Invocation to Spicer: Similia similibus curantor

My purse, my person, my extremest means / Lie all unlock’d to your occasions.
-William Shakespeare (Antonio to Bassanio,
Merchant of Venice I.i.141-142)

Whatever it was, Spicer thought
he could do it. I can’t say ship
without wanting it to wreck.
My map skills
fled for an argonaut
whilst sad songs
basically bleed cash.

No-one in America is a poet
for a living, and Rome
is a city in Georgia
as well as our terrible legacy.

Like Paul Célan saying
I would regale you with snow,
magic become desire
on the open throes
in the mouth of spring
by a literal lake the dog
drops the tennis
ball gingerly in
constructs for it
a moat.

To what do we dare/owe
this desire?
An obviate oracle
a leaflet with its hooks.

The north and the south pole
are the points from which
all directions on earth are figured.
Jack and his dying. Between
the tropic of cancer
and the arctic circle
you were headed
for a beauty contest in Berkeley.

Your mind’s tossing on the ocean
sometime tomorrow with your ships.
Jack, can’t you see how sad songs
help when you're sad?