.... ~ ...... ,, ... \-.\&W\ .., ••.~ .. q ...... _. ,.,, w1• \tu•Alc. o• •~~c..ks ;, l.a.Md. ;.,a ..~:.,:'"'Y a-usr.. ~·d .f:..-.- -...+ "'· .C:.o" f.al»l:•"':.,, T'-.e. Sa.i.r+ •M C..'a-Mf'ttS t~~t -t .. o.,.. pc. C'f'l\t s s;, iotJ. MAUMAU AMERICAN CANTOS

by TOM WEATHERLY

· CORINTH BOOKS NY

1970 CONTENTS

autobiography 5 first monday scottsboro alabama 7 to carolyn, joel, chip, roi, tom jr, david, southern accent 8 nathaniel, pat pucci and leon siedel to old elm, in cemetery for confederate dead 1 0 court changen race by legal decree 11 sermonette to jan 12 roi rogers and the warlocks of space I-IV 14 salty gal 18 some of these poems have appeared in Noose, "say a man has privileges" 19 The Saint, Simbolo Oscuro, 3C 147, Utter & The World your eyes are mirth 20 to a woman 21 the Lions Head has a cub in its mouf 22 cover joan wilentz (poem script by the author) SUMP SONGS OF TOM 23 frontispiece carolyn weatherly the 90 lb week 24 copyright© 1970 by tom weatherly liz birch 25 imperial thumbprint 26 lib of congress cat card no 75-98908 gerrymander 27 publisher corinth books 29 perry st nyc 10014 rirty blown blue 28 manufactured in the united states of america a proper song, entitled: coonbitch, to polly green 29 bitch hazel-eyed goddess 30 war bride 31 baby, you aint best of the lot 32 MAUMAU AMERICAN CANTOS 33 pair-bond 44 blues for franks wooten 45 mud water shango 46 red & yellow fooles coat 47 autobiography

tomcat born on railroad avenue, scottsboro, alabama to big tom & lucy belle weatherly, november 3, 1942

dad in european theatre mom & i living wif his mom & dad

after the war dad & mom & lil sis & i moved to the mountain street home. grade & high school at george washington carver, split off to morehouse college at the end of eleventh grade.

two & half years at morehouse semester at alabama a & m then parris island & dante's inferno, another semester at normal, alabama made q frat sic wif bundle of sticks in hand. indefinitely suspended from a & m for publishing The Saint on campus without permission. had a vision entered a.m.e. ministry assistant pastor of saint pauls scottsboro & next year· pastor of church great grandad pas to red (bishop i.h. bonner had feel for tradition). had a division: left god mother hooded youth & first monday scottsboro alabama the country for new york, lived on streets, parks, hitchd the states. . . dishwasher at hip bagel, they dont hold grudges watter m the mountains, cook at lion's head bridges that dont know cars proofreading, copyediting, baking, bellhopping,' are in this century. camp counselor, dealing, fuckd up in the head. they dont know better to rantd in the saint marks poetry project, ranting ride over wooden bridges now in afro-hispanic poets workshop east harlem. wagons from shotgun ridges . bridgeport, paint rock, sand mountam HOLDER OF THE DOUBLE MOJO HAND & they ride to county courthouse 13th DEGREE GRIS-GRIS BLACK BELT. square to honest trades of samplers, plowshares, shotguns . bloodhounds, homebrew & gosstp. they come to buy back issues of time from north alabama ridges over bridges sherman didnt burn.

7 6 southern accent II I the tennessee valley is full the tennessee valley was author of of swimming holes dammed for commerce. lush fuU forest animal lives catfish swim, creaking in detergents. that thrive on the drive of the rain- bastards of the swanjcranes in falls to seed shivering with love, urgent circles foiiow common filling the cottonmouth swamps, low to suds, where no fish splash. where young blurred visions swam, rva built offices where grass was. shorthaired terrors of inquisition dead pond's beauty screams in the churn foiiowing dogtrot after father, of the bitter turbines whining: questioning his myths. tv's summer reruns are spun- silver slivers of catfish splash out backwaters. fishpoles are totem, stink, waters of their ripe breeding. ten pound test weight lines hang slack. youth sprawled on grass, idle pole

stuck in mud. the muddy river's murmur blues, and the river fowl alive in god's dim eye in tennessee.

