Shirley worship & follicly-challenged solidarity soundtracks walks well.
Alert genius that I am, the point-and-click failed to accompany yours truly on solo Clevelandia darkthroning, so you're stuck with the following mediocrity.
But unlike a gallon of gas, & life, there's no cost to you.
Shelves and stacks and shelves of skulls, a Dewey
Decimal number inked on each unfurrowed forehead.
Here's a skull
who, before he lost his fleshy parts
and lower bones, once
walked beside a river (we're in the poetry section
now) his head full of love
and loneliness; and this smaller skull,
in the sociology stacks, smiling (they're all
smiling)—it's been empty
a hundred years. That slot
across the temple? An ax blow
that fractured
her here. Look at this one from the children's shelves,
a baby, his fontanel
a screaming mouth and this time no teeth, no smile.
Here's a few (history)—a murderer,
and this one—see how close their eye sockets!—a thief,
and here's a rack of torturers' skulls
beneath which a longer row of the tortured,
and look: generals' row,
their epaulets
on the shelves to each side of them.
Shelves and shelves, stacks stacked on top of stacks,
floor above floor,
this towering high-rise library
of skulls, not another bone in the place
and just now the squeak of a wheel
on a cart piled high with skulls
on their way back to shelves
while in the next aisle
a cart filling with those about to be loaned
to the tall, broken-hearted man waiting
at the desk, his library card
face down before him.
-- A Library of Skulls, Thomas Lux
C'est-à-dire, pay your fines sans regret.
Books aren't the only thing we collect.
Muahahahahahaha, et
cet-
era of good feelings, I mean, whee.
The worst part about having wingnuts populate the family isn't having to listen to their ill-informed bloviating that numbs the senses with an endless cavalcade of hollow thuds thereby making an already interminably long holiday a Sisyphean punishment, nor how if I was to come up with a drunken caricature of an animated version of a stop-motion Republican sketch comedy program, it wouldn't do satire justice because the aforementioned yokels and their national compatriots brutally slaughtered satire so many years ago, but the existence of those wishy-washy types who, desperate for a faux civility because the world is just too bloody uncomfortable, give equal weight to everyone's so-called opinion, regardless of who carries facts in their sacks and who carries dog shit.
I'm so tempted to stay home for Saturnalia. I'd experience a more adult conversation talking to the dustpan.
So, taking a break from research mode, let's see what's going on in the world, though I'm sure you all have touched on this stuff at least 79 million times in the last couple of days. I may be out of the loop, but perhaps I'll say something interesting.
"....."
Ahem. Hey, how about all that craziness in India?
One former intelligence service member told Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity, that the collapse of human intelligence networks in favour of and total reliance on technological intelligence-gathering contributed to the failure.Someone didn't read their PDB, though it is Al-Jazeera, so take everything they say with a stack of Korans and the severed heads of Christian missionaries. But what about this:
The only silver lining is that there have been no blatant calls for Pakistani blood.Pussies.
I thought about waxing poetic -- hey, it's Samuel Taylor Coleridge's birthday! Hell with my substandard tripe, go read the works of a true master -- on this story about dinosaur tracks, but I soon realized that instead of calling down the murderous wrath of the assassin who singlehandedly eliminated such a dominant superorder upon revelation of said nefarious deed, I figured I'd shut the hell up instead.
"Idea good. Grrr. Poems gay. Grrr."
"I can't believe you killed all the dinosauruses! Now how will our caveman ancestors get around?"
Not on the hardworking backs of Joe the Plumber -- MRMacrum, told you I'd rectify my thoughtless offense; see below! -- since we'll all be dead, I can tell you that! First Saddam hits us on 9/11, then his arch-ally, the Invisible Caliphate of Osama, gives us the Manchurian Messiah to tear us apart from within, and now they want to take our video games away!
