James Sherry

 

 

(USA)

 

 

 

(from Entangled Bank, “Lyric Poems after Hai An”)

 

 

 

The Beautiful

 

The beautiful, the tongue

The buried, the the.

 

 

 

The Flows

 

Earth Day rivers hold over

Modern mourning. Oh thyme

Without hams or whatever,

Wherever they live scattered,

Stretched to go beyond

From and to

The tributaries.

from Entangled Bank, “Spelling Suggestions for Brandon Brown’s Obscurer Words from Baudelaire”)

 

 

 

Vampires in Frisco

 

une outre aux flancs gluants, toute pleine de pus!

Escaping strife with Smiley Face

But keeping nerve alive

Your aura trips my mystic trick,

Feral outlier in the Mission District.

 

 

 

Correct Politics

 

[notre] supplice
Aura-t-il jamais une fin?

Who wants the earth

Once they let

The meek inherit

What’s left of it?

 

Does the pitter pat of protester-

Protectors pester you?

Let me mace your grace about the face.

Or how about tarragon?

Get thee to the museum, go!

 

 

 

Tunis

 

Si, le corset brutal emprisonnant tes flancs

Patiently, patently, potently,

Picnolepsy helps us see trucks

Picked, bleeped and ripped off,

Entangled with what you’d want

From the mangled burning man.

In a struggle to be subjugated

To fat-lipped abyssal blips on radar.

Who owns your daddy?

 

Stroller Zed said, “He’s dead, Fred,

And I’d like to discuss your ass

With the fondest florist,

Disforested in the Moorish morass,

Wrenching the henchmen from drenching

The dearth of earth with assurance.”

Pretense Loves Infinitenesse, love.

Plant Erie in lingerie,

A biscuit artist retains rattan.

Kelp oleo with chairs

Slays all ages and salvages

Last week, wreaked in Tintin,

(from “Selfie: Identity and Environment”)

 

 

 

ONES For Example

 

You, Yous

You out there, hi!

Youse and

Me, yes, me. Me

Are we and us

Or was.

 

Twos

And I am we, too,

A this and a that.

Those a they

And thus an I,

They that is an I.

 

Threes

Not what you think

For you are

And so

You are not what

You think you are

You don’t see

Yourself as

You are, plural.

You are they!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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BIO

 

James Sherry is the author of 10 books of poetry and prose. His most recent book is Four For. For the past decade he has been writing on environmental poetics. He is editor of Roof Books and president of the Segue Foundation, Inc. in New York City.