The Blackbirds are Rough Today
lonely as a dry and used orchard
spread over the earth
for use and surrender.
shot down like an ex-pug selling
dailies on the corner.
taken by tears like
an aging chorus girl
who has gotten her last check.
a hanky is in order your lord your
worship.
the blackbirds are rough today
like
ingrown toenails
in an overnight
jail---
wine wine whine,
the blackbirds run around and
fly around
harping about
Spanish melodies and bones.
and everywhere is
nowhere---
the dream is as bad as
flapjacks and flat tires:
why do we go on
with our minds and
pockets full of
dust
like a bad boy just out of
school---
you tell
me,
you who were a hero in some
revolution
you who teach children
you who drink with calmness
you who own large homes
and walk in gardens
you who have killed a man and own a
beautiful wife
you tell me
why I am on fire like old dry
garbage.
we might surely have some interesting
correspondence.
it will keep the mailman busy.
and the butterflies and ants and bridges and
cemeteries
the rocket-makers and dogs and garage mechanics
will still go on a
while
until we run out of stamps
and/or
ideas.
don't be ashamed of
anything; I guess God meant it all
like
locks on
doors.
spread over the earth
for use and surrender.
shot down like an ex-pug selling
dailies on the corner.
taken by tears like
an aging chorus girl
who has gotten her last check.
a hanky is in order your lord your
worship.
the blackbirds are rough today
like
ingrown toenails
in an overnight
jail---
wine wine whine,
the blackbirds run around and
fly around
harping about
Spanish melodies and bones.
and everywhere is
nowhere---
the dream is as bad as
flapjacks and flat tires:
why do we go on
with our minds and
pockets full of
dust
like a bad boy just out of
school---
you tell
me,
you who were a hero in some
revolution
you who teach children
you who drink with calmness
you who own large homes
and walk in gardens
you who have killed a man and own a
beautiful wife
you tell me
why I am on fire like old dry
garbage.
we might surely have some interesting
correspondence.
it will keep the mailman busy.
and the butterflies and ants and bridges and
cemeteries
the rocket-makers and dogs and garage mechanics
will still go on a
while
until we run out of stamps
and/or
ideas.
don't be ashamed of
anything; I guess God meant it all
like
locks on
doors.
81 comments:
My mother used to sing me to sleep with this song. I always thought she made it up.
Went to the zoo w/ 2 Jersey girls on Friday. The pandas were awake but just munching on bamboo. We did see a monkey piss on another monkey below him on a tree. The little kids laughed their asses off. I felt like telling them there are people who pay money for what that monkey below got for free.
What happened to Sixty's question which I was going to address?
Answer away, Signore di Pollo - I deleted it because it was just hanging there, unanswered and it looked bad all by itself, as if I were dragging controversy from there back here. Which I was.
I think Sixty didn't get what rccomal was getting at. I often didn't either although I enjoy busting her chops. She goes off on tangents sometimes and assumes everyone gets what she means. Or cares which if I can put it as gently as possible.
It is the difference between men and women I think. Who the Hell understands what they get pissed off about.
Haven't you have a woman be pissed about something you did and get even more pissed off when you don't realize you did it or that it was a big deal?
That's why they invented opium dens and Chinese prostitutes.
I am always amused by the "You did something bad in my dream" so I am mad at you deal - that's a classic.
Hey my wife punched me once for something I did in her dream.
That's why I never serve jalapeno poppers after eight pm.
the dream is as bad as
flapjacks and flat tires
Flat tires I can understand. But flapjacks? I actually haven't had flapjacks for years being a strictly roll & coffee guy in the morning. But I have fond flapjack memories. So here's what I think: Bukowski threw that in because it's a poem, what the hey, no one's really paying close attention, no one really cares so I won't be called on it...he thought. Well, I noticed, Buk, BECAUSE I CARE. C'mon, get outta that grave put up your dukes and fight! And pick those bottles up off the floor!
Passing off pissed off passive aggressive behavior as a female trait is dismissive to say the least. Whatever annoys rcommal or prompts her to react online with rancor or odd assumptions is rcommal's issue, not some manifestation of a more generalized female problem.
And no, how she responds online does not appear to me to be a good example of the difference between men and women.
Going off on a jalapeno popper tangent after unloading that lame blame-the-gender explanation is almost as off-putting as unwashed bedrolls.