Good job with the free pub, Sony. And if anyone was/is/would be offended, go jump -- and I think I'm turning into Pat Buchanan as I type this -- in a lake and swim over to Bill Donohue's house. Religions that share manufactured rage together stay together. Except when they're killing each other with suicide bombers and illegal invasions and occupations, but why be nitpicky.
Hold on to your panties, ladies and gents, it's The Official World Series Prediction® of this blog!
Tampa Bay vs. Philadelphia: fuck if I know. The Rays have a deeper starting rotation, Hamels is the best of either staff, both squads have solid bullpens, intangible A, intangible 32, vitamin B12. I'm banking on Ryan Howard not sucking vast amounts of posterior for a third consecutive series. Plus there's that whole 'I personally know a Phillies Phanatic and I fear for my ears' thing. Phillies in 7.
Now stimulate me, baby!
Um, no, not you, Ben. Her.
"Oh, sweetest Randal, it's so cold and overcast outside. Let's stay in where it's warm and cozy. You can read me poetry and then we'll make it hot like an overheating computer processing too many requests in between lazy complainers bitching --"
Sometimes I hate being at work.
Bloody hell, in my musical sadness, I can't believe I almost forgot to post this!
Christians crusade with the Bible.
Muslims jihad with the Qur'an.
Mormons serve up golden plates.
Devil worshipers spill blood to the works of Anton LaVey.
Neocons try and recreate Stalin and Hitler.
Scientologists jump like Tom Cruise.
I pluck Les Fleurs du Mal.
Bonne anniversaire, Charles Baudelaire.
I appreciate you not rising from the grave and carting your crumbling skeleton across the sea to pummel me with Ali-like efficiency, given how often I've been the flâneur strolling through your pages in my unending search for a whiff of that black magical versification. Hey, if Zep can liberally borrow from the great bluesmen, I don't see what's wrong with me doing the same to you, right? Thanks for not suing, but just to be on the safe side, I highly recommend taking a swim in this river:
Le Léthé
Viens sur mon coeur, âme cruelle et sourde,
Tigre adoré, monstre aux airs indolents;
Je veux longtemps plonger mes doigts tremblants
Dans l'épaisseur de ta crinière lourde;
Dans tes jupons remplis de ton parfum
Ensevelir ma tête endolorie,
Et respirer, comme une fleur flétrie,
Le doux relent de mon amour défunt.
Je veux dormir! dormir plutôt que vivre!
Dans un sommeil aussi doux que la mort,
J'étalerai mes baisers sans remords
Sur ton beau corps poli comme le cuivre.
Pour engloutir mes sanglots apaisés
Rien ne me vaut l'abîme de ta couche;
L'oubli puissant habite sur ta bouche,
Et le Léthé coule dans tes baisers.
À mon destin, désormais mon délice,
J'obéirai comme un prédestiné;
Martyr docile, innocent condamné,
Dont la ferveur attise le supplice,
Je sucerai, pour noyer ma rancoeur,
Le népenthès et la bonne ciguë
Aux bouts charmants de cette gorge aiguë
Qui n'a jamais emprisonné de coeur.
Van Gogh, The Poet's Garden, October 1888.
Hey, if classic rock stations can play two Zeppelin or Floyd tracks on Saturdays and Sundays, we can certainly celebrate two birthdays chez Randal. So, friends, Romans, Frenchmen -- and Dutch -- lend me your ears.
Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week. Enjoy the cake.
And try not to shoot anyone. Read them some verse instead.
Mon rêve familier*
Je fais souvent ce rêve étrange et pénétrant
D'une femme inconnue, et que j'aime, et qui m'aime,
Et qui n'est, chaque fois, ni tout à fait la même
Ni tout à fait une autre, et m'aime et me comprend.
Car elle me comprend, et mon coeur, transparent
Pour elle seule, hélas! cesse d'être un problème
Pour elle seule, et les moiteurs de mon front blême,
Elle seule les sait rafraîchir, en pleurant.
Est-elle brune, blonde ou rousse?—Je l'ignore.
