Friday, November 21, 2014

Out on the Broad Lake a Breeze Will Find Us That's Wafted Around the Planet to Cool Our Divinity





Someone's flying home today for Thanksgiving Break, picking her up twelve hours and thirty-four minutes from the time stamp of this post barring flight delay. In a paper bag in the backseat when the three of us get to my car will be two orders of Ruan Thai's How Jar (I will have eaten an order of How Jaw after we pick it up and are on the way to the airport, the How Jar cooled enough I can hold in one hand while I drive up 95 towards Baltimore), two orders of Yum Watercress, one large container of Tom Yum, one order of Ghan Keow Whan, one order of Yellow Curry, one order of Pad Kha Prao. There's a Egoslavian Holy Day Sunday which I may or not observe, last year's run-up re-listening mehhed me, maybe I'll be surprised, but maybe gone until Monday, though knowing me probably not.

Yesterday a new friend did me a Kind and kindly aimed me at Annie Gosland. I'd heard the name and heard the music but never put the two together. Some research I don't mind.







  • Cats, humans, domestication, genocide.
  • Speculative Anarchism: a reading group. (h/t) It's not for me, but some of you might. Here's the reading list: The Three Ecologies- Felix Guattari. After-finitude- Quentin Meillassoux (this text is fairly foundational philosophically- but we may not really require it). Ontocartography: an ontology of machines and media- Levi Bryant. The ecological thought- Timothy Morton. Bodily nature: science, environment and the material self- Stacey Alaimo. We have never been modern- Bruno Latour. Posthuman Life- David Roden. nihil unbound- Ray Brassier. Extrastatecraft: the power of infrastructure space. On an ungrounded Earth- Ben Woodard. Essays on extinction- Clair Colebrook (2 vol.s) Stolen Future,Broken Present: the human significance of climate change- David A Collins. Testo-Junkie::Sex drugs and biopolitics in the pharmacopornographic era- Beatriz Preciado.
  • (Yet another) Scandal in Albuquerque.
  • Perilous Sanctuary.
  • Bill Callahan, for those of you who do.
  • Pynchon's Inherent Vice, the novel, the movie.
  • Publishing books nobody reads.
  • Twin Peaks, for those of you who do. I'd never seen it, I didn't watch it when it first appeared. I'm watching it for the first time now. I subscribed to NetFlix to watch Deep Space Nine from start to finish. I've already stopped thinking about it. Cooper has just rescued Audrey from One Eyed Jack. Overall I'm glad I'm watching Twin Peaks, but Lordy, James and Donna, Bobby and Shelley, die. Oh! a prediction: Leland is Bob.







DAYS OF HEAVEN

Carl Dennis

That was a great compliment the Greeks paid to human life   
When they imagined their gods living as humans do,   
With the same pleasure in love and feasting,   
Headstrong as we are, turbulent, quick to anger,   
Slow to forgive. Just like us, only immortal.   
And now that those gods have proven mortal too   
And heaven and earth can’t be divided,
Every death means a divine occasion
Has been taken from us, a divine perspective,   
Though the loss gets only a line or two in the news.   
Hard to believe the headlines this morning   
That a banker on Mt. Olympus has been pilfering,   
That a builder has been guilty of shoddy construction   
On a bridge that spans a river in heaven,   
Cutting corners to squirrel away his fortune
For a better day, when the great day has already come.   
For news that heartens we must turn to the classifieds.   
Here in what’s left of heaven it’s right to advertise   
For a soul mate. It’s right to look for a job   
That lets us incarnate spirit more fully
And leave something behind that time is kinder to   
Than the flesh of gods. Lucky there’s work.   
Lucky the streets of heaven are in need of repair.   
Paint is peeling from the dream-house trim.   
Holy rainwater backs up in leaf-clogged gutters   
Till the ceiling sags and tiles need regrouting.   
And look at the list of practical items for sale—
Used snowblowers, croquet sets, chainlink fencing.   
And what about a wooden canoe with two paddles.   
Why don’t we make time for a turn before sundown?   
Out on the broad lake a breeze will find us   
That’s wafted around the planet to cool our divinity.
The clouds will hover above us in a giant halo   
As we watch our brother, the sun, descend,
His gentle face turned toward us, his godly expression   
Undarkened by accusation or disappointment   
Or the thought of something he’s left undone.



