Post by Cenacle on Jul 19, 2021 12:13:41 GMT -5
The Groove
Phish concert,
Big Cypress Seminole Indian Reservation,
New Year’s Day 2000, Everglades, Florida
[during midnight-to-dawn show]
i.
there is no ending to the groove
through which music flows to
hearts unknown
we learned too much
we learned too little
we learned nearly enough
last night another death trip,
i keep having those of late
beyond language & name
have i even come back at all?
i’ve learned too much
i know too little
i ache for everything
is there a force to be found, a godd
to be won, even a wish left
with three clean words written on it:
Live. Learn. Grow.
or three others:
Suffer. Love. Know.
last night, a different century, I guess
I must have just decided to give in:
we know too much
we know too little
we’re putting wings to our ignorance
to see where in the cosmos it flies
Joy is emptiness beckoning
from midnight skies
Woe is a molecule to be
smoked, danced or dreamt away—
Music is laughter a million
days away
Accept. Challenge. Accept. Flow.
Knowledge keeps happening until
you stop. & listen.
Something left over from century’s end
Something twas sad perhaps now
transfigured into tree, into light,
into groove, is it music now? like
everything else?
what else is not yet music?
my inventory holds no cigarettes
or glowbubbles anymore
Music: dance flat the fuck out of
your private darkness
To nowhere sunrise someone asks
someone else something & again
til a village, a culture, a planet
& then one too many questions tumbles
the jam down
til no language til no exit til nowhere
is home & it’s time to start
again
tonight i took my wounds out
for a stroll, an airing, some
righteous funky swamptime
for themselves
& again i know nothing
again i listen for my true name
again maybe the wolves maybe the
rolling lawns in my dreams
i don’t know really— don’t give a shit
i read many a book in last century’s
time, few worth holding out on a
cold night & a box of matches
sometimes one’s last treasure is
to keep dancing, or maybe keep
still
something else, though, new sparkles
for old:
dead so to be free of time &
pretty icons & a knapsack of
some damned torn air
old, wasted, refuse, dead, thirstless
air, dead in my sack—
stop it, OK?
ii.
& it’s morning again, I suppose,
a rainbow, a wasteland, & something
fecund aerates my blood again
the band played in some farout
swampland raw empty sunrise
look— they’re picking up trash
before new century’s first sleep—
look— these are the children promised
by the trees, & midnight groans,
these are the children on the
sides of the world’s roads, slicking
through city libraries looking for books
on hemp & the mushrooms Jesus ate—
these are your children— & I am too—
& they’ll protect each other the way the
dawn protects the day, the way trees
protect the autumn— the secret in each
leaf til ready— these are your children
& they’ll survive you like a better strain—
survive you, elude you, invade you, subsume
you, turn on your daughters, grow your
sons’ beards long, put dreddies on your soul
if you ain’t careful, motherfucker—
last night off seven hits of acid after the
early show I was driven into spaced
out paranoid drug visions felt herded into
nets & cages, helicopters above, black steel
shield troopers in place the streets are
gone this walk will never end— it was
your last chance to do this, to stop what
will pour through you like it’s the music
& you’re the groove— it was your last chance
to end this mellow-vibed evolution— more
& more & more— until what things were like
back in the day means squat until
too many people are smiling doped-up
on sunshine & cannabis, starshine &
amber I could go on & on
iii.
The towline back is people
i told me acid told me so
any scrap of reality clung to til a
warm hand, watching eyes, empathy,
a vibe, a groove, a tangerine, some
advice, a smile, some water, empathy,
or anything empathetic to empathy,
clean up, there’s nothing left to
do today, i told me acid told me so
again & again & again
there is no ending to the groove
through which music flows to
places unnamed, fecund fields
tight jeans furry boots glitter
eyelashes, smoking Marlboro Lights,
looking for nuggets, sell out for
a pair, & each time goes wrong a different way
We learned too much
We earned too little
We’re easy prey for covert jackals
Our road home passes through
peyote-real ghost towns
& crack’d-out canyon city shadows
unreal, freakout, shakedown, busted for
being cloudy on a smiling day
again—where’s my bag of dank?
