Cracks in the Invisible

Poems

Stephen Kampa

• Publisher: Ohio University Press
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9780821443767
• Topic: Letteratura
• Subtopic: Poesia

Stephen Kampa 's poems are witty and restless in their pursuit of an intelligent modern faith. They range from a four-line satire of office inspirational posters to a lengthy meditation on the silence of God. The poems also revel in the prosodic possibilities of English'shigh and low registers: a twenty–one line homageto Lord Byron that turns on three rhymes (one of which is "eisegesis"); a sestina whose end words include "sentimental, " "Marseilles, " and "Martian;" sapphics on the death of Ray Charles; and intricately modulated stanzas on the 1931 Spanish–language movie version of Dracula.

Despite the metaphysical seriousness, there is alwaysan undercurrent of stylistic levity — a panoply of puns, comic rhymes, and loving misquotations of canonical literature — that suggests comedy and tragedy are inextricably bound in human experience.

VI. A Little Wind and Smoke

To make the point perhaps more graphically, I have done you no harm if I distinguish between your body and your soul. If I separate your body from your soul, however, I have murdered you.

—R. C. Sproul

Autobiography

There is no beauty left in me.

A gecko scuds behind the blinds.

A concertina whines off-key.

A lariat of smoke unwinds

From the unfiltered cigarette

That some distracted flirt has let

Burn unattended while the band

Blurts its pastiche of zydeco

And sixties’ soul. I never planned

To let my sense of beauty go,

But something’s snagged in me: I watch

A sour bartender twist a rag

And clear the bar top of spilled scotch;

A box blonde jitter through her bag

For her prescription medicine—

Citalopram or Vicodin?—

Until the reassuring smudge

Of orange bottle has appeared;

Another drunk refuse to budge,

Sloshing more scotch that must be cleared;

And a young girl, with such a thin

Shirt that her green bikini glows

Beneath it, groggily begin

Her fifth or sixth; and I suppose

We’ve all come here because we think

The music, money, flirt or drink

Will be, if not quite beautiful,

At least a decent overture

To something somewhat comparable;

But I, not drunk, am not so sure.

I gigged in bars like this. I stood

On stage, harmonica in hand,

And choked whatever notes I could

From a cheap, tarnished Marine Band,

The sawtooth texture of its comb

Rough on my tongue; I felt at home

Cascading through long solos, singing

To tipsy crowds and half-full glasses,

Biting off riffs for fills—just bringing

Folks pleasure, even if it passes.

It emptied like an ashtray dumped

Into a trash can. Now I see

All the same half-drunk dancers slumped

Against the walls but cannot see

The amber nimbus that surrounded

Them when the amped-up bass resounded

Through the floorboards, the lead guitar

Teetered on the edge of feedback,

The keyboard player teased the bar

With modal solos that would lead back

Into a chorus and the chords

Resolved like sighs . . . I loved to sing.

Sometimes when I forgot the words

I just kept playing, savoring

The changes, holding one long note

For ten full measures; or I’d quote

Duke’s “In a Sentimental Mood”

Or Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony

To prove the music could include

An incidental melody.

Everything seemed phenomenal;

A genuine world began appearing.

I recognized the beautiful

Lime supernova of an earring

Glinting its brilliant crucifix

Down in the crowd. A booth of six

Hard hats erupted in laughter when

The fattest jumped up, spilled his beer

On his huge crotch, sat down again;

“Bill pissed his pants!” they yelled. A cheer.

(I’m there. I’m there. Please teach me how

To stay this time.) The whiskey glows;

Illuminated spirits now

Surmount the bar in vitreous rows

Of hazel, chestnut, cherrywood.

Seconds ago, two servers stood

Counting their tips, but they’ve unbunched

The scrunchies holding up their hair

And shimmy through the layer of crunched

Peanut shells on the floor. (I’m there

And never want to leave.) The band

Starts in B

—half jazz, half blues—

And then the front man lifts his hand

And quavers, “Nothing left to lose . . .”;

I want to add a harmony

And somehow stumble on the key.

All that exists now is the song—

Triplets, sextuplets...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Acknowledgments
• Contents
• Aperture
• I. Sightings
• II. Sidewalk Chalk
• III. Elegies and Valedictions
• IV. Voices in My Head
• V. Absence Makes the Heart
• VI. A Little Wind and Smoke
• Notes