inspired to post, in part, by Frederick's poems today
End-of-the-World Poem
And unless the seed falls and dies, and unless the seed
falls and dies, and unless the seeds falls and die…John 12:24
As brave as a deciduous tree in winter,
with only its trembling to give, I live.
Leaves, ordinary,thin, brown, die;
dying, enrich the earth; I?
Not I. Today is my atheism.
For the cruciform tree, a resurrection,
seasons, promise, a rebirth. Beauty, in perpetuo return.
There are no coincidences, there is a plan,
the hope of seedlings, again, again, again…
Not for me. For me, the responsibilities
of chaos. For me, the uncertainties of matter,
the randomness, the ecodisasters,
the blasted, dying trees, the impartialities
of space,
of place.
(They now find patterns
in nonlinear matter,
clinging to fractals,
still hoping to escape
random, null space
and soon
eroding
place.)
Even Heisenberg was certain
that electrons would not die, become,
if need be , force: the Einsteinian assurance.
But dying is no big deal: Only cockroaches live forever.
And matter, as we know it, must disappear.
Abandon fear. The ultimate change,
called end,is already embossed on your genes.
And determined to live at all cost,
what freedom, what real,
if evanescent, truth
is lost?
In a message dated 4/1/2009 1:35:45 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:
No Deposit, No Return
Someone has mocked reincarnation,
which that culture takes very seriously;
the idea of recompense, in some form, at some time,
is like a better Lottery.
So a mob, with the warmth and closeness
of mobs, chases him through the city.
But this occurs in colonial times,
and the stranger takes refuge
at regimental headquarters.
“You’ve caused a spot of bother,”
says the colonel, who had expected
a grim, aging missionary
of his own monotheism
with its unrepeated soul.
But this is a lad, a smiling scapegrace
who says, insincerely, “I’m sorry, sir.”
“I presume you told them about Grace,
Salvation, and the Moral Law,”
intones the colonel.
“How everything is rewarded in the next life
and balances in this.”
“Actually no,” says the youth.
“I don’t think one has the right
to speak for the dead or suffering,
to excuse their pain.” “Then,” says the colonel
briskly, “I suppose you said
there are only atoms; that death is a sleep
like the one that preceded us.”
“I’m afraid not. Given endless
time and recombination, that
conclusion too seems unwarranted.”
“Well then, my God, man, what did you say
to upset them so?” cries the colonel.
“I agreed with them, sir. With a cavil:
something essentially ourselves
is born again and again
in other parts of the universe, and in other
universes. And in none of them
do we look like this,
or breathe this air, or feel anything
that we feel, or share
any of these concerns.”
Been There Done That
That bird flying northwest isn’t
one of the geese who, returning,
used to live at the reservoir
and delight people when,
past the fence, lines of goslings
followed their mothers, or upset people
when goslings strayed
under the fence, or disgust people
with their poop. Either they wanted
a change, or the new radar
and missiles beyond the reservoir
bothered them. Now they stay
along the canal or Potomac,
where herons pose on one leg
and turtles on logs for as long,
apparently, as it took them
to evolve, or until the Greenland
ice sheet slips off
and drowns them. That bird
is a heron, elegant and silent,
its head and neck the shape of the failed Concorde.
In fall I gain IQ points.
In spring I lose them, but used to regain
and now at least remember
as much of the body
as I used. And partial, sketchy
images, not of the past
but what things in the past
represented. It’s a distinction
I must insist on. Otherwise
I risk accepting
spring, and that spring isn’t mine,
and death, the soft focus
and general second-rateness
of things. Rather the way Lenin
said he couldn’t listen
(couldn’t “afford,” actually, to listen)
to Beethoven, for it made him want
to say nice things to people,
make them smile, pat their shoulders
with awkward, accommodating gestures.
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