Be Not Sad: James Joyce

Be Not Sad
by James Joyce

Be not sad because all men
Prefer a lying clamour before you:
Sweetheart, be at peace again -- -
Can they dishonour you?

They are sadder than all tears;
Their lives ascend as a continual sigh.
Proudly answer to their tears:
As they deny, deny.

The Stranger by Leonard Cohen

The Stranger
by Leonard Cohen

It's true that all the men you knew were dealers
who said they were through with dealing
Every time you gave them shelter
I know that kind of man
It's hard to hold the hand of anyone
who is reaching for the sky just to surrender
who is reaching for the sky just to surrender.

And then sweeping up the jokers that he left behind
you find he did not leave you very much not even laughter
Like any dealer he was watching for the card
that is so high and wild
he'll never need to deal another
He was just some Joseph looking for a manger
He was just some Joseph looking for a manger.

And then leaning on your window sill
he'll say one day you caused his will
to weaken with your love and warmth and shelter
And then taking from his wallet
an old schedule of trains, he'll say
I told you when I came I was a stranger
I told you when I came I was a stranger.

But now another stranger seems
to want you to ignore his dreams
as though they were the burden of some other
O you've seen that man before
his golden arm dispatching cards
but now it's rusted from the elbows to the finger
And he wants to trade the game he plays for shelter
Yes he wants to trade the game he knows for shelter.

Ah you hate to watch another tired man
lay down his hand
like he was giving up the holy game of poker
And while he talks his dreams to sleep
you notice there's a highway
that is curling up like smoke above his shoulder
and suddenly you feel a littlt older

You tell him to come in sit down
but something makes you turn around
The door is open you can't close your shelter
You try the handle of the road
It opens do not be afraid
It's you my love, you who are the stranger
It's you my love, you who are the stranger.

Well, I've been waiting, I was sure
we'd meet between the trains we're waiting for
I think it's time to board another
Please understand, I never had a secret chart
to get me to the heart of this
or any other matter
When he talks like this
you don't know what he's after
When he speaks like this,
you don't know what he's after.

Let's meet tomorrow if you choose
upon the shore, beneath the bridge
that they are building on some endless river
Then he leaves the platform
for the sleeping car that's warm
You realize, he's only advertising one more shelter
And it comes to you, he never was a stranger
And you say ok the bridge or someplace later.

And leaning on your window sill ...
I told you when I came I was a stranger.

"An insincere and...": Buddha

"An insincere and evil friend is more to be feared than a wild beast; a wild beast may wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind." - Buddha

Pembina (late post)

In Morning

(click pic for larger image)

Lifeguard Sleeping, Girl Drowning: Morrissey

Lifeguard Sleeping, Girl Drowning
by Morrissey

Always looking for attention
Always needs to be mentioned
Who does she
Think she should be ?
The shrill cry through darkening air
Doesn't she know he's
Had such a busy day ?

Tell her ... sshhh
Somebody tell her ... sshhh
Oh, no way, no way, there's no movement
Oh, oh, hooray
Slowest ...


It was only a test
But she swam too far
Against the tide
She deserves all she gets
The sky became marked with stars
As an out-stretched arm slowly
Disappears


Hooray
Oh hooray
No, oh, oh, woh, there's no movement
No, oh, hooray
Oh, hooray


Please don't worry
There'll be no fuss
She was ... nobody's nothing


(What's your name ?)
(What's your name ?)
(What's your name ?)
(What's your name ?)


When he awoke
The sea was calm
And another day passes like a dream
There's no ... no way

(What's your name ?)
(What's your name ?)
(What's your name ?)
(What's your name ?)

consumption

The Sun is
building then
shadows wide, immediately falling,
August city nearing sunset,
looking up, the highest half still holds the light
gazing down, the other force; cold reversal,
geometry and movement, the shift and the chase,
feeling the constant air,
as weight, as degree, as silence, disruption.
Recognizing the precision, the cobalt pressure
It is inhaling me
and with each hungry moment
it grows, it takes back,
it steals, breathing in every inch
as it consumes, it consumes.

