“Where were you last night?” Alison wanted to know in a shrill tone.
“I spent the night at Rabbit’s after the party.” I told her from Rabbit’s phone, mine was dead. “I wanted to stay after the last BART back to the City.” Alison didn’t have anything to say to that except to hurry home.
Rabbit had taken me to the BART and was standing off at a polite distance while I spoke with Alison. When I rang off Rabbit said I should have called last night. I had wanted to do what I wanted to do, and not wanted to fight about it. I had gone without my pills and really didn’t sleep, just lay in the dark listening to Original Synergie breathing next to me. Funny, he sleeps with a pillow over head like I prefer. I didn’t have one. Alison called my head pillow the mushroom until she tried it herself, then it was the Sleep Crown. Maybe an aluminum hat would be more effective, but the Sleep Crown keeps my dreams at bay.
“‘Drugs are bad.’” I had made a fool of myself the night before, and all I had done was smoke pot, which sometimes over-stimulates me. I had gotten up in the morning and said some things to Rabbit which later Rabbit would call me on, note to self, never joke about rape. In fact, just keep your mouth shut.
The BART was on the weekend schedule, with no direct train to San Francisco from the Richmond/Fremont line. I was hung over, in trouble with Alison and Rabbit, and had a 20 minute wait for the train having just missed one. And no phone. I was lonely and dissatisfied. No book or anything to write on, just my own inner resources. Which I lack. When there is nothing else, I can pace. Pace I did, trying not to think about last night, or the homecoming I dreaded. “Where were you last night?” “I was at a party and wanted to do what I wanted to do.” I was aware of how inadequate that was, but that was all I had.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Start in the middle, since there is no clear beginning
and then,
you wake up.iT goes up and a memory cuts w/out pain nor blood. yet.
and she sez forget.
you wake up from the dream in the dream you die and you had fallen out of a plane and crawled out of the crater of your descent, dead, but the dream, and self, continue.
and then you wake up a zircon of glass trapt in lashes. something so heavy. and if will cd. make it so dead you wd. be, right there, a line of red.
and she sez forget.
forget. i had promised you always.
you wake up.iT goes up and a memory cuts w/out pain nor blood. yet.
and she sez forget.
you wake up from the dream in the dream you die and you had fallen out of a plane and crawled out of the crater of your descent, dead, but the dream, and self, continue.
and then you wake up a zircon of glass trapt in lashes. something so heavy. and if will cd. make it so dead you wd. be, right there, a line of red.
and she sez forget.
forget. i had promised you always.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Mill College On Sunday for a recital
Christina enters stage "fuck yeah i want her in [Sacred Wall of Feedback] or whatever we call ourselves - "Make the metal scream!" dissonant lovely lonely music. I wonder how Christina feels about doom chamber music. Her percussions brought in elements of doom, jazz, and asian influences; yet the feeling was aolian, found sounds in a desert, moaning of desolation.
Monday, March 7, 2011
Ecofascism and the Radical Middle: Vote For kenne!
i wanted to say that i want to run for president and wd include in my platform your petition. i haven't decided a name for my 'party' (of whom i am the only member) - I consider True Socialist only because someone beat me to SuperCapitalism -
ecosocialists exist. I could run. I usta own the domain name ecosocialism.us, but hadta let it lapse. a more accurate term for my politics is ecofascism (i also owned the domain ecofascism.us) but no one understands what that really means.
all i am saying is seize half the wealth of the top 10 percent and put every American into a home that is their's outright. and the following year we seize another 50 percent of the top 10%'s wealth.
By which point very few people will be left who own more than 5 houses.
With that money we wipe clean the debt of every American.
The third 50% of the top 10 percent goes toward the future: devising a zero water zero emissions zero toxic waste technologies.
The concurrent first step is to seize some large percentage of every publicly held company and redistribute an equal share of the Corporate wealth to every American.
I propose two tiers of citizenship:
the resident: this includes children, aliens, and people who do not want to participate in the total surveilance culture
their duties include paying taxes and partipipating in local politics. if a citzen gets 1 vote, a resident gets a partial vote.
To become a citizen one must contribute to the weal of the nation and our people. I propose an agricultural army, a teacher's corp (college students in the classroom), an ecocorps. As well as military training. if one does choose to participate they remain residents. Other wise once one has completed your service (it starts at 13 like going to boarding school. this is one aspect of the process of the elimination of class distinctions that lead to power over.
My power of the U.S. comes only if this certified lunatic can persuade people in every state to work to get me on the ballot, even if only as a write- in.
I need you America, and I am the death of Amerika. Perhaps they may one day be Americka, but not as long as children are property. not where prostitution is safer than the factory, and they find murdered women everyday. We have to examine our hatred that we think of as love.
As has been said "a standing army during peacetime is an invitation to tyranny" the military will stand down. The U.S. under my leadership will stop being the obstructive force in the U.N. - and sign the International Court Treaty - bring every president since Bush I for crimes that go beyond against humanity. I am referring to the use of depleted uranium. This is an act of biocide. As a signatory of major international treaties, the torturers will be brought to justice.
But a "well organized militia" - everyone shd receive the training appropriate to their ability. Not everyone is a warrior - but remote control guns can be controlled w/ eye movements. (To use a disability example). No $300, no college deferment - this is college, plus getting your hands in the dirt - every citizen takes part in their youth in the raising of food and learning survival skills. Teh barrier between city and country will break down. We will use our ecocorp and build to the future. A lot of the emediate future involves dismantling dams. Teh next generation of suicide bombera will the same disaffected suburban youth who are the main consumers of rap music.
i'll end on a nasty note like that. as i have said out loud in public (to the fear and chagrin of my companion) "Does predicting civil equal promoting civil war?" in other words - are these words seditious?
ecosocialists exist. I could run. I usta own the domain name ecosocialism.us, but hadta let it lapse. a more accurate term for my politics is ecofascism (i also owned the domain ecofascism.us) but no one understands what that really means.
all i am saying is seize half the wealth of the top 10 percent and put every American into a home that is their's outright. and the following year we seize another 50 percent of the top 10%'s wealth.
