{"id":9681,"date":"2020-10-02T15:42:36","date_gmt":"2020-10-02T14:42:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cassandravoices.com\/?p=9681"},"modified":"2020-10-02T15:42:36","modified_gmt":"2020-10-02T14:42:36","slug":"poetry-ernest-hilbert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/2020\/10\/02\/poetry-ernest-hilbert\/","title":{"rendered":"Poetry: Ernest Hilbert"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spolia Opima<\/strong><\/p>\n

Models, slender and famished as cheetahs,
\nShed their imperial haute couture<\/em>\u2014
\nAlready in sweatpants, they hail their cabs<\/p>\n

Behind the Grand Palais before
\nApplause dies down inside around
\nThe vacant runway. Afternoon sunlight\u2019s<\/p>\n

Lambent overhead on friezes of Lutetian Limestone.
\nViolinists grimace at their scores\u2014
\nHaydn, Hollywood, the B\u2019s and Broadway hits,<\/p>\n

Rehearsal house-lights hard above,
\nRosin fine as cocaine settling on the boards.
\nThey\u2019re not arrogant. They\u2019re bored.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re paid to make the beauty go.
\nWhy else? We all make beauty pay.
\nGourmands\u2019 are all aglow as it arrives\u2014\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Voila<\/em>, another flamb\u00e9. Cherries, drenched
\nIn century-old brandy, burn like coals.
\nThe waiter itches to check his phone. He grins.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m given to hyperbole, I know,
\nBut something\u2019s got to me. It\u2019s all around.
\nYou have to learn to make it pay you back.<\/p>\n

The bathroom\u2019s OUT OF ORDER. Sewage seeps
\nInto the restaurant. The manager\u2019s
\nFrantic, alone today. The line\u2019s<\/p>\n

Become a mob. A voice from an SUV
\nBarks at the drive-through speaker. In the back,
\nChildren cheer a whirl of color on a screen.<\/p>\n

I feel the boredom underneath the beauty.
\nIt\u2019s weird, and getting desperate these days.
\nIn auction rooms, the arms go up. And . . . sold.<\/p>\n

The next exquisite investment\u2019s on the block.
\nThe views\u2014the hills, the seas\u2014are still pristine for those
\nWho can afford the heights. Who\u2019s this<\/em> beauty for?<\/p>\n

Beauty\u2019s boring. I do go on and on,
\nDon\u2019t I? Oh, you have a nosebleed.
\nHere, drip some in my drink. See this?<\/p>\n

Flick this switch. Now listen. Someone will scream.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Crypt<\/strong><\/p>\n

The cities burn above me as I sleep.
\nI\u2019m walled by trophies looted long ago
\nAlong the routes of conquest, centuries<\/p>\n

Of funereal remains, gold that\u2019s dimmed
\nBy dust and bound by web, as valueless
\nAs the dirt that slowly takes it back again.<\/p>\n

I wake and wonder where I am. I move
\nMy arm and bottles clink. I raise my head
\nEnough to see I must have drunk them all.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m underground. I know because the light
\nThat works like stars in chinks is far
\nAbove me. Even in this dusk I find<\/p>\n

There\u2019s something left inside a bottle here.
\nSitting up, I take a swallow and get it down
\nBefore I choke, and spit out warm urine.<\/p>\n

I half-remember falling off the edge
\nOf the world. Then nothing else. I barely breathe,
\nThe air\u2019s so thick and sapped of oxygen,<\/p>\n

A gas of churned-up worms and sporous loam.
\nI want to learn the way back up. I try
\nTo name the things I see\u2014sextants, I-Phones.<\/p>\n

An avian chorus summons me. What years
\nHave gone? I fall toward sleep again. The soil becomes
\nA lake that\u2019s darker than the night. My dreams<\/p>\n

Are long as centuries, of wars and new words,
\nAll telling me \u201cyou are gone,\u201d but I\u2019m still here,
\nCurled up, and cold, in my crown of amethyst.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Apollinaris, Medicus Titi Imperatoris hic Cacavit Bene<\/strong><\/p>\n

I check my e-mail. There\u2019s nothing there for me.
\nI check the wall. Not much, some recipes
\nI\u2019ll never cook, some boasts, some oaths, some jokes,
\nAdvice, little different from graffiti<\/p>\n

Scrawled on Roman stone two thousand years ago,
\nSmall bursts of unofficial human hopes,
\nAnd on we go, unchanged, forever griping
\nEra to era\u2014it\u2019s almost comforting\u2014<\/p>\n

Election slogans packed in ash at Pompei,
\nBillboards on the Temple of Bacchus at Baalbek,
\nWinged lions tagged on the Great Enclosure,
\nSigns of the Khufu Gang left in Giza,<\/p>\n

So many words, like air exhaled to air,
\nLike tiny helium hearts escaping
\nIn a delirium of approval up a wall,
\nOr displeased emperor\u2019s thumb aimed down.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Visit Ernest Hilbert<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spolia Opima Models, slender and famished as cheetahs, Shed their imperial haute couture\u2014 Already in sweatpants, they hail their cabs Behind the Grand Palais before Applause dies down inside around The vacant runway. Afternoon sunlight\u2019s Lambent overhead on friezes of Lutetian Limestone. Violinists grimace at their scores\u2014 Haydn, Hollywood, the B\u2019s and Broadway hits, Rehearsal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":9695,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[3014,3019,3021],"class_list":["post-9681","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","tag-ernest-hilbert","tag-ernest-hilbert-new-poems","tag-ernest-hilbert-poet"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9681"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9681\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}