Poetry of Macgregor Card > Woodland Pattern Book Center

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Macgregor Card

Macgregor Card is a poet, translator and editor living in Brooklyn. Recent poems have appeared in The Recluse, Fence, The Columbia Review,

Arsenal, Poesie, Aufgabe and Puppyflowers. He currently edits The Germ (www.germspot.blogspot.com) and Firmilian: A Spasmodic Knowledge Base (www.firmilian.blogspot.com) and with Olivier Brossard is editing an anthology of New York School poets to be published collaboratively in France (Joca Seria) and the U.S. (Turtle Point Press). He was the subject of an archival installation by the artist David Adamo entitled Macgregor Card (Swiss Institute, 2005), who had followed him in secret for eight months. He is currently finishing a collection of poems entitled Duties of an English Foreign Secretary.

The Libertine's Punishment

Macgregor Card

Today the mayor planted oranges symbolizing rage.
Tomorrow, oranges symbolizing hope.
On the third day, the mayor planted oranges symbolizing
property value as well as hope.
Soon these reverted to rage, and the tree was nowhere to be found.

All steamships are to be at once diverted
for silent golden film's maritime farewell scenes
in goldenrod New York
through a curtain of burning geese
a concrete-busting sunlight
airdropped from, wherever, the stars
in a language we can understand
to warn us of invasions
we can understand from afar
or from a field reporter
radioing presents to the trees
municipal and goldenrod the trees
we were tenants earning blaring living wages
breathing in nor'easter steams
of golden track-repair labor
governed by those agencies afloat
in the night like tankers
in their literally bottomless stream
Did you hear the one
about the Straits of Magellan?
No, listen, I'm asking you
if you heard the one
about the Straits of Magellan
not telling you.
Could if I could, could if I no could—
No, no could if I no could.
I cannot see the taxi for the open window
the field reporter's uniform
for the uniform of an
upwardly-mobile egyptologist
who combs the sand for ordinance
devours a light-emitting lunch
no interest in the outside quality of dune formation
when dressed for diplomatic travel—
puffy German peasant blouse—
in goldenrod New York, did you hear

All trains stop in the Antipodes this time of year.
This is not the city of the blessèd call-center worker.
Things vanish not as they are
but as they were to be remembered.
A stranger cannot make a living as a memoir.
We cover more ground in the hero.
In fact, we get in a car and go.
Emotion one, emotion two, emotion three,
etcetera except with feeling, and an ox named Babe.
Could if I could, could if I no could—
No, no could if I no could.
Today the mayor planted oranges symbolizing rage.
Tomorrow, oranges symbolizing hope.
On the third day, the mayor planted oranges
symbolizing rage as well as hope.
Soon they reverted to rage, and the tree
was nowhere to be found.

Let's take a walk down broadway
as the pattern of leaves rolls off.

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