The Logos Manifest

Time

And time again,

It appears

In the annals

Of our evanescing

Unrelenting, cliché-ridden

Dream. 

To the Nihilist, Too

who says

he has nothing

he needs

nothing

but his self

to give

himself up to,

this offering

will have to do.

Found Patient Index Card, Harborview Memorial Hospital, Seattle, Washington, 1976

Breast

               cancer of             the breast, meta-

static ca.                   of

axillary lymph nodes.    Butchard,

             Maude died 3-29-48 photo X-

                                                             ray of lumbar

spine and pelvis, chest

photograph                    when

granuloma is cleared                up return

later

                 return in three months

return in three

                           months return

later

return

in one week X-ray

therapy to

left axilla and left neck X-ray therapy return

in four months

X-ray stomach

and also axilla

return in two

weeks return in one

week failed

appt.

B-U-R-D-E-N S-O-M-E B-E-A-S-T-S

Such brazen nonsense coming

From such serious heads, you

Think they would take the time

To weigh their every word before

Letting their tongues enlighten away.

From Here to Eternity: Dead Ringer at Boot Camp, Ft. Leonard Wood, Mo, May/June 1965

D

You never knew Jean Genet served a stint with Uncle Sam, did you? Well, just as some things are kept under wraps for various deceptive reasons and some appearances are meant to be intentionally deceiving, i.e the bogus name-tag with that implausible soubriquet, this authentic looking photo recently discovered jammed between the thin slit left between weathered floor boards in a safe house somewhere in Europe shows the great French writer staring at us from that infamous Middle West boot camp's PX photo booth. Observe, if you will, that famous full-of-meaning slanted glance he's throwing our way and the way his cig forms an artful ringlet that has just wafted up to the bottom of his trademark horn-rimmed glasses. As if all the above weren't enough to throw us off the track, he's also adorned his left hand with--of all things--a US high school class ring!*

Excuse my use of what might seem smacking of hyperbole, but from here to eternity, this is what I'd call the sublime art of subterfuge. 

*It has yet to be ascertained as fact, but rumor has it that the phrase Tell Laura I Love Her is engraved on the ring in question.