Fernie, July 2009

Traveling with friends to see old friends is always inspiring but especially when you see how well things are going in their lives. Goos' current situation, while possibly seeming more sentimentally satisfying due to my own personal turmoil, is undeniably sweet, and I mean that in the sappiest way possible, but I say it proudly and romantically and without any negative connotations. He has a beautiful daughter, a beautiful, thoughtful girlfriend and a glorious little house nestled away in a sunny mountain community. I am envious indeed. I told Goos how fortunate he is to have so many meaningful things in his life--- he wisely admitted that he felt incredibly rich.

I'm rich as well in certain ways, I mean, I have my health, I have passion and I have honest friends--- hopefully one day I can be so lucky as to find an ounce of the loyalty and the remarkable beauty that surrounds my good friend Goos.


(Wow! reads like a grade 7 paper...still, I mean every word, even if I shoulda put more time and effort into it.)

INJA KOJAST INJA IRAN AST SARZAMINE MANO TO

a little belated but important "current event" poetry...

now we all know how this ended: tyranny forever defeating those demanding freedom.

some-some on Erich Fromm- pt the 2

"Love is union with somebody, or something, outside oneself, under the condition of retaining the separateness and integrity of one's own self." -Erich Fromm

rjb: Most recently, I lost myself-- lost my own identity and longer still, my integrity. I was foolishly focusing all I had towards one who demonstratively renounced my love. Though, I don't really blame her, I'm sure she renounced me precisely because I lost myself, perhaps she renounced me because she lost herself as well. I don't think sacrificing the self (I mean, in an uncool, non-Ahimsa way) is the rule but it certainly is the norm in most relationships. It needn't be--- and I won't allow it to be again.


---
"One cannot be deeply responsive to the world without being saddened very often. " -Erich Fromm

rjb: I'm convinced that the more sorrow one experiences in one's lifetime the more "thoughtful" (not to be confused with "intelligent") they become---if one allows oneself to appreciate the power of "legitimate suffering", without distractions and willful ignorance.


---
"To hope means to be ready at every moment for that which is not yet born, and yet not become desperate if there is no birth in our lifetime. " -Erich Fromm

rjb: I feel hopeful for many things, mostly for sustaining self-improvement and I'm not willing to concede to the still-birth or non-acquisition of a more positive lifestyle and empowering attributes; I do however have many hopes that are beyond my own control, and I think these are the main ones Fromm is referring to. By his suggestion I am trying hard to feel a calmness (and surprisingly, succeeding) amidst all this chaos which allows me to fathom and very nearly expect greater loss and disappointment (with little fear). Losing faith is stinging but it needn't be defeating.


---
"What most people in our culture mean by being lovable is essentially a mixture between being popular and having sex appeal. " -Erich Fromm

rjb: ...and I imagine all men will come to be repeatedly undone by sexual selection --- and perhaps too hopefully/cruelly I expect women also have the potential to be undone by their own "selections."

"Peace like a river, ran through the city..."

Yes, I have place; a strangely configured bachelor suite. Not much beyond a kitchen, a bathroom and a bedroom (no living room). But it’s enough for me. It’s in a really nice neighborhood and close to my work, which is important, since there’s a trade-off ---its small size.

Riverdale is the name of the community. The view of the river valley in the back is spectacular. Peace like a River. My landlord told me that someone is moving out of a one bedroom soon and that I could switch to that one, should I choose to. Besides the fact that the apt is about $150-$200 cheaper than most apartments in Edmonton, the best part about it is I feel stronger just by acquiring my own place. I almost forgot what it feels like to accomplish something, even something as small as successfully getting a place--- it adds a little bit to my long-time battered ego. Working out on ten of the last twelve days obviously helps out a lot too. Small steps all, but essential I think.

