The Art at the End of the Season

Bob, ,

And though you can’t see it,
It permeates the end of the year, it feels
In bright collapse, in the turning over
Of an old you, I walk up to the river
As what’s left of the rain foreshortens a reddening
Sky, and with a black marker write verses on a railroad trestle,
Put words to score these gut feelings,
Scrounge up the ghosts of a childhood
Sky, a string theory around your finger for luck,
It’s no small matter, this troubling
Entropy.

20 thoughts on “The Art at the End of the Season”

  1. well written, Bob: this matter of entropy, the second law of thermodynamics, is indeed troubling, the state to which all matter tends, and it does ‘permeate the end of the year’: you just feel it; I can picture you walking along the river, writing your verses on an old railroad trestle, putting words to ‘gut feelings’ —

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    1. Thank you. The end of the year has that troubling feeling. But I think too that it can be transformative. I used too, when I was younger, write on rail road trestles. I should try that again.

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  5. I don’t know entropy, but I like how you describe turning an old us while a year ends and a new one begins. And a time to gaze back farther than the past year, into the “ghosts of a childhood.” Also: your mention in the comments that you used to write on railroad trestles. I like that idea and I like the inclusion of that in the poem. It caused a memory flash for me: Years ago, being in the bathroom of a bookstore/cafe. The workers of the business had written Dr. Suess poems over the bathroom walls and stalls in an effort to dissuade people from writing graffiti. The effect of the Suess lines was quite neat.

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    1. Thank you Dave. I would love to see the Dr. Suess poems on the bathroom walls and stalls. Sounds like a fantastic idea. I think at one time, reading it so much to my kids, I had all of Dr. Seuss’s ABC’s book committed to memory. I like the idea of ruminating at this time of the year, but I’m also excited about what’s next. Happy New Year!

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  6. Fantastic Bob! I get the sense of squeezing out the last and best of the previous year and looking ahead with “a string theory around your finger for good luck,” but then again string theory (as I’ve heard on Big Bang Theory the TV show) and entropy are topics I am virgin to.

    What a great sequence of lines – “Put words to score those gut feelings, Scrounge up the ghosts of a childhood….” I was reading the other day that one of the keys to memory is paying attention to what is happening in the moment which in my case explains why I can’t remember too much about my childhood because I was too distracted.

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    1. Thanks Steve. I do my best to understand all this science stuff myself, reading popular books on the topics and watching youtube videos. I’m glad you liked those lines. I have a terrible memory too. I wish I could slow everything down and take it all in. But modern life just doesn’t give that. I sometimes feel I’m missing out on something.

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  9. Greg Nikolic's avatar Greg Nikolic says:

    Entropy is just a synonym for black despair.

    We despair of our lives; therefore, we despair for the universe that surrounds us, nestles us like a malign womb.

    Come visit my website and leave comments, if you like.

    — catxman.wordpress.com

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