8· 9 to old elm, in cemetery for confederate dead "South African Judge New York Times Rules Family Is White, April 30, 1967, p. 86 Not Colored." The pine fragrance, the magnolia graveyard, court changen race by legal decree surrounds a gnarled, old elm ...

among conferences of silence, worn it is a gesture honors heaped upon dead men, as skin, suit won in south african court i' d be proud it stands, to document the wind, declared white in new jersey not their deeds . . . or georgia. proud america leaves, fall, experience limitd journalistic season to these states i'm in for traveln. past historic years: whereas the greek states listen to elm bark in passage beautiful the gods the heroes of dixie landed gentry, it makes no gesture of sound . . . if a jigaboo dont spill milk coming he spill it going. round its trunk children chant their games these are like homer's blues over buried roots. themes. back humpd under magnolia writn Elm roots grow through graves, life of the great black neither desecrate nor revere, wasp. state oracles divine, witch docs crack the skulls open sprinkle bone dust to brace against the wind. americus mojo ~ owl watch, perched in what dark limbs silent swaying i stay here wearing thin with the wind. suitd for the climate.

11 10 II sermonette to jan your slow back going down I grizzly in your thighs growling teeth. i write it splash owl perch in cypress down swoop down. claws. snatch. in the roots of water is a slow black form it expanding circles, a leaf is down and down goes it dropd. to. something dies my vision see me thru in spring. muffled drama raw glass of wings down raised to obvious past down survivals: icy pond down. in summer as that frieze dawn. the leaf in ice, hard circles photograph of april's moon tides stopd from wavering weak strong my thots stretch round your body. that water evaporates

12 ; roi ·rogers and the warlocks of space roi rogers and the warlocks of space (for 'the world' proof of my insanity) n I one fact not erect "the dominant theme of moot fact d1e material she grab takened as a whole of me, woman takes appeals the question. o ezra to prurient interest" the koran has lanie poos as your new deal name inscribed in it, in gelded that it is human silver ink. critics beast, that is we all book the book printd is what we believe on fasces & fingerprint is where publick folks lie. fort fantasy "thomas, we're near the toilet (mended wind image today, if you're worth it." rites by the ganges we are we an era calmly measured learnt wholly cosmo politan, airconditioned soul slang "who urge no less than music" accept a-1 sauce. roi rogers and the warlocks of space roi rogers and the warlocks of space

III IV

o mother, wild, driven black hadassah leavenburg held restless tomcat baby you're selectd balld into your womb. marry me in my pre fascist period. why a wombat electd to big because i tom's wife. a worship freed dig yo fat november 1942. thighs know my dark is rumpd ass huge as alarms bald domed tits the sea, waiting at night cunt that's a live crouching. home to huge beasts. we be fuckn kosher 'til i find what shine means. salty gal "say a man has privileges" I

the apartment is two rooms. for carol mothner no boudoir for you. if i forget your self, if you must remember it. i know how yr hard sit to the window. watch red-white-blue to hear friends talk smokestacks on avenue D. to yr ear is no dogs steam & smoke changes. a small room. nose, no cat eye. claws & horns in to conflict it is setting to write at the waterholejat the saltlick. wet paw, sandpaper tongue these panes may be walls in welcome wagon town from the outside. what of it? . . . & come back in to me, opening & its so, determine & darkly smiling. one season's not to speak out change from a nondescript. write it down nor appear our bedroom is two windows. in public forums run it down in public the charge the media feeds back to my & your craw

:sweetest thing i ever saw him say to me, "melissa your skinny bones knock on my door when sun .. gone d own.

/from Joel Oppenheimer

19 your eyes are mirth to a woman

for your eyes are mirth trauma. i am he, can't say it's not born out of the laughter a language that makes you of your sleep. your repeat its singing sleep closed to me traps me inside it. waking for you i groan in the morning of joy. thru subway stations i am ignorant and stretch avenue B to avenue D my shape . .. it is beginning and you awakening it goes down pull me close. thru centuries

dawn to eve that movement past tense & strain.

it's not father who groans but the son remembering mother, a snatch

back to the beginning not the warm hole now.

