the buddha doesn’t live here is James Darman’s third collection of poetry. I tried to contact Darman for
this review but he cannot be located. He is most likely living in a squat &
roaming the streets of Hartford, Connecticut where he grew up. His blog provides
no answers- it has been dormant since 2011. http://jamesdarman.blogspot.com.au/ Darman’s publisher, Wolfgang Carstens of Epic
Rites Press, is concerned and fears the worst. Carsten says, “Unfortunately, as
a ‘street person’ James has been missing in action for about two years. I
haven’t heard from him. In fact, he’s never seen his book; at least not to my
knowledge. I fear he may be dead.”
There are thirty-three
poems in this slim book. About ten have previously appeared in Rob Plath’s short-lived
on-line mag ‘Exuberant Ashtray’: http://rsplath.wordpress.com/2009/01/05/111/
the buddha doesn’t
live here derives its name from the seven page narrative title
poem. The persona, presumably the poet, lives in extreme poverty in a derelict
house. He takes the reader on a guided tour through his house and onto the neighbouring cold streets. As he enters a
coffee shop, he notices a smiling picture of the Buddha on the wall and concludes, “2515 Manton St./ the Buddha doesn’t/ live here/ he dwells nowhere at all/ this house is perfectly empty.” Instead like John Locke, Darman surmises that the source of his knowledge derives
from his senses rather than from some unseen world beyond: “these/
weather-beaten bones/ accept/ the cold rain/ thru every pore”.
Darman is a poet of
despair who has been highly influenced by the American poet Rob Plath’s style
and subject matter. Both use free verse with a leaning towards lower-case &
truncated words. Both pare their poems to the bone and write confessional
poetry to document the pain of their descent into some sort of undefinable existential void.
In Darman’s world there
is no god. He believes we are trapped by a system heavily weighted against us and that our ultimate
purpose is to learn to face the meaninglessness of existence alone. Wine and
quiet reflection can sometimes help make life more bearable but death is our
only reprieve. Darman seems to revere squalor and a monk-like silence
punctuates his verse. He lives fully aware that he lacks ambition and that his life is disintegrating all around him, “I am-// 10,000 things/ turning to dust”- without regret or self-pity.
Most of Darman’s
shorter poems reflect these core ideas and values. He often structures his
poems around a personal anecdote which provokes an intense realisation in the
poet which he conveys to the reader through a bleak but highly memorable image-
often related to his preoccupation with death. In ‘COLD CHICKEN & WINE
BLUES’ the poet sits on the porch and tersely concludes, “I drink the wine/ w/a
feeling/ that something/ is dying/ from the/ ground/ up.” In ‘THE EMPTINESS OF
A WINE BOTTLE’ he examines a wine bottle and joins the dots that “this empty/ green bottle/ will be large/ enough//to hold my/ bones one day.”
In ‘ONLY THE GARDENER KNOWS’ he imagines he is dead and his memorial plaque is
revealed to the gardener, “one day the gardener/ will run his blades/ across
the grass// & only he will know/ my name.” This pervading morbid
preoccupation with death is furthered in the poem ‘EAT, DRINK, WRITE’ where all
questions, as innocent as “how is it that you chase butterflies?” inevitably lead
the poet to infer that the one and only answer to everything is “Death...!/Madame/ Death...!”
Darman’s originality, in
part, derives not only from his stance as a homeless person but also from his
ability to achieve a sense of twisted unity in his work through his use of
stark natural motifs- birds, beetles, lizards, cats, flowers, stars, sun, sky,
home, trees, garden clouds, moon, wine, river- to name a handful of the images which
populate his verse. Usually these words have positive connotations, but in
Darman’s melancholic hands they often resonate with morbid or sinister
associations. In his bed-of-nails figurative take on life, birds shriek “idiot
songs”, a morning flower is “torn w/buckshot & suicide”, his chest is “a
deep frozen river”, the sun “turns like rancid butter’ and the like. Darman
turns natural restorative images inside-out to reveal a dark malise at his core.
In
the poem ‘9:05’ even the comforting power of silence
becomes a prelude to a ticking-bomb of cancer or madness in his mind:
9:05
there is a stillness
here
like cancer waiting
in a blue room
for the marrow
of bone
to arrive
& the fan’s whirl
& the cat’s tail
keep me company
there is a stillness
here
that is only broken
by the sound
of my
echoing
skull
(reprinted with the permission of the publisher)
Some of the longer
poems in the collection provide Darman with more scope to develop his ideas and
values. The opening poem ‘A POEM FOR
BUKOWSI’S JOCKEYS & MY SCROTUM’ appears to be both a tribute and a critique
of the dead LA poet. In a series of five poetry letter bombs to Bukowski, Darman
develops an unflattering portrait of himself and painfully suggests that
Bukowski, although an important role model, could never understand the intricacies
of his own sorrow. The last letter in prose poem style concludes in a
tragi-comedic way:
“Dearest Bukowski…
i’ve been to the
doctor’s office 3 times this week. each time
they gave me a new
prescription: Vicodin, doxycycline,
ciprofloxacin, aspirin-
my scrotum is still the size of a
softball- we are both
sick…& she loves me…i lost 2 teeth
this week. one while
eating a pork chop. the other while
smiling…i am
sick…Dearest Bukowski- w/flowers & stars
& moons…&
death…& butterflies & sparrows…& the
jockeys you left
behind…Dearest Bukowski- i am
sick…you were right!
most people are milktoast- most
people can’t change a
flat tire…most people will never get
the drinking, writing
or living right.”
One of the best poems
in the collection is ‘TO TEAR THE WINGS OFF.’
TO TEAR THE WINGS OFF
it is not the sadness
of a father’s betrayal
or a mother’s coat
hanger
or the voice across
the room
taller than Mt.
Kilimanjaro
beckoning
as you stand on the
other side
trying not to be
noticed
against the backdrop
of cheap French wallpaper
or the fact that there
is no food in the house
or the fact
that all yr clothes
are dirty
that yr head is full
of lice
that yr teeth aren’t
all there
that you don’t
understand the
math of living
for
calendars
or cars
or degrees
or a beautiful wife
or children
& empathy
will find
you tearing the wings
off
of butterflies
(reprinted with the permission of the publisher)
The beauty of the poem
lies in its rebelliousness but also in the understated way in which it rejects
mainstream American values. The listing of its complaints about society’s
expectations- a nice family, car and job- recalls Bukowski’s poem ‘machineguns
towers & timeclocks’ from his Crucifix
in a Deathhand collection. Where this poem goes a step further is in its
denial of betterment, in its caustic incorrigible view of the damaged.
This is a relentlessly
dark collection from the rare perspective of a homeless man. From his
“lifetime/ of park benches…of hard floors” Darman speculates not only about his own
physical and mental demise but also about humanity’s inevitable collapse as is foreshadowed in ‘A
REMINDER’. Despite the poverty and isolation, Darman finds pleasure in his surroundings.
In ‘TONIGHT THE STARS’ he gazes through a large hole in the ceiling and wryly
concludes, “the stars look good tonight w/a half a bottle of wine”. In ‘SONG FOR MY PALLBEARERS’
he recognises that death fills his heart but he wishes he has more life, “fill
my cup again dear friend/ there has never been enough!”
From
the “weeds & wildflowers” of his mind, Darman has thrown us this bright brittle
gem from the American underclass. I hope one day that James Darman will resurface- but
not with a new found god or love, or cheery, self-satisfied smile.
