the twentieth century-e. e. cummings

what Got him was Nothing

& nothing's exactly what any one Living(or some body Dead like even a poet)could hardly express what i Mean is what knocked him over Wasn't (for instance)the Knowing your

whole(yes god

damned)life is a Flop

or even to Feel

how Every thing

(dreamed & hoped & prayed for

months & weeks & days & years & nights & forever)

is Less Than Nothing

(which would have been

Something)what got him was nothing

old age sticks up Keep Off signs)&

youth yanks them down(old age cries No

Tres)&(pas) youth laughs (sing old age

scolds Forbid den Stop Mustn't l)nn't

&)youth goes right on growing old

you notice nobody wants

Less(not to men

tion least)&) observe no

body wants Most

(not putting it mildly much)

may

be because everybody

wants more (& more & still More) what the

hell are we all morticians?

page 2

pity this busy monster, manunkind,

not. Progress is a comfortable disease: your victim(death and life safely beyond)

plays with the bigness of his littleness ­electrons deify one razorblade into a mountainrange;lenses extend

unwish through curving wherewhen till unwish returns on its unself.

A world of made is not a world of born­pity poor flesh

and trees poor stars and stones,but never this fine specimen of hypermagical

ultraomnipotence. We doctors know

a hopeless case if-listen:there's a hell of a good universe next door;let's go

nobody loses all the time

i had an uncle named Sol who was a born failure and nearly everybody said he should have gone into vaudeville perhaps because my Uncle Sol could sing McCann He Was A Diver on Xmas Eve like Hell Itself which may or may not account for the fact that my Uncle

Sol indulged in that possibly most inexcusable of all to use a highfalootin phrase luxuries that is or to wit farming and be it needlessly ar1tierl

my Uncle Sol's farm failed because the chickens ate the vegetables so my Uncle Sol had a chicken farm till the skunks ate the chickens wnen

my Uncle Sol had a skunk farm but the skunks caught cold and died and so my Uncle Sol imitated the ck~nkc in a cnhSle manner

or by drowning himself in the watertank but somebody who'd given my Uncle Sol a Victor Victrola and records while he lived presented to him upon the auspicious occasion of his decease a scrumptious not to mention splendiferous funeral with tall boys in black gloves and flowers and everything and

i remember we all cried like the Missouri when my Uncle Sol's coffin lurched because somebody pressed a button (and down went my Uncle Sol

and started a worm farm)

Paqe 3

Buffalo Bill's defunct who used to ride a watersmooth­silver stallion and break onetwothrecfourfive pigeonsjustlikethat

Jesus

he was a handsome man and what i want to know is how do you like your blueeycd boy Mister Death

Ladics and genticmcn: if you all have been dcccived by some imposter so have 1. It you have been tricked and ruined ­ so have 1. ,Nnd so has every man and woman, I say. I say it, and you feel it in your hearts: we are all of us no longer glad and whole, we have all of us sold our spirits hito death, we are all of us the sick parts of a sick thing, wc have all ot us lost our living honesty, and so we are all of us not any more ourselves.

Who can tell truth from falsehood any more? I say it, and you feel it in your hearts: no man or woman on this big small earth.

I­low should our sages miss the mark of life,

and our most skillful players lose the game? your hearts will tell you, as my heart has told me:

because all know, and no one understands.

O, we are all so very full of knowing that we are empty: empty of understanding.

Ilumanity i love you because you would rather black the boots of success than enquire whose soul dangles from his watch­chain which would be embarrassing for both

parties and because you unflhicilingly applaud all songs containing the words country home and mottler when sung at the old howard

Humanity i love you because when you're hard up you pawn your hitelligence to buy a drink and when you're flush pride keeps

you from the pawn shop and because you are continually committing nuisances but more especially in your own house

Humanity i love you because you are perpetually putting the secret of life in your pants and forgetting it's there and sitthig down

oll it and because you are forever making poems in the lap ot death HumanitY

i hate vou

why

do the fingers

of the lit tle once beau tiful la dy(sitting sew ing at an 0 pen window this fine morning)fly

instead of dancing are they possibly afraid that life is running away from them(i wonder)or

isn't she a ware that life(who never grows old) is always beau

tiful and that nobod y beauti

ful ev er hur

ries

dive for dreams or a slogan may topple you (tree are their roots and wind is wind)

page 4

trust your heart if the seas catch fire (and live by love though the stars walk backward)

honour the past but welcome the future (and dance your death away at this wedding)

never mind a world with its villains or heroes (for god likes girls and tomorrow and the earth)

