o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o "The Holy Words of Tristan Tzara" from ABULAFIA'S CIRCLES by Jerome Rothenberg o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o sad in his world or in yours he walks for years beside the economic lilies explores the mysteries of bread a wax archangel stands on his tongue his hands cold dry deprived of water in the room under the room where Lenin sat aromas of Bukovina gather Moinesti with its corn mush brinza cheese petroleum redheaded Leah like a hungry wolf the word he dreams is dada dada ice dada piano dada flower dada tears dada pendulum dada vanilla dada don quixote dada humid dada archipelago dada pharmacy dada sexenial dada dichotomous dada dichroic dada dicrotic dada didactic dada didelphian dada diluvial dada dingdong the fur of dada stretched out in the sun dada on a hill old fox old dada sammy rosenstock alive old exile got Zurich on my mind glass toys betwixt the stars with chains electric flags & posters "logic is a complication! "logic is always wrong! cries dada holy cow o cube o hobby horse the freedom first encountered in first trip to Zurich ghosts drunk on energy they pulled the bells of war down martyred the cabaret until it exploded like yiddish dada in the street the overture to cheese o Sammy brother the sad one of your tribe you said: disgust you sat next to the photo of redheaded Leah under the axe & clock your monocle hung from your vest red life grew distant in the room where Lenin sat the walls sang politics to us his nurse's name was "dada" so was yours & sputtered poetry redbellies laughing thru empty skulls "my name is Sammy Rosenstock "Samiro "is later Tristan Tzara "I am so sad with life "I love it "I am of course Rumanian "I allow myself to contradict "I put an owl in a hexagon "I climb on the stage "I'm prim "I'm formal "I applaud the revolution "the hands of bandits "blind worms & dada nightmares "invade your bowels " messiahs are passee "the word we dream is "dada "dada sweepeth out "dada teareth linens "rips clouds & prayers to shreds "thou rides on hiccups "dada has a balcony "we squat there pregnant birds "we shit on thine umbrella "dada "dada is against the future "dada lives "in fire wisdom fear "-- is fear of dada "like a star? -- "no like a fish a plant the moon "a metal word "distorted boiling "illumines the urethra " sixty fingers on each arm "I am a monster too "I play with cushions singing singing like hymns of queens the eye of Lenin now so wide pushes the curtains the chess game opens like a poem metaphysics of perdition rules them tired of the stars his horse eats colored snakes o angel horse on thee rides Hugo Ball himself an angel horse here Huelsenbeck & Jung walk here Arp here Janco here kings of Zanzibar here april nuns here Tristan Tzara ghost of Abulafla no ghost he makes his buttocks jump like belly of oriental queen madonna face of Emmy Hennings a silent fiddle cuts the room in two Hugo like a mannikin at piano stammers yodels farts in rhyme in lusts of sabbath -- hiccups -- -- bowwows -- dusts off the mask of dada cardboard horsehair leather wire cloth wears dada collars dada boots cothurnus of a bishop lesbian sardines ecstatic mice vanilla derbies from comers of Cabaret Voltaire how many kings crow? how many krazy kittens cry for you? how many centuries between Zurich & Moinesti? how many grandfathers? how many clicks before the poem ends? how much incesticide? how many accordions to serenade redheaded Leah? belated Lenin dies brave gymnasts march again thru workers' suburbs Stalin's moustache adrift -- o feckless future -- writes Mandelstam: "huge laughing "cockroaches on his lip "the glimmer of his boot-rims "scum & chicken necks "half human "the executions slide across his tongue "like berries o revolutions of the fathers you tease us back to death pink sands of California line my coast saloons & oracles stemming the tide can't end it you are dead & dada life is growing from your monocle ignored exalted you lead me to my future making poems together flames & tongues we write like idiots ballets of sperm a brain song for the new machine squadrons of princes pissing in the street -- intensity disgust -- an empty church from which you drew the drapes back the face of Jesus on each drape "on each Jesus was my heart" you wrote messiah of stale loaves of frogs in shoes god dada messiahs are passee there is no greater saviour than this no eye so credible your fart that night was luminous it stoked the cannons thruout Europe in the bus to Amsterdam in Missouri in Brazil in the Antilles in a bathrobe under your bed the shadows massed like sleeping robbers the moon became our moon again o moon over Moinesti o moon of tiny exiles moustaches of antelopes we eat & cry out "fire" "water" "avalanche" a swamp of stars waits toads squashed flat against red bellies at center of a dream -- magnetic eyes -- whose center is a center & in the center is another center & in each center is a center & a center on each center centered centering composed by centers like earth the brain the passage to other worlds passage to something sad lost dada an old horse rotting in the garden maneless waiting for the full moon someone leaps into the saddle rushes after you exuding light o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o AUTHOR'S NOTE: At conclusion of *Poland 1931* & *A Big Jewish Book,* I was left with after-images of largely unresolved messianic figures: historic & mythic. Of these, three appear in the present series: Abraham Abulafla, Jacob Frank, & Tristan Tzara. ABULAFIA (1240-c.1291) was a mystic & poet, whose most developed visual/meditative work took the form of 200 mandalic circles, made up of letters & words. He also adopted the name of the angel Raziel, went as messiah to interrogate the pope, was arrested & condemned to die, & only escaped after the pope's own death. FRANK (1726-1791), born Yakov Leivich in Podolia, recognized himself as messiah in the fullest sense, followed Sabbatai Zevi into Islam, & from there took the further road to Roman Catholicism. Legends of sensuality surrounded him, tied in with his proclamation of his daughter, Eva, as the female aspect of God. TZARA, born Sammy Rosenstock in Moinesti, Rumania, was the central poet of Zurich & early Paris Dada, who wrote: "Let every man shout: there is a great negative work of destruction to be done. Sweeping, cleaning. The cleanliness of the individual affirms itself after the state of madness, the aggressive complete madness of a world left in the hands of bandits who vandalize & destroy the centuries... Those strong in words or in strength will survive, for they are quick to defend themselves." His own path went through poetry & communism, & he made no messianic claims. o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o ABULAFIA'S CIRCLES was published by Membrane Press (now Light and Dust books in 1979. Copies of the complete book are available through the Grist On-Line Bookstore. Copyright 1979 by Jerome Rothenberg. o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o