Nicholas Galinaitis

“I tried each thing, only some were immortal and free.”
― John Ashbery, Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror

“Madness alone is truly terrifying, inasmuch as you cannot placate it by threats, persuasion, or bribes.”
― Joseph Conrad, The Secret Agent

“Whether

Whether anger quickens a lagging stride,

and periodic burn-offs in the forest

revitalize exhausted soil and flora—.

Whether we should take pleasure in the wildcat


jubilation of a lightning bolt

that whips its silver vein of genesis

through the night sky, flash-photo of a white

birch upended, the root-system buckled


to swollen thunderheads—. And whether naming

an offense amounts to sour grapes and common

bitterness, or even the conceited nonsense

of unwashed yahoo multitudes, a yawping


insult to civilized behavior—. Whether

a July rainstorm, even when it drenches

the unprepared pedestrian and befuddles

traffic, might be extravagant, a joy,


like the whoops and escalating bop glissandos

of Gillespie’s upraised horn, cascading pitches

a countersong to meteoric chalk marks

Perseids burn across the House of Leo—.


And whether peaceful ecstasy might float

up from a fifteen-second avalanche

reflected in the skier’s goggles, his jacket

a spark of scarlet on the topmost slope,


waiting for the homeward track to clear.”
― Alfred Corn, Contradictions

“Most reckless things are beautiful in some way, and recklessness is what makes experimental art beautiful, just as religions are beautiful because of the strong possibilities that they are founded on nothing.”
― John Ashbery