Chaplinesque by Hart Crane

Chaplinesque
by Hart Crane


We make our meek adjustments,
Contented with such random consolations
As the wind deposits
In slithered and too ample pockets.

For we can still love the world, who find
A famished kitten on the step, and know
Recesses for it from the fury of the street,
Or warm torn elbow coverts.

We will sidestep, and to the final smirk
Dally the doom of that inevitable thumb
That slowly chafes its puckered index toward us,
Facing the dull squint with what innocence
And what surprise!

And yet these fine collapses are not lies
More than the pirouettes of any pliant cane;
Our obsequies are, in a way, no enterprise.
We can evade you, and all else but the heart:
What blame to us if the heart live on.

The game enforces smirks; but we have seen
The moon in lonely alleys make
A grail of laughter of an empty ash can,
And through all sound of gaiety and quest
Have heard a kitten in the wilderness.






From The Complete Poems and Selected Letters and Prose of Hart Crane by Hart Crane, edited with an introduction and notes by Brom Weber. Used with the permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation. Copyright © 1933, 1958, 1966 by Liveright Publishing Corporation.


Hart Crane was an American poet with a very great gift for seeing, and for the way language changes what is real. Sadly, the despair that is often reflected in his work eventually overcame his appreciation for life. However, his poetic legacy deserves great respect. You can read more about Hart Crane & savor some of his work on Poets.org, here:

http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/233

To take the Multi-Bloglingual Poetry Tour hosted by my friend Jacqui Binford-Bell, go here:

http://binford-bellstudio.blogspot.com/

Have a wonderful time!

Warm Snow

Today THEY have predicted a warming trend...
Glad to hear it, very glad to hear it...
I've uncovered a forgotten cache of Fabriano paper
22 X 30
& my arm is aching to stroke wide arcs of color.

But, for now, the paper chase continues
& the street is covered with warm white snow
falling from Bradford pear trees
much maligned harbingers of every season
lollipops grown into great clouds
little purple hyacinths in their budding pride
all the worlds follow a circle
today

AH-HA HAH!

Compare me to JOB & you might call me very lucky
But it seems like the Fates have been spinning the thread
too thin these days---hasn't snapped yet, thank goodness,
I'm reduced to snapping road cracks & stealing shots
off nature programming...

Getting more portraits of human beings, but I cannot show
the teen-aged Macbeths & Tamoras, Joans of Arc & Bruti,
or the baby girl festooned with beads & a rakish sailor hat.

I wrote a blog on Multiply for Valentine's Day:
http://aimlessjoys.multiply.com/journal/item/239/A_Kind_Word_from_the_Loyal_Opposition
& I've signed up for Facebook & Flixster
just at the time I need to be spending
more time outdoors!

It's just that Sunday seems always to bring out the blog
& the blarney in me. However, I am unwilling, evidently,
to do what it takes to parlay this blogorhythm into
a six-figure income:




So I'll consider this blog my occasional platform
my replicant here at Google
I can't say that it's worth anybody's time
But Time is only a concept humans need for organizational purposes,
memories can be embellished or erased or turned into a palmipsest
called what's happening now when I think of Then.
I'll always love this scene from BLADERUNNER.

Hope you enjoy it, too, & also your life each moment.



Have Fun!

Clearing my Conscience

I'm responsible for the details of a regional Shakespeare Competition
My friend who's writing True Crime asked me to take over
I'm not saying that was a crime (am I?)
I lost my temper
the very point I'm working on conscientiously
I thought

Some people are simply impossible


Maybe I'm one of them

But I detest being lied to

& I especially detest being treated like an idiot

I only hope the student
whose teacher let her/him down
by not taking care of the necessary details
will be there, after all, will be the Dark Horse, The One
that stuns us all with a divine performance

I'm cautiously optimistic
although I know that people follow a pattern
usually
& once unreasonable, twice unreasonable,
very likely to be tertiarially, undeniably, certifiably

UNREASONABLE

again



Very likely all this will settle itself
& the Greater Good will be served
by the structure

This thing is not Open Mic

It has procedures designed to ensure equitable opportunity
because it is a brilliant opportunity
for the brilliant winner,
but these are very young people who depend upon grown-ups
to be grown-ups & own up to their responsibilities...

I said

If it makes you feel better to blame me, go ahead.
Just do this & that & come on to the show.


Let's hope the show goes on with the unknown contestant
& becomes perfect.

I can see it both ways

& it's still a good thing.

Yesterday I wandered through someone else's garden,

which now belongs to mostly everyone who stops by

to say hello to the little old ladies who guard it.

It felt so good to be in a walled garden in the sun!

The camellias are wearing poorly, lots of nips in them

from the cold winds we've been having, even within a walled garden.

The Japanese magnolias' catkins are bursting.

They'll be blossoming & booming in just a minute or two...

I have been working much more than I usually do,

being of a naturally rather, ahhhh, ambling sort of nature,

who prizes lolling about & thinking of interesting subjects,

nothing too technical or measured, thanks,

but this last month has put my resources to the test...

Patience, for one, & getting past inertia into action,

I've had pressing issues concerning my mom,

& lots of them.

But all the while a voice kept saying

Get out your acrylics!

GET. OUT. YOUR. ACRYLICS.

So, when I finally did follow my own advice,

I found a very special ring & other keepsake jewelry

I had given up on over five years ago.

It drove me crazy for awhile back then,

looking everywhere & wondering

what had happened,

speculating on how they disappeared.

Finally, I had decided that someone

must have needed them more than I did,

& let the worries go away out into the Universe.

Now I know I hid them from myself, evidently,

& revealed them to myself years later,

at a time when this ol' girl

is much more seasoned with irony.

So I have decided the paint that harbored that treasure

must be lucky, & thus I am re-beginning a painting phase.

Now that I've announced it, so must it be.

Capturing light for myself

preserving it for everybody

New Era

I always like to think something good's on its way...

Today I watched the Presidential Inauguration

All those thousands & thousands of hopeful smiles

the rejoicing

the so ready semi-fumbled promise

the poet's dream of a reality of expanding light

the old minister's quaint & funny prayer

& I felt my heart swell

It did swell with appreciation

as my eyelashes grew crisp with salt

& I knew myself again

as part of my country

whatever that entails

part of a good intention

sometimes managed badly

as all human effort must be

even the best

which this could yet still be

the best we could hope for

for now

Enjoying the Christmas tree,

& the convivial suppertime together,

I noticed in the fire

a salamander,

calmly burning,

& keeping an eye on us.