Brancusi’s Golden Bird
By Mina Loy
The toy
become the aesthetic archetype
As if
some patient peasant God
had rubbed and rubbed
the Alpha and Omega
of Form
into a lump of metal
A naked orientation
unwinged unplumed
the ultimate rhythm
has lopped the extremities
of crest and claw
from
the nucleus of flight
The absolute act
of art
conformed
to continent sculpture
—bare as the brow of Osiris—
this breast of revelation
an incandescent curve
licked by chromatic flames
in labyrinths of reflections
This gong
of polished hyperaesthesia
shrills with brass
as the aggressive light
strikes
its significance
The immaculate
conception
of the inaudible bird
occurs
in gorgeous reticence
Source:
Lunar Baedeker
(1958)
