Dream Song 29, John Berryman

There sat down, once, a thing on Henry’s heart
So heavy, if he had a hundred years
& more, & weeping, sleepless, in all them time
Henry could not make good.
Starts again always in Henry’s ears
The little cough somewhere, an odour, a chime.

And there is another thing he has in mind
Like a grave Sienese face a thousand years
Would fail to blur the still profiled reproach of. Ghastly,
With open eyes, he attends, blind.
All the bells say: too late. This is not for tears;
Thinking.

But never did Henry, as he thought he did,
End anyone and hacks her body up
And hide the pieces, where they may be found.
He knows: he went over everyone, & nobody’s missing.
Often he reckons, in the dawn, them up.
Nobody is ever missing.

How to disappear (a primer)

Untitled

be still now,
this bare hour of tar centipedes
in waiting boots
take the morning breath
that hangs like chalk dust in december air.
the shudder of night along a cheekbone,
makes familiar turn and cough.
absence is as tasteless as space
wrought as hunger in china stomachs.
who would be whole if filled with glass?
don't worry, you've already lost
ten and twenty and a hundred times.