I Am Starting Up This Work Now in New York

Note: In the thick of reading through Kenneth Koch’s poems, I found myself uninspired by the drawn-out, occasionally rhyming poetry. I plugged on with this cento but it, too, is relatively uninspired (the blame mine!). But I’m releasing it into the ether regardless.

I’m writing in addition more lines to clarify my present disposition:

I am always in love, I am always suffering from love:
I love you fame I love you raining sun I love you cigarettes.

Is it you who fill me up so? Is it you who are carrying me away?
What do you think, heart? I do notice you are beating like anything!

When the body is excited, beauty is more evident.
I might want to look at you all day long, because you are mine.

It’s for you I’ve made this chanson. For you and that big dark blue.
Once you have heard this poem you will not love any other.

(I am sorry, but it was morning, and I had nothing to do).

Cento after Kenneth Koch
——

Lines taken from the following Kenneth Koch poems (in order):

• Bel Canto
• Talking to Patrizia
• In Love with You
• To Life
• To My Heart as I Go Along
• On Beauty
• To Various Persons Talked to All at Once
• Down at the Docks
• Fresh Air
• Variations on a Theme by William Carlos Williams