Rae Armantrout's Versed, second selection

Here is a selection of passages from the second section/half of the book, titled "Dark Matter." Versed has entranced me with its meticulously honed lyricism and intelligence; I recommend it most highly.

Time is made from swatches

of heaven and hell.

If we're not killing it,

we're hungry.

last two stanzas of "Simple"

The impossible woman,

part igneous,

part surge.

from "Resounding"

Each actor's face

seems to have survived

the same brave battle

to remain in character.

They're posed

on the rubble

used to indicate

the past.

It turns out

this is heaven.

the second section of "The Racket"

In dreams, the words

speak themselves.

last stanza of "Left"

The spread

of vicious talent contests

mimics the selection

of those best adapted

to the stage

of service industry capitalism.

first section of "The Light"

The present

is a sentimental favorite,

with its heady mix

of grandiosity

and abjection,

truncated,

framed.

second section of "Apartment"

Once we believed the bees,

moving as attention does,

settling and lifting

from blue identicals,

were the picture

of eternity.

first section of "Still"

God was momentum then,

that impatience

with interruption,

from "Hoop"

I'm looking for a

heart to heart,

a rhyme

between the blankness of my

"my"

and the blue emptiness

second and final section of "Someone"

Rae Armantrout's Versed can be purchased from The Book Depository for just £7.24, with free shipping.