My life is, on certain fronts, still a mess, but I feel like I can handle anything. I’ve already mentally prepared myself for all possible outcomes; short of death--- my mantra, Thomas Hardy’s: “If way to the Better there be, it exacts a full look at the Worst” has helped me out immensely. If I could, I’d thank him for the supplied adage and for his unabashed recognition of the harmony in the dichotomy of Romance and Realism—and I hope he wouldn’t be offended if I purposely, for the time being, avoided rereading his masterpiece, 'Neutral Tones' ---at least until autumn.

rains pours

Span of 1 week:
(so far in chronological order)

-sever family trauma (can't specify)
-lost my girlfriend of 7 years, a girl I was convinced would one day be my wife
-lost my sweet dog, Newton
-lost my home

now I'm living as a transient between some friend's places and my mom's until I get a place for July. For most of my waking hours I feel as though I've been repeatedly kicked in the stomach. Yes, yes, familiar heartache.

...then today, on my way to work-out I realize I lost my gym shoes. I can't work out. I need to for my own sanity! After I accepted the fact that I couldn't exercise, I decided to drive to work. I got into my truck and alas, it wouldn't start. I have to get it towed, again. I have to spend money that I don't have getting to a garage and then getting fleeced by the garage. (again--- I went through all of this less than 5 months ago, the truck part I mean)

fuck

tomorrow:

"There’s a voice in each of us that longs to be slurred."

Some solemnly categorize me as ‘conservative’ or ‘antisocial.’ Fuck, if one is going to insult at least let the abuse be so accurate as to be meaningful; have the courtesy to understand, or at the very least thoughtfully recognize, my flaws and ugliness. “Antisocial” is a cheap label, hollow, lost in its vagueness.

I enjoy friendship as much as anyone I know and I love my friends--- I see nothing wrong in being comfortable with the friends I have, they’re established, proven, time-worn; I see no need to recruit strangers to my cause; I feel no longing to affiliate myself with people whose sole value resides in the sheer quantity of pollution they can withstand.

My inner-circle is nearly sacred, not completely private, nor completely harmonious, but it is authentic, which is important. Popularity, on the other hand, when sought as the lone goal, is perhaps the vainest and most ignoble of conquests. Others must appreciate your sincere characteristics, your gifts and your conversation. Even if you’re not enjoyed, as trite as it sounds, you must somewhat enjoy the other. I feel better refusing such cheap glories; I’d rather not, so frequently, reduce my effect on others. I feel no need to distract my intentions and distort my attributes through regular bouts of deliriousness, scheduled mindlessness. It’s better to be brave enough to let honesty, frankness and admiration determine friendship --- and then, if it happens, in whichever direction, subsequent levels of popularity.

Having said all that, I don’t mean to suggest that new friends are worthless; of course any true friendship is a positive addition. I’m simply an advocate of earning friends and fostering friendship, well, mostly by the exchanging of ideas and the sharing of authentic experiences. I think that too often we mask our real value by lazily clinging to the routine of weekly loutishness and other time-honoured forms of personality distortion.

(fer P.D.H.--- making me think)

I do not want her surrender,
I need her eager, ambitious.
Yet, effortlessly, mistakenly,
I invoke her resignation;
our defeat.

some-some on Erich Fromm

“Old Testament character Abraham, who represents the man who dares to risk individuation. Abraham becomes a hero because he heeds God’s words to him: “Leave thy country and leave thy Father’s house and go to a country which I shall show to you.” [Gen. 2.1] This is the symbol of the hero who dares to stake his existence on independence by leaving certainty and risking uncertainty. This is one of his alternatives. The other possibility is to refuse to risk individuation and become enmeshed in the confines of Mother, home, blood, soil--- never really gaining independence from these forces, never becoming an independent person.” -Erich Fromm

This one really stings me --- on a daily basis even. It’s probably pretty natural to worry about taking the safe route in life too often. I realize that the dichotomy isn’t so ‘black and white’ but I also feel that the basic truth which Fromm presents here is authentic.
---

“Freud saw history as a tragic alternative between having no culture and no neuroses or having civilization with the repression and neuroses it entailed.” -Erich Fromm

