The Annotated “Songs to Joannes,” by Mina Loy (1917)

Songs to Joannes, by Mina Loy

I

Spawn   of    Fantasies
Silting the appraisable
Pig Cupid    his rosy snout
Rooting erotic garbage
“Once upon a time”
Pulls a weed white and star-topped
Among wild oats   sewn in mucous-membrane

I would    an    eye in a Bengal light
Eternity in a sky rocket
Constellations in an ocean
Whose rivers run no fresher
Than a trickle of saliva

These  are suspect places

I must live in my lantern
Trimming subliminal flicker
Virginal    to the bellows
Of Experience
Coloured    glass

II

The skin-sack
In which a wanton duality
Packed
All the completions of my infructous impulses
Something the shape of a man
To the casual vulgarity of the merely observant
More of a clock-work mechanism
Running down against time
To which I am not paced
My finger-tips are numb from fretting your hair
A God’s door-mat
On the threshold of your mind

III

We might have coupled
In the bed-ridden monopoly of a moment
Or broken flesh with one another
At the profane communion table
Where wine is spill’t on promiscuous lips
We might have given birth to a butterfly
With the daily news
Printed in blood on its wings

IV

Once in a mezzanino
The starry ceiling
Vaulted an unimaginable family
Bird-like abortions
With human throats
A n d Wisdom’s eyes
Who wore lamp-shade red dresses
And woolen hair

One bore a baby
In a padded porte-enfant
Tied with a sarsanet ribbon
To her goose’s wings

But for the abominable shadows
I would have lived
Among their fearful furniture
To teach them to tell me their secrets
Before I guessed
Sweeping the brood clean out

V

Midnight empties the street
Of all but us
Three
I am undecided which way back
To the left a boy
One wing has been washed in the rain
The other will never be clean any more
Pulling door-bells to remind
Those that are snug
To the right a halœd ascetic
Threading houses
Probes wounds for souls
The poor can’t wash in hot water
And I don’t know which turning to take
Since you got home to yourselffirst

VI

I know the Wire-Puller intimately
And if it were not for the people
On whom you keep one eye
You could look straight at me
And Time would be set back

VII

My pair of feet
Smack the flag-stones
That are something left over from your walking
The wind stuffs the scum of the white street
Into my lungs and my nostrils
Exhilarated birds
Prolonging flight into the night
Never reaching — — — — — — —

VIII

I am the jealous store-house of the candle-ends
That lit your adolescent learning
— — — — — — — — — —
Behind God’s eyes
There might
Be other lights

IX

When we lifted
Our eye-lids on Love
A cosmos
Of coloured voices

And laughing honey
And spermatozoa
At the core of Nothing
In the milk of the Moon

X

Shuttle-cock and battle-door
A little pink-love
And feathers are strewn

XI

Dear one    at your mercy
Our Universe
Is only
A colorless onion
You derobe
Sheath by sheath
Remaining
A disheartening odour
About your nervy hands

XII

Voices break on the confines of passion
Desire     Suspicion     Man     Woman
Solve in the humid carnage

Flesh  from  flesh
Draws the inseparable delight
Kissing at gasps      to catch it

Is it true
That I have set you apart
Inviolate in an utter crystallization
Of all    the jolting of the crowd
Taught me willingly to live to share

Or are you
Only the other half
Of an ego’s necessity
Scourging pride with compassion
To the shallow sound of dissonance
And boom of escaping breath

XIII

Come to me    There is something
I have got to tell you    and I can’t tell
Something taking shape
Something that has a new name
A  new  dimension
A  new  use
A  new  illusion

It is ambient               And it is in your eyes
Something shiny        Something only for you
Something that I must not see

It is in my ears           Something very resonant
Something that you must not hear
Something only for me

Let us be very jealous
Very suspicious
Very conservative
Very cruel
Or we might make an end of the jostling of aspira­tions
Disorb inviolate egos

Where two or three are welded together
They shall become god
— — — — — — —
Oh that’s right
Keep away from me    Please give me a push
Don’t let me understand you    Don’t realise me

