hymnody

Jeremy Stewart

 

I

weep & pee—
a way out
but not for us 

island sprouts bushes
western ribbon snake 

ringtone the wilderness
preach annihilationism 

inhaling finish to finish your work
spasmodic rasp of progress   intermittent drafts
words sprung from a thicket of talk
post-lettered 

 

II

overlooking Lake Hollywood
happy birthday to me 

what time doesn’t do // what doesn’t time do 

clouds dissipate
purify your wardrobe
compressed dynamic range 

pictures from the built world

in the camp theatre, I played
the back half of the horse, but
I was fired for smoking

  

III

musical renunciations
never be bored again 

the hopeless guitar, cornered
poppycock green harlequin
tent enfolds costumes in the torchlight 

every time is the last
(or will be 

drooping north // not green except when
rivers in leaf text
the this-thus
the moment I leave you at preschool 

riding different trains
exit unknown tunnels into
a daylight blacker than burial 

I’m (not) mistaken, I see that now

 

IV

we are who we are most of all
to someone else 

inward-looking eyelids, blood
black bubblegum          (the snap of 

we play ghosts
two notes wish to form a chord 

a low meadow inside a rainbow
properly I should remain obscure 

energy field painting transferred to sound
look between the depths of sound
as with stacked pages of closed books 

we who are most
of all someone else 

stolen guitar haunts the obdurate present
label the parts of speech 

all this passing away, transformed into God
knows what

 

 

 

Jeremy Stewart's experimental novel In Singing, He Composed a Song is forthcoming from the University of Calgary Press (September 2021). Stewart won the 2014 Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative Poetry for Hidden City (Invisible Publishing). He is also the author of (flood basement (Caitlin Press 2009). Stewart is a PhD student in English Literature at Lancaster University, UK. He once dropped a piano off a building.