Absolute Variations

The first time I read a line by John Ashbery

was in a little café in Massachusetts, from left to right

There it was written across my friend’s collarbone

It felt right to be there with someone

who would show me something like that

when we had never met before

In this country it feels insane to accept our facts

To idly and without remorse on a Tuesday remember

the meadow—if it’s still there—trumpeting its tendrils—

I wonder if that was a moral place—

if the meadow has only relationship to other objects—

without intention—without obfuscation from belief—the clot of orange

there along the innermost edge of vision—are tulips—

if I ever have the chance to get up close again—form is not all

there is—I wouldn’t allow it—thought bubbles fogging

up my screen—I remember my friend had a sort of ecstatic experience of pity there—

he had recently lost his belief

that he was doing the right thing—half frozen out of himself

with worry—evergreen in friendship—we watched the dogs

go round the loop—their tails like wheat—

they ran and bobbed in time—

nobody including myself could feed my friend

the correct answers—nor descend all the way there and back—

through reddish hell—just for him—