5 comments:

  1. 1)davidly's musings about humans and their animal companions, and who tamed who, and the fluctuating 'humanity' of the former reminded me of a saying - you've got to be an above-average human to be better than an average dog

    2)the theory-heavy anarchist reading list reminded me of
    “There is absolutely no inevitability as long as there is a willingness to contemplate what is happening.” – Marshall McLuhan - to which i would add - the willingness to contemplate has as a prerequisite the awareness of the possibility of contemplation

    3)the poem 'days of heaven' reminded me of a talking heads song, about how heaven is a place where nothing ever happens


    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zNdMc6wGtU


    4)the line from the poem chosen as today's title reminds me of the buffalo blizzard of '77, when very cool breezes blowing over the relatively warmer lake erie produced several feet of lake-effect snow - it would be interesting to be there to compare the contemporary weather event to that memorable occasion 37 years ago, but it's also nice to be a mocomofo watching it on tv - at the moment montgomery county is, compared to erie county, 'a little bit of heaven'

    5)and speaking of heaven, norman d. livergood says there never was so pernicious a spiritual untruth as the assertion that jesus's sacrificial death has handed heaven on a silver platter to all those who merely believe in him

    6)among livergood's published books are


    The Perennial Tradition: The Secret Legacy--The Single Stream of Initiatory Teaching Flowing Through All the Great Schools of Mysticism (2003)

    and

    How to Become a Modern Guru (2012)

    with respect to the former book, Anthony Gagliosso wrote, two months ago, "Eye opening, insightful and refreshing. If you are considering this book, it is not by mistake. You have looked this far, and you will not regret the investment in yourself through this purchase."


    the latter work has no reader reviews yet, but the publisher's descriptive material says

    People no smarter than you are becoming Gurus. You can too.

    "But they can sit cross-legged and meditate, or breathe through one nostril, or pronounce archaic Chinese," you say. So what! The fad of the stereotyped Guru is passé. Gurus now come in many different shapes, I.Q.'s, and speech defects. Whatever your previous training or feeling of physical or mental inadequacy, you are as much a candidate for Guruhood as the next fellow or gal. In fact, more so.

    Dr. Dr. Livergood lives at his Teaching Centrum the Hermetage, with his wife, the world famous writer, Michelle Mairesse, and their goat, Hildegard. He is author of the world-famous monograph, "Kansas as the Birth-Place of World-Famous Gurus," and a world-famous recipe for home-made ice-cream made with goat's milk. Read this Masterpiece only if you're ready for Instant Enlightenment (after a great deal of Effort).



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  2. james is a dork, but i love the song he does with laura and maggie

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  3. Thanks for the David Godine link.

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  4. my earlier comment mentioned the world famous writer michelle mairesse, spouse of dr. dr. norman livergood

    here is one of her poems




    Labyrinth

    You are here
    At the midpoint of an infinite series
    Or the middle of the muddle.
    You may see a mirror:
    Reflected there is the outer membrane
    Of self, the self's reflection by the world.
    Reject this useless information.
    The exit is here:
    You may find the egress
    (not a mythical beast)
    At the center. There you can glimpse
    A new dimension.
    Egypt's animal-headed gods
    Are nothing like Aesop's foibles.
    Those seeming dogs and snakes and birds
    Embody words of power:
    Loyalty, wisdom, vision.
    Words, silent and sounded,
    Reverberate against the walls.
    Yet none will guarantee your
    Getting out alive.
    On walls of old Egyptian tombs
    Fishers and fowlers spread their nets:
    Birds mark the upward flight of spirit.
    Fish swim in their element
    Not knowing what it is.
    On labyrinth walls
    The sole symbols and signs
    You will find
    Are carvings, initials:
    Kilroy was here, and so was I.

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