John Ashbery: “The Skaters”

II-G

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	Under a reddish-brown and greenish picture of excited beagles and calm huntsmen
	A mass of squalling and retching arose from the messed-up crib.
	The newborn offspring was given the name of Charles.
It	He grew up to become a successful business executive.

	But to return to our tomato can--those spared by the goats
	Can be made into a practical telephone, the two halves being connected by a length of wire.
	You can talk to your friend in the next room, or around corners.
	An American inventor made a fortune with just such an invention.X XXXXXXXXXX contraption.

The branches tear at the sky--

	fuzz
	The blight is on the snow of inert space
	Footage to dig under you    so
	Things too tiny to be remembered in recorded history--the backfiring of a bus
In a	On a certainXXXXXXXXXXXX {street} in Paris {street} in 1932, and all the clumsy seductions and amateur paintings done
	Clamber to join in the awakening (the levee with its chocolate)
	To take a further role in my determination. These clown-shapes
	Filling up the available space for miles, like acres of red and mustard pom-poms
	Dusted with a pollen which we call "an air of truth." Massed mounds
	Of Hades it is true. I propose a general housecleaning
	Of these true and valueless shapes which pester us with their raisons d'etre
	Whom no one (that is their weakness) can ever get to like.
	kidnappers
	(On with the parade: the killers had poacedXXXXXX parked their automobile behind some black shrubbery.
	Meanwhile Doris all unsuspecting was walking in the backyard with her lover.
	Her father, the fire-chief, had told her he refused to have him inside the house
	But he was off battling flames that day, a mysterious fire having broken out
	In the Jones & Co. warehouse, the latest in a mysterious ofXXXXXXXXXXXXX series of fires
	Which had the nerves of the whole town on edge. Hearing a noise behind some bushes, Arthur
	(that was the name of Lois' boyfriend) dashed into the side yard. Returning
	Around the edge of the clapboard house he was suXX astonished to note Lois' disappearance
	Already , behind the ragged foliage, on the back seat of the black Pontiac,
	Not wanting the gag to be thrust into her mouth).

	There are moving parts to get out of order,
	However in the flame fountain. Add gradually one ounce, by measure, of sulphuric acid
	to five or six ounces of water in an earthenware basin. andXXXX add to it,X also gradually, about three-
	Quarters of an ounce of graunulated zinc.
	A rapid production of hyrdrogen gas will instantly take place. Then add,
	From time to time, a few pieces of phosphorus of the size of a pea.
	A multitude of gas bubbles will be produced, which will fire on the surface of the effervescing liquid.
	The whole surface of the liquid will become luminous, and fire balls, with jets of fire,
	Will dart from the bottom, through the fluid with great rapidity and a hissing noise.

Sure, but a simple shelter from this or other phenomena is easily contrived.