A poem of fears, in seven installments, for David Antin

[In going recently through old files, both paper and digital, I came across the following, which goes back to early years of friendship with David Antin and has an obvious relation to his great poem “Delusions of the Insane: What They Are Afraid Of.” I never published mine, as far as I can remember, but now that publication comes so easily, through Jacket2 and elsewhere, I’m posting it here, unembellished, as a kind of tribute to my dearest and oldest friend and coworker in poetry. (J.R.)]

 

1

some had a fear of men

some had a fear of women

some had a fear of girls

some had a fear of children

some had a fear of tyrants

some had a fear of priests

some had a fear of popes

some had a fear of people

some had a fear of crowds

some had a fear of mobs

some had a fear of robbers

some had a fear of foreigners

some had a fear of Englishmen

some had a fear of French

some had a fear of Germans

some had a fear of Japanese

some had a fear of Jews

some had a fear of Negroes

some had a fear of Russians

some had a fear of Chinese

some had a fear of God

some had a fear of Satan

some had a fear of demons

some had a fear of ghosts

some had a fear of spirits

 

2

some had a fear of cats

some had a fear of dogs

some had a fear of horses

some had a fear of mice

some had a fear of bulls

some had a fear of animals

some had a fear of reptiles

some had a fear of snakes

some had a fear of birds

some had a fear of fish

some had a fear of worms

some had a fear of mites

some had a fear of bees

some had a fear of spiders

some had a fear of insects

some had a fear of lice

some had a fear of microbes

some had a fear of bacteria

some had a fear of germs

some had a fear of monsters

 

3

some had a fear of flowers

some had a fear of flutes

some had a fear of bullets

some had a fear of needles

some had a fear of crystals

some had a fear of mirrors

some had a fear of pins

some had a fear of dust

some had a fear of strings

some had a fear of dirt

some had a fear of corpses

some had a fear of water

some had a fear of metal

some had a fear of gold

some had a fear of money

some had a fear of machinery

some had a fear of vehicles

some had a fear of telephones

some had a fear of hair

some had a fear of skin

some had a fear of fur

some had a fear of teeth

some had a fear of eyes

some had a fear of beards

some had a fear of feathers

some had a fear of rectums

some had a fear of slime

some had a fear of feces

some had a fear of blood

some had a fear of urine

some had a fear of food

some had a fear of drink

some had a fear of drugs

some had a fear of poison

some had a fear of small things

some had a fear of new things

some had a fear of one thing

some had a fear of everything

 

4

some had a fear of comets

some had a fear of sun

some had a fear of stars

some had a fear of gravity

some had a fear of lightning

some had a fear of thunder

some had a fear of wind

some had a fear of drafts

some had a fear of fog

some had a fear of clouds

some had a fear of snow

some had a fear of floods

some had a fear of waves

some had a fear of cold

some had a fear of heat

some had a fear of fire

some had a fear of light

some had a fear of dawn

some had a fear of darkness

some had a fear of shadows

some had a fear of night

some had a fear of body odor

some had a fear of ice & frost

 

5

some had a fear of closed places

some had a fear of heights

some had a fear of precipices

some had a fear of rivers

some had a fear of the sea

some had a fear of churches

some had a fear of home

some had a fear of heaven

some had a fear of hell

 

6

some had a fear of crossing a street

some had a fear of crossing a bridge

some had a fear of passing high buildings

some had a fear of going to bed

some had a fear of coitus

some had a fear of work

some had a fear of writing

some had a fear of sleep

some had a fear of stealing

some had a fear of speech

some had a fear of swallowing

some had a fear of soiling

some had a fear of standing

some had a fear of being idle

some had a fear of taste

some had a fear of touch

some had a fear of smell

some had a fear of thinking

some had a fear of trembling

some had a fear of ridicule

some had a fear of a beating

some had a fear of smothering

some had a fear of inoculation

some had a fear of childbirth

some had a fear of death

some had a fear of music

some had a fear of sin

 

7

some had a fear of sourness

some had a fear of sharpness

some had a fear of narrowness

some had a fear of weakness

some had a fear of dampness

some had a fear of pain

some had a fear of justice

some had a fear of freedom

some had a fear of pleasure

some had a fear of fatigue

some had a fear of poverty

some had a fear of fear

some had a fear of punishment

some had a fear of color

some had a fear of duration

some had a fear of motion

some had a fear of symmetry

some had a fear of speed

some had a fear of loneliness

some had a fear of ruin

some had a fear of imperfection

some had a fear of responsibility

some had a fear of failure

some had a fear of sex

some had a fear of marriage

some had a fear of heredity

some had a fear of nudity

some had a fear of ideas

some had a fear of words

some had a fear of names

some had a fear of philosophy

some had a fear of magic

some had a fear of infinity

some had a fear of the void

 

completed 4.i.02