Son nom? Je me souviens qu'il est doux et sonore,
Comme ceux des aimés que la Vie exila.
Son regard est pareil au regard des statues,
Et, pour sa voix, lointaine, et calme, et grave; elle a
L'inflexion des voix chères qui se sont tues.
*Paul Verlaine, Poèmes Saturniens
Bands toss out EPs between albums for various reasons: to stay in the spotlight with a brand new song, usually paired with some poorly-recorded, studio-enhanced live tracks; a tantalizing prelude of the next platter; fragmented, discarded leftovers to placate the rabid completists, of which I'm stupidly proud to count myself as a member for many acts. With Portland, Oregon folk-metallers Agalloch, it's none of the above, certainly not with their 'brand new' EP, The White. Sort of a companion piece to 2004's The Grey and its noisecape reworkings of tracks off their beyond brilliant 2002 album, The Mantle, the band has released seven mellow, melancholy, (mostly) instrumental tracks recorded in the last few years that wouldn't have sounded out of place on said long player, fit comfortably within their oeuvre and rank among their finest compositions.
Opening with a clip from The Wicker Man, a movie making additional appearances in the final two tracks as well, The Isle of Summer begins proceedings with a haunting acoustic guitar that recalls nothing but verdant leaves fluttering like ribbons in a warm, lilting August breeze, with a short, single fuzzed-out electric enhancing this late exhalation of the season. Twilight begins to arrive with Birch Black, along with a rippling electric/acoustic mix and percussion buried underneath. A sad, gentle, nearly wordless solitary voice echoes in the soundscape of Hollow Stone, a vague hymn to the panorama before us. The murmurs of the flora and fauna and a crisp, rock-strewn stream calls forth the world of the Pantheist, the EPs physical and thematic centerpiece, intertwining lines of guitar, both metallic and unplugged, a veil of drums, the notes wandering as a body and mind purposely lost in the wonders of creation, soon joined, for a moment, by a defiantly sad voice. Now, the rays of dawn, and the uptempo, accordion-accented neo-folk of Birch White, layered below the verse of English poet A. S. J. Tessimond:
The birch tree in winter
Leaning over the secret pool
Is Narcissus in love
With the slight white branches,
The slim trunk,
In the dark glass;
But,
Spring coming on,
Is afraid,
And scarfs the white limbs
In green.
The call of birds, swathed in that green, are the final notes heard before the plaintive guitar and piano of Sowilo Rune, whose whispered vocals and swirling synths conjure up the world of the ethereal, of the magical, all brought back home to the oncoming change with the piano of Summerisle - Reprise, whose notes are that inexplicable alchemy of the happy and the sad, of life and death, the ouroboros of existence that we're all fated to endure.
Sure, these guys take years between churning out full-lengths, but the wait is always worth it. And unsurprisingly, given the craftsmanship of the band, the same goes for 'stopgap' releases like The White, a wonderful collection of songs that explore yet one more shade of the band's deep-rooted interest in the stormy, yet fragile natural world that surrounds us. A request: don't take another four years until the next album, gents. Three will be just fine.
Actually, it's Jerry Cantrell's song and it's also his birthday, shared with French poet Stéphane Mallarmé. Yes, the poem below is his and not mine, évidemment. Bonne anniversaire, vous artistes que j'aime.
La chevelure vol d'une flamme à l'extrême
Occident de désirs pour la tout déployer
Se pose (je dirais mourir un diadème)
Vers le front couronné son ancien foyer
Mais sans or soupirer que cette vive nue
L'ignition du feu toujours intérieur
Originellement la seule continue
Dans le joyau de l'oeil véridique ou rieur
Une nudité de héros tendre diffame
Celle qui ne mouvant astre ni feux au doigt
Rien qu'à simplifier avec gloire la femme
Accomplit par son chef fulgurante l'exploit
De semer de rubis le doute qu'elle écorche
Ainsi qu'une joyeuse et tutélaire torche.
