The Alan Sondheim Mail Archive

the bone-frame was made for
no suck shock knit within terror,
yet the skeleton stood up to it:

the flesh? it was melted away,
the heart burnt out, dead ember,
tendons, muscles shattered, outer husk dismembered,

yet the frame held:
we passed the flame: we wonder
what saved us? what for?

(from H.D., The Walls Do Not Fall)

dojoji pushes from the ground up and up, s/he, rising,
makes rocket of worlds, they thrust, vector dust
behind them. sullen s/he stops, about to fall; vector
turns to cloud, heaves and hovers, shadow left behind
fades, halo against trim support. you might ask one
or another, fail or falter an answer: these worlds are
left alone, sheave and bone. but an answer: in front
of some dim orb, something seated, or at rest, moves,
and here too something moves, response and nocturne.
dojoji follows suit, follows through, as long as presence
murmurs. hir worlds teeter, turn and wobble, throb:
if any there be, this amazes among no other, this rock,
this rocket, sheave-skin hovered in sky-skin, earth-skin,
sun- and moon-skin in early dawn or dusk, of which,
there is no matter.

http://www.alansondheim.org/rocket.mp4

accompaniment

http://www.alansondheim.org/blush1.mp3 (electric tenor banjo)
http://www.alansondheim.org/blush2.mp3 (electric tenor banjo)
http://www.alansondheim.org/blush3.mp3 (electric tenor banjo)

To access the Odyssey exhibition The Accidental Artist:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Odyssey/48/12/22