Or we might tumble together
Depersonalized
Identical
Into the terrific Nirvana
Me you  —  you  —  me

XIV

Today
Everlasting    passing    apparent    imperceptible
To you
I bring the nascent virginity of
Myself    for the moment

No love or the other thing
Only the impact of lighted bodies
Knocking sparks off each other
In chaos

XV

Seldom    Trying for Love
Fantasy dealt them out as gods
Two or three men    looked only human

But you alone
Superhuman    apparently
I had to be caught in the weak eddy
Of your drivelling humanity
To love you most

XVI

We might have lived together
In the lights of the Arno
Or gone apple stealing under the sea
Or played
Hide and seek in love and cob-webs
And a lullaby on a tin-pan

And    talked till there were no more tongues
To talk with
And never have known any better

XVII

I don’t care
Where the legs of the legs of the furniture are walk­ing to
Or what is hidden in the shadows they stride
Or what would look at me
If the shutters were not shut

Red    a warm colour on the battle-field
Heavy on my knees as a counterpane
Count counter
I counted    the fringe of the towel
Till two tassels clinging together
Let the square room fall away
From a round vacuum
Dilating with my breath

XVIII

Out of the severing
Of hill from hill
The interim
Of star from star
The nascent
Static
Of night

XIX

Nothing so conserving
As cool cleaving
Note of the Q  H  U
Clear carving
Breath-giving
Pollen smelling
Space

White telling
Of slaking
Drinkable
Through fingers
Running water
Grass haulms
Grow to

Leading astray
Of fireflies
Aerial quadrille
Bouncing
Off one another
Again conjoining
In recaptured pulses
Of light

You too
Had something
At that time
Of a green-lit glow-worm
— — — — — — —
Yet slowly drenched
To raylessness
In rain

XX

Let Joy go solace-winged
To flutter whom she may concern

XXI

I store up nights against you
Heavy with shut-flower’s nightmares
— — — — — — — — — —
Stack noons
Curled to the solitaire
Core of the
Sun

XXII

Green things grow
Salads
For the cerebral
Forager’s revival

Upon bossed bellies
Of mountains
Rolling in the sun
And flowered flummery
Breaks
To my silly shoes

In ways without you
I  go
Gracelessly
As things go

XXIII

Laughter in solution
Stars in a stare
Irredeemable pledges
Of pubescent consummations
Rot
To the recurrent moon
Bleach
To the pure white
Wickedness of pain

XXIV

The procreative truth of Me
Petered out
In pestilent
Tear drops
Little lusts and lucidities
And prayerful lies
Muddled with the heinous acerbity
Of your street-corner smile

XXV

Licking the Arno
The little rosy
Tongue of Dawn
Interferes with our eyelashes
— — — — — — — —
We twiddle to it
Round and round
Faster
And turn into machines

Till the sun
Subsides in shining
Melts some of us
Into abysmal pigeon-holes
Passion has bored
In warmth

Some few of us
Grow to the level of cool plains
Cutting our foot-hold
With steel eyes

XXVI

Shedding our petty pruderies
From slit eyes

W sidle up
To Nature
— — — that irate pornographist

XXVII

Nucleus    Nothing
Inconceivable concept
Insentient repose
The hands of races
Drop off from
Immodifiable plastic

The contents
Of our ephemeral conjunction
In aloofness from Much
Flowed to approachment of — — — —
NOTHING
There was a man and a woman
In the way
While the Irresolvable
Rubbed with our daily deaths
Impossible eyes

XXVIII

The steps go up for ever
And they are white
And the first step is the last white
Forever

Coloured    conclusions
Smelt    to synthetic
Whiteness
Of my
Emergence
And I am burnt quite white
In the climacteric
Withdrawal of your sun
And wills and words all white
Suffuse
Illimitable monotone

White    where there is nothing to see
But a white towel
Wipes the cymophonous sweat
Mist rise of living
From your
Etiolate body
And the white dawn
Of your New Day
Shuts down on me

