Whitman’s Beard is a Cloud & Other Recent Bookstore Conjectures

Good afternoon to the literate. To the illiterate, “Shfszxcffgty!”

Since our last correspondence, we have made some startling literary discoveries, some of which, all concern you. 

1. Contrary to what your desk reference dictionary (Webster or Miriam, no mind) may read, there is a term for the moment when one cannot recall the word they are searching for and when that term is lost in after-thought, this term is irony.

2. The near magical quality of Walt Whitman’s whisping beard--full, floating above collar bones, white as the highlights in over developed photos--is a cloud. Some days cumulus, unwashed cirrus; collecting morning’s dew; suspending vapors from great lakes & driveway puddles, the earth’s mulching wisdom gasps in oxygen and grasps its hydrogen, now married, look up, suddenly stratus, the circle is closed herein: as my good friend John sees the flaming beard of the Lord whisping down and swirling our senses, a painted story, Whitman’s beard grows infini. When passed the ground he combs up around his ears. The lighting in his heart strikes out sending cloud hands to shake the waving strands of God. They become confused, give up the divide, and breathe onto the trembling leaves outside your window.

3. Poetry is about following sounds, as chasing fireflies. A fluttering truth, ablaze, like sparks of heaven no Bell Jar can contain, but merely allow us to hone its incandescence, wonder its nectar, nipping at night, as our minds. Here, our eyes reflect as the sky--transient on the wings of the dayfly: a mirrored metaphor for our heaven--huddled to its warmth.