again—who’s got my mollie?
again—14 hours stopped dead in traffic
again—Fishman took a dump, snorted
a deuce, came bounding back on stage—
& what was this Florida swampland 2000’s
eve & what was Burning Man 1999 months
ago & the several incidents in between
damn—shit went down!
but here are drums, today all there is,
the doorman handed me a card on
the way out, card says “Chill” I’ll not
be losing it, though I don’t know
what it means don’t know anything
anymore too much—
how will I get home? doobie-smoking
guru says “Chill.”
what do I do then? whirling fairy princess
chick on pure mesc & two hits of mollie
says “Chill.”
tell me about money & love & change &
change & change! Goatee’d earring’d
brother sipping a cold beer someone
just handed him, well he just looks at
me intently no smile no blame: “Chill.”
Tell me more for when I forget how!
What if psychosis resumes later?
How do I serenade open the sweet legs smiling
of one of this phatty phairie chicks?
Stop. Toldja already. Get into the groove.
All things in good time.
“This is heaven. Close to it,” she told me
after drinking, face raw with burn, jangle
locks of hair, music necklaces notes
twined in hemp chord.
Help me. I have no plan. I am
so happy. Not with a bang. With a snicker.
For all the times when I beg for just
one free taste, for all the times
when I check twice before sharing,
for all the times when I name what
I do not yet know.
for all gratuitous grace, acts of karma,
random findings, fucked lonely nights,
false where is this going panics over
sanity & roof it’s going nowhere this
is the extended jam & someone heads to
the trees with shells to shake & an
unlit cigarette this shit sounds the same
& I suppose waiting for what I want
ended last night as the box fell away,
then the space inside the box, then space
itself
shut the fuck up & try simple:
the magic spell begins every morning every
day living breathing any kind of gesture
to the good, here comes someone, ask
him the way home, ask his friend, smile,
how’s the day & what may evolve, “just
chillin’, bro, going to a party tonight &
just chillin’. Wanna come? What’s your name?”
January 1, 2000
Big Cypress Indian Reservation,
Florida
Phish concert,
Big Cypress Seminole Indian Reservation,
New Year’s Day 2000, Everglades, Florida
[during midnight-to-dawn show]
i.
there is no ending to the groove
through which music flows to
hearts unknown
we learned too much
we learned too little
we learned nearly enough
last night another death trip,
i keep having those of late
beyond language & name
have i even come back at all?
i’ve learned too much
i know too little
i ache for everything
is there a force to be found, a godd
to be won, even a wish left
with three clean words written on it:
Live. Learn. Grow.
or three others:
Suffer. Love. Know.
last night, a different century, I guess
I must have just decided to give in:
we know too much
we know too little
we’re putting wings to our ignorance
to see where in the cosmos it flies
Joy is emptiness beckoning
from midnight skies
Woe is a molecule to be
smoked, danced or dreamt away—
Music is laughter a million
days away
Accept. Challenge. Accept. Flow.
Knowledge keeps happening until
you stop. & listen.
Something left over from century’s end
Something twas sad perhaps now
transfigured into tree, into light,
into groove, is it music now? like
everything else?
what else is not yet music?
my inventory holds no cigarettes
or glowbubbles anymore
Music: dance flat the fuck out of
your private darkness
To nowhere sunrise someone asks
someone else something & again
til a village, a culture, a planet
& then one too many questions tumbles
the jam down
til no language til no exit til nowhere
is home & it’s time to start
again
tonight i took my wounds out
for a stroll, an airing, some
righteous funky swamptime
for themselves
& again i know nothing
again i listen for my true name
again maybe the wolves maybe the
rolling lawns in my dreams
i don’t know really— don’t give a shit
i read many a book in last century’s
time, few worth holding out on a
cold night & a box of matches
sometimes one’s last treasure is
to keep dancing, or maybe keep
still
something else, though, new sparkles
for old:
dead so to be free of time &
pretty icons & a knapsack of
some damned torn air
old, wasted, refuse, dead, thirstless
air, dead in my sack—
stop it, OK?
ii.
