Buster Keaton's "The General"

Watched a Buster Keaton film for the first time last night, and thoroughly enjoyed his style of physical comedy. The General was a Civil War comedy in which Keaton's Confederate character single-handedly, with his beloved locomotive, won the war against the Union army. The gags were ingenious, poetic in their repetition, variation and pacing. The famous deadpan face was surprisingly capable of expressing an enormous range of emotion. Every scene and gesture was precisely calculated; and the calculation rendered speech superfluous. Now I understand what LW meant when she compared Beckett's Fragments to Buster Keaton.

A Spring Diary

Morning Glory, Sopheap Pich, 2011

April 21, had lunch with David Curzon. Before lunch, he showed me his Asian art collection in his UWS apartment. Japanese paintings, Chinese bronzes and ceramics, and Indian sculptures. He gave me his book of 100 midrashim The View from Jacob's Ladder. The commentary on Biblical texts is creative and witty; it often applies another text, literary or religious, to interpret the Bible. The titular commentary is a tour-de-force. It thinks about Jacob's ladder in terms of emotional states, existence, mercy, effects, assent, the heart, success, love, clean hands, sojourn, connection, a difficult equilibrium, invitation, and, finally, enchantment. The writing records the return of a secular Jew to the tradition of his forefathers. His family escaped from the Holocaust to Australia. He found his way as an adult to New York, a Jewish city, as he called it.

April 27, watched Becket's Fragments with GH at the Baryshnikov Arts Center. Directed by Peter Brook and Marie-Hélène Estienne, the five very short plays were Rough for Theater 1, Rockaby, Act Without Words II, Neither, and Come and Go. The consummate actor-clowns Jos Houben, Kathryn Hunter and Marcello Magni gave the audience an hour of sheer magic. Beckett was never so funny and so dark to me,

May 4 - 6, RB stayed with us. We had lunch at Barney Greengrass, a first for me, saw the rattan sculptures of Cambodian artist Sopheap Pich at the Met, and then went for my reading at Two Moon Cafe. She met WL at the reading. The next day, she joined LW and VM to see Beckett's Fragments, before going with me to the Public Theater to see Richard Foreman's new expressionistic drama Old-Fashioned Prostitutes. The play was full of repeated gestures and sounds; the voice-over deepened the mystery. On Monday, after school, we had a lovely picnic in Central Park, before she left for her conference at Rutgers. 

May 11, heard a student's senior recital at Julliard. She played Barber's Sonata for Cello and Piano, which I liked a great deal, Cassado's Suite for Solo Cello, Massenet's Meditation from Thaïs, and Piazolla's Le Grand Tango.

Michel Houellebecq's "The Art of Struggle"

I vaguely heard of Michel Houellebecq before stumbling on his book of poems in the Labyrinth Bookshop. I did not know that he wrote poems, as well as novels. The Art of Struggle, translated by Delphine Grass and Timothy Mathews, is captivating from the first verse of the first poem:

Dawn rises, grows, settles on the city
We've come through the night and not been set free
I hear the buses and the quiet hum
Of social exchange. I'm overcome with presence.

This is an aubade, but not an aubade that I've ever heard before. The lyrical second line is sandwiched by two plain-speaking lines. The faddish term "social exchange" shares the same line as the philosophical concept of "presence."How can one be overcome with "presence," usually considered a good thing, as opposed to "absence"? The speaker has been defeated even before the day begins. The poem beginning "What we need now is an attitude of non-resistance to the world" gave me the epigraph for a new sequence of poems, "A Position of Defeat."

Like lizards we bask in the light of phenomena,
Waiting for the night;
But we will not fight,
We must not fight,
We stay for ever in a position of defeat.

In its resolute defeatism, the poetry is revolutionary. It not only indicts Western societies of the evils of capitalism and consumerism, but it also rejects the progressive optimism and piecemeal reform of liberalism. To accept the latter is to misunderstand how deep and wide the rot has set in.

An eternity package, all included,
Personalized local discoveries,
Bodies for sale in the clubs,
But no sex guaranteed for the night.

In his relentless focus on urban decay and modern ennui, Houellebecq recalls his poetic predecessor Baudelaire. He is more pessimistic than Baudelaire, however. Desire, lesbian or otherwise, no longer saves; it is dying itself, if not dead. The adventure of walking through the sleaze of Paris he has converted into the daily trudge to La Tour Gan, the nondescript office tower in La Defense, a better symbol for present-day Paris than the Eiffel Tower.

The compact quatrains of most of the poems are varied with the occasional prose poem or poem with long, languorous lines. Houellebecq has a gift for writing manifestoes. His poetry is not afraid of ideas. And one of the biggest is that there is no transcendence in life.

