Allegories of Exile  


~ after "Paradise Lost," Raqib Shaw


There are things that bring me back 
to myself as soon as I'm in their presence,

though I might not have known that to be true
the minute before— A window layered all in blue

on the lower floor of a gallery, the opening 
lines of a cello that pry something open in me. 

One morning I stood enraptured before a hundred-
foot mural, and a stone seemed to roll away from 

a sealed tomb. The artist had applied brilliant 
automobile enamel paint with fine needle tips 

of syringes and porcupine quills. The many 
avatars of himself crossed landscapes lit

on fire, studded with rhinestones, crowded 
with creatures howling at the moon. Blue 

baboons tore the hearts out of their shredded 
prey like priests presiding over a sacrament. 

Centaurs flung baskets of gold coins into the air.
Hordes of elk and hummingbirds stampeded 

off the cliffs in a shower of springtime blossoms. 
Yes, I see what our world has become, and what we

have become in it. Yes, I know what it means to sob 
when I can't find words for the untranslatable. When

did we stop carrying lanterns for each other?
There goes a picnic basket holding fig jam, rare

cheeses, olives glistening in pools of oil: 
abundance drowning in violent ocean swells. 

And yet there's time to write this story on paper, 
with ink, under a saffron tree. Time to listen to what 

leaves and what arrives. To love, even now, what breaks 
and is beautiful, what's beautiful because it breaks.

Killers 

Up and all the morning at the office, among other things with Cooper the Purveyor, whose dullness in his proceeding in his work I was vexed at, and find that though he understands it may be as much as other men that profess skill in timber, yet I perceive that many things, they do by rote, and very dully.
Thence home to dinner, whither Captain Grove came and dined with me, he going into the country to-day; among other discourse he told me of discourse very much to my honour, both as to my care and ability, happening at the Duke of Albemarle’s table the other day, both from the Duke, and the Duchess themselves; and how I paid so much a year to him whose place it was of right, and that Mr. Coventry did report thus of me; which was greatly to my content, knowing how against their minds I was brought into the Navy.
Thence by water to Westminster, and there spent a good deal of time walking in the Hall, which is going to be repaired, and, God forgive me, had a mind to have got Mrs. Lane abroad, or fallen in with any woman else (in that hot humour). But it so happened she could not go out, nor I meet with any body else, and so I walked homeward, and in my way did many and great businesses of my own at the Temple among my lawyers and others to my great content, thanking God that I did not fall into any company to occasion spending time and money. To supper, and then to a little viall and to bed, sporting in my fancy with the Queen.

men that kill perceive
many things dully

go into the country
to right their minds

into the Navy
to be repaired

for a hot war
fall into bed


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 15 July 1663.

Kararua* 


(first soul)

You spoke these words
into my ear: I cannot talk
anymore. Teaching me,
even as you were dying,
about dried flowers.

* Ilocanos have a four-soul system: kararua (like the soul that only leaves the body after death); karkarma (the soul that can temporarily leave the physical body if it is stolen or if the person is frightened — this soul can be called back to the body); aniwaas (the soul that can leave the body when one is asleep, and visit places familiar to it); and araria (the soul that is liberated after death, though its presence can continue to manifest—to haunt living relatives and loved ones).

Just a suggestion 

Up a little late, last night recovering my sleepiness for the night before, which was lost, and so to my office to put papers and things to right, and making up my journal from Wednesday last to this day.
All the morning at my office doing of business; at noon Mr. Hunt came to me, and he and I to the Exchange, and a Coffee House, and drank there, and thence to my house to dinner, whither my uncle Thomas came, and he tells me that he is going down to Wisbech, there to try what he can recover of my uncle Day’s estate, and seems to have good arguments for what he do go about, in which I wish him good speed. I made him almost foxed, the poor man having but a bad head, and not used I believe nowadays to drink much wine. So after dinner, they being gone, I to my office, and so home to bed.
This day I hear the judges, according to order yesterday, did bring into the Lords’ House their reasons of their judgment in the business between my Lord Bristoll and the Chancellor; and the Lords do concur with the Judges that the articles are not treason, nor regularly brought into the House, and so voted that a Committee should be chosen to examine them; but nothing to be done therein till the next sitting of this Parliament (which is like to be adjourned in a day or two), and in the mean time the two Lords to, remain without prejudice done to either of them.

last night lost
in the office coffee

going down to day
an almost fox

used to being an ear
is sitting in


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 14 July 1663.

Araria* 


(fourth soul; a nonet)


I bow to the blooming squash flower,
to whorls of seaweed on the shore.
The moon’s fingernail wakes me—

I am its wayward child,
a tiny insect
blinded by light,
climbing rungs
streaked with
ash.


