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A poem about Edie Sedgwick, Andy Warhol's tragic superstar |
1. Objective Desire Down a steel shaft, cold and hollow, She falls Into the euphoric sea-spill of bone-pale Phosphorescence-- A radiance to white out The Big Sadness. And the bassy backbeat that moves her Feet is the pounding, sounding four-four time of a velveteen underground Where the undead dance With chalky complexions and leers like blackened craters. Her mascaraed face pale as a sarcophagus mask: Arctic beautiful in an expression of wanting, longing, Lusting, Lacking. Her stare crosses the void and steel spaces And vacant byways of skyscraper canyons And asphalt paths that web out to all commercial points on a Glossy globe Ever-spinning with ever-rapiding Twirl of speed-cocaine-amphetamine Accelerations Till all the old foundations loosen And fly spaceward into infinity, leaving a smoldering molten core Of 15 minute celebrity --mass-produced with silk-screened automation, Their only differentiation: Warhol’s Abstracted smears of paint. Abstracted stare under paint That probes the endless nothing all Her loved ones have fallen into: One poor brother from the end of a noosed cord of hemp, One poor brother from the metal cocoon of motorcycle wreckage, One poor father (deviled deity) from the incestuous embrace of Carcinogenic tissue. Her light shadows To eye-silence And her lids close Like fleshy final curtains. 2. Subjective Entire Opening my eyes to a new day, I’m one day farther removed from the day You failed to say goodbye. We shared one year On earth (From the winter to the fall) Though unmet In that first-to-last time. And I came to know you Through the Factory films Andy and the others Caught your spirit in Like celluloid amber. And a jarred soul is still A soul, though never Free from consuming eyes. And your stare across the dead Decades holds mine And there is a symbiotic synergy Between us That merges our mouths and minds In the in-between Of dreams. I will not let you die, Ms. Sedgwick. You shall always live in me, Ms. Tragic Iconic. I will not let you die. I shall always hold you In the warmth of my spirit. And like you, I have known the Big Sadness. I have known the loss of love. I have known the drug-deadened Sedation of flesh-boned waking terrors And the come-down into night-reality. And I shall live So you may live in me. And I shall live To meet you again In the euphoric sea-spill Of bone-pale phosphorescence. You shall always live In me, Ms. Tragic Iconic. And our mutual tragedies Are the lifeline that enwraps Us and holds us together In the warmth of my spirit. And though you failed To say goodbye, I shall count the hours Till the in-between And say Ciao… For now. |