By which point very few people will be left who own more than 5 houses.
With that money we wipe clean the debt of every American.
The third 50% of the top 10 percent goes toward the future: devising a zero water zero emissions zero toxic waste technologies.
The concurrent first step is to seize some large percentage of every publicly held company and redistribute an equal share of the Corporate wealth to every American.
I propose two tiers of citizenship:
the resident: this includes children, aliens, and people who do not want to participate in the total surveilance culture
their duties include paying taxes and partipipating in local politics. if a citzen gets 1 vote, a resident gets a partial vote.
To become a citizen one must contribute to the weal of the nation and our people. I propose an agricultural army, a teacher's corp (college students in the classroom), an ecocorps. As well as military training. if one does choose to participate they remain residents. Other wise once one has completed your service (it starts at 13 like going to boarding school. this is one aspect of the process of the elimination of class distinctions that lead to power over.
My power of the U.S. comes only if this certified lunatic can persuade people in every state to work to get me on the ballot, even if only as a write- in.
I need you America, and I am the death of Amerika. Perhaps they may one day be Americka, but not as long as children are property. not where prostitution is safer than the factory, and they find murdered women everyday. We have to examine our hatred that we think of as love.
As has been said "a standing army during peacetime is an invitation to tyranny" the military will stand down. The U.S. under my leadership will stop being the obstructive force in the U.N. - and sign the International Court Treaty - bring every president since Bush I for crimes that go beyond against humanity. I am referring to the use of depleted uranium. This is an act of biocide. As a signatory of major international treaties, the torturers will be brought to justice.
But a "well organized militia" - everyone shd receive the training appropriate to their ability. Not everyone is a warrior - but remote control guns can be controlled w/ eye movements. (To use a disability example). No $300, no college deferment - this is college, plus getting your hands in the dirt - every citizen takes part in their youth in the raising of food and learning survival skills. Teh barrier between city and country will break down. We will use our ecocorp and build to the future. A lot of the emediate future involves dismantling dams. Teh next generation of suicide bombera will the same disaffected suburban youth who are the main consumers of rap music.
i'll end on a nasty note like that. as i have said out loud in public (to the fear and chagrin of my companion) "Does predicting civil equal promoting civil war?" in other words - are these words seditious?
Sunday, March 6, 2011
A completely unedited spew of a beginning of my Shakespeare paper
Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale as a spiritual journey
What is a spiritual journey? And in the context of The Winter’s Tale, who is taking this journey? From some evidences one could argue that it is Shakespeare taking a journey, a reconciliation of the Catholic traditions of old Europe against the Puritan groundswell of dissent that after Shakespeare’s death irrupted into a violent Puritan Authoritarian State that was worse than the old Royalty. An athanor is the crucible of the alchemist, and in the inner tradition the athanor is your own body.
(and Shakespeare may have been raised Catholic, a fanatical underground Catholicism that under the reign of Elizabeth I was ever under suspicion, and after the death of Shakespeare and Elizabeth erupted into a violent Puritanism). But Ted Hughes has written his book on Shakespeare’s spiritual journey, and I wonder who else is undergoing a spiritual journey. One answer – the audience – leads to myself, does experiencing The Winter’s Tale take me on a journey, solo, as I read the play, or an ensemble, as an audience member. Myself, as I try on each character and see glimpses of someone else, not a mythic cypher, but living embodiment of a principle or archetype of the spiritual journey.
There is a sense reading Shakespeare that one is playing each rôle, perhaps true of other great dramatists – my reading has been in various ghettoes of literary science fiction and the Eco’s and Calvino’s, the Donald Barthelme. I cannot speak of that which I don’t know. What kenne is looking for in story is that mythic dimension that irrupts into the ordinary. Try L.A. Lafferty – a conspiracy to take over the world is centered in Tulsa OK. A bar in the novel has a brass plaque proclaiming that place to be the exact center of the Universe. In Shakespeare, a character like Leontes becames the center of the world. As Yeats wrote of the 20th century “the center does not hold” Leontes reflecting on his conviction that he is cuckolded “No, if I mistake
In these foundations which I build upun,
The center is not bigh enough to bear
A schoolboy’s top.”
The following line is “Away with her to prison!”
What is a spiritual journey? And in the context of The Winter’s Tale, who is taking this journey? From some evidences one could argue that it is Shakespeare taking a journey, a reconciliation of the Catholic traditions of old Europe against the Puritan groundswell of dissent that after Shakespeare’s death irrupted into a violent Puritan Authoritarian State that was worse than the old Royalty. An athanor is the crucible of the alchemist, and in the inner tradition the athanor is your own body.
(and Shakespeare may have been raised Catholic, a fanatical underground Catholicism that under the reign of Elizabeth I was ever under suspicion, and after the death of Shakespeare and Elizabeth erupted into a violent Puritanism). But Ted Hughes has written his book on Shakespeare’s spiritual journey, and I wonder who else is undergoing a spiritual journey. One answer – the audience – leads to myself, does experiencing The Winter’s Tale take me on a journey, solo, as I read the play, or an ensemble, as an audience member. Myself, as I try on each character and see glimpses of someone else, not a mythic cypher, but living embodiment of a principle or archetype of the spiritual journey.
There is a sense reading Shakespeare that one is playing each rôle, perhaps true of other great dramatists – my reading has been in various ghettoes of literary science fiction and the Eco’s and Calvino’s, the Donald Barthelme. I cannot speak of that which I don’t know. What kenne is looking for in story is that mythic dimension that irrupts into the ordinary. Try L.A. Lafferty – a conspiracy to take over the world is centered in Tulsa OK. A bar in the novel has a brass plaque proclaiming that place to be the exact center of the Universe. In Shakespeare, a character like Leontes becames the center of the world. As Yeats wrote of the 20th century “the center does not hold” Leontes reflecting on his conviction that he is cuckolded “No, if I mistake
In these foundations which I build upun,
The center is not bigh enough to bear
A schoolboy’s top.”
