Nature

The sea is snoring.

Elicit

Grace note

The Finish Line

Words are simply not enough

The Clock

We glance at the clock, and then we glance away. Thus, time is lost. Why not keep our eyes on the clock, forever and always? Follow the cycle, and nothing will ever happen. Nothing will ever change.

A Sketch

The world is a riot of color, all of life is grey

Logical

I seek to be bound. Only then can I seek to be free

The New Voice

He had cleansed all the marks from his skin. He sought a purity - blessed obscurity. The fields did not chant his name. The wind did not hurry him.

There was such joy in a voice, for silence would follow. There he would dwell...

Looking up

Art is to life a painful subservient.

If

Hard work makes living easy

Universal Speech

The speech of the tree : "I am old and tired"

The speech of the air : "There is nothing here"

The speech of the bird : "Can shatter the light"

The speech of the ground : "Step softly now"

The speech of the sky : "I cannot reach you..."

The speech of the stone : "I am content"

Blue and Green

One page is blue, the other green. Which do you choose?

Swap the pages swiftly until they are one continuous color. Now there is no choice to make...

At A Loss For Words

How many have given their souls away for music? That insubstantial stuff

Off With All The Skins

The Tiny Flowers

The grass is speckled with flowers. They do not wish to be seen. They are trampled underfoot.

Or carried aloft by the wind! Such a great distance, in the air they dissolve

A Simple Question

Are our lives simpler than they appear, or more complicated than they appear?

To me, this is a meaningless question. Some are repelled by simplicity, others by complication. We follow our fears.

Cryptic

I must unlock that place within myself
from which there is no escape.

Renunciation

I renounce obscurity. From now I speak with clear and simple mind

Embargo

On Tuesday relaxed

The Man From Quetta

Today I met a man from Quetta. I was excited to meet him, it is so qool to come from a place that begins with a Q! Queenslanders, Qataris and certain Ecuadorians have an advantage over the rest of us starting right from birth...

Sometimes life just isn't fair.

Crossroads

Here you are, at the crossroads. The roads go six ways from here. You do not wonder where they go.

It is this spot on which you dwell. Lost in a stillness of pleasant confusion. Thinking you are at the centre of things. Knowing that choice will leave you bereft...

In a spot, secure, you raise your head. But as eyes wander at random over the field of things, you see more crossroads, and then more. The roads themselves seem to have vanished. You pray for a straight or crooked line to set you right. You begin to wonder... Is this world a patchwork? Where is the substance of things?

Perhaps lines are in the eye? So too the patchwork?

Then you cease wondering. Again, you are still. "Thread a needle through space; make something of yourself".

Fear of Potted Plants

Damned introverts, never look into your eyes. Deep, so deep, spreading sedition through Roots, famed underground network. At least with the trees, they have their heads up in the sky. It's a proud failing. They show their strength, their bark . Potted plants are like scheming children, smug in the careful hands of their proud owners. Or on windowsills, waiting to topple. They even tremble...

There is fear of spiders, of physiognomy. And there is fear of great secrecy, of veins on the leaves that are the lines of your life, of the sap in the veins that is the fever in your mind. Time to take a breather. Turn the leaves of your book (but look, the book has grown flower

"Baby Face", a movie directed by Alfred Green

"Baby Face" is a black-and-white Hollywood movie telling the story of Lily(Barbara Stanwyck), a young woman left alone in the world after her bar-owner father dies in a gas explosion. Classic tear-jerker, eighty minutes of humdrum, predictable lesson about the evils of the world and how pretty young women deserve to suffer, of course? Well, fortunately, the movie was made in pre-code Hollywood. Meaning, sex and money are nothing to be ashamed of. It turns out that her father was keeping Lily down; freed from his baleful influence, she moves to New York with her faithful servant (black, of course, these weren't enlightened times and the movie doesn't pretend), proceeds to make her way up in the world. Literally. Starting from a job on the lowest floor of the multi-storeyed office of a major financial company, she parlays her charms into knowledge of the workings of the very highest level. "Parlays her charms", ha - I ought to be ashamed of myself. She sleeps her way to the top. But she's not asleep, she's wide awake, she's on the make...