"Randal, you look so fine today. Of course I'm wearing my beer goggles, why do you ask?"
I've nothing against the drink, but man, am I fucking glad I'm not at work today so I don't have to deal with the inevitable invasion of drunken, hooky-playing idiots buzzing like bloodthirsty, brain-damaged flies around the tightly coiled feces serpent that is the St. Patrick's Day parade meandering through downtown Cleveland.
"Dude! Where's the fucking bathroom!"
"Your pants, apparently."
Oh, and don't fall in the giant crater, morons.
"Dude, that's the biggest tap I've ever seen!"
At least the little kids don't get plastered, then annoying.
They're merely there to see shiny, floaty things of green.
Let us close on a classy note, with some poetry.
Edgar, take it away.
Lines on ale
Fill with mingled cream and amber
I will drain that glass again.
Such hilarious visions clamber
Through the chamber of my brain -
Quaintest thoughts - queerest fancies
Come to life and fade away;
What care I how time advances?
I am drinking ale today.
You didn't think a single post about a crotchety old lunatic would suffice on today of all days, did you? Come on.
Everyone loves love, no? Especially this time of year when countless fools wait until the last minute to scrounge through the Hallmark leftovers, vacillating between a red, pink or white envelope while hoping that there's still some of the good -- but not too good -- chocolate remaining. Oh, and cashier? One of these two dollar roses in the plastic wrap.
Bah, I say. Bah.
This is the stuff that works like a charm.
At least that's what my wife tells me, despite my clockwork failure, and she wouldn't lie to her husband.
Would she?
Oh well, even if that was the case, it's not like I still wouldn't write.
In honor of this inscrutable holiday able to combine, with more success than any other, the entire spectrum of emotions from dark to light -- and back again -- I shall offer up some poets well-versed -- now that's funny -- in l'amour, those that I tend to pilfer from read for inspiration in order to aide, along with a generous helping of music and the occasional glass of spirits, bien sûr, the creation of the godawful verse that I present to my sometimes-better-half. At least she cringes less than she used to.
"If you don't watch the violence, you'll never get desensitized to it."
"Please tell me when the scary part's over."
"It's over."
"Aaaaaaagh!"
For starters, you can't go wrong with this lovesick dude plein de regrets of the French Renaissance, Joachim Du Bellay:
L'Olive, XXVIII*
My tongue, madame, would eagerly express
My thoughts to you when you bide far away,
But when I feel you close, naught can I say:
Suddenly it falls mute and powerless.
Thus hope both calms and kindles my distress;
Nearer I draw, yet farther seem to stay:
My pleasure is my woe, ah, welladay!
What most I crave, the least dare I possess.
Joyous by night and sad by day am I:
Sleep brings me what my waking hours deny;
The good I feel is false, the ill is true.
Woman I blame, yet faultless is she, quite;
Thus, Love, to ease my pain, I pray that you
Cut short my days, or grant me endless night.
I hear you, DB. Far easier to spill your guts in verse -- or in dream -- than in the spoken word. And how about his partner in poetical crime, Pierre de Ronsard, this one in the original French because let's face it, English may be the better language for rocking out, but it certainly isn't as sultry when it comes to versification. There's a reason it's classified as a 'romance' language, muah:
Le Second Livre des Sonnets pour Hélène, XIV
À l’aller, au parler, au flamber de tes yeux,
Je sens bien, je vois bien que tu es immortelle:
La race des humains en essence n’est telle:
Tu es quelque Demon ou quelque Anges des cieux.
Dieu pour favoriser ce monde vicieux,
Te fit tomber en terre, et dessus la plus belle
Et plus parfaite idée il traça la modelle
De ton corps, dont il fut lui-même envieux.
Quand il fit ton esprit, il se pilla soi-même:
Il prit le plus beau feu du Ciel le plus supréme
Pour animer ta masse, ainsi ton beau printemps.