Celebrating Sound

Debbie Chou set my poem "A Position of Defeat 24" to music and sang it at the "Celebrating Sound" event last night. It was a moving and humbling experience, hearing my rhyming quatrains dissolve and then rejoin into a highly coherent, intensely dramatic, composition. I felt as if she and I truly met last night through Matthew Edison Bremer, in whose memory the poem was written. 

Her singing at the piano was a beautiful climax to an evening of poetry and music, which she put together. Jason Irwin, Jennifer Harmon and I read. Two Moon Cafe, where it all took place, also showcased the striking nude photographs of Debbie's husband, James M. Graham.

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 30"

30. A Manifesto for Defeatism

in honor of Matthew Edison Bremer, aka “Sean,” who had everything and took his life

we cannot climb up to the sun

we cannot sink deep in the earth

coming from plenty or from dearth

we cannot change one thing thats done

we cannot separate love from lust

we cannot be but drawn to power

cantering through the hoops of hours

we cannot stop us from being us

we buy the world and we are bought

we sell the lot and we are sold

everything has its price in gold

every thought that will be thought

the west indies poet last night

invoked dante and arnaut daniel

the servers three handsome devils

tipped to the salon full of whites

so tall and beautiful was one

i lost all interest in the voice

going on about chiasmus

and longed to fuck him in the kitchen

he was far too professional

to mix together work and fun

the poet going on about puns

had no qualms about being on call

the good we do produces evil

the evil good despite intent

the web delivers discontent

to the licentious and the lethal

against the will to kill oneself

the agencies have no defence

we cannot stop lifes offence

life cannot comprehend death

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 29"

29.

the sun rises and the sun sets one day

the light unclenching its hold on the air

its noticeably colder everywhere

from the east to the west of the usa

a boy is sucking greedily ice pop

his mother checking her phone for updates

a tall black man whizzes by on his skates

a bench where two old faggots had to stop

the reservoir looks as if its on fire

the ducks swim calmly through the burning field

the envelope of day has been unsealed

picture the long decline of empire

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 28"

28.

the sun parading on its blue runway

has changed its chaos into floral chic

up to the minute as soho boutiques

it has passed up bouquets as passe

less is more as the clean shaved well heeled know

flocking to a petite clothes closet

they cinch their beef fed waists in a corset

woman and men and mannequins on show

if you imagine you can fight the trend

consider the spring show now at the met

punk style with its saliva blood and sweat

is catalogued by wintour as high end

no uniform becomes the uniform

in poetry as in pashmina shawls

from glitzy runways to the market stalls

the naked screams do nothing but conform

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 27"

27.

a wedge of the suns landing gear

is lodged between my rotting teeth

the toothpick rescues bits of wreath

charred fat and torn masculature

flossing day and night does not help

the gum burying the bone bleeds

but the whole body has to feed

on prime estate and chinese kelp

mouth striated with lost remains

i orate with a nasty kink

to the blind glass above the sink

breath smelling of dead people’s brains

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 26"

26.

the sun a bit of deep programming code

swivels its suspect electronic eye

logging on at hotspots to its wifi

i give away my bearings on the road

wired to love what’s good, i love

to stir my stick in a man’s shithole

and submit to the sun’s social control

though wired to fear what i know not of

a reproductive program gone rogue

at school i am still gainfully employed

to vaccinate the young by being paranoid

of what is in vain and what is in vogue

Poem: "I wrote a poem yesterday"

Wrote an additional poem today, for Spanish class. My limited vocabulary became a useful constraint.

I wrote a poem yesterday.

It was a sad poem, very sad.

I wanted to tear it up

but it was on the computer.

I wrote a poem day before yesterday.

That one was sad too.

In the poem I went to the river

but the river had no water in it.

I wrote seven poems last week.

They were all sad, very sad.

They followed me to the river

and followed me back home.

I wrote a poem in 1992

that was a happy poem.

I tried to remember it last night

but it has gone down the river.

Yo escribí un poema ayer.

Fue un poema triste, mui triste.

Lo quise romper

pero fue en la computadora.

Yo escribí un poema anteayer.

Este uno fue triste tambien.

En el poema fui al rio

pero el rio no tuvo agua en él.

Yo escribí siete poemas la semana pasada.

Ellos fueron todos tristes, mui tristes.

Me siguieron al rio

y me siguieron a mi casa

Yo escribí un poema en 1992

que fue un poema feliz.

Lo traje recordar anoche

pero él ha ido abajo del rio. 