We would seem to be exchanging one cliche for another. The movie is far more interesting than that. The idea for her modus operandi does not come from Lily herself, but from a mentor, a benevolent cobbler named Adolph Cragg. He tells her she has power over men of which she is unaware, and to press the point, he quotes, I kid you not, Nietzsche to her! Not one vile thought had entered her virginal mind, until Nietzsche, corrupter of young women, came forth, brandishing madness and moustache and talk of masters and slaves... In the middle of the movie, just before Lily inadvertently causes the murder-suicide of a pair of her lovers (one the prospective father-in-law of the other), a package arrives in the mail. It is from Cragg, and it contains encouragement. Yup, more Nietzsche.

The movie is truly strange - it surrenders the opportunity for exploitation inherent in the theme, it is rigorously Darwinian. Lily is not punished for her methods, instead she finds love with the president of the company in the end... One can imagine how disturbing this amoral vision must have been to the censors, much more disturbing than the innuendo. The filmmakers were forced to add three hilariously absurd scenes to the original, with Cragg insisting that Lily take the "right way" rather than the "wrong way" to her goals, and the movie ending with Lily and the company president forced to work as labourers after losing all their money :)

Catch "Baby Face" if you can. She's so demure, power's the lure... But heavens above, it ends with love!

Classic Spam

A few days back I opened a random spam e-mail ( just for the fun of it - yeah, I'm mad, bad and dangerous to know) to find a passage from "Anna Karenina". Why not "White Noise"? But let us not be ungentle, the message registers: all spam aspires to the condition of classic literature. Who can know cliche, and hence its opposite, more deeply than a spammer? Ultimately, all those ironic games - random combinations of words, comical obsession with penises and mortgages, prose that plunders itself and is generous with the plunder - must pall. All spammers are poets in secret; their god is Ray Johnson; their audience is legion; and if, consumed by our petty concerns with time and money, we fail to be overcome, thrillingly, by their effusions, we are so much the poorer. We are, sadly, no wiser. We grow older slower...

The Master Re-mastered

Third time unlucky . But the Fed is getting closer, in what is likely to become one of the great rivalries in tennis. Expect a battle royale on the terre battue at Roland Garros. Perhaps, this time around, someone will be so glued to the screen that they'll actually miss a flight...

The Deer

The deer stopped on the threshold. We would not let its dewy eyes in. Stray, it stayed. We saw it all: the living leather, pencil legs, neck graceful as a vase. It amused us deeply.

In the deer's mind there was a valley. Filled with light that fell of mountain snows. Flowers came to the valley...

Feet stirred, afraid.

Makes Nothing Happen

I started this blog so I could compel myself to write about poetry. I've been detecting in myself an "instant gratification" impulse both in my writing and reading, and this needs to be remedied before my critical faculties are numbed entirely. Writing should be about thinking things through in words. I am skilled at formulating maxims, less skilled at living up to them. Then again, we do not judge ourselves fairly.

Judgment and appreciation, their interweavings, shall be the subject of this blog within a blog. I shall try to be catholic in my choice of poems, but sadly, I assure you, Japanese poetry of the 19th century is going to get short shrift. Perhaps, also: Ukrainian poetry of the 12th. And silent poetry - a burgeoning genre - where the poems themselves are blank, only the titles matter. I like these poems myself, but am willing to make concessions for my putative readers, who might be less easily amused...

Whimsy is, as it has always been, a dictating principle. Why? That is the phoenix question. Jack-in-the-box-of-all-boxes-that-are-not-boxed-in-themselves. We spin, but the ground exists. I have fallen again.

Auden said "Poetry makes nothing happen"; yes, that's what it does, it makes . The point of reading is to unmake - a fine complement, necessary. We began with nothing, and we must end with nothing, and what happens meanwhile? We ask why.

Exercise

Discuss and differentiate:

1. Monsieur Teste
2. Monsieur Songe
3. Mr. Palomar
4. Mordechai Schamz

Which reminds me: I need to retrieve "Mordechai Schamz" from its undisclosed location in a box of books whose names I can't remember, and never will be able to, so why even bother, got and forgot, what an unhappy thought, it would be much simpler just to renounce the lot. Happily not.

Babe of the Day

The incomparable Ruth

This is for all you lads and ladettes out there! Have fun, folks!

Tell Me True

I might have breakfasted a while, then I might have gone out for a walk. Then I might have thought about math for a while... Then I might have given up. Or I might have soldiered on...

Was that wrong? I did not confuse a plan (nor was I confused by one).

What is New?

