The cloning

by Peter Wild

103 pages, Unbound

Published January 1, 1974

Reviews

[Rand · Rating 4 out of 5]

Visceral, apocalyptic, rustic, surreal, rugged, playful, mimetic, surprising.

If you enjoy the feeling of the desert then these poems will appeal to you. This book is in fact a collection of two separate chapbooks (Wild released over 200 poems in his lifetime). The Buffalo is included in this book; Roaches is not. The Cloning contains a little poem that anthropomorphizes termites rather tenderly.

Here is his "History of the Horse"

When the first horses came
they were wooden skeletons
stumbling sheepishly out of
the gravelly sunrise. we
picked the flesh from their bones, the fire strips from their eyes and ribs, and
with the other grabage
kicked the rest over the cliffs.
but our women glued bucksin
to their legs, and in their ears
hung trinkets. mornings they came up to our tents smiling like second moons, and we rode them who could take us on their thoughts
over the ranges, and when they dropped
found their flesh delicious. we
clothed them in the robes from our backs,
made gold plugs for their noses
and they eating the grass up as in
some dream increased, grew
strong, large as armed windmills
spinning in the sun. released
they flew like lions over the hills
to pounce on mountains, claws spread. we
took their children in, built stone houses for them,
fed them incense, fruit, on holy days
presented the silent virgin's flesh.
at night our village is an island surrounded by their moving lights
and screams as they tear up the earth
and we sleep in our tattered tents
hugging the tiny scapulas of the
sacrifice on which we dream.

If Jim Morrison faked his own death, he might have become Wild.

[Zeno Izen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't figure out what this guy is trying to say, but his images are awesome.