* Ilocanos have a four-soul system: kararua (like the soul that only leaves the body after death); karkarma (the soul that can temporarily leave the physical body if it is stolen or if the person is frightened — this soul can be called back to the body); aniwaas (the soul that can leave the body when one is asleep, and visit places familiar to it); and araria (the soul that is liberated after death, though its presence can continue to manifest—to haunt living relatives and loved ones).

Aniwaas* 


(third soul)


In a dream, I scour
the countryside, looking

for groves of cottonfruit—
their leatherlike exterior

cradling a tart but honeyed
core, a heart that’s mastered

how to be both guide and
its nemesis. If I don’t return, put

a pebble under your tongue, there
at the fork of the road facing east


* Ilocanos have a four-soul system: kararua (like the soul that only leaves the body after death); karkarma (the soul that can temporarily leave the physical body if it is stolen or if the person is frightened — this soul can be called back to the body); aniwaas (the soul that can leave the body when one is asleep, and visit places familiar to it); and araria (the soul that is liberated after death, though its presence can continue to manifest—to haunt living relatives and loved ones).

Red-lettered 

So, it being high day, I put in to shore and to bed for two hours just, and so up again, and with the Storekeeper and Clerk of the Rope-yard up and down the Dock and Rope-house, and by and by mustered the Yard, and instructed the Clerks of the Cheque in my new way of Callbook, and that and other things done, to the Hill-house, and there we eat something, and so by barge to Rochester, and there took coach hired for our passage to London, and Mrs. Allen, the clerk of the Rope-yard’s wife with us, desiring her passage, and it being a most pleasant and warm day, we got by four o’clock home. In our way she telling us in what condition Becky Allen is married against all expectation a fellow that proves to be a coxcomb and worth little if any thing at all, and yet are entered into a way of living above their condition that will ruin them presently, for which, for the lady’s sake, I am much troubled.
Home I found all well there, and after dressing myself, I walked to the Temple; and there, from my cozen Roger, hear that the judges have this day brought in their answer to the Lords, That the articles against my Lord Chancellor are not Treason; and to-morrow they are to bring in their arguments to the House for the same.
This day also the King did send by my Lord Chamberlain to the Lords, to tell them from him, that the most of the articles against my Lord Chancellor he himself knows to be false. Thence by water to Whitehall, and so walked to St. James’s, but missed Mr. Coventry.
I met the Queen-Mother walking in the Pell Mell, led by my Lord St. Alban’s. And finding many coaches at the Gate, I found upon enquiry that the Duchess is brought to bed of a boy.
And hearing that the King and Queen are rode abroad with the Ladies of Honour to the Park, and seeing a great crowd of gallants staying here to see their return, I also staid walking up and down, and among others spying a man like Mr. Pembleton (though I have little reason to think it should be he, speaking and discoursing long with my Lord D’Aubigne), yet how my blood did rise in my face, and I fell into a sweat from my old jealousy and hate, which I pray God remove from me.
By and by the King and Queen, who looked in this dress (a white laced waistcoat and a crimson short pettycoat, and her hair dressed ci la negligence) mighty pretty; and the King rode hand in hand with her. Here was also my Lady Castlemaine rode among the rest of the ladies; but the King took, methought, no notice of her; nor when they ‘light did any body press (as she seemed to expect, and staid for it) to take her down, but was taken down by her own gentleman. She looked mighty out of humour, and had a yellow plume in her hat (which all took notice of), and yet is very handsome, but very melancholy: nor did any body speak to her, or she so much as smile or speak to any body. I followed them up into White Hall, and into the Queen’s presence, where all the ladies walked, talking and fiddling with their hats and feathers, and changing and trying one another’s by one another’s heads, and laughing. But it was the finest sight to me, considering their great beautys and dress, that ever I did see in all my life. But, above all, Mrs. Stewart in this dress, with her hat cocked and a red plume, with her sweet eye, little Roman nose, and excellent taille, is now the greatest beauty I ever saw, I think, in my life; and, if ever woman can, do exceed my Lady Castlemaine, at least in this dress nor do I wonder if the King changes, which I verily believe is the reason of his coldness to my Lady Castlemaine.
Here late, with much ado I left to look upon them, and went away, and by water, in a boat with other strange company, there being no other to be had, and out of him into a sculler half to the bridge, and so home and to Sir W. Batten, where I staid telling him and Sir J. Minnes and Mrs. Turner, with great mirth, my being frighted at Chatham by young Edgeborough, and so home to supper and to bed, before I sleep fancying myself to sport with Mrs. Stewart with great pleasure.

high for hours
just up and up

in my book of red ruin
for no reason

and they are in their
arguments again

the moth
and the light

fiddling with their feathers
and changing

trying on one
another’s heads

my red eye now
can exceed a castle

with strange company
in my sleep


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 13 July 1663.