For a long time I confused rcommal with rccocean. Which, now that I've revealed my confusion or conflation pisses both of them off at me worse than they were pissed off at me before I'm sure. :^{(
Plus I think I misspelled rccocean which is rcoccean or rcocean I think. Jeezus Cripes life is hard!
Don't be mad MamaM.
It is just the difference between men and women. You pointed it out when you identified the games that Inga was playing here when most of us dudes were oblivious.
Rcommal's thing is specific to her that's for sure. Half the time I wasn't sure what she was mad about. Or I thought it wasn't that serious.
I am always doing stuff that gets people pissed at me and I am oblivious as to the reason why.
rcommal is the artist formally known as reader-I-am.
Rcocean is the soda formally know as rc cola.
rcommal did get offended that I did not take her seriously and asked to be removed from access to this site. I think it had to do with me busting on Chris Christie but what the hell do I know.
I wish she didn't do that but waddagonnado.
Well, I have no understanding of what she was writing, so I really should just shut up and not stir the, well, you know.
So, how about the weather we're having, eh?
Haven't you have a woman be pissed about something...
You can say the same thing to a woman and one way gets you the booty, the other way only gets you the boot.
"When I look into your eyes, time stands still."
"Your face could stop a clock."
After a couple of interactions with rcommal I made it a point not to respond to anything she said. I started to a couple of times, but not knowing what might set her off, I decided to stick with my original resolve to stay clear. I doubt she was any poorer without my insights.
Panda sex pales in comparison with this abomination.
@Windbag: It behooves the giraffe to make cervical contact.
Reader used to comment here. In fact, it was her suggestion to read Trooper York which first led me here.
She was hard to figure sometimes. Here is an old reader/Trooper exchange which typified things here: link
An Edjamikated Redneck guessed that the pictured Cadillac had a 400ci engine - it looks like '66 Cadillacs were only produced with 429ci engines.
Let the record reflect that fact.
Also, for the record, I have no idea what she was on about - even all these years later.
Such is my lot in life.
I think I was one of the closer people to reader_i_am back in first balcony in the old Althouse Theatre. She has a fine knowledge of music and sophisticated tastes (Her father and late mother were both music professors.) Her training and experience as a journalist gave her some of the best bullshit radar I've ever seen (when it was turned on), and her writing, obscure as it may have been, was extremely witty and perceptive, assuming you spent the time and effort to deconstruct it. I valued reader as one the few people I've met online I considered a genuine friend. Her move East gave us both hope that our families might meet IRL.
Then things started to go wrong. I don't know what the matter was. I think she objected to my strong anti-Althouse sentiments here, but she also seemed to be getting more peeved in general, not just at me. The process has continued to the point where she has mostly vanished from Facebook, which as been our main meeting ground. She left a fairly negative remark about people on Facebook in general a couple of weeks ago and hasn't posted anything since, as far as I've seen. She also has had the habit of dropping out of Facebook with some regularity, so this may be more of the same.
I don't know what's happened, and although I could speculate, I won't. I'll just say it's too damn bad, and I really miss the old Lori, wherever she has gone.
Looking over the exchange in question, it seems the old bullshit radar needs maintenance. You really don't want to scramble the jets for a balloon with a smiley-face George Bush on it someone let loose.
"If life is going to exist in a Universe of this size, then the one thing it cannot afford to have is a sense of proportion."
—Encyclopedia Galactica
and her writing, obscure as it may have been, was extremely witty and perceptive,
Some of that still shows up as glimmers.
Rancor wasn't the right word. Vexation might be a better fit. If I knew she was playing around, I'd respond in kind, but I'm not sure, so I tend to hold back.
As for the poem, I got stuck right off the top with "rough blackbirds".
Rcocean is very easy to spell:
Rc + Ocean
It was the eyes, in the photo Lem posted on President's Day, along with the tweet; and the look in them invited emotion along with the awareness that the person they belonged to had witnessed and registered profound loss on a deep level.
What I saw was a man who held onto enough ego strength to make it through the task he'd undertaken and enough humility to know his decisions for good or ill had life and death consequences, both within and outside of his control.
Regardless of what one thinks of Bush politics, the picture posted portrayed something more than ego or politics. And that called up emotion for me, touching grief which includes loss, anger, hurt, and fear. In my experience, intensity and drama usually have something driving them beyond political preferences. While men and women may have different ways of expressing it, emotion is a human birthright common to both genders.