Unthinkable    that white over there
— — — Is smoke from your house

XXIX

Evolution    fall foul of
Sexual equality
Prettily miscalculate
Similitude
Unnatural selection
Breed such sons and daughters
As shall jibber at each other
Uninterpretable cryptonyms
Under the moon

Give them some way of braying brassily
For caressive calling
Or to homophonous hiccoughs
Transpose the laugh
Let them suppose that tears
Are snowdrops or molasses
Or anything
Than human insufficiencies
Begging dorsal vertebræ

Let meeting be the turning
To the antipodean
And Form    a blurr
Anything
Than seduce them
To the one
As simple satisfaction
For the other

Let them clash together
From their incognitœs
In seismic orgasm
For far further
Differentiation
Rather than watch
Own-self distortion
Wince in the alien ego

XXX

In some
Prenatal plagiarism
foetal buffoons
Caught tricks
— — — — —

From archetypal pantomime
Stringing emotions
Looped aloft
— — — —

For the blind eyes
That Nature knows us with
And the most of Nature    is green
— — — — — — — — — —

XXXI

Crucifixion
Of a busy-body
Longing to interfere so
With the intimacies
Of your insolent isolation

Crucifixion
Of an illegal ego’s
Eclosion
On your equilibrium
Caryatid    of an idea

Crucifixion
Wracked arms
Index extremities
In vacuum
To the unbroken fall

XXXII

The moon is cold
Joannes
Where the Mediterranean — — — — —

XXXIII

The prig of passion — — — —
To your professorial paucity

Proto-plasm was raving mad
Evolving us — — —

XXXIV

Love — — — the preeminent litterateur

 

