Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
The Book's Passionate Bearer: A Page from Jorie Graham's The Errancy
The Errancy
by Jorie Graham
Then the cicadas again like kindling that won’t take.
The struck match of some utopia we no longer remember
the terms of—
the rules. What was it was going to be abolished, what
restored? Behind them the foghorn in the harbor,
the hoarse announcements of unhurried arrivals,
the spidery virgin-shrieks of gulls, a sideways sound, a slippery utterly ash-free
delinquency
and then the subaqueous pasturings inexhaustible
phosphorous handwritings the frothings of their own excitements now
erase, depth wrestling with the current-corridors of depth ...
But here, up on the hill, in town,
the clusterings of dwellings in balconied crystal-formation,
the cadaverous swallowings of the dream of reason gone,
hot fingerprints where thoughts laid out these streets, these braceletings
of park and government—a hospital—a dirt-bike run—
here, we stand in our hysteria with our hands in our pockets,
quiet, at the end of day, looking out, theories stationary,
while the freight, the crazy wick, once more slides down—
marionette-like its being lowered in—
marionette-strung our outwaiting its bloody translation ...
Utopia: remember the sensation of direction we loved,
how it tunneled forwardly for us,
and us so feudal in its wake—
speckling of diamond-dust as I think of it now,
that being carried forward by the notion of human
perfectibility—like a pasture imposed
on the rising vibrancy of endless diamond-dust ...
And how we would comply, some day. How we were built to fit and comply—
as handwriting fits to the form of its passion,
no, to the form of its passionate bearer’s fingerprintable i.d.,
or, no, to the handkerchief she brings now to her haunted face,
lifting the sunglasses to wipe away
the theory—or is it the tears?—the freight now all
in her right hand, in the oceanic place we’d pull up
through her wrist—we’d siphon right up—
marionette with her leavening of mother-of-pearl—
how she wants to be legible, how the light streaking her shades now grows vermilion,
which she would capture of course, because that, she has heard,
from the rumorous diamond-dust, is what is required,
as also her spirit—now that it has been swallowed
like a lustrous hailstone by her unquenchable body—suggests—the zero
at the heart of the christened bonfire—oh little grimace, kiss, solo
at the heart—growing refined, tiny missionary, in your brightskirted host,
scorched comprehension—because that is what’s required,
her putting down now the sunset onto that page,
as an expression of her deepest undertowing sentiment,
which spidery gestures, tongued-over the molecular whiteness,
squared out and stretched and made to resemble emptiness,
will take down the smoldering in the terms of her passion
—sunglasses on the table, telephone ringing—
and be carried across the tongue-tied ocean,
through dusk, right through it, over prisons, over tiny clapboard houses
to which the bartender returns, exhausted, after work,
over flare-ups of civil strife, skeletons rotting in the arms of
skeletons, the foliage all round them gleaming,
the green belly-up god we thought we’d seen the last of,
shuddering his sleep off, first fruit hanging ripe—oh bright red zero—
right there within reach, that he too may be nourished,
you know this of course, what has awakened which we thought we’d extinguished,
us still standing here sword in hand, hand extended,
frail, over the limpid surface of the lake-like page,
the sleep-like page, now folded and gently driven into
its envelope, for the tiny journey, over offices, over sacrifices,
to its particular address, at the heart of the metropolis,
where someone else is waiting, hailstone at the core,
and the heat is too great, friend, the passion in its envelope,
doors slamming, traffic backing-up, the populace not really
abandoned, not really, just very tired on its long red errancy
down the freeways in the dusklight
towards the little town on the hill—the crystal-formation?—
how long ago was it we said that? do you remember?—
and now that you’ve remembered—and the distance we’ve
traveled—and where we were, then—and
how little we’ve found—aren’t we tired? aren’t we
going to close the elaborate folder
which holds the papers in their cocoon of possibility,
the folder so pretty with its massive rose-blooms,
oh perpetual bloom, dread fatigue, and drowsiness like leavening I
feel—
by Jorie Graham
Then the cicadas again like kindling that won’t take.
The struck match of some utopia we no longer remember
the terms of—
the rules. What was it was going to be abolished, what
restored? Behind them the foghorn in the harbor,
the hoarse announcements of unhurried arrivals,
the spidery virgin-shrieks of gulls, a sideways sound, a slippery utterly ash-free
delinquency
and then the subaqueous pasturings inexhaustible
phosphorous handwritings the frothings of their own excitements now
erase, depth wrestling with the current-corridors of depth ...