The following line is “Away with her to prison!”
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Divorce and Property: where did the child go?
From the Huffington PostOf course, not one mention of what the child might want. Or that the child is anything other than a contested piece of property. A recent re-read of the Communist Manifesto was remarkable to me in many ways. Marx and Engels write of the evolution of society and points to the moment a hunting party turns to a human settlement as easier than the rigours of the hunt - that the raiding party is a natural extension of the hunting party, and the long known customs of war - kill all the men, rape all the women and enslave the children. That women were the first property in Marx and Engels gives the two a feminist consciousness not always acknowledge. Marx and Engels argue for the dissolution of the nuclear family in order to free children and women from servitude. I was especially struck by the repeated use of the word democracy in connexion w/ socialism. As any one who has made a cursory glance thru the Marxist ouvre, is struck by a religious sense of communism being the Omega Point of Humanity - a thing of the far future. The Communist Manifesto can without a single edit fit any kind of Fabian Socialism you like. I for instance believe in a Socialist Democratic Republic, and have a touch of the royal in my chart, and fancy myself a latter day Emperor Norton, tho at the time being, going incognito and unproclaimed. (unless you were at the poetry readings in San Francisco where i worked out the details of my plan to take over the world.) I
Of course, not one mention of what the child might want. Or that the child is anything other than a contested piece of property. Does 'conventional' divorce take the real status of the child[ren] into account i.e., do the children have lawyers representing their interest.
As a child i learned that the 1st Amendment does not apply to children. Children have no redress against censorship. Because the child belongs to someone, the school, while ze is there, is in loco parentis. The Founding Fathers did not consider anyone without land a citizen. The extension of the franchise to more and wider groups is still being fought, but no one talks of the native child as citizen. Why shd not some one who can read not be allowed to vote for President? in fact, to have an opinion, one need not be literate. An indiscriminate perusal of the comments on these kinds of discussions suggests that one not be 'literate' to compose a comment. So why not when a child is old enough to understand that they are making an important choice (what? 5 - i think a 3 year old capable of deciding "I like this candidate, i don't like this other candidate.")
I admire all the people who have put a lot of thought and time and personal availability for those undergoing the dissolution of a family. And a lot of well meaning people cannot prevent themselves as thinking of children as a special kind of property. I can say of my daughter "She is mine." but not legally. Without a helpful free lawyer to point out that my natural child has the right to certain benefits, including health insurance, as i struggle to maintain on disability, after my mental illness brought about the end of contact w/ my daughter. After a couple of postcards detailing the adventures of Bille Bunne and Tejas [pronounced w/ a hard 'j'] i received a bille bunne and tejas story from the mother explaining that seeing her father go insane is too painfull for little girls to witness. I am reminded that i was explosive and unpredictable - the kind of person a child shd be protected from. Without the understanding that is her father re:birth certificate, that my daughter was entitled to benefits (i don't know about the not living w/ me part) so that a letter delivered by a Local Marshall (causing my roommate to hide in the closet) having nothing on me, i answered the door and found myself in receipt of some paperwork relinquishing my rights as a father, so her mother's husband cd adopt her. The explanation given was so that he cd put her on his insurance. It tore my heart out, when the lawyer in Texas explained that in order to fight i would have to return to Texas, pay child support out of my disability pittance… and the likely outcome was that i wd lose no matter how hard i fought, and that he wouldn't do it for less than $7000, which was a fantastic a sum as 7 trilllion as far as my assets are concerned. My daughter on facebook uses her first name, her 2 middle names, her mother's maiden name which is her name or her birth certificate and her stepfather's name. Tho her facebook identifies me as her father, so also is so listed her stepfather. He and his mother started dating as i was going out of my mind (to a whole other level - later in the process i decided i would no longer fight it, and give up my skeptickal toolkit. "Let's see how far it goes…" That decision came either before or after my final contact w/ my daughter, the chronology of that period (there were a lot of drugs) is vague, but i think after. I remember the where (walking down Filmore between Haight and Waller - on my way either to or from Body Manipulations where i had a major passion for an employee. seeing her was the highlight of my week. and i slipped in and out of rapid cycling i decided i would not divert the crazy into a major depression, but go w/ it. by the following year i was back on psych meds, escaped from Texas w/ 3 months of psych meds to tide me over before the system took me over here. Since i had the meds and diagnoses and a chart as big as the Encyclopedia Britannica plus a very public display of madness that has left me convinced that if only eveyone listened to me, that i could save the world.
My parents fought savagely - all verbal, no hitting, but i wished they wd divorce with all my heart. Or to quote my 12 year old nephew at a combined Birthday for my mom and myself (we are both Leos and against my better judgement have often visited Texas in August) (a propos nothing in the conversation) "I hate my dad." i bit my lip. His mother, my sister Alison, looks at him a moment particularly unreadable and sez: "That's not a nice thing to say. Can you think of a better way to say that?" he thought a moment and said "I strongly dislike my father." I cda high fived him, but i was maintaining as high a level of truce concerning her Asshole Husband, and was only silent witness. Right on kid! Even you know yr dad is as Asshole. that is his nature, and the racist crap that goes with it is all of a piece. I feel the same way toward the Irish that he does towards Blacks and mixed and his racial bullshit. mine is more Scottish - Fuck All Of You, Especially you Other Scottish bastards. I say, take 2 steps back. by that i mean, go to the land of one of your grandparents. In Mythological Terms: the Witch, the Werewolf, The Evil Vampyre and
Of course, not one mention of what the child might want. Or that the child is anything other than a contested piece of property. Does 'conventional' divorce take the real status of the child[ren] into account i.e., do the children have lawyers representing their interest.
