By Yukihede Maeshima Hartman
A poet brings to The Future what is beyond time and space. A pet
at his side. His wings are made of cheesecloth. His eyes are buttons,
glowing in the dark.
What is not known. What is about to happen. He is there, half in
a dream world.
And if he gives you a headache or a heartache, that’s his pleasure.
If you miss that, there is no future. That is to say, he knows how
to push you against the wall. Gently. And you fall into a mythical
dimension – You don’t know that yet.
Seeing is not always believing, you might say. Seeing sometimes makes
you wonder. And wondering leads you astray. Have it any way you want.
That’s your pleasure.
You break the framework. Future shock, a poet keeps his suitcase
packed. You’ll never know when he is called to the unknown. He is
already there. Look deep into his eyes and beyond, and there you
have it.
And you, too. You’re learning a new motor skill, a new language, an awkward
attempt at singing. The voice comes not from the same place as before.
And you choke. That’s a good sign. You are trying.
You try to catch something and you don’t even know what it is. It
gives you a jolt, a surprise encounter, which is followed by
nightmares. Aren’t they wonderful? A rite of passage. A roller
coaster is about to take off. You hold on. All upside down, twisting
and turning, and the sky so blue. You turn up the power, and it
turns bluer. Your control is excellent.
You draw the red line on the blue background. It tells you something.
You have created something. You follow the red line to its logical
Conclusion. You enter the abyss.
That’s the future. And this is the mirror that reflects the labyrinth,
that is us. The future looks into it, and shuttering it, replaces
it with its own reflecting pool, burning at the edges.
We are poised for something. We stumble onto a blank stare, and nothing
is revealed. Such sweetness.
What you already know: Comings and goings. What can happen. What
can’t. It’s time for a wine and pleasure. And for destruction and
revolt. Take your pick. All that is of life and art, its false and
true premise.
What you don’t know. What may happen. You go down on the barge down
a river to the Outer Galaxy. Or go up a river to a stream,
to the original forest. Where your faces are undisguised and clear.
Our slender beliefs. They are embedded to this realm. That’s the
Future.
Look, Time is a holograph. You start from a point in the holograph.
You go on. You end up on the same plane. You start from the outside
to its core, and you will become smaller and smaller, until there
is no you. This is where a poet disappears and sings. You see,
dimensions can be exchangeable.
I’ve heard that when their plane crashes in the Amazon, no one goes
to look for survivors for more than a day or so. The assumption
is that no one survives the Amazon. The survivors, if any, are
on their own, obviously. Once there was a twelve-year-old girl who escaped
from the crash after traveling 420 kilometers. I think it took her
3 weeks.
A poet who disappears into the beyond, who would look for him? When
no one actually knows whether he is going or not. Most likely, though,
he is gone, and trying desperately to come back. And when he returns,
there is rejoicing. Or a disturbance. Disturbance because as he
comes back, Time contracts and expands and strangely, and all else must
be aligned to this standard. Call it a warp. And it begins to shake
your foundations.
The journey that he takes to the beyond. He takes you back and forth
In any mode you like, and don’t. Including the future. Illumination is
the vehicle, sometimes dark as black diamonds.
Seeing is not always believing. What you can’t see, what is beyond
your grasp. You believe, and that’s not what you mean. You give up.
And maybe, it may begin to make some sense.
You come back, where nothing is the same. You come back to the
future. You study it for a while. You share it with the world. In
a way.
The future. It catches up with you. Is it going upstream or
downstream? If you can answer that, you’ve rendered the future.
We surrender our notion of Time and Space, and arrive at the
beginning. In the meanwhile, these are our sweet confusions that
we indulge in, and their bitter after-taste. We construct a mirror
that reflects these things. What we don’t know. We look into it,
and we don’t see. We stumble upon it, and we see too much. Breaking
and entering, we come into this strange and deserted arena. And the
mirror standstill. We look into it. And the mirror is flying.
It is May 5, 1989, in New York City. I asked Frank O’Hara, Is this
it? And he just laughs. He has come back from the show:
‘The Effect
Of the Future on Postmodern Art.’ He is amused. He is about to say
Something, but changes his mind. Instead, he wants a large beach
towel. And after that, a stiff drink.
When a dream comes true, you think you were still dreaming.
It means
That you were not there, yet.
Yuki Maeshima Hartman was born in Tokyo and emigrated to New York in 1958. This work was first published in The Poetry Project newsletter, then appeared in his book, New Poems, 1991. Paul Violi has called Hartman, “one of the best poets in New York.”
