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READIN
READIN started out as a place for me
to keep track of what I am reading, and to learn (slowly, slowly)
how to design a web site.
There has been some mission drift
here and there, but in general that's still what it is. Some of
the main things I write about here are
reading books,
listening to (and playing) music, and
watching the movies. Also I write about the
work I do with my hands and with my head; and of course about bringing up Sylvia.
The site is a bit of a work in progress. New features will come on-line now and then; and you will occasionally get error messages in place of the blog, for the forseeable future. Cut me some slack, I'm just doing it for fun! And if you see an error message you think I should know about, please drop me a line. READIN source code is PHP and CSS, and available on request, in case you want to see how it works.
See my reading list for what I'm interested in this year.
READIN has been visited approximately 236,737 times since October, 2007.
Tuesday, November 12th, 2013
by Jeremy Osner
But why not just sit silent a moment
without words.
But why not pay close attention
to the timing of your statements.
But why not count backwards
to onehundred from seventythree
but using letters
not digits.
But why not deem yourself
unworthy
of being taken seriously
and play the fool. Alas, poor Yorick
I knew him, Horatio. A man's
got to know his limitations
Briggs. But why not switch
forever back and forth between the two.
But why not alienate
the very people
whose support you most depend on. Send them
back to me, I'll try to make you whole.
But why not tell me then
you can't have forgotten already again
come on. But why not
listen
just a minute
to the street now as we walk
its shifting melodies and humming
swarms of insects in the grass
and on the trees.
But why not try to relate
this ambient cloud of noise
creative destruction
of silence
to the ideas you've been trying
to get across, so why not listen
to the moral core
of the cicadas' ceaseless roar.
But why not listen to the cicadas' roar
and the thin shrill whine
of creeping hearing loss
beyond language in mazes
and repetition.
But why not tangle yourself delighted
in these strictures and obstructions
and obligations
make concrete these abstractions
forge an idiom
one you alone will ever
understand. But why not admit
you just don't know
or at last
give a damn.
A pull-quote for Analogies for Time -- from Meredith Sue Willis' wonderful review: --
A small digital book of excellent poems... A wonderful meditation on time and how we swim and float in it: "Think of time as a river of events/think of time simply as a river...." and of course as the analogy gets increasingly concrete, things fall apart and reform. It ends with a celebration of being in the moment.
I must say I am impressed and humbled and heartened! by the number of people that seem to "get where I'm coming from" with this poetry. Thanks.
posted evening of November second, 2013: 4 responses
This gap between myself and me
What is it then?
This existential synapse of identity-
What can I do
To bridge it or to broaden it, uncaring?
To deepen my sense of dissociation from self
Estrangement, alienation, dislocation, discomfort, disquiet-
Like a varicolored skein i unravel.
