Reading Red

Charles Bernstein

1.

Reading red

only event

over & under

fuses

green with

(no idea

2.

Road Show

Face on face

hides (divides)

not what’s inside

but what’s

3.

Four Foot Six

Dear Blue,

Dear Orange,

knock me for obtuse

rending (rendering)

layers of treats,

rips

4.

5.

Dear/Duel

Delirium would stand for

what’s next to

the girls next door

the boy who falls

beside oneself in a sane way

6.

There is no level

In the middle ground

7.

Double & Out

Remove the ground

triple the crack

you still won’t get

the middle back

the pains are yellow

& speak like facts

flush then drained

absorption’s knack

8.

Side by Side

The shadow falls

& the object appears in

the space between

(don’t ever leave)

9.

Blue Blue (Off the Mark)

I’d like to talk to you about the mistakes

We just can’t handle

laminating (lamentation)

warp us as

humility changes

We don’t have to

10.

Where the fold should be

There is no fold

11.

No Man’s Land (Call and Response!

now that I’m

old as I am

the more I appreciate

that moment of

human life

I must

have lived

through but

didn’t experience

at the time

you can’t paint

what you can’t feel

12.

Broken Token

Hush

slips sealed

13.

Dear. Here

if a tree could

talk you would

not understand

its bark only its

bite

14.

Loopy

a

pine

is

a

curve

that

isn’t

deterred

15.

color is not about the object

but a part of the human being

not inside but outside

not outside but inside

16.

Key Lime Hide

It’s about playing a game

the way a lamp shines out at

flight

but the subject is still

overlay & under-

cover, in which

the line pertains

to neither

either, ether

17.

White along edge

Bark of tree

As if blue becomes a

lighter color

Holds

As you make your bed then

lie in it

Ground father to

Figuration

18.

The Knees Have It

I had a double meter

I gave my father half

He put it in his pocket

Then threw it in the trash

Now since that time I’ve lost a dime

I’ve even broke a flute

But all I want’s that half a rime

To bleat the denting out

19.

Duophone

East is hung & south

is its

torn motion

belongs to Caesar

  neither, or

   north’s west passagelessness

20.

This Side Up

flues cross

memory’s encyclopedic

permutations—

transparent, succumb

“the body,

the

21.

Zone

no circle

no shape

coming out of my mouth

“the sun is but a morning star”

22.

Don’t Touch

Shadow cast on black

mocks line

cleave, dart, splinter

23.

Can’t hold what resists

enclosure—

a village of

malcontents

Dear or Don’t

Agents of

24.

Against Itself

like a cut in skin

or the bleating of edges

into the frost

the paintbrush is the forest of society

25.

strongest attempt

the work could make

to destroy itself