This is the way

I would talk
if I didn’t

apophenia have to think about

what I was saying.

text from reading at

“Syncoperipateticism
Prism Poetry Series, at its finest”
—Dr. Susan R. Larson
September 30, 2007
Tom W. Lewis
 “I wrote it in my mind” I wrote a pretended sign, I wrote a vision
and the ink I wrote out of mind ideas, I wrote it kindly
froze on paper. I wrote several out-of-body experiences no one really had
I wrote the young flies don’t pass their wisdom on to the old
. . . . I wrote she’s practicing piano across the street again
I wrote nails that come up in the spring we pick them up and use
I wrote a past for you them for repairing the roof
I wrote a part for circus dwarves I wrote all about sarcastic wit and the people who take it seriously
I wrote three dozen sensible requests I wrote an anger that cooked for me but didn’t clean the floors
I wrote nothing that wasn’t in the papers
I wrote with no intention of seeing my name in lights
I wrote and the sound of the words lasted . . . .
I wrote after the fact, I wrote fast
I wrote because of the effect
I wrote in the space capsule and watched it rise above the clouds I gave him the bum’s rush
I wrote young and was young the tennis ball
I wrote the time down but then the clock ran out of ink range of excuses
I wrote all the memories I hadn’t purged for spite the liquid diet
I wrote a season and then I wrote another one the premium medical plan.
I wrote because we’re all gonna die, but that doesn’t happen now I gave him my house, said
I wrote you this but in time you will fade away here, take it. my spectacles.
I wrote in a book but the book was made of edible materials I gave him a load
I wrote and it wasn’t work it was a house and what’s my address of what I was drinking that night.
I wrote about being lost when there was no money in it the drop of a pin
the angle on my cashflow
the luxury performance of my Subaru.

2 apophenia Tom W. Lewis apophenia Tom W. Lewis 2

 bringing people together. Don’t Flarf Me This Way, Baby
forcing them
to eat the horrible seed. every time. I baby brown.
warms your heart facilitate.
to see such pride thought I could the time goes by.
when oatmeal’s
boiling out there tell you. now
on the flip-side. don’t flarf me
the man-built I don’t think I this way, baby.
hand-built could ever tell you. don’t flarf me,
human-built
wall, each bright eyes.
imperfection listen. every time.
lasting, strengthening
as though I can only say this two hundred.
designed first once. come over here.
instead of
just mistakes. “dissolves
our reputation’s on under the lobe
what makes the leader strong?
an uncounted throng. the line. I thought of the tongue”
what makes a leader weak? I could tell you.
bare feet.
life’s not fare
litmus test. what are you staring at? when you owe
canary in a.
come on, you know I don’t think I can taxis
the rest of it. tell you this now.
do I have to spell
it out for you? word is love.
if you had a pen, come over here. every practical
you’d be writing
the same thing. time. I’ll only say
here, take this, this once: talents.
you do it now
for a while. thermometer.

3 apophenia Tom W. Lewis apophenia Tom W. Lewis 3

 Torah
these books expand.
these books receive.
these books are not read.
these books were not written.
these books fill the empty space.
these books waste away
or burn in a powerful blaze.
these books save.
these books condemn.
these books enlighten.
these books are on your shelf.
these books will have nothing
to do you with you.
every page means only to say
Hallelujah!
these books are a pathogen.
these books are a living disease.
these books grow with the times.
these books speak.
4 apophenia Tom W. Lewis
these books represent an equally
distant age when no law
was observed in any land.
these books exist.
these books are not written.
these books receive all who
seek them out.
. . . .
at Vello’s grave
come to the place of no languages,
of nothing spoken.
no one language,
telling nothing, only
the silence beyond tongues.
the place of no language.
nothing spoken.
darkness. living
in the silence.
a god of files & levers.
every thought reckoned,
all steps recognized
as made.
apophenia Tom W. Lewis 4
 controlled freefall. Couldn’t Hit the Muse Side

do wrong this time, Melpomene lost her sandal in the mud

Terpsichore stubbed her toe
next time is right.
Satanic mudras of the Underworld
drifting, praiseless, Every finger snaps and defends
with no cohort . . .
Unreadably dense in an hour’s time
That’s what they said in the forecast
listen to the way.
listen to the way. So black, so black. We couldn’t see cloud
listen to the way. And the urine-colored past is gone
listen to the way listen to the way listen to the way
The apparent action was only for show
listen to the way listen to the way listen to As Clio cartwheels into our barn
the way listen to the way listen to the way.
listen to the way. How clean must your hands be to throw a rock?
When it is little the work is pure
America, a vanguard. O screaming Sybil in leaf-piles, utterances
America, a cross goes on before. On Helicon the woodbine weaves women’s figures
This is nothing
you didn’t already know yourself. Tire wave and wrap so much in the heat
And so too the telephone cords, winding, flapping

can’t cut the cheese? “Or yourselves abundant.” I hope this means me
so sharpen the knife. And Calliope says, “the work is in the doing”
can’t hear the words?
Something will hit her in the divinity so right
so sing the song.
The hills sing and break at her terrible delight