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 25"

25.

the sun will not stay long enough to broker

ceasefire in terrific zones of death

the day is shot through with decaying breath

the coffee cold the croissant mediocre

i will catch some infection or another

from the untreated slash in someones head

a youtube video of an oyster bed

round razors laved to a gleam by fresh water

a vimeo of a knitted boyfriend strikes

at lonelyhearts and artist wannabes

imagination falls to fantasies

and action is reduced to hitting like

i have set up a facebook author page

invited my five thousand facebook friends

link to it like share follow recommend

or hit my virtual target with your rage

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 24"

i.m. Matthew Edison Bremer

24.

the sun was high the morning he bottomed

by a pool tastefully appointed with books

the all-american with esquire good looks

so young he could have just come from the prom

high too when he was tag-teamed by two men

their cocks stuffing his hungry mouth and ass

highest when fucking the big-boob stewardess

he brought ken to his knees sucking his glans

overdosed on prescription medicine

provided, some say, by a kindly client

in life he went by matt on screen by sean

no matter now the worms have him in turn

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 23"

23.

out of the datsun whizzing through the sky

shoots a wad from a politico

into the oval office fellatio

delivers with last names like lewinsky

the obvious phallus of a congressman

stretching his gray cotton boxer briefs

is sent to followers via a tweet

the media say we get off on attention

there will be less and less for everyone

as our free-for-all intensifies

power and sex and power and sex

will divvy up the vision of the sun

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 22"

22.

crushing the burntout sun under my heel

i stomp both feet to get the blood flowing

the trees are stuck between dying and growing

the water is too weak against the wheel

the women on the exercise machines

are back after a guilty hiatus

the men are flexing their deltoideus

pumped up by growth-enhancement vitamins

they chase an image of their sunny youth

receding further even as they strive

they age at twenty-four or twenty-five

the trees are pushing north while heading south

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 21"

from The New York Times

21.

theres nothing new under the sun

the present is a product of the past

and will surrender at long last

to a future bristling with guns

a boy skateboarding toward me

as i am running in the park

we raise our spirits to the mark

of the dark eyes of enmity

at the last moment the cunt swerves

just missing my battering ram

a voice inside exults i am

the man because i hold my nerve

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 20"

20.

hurtling around the sun itself spinning

at dizzying speeds in differential circles

a wave of subatomic particles

dies on the bat in the day’s last inning

that fine metallic ping in the spring air

draws in its wake a low approving roar

and then a vast communal silence soars

through the sound barrier bursting into cheers

around the field the music of the spheres

echoes in one wild dionysian pitch

until the noise reduces to a twitch

i hold my head blood dripping from my ears

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 19"

19.

the sun shines everywhere but here it calls

forth from the road a restless perky rage

all the old world has crossed a players’ stage

the new is squatting from an urban sprawl

so big a country but only one story

and it is not about the wounded knee

the crippled canters for the blind to see

and death as they say is a kind of journey

form does not exist in the incomplete

meaning does not stay in the ongoing

the poem of the open road singing

can’t understand positions of defeat

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 18"

18.

sunday like any other day of the week

begins the work of filling up the time

the hours integral empty sublime

present so many unravished physiques

a white boy fifteen or sixteen of age

honey for hair runs past in tennis shorts

i unzip my jeans and take out my cock

behind the new york times and turn a page

minutes later his older brother shows

bulging a navy blue college sweatshirt

his rowboat legs pumping along the dirt

my dick hardens unbearably below

he comes again this time pushing a stroller

in front of him as he runs after his youth

thicker in the waist longer in the tooth

and jogging back and forth as if bipolar

the final figures are predictable

the crumpled suit the shaky gouty walk

i close my eyes and whack my wilting cock

the spirit willing but the flesh unable

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 17"

17.

flying across the cut and pasted sun

a chiseled father saves his tumbling boy

emerging from the shadow gates of troy

a woman runs toward agamemnon

no one no movement in this corridor

constructed by an old drawing program

above the photograph four videocams

watch the airless space inside the maw

i cannot tear my eyes away for dread

a grin has opened in the continuum

a tree beckons with multiplying arms

this beady blackbird with a bluish head

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 16"

16.

the system of the sun the net

is streaming videos of the blast

no one escapes from the broadcast

of mayhem and the terror threat

someone sincere a hacktivist

has broken in and gained access

the rootkit set in our recess

he works with other idealists

they want to combat code with code

they always get what they phish for

very soon all that we wish for

we get too when we press download

Poem: "A Position of Defeat 15"

15.

the sun once shone so gently from my limbs

this snap of me on college lawn doth show

and he fawn-like yet milky as a doe

drew every ray of light from me to him

i was a god and he my first creation

but matters were as though the other way

a deer called forth the dawn out of the day

a god could kiss a tail in adoration

the wonder is imprisoned in the snap

the roebucks on this island crawl with ticks

the sun appears like a cardsharper’s trick

or burnished as the past a burning trap