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Previous post: Strange Daze
Even though a cloud’s white curtain in a far-off corner flashed
An’ the hypnotic splattered mist was slowly lifting
Electric light still struck like arrows, fired but for the ones
Condemned to drift or else be kept from drifting
Tolling for the searching ones, on their speechless, seeking trail
For the lonesome-hearted lovers with too personal a tale
An’ for each unharmful, gentle soul misplaced inside a jail
An’ we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing
Starry-eyed an’ laughing as I recall when we were caught
Trapped by no track of hours for they hanged suspended
As we listened one last time an’ we watched with one last look
Spellbound an’ swallowed ’til the tolling ended
Tolling for the aching ones whose wounds cannot be nursed
For the countless confused, accused, misused, strung-out ones an’ worse
An’ for every hung-up person in the whole wide universe
An’ we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing
Stone-cutters fighting time with marble, you foredefeated
Challengers of oblivion
Eat cynical earnings, knowing rock splits, records fall down,
The square-limbed Roman letters
Scale in the thaws, wear in the rain. The poet as well
Builds his monument mockingly;
For man will be blotted out, the blithe earth die, the brave sun
Die blind and blacken to the heart:
Yet stones have stood for a thousand years, and pained
thoughts found
The honey of peace in old poems.
— Robinson Jeffers
Reason will not decide at last; the sword will decide.
The sword: an obsolete instrument of bronze or steel,
formerly used to kill men, but here
In the sense of a symbol. The sword: that is: the storms
and counter-storms of general destruction; killing
of men,
Destruction of all goods and materials; massacre, more or
less intentional, of children and women;
Destruction poured down from wings, the air made accomplice,
the innocent air
Perverted into assassin and poisoner.
The sword: that is: treachery and cowardice, incredible
baseness, incredible courage, loyalties, insanities.
The sword: weeping and despair, mass-enslavement,
mass-torture, frustration of all hopes
That starred man’s forehead. Tyranny for freedom, horror for
happiness, famine for bread, carrion for children.
Reason will not decide at last, the sword will decide.
His soul stretched tight across the skies
That fade behind a city block,
Or trampled by insistent feet
At four and five and six o’clock;
And short square fingers stuffing pipes,
And evening newspapers, and eyes
Assured of certain certainties,
The conscience of a blackened street
Impatient to assume the world.
I am moved by fancies that are curled
Around these images, and cling:
The notion of some infinitely gentle
Infinitely suffering thing.
Wipe your hand across your mouth, and laugh;
The worlds revolve like ancient women
Gathering fuel in vacant lots.
— Eliot
The scientists are in terror
and the European mind stops
Wyndham Lewis chose blindness
rather than have his mind stop.
Night under wind mid garofani,
the petals are almost still
Mozart, Linnaeus, Sulmona,
When one’s friends hate each other
how can there be peace in the world?
Their asperities diverted me in my green time.
A blown husk that is finished
but the light sings eternal
a pale flare over marshes
where the salt hay whispers to tide’s change
Time, space,
neither life nor death is the answer.
And of man seeking good,
doing evil.
In meiner Heimat
where the dead walked
and the living were made of cardboard.
Even though a cloud’s white curtain in a far-off corner flashed
An’ the hypnotic splattered mist was slowly lifting
Electric light still struck like arrows, fired but for the ones
Condemned to drift or else be kept from drifting
Tolling for the searching ones, on their speechless, seeking trail
For the lonesome-hearted lovers with too personal a tale
An’ for each unharmful, gentle soul misplaced inside a jail
An’ we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing
Starry-eyed an’ laughing as I recall when we were caught
Trapped by no track of hours for they hanged suspended
As we listened one last time an’ we watched with one last look
Spellbound an’ swallowed ’til the tolling ended
Tolling for the aching ones whose wounds cannot be nursed
For the countless confused, accused, misused, strung-out ones an’ worse
An’ for every hung-up person in the whole wide universe
An’ we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing
Gerard Van der Leun
Comments on this entry are closed.
Just what we fuckin’ need…
JWM
I had a similar feeling as JWM.
I have nothing against people of other religions or ethnicities coming here if they wish to assimilate.
Having said that, it appears that two, possibly three of the new citizens are Muslim. If we scrutinize the teachings of Islam, it is clear that Muslims do not wish to assimilate to any nation which has allowed them entry. Muslims have a long history of killing not only, Jews and Christians, but also Buddhist, Hindus, Zoroasters, atheists and they even kill each other over differences in sect. In areas where they gain political power within our system they are advocating for Sharia law. I understand that politics is much about optics and the holy name of diversity is a selling point in the minds of many Americans, but do we really need more Muslims here?
ALL new foreign citizens should be required to have a bond in the amount of $10,000.00 for a period of 10 years and be banned from any sort of welfare during that period. If, after 10 years, they can prove they are an asset to the country, have commited no felonies, and know how to read, speak and write conversational english the bond will be returned to them. Otherwise you’ll just end up with “poor, tired, huddled masses” on every kind of welfare they can sink their claws into, kinda like what you have now.
Unfortunately that’s one thing with which I disagree with our President. We need a complete moratorium on immigration. Yesterday.
Now we’re gonn’a hate on legal immigrants…???
I’ll take most of them over than what is currently burning our cities right now.
Fine. They can all live on your street.
Fine. They can all live on your street.
I’ll take them on my street.
I doubt Gerard’s purpose in posting this was to invite half a dozen comments decrying legal immigration. If I was him, I’d be disappointed in all of you, but chalk it up to the fact that you can’t control who reads your site and as long as they maintain the barest hint of civility, a decent respect for the “energizing contest of freedom,” as Samuel Adams put it, means you don’t silence people even when they’re tactless and crass.
Honestly, if you watch a naturalization ceremony where people from all points of the globe choose to forsake their home country to become American citizens and you don’t get a little choked up, then you have lost something important. You have lost an essential American-ness. We natural-born citizens didn’t have to do what those people did. We didn’t have to take a test (that most high schoolers would probably fail), we didn’t have to jump through endless hoops, and most of all, we didn’t have to take an oath. Because we didn’t, we admire those who do. I do, anyway.
Tim,
I said nothing about hate. I asked a question. Perhaps you should do your own research about Islam – “the religion of peace”….and again, I ask, Do we really need more Muslims in our country?
Mitchell,
Pity your “disappointment” in the commentariat here. Perhaps you might answer the question.
Allow me to assist both of you with a link to begin your edification. https://www.billionbibles.org/sharia/america-sharia-law.html
On my street???!!
Hell, a few representatives of all of that diverse group already live IN MY APARTMENT COMPLEX. Had a taco supper with them last night. See them when I walk around and go to the pool.
If you become an American through the right channels as set down in law you are my equal as a citizen. In fact, considering what you go through to become a citizen, you are probably better than I am in many ways.