Blue

by Tom Clark

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1974

About the author

Clark was an American poet, editor and biographer. Clark was educated at the University of Michigan and served as poetry editor of "The Paris Review" from 1963 to 1973 and published numerous volumes of poetry with Black Sparrow Press. His literary essays and reviews have appeared in "The New York Times," "Times Literary Supplement," and many other journals.

Reviews

[M.W.P.M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Blue


Sky above California apartment building
Sky above Damascus' whitest mosque
Sky above Franz Schubert composing a nostalgic measure
Sky above Vida Blue throwing smoke
In all of you one common ingredient: blue

Blue is not white
Death is white
Blue is cool
Blue is all right

*

You can't exhaust blue.

Mallarmé
loved it

so much he
whited out.

*

Red,
ah.
Red spreads.

Blue
sort of
deepens.

*

Ah - There

the emerald mosque

in motion

every time a fern

touches

the honey

coloured comb

she pulls

through her

fallen hair

*

Hair Pins


her arms
are guitars
the air plays

*

Angel Face

angel face

in deep

gets heavy

& that's alright

'cos sleep

means gravy

so never stop

or your wings

might rust

and you'll

get a hole

in your aura

*

Sad Alba

I stroked her lug

and she murmured

"Peace"

then I stroked her belly

and softly from her sleep

she said "vomit" -

so I let her lie

*

Mambo


Coming out of the water
that proud long body
seems for ever young
but will die & go away
day by day, some day

& then it'll be time
for memory, not before.

Ooh babe, rubber belly
so brown & fine
come rub up on me
guava jelly
& not before.

*

gimme lil drink
fumyer lovin cup

it's the poor
man's listerine

*

ze poozy

eez "OK"

*

Personal Poem

Some deranged jackal

might take my place tomorrow

wudja know the difference?

*

Rubbin the
dust off
her wings,
sweet Nada
tells me
all the
bad news

*

Metaphysm


"a bolt from the blue"
or
"she had a
metaphysm"

&
it changed
her
into a

(---------------)

*

February

the animal

babble

in the water

like a broken

radio

until their cells

spring

open

to rust

slowly

in the sun

*

The Door to the Forest, for Jim Carroll


Eric Dolphy can't wake up:
the green light's still burning
by the gate. Pine cones

when stepped on by
dogs or raccoons, click
gently, like bones

into the mist, which
smells like mint; the
sounds diminish it;

the white fire rose
through the dropper's eye
falls; and the rain remains.

*

Hot Dog


I am watching Mouse Factory with one eye
and my other eye is on Warren Jabali
who steals the ball and drives bravely
and at half time a returning POW (black)
admits he'd like a piece of the pie
bu they'll probably be giving lumpy gravy
laced with the snow white pacifier
that'd keep even King Kong in line
the Greeks gave it credit for wonders of nature
which by the way applies to this here Julius Erving
who lopes in for a backward slam while I blink
then glides upcourt like a Clipper Ship

*

Television (later)


Richard Hoggart
once told me
television was
the sociological
equivalent of
the hearth;
smart dude,
that Hoggart.

*

Masters of Distortion


The distortion
of a form
is inventive
activity

Jimi Hendrix
and John Lee Hooker

Music
looked into them
like
freak
mirrors
and saw
its own future

*

In Concert


Give Miles

an inch

and he
takes it

*

Poetry Street


On Poverty Street, the disinterested
click of Dixie Cups on bakelite trays
reminds me that prose exists.

*

Death & Taxes


Death, yes
it's
necessary,
even important,
if not
exactly
"great" . . .

but
taxes?
Forget it.

*

Campaign


The Nix surfboard along on the
electronic wave as triumphantly as
ol' Hitler rode the mechanical wave of voodoo . . .

one thing's for sure. It's pain in the hair time again
for America's walking weird
and the dancing robots are going to be front & centre.

*

Buy More Groceries, Kids


The prisoners of war
stepping from the plane
in socialist pajamas
& zen crewcuts
to be "briefed"

by Elmer Fudd.

*

History


Alfred E. Newman
sees the universe as
a peanut butter 'n
jelly sandwich on
rubber bands, and
he eats it right up.

*

Detroit, Nov. 4 '73


A clear purpose carried
John Brodie's passes over
the arms of the secondary
for 15 years; then
zone defenses came in
with their own E-meters
'n as-ised him

*

Europe, for Max Ophuls

"the kind of establishment
where one learns many things"

*

clair de lune
strüdel

yuck

*

Europe Again


Fritz Lang's great
awareness of evil
always falls on
some cowboy's
shoulders*
like a tube of shit
_____________

*Gary Cooper in
Cloak & Dagger;
& in Human Desire,
Glenn Ford

*

The Best of Europe


Ali McGraw's
ass
in Goodbye Columbus

is just
American butt

but
Lili Palmer's
in Cloak & Dagger

is open
to Cartesian dispute.

*

Community


The heads of
the women are
bowed as the
men slit the
throats of the
giant fish

*

don't be too hasty
to trace
all evil to
the marketplace

*

Andromeda Strain


The "last
superstar" a
virus?

*

"That makes sense."

*

On Venus


I like breathing better than work
but strange is the meat
when it is yanked out of the sky
and arrows are shot into it
Nothing is personal then
and everything is true
including both love's great circumambience
and the hideous skull-glare in the mirror
which pulses and glows
like some videotape of the future

*

Think Stone Age!

*

Solipsism


I don't care
what anybody thinks
and I hope
nobody thinks
I do

*

The Finger


when I'm out
walking
I see people
I know driving
in cars
and I give
'em a little
hand signal

sometimes
it's a
hi sign
and some
times it's
the finger

*

Road Song (Why I don't have a car)


I walk
where I want to go;

I was born with this
body, so I use it.

*

Water


The fog comes in, flatter
than ever. The air, apparently

is blue somewhere, not here.
Flat and linear. The women

can't escape except through speech
so they go to the beach.

I know. I'll talk to
the wall for once, tell all.

I'll be its friend
as it bends, and fall with it.

*

Peace is Eastern


A lovely morning
one of many

Blue dawn suffused
with red and gold

Before the dogs
and birds awake

I walk with beauty
like the night

down the dark cliff
to the murmuring sea

with one black eye
and a bloody fist

*

The Code of the West


If guts is grace under pressure, then
guts is pressure over grace, and
pressure is grace times guts. But
pleasure is never mentioned.

*

You can kick the shit
out of any cowboy
without exhausting it

*

After Amos Otis


Marvin Gaye sings Trouble Man, comes apart
Moves down the line a token interest
Ray Davies sees space as famous
But the only stars I know are in the sky

The moon is in the second house
Jupiter aligned with Mars
So I go out by the herbarium
And puke on a moss rose

I'm beginning to see the light
It's looking black & blue
My stomach's in knots
No longer grateful to be white

"There are problems in these times
But ooh none of them are mine"

*

Oakland Coliseum


10th inning of
AL playoffs '72:

kid next to us
in the bleachers
starts to cry 'cos
Reggie Jackson's
not his father!

"My dad's a
garbageman, if
Reggie was my dad
I could get anything
I want!"

*

1971


Reggie, too, has wept
on the dugout steps
in pursuit of the
unattainable

*

Don't Talk To Me About Jogging


walking is a gas
running is a good time

but jogging is for
"exercise" creeps

"fitness" freaks
like Proxmire

children of
the "work ethic"

*

See You


Day or night
in any weather
if you can get
a game together
I'll be there

[edmondegreen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good book

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pithy.