As a child i learned that the 1st Amendment does not apply to children. Children have no redress against censorship. Because the child belongs to someone, the school, while ze is there, is in loco parentis. The Founding Fathers did not consider anyone without land a citizen. The extension of the franchise to more and wider groups is still being fought, but no one talks of the native child as citizen. Why shd not some one who can read not be allowed to vote for President? in fact, to have an opinion, one need not be literate. An indiscriminate perusal of the comments on these kinds of discussions suggests that one not be 'literate' to compose a comment. So why not when a child is old enough to understand that they are making an important choice (what? 5 - i think a 3 year old capable of deciding "I like this candidate, i don't like this other candidate.")
I admire all the people who have put a lot of thought and time and personal availability for those undergoing the dissolution of a family. And a lot of well meaning people cannot prevent themselves as thinking of children as a special kind of property. I can say of my daughter "She is mine." but not legally. Without a helpful free lawyer to point out that my natural child has the right to certain benefits, including health insurance, as i struggle to maintain on disability, after my mental illness brought about the end of contact w/ my daughter. After a couple of postcards detailing the adventures of Bille Bunne and Tejas [pronounced w/ a hard 'j'] i received a bille bunne and tejas story from the mother explaining that seeing her father go insane is too painfull for little girls to witness. I am reminded that i was explosive and unpredictable - the kind of person a child shd be protected from. Without the understanding that is her father re:birth certificate, that my daughter was entitled to benefits (i don't know about the not living w/ me part) so that a letter delivered by a Local Marshall (causing my roommate to hide in the closet) having nothing on me, i answered the door and found myself in receipt of some paperwork relinquishing my rights as a father, so her mother's husband cd adopt her. The explanation given was so that he cd put her on his insurance. It tore my heart out, when the lawyer in Texas explained that in order to fight i would have to return to Texas, pay child support out of my disability pittance… and the likely outcome was that i wd lose no matter how hard i fought, and that he wouldn't do it for less than $7000, which was a fantastic a sum as 7 trilllion as far as my assets are concerned. My daughter on facebook uses her first name, her 2 middle names, her mother's maiden name which is her name or her birth certificate and her stepfather's name. Tho her facebook identifies me as her father, so also is so listed her stepfather. He and his mother started dating as i was going out of my mind (to a whole other level - later in the process i decided i would no longer fight it, and give up my skeptickal toolkit. "Let's see how far it goes…" That decision came either before or after my final contact w/ my daughter, the chronology of that period (there were a lot of drugs) is vague, but i think after. I remember the where (walking down Filmore between Haight and Waller - on my way either to or from Body Manipulations where i had a major passion for an employee. seeing her was the highlight of my week. and i slipped in and out of rapid cycling i decided i would not divert the crazy into a major depression, but go w/ it. by the following year i was back on psych meds, escaped from Texas w/ 3 months of psych meds to tide me over before the system took me over here. Since i had the meds and diagnoses and a chart as big as the Encyclopedia Britannica plus a very public display of madness that has left me convinced that if only eveyone listened to me, that i could save the world.
My parents fought savagely - all verbal, no hitting, but i wished they wd divorce with all my heart. Or to quote my 12 year old nephew at a combined Birthday for my mom and myself (we are both Leos and against my better judgement have often visited Texas in August) (a propos nothing in the conversation) "I hate my dad." i bit my lip. His mother, my sister Alison, looks at him a moment particularly unreadable and sez: "That's not a nice thing to say. Can you think of a better way to say that?" he thought a moment and said "I strongly dislike my father." I cda high fived him, but i was maintaining as high a level of truce concerning her Asshole Husband, and was only silent witness. Right on kid! Even you know yr dad is as Asshole. that is his nature, and the racist crap that goes with it is all of a piece. I feel the same way toward the Irish that he does towards Blacks and mixed and his racial bullshit. mine is more Scottish - Fuck All Of You, Especially you Other Scottish bastards. I say, take 2 steps back. by that i mean, go to the land of one of your grandparents. In Mythological Terms: the Witch, the Werewolf, The Evil Vampyre and
Thursday, February 24, 2011
during the course of this rant i will touch on points relevant to my research paper on William Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale as a spiritual journey; or, not to mention the dog
The first formal introduction to any than the vaguest impression of breathing (i did it 'wrong' as in, i wd tighten my stomach on the in breath). When i sought the Sufis (whom i found in the San Francisco White Pages under the name Sufi Islamia Ruhamiat Society (due to irrational prejudice the Society has dropped the Islamia and is now simply The Sufi Ruhaniat International. My teacher was Ahmaddin As-Salik in the lineage of the current Pir of the order, Moineddin Jablonski. After Ahmaddin's death, and other factors, i chose to focus on the mundane part of my life. I started at City College in 2000. 11 years and i have 3 classes to go on a 2 year certificate program. considering the difficulty of Design 110 - Rapid Visualization i may take just that one class in the fall. City College is tired of me, and no longer offers financial aid. That does not rule out scholarships, which require 2 letters of recommendation (check - at least as far as asking. Both would like some personal details that might be relevant, and what the committee is looking for. I attended a seminar on scholarships. My major life challenge boils down to procrastination. I very well cd have hammered out a letter to my two instructors w/ the data they need. The due date is the 4th - shd have already done it, and tonite is not too late. not to speak of the letter i have to write myself, explaining my struggles and how i have overcome then. I only have a high GPA on my side. a poor completion ratio, but that will be wiped out if i take the additional 5-8 classes i need to transfer to state. If going to school is like pulling teeth, why do it? Alison Miller suggested that 'it is the only game in town'. that is, if they are gonna pay me to go to school, may as well. well, let's see how Scholarships pan out. I get as much as the FEDs say is my need. Since my own personal contribution is close to zero, i qualify for approx $16,000 in scholarship money. which, declared on my taxes the right way, does not affect my disability payments. (Tho the accountant at A.C.O.R.N. used a 'deferment' that may come back and bite me. fortunately i know a real accountant if such a thing were to manifest, i think he might take me on as a charity case.)