The Well of Grief
Those who will not slip beneath
the still surface on the well of grief
turning downward through its black water
to the place we cannot breathe
will never know the source from which we drink,
the secret water, cold and clear,
nor find in the darkness glimmering
the small round coins
thrown by those who wished for something else.
-- David Whyte
from Where Many Rivers Meet
What I saw in Bush's face, and I must immediately reverse course and say that I could not read his face prior to the attack, what I saw after 9/11 was a great weight, call it the weight of the world but really simple weight is better, which had left its greatest mark, I don't know why, on his forehead, not his eyes or mouth, two areas which can be made to deny the worst even in the worst, no, the forehead, that most defenseless part of the face, in which the weight could not be denied. I loved that in him. Even though I didn't and never could come to like him. Because though I couldn't read anything else about him I could read that forehead.
He was, and remains, the greatest president we have had this century.
rcocean said...
Rcocean is very easy to spell:
Rc + Ocean
How's your buddy Crack workin' out for you?
@Sixty: Crack is over explaining the "raised by slaves thing again" and Freeman Hunt is providing cover.
Unbelievable. And to think I used to follower her on Twitter.
I like Lori. She's got a lot going for her. But her resentment on some topics is palpable.
Some people lose their way. Being overpraised can do that to you.
You start to believe your press notices.
It is the cheerleader syndrome.
I want to say I really like reader I am. I just don't understand what the hell she is talking about have the time.
That's half the time.
I am just glad that Crack and his buddy Meade are not coming around Lem's anymore.
Who needs that bullshit.
Well, I admit I continue to enjoy needling their hypocrisy, as did some of youse guys. I played it more subdued than most of you.
But you're right. It belongs over there and not here and not at Lem's.
I don't know what you are talking about chickie but I can just imagine what a shit storm it must be. I am glad that he found new friends to play with. I hope everyone at Lem's continues to ignore him if he shows up.
I am busy watching American Idol and ice skating.
That is why I lose myself in the world of Doc Holliday and Joey Gallo.
Trooper York said...
I don't know what you are talking about chickie but I can just imagine what a shit storm it must be.
The sign of Crack is in the ascendancy, according to my horrorscope.
Also, just this AM she took to berating another long time friendly commenter and also chided Freder for using the dreaded TY expression "Oh, and..."
/update
Could someone point me to the rcommal post? I like to try and decipher her stuff.
The sign of Crack is in the ascendancy, according to my horrorscope.
Sexually active too, thrusting his macho response into whatever Althouse opening he can find, delivering his potent stooge sploodge with penetrating racist remarks aimed at defying her comment policy and defiling her blog, while she allows him to go on and on and on and on like a pinned bug.
Here ya go, Darce.
Sorta related: I didn't know if you'd seen this, Darcy, but I thought you might like it.
LOL. I don't think I'll be deciphering that.
The second link is amazing! Thank you.
Sexually active too, thrusting his macho response into whatever Althouse opening he can find, ..
Still mostly ocular and aural intrusions, designed to elicit the visceral.
@Darcy: Herein throughout, I think.
Huh. I was looking for something juicier. But thank you, chick!
Well, you may have to consult with Sixty to verify...
Say, did you see AllenS's sweet comment regarding what Lem's needs more of? link
Juicy is over at Althouse's, where the where black and white come together to artistically moan, "Ooooooohhhh Freedom, OOOOOOooooooo FreeeEEEEdom, oooooOOOOOOOOO Freedom over me, And before I'll be a slave, I'll be buried in my grave..." while driving up each others page views.
Lest you think my imagination to be overactive, the stage was set with declarations from the macho one himself regarding the white man's inability to satisfactorily thrust.
Aww chick. That was sweet of you to point out Allen's post!
I have been in a bit of a funk. I guess you'd call it that. The days are a blur. I'm exhausted and when I go to write (even a comment sometimes) nothing comes forth except what I view as inane stuff no one would want to read.
I don't know how to account for this. I'm not an unhappy person, generally. Almost disgustingly optimistic for the most part. Just...have the winter icks, I guess.
I'm off to Florida for a week to rejuvenate and hopefully heal a broken tailbone. (A broken tail is so apt...)
Please leave a space at the table. I'll be back.
I think Lem's place really needs a Darcy post.
Something about Anna Kournikova's
breasts.
@Darcy: You could write about the Tigers.
