Iowa Writes

ANNE CARSON
"TV Men: Artaud"


Artaud is mad.
He stayed close to the madness. Watching it breathe or not breathe.
There is a close-up of me driven to despair.

His face is mad.
It was something of fire on which his soul wrote. All this mental glass.
Me beating my head against a wall.

His body is mad.
Some days he felt uterine. Mind screwed into him by a thrust of sky.
I run among the ruins.

His mind is mad.
There was (he decided) no mind. The body (hell) just as you see it.
Go throw myself from the tower, gesticulating, falling.

Artaud is mad.
He stayed close to the madness. Watching it breathe or not breathe.
There is a close-up of me driven to despair.

His face is mad.
It was something of fire on which his soul wrote. All this mental glass.
Me beating my head against a wall.

His body is mad.
Some days he felt uterine. Mind screwed into him by a thrust of sky.
I run among the ruins.

His mind is mad.
There was (he decided) no mind. The body (hell) just as you see it.
Go throw myself from the tower, gesticulating, falling.

His hospital is mad.
He noted in electric shock a splash state. What holes, and made of what?
Falling to the beach.

His Mexico is mad.
There was not a shadow he did not count. No opium, no heads on the days.
You see my body crumpled on the sand.

His God is mad.
He felt God pulling him out through his own cunt. Claque. Claque-dents.
It moves convulsively a few times.

His double is mad.
The drawback of being mad was that he could not both be so and say so.
Beautiful jerks.

His word is mad.
He had to become an enigma to himself. To prevent his own theft of him.
You see my battered face.

His excrement is mad.
He envied bones their purity. Hated to die rectified (as he said) by pain.
Then I fall back.

His spring is now mad.
They found him at dawn. Seated at the foot of his bed. Holding his shoe.
And shy away.

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About Iowa Writes

Since 2006, Iowa Writes has featured the work of Iowa-identified writers (whether they have Iowa roots or live here now) and work published by Iowa journals and publishers on The Daily Palette. Iowa Writes features poetry, fiction, or nonfiction twice a week on the Palette.

In November of 2008, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated Iowa City, Iowa, the world's third City of Literature, making the community part of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network.

Iowa City has joined Edinburgh, Scotland and Melbourne, Australia as UNESCO Cities of Literature.

Find out more about submitting by contacting iowa-writes@uiowa.edu


ANNE CARSON

Anne Carson is a Canadian poet, essayist, translator, and a professor of Classics.

"TV Men: Artaud," published in issue 26.2 of The Iowa Review, can be found on the magazine's online archives.

This page was first displayed
on July 24, 2013

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