20 21 ll

SUMP SONGS OF TOM

whats in a doggie bag

the Lions Head has a cub in its mouf for nathaniel oppenheimer

joel o & pete hamill tell me how the windmills they defeatd joel is enrolld at berlitz school languages during th 50s, corso is mad but theyre drunk tonite learn to speak dog i dont listen feel th splinters 3 lessons he talks or pick them out & glue 'em together. to dogs fluent in their language practices at the Lions Head

what is the world coming

co talk to dogs. i met this kissie frog last nire with blonde hair ...

22 rhe 90 lb week liz birch

(for sam & ezra) for tom campion

keep book the cash i'm not the gentle move figures, why honorable man of collar bank tellers stay late speaks from scottsboro keep book interested to read that the figures dont sociological inverse lie cheat steal. relationship, lynchd & the price of cotton this is the first & great commandment throw up & not speak in fronts, follown poker chips, the money my life in your freed dam changers our, the hands. given what in me the test, the shit the phone is bugged is is a standard F A A 2 pound pigeon registered in yr name there is the trick to is shuffle down the buffalo gone west tear the yellow pages in half. we grease on their bones, we going west

"Breaks time, as dancers "From their own Musicke when they stray jlay awake "and just can't eat a bite, she used to "be my rider." imperial thumbprint

gerrymander this is a white world dont give damn shit for jerrold & lightning to me boy. is whether live & howling or dead black is not white nor is life or death no man how hard you fuckn try you cant neither living nor dying you aint snow white. no speak under breath curse the black light black surburbs skin you give man mother & no kite rainbow out of goddamn the street full you head in 1940 outside where there is white smoke smack tomorrow is today the black lightning jus get you high. walk down fifth avenue, hawkbill in my hand. a proper song, entitled: coonbitch, to polly green "lch bin so dumm, du bist so dumm, wir wollen sterben gehen, kumm!" for mike allen, a rnarkd saint Galgenlieder traveln salesmen pump my joint Christian Morgenstern collective farm wife, make this killn floor stern, killn deck 'i'm so dumb, you're so dumb, aft document: let's go kick the bucket, com eon!' roi jones TW in the year of our lady did you not write on page 17 titty blown blue "old envious blues feeling" the hound diggings where love is all right, but shit ole bean dug up a pewter raccoon loaded for bare our roots too deep to go down necessities "ive done more for you baby or own to bunny than yr daddys ever done" who'll buy my violets i can't get started. walk on the tops of my shoes. the peekers ride off you hump like a horn lookout mountain to some pass. thru traffic. cut them off at possibly "done more for you baby than yr daddys ever done." possibly mosby is the posse the marshal clan & chases the treed muse, the flower of backdoor.

29 war bride bitch hazel-eyed goddess gerlinde the virgin wif spear my lady bring me remembers ten young virgins. german children deprived of fireplaces my lady bring to my black dick your white cunt birch logs snap no treed rhetoric for those hounds at me hot cinders at us. fuckn commit to our bedroom not bullshit horns mount moriah deacon AMEN or cattle prods. beardless strong speaks nothing to his own dark my lady bring me possums sisters wif thighs like jewels suckn to your belly what· the songs i remember meant four of them bitch hazel-eyed. where songs sung & this is my lady. mr mason mr dixon

'

go 31 baby, you aint best of the lot MAUMAU AMERICAN CANTOS (a purim song, first degree) leroi rides again is freed 1 man shuffling home to intersection read the good book W ASHD IN THE BLOOD BURNING SPEAR. hadassah knows theres a pogrom tonite & always honking sirens approach at, an eclipse. hadassah went dressn up searchlights royally:suh haman erectd the stake. honk out HANG HIM ON IT. FRANK the saddle is empty of kill you dipshit fagot the accuser. motherfuckers.

& frank never know how to outguess stupidity

the blood, the mean woodenframe the coptic site blues

the mans honking

dont come

at my door.

