Tag: alice notley

thelonguepuree:

It’s because I’m the same then that I’m writing this

I mean now and if we go out for a ride in the 50’s car
        it’s our Chevy
And I’m the one who already knows what I learn
The minute I’m shown the words—clock, hat, Bill, Susan,
“A Flaming Meteor Hits the Earth”
We ride out towards Topock I lie in the backseat
Night, somewhere after the Five-Mile Station
Against hills flowing they cry out, “Did you see that? It
        lit up the whole sky”
I’m afraid to look when I do it’s gone
A week later they have Life magazine
“That’s what we saw”: on the cover a fireball
With caption “A Flaming Meteor Hits the Earth”
So I read those words, ‘49 or ‘50.

I didn’t read a couple of years before, wasn’t doing that
I talked when the words came but first the world
Was my recognition my just-prior knowledge of it
I’m still here in the backseat
“A Flaming Meteor Hits the Earth” contains no car or terror
How did I get to be born. And recognize the events
        of my life
Some of them were always going to be
But I don’t want any events—I have, even early, revulsion
        for their names:
Graduation, marriage, childbirth
The meteor’s named by science
We name us and then we are lost, tamed
I choose words, more words, to cure the tameness, not the wildness.

I remember everything it isn’t past it’s wild
I’m so constant and have nearly lost myself only seldom, later,
But I would have lost it, lost me
Flaming Meteor I was scared of you first
I love this alley, love is recognition
Born in love.

— Alice Notley