css.php n., a kind of spade used in Ireland (OED 1892); alloy (obsolete, rare; 1622). Loy changed her name from 'Lowy' to 'Loy' in 1904 when she entered in the Salon d'Automne, a Parisian art exhibition (Burke 97).v.it, to flow or drift in after the manner of silt; transf.: to pass gradually away (OED 1892); v.t, of silt: to fill, block or choke up (a channel, the bed of a river, the sea, etc.) by gradual accumulation. Also rarely without 'up.' Chiefly past participle (fig. 1855)n., a mythological figure, here in his Roman iteration: son of Venus, god of love, whose symbols are the arrow and the torch, “because love wounds and inflames the heart,” per Isidore of Seville in his Etymologiae (600 AD) (Wikipedia). possibly playing on “starrush whitetop,” a plant whose inflorescence comprises spiky, white blade-like petals with clusters of small yellow flowers. Sedge; wildflower.first used colloquially by Thomas Becon in 1542 to mean the youthful indiscretions of a wild young man; in 1576, Thomas Newton writes, “That Wilfull and vnruly age, which lacket rypenes and discretion, and (as wee saye) hath not sowed all theyr wyeld Oates” (OED). Note Loy’s pun on sewn/sown.n., a firework or flare that burns a blue light, used as a signal (OED 1899)n., a rocket or firework consisting of a thin, cylindrical payload attached to a stick, which explodes high in the air, to stunning visual effect (OED 1913)n., the configuration of stars, especially at one’s birth; an assemblage, collection or group of related persons or things (MW); per Wikipedia: “a group of stars that are considered to form imaginary outlines or meaningful patterns on the celestial sphere”adj., physiological: of a sensory stimulus: below the threshold (limen) required required for conscious perception (OED 1906)n., an instrument or device constructed to furnish a blast of air to stoke a fire; v., the roaring of a bull (OED 2, 1870)adj., merciless, cruel; without check or limitation; lewd, bawdy; playfully mean or cruel (MW)adj. unfruitful; fruitless, unprofitable (MW)v.t, to eat or gnaw into (OED 1864); to make by wearing away something (1888); to gnaw, chafe (1867) to cause to suffer emotional strain (1867); the action of covering (a ceiling, etc.) with frets or fretworks, the ornamentation so produced (1880); to furnish (a guitar, etc) with frets (1877), may also indicate the act of playing the instrument by depressing the strings below the frets to change the strings' vibration and soundn., a mat placed before a door for cleaning shoes before entering (1665); applied to a person upon whom people “wipe their boots” (OED 1861)adj., bedrid (OED 1816), viz, confined to bed through sickness and infirmity (1814); worn out, decrepit, impotent (1837); given the coupling in the first line, this may be a sexual innuendo, though most likely, Loy is playing on the definition of -ridden as afflicted, troubled, infested (1913)n., chiefly financial term: the exclusive possession or control of the trade in a commodity, product, or service; the condition of having no competitor in one's trade or business, also: an instance of this (OED 1883); more generally: he exclusive possession, control, or exercise of something; an instance of this (1903)puns on “breaking bread” and the notion that the bread of the Eucharist is Christ’s flesh; “broken flesh” also sexually connotative, suggesting a broken hymencommon Protestant church fixture: a table used for the preparation and display of the Holy Communion sacrament (Eucharist) (Wikipedia)possible allusion to The Daily News, a popular national daily newspaper in the UK founded by Charles Dickens in 1846; more generally, seems to refer to newsprintTooltip contentn., induced or spontaneous expulsion of a fetus resulting in termination of a pregnancy; termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by the death of the embryo or fetus (MW)Italian; n., child carrier; a sort of portable bassinet; (British) carrycot. (Collins) alternate spelling sarsenet; n., a fine, soft silk fabric used as a lining material and in dressmaking (OED 1881)adj., worthy of or causing disgust or hatred; very bad or unpleasant (MW)n., equipment that is necessary, useful, or desirable (MW)n., the young of an animal or a family of young; especially the young (as of a bird or insect) hatched or cared for at one time (MW)n., practicing strict self-denial as a measure of personal and especially spiritual discipline; austere in appearance, manner, or attitude (MW)n. (gerund) from v.t, figurative: to pass through, to make a hole through, penetrate, pierce (OED 1899); to make one's way through (a narrow place, etc), to pass skillfully through the difficulties of (1866)n., one who uses secret or underhanded means to influence the aspects of a person or organization (MW); possible allusion to abortion via wire coat hanger. Could also be an allusion to F. T. Marinetti: the Wire-Puller could be one operating marionettes; this would be consistent with Loy's play and punning on names