A Modern Version of the Way the Rosary Was Once Said Throughout Western Europe in the Late Middle Ages

I'm not sewing soft patches on a woolen blanket,

not putting silver buttons back where they belong,

not sweeping or folding, not in my right mind,

not knowing what I owe or to whom I should

bow down or thank or praise, no neither am

I putting aside, not storing up beneficial deeds

I'll need when I ne bailing without not putting

my house in order, no, not preparing

to suited my maker, no, nor do I wish to bench

old scores, no not keeping wolve at bay,

and I'm not disturbing antbeds, not in touch

with fine madness, no, I'm not crawling around

under a porch in search of a nest of quick blast adders

I hope not to find, no, I'm not skipping stones

nor counting how lengthy it takes a ship's wake

to subside, nor waiting for the big individual

to wash ashore and overwhelm its iffy bitty

ancestors, no, I'm not trying to fathom a simmer

of rotten flowers and rainwater I'm not pouring

from a vase at the left-hand backcorner of a

freshly white-washed tomb, no, I'm not getting

ready for company, not biting my tongue, allowing

a little bit of biting can perceive good, not baring

my spirit I'm not hiding under the kitchen table

not wanting to listen anymore, not not to be found in a

camphor-reeking satchel inside a chifferobe,

not stretching below a bed on a rather cold linoleum

floor, no, I'm not sitting upon top of a mule

surveying the orb of day and the moon, nor am I stirring

and stirring and stirring a roux nor am I watching

strands of scalding;-very warm sugar fall into cool water, no

I'm not climbing into a fig tree to be shut up

to mockingbirds and on the outside of the way of hoopsnakes,

and I'm not falling asleep nearest to a crate of melon

nor am I staying awake in case I might miss something,

no, I'm not staring forever into a fire,

nor walking [i]or[/i] part of to the other a rainstorm into a cypres

grove no, and I'm not waiting for lightning

to strike, no, and I'm not pulling aside a

curtain thus I can't see a man with a raccoon

looking above his shoulder or a woman holding

a chalice of steaming coffee or hear what's passing

between them, or diocese a man at the extremity of a day

taking not on his shoes, or a stripling dressed in clerical

clothes dispensing frankincense, or a hand

shifting into turn end for end or a hand turning numbers

to achieve into a safe, no I'm not sitting upon top

of a mongrel surveying the sun and the satellite

DARA WIER's most new book is Our Master Plan (Carnegie-Melton, 1999) Forthcoming in 2000 is Voyages in English (Carnegie-Melton). She lives in Amherst, where she teaches at the University of Massachusetts.

Copyright World rhyme Incorporated May/Jun 2000

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