The exemplum
The blue brocade
The pinchbeck smile
The heart's revenge
The strut of peers
The raven 'S

The Subway Code

The grammar of glances on a subway train? Feigned indifference? Cynosure for play? Perhaps...

But what I had in mind was more hygienic, morally speaking. Jared's Foster Home. That's right, fresher is better. I should warn you - what I'm going to say now will shock you profoundly. But in the final analysis it's good for you, you need to have it:

The eponymous sandwich chain is merely the front of a vast conspiracy in which a nebulous matermind is, slowly but steadily, assisted by an army of eager minions, gaining control of the minds, and more significantly, the appetites of the American public.

If you're a smart-aleck, you'll make some quip about late capitalism and how I'm belaboring the obvious. You with your fancy theories, go and get a life, will ya? We're living in the real world here, and I'm a straight talker.This is all very serious. Mine is now a face without a grin. I mean it literally .

Guys, this beggars belief, I tell you... It's an operation on a massive scale. Humongous. Even the sandwiches can't compare.

How did I suspect? It was quite simple and logical, really, thinking back to it. Those sandwich guys count on you coming to the stall to eat. Eat, spout cash, and leave. Nothing more. But I, I use my brain wherever I go. Can't help it, that's just who I am. And I got to thinking...

What's with all the choices anyway? I'm sure there have been times when you've felt frustrated, or overwhelmed. Or maybe you just know your favorite combo, and you don't trouble yourself about it any more? Either way, doesn't it feel strange to you that they have stuff like banana peppers and roasted tarragon bread that no-one in their right mind would try? Such a waste, but just another instance of capitalistic excess, right? Or too boring to be worth bothering about?

Questions, questions. I submit to you that the czars of the sandwich industry aren't stupid, that in fact that every ingredient, every condiment, every sequence of choices carries meaning. By my calculations, there are 12,784 different sandwiches one could order. Fine, but then a sandwich order is such a simple thing, where's the harm in it? And a sandwich consumer is a simple, virtually anonymous being, but not simpler or more anonymous than the uniformed functionaries behind the counter...

Oh, the genius of it. The devilish steganographic genius of it. When I first saw it, I couldn't quite believe it. I denied it, just as you do now (oh, yes, gentle reader, I see right through you too!). Combinatorics, that slurred and inexact sport. Seurat with his colored dots, then dandy Warhol... Art must yield to money. I could not rest until I saw my doubts confirmed.
I dedicated myself to study. Suspicion and study - the study of suspicion. Suspicious study, at sandwich stalls and in my study.

This is all rather vague and confusing. You didn't think I was one of those nutty conspiracy theorists, did you? I have proof, I have proof positive. I camped out at an outlet yesterday, and those thousands of hours spent in rigorous observation and analysis of sandwich orders (all the while pretending to be a sandwich addict, me of all people...) bore sudden fruit before my startled eyes. I read a message (no cherry-picking, promise), there was no mistaking it."They're on to us. We must act now." Wow, these guys are paranoid! Do they never stop to think whether lives like theirs worth living? Anyway, as to how the message was conveyed...

Where am I? Who wrote this? Oh, well, who the fuck cares, life is meant to be lived... I'm gonna go out, get some fresh air, and I think I'll need a Subway sandwich soon.

Above and Beyond

The old stone bridge leads to I know not where. It is limned with lights. There is no moon overhead.

The city is sprinkled with lights (salient lights, alien lights); the sky has scars of cloud... I see a silver moon.

How to Draw the Light

With straight lines, of course (like this one. Honest to goodness - that's the shortest path)

Mock-speleologist's Motto

"Strictly Platonic"

Peace and in Hammocks

Just remembered the Simpsons episode with the cloning hammock. Bellybuttons, that's the answer! I'm starting to get a bit suspicious that Jose Saramago doesn't mention any of this in his acclaimed novel "The Double". No Homer, no hammocks, there isn't even any navel-gazing...

When, oh when, are we going to have novels with reliable narrators? When, oh when, is there going to be peace in the world? When, oh when, are you going to make me dinner?

These are all poignant questions, and we should try not to think about them for too long... Peace.

Pizza Parlor/Women's Clothing Store

There was a pizza parlor in my neighborhood that I used to frequent. Come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly... Something sinister was going to happen. What else to expect when, instead of wicker chairs and embroidered tablecloths, one got great gobs of cheese and tomato sauce on fried bread? But the pie was good, it was comfort food, and I was proud of my little card with ticks on it - six entitled one to one free slice. It was a Saturday afternoon ritual, to earn this small measure of approval.