in her other poemsn., a hard, flat piece of stone used for making paths (MW)n., a building for storing goods (warehouse); an abundant supply or source (repository) (MW)from the Century Dictionary: n., the fag-end of a candle burned down; hence, a petty saving; a scrap; a fragment; a worthless triflen. pl., the male sexual cell in animals (Medical Dictionary, MW)n., a cork to which feathers are attached to form a cone shape, used in badminton and battledore (OED 1897)neologistic homophone of “battledore,” n., the light, flat bat (OED 1794) used in a game of the same name (OED 1836), played with a shuttlecock and rackets, similar to (predating) badminton; the game Loy puns upon referred to as “battledore and shuttlecock”appearing to be an alternate of “disrobe,” “derobe” seems to derive from the French dérober (to steal), adj. dérobé, “secret, hidden” (Collins)n., an investing cover or case of a plant or animal body or body part, e.g., the tubular fold of skin into which the penis of many mammals is retracted or the connective tissue of an organ or part that binds together its component elements and holds it in place (MW); medical definition; a slang term for a contraceptive worn on the penis: condom (OED 1897) adj., sinewy, strong (archaic); showing or expressive of calm courage (bold); marked by effrontery or presumption (brash); excitable, nervous (MW)“humid”: adj., oppressively damp; “carnage”: n., flesh of slain animals or humans (MW). Note Loy’s play on the phrase “human carnage” with “humid carnage,” suggesting sexual overtonesadj., not violated or profaned; pure (MW)n., formation of crystals; crystalline form; a fixed, definite form (MW)v., to flog, whip; to punish severely, chastise (MW)n., lack of agreement, as with cognitive dissonance; discord; commingled, inharmonious sounds (MW)n., an almost onomatopoetic word indicating a sudden sound or cry; a rapid expansion or increase (MW)n., measure in one dimension; one of three coordinates determining a position in space or four coordinates determining a position in space and time (mathematics); bodily form or proportion (obsolete); level of existence or consciousness (MW)n., the state of being intellectually deceived or misled; a misleading image presented to the vision (MW)adj., existing or present on all sides, as with light or sound; encompassing (MW)adj., a vibration of large amplitude in a mechanical or electrical system caused by a relatively small periodic stimulus of the same or nearly the same period as the natural vibration period of the system; the intensification and enriching of a musical tone by supplementary vibration (MW)n., the state of being jostled or pushed together (MW); see the vibratory movement in “resonant”vt., to throw (as an asteroid or comet) out of its normal orbit (MW); perhaps another play on “disrobe”adj., not violated or profaned; pure (MW)vit, to become or be capable of being welded; vt., to unite (metallic parts) by heating and allowing the metals to flow together or by hammering or compressing with or without previous heating; to unite or reunite closely or intimately (MW)vt., British spelling, to bring into concrete existence; to cause to seem real (MW)n., the final beatitude that transcends suffering, sought especially in Buddhism through the extinction of desire and individual consciousness (MW)adj., open to view: visible; appearing as actual to the eye or mind (MW)adj., not perceptible by a sense or by the mind; extremely slight, gradual , or subtle (MW)adj., coming or having recently come into existence; of…or being an atom or substance at the moment of its formation usually with the implication of greater reactivity than otherwise (Medical Dictionary, MW)unclear antecedent, possibly referring to hate, indifference, or sexn., a void, a gulf, an abyss (OED 1840); primordial matter personified (1910); the formless void believed to have existed before the creation of the universe (1855); a state resembling that of primordial chaos, utter confusion or disorder (1908)n., a current of water or air running contrary to the main current: whirlpool (oceanography); a contrary or circular current (as of thought or policy) (MW)adj., from v.it “drivel,” to let saliva dribble from the mouth: slaver; to talk stupidly or carelessly (MW)a river in the Tuscany region of Italyadj., noisy, harsh, tinny; though used here as a noun: perhaps an allusion to the contemporaneous popular music of Tin Pan Alleynpl. fleshy moveable muscle in the human mouth for speech; language: especially spoken language (MW); possible metonymic allusion to viable conversationalistsn., bedspread (MW); given the excess of play in the next two lines, Loy is possibly punning on the homophonic phrase, “counter pain”Loy puns on many possible meanings of “count” and its variations; “count” v., to tally; to consider or account; to include or exclude oneself by or as if by counting (“count me in”); add, totalvariations on “count”: nouns: Count, n., European nobleman whose rank corresponds