Reading Biographies

Perhaps Frost was poking his secretary The apple core of his good-living chewed To the bitter seed. Perhaps he buttoned up Disgusted with the dead lizard cupped in his palm And his woman? She was as large as Gilbraltar A chunk of cheese in each armpit She took a deep breath And wiggled the goose of her tasty fanny Into the kitchen. There, she poured pancakes Onto a skillet as old as this country And Frost, a pioneer for all writers Picked up his beaver-thrashed pencil and proclaimed O Sweet Youth, etc I don't know how to read Biographies, the dead words of dead writers Etched on my eyes, then gone. I read them And drive my car recklessly through leaves The cushion for my own eventual death Sure, I reflect, like a chip of mirror And then I forget them, these subjects These writers with lungs and straight-A penmanship They're of no use. I'm not saved By the repetitions of jealousy and all-day drinking Wind frisked the trees, hair fell like wheat And the liver, saddlebag of disease Bulged with inoperable knots I touch my own hip, then hobble home Where a pumpkin glows in a window Birds shrug into their coats of dirt Crickets stop the violin action of their thighs A fire is built, and I'm lit in the living room I'm a democrat, I slur to the couch And add, Venus is a star and fly trap Thank God, I've learned nothing