I don't suppose any of that has to do w/ Shakespeare. So far, in my reading among the critics, i have encountered the thesis that much of Shakespeare's later texts contain incoherencies that scholars attempt in vain to edit into some kind of sense. The counter thesis that the speeches of Leontes and Polixenes, rather than revealing a lack of sense in the original, tho obscure, reveal that instead of blaming Shakespeare for creating lines that are nonsense, that Shakespeare is exploring a theme, which has to do w/ power over and a refusal of ambiguity. Those in power cannot tolerate the ambiguous. Went to the Rosenberg Library at City College and found Ted Hughes exploring the NeoPlatonic/Alchemical milieu that was part of the circle that commissioned Love's Labour's Lost. I haven't read enough of Ted Hughes book to judge his thesis, but he prefaces his introduction by asking the gentle reader to abandon, for the sake of a thought experiment, the Shakespeare of psychological realism, and see instead a 'mythic' writer. To join him in exploring the underground grottoes and structures of Shakespeare's mythic imagination. I put the book aside at the beginning of the chapter on Venus and Adonis. By now i know that Hughes intends to show that the image of (in Grail imagery) 'the dolorous blow' in particular the roman variant the Shakespeare makes his own. I haven't read that, which mebbe i will do right now. let's see if i can find the text online.
[… … …](read along w/ me)
I don't suppose any of that has to do w/ Shakespeare. So far, in my reading among the critics, i have encountered the thesis that much of Shakespeare's later texts contain incoherencies that scholars attempt in vain to edit into some kind of sense. The counter thesis that the speeches of Leontes and Polixenes, rather than revealing a lack of sense in the original, tho obscure, reveal that instead of blaming Shakespeare for creating lines that are nonsense, that Shakespeare is exploring a theme, which has to do w/ power over and a refusal of ambiguity. Those in power cannot tolerate the ambiguous. Went to the Rosenberg Library at City College and found Ted Hughes exploring the NeoPlatonic/Alchemical milieu that was part of the circle that commissioned Love's Labour's Lost. I haven't read enough of Ted Hughes book to judge his thesis, but he prefaces his introduction by asking the gentle reader to abandon, for the sake of a thought experiment, the Shakespeare of psychological realism, and see instead a 'mythic' writer. To join him in exploring the underground grottoes and structures of Shakespeare's mythic imagination. I put the book aside at the beginning of the chapter on Venus and Adonis. By now i know that Hughes intends to show that the image of (in Grail imagery) 'the dolorous blow' in particular the roman variant the Shakespeare makes his own. I haven't read that, which mebbe i will do right now. let's see if i can find the text online.
[… … …](read along w/ me)
Friday, February 11, 2011
kenne on Liberty
Democracy is a dangerous tool in the hands of the People. the Founding Fathers (notice there were no women? unless i am mistaken there were no black men at the Convention where the Constitution was argued and ratified - pls tell me their was a freedman at the Constitutional Convention!)
the founding fathers didn't like the direction that the democratic institutions were going under the Articles of Federation. the people are too emotional too easily swayed by demagogues (see the Federalist Papers by Madison, he was there. and he is remarkably blunt.) The purpose of our Constitution was to dilute the power of direct democracy. The Fathers didn't trust the people. And at the time the right to vote was limited to property holders. They didn't trust their own class. Jefferson is considered to be the liberal hero who saved us from Hamiltonian tyranny. Aaron Burr may have been mentally unstable, but his antagonism to Hamilton started as an argument over the crippling control the banks had over America. go Burr! vendetta and dueling are often seen as 'outlaw' justice, but it is the path chosen by many throughout history. Hamilton was not a native citizen and cd never be President but he at the time of the duel was the most powerfull person in America.
I hope Egypt is not unduly influenced in their path to Democracy by the American system. I think a Parliamentary system is more just, in that minority parties have access to power. I have been a mutterer in the corner (kind like a voice in the wilderness, only more invisible) calling for a new Constitution. let's not rush into it. let's spend a decade talking about what kind of society we want. There are those that claim that no system can be imposed by decree and change the facts of human nature. I think that argument is so wrong - the facts of human nature are the distortions of human nature imposed by the needs of production. we are slaves, and are very angry about it, and cling to those scraps of freedom we have.
For instance, i sorta want to be a school teacher. In America i am free to celebrate any religion i want in ways that include the ingestion of drugs forbidden to non-members of the religion As in peyote, which is legal for those whose religion uses peyote sacramentally. I can't argue if i'm caught w/ a bag of peyote buttons that i have a religious right to use peyote, because despite the 1st amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" there are many court cases around veganism and other belief systems where 'religion' is defined in a way that one's idiosyncratic belief system does not constitute a religion. I wear certain items of jewelry for what are religious reasons. But a religion according to the courts must have a foundational text and certain level of organization (churches and popes and such).
I have joined a church or religion but the members of said 'institution' usually flinch when you refer to their activity as religious. "This is spirituality". But i tithe a certain amount of time every year to helping out during our major holidays. But if i were a school teacher, or worked for a religious bigot (as a teacher you are certain to have some students whose parents are intolerant of other religions) it wd behoove me to keep my mouth shut about my belief system. Those of you who are pagans and work in public schools know what i mean. I hesitate to call myself a pagan, but there is a certain polytheism in my beliefs, so pagan is as close as you are going to get. My own private religion was revealed to me alone (the original meaning of heretic) and in the course of my life have had experiences that seem like memories of a pre-conceptual worldview. i don't know how writers get their ideas. Some people call the source of their writings a being from Beyond like Ramtha and they say they channeled the information. The experience is for me more like vividly recalling something that didn't happened to kenne any time since 1963 when i was born. Like vividly recalling being a Franciscan msk who had fallen in love w/ the witch whose confession wd. allow Her to go to Heaven. I once read that some of the Franciscans were so devout that they wd stay w/ their 'client' right up to the Burning, and as i read that it even so often happen that the Franciscan friar wd be so close to the fire, hoping for a 'confession' that he wd also die - i cd vividly recall my spirit entwined like smoke w/ the spirit of the witch, and becoming one w/ that person. Frank Herbert writes in the Dune books that the female line of ancestral memories is unendurable for any man but their Kwisatz Haderach [sp?] whose cd look at all the time lines. That may be true, I don't have access to the memories of that witch i imagine that once i loved and died trying to save her soul. If i really am a twin soul, I only remember selective scenes. Or, i just cannot imagine what it is like to be a woman.
