Innocence Blog

April 2009 – Normal, IL

All is incomplete
Can you handle
being
a work in progress
Can you handle
incomplete
unfinished symphonies
novels
portraits

The moments of perfection
of completion
like finished work
that you set your gaze upon

When I stop to think about
the shuffle and
that John Lennon song
pops into my head
the one about the wheels
it occurs to me that all we have
and all we’ll ever have
is unfinished work

I guess the realization comes
when you realize you’re not headed
to some moment of perfect
but just another
moment of unfinished
incomplete work

It was a dream I had
before I went to bed
I said ‘Dad-
both of us were in the car
on a strip of the highway
Both of us stared into the
light on the road ahead

What – my dad answered
Is it always like this -
I mean do you ever get
to the end of the road

That’s when the desert appeared
in and out of the shadows-
and cacti made faces

Your work is never done
and the road never ends he said-
Then are we lost I wanted to know-
No, we’re not lost, we’re just driving

Poems to my mother

We had fun didn’t we – on earth
We laughed, our laughing
released us from the pain
of circumstance.

We couldn’t adequately explain
or escape but like now
there are these nether worlds
right above or beyond – the
colliding particles of everyone else.

What I’m saying is that there’s
always a space to build a
sanctuary -

No space is too small -
your laughter filled those rooms
my laughter was the sky blue lining of yours -
enspiraled in one another.

hard to explain things now -
there has obviously been
a change

me here

you there

or here
i’m not able to give
the right word for every
designation

but i know this world is where
i’d rather be

opposed to the world on the other
side of this thin wall of
air? clouds? membrance of
something -

there are default worlds -
default worlds of pain – of
hunger – of void -

And i’d rather be in this
bright world of you -
of miracles dancing

I belong here. don’t i mother
with you. or not?

Are we really in two separate places?

i laugh when i think of all people i project my feelings onto -

when it’s so much better -
to relieve these minor deities

And talk to the source -

talk to the source – All these
bright stars – these individuals
web of stars – i’d talk to them
all – i’d memorize each one
of their stories – but

the door – the big door

is open. why make cold calls

to darkness – when angels

welcome you into light -

go ahead, fall back if you have to
Christopher

it’s only natural – gravity pulls
you down – everyone has to
deal with that -

Then go – let yourself go – Rise
like nothing – like everything
without weight -

this life it fades out -

watch with me
watch

i disappear

forever.

Without giving away too much about the circumstances in my life, I feel I am going through an exceptionally dark period.

Such black, black days
In so green a season!

And sorely
My heart is shaken at the thought
Of how everything in the world goes by
And leaves so little trace behind.

The work-day comes on, and time takes away
All we are and do.

And random suffering cancels all
Such raw, unripened knowledge.

Both of us, she said, were born to suffer:
Our lives lacked joy, and the heavens took
Pleasure in our pain.

For I’ve seen enough of wretched cities
Where hatred dogs unhappiness, and where
I live in misery and will, soon enough,
In misery die.

Even you,
Scorning calamities and crosses, smile
Only on those who lead happy lives.
In heaven, on earth, the lost ones
Can find neither friend nor refuge
Except in their own cold steel.

It was
That sweet unrepeatable season
When the sad stage of this world seems
To young eyes a paradise of smiles:
In its very first virgin flush of hope
A boy’s heart gallops with desire
As he, hapless poor creature that he is,
Plunges into the business of living
As if it were only a game or a dance.

Now
It is stormy weather I love plunging into
Along the crags and through deep valleys,
Seeing terror-stricken flocks in scattered flight,
Or hearing wave after wave go rushing over
Crumbled banks: the swollen torrent’s headlong roar.

But ah,
The gods and grim-lipped fate have given
Poor Sappho no part of this infinite beauty.
A tiresome wretched guest in this
Grand, indifferent domain.

What sin
Did I commit as a child—when one can know
No wrong at all—that my iron-dark thread of life,
Lacking all the summer colors of youth,
Lay twisted on fate’s implacable spindle? Reckless
Words fly from your mouth: A hidden purpose
Fashions whatever has to happen. Everything is hidden
Except our pain. We come, a forsaken race,
Crying into the world, and the gods
Keep their own counsel.

From his miser’s store
Of sweet blessings, God gave me nothing
Once my dream of youth and its illusions
Withered.

This issue of Escape into Life expresses every reason why I began the journal in the first place. Lara Cory's article, "The Etsy Phenomenon," challenges us to see the effects of a democratic web on art. The article provoked a lot of conversations, and I invite you to read the string of comments.

Tino Sehgal's live sculptures at the Guggenheim challenge our notions of "object-based" art. Sehgal's actors respond to museum-goers, and remain in the exhibit the entire time the museum is open. What is even more far-fetched is that the artist sells these works. Writer and artist Fraser MacIver, with editorial work done by Tony Thomas, covers Sehgal in our latest issue of Escape into Life.