And how they will challenge the Yankees.
The only sole here who'd stomp on Darcy and the Tigers is more of a heel.
Hey I love the Tigers.
My favorite Tiger?
Norm Cash.
Drowned in three inches of water because he was drunk out of his face. My kind of guy.
I'm off to Florida for a week to rejuvenate and hopefully heal a broken tailbone.
Ponce de León went to Florida to rejuvenate as well. He started the trend.
Did you crack your sacroiliac?
Say, that bone's pretty hard to reach. Details, please.
My guess would be a slip on the ice resulting in a cracked coccyx.
That sounds rude when I write it, but I can imagine it is painful, too.
The last time I hit my tailbone hard was bowling after several beers. I threw myself into the follow threw and landed smack on my ass. But like a drunk driver surviving a crash, I walked it off.
It is a cracked coccyx. There's a really scary story behind it that would be mortifying to tell. I wish I could lie and say that I fell on the ice. I've actually told a few people that, though.
Yeah, so, I fell on the ice. :)
Well Darcy this stuff would never happen if you stopped doing that crazy stuff all the time.
Heh. Those were the days. And I totally get the assumption, however, I wasn't drunk.
Okey Dokey!
There are times when leaving the rest of the story to wander through the halls of imagination can be worse than reality!
I bruised my tailbone in high school while sliding down an icy hill on a giant inner tube with a group of friends. We were sitting on the edge facing out and when the tube when over a bump, I went up in the air and landed in the hole in the center on the hard packed snow. I could hardly walk afterwards. I don'tn know that I broke anything but it hurt like hell for a while.
I'm imagining there might be a number of people who've embarrassingly, surprisingly, scarily or stupidly bruised their tail bones or cracked a coccyx. Enough to garner a comment or two if a post were made on the subject. Mortification can be a great ice breaker!
Ouch! That sounds very painful, MamaM. I felt that.
I may write about it. Too soon, though.
In 6th grade we used to play inside in the gym when it rained. There was only one gym and half of it was boys and the other half girls. One of the games we played involved throwing and catching these hard red rubber rings. Anyways, somebody threw one at me hard and I missed the catch. It hit me right in the nuts! I remember almost passing out and then disappearing up some steps onto a stage to walk off the pain.
Line drive at the age of 14, playing second base.
At least I had had all my children by then.
Another painful event was one time I went grocery shopping at Piggly-Wiggly with my mom. I must have been around four -- before starting kindergarten. It was summertime because I remember I was barefoot.
She was busy for a moment at the check out paying and I wandered over to automatic doors. For some reason I was fascinated with them and was trying to get the "in" doors to open after I had successfully triggered the "out" door by standing on the black rubber mat.
Suddenly, an unsuspecting woman pushing a car came into the store and opened the door from outside. The door swept over the toes of my little feet and popped off two or three of my toenails like tiddle-dee-winks. Man did I howl!
There's wasn't much blood and the nails grew back. I even forget the pain. I do remember how nice the lady was and how she checked up on me a week or so later.
Was on my bicycle racing my oldest brother, motor paced into a parked car.
Thank goodness it wasn't a '59 Cadillac, as I flew over the trunk onto the ground. Ripped my little finger nail mostly off.
My old man was pissed - having to tend to his bleeding child tore him away from that week's Maverick.
Ha, showed you, old man, Jim Garner and I are still here!
Hey, speaking of which, did the last group of 3 dead celebrities get filled out to everyone's satisfaction, and can Mr. Garner rest easy this evening?
You guys! You made it here, so I'm grateful. But ouch!
I'll tell my story when I get back. It's about carelessness on my part and darkness on someone else's part. I'll head to sunny Florida first.
Hope you all have a nice week.
Have a great time in FLA! Is there tennis down there?
No tennis. Visiting a friend in Cape Coral. Thank you!!
I awoke in the middle of the night with the vision of both MamaM and Darcy walking around with a cast on their coccyx.
"Zo, how lonk haf you had zeez dreams?"
"It was a nightmare, doc, a nightmare I tells ya!"
The vision of both MamaM and Darcy walking around with a cast
At least walking was involved, that's a good thing.
There's worse pictures that could have showed up.
Lol! Yes, and include that pants in that response.
You don't still own those, do you?
Bolly Uster is not only indestructible, a pair like that is difficult to give away.
Oh yah, duble nit, too, they are!
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