to that of a British earl; the total obtained by counting: tally; “counter” a piece of metal or plastic, used in reckoning or in games; something of value in bargaining: asset; a level surface, such as a table or shelf) over which transactions are conducted or food is served (MW)n., Physics and Astronomy: emptiness of space; a state or condition resembling a vacuum: void (MW); according to the OED, the usage “vacuum” as shorthand (1910) for “vacuum cleanser” (1903) to refer to “a space from which most of the air has been removed by a pump” or the act of removing debris in cleaning via suction could be a evoked herev.it., to make or become wider, larger, or more open; to become expanded or swollen (MW: Medical)verb (vt., to put or keep apart, divide; v.it, to remove sth by or as if by cutting), used as a noun here: something that has been separated, cut off (MW); note: Loy does not use “severance,” the noun form, but instead the gerund, “severing”n., the intervening time; meanwhile (MW)adj., that is about to be or in the act of being born or brought forth (OED 1891), mathematics: of an entity or quantity: beginning to increase or develop from zero to a trivial initial state, forming or designating an infinitesimal increment (obsolete, 1821); chemistry: of a material thing or substance: in the act or process of being formed from component parts or emerging from one state to another (1877)n., exerting force by reason of weight alone without motion; of or relating to bodies at rest or forces of equilibrium (MW)n.gerund, “cleave” has two simultaneous and antithetical meanings: v.it, to adhere firmly: cling; and v.t, to divide by or as if by a cutting blow (MW)Roger Conover (RC) notes the possibility that this may be a Duchampian pun (à la L.H.O.O.Q.); it does not seem to track in French, but as Loy knew several languages, perhaps it is a pun in German or Italian? It may also be a personal joke/reference, or a now forgotten artifact of pop culturev.t, gerund, quenching: satisfying (MW)n., the stems or tops of crop plants especially after the crop has been gathered (MW)n., a type of square dance; also, a card game popular in the 18th century (MW)n.ger. or v.it, to join together for a common purpose (MW)n., a transient variation of a quantity (such as electric current or voltage) whose value is normally constant; an electromagnetic wave or modulation thereof brief duration; a brief disturbance of pressure in a medium (MW)n., having, admitting, or admitting no rays: dark (MW)verb (most commonly a v.it, to move with a light quivering motion through the air (OED 1873); here a v.t (causatively), to cause to flutter, to move sth in quick irregular motions, to agitate or ruffle, also: to wear a thing into rags or to pieces by fluttering (1893); to throw someone into confusion, agitation, or tremulous excitement (1871). Loy may also be punning on 'to flatter' here.adj., made to swell or project; rounded out (OED 1647); v.t meaning also shadowed here: mastered or managed: directed, controlled (1882)pun on homophone “floured” n., a starch-based, semi-set dessert (akin to a pudding); also: mere flattery or empty compliment (OED 1891) n., action or process of solving , the state, condition or fact of being solved (OED 1879); The action of dissolving, or changing from a solid or gaseous to a liquid state, by means of a fluid or solvent; the state or fact of being so dissolved (1870); A more or less fluid substance produced by the process of solution (1875, figurative 1858)adj., of a person: arriving or arrived at the stage of puberty (OED 1890); Botany: of stems, leaves, etc.: having pubescence, covered with short hair (1906); Zoology: of (part of) an animal, esp. an insect: covered with short soft hair, downy (1882) n.pl (the plural is unusual), the action or an act of perfecting, chiefly religious (OED 1838); acme, height, perfection (1911); the action or an act of completing, accomplishing, or finishing (1898); the action or act of consummating a marriage or relationship, also more generally, the action or an act of sexual intercourse (1879)adj., Anatomy and Biology: of a nerve, blood vessel, or other anatomical structure, or the course of such a structure: that reverses direction; that turns back upon itself (OED 1877); of or relating to sensation (esp. of pain) associated with the ventral (chiefly motor) root of a spinal nerve, originally attributed to recurrent fibres from the dorsal root (1873); occurring again, especially regularly (1860)adj., begetting or bringing forth offspring: reproductive, propagative (MW)exhausted; gradually finished (OED 1896)adj., destructive of life: deadly; injuring or endangering society: pernicious; causing displeasure or annoyance; infectious, contagious (MW)n.pl (here), the quality or condition of being lucid; brightness, luminosity; intellectual clearness, transparency of thought or expression (OED 1884)v.t, to befog or stupefy; to mix confusedly; to make a mess of (MW)adj., hatefully or shockingly evil: