VOLUME SIX (2020): ARCHIVES ON FIRE

Monday, November 30, 2009

Jeff Harrison, "Knots of Hilda Doolittle"

Jeff Harrison

Knots of Hilda Doolittle

HERMETIC DEFINITION

to tie a Bowline Knot

Bowline is tied to:
swift thru dolorous lessers

form an eye

eye is tied to:
ships (schooners) affrighted

with the standing part
of the rope running underneath.

run the free end thru the
dolorous lessers swiftly, then
thru the eye (wide, affrighted
by schooners), making a loop
below said eye. take a turn
around
the standing part & feed
the free end back down
the eye & hold there.

pull standing part to tighten knot.


THE HEDGEHOG

beware! the Square Knot will untie
itself under movement. do not trust
the Square Knot to join two ropes
together. the Square Knot will capsize
under a heavy load. when tying the Square
Knot, both parts of the rope must exit
together. whence the untrustworthiness
and trickiness of the Square Knot? gather
around: but no, I will breathe not a word,
not until the Double Fisherman runs out of
rope.

these are the words he was at last compelled to write.


HYMEN

to tie an Anchor Bend Knot,
make two turns around
the shackle, leaving turns
open. knots may evade us,
as our own features are
less familiar to us, to our.
take a half-turn around
the standing line and
feed the free end thru
the turns and pull tight.

the Anchor Bend Knot was a ruin awash in wilderness when I found it.
_____

Jeff Harrison has publications from MAG Press, Writers Forum, Persistencia Press, and Furniture Press. He has two e-books at xPress(ed), and one at Blazevox. His poetry has appeared in The Hay(na)ku Anthology Vol. II, Sentence: a Journal of Prose Poetics, Xerography, Moria, NOON: journal of the short poem, and elsewhere. More of his poems may be read here.
_____

RECONFIGURATIONS: A Journal for Poetics & Poetry / Literature & Culture, http://reconfigurations.blogspot.com/, ISSN: 1938-3592, Volume Three (2009): Immanence/ Imminence
_____

No comments: