Stephen Bett Puns Buddha Love, The Locked Drawer of Spiritual Fatigue, Agoraphobia, and Learning Emptiness

Back Principles (14) : Keats & Rilke coming up again (& damned Spicer, too)

Who sees into me
… has mine heart?


Too easily tossed
(on a heap, on
a mound)


This inning is
future time
(grace time …?)


I would take
a pitcher
of you


Drink it, bat it
out of here
−−whatever
it takes


I lose myself
completely, am
struck dumb
in your
buddha
love


Where is my
ground, where
is my Heysus
spinning to
now


This (heady) gain
is nerve loss
(also)


It is mystery
one enters
−−terrified
(& possibly
alive …)
Witless &
spooked,
& unafraid
to say so
(god help
me)


Look in mine
eyes & give
me your
strength,
I have none
that doesn’t
shake the bases
loose in the
night


Look in mine
eyes, I have
forgotten how
to see
 
Back Principles (34) : spiritual fatigue

This is surely
spiritual fatigue
(on the loose)
(at loose ends)


Backed into a corner
(loosely speaking)


Back me, back
me not …


My back is knotted


Lies bound in a
locked drawer


When it creaks open
pray for something
merciful


Pray there is
something
there


You will not
have my back
beyond this
point


It will be loose
at ease, or it
will be
broken
 
Back Principles (52) : agoraphobic 

Big spaces are
made of this


Phoenix to Yuma
−−terrifying


The christ to
the buddha …
terrifying too


Hold my back (pls)
the landscape
would break
it in halves


Agoraphobic,
big space


Holding emptiness
in my hands






Stephen Bett is a widely and internationally published Canadian poet. His earlier work is known for its sassy, edgy, hip… caustic wit―indeed, for the askance look of the serious satirist… skewering what he calls the ‘vapid monoculture’ of our times. His more recent books have been called an incredible accomplishment for their authentic minimalist subtlety. Many are tightly sequenced book-length ‘serial’ poems, which allow for a rich echoing of cadence and image, building a wonderfully subtle, nuanced music. Bett follows in the avant tradition of Don Allen’s New American Poets. Hence the mandate for Simon Fraser University’s “Contemporary Literature Collection” to purchase and archive his “personal papers” for scholarly use. He is recently retired after a 31-year teaching career largely at Langara College in Vancouver, and now lives with his wife Katie in Victoria, BC.     www.stephenbett.com