Drummed Up Noisy Wellbeing The circling stars. The deserted railroad yards. The pleading distance. Consciousness humming. Hold onto the sky, the dusk, The flowers in the field. I walk and I walk, like a cast stone, Behind the old factory, Above me the blue sky. Post-Work The clerk alphabetizes Piano concertos by tone. All the while on stilts, With a spyglass. Clouds in the distance Head the ledgers. Field Guide A star Depending on mass May end up a hole In the ground of the universe. The Autumn Rain The autumn rain Is drastically the Idea of a sandwich. We agree. A straight line On a plane Can’t Touch its toes. But A berry From this world Can. The Philosophy of Horizons Specifically, the chapters on distance, Is the zoology of time. You can accompany All the volume of space and time, Always, wherever you go, Because it has stripes Like a tiger.
enticing snippets: hard to beat the straight line on a plane not touching its toes; or the space-time continuum having stripes like a tiger; enigmatic sen-like koans 🙂
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make that ‘zen’ -like koans —
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Thanks, John. I’ve always been fascinated by koans, or what I’ve understood of them.
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I love the one entitled “Post-work”. It’s a real picture. Surreal and wonderful.
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Thanks, Worms. It would be nice to live in a world where your job was stilt walking and filling ledgers with pictures of clouds.
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Absolutely! 🙂
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I like how these poems are all separate and yet they share some resemblance the way nature appears in stars and clouds and sky and rain and space and once again it’s so exciting to discover along with you all the abandoned places like the deserted railroad yard and at the same time the yummy and current items like “the idea of a sandwich” which to me is perfectly placed in the poem “The Autumn Rain.” It’s like the blessing of a sandwich counteracts the depressive mood of autumn rain and its reminder of the winter ahead although one nice thing about winter is that I don’t feel lazy for not exercising and also because of hockey and basketball.
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Thanks, Steve. Now that winter is almost here, and there are plenty of days of cold rain, a sandwich is a perfect escape from that. Especially hot coffee afterwards. I try to get out, but like you said, often it’s not worth getting concerned about not exercising. And just spend time catching up on some reading.
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Good old fashioned reading I love….away from the computer screen. I guess we gotta be careful or else books might become obsolete too like it’s happened to newspapers. I used to love reading the paper and clipping out interesting articles and saving them in binders like my own little library.
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I agree. Old fashioned reading. From books. The last time I clipped from a newspaper, it was in the 80’s, and was the MLB standings. Cause I kept them all to keep track of.
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A MLB Standings clip. Awesome! i think there’s a lot to be said for having to wait to see standings and batting averages. I wonder about the negative consequences of info being so easy to access. For one thing, it makes libraries less populated which is actually a positive change.
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I remember back then, watching Sports Center multiple times in a row, just to see a highlight of a Dominic Hasek save. Or some other highlight. That was the only time to see it.
I like quiet libraries too.
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sportscenter! Yes! I guess we’re all destined to be gamblers, checking out those scores with nervous twitches even as pre teens. But best to be a gambler I think as opposed to not taking any risks. I’ve found as I’ve gotten older, I take way fewer risks and that depresses me, has me getting nostalgic about the past, but I hear stories about 70-year olds learning how to rock climb or 50 year olds signing up for xylophone lessons. I guess it’s like that Dylan line – “He who’s not busy being born is busy dying.”
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Yea, sadly me too, I definitely take less risks. Is that something like wisdom or just being stuck in a routine? Love that line from Dylan. Really makes me want to try something new. But Sports Center was the best. If there was a replay I liked, I’d watch SportsCenter three times in a row just to see it.
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As far as taking fewer risks, I think it also has to do with us being closer to death which rather than inspire us to try things we’ve always wanted to try, it makes us scared.
I had the same experience as you with sportscenter, watching highlights over and over with many of them probably forever embedded in our minds.
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I love all of these, but The Autumn Rain is probably my favorite. The imagery is brilliant!
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Thank you!!
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