p.61 of John Ashbery's "The System," 800% slower

p61 of Ashbery's the System 800 percent Slower

p61 of Ashbery's the System 800 percent Slower

Flowers are Prettier than You

1

My flowers are prettier than Melissa's,

prettier than flowers. You take advantage

of flowers & gifts, you said, you arrange

colors prettier than Celeste in the service,

flowers prettier than plain green leaf,

variety prettier than wedding. Thank you

for a walk among flowers. In June,

my flowers are perfect. We received

everything prettier than ourselves, simply

the flowers you prepared for, making

our day the flowers, prettier than I expect

of myself. Desire captured perfectly,

expertise and interest wedding me

to myself, my flowers are perfect.

  

2

Your pineapple flowers were prettier

than mine, the blue and yellow theme

my friends all mentioned, they were

prettier than flowers could be.

You did things along less traveled trails

prettier than I could hope for,

busier than woodland thoroughfares,

becoming prettier as the evening wore.

My cookie cutter was rough

on the flowers for Manny,

the centerpiece not sharp enough

for what I was planning.

Still, the yellow and blue

flowers are prettier than you.

Blue Book Marginalia c.2008

Though walk in beauty I may never

Nor beauty limn like Peter Gizzi,

Whose vowels soft and echoes clever

Smooth the strange to make it pretty;

Nor like Swenson make a lever

Of charming gardens and a local library

To move the literary world (Albion's

Angels may never call, nor the Iowans,

To make me timeless), I court frustration

By failing faith in the new new lyric:

Direct address in soft disjunction,

Routine craft of the cracked syntactic,
All the comforting beautifications

Avant rebels' debtors' I's make.

And though I never be printed in Fence,

I can’t make myself make such sense.