Thursday, December 29, 2011

Or Until They Swerved in a Swift, Circular Line to the Left Because of the Firecat




This story about Pentagon cuts of generals and majors could have gone to press two weeks ago, two weeks from now, what is the Post's interest in releasing it yesterday, the Wednesday between Giftmas and New Year, the Wednesday before the first Republican primary Tuesday? Speculate.

How's that for mailing it in? The XTC song in one of my fifty most air-guitared songs ever and reliable bit here with the right topical. Also, I'm not mailing it in: Vagabound Scholar has continued the tradition of the great Jon Swift's annual bloggal roundup. Jon/Al did me a major Kind five or six times; he would badger me to send in my favorite BDR post of the year to blogwhore at his roundup. Looking at some of the bloggers on Vagabound's list and on his blegroll, many of you who read me now must have found me through Al, a good and Kind guy.









EARTHY ANECDOTE

Wallace Stevens

Every time the bucks went clattering
Over Oklahoma
A firecat bristled in the way.

Wherever they went,
They went clattering,
Until they swerved
In a swift, circular line
To the right,
Because of the firecat.

Or until they swerved
In a swift, circular line
To the left,
Because of the firecat.

The bucks clattered.
The firecat went leaping,
To the right, to the left,
And
Bristled in the way.

Later, the firecat closed his bright eyes
And slept.
 

8 comments:

  1. Yes, thanks, I thought I'd linked it but it looks like I forgot.

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  2. English Beat has the the power to get even an oaf like myself to dance. That is power.

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  3. Hey, did that wreck mess w/your commute home yesterday?

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  4. Naw, I usually ride my bike and I was working weird hours (post in-law hangover). I did think it was weird that there were so many cars on a typically quiet week.

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  5. Obama-Clinton--that oughta cinch it--the last U.S. presidential election? This is all working perfectly in my hypothetical scenario (sorry to say).

    This morning on line to pay my property tax at the courthouse annex (so cheap for all I've got!! yay Missouri) I got into it with a deputy sheriff who is very concerned about the United Nations training troops on US soil and, of course, those pesky illegal immigrants. (This is to dpirate's comment yesterday about crazies--scratch the surface, the "craziness" is everywhere.)

    With about 30 people in line who couldn't help overhearing, I told him (and he listened with firearms strapped on both hips) about the mules in the Bonne Terre lead mines. They would lower the mules down in a special elevator and they would never see the light of day again. Why so cruel, I asked him? Why not rotate the mules, let them come up occasionally to see the sun, the sky, breathe fresh air, snack on some dandelions? He had no answer. So I suggested to him that it was management's way of giving the workers, themselves horribly exploited, a way to see themselves as not located on the very bottom rung--another creature with a beating heart to pity or revile. And that in the same way power was still trying to divide us but that we didn't have to let ourselves be so easily manipulated. He said, "This conversation is over!" But I know I got through. And next time I see him we'll have more to say to each other. You got to give them something else to chew on, another way of looking at it. That's how we can dispel the "craziness," but it does require engagement, risk taking, sticking one's neck out, breaking the silence, as you say.

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  6. Talking to a few cops at Occupy K St was interesting. One told me to fuck off, one told me she was told by supervisors not to talk to Occupiers except to give orders, a third told me having to do his duty made him heartsick. The seven or eight others I tried to engage just stared at me.

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  7. One of my neighbors, a very sweet man (used to be a bad-ass dude but got reformed in Christ), works at the local prison. Personnel haven't received a raise in six years. Last week, some muckity-mucks came by from Jeff City and of course they can't walk fifty feet, they have to be toted everywhere. My neighbor's colleague was assigned to drive them around the prison and he put a big ole coffee can on the dashboard with a "Donations Welcome" sign.

    It's fun to look for the fissures in the monolith. Good news, out here they're everywhere. The Gaddis above is humbling. Remember what Elkin said in his PR Interview about Gass? "He is fucking around with language. That to me is legitimate and acceptable, and the furthest out you can go is the best place to be." But honestly, doesn't it look like he's taking his own pulse?

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