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5634. Seamus - 4/10/2006 11:43:01 PM arky, a chara, how good it is to see you here.
"a wish that it could be as it was, if only to reexperience the people and their insights that we can't reach any more--whether they're gone from the world or just from us."
That's a hauntingly exquisite way of putting it.
"It's what many people seem to find most appealing about the idea of heaven."
Something has inexorably led me to conclude that *this* (stomping foot and pointing at ground) is as close as we are intended to get. Or, for a happier spin, *this* (spreading arms wide and noting individual subatomic particles and infrared waves floating by) was the idea in the first place.
Now, them's neither particularly original nor mature forms of thinking, but then again, those aren't traits I'm associated with in the first place.
But if my poorly concocted apologetics turn out to be correct, then it follows that some people will be well able to "reexperience the people and their insights that we can't reach any more" because they will simply have the human capacity to re-summon them. And then there will be those of us without this ability to conjure them correctly along with just enough self-awareness to make that hurt like, well, hell.
That's why I'm not altogether upset that that tired old man won't meet my gaze. He looks, somehow, familiar, and I do not think he would be pleased with me. 5635. judithathome - 4/10/2006 11:47:10 PM Seamus, how good to see you...and you are stating one of my thoughts so eloquently...that hell is loss of memory. Because memory is all we have, really. 5636. Seamus - 4/10/2006 11:51:12 PM And to jump upthread in agreement with PD earlier and Jenerator, just now...
Nu, the form your work takes isn't haphazard. If you can't see the beauty in the words you use and the form they take, then please take it from us, it's there in abundance. 5637. arkymalarky - 4/10/2006 11:55:13 PM Emily Dickinson said, (and I love this line) "Parting is all we know of heaven and all we need of hell."
I do not think he would be pleased with me. I can't envision why that would be.
5638. Seamus - 4/10/2006 11:57:27 PM I am so lucky, judithathome, to barge in here and find you and other friends.
Part of my developing "philosophy" as it were is that if I'm not going to be very skilled at conjuring, then I'd damned well better be able to hold onto what I can see now.
So I am holding on, and I am blessed to have you here, talking to me. 5639. arkymalarky - 4/11/2006 12:05:55 AM I hope you continue to be blessed and bless in return, Seamus. I don't get to post from work any more, and it's a huge thrill for me to come home and see the name of an old online friend like you here.
While we're on the subject of conjuring and all, I've thought about something and where to post it and here's as good a place as any, I guess.
When I had my surgery last year--which was a very common and not dangerous procedure, but I was worried since I hadn't had surgery since a tonsilectomy when I was eight--I went through a morbid spell and decided I wanted to know where I would be buried. I had a place picked out on a lonely hill between our house and where I work, so I hauled my poor husband along and we went up to look at it. It just wasn't what I hoped at all. It didn't feel right and I wasn't comfortable (not scared, just not comfortable). But I don't want to be buried with Bob's mother's side of the family because they're right on a highway. All this is silly, I know, but when I edited my dad's book about his experiences in the Korean War, one of the things that most struck me was his description of Korean graves on hillsides that rural men chose for burial, with a good vantage point of the place they and their ancestor had spent their lives. So Bob and I are going to try to be buried here, if at all possible.
At the other end of the spectrum is a friend of my dad's who wrote a song called "Send me to Glory in a Gladbag," the chorus of which ends with "just set me on the curb on Thursday, and let the sanitation locals take me home." 5640. judithathome - 4/11/2006 1:01:39 AM Arky, that is so funny...and I wish we had talked about your "burial blues" when I was there...Keoni and I plan to be cremated and have our ashes mixed. Maybe some kind soul will take a few of those ashes and sprinkle them on Bob's trail behind your house...we loved driving that last year! And of course, some will have to go on Keoni's beloved golf courses wherever those may be. It will be the one time I accompy him to golf and don't complain...ha! 5641. arkymalarky - 4/11/2006 2:30:41 AM Oh how nice! The idea of mixing them is really wonderful. The trail's a great place to be, and either or both of us would be honored if we were still around, and I know Mose would! 5642. Macnas - 4/11/2006 1:24:05 PM Samuel Beckett