5 apophenia Tom W. Lewis apophenia Tom W. Lewis 5

 samech is as much a sound
samech is as much a sound
samech is as much a sound
samech is as much a sound
see high the way any is spelled
see high the way any is spelled
samech is as much a sound, and
see high the way any is spelled
several tame leopards in the zoo
see high the way any is spelled
samech is as much a sound as
several tame leopards in the zoo
as much a sound as samech is
as much a sound as samech is
as see high the way any is spelled
as several tame leopards in the zoo
samech is as much a sound
samech is as much a sound
several tame leopards in the zoo
samech is as much a sound
samech is as much a sound
see high the way any is spelled
6 apophenia Tom W. Lewis
samech is as much a sound
samech is as much a sound
shaking or the tell is a thousand
as several tame leopards in the zoo
shaking or the tell is a thousand
shaking or the tell is a thousand
tell is a thousand or they’re shaking
they’re shaking the tell is a thousand
tell is a thousand or the shaking
the shaking the tell a thousand
. . . .
as see high tell as shaking
as tame leopards in the samech
as several sound like much
as much as leopards sound
as high the anyway is spelled
as samech is shaking is zoo
as tell see tame say the way
as a thousand high is sound
apophenia Tom W. Lewis 6
 ”this has got to be beautiful, Lydia” NYT * July 19, 2007—Bon Jovi Objects to Name of Energy Drink

1 anchovy
having deployed a vocabulary that constantly suggests falsification. ant jovial
wront words, Lydia. why insist? there’s time andro juice
and there’s sun and there’s green sneakers
for loping out to the street for a cigarette. jake it’s stated in bold
nothing special. nobody writing short stories this year. before the law
the houseboat foundered. fading like a planet. it will take time and tempo
even the Pop songs are dislocated nothing but pop
the next time Murph plays them. to put pieces of money
even the radios smoke with hypnagogia.
a kind of daylight waking diaspora for their boon jinx
sarcastic absence. house under a tree violate bond
and under a tree the house was built. vitiate bong
make grass as soft as smoke again.
sounds as significant as S-O-S in the common, together in a blender
seeping alarm to those girls with plastic sandals. sounds about the same
if you’ve got nothing but sweat
2 energy in kilojules
“this has got to be beautiful, Lydia. got to be beautiful.” electric guitar in hemoglobin
huge cookies. this has got to be brownish light
on greyish asphalt stretched into streets boring jeunes
of a lazy city. none work but all wear perfume. born joven
“you’ll find out what this means, Lydia, after the poem’s over.” abort young
you think grass indulges in aesthetic indictments
during the seven-o’clock hour? “this has got to be prisming central sphere of noise
something you like. something in Paris. that’s where
stories naturally begin.” so what did this mean?

7 apophenia Tom W. Lewis apophenia Tom W. Lewis 7

 from Socrates: make you a legend
in her own mind!! (cut-up)
At legend. Who is so in with and
Withdrawn from the relative, that these are plain??
I long for you well,
And with the same again not following,
With the contrary in withdrawn wood.
Thus, easily we do Viagra.
But the men are quantitative, of the same mind!!
Nor mind!! Having same, not the substance.
Another cannot own again, from both
Problems: that pair of Viagra and the ox again.
That we make of wood, heated,
And seated, one true thing: plain white mind!!
....
8 apophenia Tom W. Lewis
hey toilet man who broke your arms?
morale in this place has never been lower
could be the sticky weather everyone says everyone is having
this time of year
it’s the rays that get you every one pinpointing an exact atom
over some patch of skin and drilling in
seep through and douse the paper in a stiff kind of transfer
we must have evolved to relate to that sort of thing, but
Darwin wouldn’t last five minutes of grilling if that was
what you were into
. . . .
torque named any in pop apricot fast any
because of an erased provocation? see, the
meat got ran, you know, for the wanted god of it
is it too much, have it’s only could how (this love,
couldn’t prophecy for the clouds on its torque turn
and by this leopard wrench where the line is drawn
they’re angels creaking, run under everything
that happens wtih the tone we drew, everyone of you
timing now ranching a mean heard grammar,
with this Merry mutter and clouds breaking
got the wild side, by berries for the dropping
apophenia Tom W. Lewis 8