No God but the Gold Forged in the Furnace of Flesh: A Poem on Jacob Frank Jakub Lejbowicz slithered east Beneath a heretic’s curse. A worm of rot, crowned in Ottoman dust, He wore another man’s face — Berukhiah reborn Jacob Frank, Westerner of Podolia, Messianic pretender. In Salonica, blasphemy transmuted: Sin kissed the breasts Of someone else’s wife. Torah pressed into palpable skin, White fire turned utterly black. Apostates writhed. A tho

A Ghost As If I am not your keeper O ghost who crouches At the grave of my father. The body is dead; it is in the shade. A pale figure with a sheet for a robe rises from the earth (His hair black as ravens' feet). With cold-clay fingers, He could quell the soul’s fire. As if. A seagull cries In the salted air Like a baby Calling for its parents. There is blood on the land, Blood in the rivers too. You are not what you appear To thi

The Soul Moves The soul moves & by small degrees Of slow calculation Actuates the two substances That are body & mind. First operation is the entry of light Into dark, of dead limbs Galvanized by the sun’s power; The second is of vast dreams cut short By a harsh & loud noise, Like a fire alarm at the cinema – Enfolded in stillful bliss no longer, Soul, body and mind sit up blinking, Grudgingly resurrected – Otherwise known as waking up.

Deliquescent Bodies (Love Parade) I hope for night; it comes; it is here; it comes with rain & river, & the lights are electric. I am offered a drink & the mercury blue neon over the door catches my eye, tears open the retina, imbuing the optic nerve with cold cathode gas, ionising my nervous system to the limit. Breathing carbon dioxide, I metabolize my own body. I am a pillar of ether by the exit door. But I’m not alone. We all matter less than we did before,

Without division or interval, the body appears as pure form over content, surface without depth.

Sin's Body There is in me a Body of Sin: Sin its own heart and lungs, brain-blood-bones- teeth-tongue; a crown of vice adorns the head; channels and ducts convey lust to the secret parts; and the juicy marrow gives much succulence to Sin. Secreting sweat and bile, Sin does its vile work. Possessed, inhabited, I am Sin.

Embodiment The eye looks, the ear waits, the head turns, the heart aches, the lung breathes, the hand gropes. Skull! cerebral hemispheres! limbic system! basal ganglia! olfactory nerve! eyeball! sinuses! teeth! tongue! ear! vertebral column! brainstem! thyroid! coccyx! spinal cord! sternum! trachea! pleura! aortic valve! pulmonary vein! axilla! radius! metacarpal bones! oesophagus! stomach! colon! liver! renal pyramids! ureters! urine! patellar ligament! femur! sciatic nerv

The Eye Looks The eye looks The ear waits The hand gropes The heart yearns The body thrashes about the turning wheel, which turns in TIME. Head-Neck-Thorax-Limbs-Abdomen-Reproductiveorgans-Pelvis-Veins- Nervoussystems-Mind-Mentalformations-Volition-Memory-Perceptions- Thoughts-Awareness-Feelings-Desires-Consciousness Breakdown-Dissolve-Expire-Crackunderpressure-Atomise-Losecoherence- Liquify-Scatterlikeseedsonthewind-Thaw-Dissipate-Fadeout on the outgoing breath Is the eye