I didn't name the church i joined. and if the members of that body were to hear me call their organization a church they wd collectively flinch. But the essence of religion is this (to paraphrase Paul) feed the hungry, comfort the widow, visit prisoners. "By your fruits you shall be known."
The religion whose foundational texts i am most familiar w/ is of course Christianity and to a lesser degree Judaism (the Judaic approach to what Christians call the Old Testament) is different enough from the luke-warm assention to christianity (we went to church when more religious family were visiting - i was baptised as a new-born as is the custom w/ the Methodists. joke: my grandfather was Church of Scotland, my grandmother was Catholic - they chose Methodism as a compromise. hahaha. The Methodist Church didn't seem to have much juice back then. as a child i preferred Catholicism, the ritual appealed to me. and my first glimmerings of any use for my psychick powers came to me at church - i found i could sing along to any song, even tho i had never heard it before and wasn't looking at the lyrics. I can also answer your question based on the first word before the question itself is posed. In my English class i wrote 'reconciliation' in between the columns of qualities personifled by the Sun and the North Star in the characters Leontes and Polixones in the Winter's Tale. when the instructor was framing his question about these contradictory qualities i said "Reconciliation." he said "who said that?" ["me."] he looked at me funny, he had barely started the sentence. "That's right." for the benefit of the class he finished asking the question. This skill or intelligence can be disruptive. I have profound respect for all the previous Cassandras. a fren recently called me a canary and people ignore my distress at their own peril.
every semester i make a vow to keep my mouth shut, and just be a good student. i have learned to wait long enough for someone else to speak up when the instructor asks a question. My educational goals aren't the same as the normal young person going to City College. why shd they have to ask the famous question "Is this going to on the test?" After a kenne digression the teacher found interesting lead the class on a long digression, someone wd say that. i hope to never hear it again. but when i had a social fail at a fren's birthday party he disagreed when i said i had the intention of having conversatations w/ people, and not take hostages. he said, "No. you want to be heard."
Well here, in this obscure corner of the internet, i can ramble and hold you hostage and at any point you can stop reading. in person, getting kenne to be quiet is a skill that very few people have. In hindsight, i see that I like Mike and Lizie and courted them for the room i live in now, because they both have excellent disengagement skills, and i can be told to shut up and not get hurt feelings. most people don't have that skill, or they just don't choose to be kind. most people will allow kenne to take them hostage and escape at the first opportunity, generating resentment and such. When in the course of a lecture on social norms and the crazy vibe i radiate i suggested that people have a share of responsibility when someone like kenne seems to have fallen in love w/ their own voice. I do listen. if i think you are grossly wrong i may choose to walk away from you rather than let myself get upset and argue w/ someone i don't enjoy arguing w/. Otis (otherwise known as Douche) prefaces every response to anything i say w/ a "this is how you are wrong and a fool." The last time i saw Douche i was talking about certain particulars about the experience of being a recipient of Federal and State entitlements. I am on both Medicare and Medical and have the best medical care possible. Certain specialists like psychiatrists pretty much are impossible to get in as a new private practice patient. But my orthopedist is glad to take what the Medi/Medi offers as recompense. Medi/Medi people are a small niche of disabled people who have enough years of a work history to qualify for Medicare, but make the minimum payout, and have no assets so i also still am on MediCal [MediCaid is the generic term for the state run health systems. different states call it different things.] So my conversational gambit is based on my own experience as a member of a denigrated elite - the leisured poor. And Douche starts his denounciation of socialism w/ his usual "yer wrong" and i walked away. he said "Oh, you say your piece and then when it's my turn you walk away." So i returned and said "I won't listen to your lies. When I am talking I sm telling the truth, and when you talk all you do is parrot lies." and walked away for good. Douche's birthday is the same day as my party and Douche is the boyfren of Lizie's best fren, so there is a conflict. If Douche and I ever do talk again, i will tell him i will not tolerate being told i am wrong, or that i don't know what i am talking about. If he is willing to back off from being a Douche and talk to me as a peer. But i will not tolerate being abused.
Am reading a book Hayek On Liberty but i don't have a reasoned response to it yet. this post is my unreasoned response. Douche and the entire built meme of the free market (which Hayek claims to be an evolved entity) rests on the creative efforts of people like Hayek to purge science and philosophy of certain entities which have been found to be full of contradictions. But Hayek is the main apologist/architect of the current worship of 'free market economy' as the only route to liberty.
the founding fathers didn't like the direction that the democratic institutions were going under the Articles of Federation. the people are too emotional too easily swayed by demagogues (see the Federalist Papers by Madison, he was there. and he is remarkably blunt.) The purpose of our Constitution was to dilute the power of direct democracy. The Fathers didn't trust the people. And at the time the right to vote was limited to property holders. They didn't trust their own class. Jefferson is considered to be the liberal hero who saved us from Hamiltonian tyranny. Aaron Burr may have been mentally unstable, but his antagonism to Hamilton started as an argument over the crippling control the banks had over America. go Burr! vendetta and dueling are often seen as 'outlaw' justice, but it is the path chosen by many throughout history. Hamilton was not a native citizen and cd never be President but he at the time of the duel was the most powerfull person in America.