But here, up on the hill, in town,
the clusterings of dwellings in balconied crystal-formation,
the cadaverous swallowings of the dream of reason gone,
hot fingerprints where thoughts laid out these streets, these braceletings
of park and government—a hospital—a dirt-bike run—
here, we stand in our hysteria with our hands in our pockets,
quiet, at the end of day, looking out, theories stationary,
while the freight, the crazy wick, once more slides down—
marionette-like its being lowered in—
marionette-strung our outwaiting its bloody translation ...
Utopia: remember the sensation of direction we loved,
how it tunneled forwardly for us,
and us so feudal in its wake—
speckling of diamond-dust as I think of it now,
that being carried forward by the notion of human
perfectibility—like a pasture imposed
on the rising vibrancy of endless diamond-dust ...
And how we would comply, some day. How we were built to fit and comply—
as handwriting fits to the form of its passion,
no, to the form of its passionate bearer’s fingerprintable i.d.,
or, no, to the handkerchief she brings now to her haunted face,
lifting the sunglasses to wipe away
the theory—or is it the tears?—the freight now all
in her right hand, in the oceanic place we’d pull up
through her wrist—we’d siphon right up—
marionette with her leavening of mother-of-pearl—
how she wants to be legible, how the light streaking her shades now grows vermilion,
which she would capture of course, because that, she has heard,
from the rumorous diamond-dust, is what is required,
as also her spirit—now that it has been swallowed
like a lustrous hailstone by her unquenchable body—suggests—the zero
at the heart of the christened bonfire—oh little grimace, kiss, solo
at the heart—growing refined, tiny missionary, in your brightskirted host,
scorched comprehension—because that is what’s required,
her putting down now the sunset onto that page,
as an expression of her deepest undertowing sentiment,
which spidery gestures, tongued-over the molecular whiteness,
squared out and stretched and made to resemble emptiness,
will take down the smoldering in the terms of her passion
—sunglasses on the table, telephone ringing—
and be carried across the tongue-tied ocean,
through dusk, right through it, over prisons, over tiny clapboard houses
to which the bartender returns, exhausted, after work,
over flare-ups of civil strife, skeletons rotting in the arms of
skeletons, the foliage all round them gleaming,
the green belly-up god we thought we’d seen the last of,
shuddering his sleep off, first fruit hanging ripe—oh bright red zero—
right there within reach, that he too may be nourished,
you know this of course, what has awakened which we thought we’d extinguished,
us still standing here sword in hand, hand extended,
frail, over the limpid surface of the lake-like page,
the sleep-like page, now folded and gently driven into
its envelope, for the tiny journey, over offices, over sacrifices,
to its particular address, at the heart of the metropolis,
where someone else is waiting, hailstone at the core,
and the heat is too great, friend, the passion in its envelope,
doors slamming, traffic backing-up, the populace not really
abandoned, not really, just very tired on its long red errancy
down the freeways in the dusklight
towards the little town on the hill—the crystal-formation?—
how long ago was it we said that? do you remember?—
and now that you’ve remembered—and the distance we’ve
traveled—and where we were, then—and
how little we’ve found—aren’t we tired? aren’t we
going to close the elaborate folder
which holds the papers in their cocoon of possibility,
the folder so pretty with its massive rose-blooms,
oh perpetual bloom, dread fatigue, and drowsiness like leavening I
feel—
Monday, February 25, 2008
Additive: Optimism
The horse latitudes refer to region in the Northern Atlantic (between 30 and 35 degrees north and south) where vessels lightened their loads by throwing the horses overboard to catch the weakened current to return to course.
Modest Mouse:
Medication
this is the part of me that needs medication
this is the part of me that believes in heaven
...thinks outer space is all dead
...wishes it was with it
...'s trying to be funny
...loves my parents
...thinks that ants are cavemen
...thinks all humans are ants
...learns from sitcoms
....means nothing
and I do-o-o-on't know
where I could go away and you could wish that I had stayed or just
stayed gone
and I don't know
and I don't know at all
so, out of the context and into what you meant
and you know your reasons
you don't know who you are but you know who you wanna be
I-I-I doooon't know
so you go to the library to get yourself a book and you look and you look
but you didn't find anything to read
and I do-on't know at all
left all my kinder parts rusting and peeling
that guy was complaining as he looked at the ceiling
my nose isn't that big it looks nothing like me
we're all doctors trading sadness for numbness
grass looks much greener but it's green-painted cement
the mayor's machines are there cleaning the pavement
you can't make dirt clean so we'll just lemon-scent
Interstate 8
Spent 18 hours waiting stoned for space
I spent the same 18 hours in the same damn place
I'm on a road shaped like a figure 8
I'm going nowhere, but I'm guaranteed to be late
You go out like a riptide
You know that ball has no sides
You're an angel with an amber halo
Black hair and the devil's pitchfork
Wind-up anger with the endless view of
The ground's colorful patchwork
How have you been? [x2]
How have you? [x2]
I drove around for hours, I drove around for days
I drove around for months and years and never went no place
We're on a pass, we're on pass
I stopped for gas, but where could place be
To pay for gas to drive around
Around the Interstate 8
You go out like a riptide
You know that ball has no sides
You're an angel with an amber halo
Black hair and the devil's pitchfork
Wind-up anger with the endless view of
The ground's colorful patchwork
How have you been? [x2]
How have you? [x2]
The above lyrics are taken from an EP collection, "Building Something Out of Nothing" by Modest Mouse.