Hommes, qui la voyez de tant d’honneur pourvu,
Tandis qu’elle est çà bas, soulez-en votre vue.
Tout ce qui est parfait ne dure pas long temps.
Sure, you may not know what it says -- I still have to reach for my bilingual dictionary from time to time, myself -- but it sure does sound beautiful. Moving forward in time, I'd be painfully remiss if I didn't mention the Romantics. No, not the fucking band, but all the literary and poetical figures to come out of that grand movement one reads in order to have their fragile ego brutally crushed under the inexorable weight of their collective genius. Here's a bit o' Shelley:
'Love's Philosophy'
The fountains mingle with the river
And the rivers with the Ocean,
The winds of Heaven mix for ever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one spirit meet and mingle.
Why not I with thine?
See the mountains kiss high Heaven
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea;
What is all this sweet work worth
If thou kiss not me?
Cheesy by our sensibilities? Perhaps, but we live in a jaded, postmodern age where everything must be ironic and satirical, where love is gleefully murdered only to be brought back from the grave in the mummified film of a formulaic romantic comedy. I've nothing against a heaping dose of snark and ennui, evidemment, but the sap in some of us needs nourishment, lest it die, too.
And thus, we arrive at last to the work of a twenty-first century clown with no delusions of adequacy, who merely continues in the gently shadowed vein of the above, better composed, pieces. But I like to write, my wife feigns her enjoyment of reading them, and it closes out the post on a down note, in both quality and tone, and if I'm about anything, it's ending things poorly.
L’étoile seule
Words fail to take hold in the superheat,
marooned in a street where no one speaks my language.
And if I’d try and translate what I’d say,
the same as a blank stare anyway.
I ask only that you sing my verse, feel the liquid
of every bon mot in line, the note of a letter,
the curve of each sound resonate, all to serve as
the coursing of nothing through your veins –
watch how easily your heart cleans up my mess.
Everything grows more complex by the hour,
vagabond wisdom cast aside for emotion to glide in,
to reign with a beautiful tyranny;
a sentence of melancholy carried out with immediacy.
Pleasure thrown in prison, you guard with a blind eye,
for you know escape from experience is impossible.
I breathe, I feed the shadow you cast,
captured and made to disappear in a spell –
maybe you don’t see me because I have so much to say.
I thought I caught a smile, a copper remembrance
of a crime once shown with purpose to deceive.
I’ve etched it again and again in my flesh so many times that
nerves have gone numb and the blood has dried up.
Locked away for so long, I’ve been redrawn as the dirt
for you to sweep away to the corner of an endless frame,
into the cracks of your soul; there let me stay
to pass these remaining days fulfilling your transient need –
leave me as the dust revolving around your star.
*English translation by Norman R. Shapiro. What, you didn't honestly think I did that. It would've been an incoherent mess.
Huh? What? Oh, sorry, I was just resting my eyes. Seriously, I was. Shut up. Ho hum, another Friday evening. The kids are off doing whatever it is that young people do - setting things on fire and honing their kleptomania - and the wife is no doubt conspiring against me. What to do, what to do...
I could sit on my ass and watch some ridiculous teevee program. No, I think I'll keep those last few remaining brain cells relatively active. Shall I pen some more verse? What a bloody bad idea.
The labyrinth lies where the sun doth rest,-- 'oh, stop, please stop!' screams the gallery of assorted nuts. That should give you a taste of what I churned out earlier: a veritable crime against the sonnet form. To the stockade, butcher! The muses have the divine right to judge, but Will, your barbs are beyond cruel and unusual so I beg of you, cease that infernal tootling!
seducing my wish with a frightful ease
to bring from sleep --
If only we could get a small handful of our politicians to do the same - and follow through. Not that he always did, but then again, he wasn't running the fucking country. Happy Birthday, Arthur Rimbaud.
And at least Verlaine didn't shoot anyone in the face.