abominable (MW)n., the quality of being acerbic—sharp or bitingly critical, sarcastic, or ironic (MW) probably alluding to street prostitution, wherein a sex worker waits and solicits from a street cornerv.it., to be busy about trifles: to trifle; (trans) to cause to rotate lightly or delicately: to turn anything about, esp. with the fingers: to twirl (OED 1874, 1886). Because of the “licking” and “tongue” of stanza 1, “twiddle” may also have sexual connotationsn., a small recess or compartment (usually one of a series) for a domestic pigeon to root or nest in (OED 1806); a theoretical compartment or division: a fixed category or role into which a person, thing, idea, etc. is classified (1902)v.t., to pierce, perforate, make a hole in or through (OED 1887); Loy also puns on the adjectival “bored”: wearied, suffering from ennui (1861)n., a firm or stable position of the feet: a surface from which a person or animal can (safely) stand or walk: a notch or ledge that can be used as a step (OED 1898); a place where a plant can take hold: firm rooting: roothold (1880)n., prudish behavior, attitudes, or character: extreme or affected modesty, demureness, or propriety, esp. in relation to sexual matters (OED 1880)v.it., to move or go sideways or obliquely: to edge along, esp. in a furtive or inconspicuous manner, or while looking in another direction: to approach a person or thing in this manner (OED 1885)n., pornographer (OED 1893), viz, a person who produces or provides pornography (1809), viz, the explicit description or exhibition of sexual subjects in literature, paintings, film, etc., in a manner intended to stimulate erotic rather than aesthetic feelings (1896), a study of prostitution (1895)n., Astronomy: the small bright body in the head of a comet (OED 1868); Biology, Physics, Anatomy, etc.: a central point, group, or mass about which gathering, concentration, or accretion takes place, as in cells, atoms, or molecules cells (MW)n., a substance that is easily molded or shaped under some conditions but that solidifies as it cools, dries, etc. OED 1896); also: adj., a sculpted or modeled figure, e.g., the plastic arts. Like so many of Loy’s phrasings, this is oxymoronic: plastic is, by definition, modifiable and pliant until it hardens.adj., of diseases: beginning and ending in a day (OED 1881); of insects, flowers, etc.: existing for one day only, or for very few days (1880); in more extended application: that is in existence, power, favor, popularity, etc., for a short time only: short-lived, transitory (1867)n., the action of conjoining; the fact or condition of being conjoined; union, connection, combination (OED 1890); union in marriage (1819, obsolete) or sexual union, copulation (1794, obsolete); Astrology and Astronomy: an apparent proximity of two planets or other heavenly bodies; the position of these when they are in the same, or nearly the same, direction as viewed from the earth (1889)n., the action of approaching: approach (OED 1646); approach in character, affinity (1830)colloquial: pregnant (OED 1906); also: habitual individual behavior (1871); but also, something that forms an obstruction or hindrance to one’s passageadj., relating to a critical period (OED 1881); critical, decisive, epochal (1885); Physiology and Medicine: designating a period of physical (and, often, psychological) change occurring in middle age and believed to indicate the onset of senescence (1879); Medicine and Psychology: the period in middle age at which a person’s reproductive or sexual capacity declines, spec. (in women) the menopause (1897) a neologism? possibly from cymophane, n. Minerology: chrysoberyl (MW), esp. an opalescent chrysoberyl or a homophone of 'symphonous,' (OED 1831) adj., rare spelling of symphonious, viz, sounding pleasantly together or with something else; concordant; harmonious (1865)v.t, Botany and Horticulture: to cause (a plant) to develop with reduced level of chlorophyll (esp. by reducing light) causing bleaching of the green tissues, elongated internodes, weakened stems, deficiencies in structure, and abnormally small leaves (OED 1835). Note Loy’s curious use of the infinitive form here. n., counterpart, double; visible likeness: image; correspondence in kind or quality; a point of comparison (MW)v.it, to speak rapidly and inarticulate; to chatter unintelligibly (OED 1900)n.pl, a pseudonym or codename, esp. one given to a spy or clandestine operation (OED 1876)popular misspelling of “hiccups,” though pronunciation remains the same. n., an involuntary spasm of the respiratory organs, consisting in a quick inspiratory movement of the diaphragm checked suddenly by closure of the glottis, and accompanied by a characteristic sound. Also, the affection consisting in a succession of such spasms (OED 1877)adj., Anatomy and Zoology: pertaining to the back of an animal: situated on or near the back (often opposed to ventral) (1882); Merriam-Webster also defines “dorsal” as a mis- or alternate spelling of “dossal,” n., an