The Post with No Name



BFI has come for the children, late and reneging on his promise to take them to breakfast. Still won't take them overnight as his imaginary chigger problem continues. Thanks to Steve D. and Velmar for doing chigger research which pretty much lays to rest any doubt that BFI's contentions of continued infestation (or any infestation at all) are bogus. Have on classical music and trying to decompress after awful week at work and the usual day to day kiddy madness.

New torture at Binder...solitary confinement. I have been torn from the company and camaraderie of the other writers and have been seated in a no-man's land across from the Evil Brenda's office. I have been told this move had nothing to do with retribution. This is a lie and I miss my buddies. Steve has been moved away from other writers as well and poor Jamie sits by himself now. Jamie put it succinctly when he said it was a "divide and conquer" move. Now there is nothing making the place bearable, which is probably the point. They want us to quit.

In other bleak news, Issac Mizrahi has been replaced as Target's star designer by a snow-boarder named The Flying Tomato. Somehow I don't think the Flying Tomato will be designing clothes for the over-forty ladies crowd. Deep and heavy sigh. Must rouse myself and think happy thoughts...

The Boy is being considered for The Honor Society! My cold is better...there is a glimmer of sunlight on the horizon when I leave work now...I'm not married...I don't have diabetic neuropathy or lumbar spine impairment...anybody who can come up with more reasons to be cheerful, please post...

Happiness

So early it's still almost dark out.
I'm near the window with coffee,
and the usual early morning stuff
that passes for thought.

When I see the boy and his friend
walking up the road
to deliver the newspaper.

They wear caps and sweaters,
and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.
They are so happy
they aren't saying anything, these boys.

I think if they could, they would take
each other's arm.
It's early in the morning,
and they are doing this thing together.

They come on, slowly.
The sky is taking on light,
though the moon still hangs pale over the water.

Such beauty that for a minute
death and ambition, even love,
doesn't enter into this.

Happiness. It comes on
unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,
any early morning talk about it.

Raymond Carver

Sunday Sunday



Sunday morning and my throat is killing me. Hot coffee helping. Hope kiddies stay asleep awhile longer. Feel like I'm swallowing tiny swords.

Went Target shopping yesterday with remarkable results! Got a very cool pair of Isaac Mizrahi shoes for seven dollars, perfect for work, and an Isaac Mizrahi soft red turtleneck for eleven dollars. All hail Isaac Mizrahi, king of inexpensive, slammin clothes for women! Also got sneakers for the boy at the lowly price of six dollars and change. Sneakers he LIKED. Felt like I was shopping at the Salvation Army. Fleetingly wondered if these prices were the result of a very bad national economic downturn, before skipping off to the register. Today I have to look for sneakers for the girl child. May the fairy of low priced footwear still be with me.

I am feeling my way toward doing what I do at work from the comfort of my own home. Sent out emails to a bunch of law firms offering freelance services with a few interested responses. Purchased a memory card to take to work so I can bring all my written decisions home, and have to price fax machines. This could be something wonderful...everyone keep their fingers crossed!

Mr. Jiggers, AKA BFI, has gotten a real job, at a real company, with wages that can be garnished! I figure this will last about 8 months before he is canned, so we'll have abour half a year of steady support checks coming our way. Hurray!

Well the boy is now awake and I must away to put biscuits (Poppin Fresh) in the oven. Today is house cleaning day (the high point of my week). Poems below to make this post something other than banal.

Digression On Number 1, 1948

I am ill today but I am not
too ill. I am not ill at all.
It is a perfect day, warm
for winter, cold for fall.

A fine day for seeing. I see
ceramics, during lunch hour, by
Mir6, and I see the sea by Leger;
light, complicated Metzingers
and a rude awakening by Brauner,
a little table by Picasso, pink.

I am tired today but I am not
too tired. I am not tired at all.
There is the Pollock, white, harm
will not fall, his perfect hand

and the many short voyages. They'll
never fence the silver range.
Stars are out and there is sea
enough beneath the glistening earth
to bear me toward the future
which is not so dark. I see.

Frank O'Hara


A Supermarket in California

What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for I walked
down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache self-conscious looking
at the full moon.
In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon
fruit supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at
night! Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes!
--and you, García Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?

I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking
among the meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery boys.
I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the pork chops?
What price bananas? Are you my Angel?
I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans following you,
and followed in my imagination by the store detective.
We strode down the open corridors together in our solitary fancy
tasting artichokes, possessing every frozen delicacy, and never passing the
cashier.

Where are we going, Walt Whitman? The doors close in a hour.
Which way does your beard point tonight?
(I touch your book and dream of our odyssey in the supermarket and
feel absurd.)
Will we walk all night through solitary streets? The trees add shade
to shade, lights out in the houses, we'll both be lonely.
Will we stroll dreaming of the lost America of love past blue automo-
biles in driveways, home to our silent cottage?
Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher, what America
did you have when Charon quit poling his ferry and you got out on a
smoking bank and stood watching the boat disappear on the black waters of
Lethe?

Alan Ginsberg

Loaves and Fishes



Jr. has been harrassing me because she does not have a new blog post to read. Here's some new thoughts:

. Although you would think cats would be happy to eat smushed up fish sticks when their cat food runs out, they are not.

. Antidepressants make you fat

. Banannas are best with ice cream and chocolate syrup

. Emily Dickinson, John Keats, and Jane Kenyon all suggest that god is in the trees, the air, the light, the sea, and we are better for noticing.

On the Sea

It keeps eternal whisperings around
Desolate shores, and with its mighty swell
Gluts twice ten thousand Caverns, till the spell
Of Hecate leaves them their old shadowy sound.
Often 'tis in such gentle temper found,
That scarcely will the very smallest shell
Be moved for days from where it sometime fell.
When last the winds of Heaven were unbound.
Oh, ye! who have your eyeballs vexed and tired,
Feast them upon the wideness of the Sea;
Oh ye! whose ears are dinned with uproar rude,
Or fed too much with cloying melody---
Sit ye near some old Cavern's Mouth and brood,
Until ye start, as if the sea nymphs quired!

John Keats


122

A something in a summer's Day
As slow her flambeaux burn away
Which solemnizes me.

A something in a summer's noon—
A depth—an Azure—a perfume—
Transcending ecstasy.

And still within a summer's night
A something so transporting bright
I clap my hands to see—

Then veil my too inspecting face
Lets such a subtle—shimmering grace
Flutter too far for me—

The wizard fingers never rest—
The purple brook within the breast
Still chafes it narrow bed—

Still rears the East her amber Flag—
Guides still the sun along the Crag
His Caravan of Red—

So looking on—the night—the morn
Conclude the wonder gay—
And I meet, coming thro' the dews
Another summer's Day!

Emily Dickinson


Twilight: After Haying

Yes, long shadows go out
from the bales; and yes, the soul
must part from the body:
what else could it do?

The men sprawl near the baler,
too tired to leave the field.
They talk and smoke,
and the tips of their cigarettes
blaze like small roses
in the night air. (It arrived
and settled among them
before they were aware.)

The moon comes
to count the bales,
and the dispossessed--
Whip-poor-will, Whip-poor-will
--sings from the dusty stubble.

These things happen. . .the soul's bliss
and suffering are bound together
like the grasses. . .

The last, sweet exhalations
of timothy and vetch
go out with the song of the bird;
the ravaged field
grows wet with dew.

Jane Kenyon