Banjo Crescendo

Preliminary Invocation

Of Blood & The River

2016 8/30

(29.) ASTAROTH. - The Twenty-ninth Spirit is Astaroth. He is a Mighty, Strong Duke, and appeareth in the Form of an hurtful Angel riding on an Infernal Beast like a Dragon, and carrying in his right hand a Viper. Thou must in no wise let him approach too near unto thee, lest he do thee damage by his Noisome Breath. Wherefore the Magician must hold the Magical Ring near his face, and that will defend him. He giveth true answers of things Past, Present, and to Come, and can discover all Secrets. He will declare wittingly how the Spirits fell, if desired, and the reason of his own fall. He can make men wonderfully knowing in all Liberal Sciences. He ruleth 40 Legions of Spirits. His Seal is this, which wear thou as a Lamen before thee, or else he will not appear nor yet obey thee, etc.

After the Sumerian:

Inana abandoned heaven, abandoned earth,

and descended to the underworld.

She said:

Come my faithful minister

my minister who speaks fair words,

my escort who speaks trustworthy words

I am going to give you instructions:

my instructions must be followed;

On this day I will descend .

When I have arrived in the underworld,

make a lament for me on the ruin mounds.

Beat the drum for me in the sanctuary.

Make the rounds of the houses of the gods for me.

Lacerate your eyes for me,

lacerate your nose for me.

Lacerate your ears for me, in public.

In private, lacerate your buttocks for me.

Like a pauper, clothe yourself in a single garment

and all alone set your foot in the Mountain-house,

The house of the storm

When you have entered the Mountain-house,

the house of the storm

lament before the storm-god

Father, don't let anyone kill your daughter in the underworld.

Don't let your precious metal be alloyed there with the dirt of the grave

Don't let your precious lapis lazuli be split there with the mason's stone.

Don't let your boxwood be chopped up there with the carpenter's wood.

Don't let young lady Inana be slaughtered in the underworld."

When Inana arrived at the palace

she pushed aggressively on the door of the underworld.

She shouted aggressively at the gate of the underworld:

Open up, doorman, open up.

Open up

I am all alone and I want to come in.

2016 7/30

(28.) BERITH. - The Twenty-eighth Spirit in Order, as Solomon bound them, is named Berith. He is a Mighty, Great, and Terrible Duke. He hath two other Names given unto him by men of later times, viz.: BEALE, or BEAL, and BOFRY or BOLFRY. He appeareth in the Form of a Soldier with Red Clothing, riding upon a Red Horse, and having a Crown of Gold upon his head. He giveth true answers, Past, Present, and to Come. Thou must make use of a Ring in calling him forth, as is before spoken of regarding Beleth.17 He can turn all metals into Gold. He can give Dignities, and can confirm them unto Man. He speaketh with a, very clear and subtle Voice. He governeth 26 Legions of Spirits. His Seal is this, etc.

In the year 1609,

Madeleine de Demandolx de la Palud , a 14 year old nun

prone to fits of melancholy and petulance

returned to her family's care for just such an episode

met a friend of the family,

Father Louis Gaufridi

a priest of a lower class, but witty

twenty years her senior

Soon, rumors began circulating

Gaufridi had spent an hour and a half closeted with the girl

they were prone to intense conversation

Madeleine admitted to Mother Catherine de Gaumer

at the Ursuline convent of Marseille

that the handsome priest had his way with her

and the mother superior sent her to the convent

at Aix en Provence, far from his touch

and for two years, nothing happened.

Madeleine became subject to shaking fits

her face convulsed and writhed

she shouted obscenities

and before Christmas, at confession

she smashed a crucifix.

Father Romillon, her confessor, attempted an exorcism

Three other nuns caught her malady

and began convulsing, crying out

Madeeline claimed Gaufridi

had been given intoxicating breath by the devil

had given her a green devil as a familiar

that he had first had intercourse with her

when she was nine

and that he had given her a charmed peach

that he had denied god, and given her a powder

that any offspring she bore

would not bear his face

Louise Capeau, another nun

spoke in the voices of a demon named Verin

convulsed and screamed like a flock of parrots

claimed she would not be free until Gaufridi was killed

Romilon reached out, in despair

to the grand inquisitor, and then another exorcist

Verin spoke, in a deep voice

blamed Gaufridi for 6,660 demons in her body

Astaroth, Ba'al Berith a host of black birds

for the ecstasies that racked her body

Gaufridi was sent for to exorcise Capeau

Verin claimed Gaufridi had eaten human flesh

and every tangle that bodies can do

claimed he was marked of the devil

Gaufridi did not know the rite of exorcism

and the nuns, drunk on the devil

called him magician, witch, fumbler

Gaufridi said, exasperated

“If I were a witch, I would certainly give my soul to a thousand devils!”