I hope Egypt is not unduly influenced in their path to Democracy by the American system. I think a Parliamentary system is more just, in that minority parties have access to power. I have been a mutterer in the corner (kind like a voice in the wilderness, only more invisible) calling for a new Constitution. let's not rush into it. let's spend a decade talking about what kind of society we want. There are those that claim that no system can be imposed by decree and change the facts of human nature. I think that argument is so wrong - the facts of human nature are the distortions of human nature imposed by the needs of production. we are slaves, and are very angry about it, and cling to those scraps of freedom we have.
For instance, i sorta want to be a school teacher. In America i am free to celebrate any religion i want in ways that include the ingestion of drugs forbidden to non-members of the religion As in peyote, which is legal for those whose religion uses peyote sacramentally. I can't argue if i'm caught w/ a bag of peyote buttons that i have a religious right to use peyote, because despite the 1st amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" there are many court cases around veganism and other belief systems where 'religion' is defined in a way that one's idiosyncratic belief system does not constitute a religion. I wear certain items of jewelry for what are religious reasons. But a religion according to the courts must have a foundational text and certain level of organization (churches and popes and such).
I have joined a church or religion but the members of said 'institution' usually flinch when you refer to their activity as religious. "This is spirituality". But i tithe a certain amount of time every year to helping out during our major holidays. But if i were a school teacher, or worked for a religious bigot (as a teacher you are certain to have some students whose parents are intolerant of other religions) it wd behoove me to keep my mouth shut about my belief system. Those of you who are pagans and work in public schools know what i mean. I hesitate to call myself a pagan, but there is a certain polytheism in my beliefs, so pagan is as close as you are going to get. My own private religion was revealed to me alone (the original meaning of heretic) and in the course of my life have had experiences that seem like memories of a pre-conceptual worldview. i don't know how writers get their ideas. Some people call the source of their writings a being from Beyond like Ramtha and they say they channeled the information. The experience is for me more like vividly recalling something that didn't happened to kenne any time since 1963 when i was born. Like vividly recalling being a Franciscan msk who had fallen in love w/ the witch whose confession wd. allow Her to go to Heaven. I once read that some of the Franciscans were so devout that they wd stay w/ their 'client' right up to the Burning, and as i read that it even so often happen that the Franciscan friar wd be so close to the fire, hoping for a 'confession' that he wd also die - i cd vividly recall my spirit entwined like smoke w/ the spirit of the witch, and becoming one w/ that person. Frank Herbert writes in the Dune books that the female line of ancestral memories is unendurable for any man but their Kwisatz Haderach [sp?] whose cd look at all the time lines. That may be true, I don't have access to the memories of that witch i imagine that once i loved and died trying to save her soul. If i really am a twin soul, I only remember selective scenes. Or, i just cannot imagine what it is like to be a woman.
I didn't name the church i joined. and if the members of that body were to hear me call their organization a church they wd collectively flinch. But the essence of religion is this (to paraphrase Paul) feed the hungry, comfort the widow, visit prisoners. "By your fruits you shall be known."
The religion whose foundational texts i am most familiar w/ is of course Christianity and to a lesser degree Judaism (the Judaic approach to what Christians call the Old Testament) is different enough from the luke-warm assention to christianity (we went to church when more religious family were visiting - i was baptised as a new-born as is the custom w/ the Methodists. joke: my grandfather was Church of Scotland, my grandmother was Catholic - they chose Methodism as a compromise. hahaha. The Methodist Church didn't seem to have much juice back then. as a child i preferred Catholicism, the ritual appealed to me. and my first glimmerings of any use for my psychick powers came to me at church - i found i could sing along to any song, even tho i had never heard it before and wasn't looking at the lyrics. I can also answer your question based on the first word before the question itself is posed. In my English class i wrote 'reconciliation' in between the columns of qualities personifled by the Sun and the North Star in the characters Leontes and Polixones in the Winter's Tale. when the instructor was framing his question about these contradictory qualities i said "Reconciliation." he said "who said that?" ["me."] he looked at me funny, he had barely started the sentence. "That's right." for the benefit of the class he finished asking the question. This skill or intelligence can be disruptive. I have profound respect for all the previous Cassandras. a fren recently called me a canary and people ignore my distress at their own peril.
every semester i make a vow to keep my mouth shut, and just be a good student. i have learned to wait long enough for someone else to speak up when the instructor asks a question. My educational goals aren't the same as the normal young person going to City College. why shd they have to ask the famous question "Is this going to on the test?" After a kenne digression the teacher found interesting lead the class on a long digression, someone wd say that. i hope to never hear it again. but when i had a social fail at a fren's birthday party he disagreed when i said i had the intention of having conversatations w/ people, and not take hostages. he said, "No. you want to be heard."
Well here, in this obscure corner of the internet, i can ramble and hold you hostage and at any point you can stop reading. in person, getting kenne to be quiet is a skill that very few people have. In hindsight, i see that I like Mike and Lizie and courted them for the room i live in now, because they both have excellent disengagement skills, and i can be told to shut up and not get hurt feelings. most people don't have that skill, or they just don't choose to be kind. most people will allow kenne to take them hostage and escape at the first opportunity, generating resentment and such. When in the course of a lecture on social norms and the crazy vibe i radiate i suggested that people have a share of responsibility when someone like kenne seems to have fallen in love w/ their own voice. I do listen. if i think you are grossly wrong i may choose to walk away from you rather than let myself get upset and argue w/ someone i don't enjoy arguing w/. Otis (otherwise known as Douche) prefaces every response to anything i say w/ a "this is how you are wrong and a fool." The last time i saw Douche i was talking about certain particulars about the experience of being a recipient of Federal and State entitlements. I am on both Medicare and Medical and have the best medical care possible. Certain specialists like psychiatrists pretty much are impossible to get in as a new private practice patient. But my orthopedist is glad to take what the Medi/Medi offers as recompense. Medi/Medi people are a small niche of disabled people who have enough years of a work history to qualify for Medicare, but make the minimum payout, and have no assets so i also still am on MediCal [MediCaid is the generic term for the state run health systems. different states call it different things.] So my conversational gambit is based on my own experience as a member of a denigrated elite - the leisured poor. And Douche starts his denounciation of socialism w/ his usual "yer wrong" and i walked away. he said "Oh, you say your piece and then when it's my turn you walk away." So i returned and said "I won't listen to your lies. When I am talking I sm telling the truth, and when you talk all you do is parrot lies." and walked away for good. Douche's birthday is the same day as my party and Douche is the boyfren of Lizie's best fren, so there is a conflict. If Douche and I ever do talk again, i will tell him i will not tolerate being told i am wrong, or that i don't know what i am talking about. If he is willing to back off from being a Douche and talk to me as a peer. But i will not tolerate being abused.
