Aug 16, 2016
Epitaph
Marjorie Welish
1
Pouvrette et ancienne
I don’t knowmay be oaths
Pouvrette et ancienne
I know
Pouvrette et ancienne
I knowdon’t knowdoesn’t apply
Low water pressure
Why would water
Why would enhancing pressure be lackluster
in parentheses
Why would there be less to the system
If tampering be not
2
Pouvrette et ancienne
I knowI don’t knowother
Publics, whose
Nitrogen?Estragon?
(Public knowledge does not depend on)
whether I myself know
Ramified litter
Never letter have I written
Never a letter have I writtenmay be oathsan oath
What
is lost [anyhow] through evaporationmay be an oath
If no temptationif no attempt
If no tampering or if non-tampering
Water is lost [anyhow] in the process
Of a life and of
Alias?Nitrogen?Never a letter have I written
Never a letter have I read, received
Never did I receive your
Public lettering
3
Here’s the gaugethe gaugeyou can hardly see,
hear, taste it. The gauge you can hardly taste.
Never did I receive your public lettering, graying. Graying
as a possible world. Graying as a possible world
will have been an oath. A gray scale shall have been
have written. A sampling-of a gray scale
might have been an oath at least.
The gradient shall have been recited.
Pouvrette et ancienne
I knowdon’t knowother
Pouvrette et non-white
Pouvrette et ancienne
I knowdon’t knowplace of death
Pouvrette et place of birth
I knowaddressdon’t knowother
Place of birth may be an oath
4
I knowshall have an oath
Of gray areas whether I myself know it
Which alias? Of a time writing
Are gray areas where we do not know where to incise
Can hardly taste it
I don’t knowI never wrote grayness
Grayness is not an oathis
A temptationotherwhere gray areas where V-cuts
Would writealthough a graying incision may write
A locus for indeterminacy
See hear taste itcounterclockwise
Taste
I don’tlike ascendersI don’t know the ascenders of which
You speak
Have not yet recited space.
5
Littering.Litter gravitates toward the spaced
Creasesthe imbricated spacing yet it distributes differently
Think of epochs and historical formations
Of courtyards:everything in its placemay be an oath.
A quarter turn?
Letterstraversea plastic spoon.
Unlettereda new archive.
I knowI don’t other
A quarter turnimbricated
Whether I myself know it
Whether I might have known itmay know itshall have.
The historical formation of litter
Of litter we have known:think of epochs
Courtyardseverything.
Distraught V-cuts could be adjacent
To the system.Cuts governing
Pouvrette et ancienne
I don’t knowunlettered and low pressure
Make a heapor may
Pouvrette et ancienne
I knowI don’t knowdoesn’t apply
And cannot.Cuts governing vague predicates
Cannot be incised
I know no precise dividing lines that can incise vague predicates
While others say: may not precise dividing lines incise noise
Even if we do not know where.
Still others hold
That distracted V-cutsnitrogenand counterclockwise–yes?
More…
- Readings by Marjorie Welish
- Interview with Jasper Johns, Bomb Magazine
- Marjorie Welish- Isle of the Signatories, Allen Mozek
- A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs, Donald Davidson