Gaufridi was taken into custody

his body searched for the devil's mark

his quarters searched for black books,

for tapers of baby fat

nothing was found

Released, he petitioned the pope to clear his name

took legal actions to suppress the convent

in her cell, Madeleine neighed like a horse

sang love songs, vomited froth

laughed and cried, disrupted mass

her bones cracking, her bowels unsprung

she crooned of sabbats, of blood libel and sodomy

Gaufridi was brought to court

and the devils allowed to testify against him

the girls writhed and had orgasms in his presence

shouted out that all was false, then showed their

devils marks under their breasts

Madeline's maidenhead was inspected

in despair, rat bitten and shaved

Gaufridi said the truth did not matter anymore

confessed to eating babies

sorcery, magic, idolatry, and fornication

He was strung up, dropped,

his bones delocated

weights were attached to his feet

and he was dropped again

he refused to indict Madeline in anything

and was finally dragged through the streets of Aix

in a sled for five hours

then by merciful dispensation of the bishop

strangled, before being burned atop a pile of bushes.

Madeline was cured and exhibited no more signs

though the posession burned through two more convents

and condemned a blind girl to the pyre

In 1642 Madeline was accused of witchcraft

and spent her inheritance on her defense

again in 1652, when witches marks were found on her body

after ten years in prison, she was released

and died in the care of her family, at 77

2016 6/30

(27.) RONOVE. - The Twenty-seventh Spirit is Ronove. He appeareth in the Form of a Monster. He teacheth the Art of Rhetoric very well and giveth Good Servants, Knowledge of Tongues, and Favours with Friends or Foes. He is a Marquis and Great Earl; and there be under his command 19 Legions of Spirits. His Seal is this, etc.

My house the dead house

the burned house on the weedy lot

black timbers shipwreck the mud

My book the dead book

pages brown with burst pipes

crawling with silverfish, with woodlice

ancient engines turn to dust

and scarecrow Christ rots in the dustmotes

of a locked house, windowless

my hand a dead hand

with black rimmed nails,

scarred, relentless

rough edged as a rasp, as a file

as a salt-eaten rocker panel

the widow's car, resting on it's axles

the dry-rotted foam of the upholstery

crawling with infant mice,

birds wheel in the open attic

flashlight glow of eyes in the lightening struck tree

the moon pooled in every leaf

My mouth a dead mouth

stuffed with gravedirt to bury you

with bent pulled nails, with tacks and woodscrews

dead tubes, transistors, flux and lead

my teeth are dead teeth

that break, and yellow, the gums drawn back

to the rotting bone, cutting torch and framing hammer

my black boots ring on your floor

leave grease wherever they go

hobnails and cinders, the calligraphy of all I have touched

In your dream I am a mouthless

giggle, a worm that swallows the sun

the rictus-grin of a drowned dog

black eyes of the rat in the trap

the cold weight of my touch

heavy as a malt sack, and cold

Like a bottomless pool of oil and gasoline

a cloud of gas in a crawlspace

a spark in a pile of rags

all my tools rust in locked dark

all the heralds of my homecoming

2016 5/30

(26.) BUNE, or BIME. - The Twenty-sixth Spirit is Bune (or Bim). He is a Strong, Great and Mighty Duke. He appeareth in the form of a Dragon with three heads, one like a Dog, one like a Gryphon, and one like a Man. He speaketh with a high and comely Voice. He changeth the Place of the Dead, and causeth the Spirits which be under him to gather together upon your Sepulchres. He giveth Riches unto a Man, and maketh him Wise and Eloquent. He giveth true Answers unto Demands. And he governeth 30 Legions of Spirits. His Seal is this, unto the which he oweth Obedience. He hath another Seal (which is the first of these,15 but the last is the best

We would cut through the woods,

past the empty house with it's rotting curtains

the bullet hole-riddled no trespassing signs

where the trailer-dwellers fired rock salt at us

We would climb the back fence,

a few overgrown, forgotten graves

in the thick brush

cross the gravel path in the dark, hiding from cops

local legend said

if you kissed the angel statue at midnight

it's eyes would light up

said a light burned in the mausoleum

and someone wrote, or cried inside

we would run through the fog-filled bowl

of the muddy pond

drink stolen liquor

smoke shitty weed

on the mausoleum steps

lay on the toppled cross

came once, at midnight

to find a mausoleum door

standing open

a casket sitting in the middle of the road

saw the spray-painted swastikas

of teenagers worse than us

when you died they burned your body

threw your ashes in some lake

they never told me where.