33 CANTO 2 CANTO 3 the yellow brick road the issue, the blood, is heavy

for trane dearest big tom & lucy belle we trespass the blues they mebbe come suck hanging outhouses in picture frames at me the fan, & fuck up the current a record heard modern jawless vertebrates live performance lampreys blow easily forgotten phrase. we bleep new york citys dont hold their dont read music. listen mouf right anthony travia dont move dont you remember or the estonian minister of saxophones never die. cultural affairs to the U.N. titty toad down southern politics aint got remember, read scratchy less probably mores of the region sheet music, croak flavor: big jim folsom in the backyard. the man in bama forkd a chaw the cracker get his mouf around wouldnt choke.

now you teachers share- crop reared me, now the sirens honk at my hymns to malcolm ...

35 what the man . . . did to stoke CANTO 4 fire beneath his black skin fuses his soul the thing, not in ideas my poetics a sociology independent gullfish of the results bullets in mississippi election returns in vietnam what is black ) the token in me is not like white NEGRO even i have to include you thot enuf in that to say what we were nostril on top the head brought up to be the laterally placed eye, behind which are the gill openings our parents we are not.

dip shit mothafuckn blood you no sou£ carolina gal suckers, stuff the ballot, drain tell me i bring no the treasury, increase taxes chocolate to an occupied town so what honest hard work bring 1s another war i'm involved you eat out the horn in will do & hardart dairy queen. speak of my self respect as you see yourself the language is, for myself your politics aint the moral. no success, the score is success, the ritual put down all the blues gone west mongers of the world unite!

g6 37 "Beware! · Beware! CANTO 5 His flashing eyes, his floating hair!" coon fire CANTO 6

americus mojo the landscape was musical cartoons. brown stone woman honkn outside, tattoo the sound of my honeydew rider. blood on my eardrums o deliver me my lady, tom reconstructd tom, dont ride no more fronts for the lily taut, the tenses BLACKJACK PERSHING i were wolfish to dance THE HIGH KITE SUCK YOUR dance the half romance BONES. the language east fifth street sings TPF out my ears the morning you're not here & violence, music to i sat up all nite with the kittens packn my leaving dance to poems violate the progress: 3 corner box got me my lady i've gone down on your body broken open in rust at the muscle. remembrance my front door is your front door, no backdoor lily as a black gals pussy moans waycross georgia.

39 CANTO 7 CANTO 8 first thesis valley stream carol

for m.l.k., jr. summer returnd 3 days. winter is slow. cant concentrate where thot enters here goes aim get your sights & its sound head bodyless LOOK OUT TOM POOL DOOS in abstract or journal movements GET YOU to a peace settlement freight trains gone in last round house. home fret no music made, no drama, shiftless old western fancy out of head gear, disorient blues takes firm control these days keep me cool enuf collect dude shot my man my thots my fingers (your river hips flow away) swim wif th current holdn breath. dead, east fifth street children dont fear broken glass precious lord blow off come rescue me losing touch system theres no willy in th blues theres no you. reality, blue singn me wif his bad mouf. them mushrooms th stink of pool doos pussy biography of joseph smith on my desk life & times change again look old things pewter wif designs on 'em made in england unicorn products limited go lovely to th kick hills. my tongue is blue any form you wish come bird fish worm sing swun loosen th black belt. CANTO 9 CANTO 11 lucy belle

db a rider east corinthian ginger hips bred you said village period piece hettie captain easy cohen got her jones, wiped th colostrum go down on off th mouf of his first poems river hips days down wif it. new orleans louisiana east fifth street kikes have retreatd to where my mouf sings maw of long-guyland, few ulanower cong. a goat song a saturday holdn act from soap opera kahn. ( th chorus line.) lissen mama right -handed -wingd CANTO 10 i'm head tomcat round this spray WOOten net weight in th morning c-wt. & eighty th motherfuckn all th black hat stingy brim limitd to th east side & fillmore music on th street you live gem spa & i cant spare a dime. one more day wearing it angel my poems & lil tomcat in your belly enuf so you live. enuf. teethn on raw blood too are down wif it devil lights up th day knowing (totem is in th spirit house) th red­ which hat to wear in his bone hunger. green avenue stampers above franklin going downtown, th :obins by stuyvesant, nostrum, utica avenue. over wireless 'robins nest' slim harpos blue thang. do your thang blue sea cop the reefer ride away th highs translate literally railway carmens soft white underbelly. 42 43 blues for franks wooten

