501

every poem
numbered
milestones
on my highway
of words

a little headway

501
this numbered poem
its imprecise reckoning
lost in paper scraps

data
encoded for nothing
imprisoned for nothing

every poem numbered
lines already broken
half-rhymes half-written
the flawed art of writing

every poem numbered
sequence and significance
voided

every fag-packet scrawl
thrown away useless
hidden or hoarded
for some poetic rainy day

every poem numbered
but the world adds its own

the more I write
the more I must write
words unwritten

every poem to fill a hollow
or like a blade cut to a mark
not made by me

501: 
the face of god
in human shape
the angelic number 
of change

© BH, 2018

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I’d ben saying for months that I was soon to write my 500th poem. 500 poems in 49 years… That poem was Fisher and I thought I’d mark the occasion by writing poem 501.

Sifting my archives over New Year, I discovered fragments I’d written in those 49 years, some worth an update or even completion. So 500 and 501 are just numbers. The truth about sequence is that it is defined by chance, inclusion, selection and so on.

That is the poet’s curse: to impose a pattern on the universe only to discover it is only a pattern from where you see it. Like constellations of stars, I suppose. Besides the choice of references to embed are often myriad. 

For example, I looked at 501. I found it could refer to: HTTP status code – not implemented; SMTP Error Syntax error in parameters or arguments; a US Non-profit tax exemption; the Arkansa area code; the Angel number meaning life changes, upheaval, transition; in numerology, God’s human face  - from "temunah" (image) and "parsuf 'adam" (human face); the sum of the first 18 primes.

To weave them all in (there are even more, by the way) would have been clumsy. 

I did what I could…

THE ILLUSTRATION'S BASE IMAGE IS A PHOTO BY DIANE ARBUS '42ND STREET MOVIE THEATER'