replenished from limitless debt.
The body is proud and pays for itself with itself.
Only the faint force of thought is innocent.
Charmed by no granter of fictive wishes,
Bound by no benefactor's demand of repayment,
Eternal, for it is constant and changes
Only to remain familiar,
It plays the role of one redundant goal:
To go someplace alone
And come out knowing.
- Sitaram
(circa 1966)
Black, chilled, high, wavering extension,
Straight, stretched out and away, away,
Onward, lured by words which sing
"Crawl forth, crawl forth!
Time has come to this!"
Muscles have strengthened, cells built, nerves arranged.
Do not ask why, but when,
There is only below.
All of before was chewing, chewing outward.
And then the break, the rush, pushing.
Hundreds and hundreds pouring over,
But with no identity, no one image to grasp
And then the catching, killing, and consuming
Constant clutching out at space, the urgency
Capture, suck dry, cast away.
Then eggs, eggs, the laying of eggs.
The quest for warm dry corners.
The building, the placing, the leaving, always leaving.
But here, to this place,
Black, chilled, high, wavering extension,
There is only to touch, to hear, to smell, to taste
And to touch it tastes good
And there is no smell, for here it is wind blown clean
And the sound is too far to be heard
There is only quiet.
And these are the only image, identity
To cast out and away feels good,
There is nothing beneath.
To fall is a new sensation.
To become so light, so light to be carried away,
Is peace
And there is no need for thought.
Part Two
Out from light
Four jewels fell
Down from a chain
Around the neck and rained
Over the stomach,
Onto the thighs,
Into the darkened curl
Of soul and cell.
No sun shown.
No eye, no sight
Of skin or teeth
Or body showed.
One was a sun jewel,
Touch brought light;
There was no need of sun.
No love lived.
No mind, no head
No hair of head
Or ear enclosed.
Love was a jewel,
One touch fulfilled;
All else was unnecessary.
No sperm swam
Or ovum fell
From glands to foreskin
Or in thighs,
No tickle of dividing cell,
No death rattle,
Or decay whisper,
Two jewels set in janus gleamed,
Birth joy, death sorrow;
There was no need.
No morning, afternoon, or evening rolled.
No fall of years or eons snowed
On sweet, forgetful generations.
Touch possessed.
Possessing, these four jewels surpassed
The patient links
Of needs and fulfillments.
Mere position filled all needs,
All needs but those of the whole;
The burden of the conceptual.
Chain diffusing,
Light effused,
And there was no need of jewels;
The gem sun dawned.
Part Three
She woke at the end of dark
And stood in space,
To see the yellow pushing through the red.
And she re-heard the slide and cry of birth
And felt the first breath break upon her face.
She smelled the yellow pulsing into white
And tasted those first forms her heart beheld,
The nipple of the trees, green lap and leg,
The lips of leaves around her hearing head.
And, swelling up, the white became her mind,
And pondered those first peeking hairs of summer,
The tickling faint of warm, pink flesh to flush;
She spoke the blush that murmured on her breast.
Staggering, chin tipped up,
The glare became an echo
And she recalled the paring plums
Who split to tiny eyes, they loved
As no small seed could flower at her feet.
Turning, her squint became the roots uprooting,
Far from all in the shadow cast flung down;
She dreamed her wishes, fantasied her grief.
Finally, still again she stood.
Finding the yellow sinking through the red.
out she touched delicately;
Blind, she moved on.
Part Four
Evening in my mind.
My thoughts are a candle flicker in my head.
Wind and twine around, surround, encompass, thoughts
Dead yellow in your color!
The night vine's leaves are crawling up my eyes,
Bearing every flower of my touch.
Rise, leap, lick, dull flame,
Their stamens and their pistils, sputter forth
Sweet pollen and the egg cell, tubules
To creep down into my life!
Soul, O Soul, dear dormant seed,
Progeny and sustenance and hope,
Lay still and soft and sleep.
Steep, small thoughts.
Melting mellow tallow, now I feel
The essence of my garden.
Taste my fruit and lay beneath my tree!
Rain down, kind darkness!
Rain down and wet my leaves,
That I may sleep but yet not see,
Rest and yet stir,
Grow and not know
But wake grown.
Part Five
These are the finest moments of myself,
The soft, quite comings together
And the sparks I feel.
The long gray look down a line
To the first, farthest dawn that I can see.
The peace, the raging, singing peace within my bowels
And the still, white, deathless thread
Stretched out across my mind!
Sing, thin thread!
Sing of all my fathers and their sinewy prides!
Sing of my humble mothers and their venous breasts sucked dry!
In and in, unravelling the delicate lace of age,
Define my tapestry!
Tell me each link of my lineage, each knot, and fray.
But most of all
Teach me your wisdom that I may knit one more.
Part Six
The body is a commodity to be spent
For pleasure and pure joy or for achievement
The heart has just so many throbs in its folds
That pulse oblivious of time and intent.
The eye sees only that whereon it is turned
And grows dull and aching upon words as stones.
The honest chest shrinks upon worry or contentment
And the skin grows idle and dries independent of the will.
Life is a slight imbalance of age upon youth,
Which sends us up a hill and down again,
Whose summit we owned once and called Reason.
Living, which wears things out with use
Whose very pieces nature gave immunity to change;
The large as the good is hard-put to stay intact.
To cherish either is to conserve it
But to respect it is to put it to good use.
Humble time finds its own occupation and diminishes
Only to be replenished from limitless debt.
The body is proud and pays for itself with itself.
Only the faint force of thought is innocent.
Charmed by no granter of fictive wishes,
Bound by no benefactor's demand of repayment,
Eternal, for it is constant and changes
Only to remain familiar,
It plays the role of one redundant goal:
To go someplace alone
And come out knowing.
- Sitaram
(circa 1966)