I particularly like the image in the refrain, "[w]ind-up anger with an endless view of / [t]he ground's colorful patchwork".
How often I have felt that activating, confounding anger simply sputters out before I am finished with it.
Modest Mouse:
Medication
this is the part of me that needs medication
this is the part of me that believes in heaven
...thinks outer space is all dead
...wishes it was with it
...'s trying to be funny
...loves my parents
...thinks that ants are cavemen
...thinks all humans are ants
...learns from sitcoms
....means nothing
and I do-o-o-on't know
where I could go away and you could wish that I had stayed or just
stayed gone
and I don't know
and I don't know at all
so, out of the context and into what you meant
and you know your reasons
you don't know who you are but you know who you wanna be
I-I-I doooon't know
so you go to the library to get yourself a book and you look and you look
but you didn't find anything to read
and I do-on't know at all
left all my kinder parts rusting and peeling
that guy was complaining as he looked at the ceiling
my nose isn't that big it looks nothing like me
we're all doctors trading sadness for numbness
grass looks much greener but it's green-painted cement
the mayor's machines are there cleaning the pavement
you can't make dirt clean so we'll just lemon-scent
Interstate 8
Spent 18 hours waiting stoned for space
I spent the same 18 hours in the same damn place
I'm on a road shaped like a figure 8
I'm going nowhere, but I'm guaranteed to be late
You go out like a riptide
You know that ball has no sides
You're an angel with an amber halo
Black hair and the devil's pitchfork
Wind-up anger with the endless view of
The ground's colorful patchwork
How have you been? [x2]
How have you? [x2]
I drove around for hours, I drove around for days
I drove around for months and years and never went no place
We're on a pass, we're on pass
I stopped for gas, but where could place be
To pay for gas to drive around
Around the Interstate 8
You go out like a riptide
You know that ball has no sides
You're an angel with an amber halo
Black hair and the devil's pitchfork
Wind-up anger with the endless view of
The ground's colorful patchwork
How have you been? [x2]
How have you? [x2]
The above lyrics are taken from an EP collection, "Building Something Out of Nothing" by Modest Mouse.
I particularly like the image in the refrain, "[w]ind-up anger with an endless view of / [t]he ground's colorful patchwork".
How often I have felt that activating, confounding anger simply sputters out before I am finished with it.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Charlie Rose - CLOSE / RAUSCHENBERG
There are worst things than not being taken seriously. Charlie Rose is my guilty pleasure...
because I am astounded that someone makes something.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Observed by Clouds
I have observed (in no order): the men's collection this Spring for Vivienne Westwood
JMW Turner's Sunrise with Sea Monsters
Gorey's Gashlycrumb Tinies, a favorite childhood book
in preparation for a canary-yellow-lined, chiaroscuro-ed spring.
JMW Turner's Sunrise with Sea Monsters
Gorey's Gashlycrumb Tinies, a favorite childhood book
in preparation for a canary-yellow-lined, chiaroscuro-ed spring.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
A Flower for Your Thoughts
The jonquil and the paperwhite are in the genus Narcissus.
Jonquille or junquillo share the Latin root word for reed, iuncus.
Jonquille or junquillo share the Latin root word for reed, iuncus.
For the Chinese, the jonquil is a good luck symbol.
According to the Flowerbulb Research Program at Cornell University, to stunt the growth of tall, top-heavy paperwhites use a dilute alcohol solution in watering:
To convert your booze to 5% alcohol, just divide the percentage alcohol by 5 and then subtract 1. That will tell you how many parts water to mix with your 1 part alcohol.
Narcissus, Photographer by Erica Jong
"...a frozen memory, like any photo,
where nothing is missing, not even,
and especially, nothingness..."
-- Julio Cortázar, "Blow Up"
Mirror-mad,
he photographed reflections:
sunstorms in puddles,
cities in canals,
double portraits framed
in sunglasses,
the fat phantoms who dance
on the flanks of cars.
