{"id":2526,"date":"2026-05-04T14:50:42","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T21:50:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/?p=2526"},"modified":"2026-05-04T15:03:24","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T22:03:24","slug":"epithalamium-my-first-permie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/2026\/05\/04\/epithalamium-my-first-permie\/","title":{"rendered":"Epithalamium: My First Permie*"},"content":{"rendered":"

* <\/i>For<\/em> permie, see XXX<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

My first permie, an epithalamium of sorts, was composed in April, 1977 on the occasion of my first wedding:<\/p>\n

Those who who …
\n<\/i><\/i><\/p>\n

love change fear
\nfear love change
\n<\/span>change fear love
\n<\/span>love fear change
\n<\/span>change love fear
\n<\/span>fear change love
\nlove change fear\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I thought of it as a concrete poem and had composed it while I was working on the first academic paper I published, From the Pictograph to the Metapoem: Realms of Concrete Poetic Reference in Brazilian Concrete Poetry<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For the ceremony, it was set to music by Philip Larson<\/a>. Unfortunately the recording and the original manuscript have been lost.<\/p>\n

I wrote a second more conventional epithalamium, Buds Longing to Be Leaves<\/a><\/p>\n

The apples blossomed first. The old apricot\u2019s
\nfruit we missed visiting inquisitive relatives.
\nThe exuberant migratory bird
\nwho passed through last week has left us
\nand this evening in the garden recalls
\nthe surreptitious spring we shared
\nin a backwater province more home than here.
\nSo fertile then, we eked through months
\nof bliss with fear. Nothing came of it but
\nmy now looking from this knoll to the light
\nmatted by the screen of our kitchen door.
\nSo this is what we engendered seasons ago,
\nour bodies buds longing to be leaves.<\/i><\/p>\n

Yet as the changes rung upon the first tryptich (love change fear –> love change fear) show love is a complicated matter. It was a short term-marriage, as much my own fault as that of my partner. Soon I began a series of divorce poems, including:<\/p>\n

Golden Gate<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Rainbows burgeoned over the old apricot
\nI was watering, showers of tiny red leaves
\nleaves feigning rejuvenation. \u00a0I fell<\/i>
\n<\/i>into some weird trance. Friends \u00a0shed<\/i>
\n<\/i>inveterate habits, hobbled along<\/i>
\n<\/i>with canes, comfortable in their flab.<\/i>
\n<\/i>All went fine until their glib repartee<\/i>
\n<\/i>struck home. I lost my bearings.<\/i>
\n<\/i>You were hurt. I took fix after fix<\/i>
\n<\/i>on shooting stars. There was no choice.<\/i>
\n<\/i>I unleashed the hose, let it writhe<\/i>
\n<\/i>across the soggy lawn. Hoisting<\/i>
\n<\/i>my sacroiliac up the tree. Chary of tart<\/i>
\n<\/i>fruit, I\u00a0gazed with watering eyes<\/i>
\n<\/i>to the isthmus\u00a0of ocean, aching for an out.<\/i><\/p>\n

Reciprocity<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Down the well I threw a stone. No splash returned.
\nJust the right slice of night was served up instead.<\/i><\/p>\n

Twice now the moon\u2019s beckoned through the fog.
\nI\u2019m no fool: moonbeams can\u2019t be harnassed up to woe.<\/p>\n

Riders end up ridden, haulers hauled, just like
\nthe bars we put up to keep out thieves, not<\/p>\n

ourselves in. I married someone. I made her
\nunhappy. She learned to make me unhappy.<\/p>\n

So Clouds We Keep Making<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Earthlings we are, so clouds we keep making
\nlast in the sky as long as the light,
\nthoughts tracing the same thoughts at flight
\nin the afterglow of an undertaking.<\/i><\/i><\/p>\n

Say some man leaves his wife. Say she leaves.<\/i>
\n<\/i>Said man sees the sun set through winter smaze<\/i>
\n<\/i>though no orb sinks into distant waves,<\/i>
\n<\/i>it is the spin of the earth he perceives.<\/i><\/p>\n

Despite quakes and slopes plants grow straight
\non this planet. We walk about, change spheres,
\n<\/i>gravity keeping up and down athwart<\/i><\/p>\n

and mooring the sun as the solstice nears.
\n<\/i>Are there decent grounds to celebrate<\/i>
\n<\/i>when bodies slip their bonds and fly apart?<\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

* For permie, see XXX My first permie, an epithalamium of sorts, was composed in April, 1977 on the occasion of my first wedding: Those who who … love change fear fear love change change fear love love fear change change love fear fear change love love change fear\u00a0 I thought of it as a … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Epithalamium: My First Permie*”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2526"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2530,"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2526\/revisions\/2530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alteritas.net\/alteritas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}