After reading Steven Pinker, part of me would like to dismiss this interpretation as an overly Romantic take on the damning effects of civilization which is often stressed by those who purport the validity of the ‘noble savage’ theory. But I think that it’s talking more about the societal strains put upon a person whose evolutionary history simply can’t keep pace with their cultural ones--- which obviously creates more friction, at least psychologically, than I would imagine our ancient ancestors ever felt. Pinker and Fromm’s psychological insights needn’t be contrary to one another.
---

“It is often the case that psychologists searching for validity and rigorous proof prefer to deal with problems which are insignificant but can be proved, rather than with problems which are significant but which cannot be proved so rigorously” -Erich Fromm

I think this was probably Fromm reacting to some of the hard science being celebrated as the ultimate tool for psychic insight. There always seems to be some sort of ‘either or’ scenario recurring throughout Fromm’s work but I think that these distinctions, while perhaps overarching, are most likely the natural way one comes to conclusions, which on the more gradual path of reality, seem to be too difficult to decipher without the help of such illuminating exaggeration.
---

Anyway, I love the insights from this guy whether they’re polarizing or not.

mayonnaise / minds

Aly took her turn on the computer. I walked out of the room, through the hallway and into the kitchen. Entering the kitchen I saw the bright, white ‘Kitchen Aid’ squarely in front of me, I had never used it before but I became suddenly excited. I ran back into the computer room shouting boastfully along the way, “I’m going to make homemade mayonnaise!” Aly, half-laughed and looked at me with widening, inquisitive eyes. She was hunched forward her chin on her palm, her nose a foot from the monitor, the screen was covered with Google search results from her most recent query, “homemade mayonnaise”.

Prophesy

In the early morning hours a wild-eyed man travelled toward me, he came from the North. Unprovoked, he told me about my future lives and his voice was hard and sure. “In the next life, you’ll be down here,” he said, raising his flat hand up and down near his ankle. He thought harder, “you’ll be my waitress--- only you won’t serve me anything; you’ll just stand there, waiting---waiting.” His eyes were like liquid. “You’ll, you’ll…” he debated, breathing heavily --- “you’ll not be wearing any coat, and you’ll know what the cold is!”

I tried to laugh and then I believed him.

the drugs had different expressions/ Burning Man 2008

In 2008 the drugs had different expressions. MDMA was new to me but I had known ecstasy before as it made me cry… Previous experiences on ‘e’ anyway led to blathering sorrows as I walked down Whyte avenue bawling, longing for an ex-lover, then, more newly made ruthless in a strange and daring role-reversal. Previously yes, incoherent on ‘e’, 2002 maybe, four in the morning after the bad rave and worn music, full of sweaty, suburban boys in white, sleeveless undershirts and dark, baggy, blue jeans, having dance-offs with the blue light strobes and the grinding polyrhythms manifesting in their jaws; me too, all but the white shirt, yes our jaw-gnawing required hard walking, as we headed outside the sunlight shone on an abandoned parking lot, we strolled up the bleak, cubic spiral to the top floor and amongst the debris a ray directed me to a cement conglomerate---picking up the chunk, God asked me to throw it. Far away there was a target / lady, three stories down and impossible to hit, a different block, impossible! ---She was probably on her way to Church since it was Sunday. The ray dared me to get as close to her as I could with the rock. Asshole, unforgivable asshole threw the rock and really hit her at an absurd distance. Not a huge rock or a hard hit but the age and the purity and the atrocity still demanded insatiable amounts of guilt to be digested at a later hour and still now, at this, a much later year. After the turmoil, frenetic remorse and truly satanic jazz which my brother mercilessly tried to sooth me with, I headed south. Yes, embarking on the trendy avenue without sleep, no longer high, but concerned, especially about the nostalgic and the tragic. I walked past frightened girls, red-faced, with tears streaming hot and joining under my chin. Unhappy, I’d say. My brother of the acid-jazz eventually came to my rescue, this time around unable to accost me with Charles Mingus’ "z-zeete- beee-boooop-wip ah-doo-ip-bop-weeeg-beee" period.

