musings

I've taken to wonder, recently,about our shared enterprise.How much time do I waste watching the ridiculous television set, even if for only Hockey and now Baseball games?Would this time not be better spent playing with my kids,walking the dog, reading a book, listening to Bach or actually speaking with my friends?The contradiction ,of course, is that I truly appreciate 21st century technology , I love trains and planes and the internet and lovely stereos and that I can watch films by Tarkovsky whenever I wish.The flip side,is of course,the dark side.Folks,it seems to me, will always give up some freedom if it mean technological convenience .Cell phones,GPS tracking,wireless internet,the lack of privacy,the intrusion that has become the ordinary. Here is an example. I waited for my wife to come home by subway on day, with the ever loving Delenn at my side, and counted not the people emerging from the subway speaking on cell phones, but those who were not.It was almost 20 to 1.Now, of course, there are myriad reason why, the one that struck me,though was loneliness, a gnawing deep gaping emptiness.{Of course this is not to say that the phones are not handy, can save a life,etc.it is the somewhat larger picture, sans the extreme example used as a common defense upon questioning the reliance upon the phones]How much intimacy we have given up for just a little toy.Well, what do I know? I'll have a cup of tea, crack open a book of poems, listen to Bach St Matthews Passion, and feel content.

civility

Again, it would seem, I come back to this subject. Civility,or lack thereof , is a pernicious threat to the body politic, our rights,our very existence as polis.The insane rancor over the health care "debate" which was actually no debate but rather the insurance companies and pharma giants waging war,as they know it to be done. The behavior of the porcine politicians ,the lunatic ravings of the radio and fox folk is so repugnant it makes you gag.Follow the money.Find out who benefits most from this, and you will find the real debate.The war in Iraq, who has benefited most ?Certainly no the Iraqi's,nor the Kurds.It is the defense contractors and the oil companies.Is there anyone who still believes this war has been fought over anything other than profits?Does anyone really believe the health care nonsense has anything to do with,well, health care? It is about profit, who controls it, and who controls the debt.Jesus wept...

Mrs. Bruno

when I was very young
there was grocery store
smack in the middle of our small street
Mrs. Bruno's
we called it
she was an old widow
her husbands snap brimmed
fedora
soft and grey
hung from the top of a coat rack
as if he was sitting in the kitchen
waiting
her store,though
was magic to this child
candies breads drinks cakes
I imagined that the store was
as vast as a supermarket
its stocks never ending
once
My mother needed some vegetable
I told her I would go to Mrs Bruno's
she has it
i said she has everything
My Mom calmly told me that she would not
I went anyway and asked
when she told me no
I was stunned
I thought she could reach in back
and withdraw
anything
like heaven
I guess
I remember asking her
repeatedly
are you sure you don't have it?
and spending some time
astonished at this unfolding

we moved the next summer
I went back ,once to see the store
it was now decrepit
not at all what I remembered
[whatever is?}
I went inside
the new owners said Mrs Bruno was gone
and I saw the
hat was
as well

latter days

eventually
the number of bank accounts
401K's
stocks bonds
real estate
will be
as ephemeral
as eider down
sunsets watched
will mean
more than assets
calculated
the red and black
might describe the sky more than a
ledger

as I listen to Bach
drinking tea
i think of all the opportunities
wasted
missed
because
I chased a butterfly
read a poem
held my wifes hand
walked with my child along the
edge of the sea

I smile and wonder
who missed what?

open place

we want more
by we I guess
I mean americans
though pretty much
the rest of the world
listens the same
we want it all
now
always
we want God
boxed
tied up
neatly
used to
secure arguments
and quiet loud relatives
we want land
preserved pristine
and highways to get to them
fast
before they're gone
we want to travel
quickly
cheaply
to go there
and SAY
we've been
our passports looking like
a proud third graders report card
with pretty
colorful
stamps
buying
maybe a hat or some bright scarf
soon forgotten

that will fall and clog a closet door for years

we do not take time
to sit
to breathe
our yoga is a competition
we run on treadmills
the metaphors screaming
no one listening

perhaps im just getting old
recognizing styles from 35 years ago
newly worn as if invented yesterday
listening to the same tired
speeches
the same old bugaboos
the victims
always
the other
the speeches have become cruder though
the tone more openly
vile
and
ignorant
ignorance is flaunted
militant
and by ignorance
i do not mean lack of
education
i mean
the argument that
the earth is flat
because the bible is printed
on flat pages
i mean the OTHER always being
someone who doesnt look
like my reflection

perhaps im simply
getting old
the cops all seem so young
the winters seem longer
the spring so short a time
the music though
if you stop
is always playing
it is beyond the hum
the hub
the din
it is the mercy of the wind
the breath of the earth
it is the planet
itself
rejoicing
who the hell am I to
dissent?

now and then

...haven't written anything in a while, simply trying to keep my head above water, as it were. Been concentrating on Dostoevsky and Pasternak so far this year,Pasternak's poetry to be more precise.Russian novelists have such grand designs,Feodor D always reaching for the grey to colorize ,Pasternak going back to childhood,to wonder.Sigh. His verse can be so seemingly obtuse, no wonder Stalin reportedly said"leave the Cloud Dweller alone." when he woke up one day and decided to whack half of the writers in the country.What a sad, strange wonderful country Russia is!Sad because its history is so replete with leaders who were either incompetent or corrupt or deranged,or all three.sigh. I have such a deep love of the people there, their openness, their love of literature of talk of chess and tea. I know so much of this has changed in the last 20 years,though I wonder if these things are not genetic/environmental somehow...been reading a great deal on the Russian/German battles of WWII.I am no buff of war, i usually read the poets to find out what was going on during any given time. However, since so much of history is constantly re-written[even in the USA,I'm afraid]it's good to see other viewpoints.The Russian losses in WWII are beyond comprehension.The Germans behaved demonically on their way into Russia, and the Soviets paid them back.Of course the civilian populations were the victims.The women of Berlin, dear God,rape as a means of subjugation !The diary a woman in Berlin and the film are so difficult to read and watch because the suffering is so continual.Does the fact that the diarist was FASCIST make her victim hood any less painful? Did the fact that the Ukrainians and Belorussians not support the Soviets make their suffering any less intense by the Germans?War by decimation. Has the world yet recovered from it?