House of the Lifting of the Head

let me open mama your 3 corner box. yes open mama your 3 corner box. i have a black snake baby his tongues hot. pair-bond you shake round those curves baby dont quite make the grade. what is heart you shake round those curves baby dont make the grade. is untransplantable man come home tired dont want no lemonade.

is not the house we been blowing spit bubbles baby in each others mouf. we move in, home to. we bee~ blowing spit bubbles baby in each others mouf. burst all them bubbles mama nor£ cold like the souf. caroline your ears in the wind hear me let me be your woodpecker mama tom do like no peeker speak to home. would. let me be your woodpecker mama tom tom do like no peeker would. open your front door baby black dark come home for good.

44 45 a bouquet for my lady mud water shango

red & yellow fooles coat. a big muddy daddy my daddys gris-gris to the world. i'm a big muddy daddy daddys gris-gris to the world. yellow ladys got a mojo chop for sweet black belt girl. bedstraw. white ladys bedstraw. 3 faces under a hood. daddys a river & my mamas shore is black. love in a mist. smoke of the earth. daddys a river mamas shore is black. old mans beard. devil in a bush. flood coming mama you cant keep it back. wild madder. sun spurge. lightning in my eyes mama thunder in your soul. good night at noon. theres lightning in my eyes mama thunder in your soul. i'm a river hip daddy mama dig a muddy hole. violet-coloured bottle. egyptian lotus water. phisick spurge.

tom weatherly hato rey 1969

47 COR.IN'm BOOKS o POETRY & POETICS o

TED BERRIGAN o Many Happy Returns• BOB BROWN • 1450-1950

DIANE DI PRIMA o Dinners and Nightmares EDWARD DORN • Hands Up! • Empty Mirror • The Blue Stairs•

LEROI JONES o Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note,. o

JACK KEROUAC o The Scripture of the Golden Eternity

FRANK O'HARA o Second Avenue

CHARLES OLSON o The Maximus Poems

JOEL OPPENHEIMER o The love Bit and Other Poems DAVID OSSMAN • The Sullen Art (Interviews) PETER SCHJELDAHL • White Country• • Myths & Texts • Black and White This first edition of maumau american cantos TOM WEATHERLY • Maumau American Cantos• totals 3,000 copies of which 50 are numbered • Like I Say and signed by the poet AL YOUNG • Dancing• LOUIS ZUKOFSKY • A Test of Poetry THE BEAT SCENE • Elias Wilentz (editor) Fred McDarrah (photographs) FOUR YOUNG LADY POETS • Carol Berge, Barbara Moraff, & Diane Wakoslci The book was designed by Joan Wilentz and printed by the Profile Press of New York MODERN POETRY FROM SPAIN AND LATIN AMERICA • Nan Braymer & Lillian Lowenfels (translators)

•Limited signed editions available. t.. a.A 'a. 4·,v;!&oN: le.~+ 1ocl MO-\-"t.r koodacl yo~+~+ ""'~& GC.OUIU~'l.fot .aew 1•r\c.J \',"e.cl a" s~re.4.-\-SJ p-a."ks) ~:-tc.k&t ~"e. s-T a.+e.s. cl~s ~-~sk&f' -a.'"' \-.'lf. \.&,e.(., w•:+c.r ~~ +ke. ~ouN-\-'a.ifoiS, c.oCIK ~+ \•,o..a's ~e...A r•"•t.,...,.J;.,1, ""PT~J:+:.. ,. ~, ... ";"1, ~-" ~..,;.. 1, ' ,,... f c.o~ol>'"lor 1 d.-.1;"1' """ckd "f' ;.. -+k &. .. -..A. f'a,.M.f.cl ;,., .... kC. ~-a.i .. "" H\'a.f'\

HOL])E~ OF THE l>ou8L& IV\070 HAHJ)

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