composed slowly. Transposed "Losing My Religion"
to D-flat. Posted six point five "do not disturb"
signs outside my office. Awaited revelation.
In such manner I wrote this—poem / public display
of futility / exercise in repeating cacophony.
Or is it a sestina? Form eclipses

purpose. Either I'm watching solar eclipses
like an Aztec priest, turning absence into religion,
or I'm missing something. This poem's cacophony
supposed to reveal something important—how apricots disturb
the universe; why women never display
interest in me beyond the second date; or revelation.

But I'm still wrestling the form. So, here's your revelation:
As a young Mayan boy, I stared into solar eclipses,
was blinded by the burnt celestial display,
hesitated to tell the priests; you see, their religious
cants disturb me, much like Phillip Glass disturbs
me, weaving in and never out of cacophony.

(Does it surprise you to find cacophony
at the center of this poem?) Revelation
is the only solution for blindness. I let them disturb
me for thirty-nine months, until the next lunar eclipse.
The sun and moon are opposites. The religion
is simple. One blinds you from the world. One re-displays

it. Like the power switch on my LCD display.
One second, I'm lost in its blackness; the next, cacophony:
six words repeating in their own incessant religion.
From this I'm supposed to derive revelation?
I tried it once. Made some pick-up line about an eclipse.
Used the same six words over and over again. Disturbed

the hell out of chicks. But this, this really disturbed
me—when I met Ginsberg at a church. He put on a display
of how he wins women's hearts. No eclipses.
Just random chit-chat. A few unplanned smiles. Cacophony
is the opiate of the masses, he said. Revelation
is that, and this alone. He won their hearts. His only religion,

that of disturbing form, constructing cacophony.
But this display was not enough, was like buying revelation
from eclipses. What I needed was religion.