ornamental cloth hung hung behind and above an altaradj. (misspelling), of or pertaining to the opposite side of the world, esp. Australian (OED 1877); humorously, Having everything upside down (1853)alternate spelling of “blur”: n., a smear which partially obscures, made with ink or other coloring matter, or by brushing the surface of writing while still wet (OED 1871, spelled thusly, in R. Browning); fig., a stain which bedims moral or ideal purity, a blemish: an aspersion on character (1883, spelled thusly); an effect like that of blurred writing or painting: an indistinct blurred appearance, indistinctness, confused dimness (1873 spelled thusly, in R. Browning)adj., Geology: of, subject to, or caused by an earthquake; of or relating to an earth vibration caused by something else (such as an explosion or the impact of a meteorite); of or relating to a vibration on a celestial body (such as the moon) comparable to a seismic event on earth; fig., having a strong or widespread impact: earthshaking (MW)n. and adj., belonging to another person, place, or family; not of one's own; from elsewhere, foreign (OED 1880); Born in, or owing allegiance to, a foreign country; esp. designating a foreigner who is not a naturalized citizen of the country where he or she is living (1863); of a plant or animal: brought from another country or district and subsequently naturalized; not native (1903); Biology: DNA or other biological material, such as cells or tissues: originating from another organism, esp. one of a different species (1911)n., Psychology: that part of the mind which is most conscious of self; spec. in the work of Freud that part which, acted upon by both the id and the super-ego (ego-ideal), mediates with the environment (OED 1910)n., the act of, or something, plagiarized: v.t: to steal or pass off the ideas or words of another’s as one’s own; use another’s production without crediting the source; v.it, to commit literary theft; present as new or original an idea or product derived from an existing source (MW)n., chiefly British spelling: fetal (MW)n.pl, ‘A man whose profession is to make sport by low jests and antick postures’ (Johnson); a comic actor, clown; a jester, fool (1868, archaic)adv., the original pattern or model of which all things of the same type or representations or copies; a perfect example (MW)most probably an allusion to the crucifixion of Christ; notable here for its thricely anaphoric opening of each stanza; note its juxtaposition with the biological world (“eclosion”) and the world of pagan myth (“caryatid”)n., (without hyphen) an officious, interfering, meddling, or prying person; one who involves himself or herself in other people's affairs without invitation (OED 1871); because Loy adds the hyphen, we must consider the terms separately as well: busy: adj., occupied with or concentrating on a particular activity; actively engaged; doing something that engrosses the attention (1874); body: n., the physical form of a person, animal, or plant (1881), esp. as contrasted with the souln. Biology: the act of emerging from the pupal case or hatching from the egg (MW)n., a draped female figure supporting an entablature (MW)adj., Nautical: that which has undergone or suffered wreck, esp. shipwreck: ruined, destroyed (OED 1875) note the homophonic pun on “racked,” alluding, perhaps, to the medieval torture device npl, the farthest or most remote part; a limb of the body, esp. hand or foot; extreme danger or critical need; a moment marked by imminent destruction or death (MW)n., Physics and Astronomy: emptiness of space; a state or condition resembling a vacuum; void (MW)RC, in his careful footnotes to The Lost Lunar Baedeker, suggests that Joannes probably refers to Giovanni Papini (arguing that “Joannes” translates to “Giovanni” in Italian). Another possibility: “Joannes” is a curiously unisex name; while some sites identify it as masculine, it is neither “Johannes” nor “Joanne/a,” suggesting a third, androgynous possibility. Perhaps these poems—“Songs to Joannes”—do not merely signal apostrophe to a beloved but also (instead?) are dedications to their patron saint/muse n., a thief (OED 1874); an excessively precise or particular person: a dandy, a fop (1882); a conceited or self-important and didactic person (1897)n., scantiness, thinness (OED 1866): smallness of number/quantity: dearth (MW)n., Biology: the complex, translucent, colorless colloidal material comprising the living part of a cell, including the membrane-bound cytoplasm, nucleus, and other organelles (OED 1903); (gen.) a primitive or primary form of something; a primordial substance (1906)adj., surpassing others in rank or excellence, in respect of some quality: exceptionally distinguished: outstanding (OED 1906)n., a literary man, a writer of literary or critical works (OED 1895); a literary person, esp. a professional writer (MW). Note Loy’s dropping of the accent aigu (from French litérateur) and her (not incorrect, but more dated) use of the double “t”