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The Selected Poems of
Hamster
The Characters: Hamster, and Other Hamster
Waking from a dream in which I was mesmerized by a glowing instrument panel. Warm glass wall in early sun, wood chip in my mouth.
Dark night teeth hurting, the drip of the water bottle. Restless, I twitch.
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On the spinning wheel it never matters. I run straight through my mind straight out of it. I fill my lungs to bursting in all light and on nights with a moon I get on the wheel and go on a moon-shot.
Pajama shadow, shirt slung over the top. Hamster digs in the shade. I clean my forepaws beside old food pellets.
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Small mysteries. The acyclical flux of piss-smell, The newspaper of the underworld. The edge of this place.
Drunk on the fumes of a new bed of cedar chips I zigzag to the salt-lick.
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Defensive measures. The toys in an arc around the hole. Wait for the relentless, eyeless groping, the afternoon onslaught.
Eyes closed in the heat of the hand. Intrusive itch, back leg. Whiskers crushed against fingers. My shiny coat tonight.
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Nose twitching, switching side-long looks, eye to eye to eye, up on my hind legs. This is exciting!
Up against the glass looking out over the vista stereo, books. Something, rain beyond the window.
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Maximizing the light & space, I run to and fro. Hamster watches half-buried in a froth of chips.
I can see Hamster’s eyes in the dark. Why won’t she sleep? Now she squeaks a little and digs a little; maybe she’s hurt.
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Paws in the air resting on my back naked except for the moonlight.
What is the history of the tank? What ghosts do I feed with? Hamster is struck with the past of the place. I don’t feel it, but root around for it.
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The fan around the sun with the pull-cords hanging down gives such supreme creamy-air pleasure.
Looking is waiting what’s this music? All the green quite far none here.
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Jelly. Hamster and I nibble in silence at this perfect treat.
Fury of back legs kicking as it tries to pick me up. I’ll not make a sound.
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Scratching both my ears with both my paws. Itchy morning.
Unable to sleep. What did we do so wrong to lose our tails? Night drips away like the faucet.
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Knocking things over I K.O. this I K.O. that there are not enough things in here.
The point, the edge, the front and back, vanish in our play.
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Peed there and there, and over there. Surveying all the spots from my warm dugout.
So swollen. How does she move? She asks nothing of me, and I leave her alone.
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Idle, smelling, eyes unfocused, thinking of nothing.
Decisions to be made. How can I uncoil them here, the smell, this singular darkness, this mute heat.
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Nightmare of big flapping shadows carrying me off.
She asks - Where are you? without looking. Cedar dust and unquenchable.
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Solo in my head. Hamster sits perfectly still, wide awake.
The water bottle gone, a heavy bowl in its place in which I see myself among floating wood chips and dung.
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The pinecone is new, and incomprehensible. Not here last night when we left for sleep.
Filing my teeth languidly, the far-off lamp on late.
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Skimping on food in order to touch it, the inner moon.
Strange enough, the heat begets play, sluggish, with pauses. Hamster in the water.
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Terrible noises from beyond the tank, nascent, other-worldly rage.
Hamster cries out in her sleep. Wake her with my nose.
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Unmade bed ghost of its inhabitant.
Hamster touches me here and here as well; I’m rent.
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Waking from clover dreams wondering my age.
Bug on the glass other side of the tank. Unreachable life.
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A plant has started to peek at us from around a corner.
Digging down to the paper, stirring a pot with my face.
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Worthy of the world I find myself in? Nose twitching at the limits.
Dust of radio chatter; the ballgame. I can eat forever.
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Cricket chirps tick-tock timepiece. Skin-tight stars.
Wealthy, surveying what I’ve learned. The tank is pocked. No fathomless holes here. They are quickly dug, shallow, austere.
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Here we are again bedded down. Why smell her? I know what she smells like. Still.
The magnificent salt-lick caught in a moon beam. Sleep suddenly remote.
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Filing my teeth down, I’m convinced. A confrontation with others is always also a confrontation with myself. Unfocused and tense with rage.
Angry. Old food. Ugly sturdy dish. To hell with it.
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Queasy, a presence behind me like my mind is pointing to the perfect cookie.
Scent of uncapped hibiscus shampoo settles in the tank like gentle weather or fragrant ghost.
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Chips in the wheel, an indifferent bank piled opposite. Stay quick.
Slow and without warning, the smell of my mother’s underbelly here.
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In the world of squirrels the immense trees & great green light comes to bear on love. It must.
We’ve begun to wonder about the nests & networks of fieldmice, the crisp wet nights.
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Watching early winter on all fours. Leaves blown through a gap beneath the screen. Gets violent. On two against the glass.
It’s all coming together amidst too much wreckage. No chance for the only two witnesses.
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“Are you writing a poem about me? No? Because I could say some more things in French, oui.�
Her rumpled fur her stirrings not far We are both on the wind.
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Fighting off perception-through-glass none too well, and early summer.
Wipe my feet on good cedar watch a fly sticky and nimble.
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No question, suddenly, too lopsided she holds nothing back it’s all there resonating in her whiskers.
Dig deep enough and there are faces in the cedar chips, black and white.
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Spoken with authority but somehow empty and she knows it.
There was an ark? Who was there? Give me terms, give me specifics.
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Automobiles nothing but a kind of sound.
I used to watch her relieve herself. I don’t anymore. I think of ways to get out.
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Quick nose quicker than the eyes changes everything.
I appropriate the dish then the wheel, unable to explain my need to make a point.
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No reinstatement point. Your ghost and mine down river.
Ever so quiet she draws up behind I always know. Her paws set the tiny forests of each eye stretching back whiskers aslant ready now to engage, now. We touch noses without looking.
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She won’t come closer nor will I. We chirp at each other from opposite ends of the tank.
However I live it’s with reference to her eye One & eye Two. And the four clear walls. Never in repose.
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Things known but uncomprehended Radio declares: “It’s the middle of the week. It’s 7 ‘o’ clock.” evening takes shape.
Looking up, Hamster tired and distracted. I accelerate my digging.
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Apples in winter. One detail yet to be deciphered.
Self-absorbed morose made of crystal. Hear me look at her
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Legitimated by belief I hunt; the scant yield of four corners.
Back to self in the ridiculous center. Night and the flit of wings, steady panic busy & dark.
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The voracious imagination does nothing with the earthen bowl or the pellets.
The biological imperative to skip about.
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Tremendous force of the pigeon-holing mind, noisy spry.
Emptying effect of strategy, process, content, context. Whipped.
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Make birdcage. Make bird. Play sounds.
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The Selected Poems of Hamster Š Carlos Blackburn 2008
UGLY DUCKLING PRESSE Brooklyn, NY www.uglyducklingpresse.org
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