& it’s morning again, I suppose,
a rainbow, a wasteland, & something
fecund aerates my blood again
the band played in some farout
swampland raw empty sunrise
look— they’re picking up trash
before new century’s first sleep—
look— these are the children promised
by the trees, & midnight groans,
these are the children on the
sides of the world’s roads, slicking
through city libraries looking for books
on hemp & the mushrooms Jesus ate—
these are your children— & I am too—
& they’ll protect each other the way the
dawn protects the day, the way trees
protect the autumn— the secret in each
leaf til ready— these are your children
& they’ll survive you like a better strain—
survive you, elude you, invade you, subsume
you, turn on your daughters, grow your
sons’ beards long, put dreddies on your soul
if you ain’t careful, motherfucker—
last night off seven hits of acid after the
early show I was driven into spaced
out paranoid drug visions felt herded into
nets & cages, helicopters above, black steel
shield troopers in place the streets are
gone this walk will never end— it was
your last chance to do this, to stop what
will pour through you like it’s the music
& you’re the groove— it was your last chance
to end this mellow-vibed evolution— more
& more & more— until what things were like
back in the day means squat until
too many people are smiling doped-up
on sunshine & cannabis, starshine &
amber I could go on & on
iii.
The towline back is people
i told me acid told me so
any scrap of reality clung to til a
warm hand, watching eyes, empathy,
a vibe, a groove, a tangerine, some
advice, a smile, some water, empathy,
or anything empathetic to empathy,
clean up, there’s nothing left to
do today, i told me acid told me so
again & again & again
there is no ending to the groove
through which music flows to
places unnamed, fecund fields
tight jeans furry boots glitter
eyelashes, smoking Marlboro Lights,
looking for nuggets, sell out for
a pair, & each time goes wrong a different way
We learned too much
We earned too little
We’re easy prey for covert jackals
Our road home passes through
peyote-real ghost towns
& crack’d-out canyon city shadows
unreal, freakout, shakedown, busted for
being cloudy on a smiling day
again—where’s my bag of dank?
again—who’s got my mollie?
again—14 hours stopped dead in traffic
again—Fishman took a dump, snorted
a deuce, came bounding back on stage—
& what was this Florida swampland 2000’s
eve & what was Burning Man 1999 months
ago & the several incidents in between
damn—shit went down!
but here are drums, today all there is,
the doorman handed me a card on
the way out, card says “Chill” I’ll not
be losing it, though I don’t know
what it means don’t know anything
anymore too much—
how will I get home? doobie-smoking
guru says “Chill.”
what do I do then? whirling fairy princess
chick on pure mesc & two hits of mollie
says “Chill.”
tell me about money & love & change &
change & change! Goatee’d earring’d
brother sipping a cold beer someone
just handed him, well he just looks at
me intently no smile no blame: “Chill.”
Tell me more for when I forget how!
What if psychosis resumes later?
How do I serenade open the sweet legs smiling
of one of this phatty phairie chicks?
Stop. Toldja already. Get into the groove.
All things in good time.
“This is heaven. Close to it,” she told me
after drinking, face raw with burn, jangle
locks of hair, music necklaces notes
twined in hemp chord.
Help me. I have no plan. I am
so happy. Not with a bang. With a snicker.
For all the times when I beg for just
one free taste, for all the times
when I check twice before sharing,
for all the times when I name what
I do not yet know.
for all gratuitous grace, acts of karma,
random findings, fucked lonely nights,
false where is this going panics over
sanity & roof it’s going nowhere this
is the extended jam & someone heads to
the trees with shells to shake & an
unlit cigarette this shit sounds the same
& I suppose waiting for what I want
ended last night as the box fell away,
then the space inside the box, then space
itself
shut the fuck up & try simple:
the magic spell begins every morning every
day living breathing any kind of gesture
to the good, here comes someone, ask
him the way home, ask his friend, smile,
how’s the day & what may evolve, “just
chillin’, bro, going to a party tonight &
just chillin’. Wanna come? What’s your name?”
January 1, 2000
Big Cypress Indian Reservation,
Florida