something missing.
in ruts
there are found pieces
placed or shed or even
violently disavowed
but in not one
what i miss.
eye and tongue
drifts the
flavorless glaze
spread thick
a pushing tick
of time
drags
another identical
interval.
Friday, October 12, 2012
Thursday, October 4, 2012
the possibility of beginning again
it hasn't been a pleasant fall break. on monday and tuesday, my son was sick with a high fever and vomiting. on wednesday, there was a "true break," and i was able to take my kids and two of the cousins out to fish in the ocean off of heeia pier. but today, my daughter caught the same cold that my son had, and was in bed all day. on those days when my kids were sick, i stayed home with them. i also have been feeling some kind of malaise of late, with frequent bouts of diarrhea (i know, tmi) and a lethargy that i've been finding hard to shake...
there is a kind of despair that you feel when you realize your break is more than half over, and that you haven't taken advantage of it yet.
***
on the way to work this evening (my other teaching job), i realized that i would need to restart my outlook. i think i have been neglecting to do this lately, partially because it becomes harder and harder to do the more time passes, and your outlook becomes smothered over by the patina of rust and decay and habit that accrues with experience. but it is vital and necessary; a necessary fiction, if you will.
there is a (cynical) song called "clean" by depeche mode that reflects the conflict between a jaded "knows better" perspective and the need to "start again." i think the lyrics go something like this:
"clean, you know what i mean, an end to the tears and the in between years and the troubles i've seen."
"white wedding" by billy idol is another song that reflects this feeling, the need for a "fresh" start...
as i've grown older, i've come to realize the fiction of the restart, and no longer commit it with the conviction that i once had. you can't really escape your mistakes, or, for that matter, the mistakes of others, or even (outside of the realm of "mistakes," which betrays the assumption of a "should" and a volition which may not even exist) just plain circumstances. you can't escape your obligations, your inescapable debts to the world... someone will visit you to make the collections, if not tomorrow, then another day...
BUT. there also comes a point when it is difficult to function without pretending ignorance or oblivion of circumstances. and at those times, it is vital to practice the skill of forgetting and saying, "once upon a time," with a tacit understanding that that time is now.
the life of an organism is filled with such restarts: sleeping, shitting, bathing... why is it so strange that the life of the soul, the narrative of the individual, also require such restarts? do we assume that the self is a smooth evolving, that it too does not require times when it empties itself, or loses its mind, or loses its way?
***
remember this: the capacity to forget is almost more important than the ability to remember... and it is not that "memory" and "forgetting" are a duality. rather, it all comes down to how things are "held." there is a blur between memory and oblivion. it's not an on-off switch. in a way, we cannot forget what we remember, and we cannot remember (bring back) what we have forgotten (what has passed on)... perhaps in this (and i'm not alone in this observation), we come
there is a kind of despair that you feel when you realize your break is more than half over, and that you haven't taken advantage of it yet.
***
on the way to work this evening (my other teaching job), i realized that i would need to restart my outlook. i think i have been neglecting to do this lately, partially because it becomes harder and harder to do the more time passes, and your outlook becomes smothered over by the patina of rust and decay and habit that accrues with experience. but it is vital and necessary; a necessary fiction, if you will.
there is a (cynical) song called "clean" by depeche mode that reflects the conflict between a jaded "knows better" perspective and the need to "start again." i think the lyrics go something like this:
"clean, you know what i mean, an end to the tears and the in between years and the troubles i've seen."
"white wedding" by billy idol is another song that reflects this feeling, the need for a "fresh" start...
as i've grown older, i've come to realize the fiction of the restart, and no longer commit it with the conviction that i once had. you can't really escape your mistakes, or, for that matter, the mistakes of others, or even (outside of the realm of "mistakes," which betrays the assumption of a "should" and a volition which may not even exist) just plain circumstances. you can't escape your obligations, your inescapable debts to the world... someone will visit you to make the collections, if not tomorrow, then another day...
BUT. there also comes a point when it is difficult to function without pretending ignorance or oblivion of circumstances. and at those times, it is vital to practice the skill of forgetting and saying, "once upon a time," with a tacit understanding that that time is now.
the life of an organism is filled with such restarts: sleeping, shitting, bathing... why is it so strange that the life of the soul, the narrative of the individual, also require such restarts? do we assume that the self is a smooth evolving, that it too does not require times when it empties itself, or loses its mind, or loses its way?
***
remember this: the capacity to forget is almost more important than the ability to remember... and it is not that "memory" and "forgetting" are a duality. rather, it all comes down to how things are "held." there is a blur between memory and oblivion. it's not an on-off switch. in a way, we cannot forget what we remember, and we cannot remember (bring back) what we have forgotten (what has passed on)... perhaps in this (and i'm not alone in this observation), we come
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