dressed oblique | a poem by a faust

dedicated to Chica, Eno, and Schmidt

like accidental correlation meant to misdirect the gaze

ice cream profit plotted against summer homicide

some relationships connect you not so much to things as away

i test these by resisting, to see if & where they hide.

take attachment to desire, or, as wisdom has, it leave

for ever the advice will with cold indifference side

but should some sudden shock befall that would you of your love bereave

then may you wish your heart had been more truly occupied.

so disconnect from your desire not yourself but your regrets

try to see things as they are -- aim for not more or less

& when it comes to what you Will, take no prisoners, place no bets

they talk not overmuch that have no pressing need confess.

so close Desire this connection brings us, itself less blind, more ruse

that the lucky sometime suffer & the poets ever choose.

to life west (hastily composed in gratitude)

like pain when it finally lessens and ends
if with its ending comes likelihood never again
freedom from prison becomes like the heaven it sends
especially precious when that prison is made up of pain

wonderful blessed and all future happiness
everyone working to make this happen each day
someone is relieved of, or how to relieve this is
taught, is teaching, making open a way