I want words that leave cinders, curls of smoke
rising from black ash,
words without paper,
words that set desks afire, burn holes in doors,
melt & shatter vaults, the eyes of buildings — molten glass perforations.
TUNGSTEN WORDS! I want TUNGSTEN WORDS !
white hot & clean, words that brand space ownerless –
the public domain… words that ignite & nourish,
words that feed green
as can only the cold potash remains of brush-choked-bluffs,
words black as the eye of the vulture, the beak of the raven,
words that eat fever & plague to grow swifter & stronger,
to glide higher & farther.
I want words to silence a hundred-thousand pairs of
starched-white-cuffs plotting endless money supply,
endless cash flow, cuffs sliding back & forth across
polished mahogany teak, oak & maple, white slick cuffs
linked behind bolted authorizations, behind
printed circuitry, behind instantaneous
printouts of non-communicative communication,
sliding cuffs signing execution orders with the
intragalactic pen of usury. I want words denser than
the clogged air, words to set these cuffs crawling,
curbed, hand-over-hand in their own excrement of
2000 year old tree stumps, stripped earth,
dead cities & discarded species,
losing breath,
stacking themselves in blackened pyres
putrid … turgid … flesh.
I want words that suck the sick breath, the stench
of conflagration
& exhale sunlight
through sheets of rain.
Hurry Up Please! Scatter these words everywhere. There is
great need. Tell Rudolph to dim his nose, to fly low & fast into the darkness.
There will be guides and openings of light for rest.
Get Moving!
Solstitial Greetings!
God-speed & thank you,
— Donnie Shanley, Newport Chute, December 1977
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