Lowering Proust
before me,
I hear the autumn rain rise,
beat around the bush,
then straight on through the shrubs,
'til suddenly ceasing
in an aftermath of drips & drops,
irregularly pleasant
to an avant-garde ear,
discerning György Ligeti's Poème Symphonique
for 100 Metronomes
out of the rhythms,
my second mug of strong, black
straightening out any dilly-dally doubts;
local livabilities slotting in
like perfect mechanics,
glazed with comfortable contempt
for all poor excuses I encounter every day,
filling my case of disgust to the brim;
nitwits and dopes coughing & snoring
through endless uselessness,
stiff in everlasting ignorance;
puffing skinbags
stuffed with meat and formidable filth

At night,
when Proust becomes a plowman;
his sentences deep furrows
disappearing
out into the dark;
reminiscences and hidden sounds
draw close like a gang of wolves
'round a Canadian camp fire;
a heavy sense of sentience filing past
in the guise of three musketeering
ball lightnings
across the coniferous perpetuality
of the North,
deep into the ancient halls
of my mind;
the unconscious flickering