THE SMILE

for Nathaniel Otting

The wrong
book hurts
for the beauty
of its words
which clang out in
communities of common sin
is what the Americans say
when they have finished washing
I’m attaching a quote from Emerson
no I’m attaching one from Poe
no I’m attaching no quote
except which emanates from plough
or emanates from clough
a weird Georgic intelligence
for seeping roughly
into the daydream
of tillers
whose smiles
easy without teeth
speak in flaps
to honor destitution’s ease
we grew our beard
long and let it flower
into tufts of pilling fractal
until our smiles were well hidden
so we could take greater joy
in the wrongness of humanity
and not upset them constantly
who are already so upset
but to cry out
silently our deafening mirth
we researched schizophrenia
and read Schilder’s
The Image
and Appearance
of the Human
Body at work
while our bosses slept
off their odious lunches
their pockets stuffed with receipts
so not to be possessed
with the Georgic intelligence so loved
among willing caretakers of the schizophrenic