Роджер Желязны - To Spin Is Miracle Cat

but note, and again,

there's no escape

from images unsought.

AUGURY

A fistful of entrails

makes all the difference in the world

at a time like this, oh king,

and these guts say you're in trouble.

It could be the lord chamberlain

or — God forbid! — the queen

that bears watching,

but the innards indicate the stranger.

The people themselves,

heirs to your benevolence,

typically ungrateful,

screaming for your head,

as usual,

have a new twist to their defiiance.

They used to say it's wars, taxes

and the recent executions,

but now they're after

social security,

a 40-hour work week

with paid vacations,

workmen's compensation

and a comprehensive

medical-dental plan.

Now, that stranger in the dungeon

and the glowing bubble he came in -

We all know he's mad,

with his talk

of flying machines,

thinking machines,

killing machines,

but this segment, here,

ties him to the current unrest.

I believe he found an audience

before we got to him.

So it comes to this:

We must burn him as a sorcerer

or offer him a cabinet post.

Offhand, I'd recommend the latter.

You see, it's really a matter

of vocabulary.

His words have found them ills

they never knew they had.

So let him talk awhile

and place a moratorium

on the penning of dictionaries.

Drown his words in realities

and the next time they come by

it'll be his head,

like a grisly lollipop,

passing down the avenue.

Then give it a year, I'd say.

The people will forget the words,

saying it's wars, taxes

and the recent executions.

I feel it in my guts.

TO HIS MORBID MISTRESS

Two hundred-six bones,

held together with passion and flesh,

four hundred-twelve bones.

ditto,

cushioned against rattle and stress,

facing the future with a smile,

show entropy's got poetry inside.

Be my Valentine, awhile.

EVANGEL

The moth,

seeking a gateway to another dimension

where moths wear crowns,

trusts the flickering door atop the pillar.

Have I overlooked the comparison?

You, to whom I address these lines,

have asked for my trust.

I did not crawl out of my cocoon yesterday.

I came to pray; mocking, I stay.

LOBACHEVSKY'S EYES

Lobachevsky alone has looked on Beauty bare.

She curves in here, she curves in here. She curves out there.

Her parallel clefts come together to tease

In un-callipygianous-wise;

With fewer than one hundred eighty degrees

Her glorious triangle lies.

Her double-trumpet symmetry Riemann did not court —

His tastes to simpler-curvedness, the buxom Teuton sort!

An ellipse is fine for as far as it goes,

But modesty, away!

If I'm going to see Beauty without her clothes

Give me hyperbolas any old day.

The world is curves, I've heard it said.

And straightway in it nothing lies.

This then my wish, before I'm dead:

To look through Lobachevsky's eyes.

552-1212

[It begins and ends,

that's what it does,

and then again begins,

with tremulous cadence slow,

usually getting me off the john

or out of the bathtub.

The eternal note of sadness

is what I call it,

among other things ...]

Ask not whom the bell tolls

and you often get stuck with a collect call,

as I that one from thee.

I suppose it's easier

to be a Number than an Islande,

but I resent the use of one

much more than the other

and wish to remain unlisted

though I've no objection to begin mapped.

As any idiot with nothing to say

delights in calling to say it,

I eagerly await my diminishment in thee,

geographical anomaly,

if continenthood

be the best one can hope for.

* * *

Yet, while it's doubtless difficult being

an Islande, the shrinkage does seem worth

the effort, J.D., if others reports bear true,

and I will keep at it.

The 17th Century having no number

I can reach, I am writing all this out

and would welcome any second thoughts

you may have had on the matter,

for it's hard (that's little conceit)

much of the time,

and I would welcome

shrieking gulls, mindless surf, gusty winds

in place of all these confused alarms,

tolling for, telling at,

belling after me.

R.S.V.P. via bottle.

cc: M.A.

HANDS

Where the last flag is raised

and the last body laid

two birds in a bush

and one in the hand

are equivalent no more.

*

The sound of one hand clapping

requires a face

for its fulfillment.

*

I never let the right

know what the left was was doing.

Consequently, I castrated myself

while opening a can of beans.

*

A Great Big Hand

For The Little Lady

came in through the window

and whisked away.

*

The Devil finds work

for the idle,

such as this.

WALL

I would like to come and live in your Utopia

where brotherhood, sisterhood, joy,

simple communal pleasures, each to every,

dancing, singing, studying, sacrifice,

group therapy, nationalized poverty,

healthy pacifism, modern dance,

lots of wholesome food, mass calesthenics,

cold showers, jogging, writing workshops

and maybe a little flagellation

add backbone to the salt of the earth,

so to speak.

I will build you a great long wall.

Give me your wretched refuse

who do not believe in all of the above.

We will cause them to stand

with their backs against the wall,

blindfolded, as they were blind to the truth,

and I will help to preserve your ideals,

for even the best of us need protectors

every now and then.

TORLIN DRAGONSON

Beneath my feet

grass withers.

Poison drips

from my lips.

I smash orchards,

burn churches,

sink sailors,

foul rivers.

I rend white knights,

raze castles,

gulp virgins,

breathe arsons.

But love's my hoard,

where gold's gleams

comfort me,

just like thee.

PARANOID GAME

Paranoia is fun.

I once thought of inventing a board game

with that name.

Roll the dice. Deuce.

Go two.

Draw a card.

Your cat has died

after eating the dinner's scraps.

Go to hospital. Have your stomach pumped.

Forfeit a turn.

The possibilities are endless.

Read the instructions:

Watch out! They are all around you.

I wouldn't be too quick with those dice.

Keep an eye on the other players.

Listen.

What you do not hear is also important.

Or see, or feel, or taste,

touch, smell or kinesthese;

none of the above;

or all of these.

It is a good day.

Sort of makes you wonder.

Don't be the first to move.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be.

One of the other players has instructions

for a different game.

It is called Manic-Depressive.

He/She is watching too, just now,

but the adrenalin is rising.

When things get desperate,

you could draw a card.

Or not.

Nobody wins, of course,

but the best loser

if undefeated in a certain spiritual sense.

The way out is to draw the black card,

though it may only say "Taxes".

Something is rotten,

but Dad's ghost on the castle wall

is not to be trusted either.

(Remember the stories he used to tell?)

Offhand, I'd say there's something to do.