Cascando
why not merely the despaired of
occasion of
wordshed
is it not better abort than be barren
the hours after you are gone are so leaden
they will always start dragging too soon
the grapples clawing blindly the bed of want
bringing up the bones the old loves
sockets filled once with eyes like yours
all always is it better too soon than never
the black want splashing their faces
saying again nine days never floated the loved
nor nine months
nor nine lives
saying again
if you do not teach me I shall not learn
saying again there is a last
even of last times
last times of begging
last times of loving
of knowing not knowing pretending
a last even of last times of saying
if you do not love me I shall not be loved
if I do not love you I shall not love
the churn of stale words in the heart again
love love love thud of the old plunger
pestling the unalterable
whey of words
terrified again
of not loving
of loving and not you
of being loved and not by you
of knowing not knowing pretending
pretending
I and all the others that will love you
if they love you
unless they love you
5643. Seamus - 4/11/2006 2:25:02 PM arky, I liked your story and I liked judithathome's name for it: "burial blues".
I like the Becket, Mac.
Our discussion brought this to mind:
In My Life
Lennon/McCartney
There are places I'll remember
All my life though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I've loved them all
But of all these friends and lovers
There is no one compares with you
And these memories lose their meaning
When I think of love as something new
Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them
In my life I love you more
Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them
In my life I love you more
In my life I love you more 5644. Macnas - 4/11/2006 2:28:00 PM Seamus boy, cad e an sceal anois?? 5645. alistairconnor - 4/11/2006 2:51:32 PM The Beckett works for me.
i.e. it fills me with anguish.
He does that to me every time. 5646. Seamus - 4/11/2006 3:58:11 PM dada, Mac. Faic úr.
You? 5647. Macnas - 4/11/2006 4:14:42 PM Go measartha, buiochas le Dia.
5648. Macnas - 4/11/2006 4:18:00 PM But, faic-all happening anseo freisin. 5649. Macnas - 4/11/2006 4:18:47 PM I had to laugh, I hadn't heard "dada" in so many years! 5650. Seamus - 4/11/2006 4:32:34 PM Sea, Mac, buíochas le Dia! (Much may she care to hear from me.)
So, is that a "fair to middlin" measartha, a "your daddy's rich and your mama's good lookin'" one, or is it "when I woke, I reached up and didn't feel the lid of a coffin, so it's a good day"? Just asking.
Because my "measartha's" vary. 5651. Macnas - 4/11/2006 4:35:04 PM Well, considering the drink taken last night, fair to middling just about covers it. 5652. NuPlanetOne - 4/12/2006 9:51:53 PM
…thanks Jen. But that I were soft and warm or understood talent. Yet, I understand your affection. And that is nice!
5653. NuPlanetOne - 4/12/2006 9:52:36 PM Seamus..
I suppose haphazard more reflects my mood during a half hearted attempt to conform or transform, as it were, some of my things. Now and then I confuse my pile of poems with the notion of academic or scholarly significance. An association better officiated by people with diplomas and such, perhaps. It’s just that sometimes I scribble off something I really feel and later admire, and then later on I question why it happens so fast and easily. It just seems like it should be more difficult. The only difficulty is the missing urge. But I count that as the most excruciating part of writing. And if the ladies will excuse the analogy, false no doubt, that is, trying to conjure inspiration out of a vacuum must be like faking an orgasm. Convincing at best, obvious at worst. Eh, old friend?
And having somewhat aroused feelings of mortality by mentioning our beloved ghosts, I too love the notion put up by Judith that ‘hell is loss of memory.’ I have written so often on chords in that melody. The afterlife is only a source of dread and foreboding, if, as an adherent, you confuse right and wrong according to the accumulated and codified tenets of your specific faith bureaucracy. But like the dog that waits days by the corpse of its dead master, if you aren’t a member, you become that dog.
Anyway, the ‘burial blues’ discussion reminded me of my poem for my brother and the obligation of his burial.
HILLS AND VALLEYS
The air that the sun touches
Pushes the cool autumn breeze
Aside, down under the trees
And shady reaches below the hill
This hill, the burial ground
Faces the hill with the white church
Where numerous ministers have made
Their case for eternal splendor
They carried you down then up
And buried you here, solemnly
Yet smiling and resolute knowing
Your soul would not perish
They did not know you, my brother
You big jolly bear of a man
Who wore his gold crucifix on
The same chain with the red horn
Vengeance was yours also, you said
But to harm a stranger was the act
Of a coward. You knew the Stations
Of The Cross. Greed was unforgivable
Hills and valleys, you always said
That is what life is. And in your way
You had a faith that was as pure and
Uncomplicated as such a thing could be
It is not your church, over there
And you cannot smell the candles
Wafting through St. Anthony’s vaulted
Basilica. But forgive me Vitorio,
I found you a hill.
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