But more recently, in this newest experience, I had sworn off even attempting psychedelics and its friends such as ‘e’ and ‘MDMA’ from the 24^th of August onward, until recanting only moments before ingestion on the 30^th, due in part to a week of high winds, a day of lunging up on airborne alkaline and progressively swilling an “all you got, it’s in here” drink, treacherously poured from a sticky, Culligan water jug, my mind was irreparably made up. For the MDMA I dipped my grimy finger in the bag which resembled a miniaturized pack of big-league chew, that sort of foil-thing going on, and like another certain candy analogy that momentarily eludes me, I dipped my wet finger into the powder and licked the first attempt ---later, sans-candy analogy, I snorted the second---just in case the first method of ingestion was wrong, I mean, I know one was incorrect but I still couldn’t tell you which. The white MDMA powder felt like dried vinegar and trickled down my nasal cavities into my throat tasting both sour and bitter. We kept drinking. Later after a genuine human pyramid and cat-calls to the Burning Man himself, my dearest human-cannon ball and current lover, asked a well-timed and well-armed stranger for some ecstasy. The request was surprisingly yet expectantly fulfilled amid the floral bursts of fiery pulses. We arrived at Nexus, following the crooked and much loved path set by my brother. I waited in line cleaning the dust and syrup out of my cup in want of a maintaining drink. Aly asked, “How are you feeling?” and at that precise moment I turned to her and felt the tip of my nose buzzing. Instantly, I felt fear and walked a few steps slo-motion in direction of the barer desert, Aly cut-in front of me and with cat’s eye glasses she handled me, persuading me to handle my anxious glow. Luckily, I conceded but understood that such heavy feelings could only be properly dealt with with my back firmly on the ground. As the place filled up and my oasis became ‘entry-way’ many innocent soles pounded my body, first stepping hard then almost tumbling with polite correction. I loved it, each impact sent waves of giddiness and delight down my spine and into my hips. I danced, planted on the ground as Bassnectar’s bass filtered through the bodies and rolled over my swaying, horizontally pleased body. Concerned road-warriors held me up from time to time, nourishing me with ripe fruit and camel-packs; reassuring me that the polyethylene-teet rehydrates. The music was perpetually and rhythmically stunning. Eventually the tired, familiar crew came to rest on my high-stepping hips and gut; multiplicitously warming me up.

---

video at NEXUS on the night of the Burn --so you might hear me getting stepped on, anyway,I don't know who filmed this---I'm glad they posted it though, I esp. like(d) the music in the last third of the vid, if anyone cares (Echo?)

Rocks

Beg my eyes to look away from
all the energy that beckons me,
By day, the skin bright,
sparkles, resiliency
and later by night,
swollen lips, the eroticism,
sick and fancy.
I am perpendicular to all temptation.

The fear of stolen glances
must be met with strict,
learned aversion,
purposive tactics, shame.
And through the streets, in the crowds,
or as a solitary member
of unbeknownst potential partnerships,
muted duologues,
hot games,
the withdrawal steadies, it heaves,
and multiplies.

A blue sky,
cloudless, cool and swallowing,
born without edges,
worn without creasing,
shines too brightly for these my eyes,
so I avert my attention to stare at the familiar
ground, its dirt, its stones, innocuous,
admired close-up
and instantly inspected,
known without fear.

These rocks, unique and alternative
to each and every other rock;
their blindness that binds me.
Never expressive but only experiencing my affection
silent still, forever receptive.

Indecisiveness cont. / One year to the day, but more than that

The day you decide on anything you are hit by a random passage that literally reads “mistaken identity” and while the Emersonian concept of ‘Universal conspiracy’ still sway’s your heart, your mind which now leads, starts blinking--- you seize up. Too many false-positives initiate your hysterics. You don’t even attempt to do what you want because you’re afraid that after a while you might find out that what you want,---well, really isn’t---