One afternoon I was feeling healthier than usual, meaning the parlor was due a visit. I happened by, but the place had disappeared. I hadn't dreamed it, surely - one dreams of learning French to read Mallarme and of Federer winning the French, but not of pizza... And I was a card-carrying member, wasn't I? I enquired of my wallet, anxiously. Confirming ticks.

The odd thing was that the disappearance of the parlor had made no alteration to the street. A row of shops, the most natural thing in the world. I couldn't even decide on the precise location of the parlor. A certain women's clothing store had a more elaborate look to it than I remembered, but opulence hid the secret well.

I moved on. Walking down the street another day, by that precise spot, I felt no hankering for pizza. But I did happen to look at the store-front display, a casual glance... Then attention. Not clothes, no, that would have been far too natural, instead a photographic reproduction, slightly blurred, of a library bookshelf. The emphasis seemed to be on history and philosophy. There were a couple of titles that looked interesting: Craig Thomas' "There to Here" and Lloyd-Jones' "Blood for the Ghosts". Some other titles were hard to make out. I entered the store, in hope of enlightenment...

False advertising, of course. The clothing store had clothes in it. However, I did find a copy of the Everyman edition of Woolf's "Mrs. Dalloway" on a shelf. I walked to the purchase counter with it. My face was drained of all expression. I did not look into the eyes of the saleswoman. She offered to wrap the book in tissue paper, such a nice gesture, but I declined.

My story is getting ahead of itself. Before I made the purchase, I did find a photographic reproduction, slightly blurred, of a library bookshelf inside the store. The emphasis seemed to be on philosophy. A couple of titles did look interesting: Craig Thomas' "There to Here" and Lloyd-Jones' "Blood for the Ghosts". Certain other titles were blurred.

Such confusion, such delight. We'll pay for it, my friends, if we haven't already. I was on a street in the city, and then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, I found my way home.

Babe of the Day

Francesca Neri

This is for all you lads and ladettes out there! Have fun, folks!

Jose Saramago's "The Double"

You've got to read Jose Saramago, he's a Nobelist. I like to improve my mind, that means a Nobelist a month at the very least. Nobelists are great writers, tautologically so, and also decent, dignified human beings.

Saramago does reward his readers. "The Double" is about a history teacher, Tertuliano Maximo Afonso, who discovers accidentally that he has an exact double, a man whose body is identical to his in every detail. Tertuliano becomes obsessed with tracking down his double, and when they finally do meet the consequences are chaotic and disastrous. The novel is perfectly paced and plotted, starting off with a leisurely examination of Tertuliano's environment and his depressive state of mind, gaining momentum as he pursues his obsession, and ending in a flurry of action as the doubles dissolve into games of oneupmanship, each determined to prove that he is the "original". There is confusion at the end, a loss of focus, but then the path of light when one mirror inclines to another is never simple (and a third mirror has not yet arrived). The novel is really a rigorous working out of the philosophical theme that individuality is what keeps anxiety at bay. However, it's never cold, quite the contrary, because of

Saramago's writing style - unique, happily it translates well. He is a chatty, digressive writer; these qualities find a natural correlative in his famous run-on sentences. Full stops are scarce in Saramago's work. The mind has not much grammar, and Saramago's style allows him to explore the psychology of his characters as well as make frequent authorial interventions (thus to betray the thinking of author as narrator) without the switches and segues seeming contrived. Conversations are reported with minimum discrimination between speakers - a mere capital letter to indicate that the microphone has passed. This makes them rather hard to parse sometimes, but the principled reader will bear the hardship bravely when he considers that it is consistent with the democratic quality of the work.

History is the constant theme, directly or indirectly. The very notion of History with a capital H presupposes the existence of an impartial observer, who distinguishes reliably between the necessary and the contingent. This observer is of course the author, but the author is also the one who sets the globe spinning, so to speak, and often intervenes, or interferes (with a hidden agenda in mind?). This fact is acknowledged and addressed, but the purpose remains dark, and the consequences irrevocable.

How's it going?

How is it going? What is it? Where? When?

It's gone. It is, or was. Gone.

We've got to be going...

Time Imagined

No past and no future, merely the infinite present