If you can't eat you got to

smoke and we sent got nothing to smoke:come on kid

let's go to sleep if you can't smoke you got to

Sing and we sent got

nothing to sing;come on kid let's go to sleep

if you can't sing you got to die and we sent got

Nothing to die,come on kid

let's go to sleep if you can't die you cot to

dream and we sent got nothing to dream(come on kid

Let's go to sleep)

plato told

him:he couldn't believe itOesus

told him;he wouldn't believe it)lao

tsze certainly told him,and general (yes

mam) sherm an; and even (believe it or

not)you told him ;i told him;we told him (he wouldn't believe it.no

sir)it took a nipponized bit of the old sixth

avenue

elfin the top of his head :to tell

him

dying is fine)but Death

?o baby

I wouldn't like

Death if Death were good: for

page 5

when(instead of stopping to think)you

begin to feel of it,dying 's miraculous why? be

cause dying is

perfectly natural;perfectly putting it mildly lively(but

Death

is strictly scientific & artificial &

evil & legal)

we thank thee god almighty for dying

(forgive us,o life!the sin of Death

it really must be Nice, never to

have no imagination)or never never to wonder about guys used to(and them slim hot queens with dam next to nothing

on) tango ing (while a feller tries to hold down the fifty bucks per Job with one foot and rock a

cradle with the other)it Must be nice never to have no doubts about why you put the ring on( and watching her face grow old and tired to which

you're married and hands get red washing things and dishes)and to never, never really wonder i mean about the smell of babies and how you

know the rent's going to and everything and never,never

Never to stand at no window because i can't sleeP(smoking sawdust

cigarettes in the middle of the night

if i

or anybody don't know where it her his

my next meal's coming from i say to hell with that that doesn't matter(and if

he she it or everybody gets a bellyful without lifting my finger i say to hell with that i

say that doesn't matter)but if somebody or you are beautiful or deep or generous what i say is

Dane 6

whistle that sing that yell that spell that out big(bigger than cosmic rays war earthquakes famine or the ex

prince of whoses diving into a whatses to rescue miss nobody's probably handbag)because i say that's not

swell(get me)babe not(understand me)lousy kid that's something else my sweet(i feel that's true)

WE ARE TRANSMITTERS

Life-D. H. Lawrence page 7

As we live, we are transmitters of life. And when we fail to transmit life, life fails to flow through us.

That is part of the mystery of sex, it is a flow onwards. Sexless people transmit nothing.

And if, as we work, we can transmit life into our work, life, still more life, rushes into us to compensate, to be ready and we ripple with life through the days.

Even if it is a woman making an apple dumpling, or a man a stool, if life goes into the pudding, good is the pudding, good is the stool, content is the woman, with fresh life rippling in to her, content is the man.

Give, and it shall be given unto you

is still the truth about life.

But giving life is not so easy.

It doesn't mean handing it out to some mean fool, or letting

the living dead eat you up.

It means kindling the life­quality where it was not,

even if it's only in the whiteness of a washed pocket­handkerchief.

SICK

I am sick, because I have given myself away.

I have given myself to the people when they came

so cultured, even bringing little gifts,

so they pecked a shred of my life, and flew off with a croak

of sneaking exultance.

So now I have lost too much, and am sick.

I am trying now to learn never to give of my life to the dead, never, not the tiniest shred.

SELF­PI TY

I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.

SEARCH FOR LOVE

Those that go searching for love only make manifest their own lovelessness, and the loveless never find love, only the loving find love, and they never have to seek for it.

THE MOSQUI TO KNOWS

The mosquito knows full well, small as he is he's a beast of prey. But after all he only takes his bellyful, he doesn't put my blood in the bank.

I met a seer. He held in his hands The book of wisdom. "Sir," I said, "Child-" he began. "Sir," I said, "Think not that I am a child, For already I know much Of that which you hold. Ay, much."

He smiled. Then he opened the book And held it before me- Strange that I should have grown so suddenly blind.

I stood upon a high place, And saw, below, many devils Running, leaping, And carousing in sin. One looked up, grinning, And said, "Comrade! Brother!"

There was one I met upon the road Who looked at me with kind eyes. He said: "Show me your wares." And I did, Holding forth one. He said: "It is a sin." Then held I forth another. He said: "It is a sin." Then held I forth another. He said: "It is a sin." And so to the end. Always he said: "It is a sin." At last, I cried out: "But I have none other." Then did he look at me With kinder eyes "Poor soul," He said.

On the horizon the peaks assembled; And as I looked, The march of the mountains began. As they marched, they sang: "Ay! We come! We come!"

Nine Verses-Stephen Crane page 8

A man feared that he might find an assassin; Another that he might find a victim. One was more wise than the other.

I saw a man pursuing the horizon; Round and round they sped. I was distrubed at this; I accosted the man. "It is futile," I said,

"You can never..."

"You lie," he cried. And ran on.

I walked in a desert. And l cried: "Ah, God take me from this place!" A voice said, "It is no desert." I cried: " Well, but . . . The sand, the heat, the vacant horizon." A voice said: "It is no desert."

In the desert I saw a creature, naked, bestial, Who, squatting upon the ground, Held his heart in his hands, And ate of it. I said, "Is it good, friend?" "It is bitter­bitter," he answered; "But I like it Because it is bitter, And because it is my heart."

I was in the darkness; I could not see my words Nor the wishes of my heart. Then suddenly there was a great light .

"Let me into the darkness again.'