from Novaless . . .
by Nicholas Manning
VIII.
bridges
of bluest reason :
we have come so far yellow trees
line the city * ’s a syntagma
pale wharves golden
air anywhere
else but * my noumenon
former trivialities awake worse
than ever the knotty irregular
rainbows : a mild
radiance
in the obstacles a bayonet « what’s a tree
beside a life . . . ? » a synecdoche !
set foot * on marks :
to do
quite silently
look touch and learn
the curtains * are drawn
it is exactly its own * age :
« keep the blind down
‘till I come »
IX.
when it is dark
the probability is sufficient
came over the green * worn by way
of mourning
the books and matériel
rank literatures of emotion and passion
he honestly was * at times
in the midnight rays
of his lamp
X.
underwave . . .
the hectic leaves
the mud-picture of force
over mats * of starry moss . . .
the helical molecule
underwoven
rosy passionate deference
urbi et orbi * from the theologium . . .
bending * these pale rays
stretched away
(most) into remote
space directions being
invisible * but treasuring * her
image : if it lacks memories
the top of a tree
XI.
enclosed
a divided sigh
still * of the objects :
pitcher-shaped * polyhedral
lateral petals with cordate leaves . . .
the horses wore their bells * that day
yet remained as narrow :
to be sent away
by reason
of their own noise . . . suddenly
there beamed : a nucleoside
their Urheimat * haloed
(in former times)
tuned to scale
forming
two octaves (viola
da gamba) among the last
to retain the animate * biographical
field of his vision whose hands planted
the trees : arms of any imposter
the fog * of the previous
evening setting fire
to the dead
leaves
