Flying Deeper into the Century
Flying Deeper into the Century
Original Text
Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, Living in Paradise: New and Selected Poems
(Toronto: Manfield Press, 2001): 59.
1Flying deeper into the century
2is exhilarating, the faces of loved ones eaten out
3slowly, the panhandles of flesh warding off
4the air, the smiling plots. We are lucky to be mature,
5in our prime, seeing more treaties, watching
7It lives off the land. The glow over the hill, from
8the test sites, at night, the whole block of neighbours
9dying of cancer over the next thirty years. We are
10suing the government for a drop of blood; flying deeper
11into the century, love,
12the lies are old lies with more imagination;
13the future is a canoe. The three bears are ravenous, not content
14with porridge. Flying deeper into the century,
15my hands are prayers, hooks, streamers.
16I cannot love grass, cameos or lungs.
17The end of the century is a bedspread up to the eyes.
18I want to be there, making ends meet.
19I will not love you, with such malice at large.
20Flying deeper into the century is beautiful, like
21coming up for the third time, life flashing before us.
22The major publishing event is the last poem of
23all time. I am a lonely bastard. My brothers and sisters have
24had sexual relations, and I am left with their mongrel sons
25writing memoirs about the dead in Cambodia.
26Flying deeper, I do not remember what I cared for, out
27of respect. Oh Time, oh Newsweek, oh Ladies' Home Journal,
28oh the last frontier, I am deeply touched.
29The sun, an ignoramus, comes up.
30I have this conversation with it. Glumly, glumly, deeper
31I fly into the century, every feather of each wing
32absolution, if only I were less than human, not angry
33like a beaten thing.
Notes
6] Death has no dominion: the title of a poem by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas (1904-53). Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1982
Publication Notes
Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, Flying Deeper into the Century (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1982): 16.
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2003
Rhyme
Special Copyright
Copyright Pier Giorgio Di Cicco 2001