Nothing caught his eye
unless it bent
or glistered
over something else.
He trapped clouds in bottles
the way kids
trap grasshoppers.
Then one misty day
he was stopped
by the windshield.
Behind him,
an avenue of trees,
before him,
the mirror of that scene.
He seemed to enter
what, in fact, he left.
Monday, February 18, 2008
And Now, (Again) the Anticlimax
After reading Jean-Paul Pecqueur's The Case Against Happiness, particularly "What We Want When We Want It" I want to resift the debris of a former life in words. This work, full of dancing digressions, makes me want to try my hand again at it. Here, the meaningless conversation fillers like "reeling me in" and "[l]ike quote-end-quote now" provide nice turns--Looking back at one less halting poem, I wonder if Pecqueur's sensibility is at work here, of one who painstakingly means, but says, nothing. Or is it off-handed irony?
Your Personal Effects
To undermine any appearance of rationality, practicality
Enter the immersion exhibits of the office: their workrooms
Nervy obstacles for personal ascriptions, and of course, finality.
Flush spines of trade paper and other forsaken vendibles
Proffering the personal, when clearly you mean business, straying
Here an incidental activity from Home, and not hours spent
In contemplation there before that doorway with its unrelenting ivy
To be rent-free again! The inside faintly redolent of the aviary
Where this bird has flown, and that excuse-strewn daybook
Divested of meeting one. Who could possibly envy the life huddled
Behind your post. Your voice breaking with a client who cannot hold
You. Blanched, while paperwhites rework tri-winged from forcing
Glasses, you rewash their feeble roots nestled in tumbled glass,
And so Clear this is the shoot and scape that suits you, "just fine."
Your Personal Effects
To undermine any appearance of rationality, practicality
Enter the immersion exhibits of the office: their workrooms
Nervy obstacles for personal ascriptions, and of course, finality.
Flush spines of trade paper and other forsaken vendibles
Proffering the personal, when clearly you mean business, straying
Here an incidental activity from Home, and not hours spent
In contemplation there before that doorway with its unrelenting ivy
To be rent-free again! The inside faintly redolent of the aviary
Where this bird has flown, and that excuse-strewn daybook
Divested of meeting one. Who could possibly envy the life huddled
Behind your post. Your voice breaking with a client who cannot hold
You. Blanched, while paperwhites rework tri-winged from forcing
Glasses, you rewash their feeble roots nestled in tumbled glass,
And so Clear this is the shoot and scape that suits you, "just fine."
Friday, February 15, 2008
Don't Smother the Writer
The loner needs his or her space. A part of her may enjoy people and actually need to be with others. However, when you see the lower stroke of a y or g drawn straight down, realize this person has a need to make it on her own emotionally. In relationships, this person will need space and not be co-dependent. In fact, independent is the key word. This can be a very healthy trait. Remember that at times, this person will need to be alone and give them this freedom.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Jane Siberry's Temple
My favorite--this song (and its remixes)is a collaboration with Brian Eno, Gordon Downie and Jane Siberry. I take her a bit like Annie Lennox or Kate Bush. The tussle at the end reminds me of a Jacob fighting the angel scenario in a chapel perilious, but we know what the "temple" means.
The dancers seem like the theme of Joni Mitchell's latest, Shine, which used the Vancouver Ballet.
Friday, February 8, 2008
Me And You And Everyone We Know
Can you spot the metanarrative:
I came home from "night psych," where I stayed behind to argue over two points as to whether math anxiety resides in the domain of cognitive or psychosocial dysfunction (since we are being dichotomous), and I discovered two perceptions unknown to myself. I am Jewish (so I would be an authority on Tays-Sachs), and I am fifteen-years-old in a dual-enrollment from the local high school.
Later, I pieced together a cobalt blue (painted like the hydrate I used in lab) gingerbread house with white trim, obscured by pine needles on the coffee table. The mere five-hundred pieces fell right into place as I viewed this film heady from White Owl merlot, which I bought only because I liked the picture and because it had a bronze medal on it. In these moments, life proclaims itself to me. In addition to producing some aesthetic amino acid wallpaper from the tesselated side chains to decoupage one wall, I think I will steam off all of the labels of bottles that I have opened to make a "Drinking Diary." Did I detect the chocolatey notes with green apple finish?
The bird imagery in this film recalls my early experience of ornithology: Once I was looking up in a sylvan sweep and an indigo bunting and a scarlet tanager were facing each other on the same branch. As I turned away to tell the others, the pair of birds remained there, a clash in my vision.
