Kiefer Lights a Big Cigar

 

& waves the heavy machinery into place

He rearranges the rubble

speaking whichever language suits the occasion

He & Tony saunter through a tunnel in the South of France

“It’s my gesture” is what he says about his art

His use of lead & straw reminds me of a Jack Gilbert poem

Kiefer & Werner Herzog must never meet

If they have, they must never admit it

(When Gerhard Richter met Stockhausen

neither one was left unscathed)

Kiefer carries the weight of the world on his shoulders

& shakes it off with a flick of his cigar

 

—Klipschutz

 

 

The Poet’s Garden

 

Without these words, without these needs,

how much simpler life would be: free

from invidious and irrelevant comparisons,

resentful longings, and obscurely realized

self-actualizations: a life less whole,

a lifeless hole… but a destiny, at last,

within my control – striving

only towards resignation,

a worthy goal.

 

—John Tottenham