oh...just me: July 2007 Archives

"Spiritual gateway to the soul." The Intuitive Acupuncturist volunteered the info as the name for the two "in-and-outs" she did on my back, one on either side of my heart.

I told her I was labile (which I always think of as the opposite of volatile) and disoganized. "You're changing," she said. "Sometimes we don't recognize ourselves."

We got onto the topic of our first meeting, and how that led to my so symbolically transparent (!) tattoo.

She gave me a series of "in-and-outs" - to two fingers on my left hand! Ouch! - explaining "the short, quick ones pack a lot of punch!" We were trying to stabilize me around the ambition/love intertwinement-thang I've got going on. "For whatever reason," I told her, "I've got a lot ambition. I have to channel it along the paths that are available." "Don't you mean you have a lot of love?" she asked. I paused before replying, "I think they are the same thing." She sat for a minute before speaking softly, "Of course."

My introduction to Rainer Maria Rilke was through a quote from a calendar years (decades!) ago.

I picked up In Praise of Mortality at the campus bookstore a week or two ago. Over the past two days, since attending a funeral service, I've read the introduction by the two translators. They quote from some of his letters, which I find as interesting and inspiring as his poetry.

Rilke writes (to his ex-wife), during the First World War (when he was unable to write poetry for over a decade), of the "inner will for the great changes that would be needed to save the world" (2005:2-3), and of the need to "submit to [his "indescribable"] suffering [rather] than make any concession in the essential" (3).

The translators, Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy, discuss their labor of translating his Duino Elegies and Sonnets to Orpheus as "work [that] soon took us where we needed to go, offering ways to dignify our pain for the world and deepen our capacity for gratitude" (5-6). Is it a social metonymy that Rilke's work spoke to them? "Like Rilke during the First World War, we at the beginning of the twenty-first century have felt refuted and weighted with dread as our nation mounts preemptive war and arms itself for domination of the world" (3).

“Rilke invites us to experience what mortality makes possible” (22) by “liv[ing] death at the heart of each moment” (21).

Not a criticism (as if we never vibrate at the pulse of life), rather – Rilke refers to embracing “the onceness of our lives [which] calls us to be more fully present” (19). Practicing such intensive presence can heighten “intuitive awareness of our oneness with nature and the ecological roots of consciousness” (14), preparing us for “a reciprocal transformation. To a real extent, we become each other. It is a sort of resurrection, in which our intrinsic belonging to each other is conscious and complete” (14).

“In the First Elegy, Rilke suggests that our very capacity to let go of attachments has an effect upon the world, allowing more spaciousness for other creatures to enjoy (13-14):

Three parts of the services for a colleague’s husband affected me the most: the sixties protest music before and after the actual ceremony, the spontaneous testimonials, and the missing poem. The description of the poem intrigued me, both for its theme of family resemblance and the imagery invoked about the hand as tool. This sensibility came back to me as I read these lines (II, 25) from Rilke’s first famous work, The Book of Hours:

It seemed to me that the missing poem is evidence of the “courage born of the … acceptance of mortality” (23), which does not shy away from “naming what is doomed to disappear” (23).

Listening to the testimonials, I was reminded of Sam. Combining that with the work of one’s own hands – literally and figuratively: the evidence of one’s use to others, to the Earth, to life. I was also reminded of Alec. And the music. Of all choices! How like “Orpheus, the singing god, who confronted and redeemed the realm of death” (20) through “his refusal to allow it to destroy the basic intention of his life” (8):

by email. Posting delayed.

I met his widow, Tumbleweed, in Belgium two years ago. The man's art still speaks. Loudly. Strong.

He has a large piece called "The Interpreter" that I hope to have as the cover of a book (someday). :-)

I remember wishing I had my tape recorder on while Tumbleweed toured me through the hobbit house, explaining the backstory of all the paintings there.

There are a few limited edition books of some of his work; I hope more will become available. He deserves much wider viewing and recognition. Inspiring, poignant, real. I wish I'd met him in person.

I saw Brazil last week.

Despite the ambience - a university classroom, bottles of beer, friends, the bootleg copy marred by occasional stops and that annoying cursor arrow in the middle of the screen . . . it sucked me in. Damn depressing.

Why? Because my dreams have sustained me for three years. You think I'm kidding? Not! My dreams consistently track a reconciliation process with a certain (no longer quiet so) short person that little evidence in real life supports. Brazil rips the potential belief factor of one's dreams ("phantoms in the brain"?) to the charade they most probably are. Granted, my dreams contain none of the fantastic images that pepper Sam Lowery's hallucinations - which also seem to occur during wake as well as sleep. Mine are quite mundane. A conversation, a look, a hug. the frequency and duration of mine vary, months sometimes pass with nothing, then I may have several in a row. Perhaps (probably) these dreams are simply indicative of my own emotional process, hopes and griefs re-ignited by current events.

Meanwhile, a few days ago I watched the youtube video of Paul Potts. One of the professors in my Department sent it around with these comments: "It centers on a humble fellow from Wales named Paul Potts. He recently appeared as a contestant on "Britain's Got Talent" and, well, I won't say what happened -- watch for yourself. Be sure to check out the judges' changing reactions while he sings. If you find him inspiring (as I did), you'll find lots of follow-up videos on YouTube."

Now - there's a person who has nurtured a talent for years . . .

Funny, yesterday I had a conversation about my "secret identity", the one I use on my business cards to play on my own delusions of grandeur and desire to be a superhero (click through to see "the best belated (by two years!) birthday present imaginable. The teasing continued yesterday, "What's your super/secret power?" The question was quickly retracted, "I don't want to know!" (If you're curious, these quotations approach what I think it might be, or - at least - that for which I strive.)

Increasingly, I've been watching my brain slide toward . . . insanity? Is that what it is? Such deep convictions, so far removed from what most people seem to believe, or - at least - how most people chose to act. Can we really make a difference? Is change truly possible? How can I believe, so passionately, in "YES!"? It must be the razor-thin edge between real life and fantasy, don't you think?

I mean, let's be real. Here we are, caught up in a dialectic world. Never mind that Hegel's original conception was a method of intellectual interrogation (not a neutral description of "how things are"). Discourses (nasty things) sweep us up such that nothing we say (or write) is unique, merely representative of thousands (if not millions) of similarly, supposedly-independently-conceived notions of sheer brilliance.

Is structure bigger than any/all of us? Quantum physics suggests possibly not, but hell, that shit is dealing with things either too big or too small to matter at the human scale (except, possibly, in consciousness, but who wants to go there?).

Ok, I admit, the movie (Brazil) freaked me out. And I'm seriously just beginning to write my prospectus. How the heck am I going to link the macro with the micro? Has anyone ever defined the meso-social? (Apparently not. A Google search shows the term used as if everyone knows what it means, but really all anyone is sure of is that it is somewhere in-between the microsocial and macrosocial. Does it matter from which direction one begins? From "the top" or from "the bottom"? Is it so obvious that "macro" is the top, and "micro" the bottom?) How does one aim to occupy a liminal space whose position and location can never be exactly fixed?

Frustrated? Who, me? Whatever gave you that idea? Only temporarily stymied.

I hope! Lest all my dreams, waking and non, dematerialize without a trace. :-/