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Blue Morpho Wing is to Polyvalent Publications
"Although we all wish to be liked by persons of whom we are fond, in neurotic persons there is an indiscriminate hunger for appreciation or affection, regardless of whether they care for the person concerned or whether the person has any meaning for them. More often than not they are not aware of this boundless craving, but they betray its existence in their sensitivity when the attention they want is not forthcoming" (36) Karen Horney, The Neurotic Personality of our Time
"...According to prevailing attitudes, these people--the pride of their parents--should of had a strong and stable sense of self-assurance. But the case is exactly the opposite. They do well, even excellently, in everything they undertake; they are admired and envied; they are successful whenever they care to be--but behind all of this lurks depression, a feeling of emptiness and self-alienation, and a sense that [his or her] life has no meaning.
...
In the very first interview they will let the listener know that they had understanding parents, or at least one such, and if they are aware of having been misunderstood as children, they feel that the fault lay with them and their inability to express themselves appropriately. They recount their earliest memories without any sympathy for the child they once were, and this is the more striking as these patients not only have a pronounced introspective ability but seem, to some degree, to be able to empathize with other people. Their access to the emotional world of their own childhood, however, is impaired--characterized by a lack of respect, a compulsion to control and manipulate, and a demand for achievement. Very often they show disdain and irony, even derision and cynicism, for the child they were. In general, there is a complete absence of real emotional understanding or serious appreciation of their own childhood vicissitudes, and no conception of their true needs--beyond the desire for achievement. The repression of their real history has been so complete that their illusion of a good childhood can be maintained with ease" (5-6) Alice Miller, The Drama of the Gifted Child
When a dog barks late at night and then retires again to bed he punctuates and gives majesty to the serial enigma of the dark, laying it even more evenly and heavily upon the fabric of his mind. King Sweeney in the trees hears the sad baying as he sits listening on a branch, a huddle between earth and heaven; and he hears also answering the mastiff that is counting the watches in the next parish. Bark answers bark till the call spreads like fire through all Erin. Soon the moon comes forth from behind her curtains riding its full tilt across the sky, lightsome and unperturbed in her immemorial calm. The eyes of the mad king upon the branch are upturned, whiter eyeballs in a white face, upturned in fear and supplication. Was he mad? The more one studies the problem the more fascinated one becomes.
Flann O'Brien (1939). At Swim-Two-Birds (pp.216-217) London: Penguin.
Preface to The Handbook of Child and Adolescent Clinical Psychology: A Contextual Approachby Alan Carr (1999)
I currently listening to: DJ Pisces: Josephine (4 AM Deephouse mix)
"...According to prevailing attitudes, these people--the pride of their parents--should of had a strong and stable sense of self-assurance. But the case is exactly the opposite. They do well, even excellently, in everything they undertake; they are admired and envied; they are successful whenever they care to be--but behind all of this lurks depression, a feeling of emptiness and self-alienation, and a sense that [his or her] life has no meaning.
...
In the very first interview they will let the listener know that they had understanding parents, or at least one such, and if they are aware of having been misunderstood as children, they feel that the fault lay with them and their inability to express themselves appropriately. They recount their earliest memories without any sympathy for the child they once were, and this is the more striking as these patients not only have a pronounced introspective ability but seem, to some degree, to be able to empathize with other people. Their access to the emotional world of their own childhood, however, is impaired--characterized by a lack of respect, a compulsion to control and manipulate, and a demand for achievement. Very often they show disdain and irony, even derision and cynicism, for the child they were. In general, there is a complete absence of real emotional understanding or serious appreciation of their own childhood vicissitudes, and no conception of their true needs--beyond the desire for achievement. The repression of their real history has been so complete that their illusion of a good childhood can be maintained with ease" (5-6) Alice Miller, The Drama of the Gifted Child
When a dog barks late at night and then retires again to bed he punctuates and gives majesty to the serial enigma of the dark, laying it even more evenly and heavily upon the fabric of his mind. King Sweeney in the trees hears the sad baying as he sits listening on a branch, a huddle between earth and heaven; and he hears also answering the mastiff that is counting the watches in the next parish. Bark answers bark till the call spreads like fire through all Erin. Soon the moon comes forth from behind her curtains riding its full tilt across the sky, lightsome and unperturbed in her immemorial calm. The eyes of the mad king upon the branch are upturned, whiter eyeballs in a white face, upturned in fear and supplication. Was he mad? The more one studies the problem the more fascinated one becomes.
Flann O'Brien (1939). At Swim-Two-Birds (pp.216-217) London: Penguin.
Preface to The Handbook of Child and Adolescent Clinical Psychology: A Contextual Approachby Alan Carr (1999)
I currently listening to: DJ Pisces: Josephine (4 AM Deephouse mix)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
