'Broken bottles broken plates
Broken switches broken gates
Broken dishes broken parts
Streets are filled with broken hearts
Broken words never meant to be spoken
Everything is broken.'
More Dylan ...
I like it a lot, Kenneth. I would fiddle, sharpen, etc, but then it
would be in my voice, not yours!
(Like " I shrug: the no-fee ATM is still out of order,
the woman I fantasize over on Bedford Street
has a girlfriend.")
(And I'd delete the first three lines and get straight into the
narrative part. I'd also delete 'get on with life' - but there I go,
nitpicking.)
Enuff! I do like it. Over the years you've shown us enough to make a
collection. Are you working on a manuscript to publish?
Andrew
On 12 September 2010 20:50, Ken Wolman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I don't think I was on this list when I wrote this. In any case, it seems apropos.
>
> DAYS OF AWE (SEPTEMBER 25, 2001)
>
> The legends of resilience
> that have clung forever to the City
> have something to them after all.
> On Hudson Street, on Christopher and Bleecker,
> the Primary Day poll-watchers sit bored,
> eat pizza, while residents ignore them,
> get on with life, tunnel through private ruins
> to find pockets of air amidst the smolder.
>
> Every day brings new rumors:
> asbestos in the air, anthrax in the water,
> smallpox martyrs afoot in Penn Station.
> They’ll turn Newark into 18th century London.
>
> I shrug, am crestfallen.
> The no-fee ATM is still out of order,
> the woman I fantasize over on Bedford Street
> has a girlfriend. Count my blessings:
> there is still a paycheck.
>
> Two weeks ago the Mayor at last ascended
> his mountain. At the Opera House on Saturday,
> a crowd that used to howl him down now cheered
> this new St. Paul, servant of the times,
> with his Epistle to the New Yorkers,
> his proclamation of The Risen City.
>
> We sat in that same crowd, and
> despite memories of his unbending style,
> tears welled when he spoke of sacrifice and courage.
>
> But Dylan had rung in my head: “Don’t follow leaders,
> watch your parking meters,” so we’d left the car
> in Jersey, took the train up from the Shore.
>
> My longings are not immortal. They are for an end
> to this film noir where the Hero is a swine
> who’s klutzed his way into the truffle patch.
>
> Tragedy is neater, clarified. Opera
> restores the normal through the hypernormal.
> It levels the world again.
>
> Domingo, tormented Moor of Venice, witnesses for us
> the collapse of worlds, locks himself with us
> in a grief beyond our grief, stands for one night
> on the seesaw of the world and helps us tilt back
> what seemed to be forever broken.
>
> (The Days of Awe, or Yamim Noraim, are the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur in the Jewish calendar. They are a time for prayer and repentance.)
>
> --------------
> Ken Wolman http://awfulrowing.wordpress.com/
>
> "All writers are hunters, and parents are the most available prey."
> --Francine du Plessix Gray
>
--
Andrew
http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
'Mother Waits for Father Late' republished available at
http://www.picaropress.com/
http://www.qlrs.com/poem.asp?id=766
http://frankshome.org/AndrewBurke.html
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