Sunday, January 13, 2019

My Obsessed Incessant Itch and Interest in Things Found Frightful

  • Morton Feldman, born 93 years ago yesterday, innermost circle of rotational MSADI5G.
  • I didn't forget - I knew, know, will remember he has the same birthday as Earthgirl.
  • In middle of a satisfying (as opposed to standard) seethe yesterday, I indulged the seethe.
  • Life in the Seethocene.
  • I didn't want to post Feldman in a satisfying seethe, diminishes both the seethe and the Feldman.
  • Put another way, Feldman too important to my ears to use as zoloft on my seethe.
  • Here's Feldman's Ubuweb page (you do throw your pocket's coins at Ubuweb, yes? No.).











NIGHTWATCHMAN'S SONG

W.D. SNODGRASS

I
 
What’s unseen may not exist—   
Or so those secret powers insist   
            That prowl past nightfall,   
Enabled by the brain’s blacklist   
            To fester out of sight,   
 
So we streak from bad to worse,   
Through an expanding universe   
            And see no evil.   
On my rounds like a night nurse   
            Or sentry on qui vive,   
 
I make, through murkier hours, my way   
Where the sun patrolled all day   
            Toward stone-blind midnight   
To poke this flickering flashlamp’s ray   
            At what’s hushed up and hidden.   

Lacking all leave or protocol,   
Things, one by one, hear my footfall,   
            Blank out their faces,   
Dodge between trees, find cracks in walls   
            Or lock down offices.   
  
Still, though scuttling forces flee   
Just as far stars recede from me   
            To outmost boundaries,   
I stalk through ruins and debris,   
            Graveyard and underground.   
  
Led by their helmetlantern’s light   
Miners inch through anthracite;   
            I’m the unblinking mole   
That sniffs out what gets lost or might   
            Slip down the world’s black hole.   
 
II
  
(ending his rounds, the watchman, somewhat tipsy, returns)
 
What’s obscene?—just our obsessed,   
Incessant itch and interest   
      In things found frightful:   
In bestial tortures, rape, incest;   
      In ripe forbidden fruit   
  
Dangling, lush, just out of reach;   
Dim cellars nailed up under each   
      Towering success,   
The loser’s envy that will teach   
      A fierce vindictiveness,   
  
The victors’ high court that insures   
Pardon for winners and procures   
      Little that’s needed   
But all we lust for. What endures?—   
      Exponential greed   
  
And trash containers overflowing   
With shredded memos, records showing   
      What, who, when, why   
’Til there’s no sure way of knowing   
      What’s clear to every eye:   
  
The heart’s delight in hatred, runny   
As the gold drip from combs of honey;   
      The rectal intercourse   
Of power politics and money   
      That slimes both goal and source.   
  
What’s obscured?—what’s abscessed.   
After inspection, I’d suggest   
      It’s time we got our head   
Rewired. I plan to just get pissed,   
      Shitfaced and brain-dead.

2 comments:

  1. You hate me more than snow? Fuck, that's discouraging, but 50 years is a long time, it'll breed a little contempt, sure.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You haven't got neera podesta yet, but our love is unconditional in any case.

      Delete