What is Escape into Life?

EIL is a publication based on the concept of citizen journalism. The goal is to create a journal of poetry, essays, and art from writers who are already publishing on the Web and who would like to gain more exposure to their blogs. The artists we feature are the very best we can find, and the writers have a background in writing and a passion for the arts.

More information here

A couple months ago we did an article on the poster art movement, and in this issue our newest writer Lara Cory talks about the extraordinary artistic talent appearing in rock posters of the last decade. She also gives a brief history of the rock poster, suggesting that sex, death, and animals dominate the genre's favorite imagery.

I go down into the cool basement where

I go down into the cool basement where
the open foundation peers out of the walls
upstairs she's sleeping, beautiful and
uncomplicated, in a dream I'll never know
my cats want to know what happened
what can I say to them?
I'm sorry, I went back to smoking . . .
don't come down here, I want to be alone
my work is fulfilling but
there is something the size of a needle
it rents a hole inside my brain, a tunnel of worry
air escapes and makes things cold
I used to have that control
things to keep me busy, a goal, some bright idea
countless directions and possibilities
the reason why I came down here tonight
I had a meaning,
a strong sense of knowing
but now I just shiver from the dropping temperatures
and wait for the old spirit of wonder to make me feel better
the basement is a blunt place
to awaken the soul
so what was it I came down here for?
the future has no home,
it looms like a pendulum, moving
from desire to desire, and back to
love, time-honored
my teeth sink deeper into a bed of gums
I'm growing old, and in my house
like guests, they come and go
they smile, nod, give encouragement
I return to this
rhythm of exhaustion.


the memory of disappointment

the memory of disappointment
looms over every lover's head,
the pain of longing is

protracted
extending into future lives,
the world turns

in a continuous way

nothing is permanent
and that makes me dream
again


the people we dream about are

the people we dream about are
enigmas
and they have overwhelming powers
with their words, with their ideas

how could a few words
produce
a bright little dragon of hope?

still the experience is inchoate
not finished yet,
it conceals the final result

this state is more like a dream
than a perpetual longing--
the hope which

alters your reality
will most likely
fly away on butterfly wings

and yet I live for the chances,
how encouraging
when she wakes me out of bed
and dips me into a bath of possibility

not impotent fantasy
but real hope--
the kind that promises

an ultimate end.


surprises--what are surprises?

surprises--what are surprises?
looking back they lose their glow

wishes may be granted
if my wishes are granted
then I will breathe easily

dreams, fantasies, terrors
the cat meowing at the shut door
purposeless I drift in my cocoon
of wonder

my story is so old, so repetitive by now
not even you would like to hear it

my humdrum life, the wheel
of it turning--with only
vivid fantasies to keep me alive

I ache with wonder at
the slow action of my self
growth and maturity are
not quick enough for me

I need a dream to hang on
I need an opium pipe to suck in
clouds of happiness

there is nothing,
not even anger anymore
just the longing

a lake of separation between us.


I don't know if I can ever satisfy my longings

I don't know if I can ever satisfy my longings
with any person or thing,
my outward gaze
sees a paradise of fleeting figures
some lost, others connected by
a rift--

I invite this shapeshifting desire
into my life,
I call it forward, only to turn it down
and my adventures
I'd never give them up, I live
for change, transformation, renewal
but how dark it is to exist in a

pool of longing and astonishment.


Altheabashar is my poetry blog. You can follow the feed here.

This last week I've been researching the next novel for "25 Profound Works of Literary Genius" . . . so expect that soon.

We have another fantastic issue of Escape into Life for your entertainment and enlightenment this weekend. You'll find two excellent art essays, a poetry and illustration double feature, and a musical blend.

Slowly the west reaches for clothes of new colors
which it passes to a row of ancient trees.
You look, and soon these two worlds both leave you
one part climbs toward heaven, one sinks to earth.

leaving you, not really belonging to either,
not so hopelessly dark as that house that is silent,
not so unswervingly given to the eternal as that thing
that turns to a star each night and climbs-

leaving you (it is impossible to untangle the threads)
your own life, timid and standing high and growing,
so that, sometimes blocked in, sometimes reaching out,
one moment your life is a stone in you, and the next, a star.

We read more poems together and talked about them. I wasn't nervous anymore and I didn't have to accept or reject her interpretations of the poems. There weren't two versions of the poems, hers and mine; there was only one. What neither of us could understand, we just left it at that.

Music Heard

Music heard with you

was more than music

and the blood that flowed through our arteries

was more than blood

and the joy we felt

was genuine

and if there is anyone to thank,

I thank him now,

before it grows too late

and too quiet.

You might also like this post: Shakespeare's Sonnet 29.