2016 4/30

(25.) GLASYA-LABOLAS. - The Twenty-fifth Spirit is Glasya-Labolas. He is a Mighty President and Earl, and showeth himself in the form of a Dog with Wings like a Gryphon. He teacheth all Arts and Sciences in an instant, and is an Author of Bloodshed and Manslaughter. He teacheth all things Past, and to Come. If desired he causeth the love both of Friends and of Foes. He can make a Man to go Invisible. And he hath under his command 36 Legions of Spirits. His Seal is this, to be, etc. (26.)

What thirst the rocks must have

soaked and never slaked

thirst of dead things,

of dry seasons

dry roadbeds filled with bristling armaments

with the hurl of stones across fences

from the first murder and the feast that followed

how each son dreams he is fatherless

the knives we spit at each other

and we, each a world

so easy to break

a cheap leather suitcase

stuffed with forgotten names

and quotes out of old books

with misremembered songs

the untidy, temporary business of life

we are hastily poured cups

that spill so easily

history a heap of gnawed bones

2016 2/30

AIM. - The Twenty-third Spirit is Aim. He is a Great Strong Duke. He appeareth in the form of a very handsome Man in body, but with three Heads; the first, like a Serpent, the second like a Man having two Stars on his Forehead, the third like a Calf. He rideth on a Viper, carrying a Firebrand in his Hand, wherewith he setteth cities, castles, and great Places, on fire. He maketh thee witty in all manner of ways, and giveth true answers unto private matters. He governeth 26 Legions of Inferior Spirits; and his Seal is this, which wear thou as aforesaid, etc.

The hoard we threaded our way through

welding tanks and boxes with question marks on the sides

gutted televisions, an oscilloscope

a piano, a dead aquarium

the black phone, the oil and the gasoline

the bedrooms packed with rotting fabric

with wet books

the crumbling walls

the dropping ceiling

the thousand mice

consumed in fire

do you resurrect?

Stand flickering in the half-dark

your overgrown foundations

a dare, a legend trip

for local teenagers

your overflowing garage,

clay ditch and fire-pit?

Or do you sleep in the mud

you glutted mouth

and await our return

we ghosts of Illinois

2016 1/30

A partial index of kisses before the age of consent

Beside the fishpond, too hard, and bumping teeth

in the back of a pickup open mouthed and tongueless

till our jaws ached from the empty feast of it

in dreams against imagined sex smooth as a dolphin's blowhole

furitively, the back of the hand,

shehulk and vampirella and cherry poptart in smeary newsprint

sheen of oil in a hustler, a oui, a cheri

a bad-tracked betamax snowstorm

back, then, drunk babysitter

hitting drums with wooden spoons

with ragged-tatters of insulation hanging like party streamers

with the foster girl beside the dumpsters, almost.

some distant cousin in the funeral parlor break room

to the biker's daughter, the trash-filled woods

in truth. In dare.

yellow polaroids older than memory

frozen sun, rapturous with an unremembered neighbor

who dared me eat a white spider

in the pig farm's dirt

or back to origin, my godmother

with jack daniels on her breath

or past innocence

a girl on a set of steps

who had had a Budweiser bottle broken over her head

beneath the cloud of county fair dreamcatchers

in the trailer park

on a cement pad beside a highway

covered in blood and dresed in white

in the rotting airstream, with old milwaukee

and bad hashish

in the haunted basements

in the gravitron line, the himalaya, the screaming eagle

through clouds of aquanet and cherry chapstick, sloe gin and coke

on the steps of the silverball arcade

in exchange for a Ratt t-shirt

after crawling through a doube-wide window

after everyone had gone to sleep

and rubber banded braces backstage at the crucible

in a maze of basements, and the rooftop of the athena

with college freshman and a mouth full of towny lies

in bathrooms, in stairwells

in the theater they were stripping of asbestos

in bonfire-lit woods in the river smelling mud

in the rock ridges of the hills

with my stepfather's mistress

in prayer to the devil

with shotgunned smoke, with old crow

with two mezcal worms in my belly

with a head full of blotter acid

in the woodshop bathroom atop a cracked sink

in a storm sewer, in a tent shaking with speed

on the handlebars of a half-stolen bicycle

under the railway trestle

in sprung beds and rent to own couches

and roach filled apartments above the street

in a forest green chrysler sedan with a dead battery

in a thousand graveyards

in the kicked in mausoleum

in the empty church

in the ruined house, beside the dead well

before the fire came