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15 December 2010: On Hibernation and Writer's Block
HAVING REALIZED that the wretched behavior of this country throughout its history, dominated by wealth from its earliest days, is not so much a function of being American as being rich--a quality that does its thing worldwide; HAVING REALIZED that if the world was turned upside down to the point that the rich became poor and the poor became rich little would change; HAVING REALIZED that Voltaire's words "Il faut dire la vérité et s'immoler" (One must speak the truth and then self-immolate) apply well to Julian Assange and Liu Xiaobo, among others, I decided to hibernate, figuring that answers might appear to me more effectively in that mode than any other.
The idea that sleeping implies being out of it just isn't true all of the time. Remember what Roethke wrote: "I wake to sleep and take my waking slow."
Not that I don't have any other new ideas--which I don't--but if I persuade my dream-time subconscious to come up with something else besides solipsistic truths, maybe something significant will occur to me and my writer's block will be cured.
Socrates was the only person I know of who admitted he sought himself in all things that he studied. I haven't reached that level, even though I've forced myself out of the poetic mode to more objectivity. Is what we call "objectivity" only a disguised mirror?
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Besides that, it's so freaking cold out there that Inauguration Day 2009 seems like Florida even down here in Dixie/DC--I kid you not.
Friday promises us 40 degrees not a minute too soon, but only after a Thursday that produces an inch of snow as the freeze reaches its zenith.
Oh, what awful writing: "freeze reaches its zenith." "Freeze crests"? "Freeze peaks"? "Freeze culminates"? It's been my experience that raucous weather usually apologizes one way or another, sun rising after a hurricane or tornado (often having murdered many), snow warming up things after deep freezes, air calming down to eliminate wind chill. Maybe that's the best way to put it.
I am reduced to discussing the weather as I fight this writer's block. Maybe my mind is frozen.
Maybe this fact would freeze anyone's mind: I have been editing social work-oriented bibliographies that reveal the vast number of humanitarian organizations, foundations, and think tanks in this country, along with a few government agencies. With that many of them, and the vast spread of their subjects, one would think that all of the country's problems would be well under control, but they're not.
Throw in all of the religious charities and other NGOs. We're still where we are.
And that, my dear right wingers, is why we need as much government assistance as we have, if not more.
Why waste your time fighting this when you can be seeing the documentary Howl?
Dawn of the counter-culture? But who was Ginsberg's audience, if not the counter-culture we refer to as the Beatniks? Understand us.
Dawn of Walt Whitman's poetic style into proliferation? Read it.
I highly recommend it all--the film, the poem, and their predecessor.
(c)
