Cosmopolitan Greetings, by ALLEN GINSBERG
To Struga Festival Golden Wreath Laureates
& International Bards 1986
Stand up against governments, against God.
Stay irresponsible.
Say only what we know & imagine.
Absolutes are coercion.
Change is absolute.
Ordinary mind includes eternal perceptions.
Observe what’s vivid.
Notice what you notice.
Catch yourself thinking.
Vividness is self-selecting.
If e don’t show anyone, we’re free to write anything.
Remember the future.
Advise only yourself.
Don’t drink yourself to death.
Two molecules clanking against each other require an
observer to be-
come scientific data.
The measuring instrument determines the appearance of
the phenome-
nal world after Einstein.
The universe is subjective.
Walt Whitman celebrated Person.
We are observer, measuring instrument, eye, subject,
Person.
Universe is Person.
Inside skull vast as outside skull.
Mind is outer space.
“Each on his bed spoke to himself alone, making no
sound.”
“First thought, best thought.”
Mind is shapely, Art is shapely.
Maximum information, minimum number of syllables.
Syntax condensed, sound is solid.
Intense fragments of spoken idiom, best.
Consonants around vowels make sense.
Savor vowels, appreciate consonants.
Others can measure their vision by what we see.
Candor ends paranoia.
Kral Majales
June 25, 1986
Boulder, Colorado
From “Cosmopolitan Greetings: Poems 1986-1992” by Allen Ginsberg. (HarperCollins: $20.) 1994 Reprinted by permission.
More to Read
Sign up for our Book Club newsletter
Get the latest news, events and more from the Los Angeles Times Book Club, and help us get L.A. reading and talking.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.