BETWEEN STORMS
There are times with no idea in mind, when it prods, it pushes. I want to read, have a cup of tea, enjoy sitting in the backyard. It says Go! There are excuses like it's raining now and who wants to hear anything about dank? But that's weak. Really, when the whole thing is a flood gate opening, rain pelting down and not a bird song or a bird anywhere near enough, dry enough to sing. And there's this whole orchestra inside which is hard to explain because it's not like one anyone ever heard before, beyond instruments, past following the likes of Thelonius Monk, Mozart, even Brubeck with his well tempered compromise. Debussy floating by the gate, La Mer on a stick, an undulating Mer that tickled my toes that first time swimming underwater without fear. So maybe a scale in thirds is worth trying. And so it actually seems.
How? Just for the lull of it, as Whitman sang. Birds or Leaves, let them sing, all the world's a stage. And also fall the dead leaves of autocratic North Korea:
“DPRK's access to H-bomb justice . . . is the legitimate right
of a sovereign state.”
CNN
January 2016
This . . . freewheeling thing like a Ferris wheel.
Buyit!
Before Technology arrived to jam halls and roam the curriculum, rambling over great balls of tumbleweed -- Proust was worth the price? Truth is what we crave. Yet fictional, all dressed up in a good story – beginning, middle, end, plunk, Sellit!
I hear Monk flailing jail bar triplets, Pure, as close as it gets.
At the circus where the fat lady oozes over edges, not just this thing or that, but everything. Wouldn't it be a cosmic shame to waste this planet and all the lives? NASA inspires no awe. Missiles are no comfort. Religious belief is a costume ball.
The sense of it is beyond Monk, Heidegger, any sort of word, each one a little lie, self congratulatory, posing. Each one proclaims a domain, a sovereign state. I see laughter tumbling by and I am tired of sneezing philosophy.
Pass the collection plate. Keep your powder dry. I'm just saying what slips through the cracks, between the lines, under the sheets, out the door in the morning.
“If we push the buttons to annihilate enemies . . . (they) will be reduced
to seas in flames and ashes in a moment.”
CNN
March 2016
A cry is heard. The Pissaro image, with pixillated people, all at once becomes a picture. Then the recognition:
some of us are fooled
most of the time
most of us some of the time
but all of us
all the time?
how long does it take
to vote for wavy gravy?
There ought to be something useful, something to raft us over the next forty day epoch.
Between storms I visit the bird feeder, kitchen rag in hand to slosh out water logged seeds - Sisyphus man - white and yellow soggy babies that could, imaginatively, become swollen little newborn maggots multiplying into a sea of composting leaves. It would be splendorous, pretentious, something commercial perhaps – See the blue bit. Look at me, a red I bit! MAKAH is best!!
Maybe the value is a good guffaw for Birdland, gratefully without some golden chain being tightened around a very good idea, by all accounts. Salute the Proustian masthead?
But no. There is nothing. That all-feared lack of pushing back. There's the value if not the rub. And no one can garnish my wages.
So there we go.
Eons ago, when studying radio technology in glowing vacuum tubes, two 6L6s in push-pull configuration were like tides of the moon, filled with mystery. So I guess it pushes
and it pulls after all --
Thank you. You read this far.
End of story?
*** *** ***
Tabitha and I, weather permitting, have a chase-the-mouse stick. We sat inside today and now this writing is boring. She's curled up asleep. Of course she'll wake up, eventually the rain will stop, but here's another: Whether or not the fat lady sings. . .
Strands of DNA have diaper ends that function like modern warranties, planned obsolescence, all part of a larger scheme for future products. As the warranty expires, right on schedule, an Uber taxi appears. The next ride begins with less luggage, bound for new adventures. The gamble is there's enough wealth sloshing around the system that some of us will make it. The wealth is well worth the waste, for those who are already doubling down. The iron mask of centuries weighs heavily.
The joker is climate change.
My wish is for everyone to see through the grill, out beyond or in behind, where as Pissaro showed, we're all equipped to see more than we thought or knew, to see with ears and hear with eyes beyond words.
So forget these. Please.