Am reading a book Hayek On Liberty but i don't have a reasoned response to it yet. this post is my unreasoned response. Douche and the entire built meme of the free market (which Hayek claims to be an evolved entity) rests on the creative efforts of people like Hayek to purge science and philosophy of certain entities which have been found to be full of contradictions. But Hayek is the main apologist/architect of the current worship of 'free market economy' as the only route to liberty.
Monday, January 3, 2011
A Reply to those who are the strong ones
If you can't you must, and if you must you can.
Anthony Robbins
when it comes to taking the stairs and an assessment of the state of my arthritis your phrase might add a few years of being able to take the stairs in my gradually decline until i am old enough to be a candidate for knee replacement surgery. in that context i find your quote usefull. it might be, if applied consistently - nay, relentlessly! it might prove to a state achieve-able in my bipolar cycles - a state that when i am in it, might be the fulcrum from which i can move myself in better mental health. but i have a cyclical disease that is poorly understood, and most medicines used to treat were developed for seizures, or are weird little medicines in the category Atypical that have a long list of effects, that if you are the lucky combination of factors they admit they don't understand that you will feel better. the house of cards came down when i started taking a new asthma medicine whose number one warning was 'may cause suicidal ideation' and the may turned into "and that whole list of other psychiatrist symptoms thrown in just for kicks!"
in other words i flinch reading your statement. it feels cruel, and unforgiving towards the damaged and ineffective. it seems to have an inner architecture of isolation and the competitiveness that seems to be a compulsion of the western mind, and widely felt by all - competition in the sense of an word that comes between compassion and cooperation, one kind of behaviour exhibited by living creatures. as a man who had dreamed fantastic dreams as a young man, stripped from me by mental illness and a cruel world's response to that expression of my inner world was incredibly violent. i am permanently damaged. Like in Spinal Tap "if you want to get louder you go to 11." i have long since hit the 10 barrier. we got 10 on the pain scale as a daily experience. later today i return to physical therapy. parallel to the cruel world that commits acts of violence upon my person if i persist in saying crazy things - is a world of healers some of whom have enough craft to allow the natural compassion to manifest in my body as acts of healing. but the healing is slow, and the vulnerable are a constant target.
i appreciate the phrase as it operates as way of encouraging the faltering. it hurts my feelings to imagine the way people might express that sentiment who are not coming from a place of heart felt expressions of Service - "does this help?" is the stance of good hearted people, but the cruel and heartless use similar, more hatefully phrased, like the charming euphemism for firing that alcoholic who was good in a pinch and for god's sake he has a family: trimming the dead wood.
sorry to rant. in fact i wont. i will repost to my page and not polute your page w/ dissent: i feel that you post this because you think it might be inspiring. having had poor health my entire adult life - entirely invisible poor health, asides from the hippy extreme to which i have let the freak flag fly you mostly wd see a robust guy in his late 40s who looks pretty damn good for his age.
Anthony Robbins
when it comes to taking the stairs and an assessment of the state of my arthritis your phrase might add a few years of being able to take the stairs in my gradually decline until i am old enough to be a candidate for knee replacement surgery. in that context i find your quote usefull. it might be, if applied consistently - nay, relentlessly! it might prove to a state achieve-able in my bipolar cycles - a state that when i am in it, might be the fulcrum from which i can move myself in better mental health. but i have a cyclical disease that is poorly understood, and most medicines used to treat were developed for seizures, or are weird little medicines in the category Atypical that have a long list of effects, that if you are the lucky combination of factors they admit they don't understand that you will feel better. the house of cards came down when i started taking a new asthma medicine whose number one warning was 'may cause suicidal ideation' and the may turned into "and that whole list of other psychiatrist symptoms thrown in just for kicks!"
in other words i flinch reading your statement. it feels cruel, and unforgiving towards the damaged and ineffective. it seems to have an inner architecture of isolation and the competitiveness that seems to be a compulsion of the western mind, and widely felt by all - competition in the sense of an word that comes between compassion and cooperation, one kind of behaviour exhibited by living creatures. as a man who had dreamed fantastic dreams as a young man, stripped from me by mental illness and a cruel world's response to that expression of my inner world was incredibly violent. i am permanently damaged. Like in Spinal Tap "if you want to get louder you go to 11." i have long since hit the 10 barrier. we got 10 on the pain scale as a daily experience. later today i return to physical therapy. parallel to the cruel world that commits acts of violence upon my person if i persist in saying crazy things - is a world of healers some of whom have enough craft to allow the natural compassion to manifest in my body as acts of healing. but the healing is slow, and the vulnerable are a constant target.
i appreciate the phrase as it operates as way of encouraging the faltering. it hurts my feelings to imagine the way people might express that sentiment who are not coming from a place of heart felt expressions of Service - "does this help?" is the stance of good hearted people, but the cruel and heartless use similar, more hatefully phrased, like the charming euphemism for firing that alcoholic who was good in a pinch and for god's sake he has a family: trimming the dead wood.
sorry to rant. in fact i wont. i will repost to my page and not polute your page w/ dissent: i feel that you post this because you think it might be inspiring. having had poor health my entire adult life - entirely invisible poor health, asides from the hippy extreme to which i have let the freak flag fly you mostly wd see a robust guy in his late 40s who looks pretty damn good for his age.
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