tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.comments2023-09-04T04:39:57.325-07:00SoJourn(al): Private Dreams to Public ArtRusty Kjarvikhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03071547323352880050noreply@blogger.comBlogger112125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-59533660888734705722013-01-18T13:27:44.615-08:002013-01-18T13:27:44.615-08:00Magnifique!!
"The desert is an iconic symbol...Magnifique!!<br /><br />"The desert is an iconic symbol for the immense solitude that opens before a life lived for oneself" is a fabulous summation but then you pay it off by showing how we all go into the ascension alone, and find on the other end, the more awake ones, that everyone else is staring as if they are already dead...and there is nothing one can do...'cept walk that desert...just for you.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-70752453797351627072012-12-16T20:50:02.024-08:002012-12-16T20:50:02.024-08:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-90177845104033090652012-11-29T03:38:18.089-08:002012-11-29T03:38:18.089-08:00As always, Bill, your critical focus on the presen...As always, Bill, your critical focus on the present, and your ability to gather in the poetry of thought with the clarity of a friend's voice is so very welcome here. <br /><br />I really enjoy your words: all input is for oneself and what one chooses to create. <br /><br />Thanks for sharing! Rusty Kjarvikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03071547323352880050noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-40594771087118783092012-11-26T07:25:12.967-08:002012-11-26T07:25:12.967-08:00I don’t think you can separate “popular prophets” ...I don’t think you can separate “popular prophets” (an oxymoron if ever there was one) from the mis-used term “conspiracy theory”, since the controllers of human affairs behind the surface are always the most interested not only in what is going to happen but how to influence humanity’s perception of what is going to happen. Thus for example “global warming” prophecies feed into profit-making opportunities and the Mayan circle calendars become harbingers of fearful doom. I’ve certainly heard that all of the people you mention (with the possible exception of Rasputin) were agents of the disinformation agenda, but as with everything, discernment is required, since all input is for oneself and what one chooses to create. I do know that one of the major reasons Kerouac (who influenced Ginsberg in this) gravitated towards Buddhism was a competitive discord with Neal Cassidy, who was obsessed for a time with another “popular prophet,” Edgar Cayce, who for the reasons mentioned above only did verbal readings on individual people, on conditions of secrecy that were conspicuously violated by others. This highlights the point you make about separating the real (mystical) function of prophecy from the side-show version; visions of the future are given as the bare minimum required to further one’s self-knowledge, they are bridges to something else, not keys. Past life experiences are similar manifestations, they are not to draw one into what has “already” happened, but to provide insight on what is present, which is all that is (time being the artificial construct enforced through our endocrine system to keep us grounded on the perception of the moment).<br /><br />By the way, your Kerouac take is a little too uncanny. The inescapably Rusty poem excerpt that follows takes one to a truer, finer place.<br />WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-29773981873849503022012-11-04T05:51:16.596-08:002012-11-04T05:51:16.596-08:00You are not like Pindar holding on to the safe God...You are not like Pindar holding on to the safe Gods. You are finding something beyond the cultural prison of the real.<br /><br />Thanks for the Bernstein reference -- he's a good example of an intelligent warrior trying to be funny about the whole mad thing. <br /><br />Your dream has an admirably rich energy of adverbs and especially adjectives. The incessant modifying around the central abyss of the word.<br /><br />Those Columbian goddesses sure know how to clear out the room, don't they?WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-74522550343367125622012-11-03T14:31:35.941-07:002012-11-03T14:31:35.941-07:00thanks for your comment Bill. always appreciate yo...thanks for your comment Bill. always appreciate your readership and incredibly engaging insight!Rusty Kjarvikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03071547323352880050noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-8690615096026141002012-11-01T15:05:31.310-07:002012-11-01T15:05:31.310-07:00A string of interesting and unusual posts as alway...A string of interesting and unusual posts as always. I for one am practicing the mantra: "there is no subject and object."WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-29623486394964086572012-10-21T07:59:22.061-07:002012-10-21T07:59:22.061-07:00I love the old-school Jules Feiffer-esque caricatu...I love the old-school Jules Feiffer-esque caricature of W - it brings me, who experienced these events from a different temporary temporal perspective, back to when I was in primary school gazing at leaders with bemusement, respect and confusion. Similarly, the odd placement of the Rockwell painting here, which could stand in as eerie symbol of the type of indoctrination that filled <i>my</i> childhood, catapults me further back to a world of strange verities and standards that are forever lost -- along with the hidden manipulations that linger beyond a veil. <br /><br />For some reason, your account of Bush's America (btw I want more!) recalls my own poem, <a href="http://billsigler.blogspot.com/2008/11/crown-transit.html" rel="nofollow">Crown Transit</a>, written the day Obama won. WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-28226520836202142172012-10-11T15:54:54.655-07:002012-10-11T15:54:54.655-07:00“Why have you offered only suicide … to your stout...“Why have you offered only suicide … to your stout-hearted mob?” Indeed. And offered in contrast is the “unconscious surface flesh of all earthly necessity” at Prospero’s Island, one of my favorite literary haunts (I wrote of the Earl’s stay on the Isle of Man at the end of his life <a href="http://billsigler.blogspot.com/2012/09/some-deleted-scenes-from-oxford.html" rel="nofollow">here</a>). He is consoling himself that while the impermanence of all things in creation may be true – that this thing the imagination that can take you anywhere just vanishes once it is disconnected from this baseless fabric our earthen leaden bodies – there is an underlying possibility that by sheer force of eloquence and passion and soulful art that he might breathe undying life into these words and by extension into us too, in the longing for impossibility that carves out a separate sphere inhabitable for the dispossessed. And that all will not be in vain but will live on throughout the ages - these words and works and thoughts and many forms themselves - after all else has crumbled into dust. He says this as a man having known enough misfortune to test anyone’s faith, hope and humor, but buttresses the merest hint of possibility – the dream - with the triumphal human spirit that only Oxenforde could pull off. Is this not the very essence of Nobility?WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-88804821936697199752012-10-03T08:38:26.396-07:002012-10-03T08:38:26.396-07:00Congratulations are in order here, Rusty. You'...Congratulations are in order here, Rusty. You've definitely kicked the Jungian and Surrealistic insights up a notch or three, moving the universe in your own way towards a more expansive and harmonious sense of what art is and can be. <br /><br />The energy of freedom is an awe-inspiring thing.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-69520076618981416162012-09-28T13:47:45.343-07:002012-09-28T13:47:45.343-07:00Wow! Cicero is one of those literary mystics that ...Wow! Cicero is one of those literary mystics that often gets lost in the shuffle of crumbling Latinates. You do a wonderful job here of keeping the flame burning, and of making the connection to Blake no less! <br /><br />And as usual you throw so much intensity and thought into the mix I can be groggy for days. Love the passion in the world peace poem (if that's what it is). We need to work on an international peace flag!WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-35806117631858711012012-09-25T07:50:18.518-07:002012-09-25T07:50:18.518-07:00A petit mind-blowing excursion into esoterica. Tha...A petit mind-blowing excursion into esoterica. That chart is pretty compelling.<br /><br />Your dream calls to mind my song I recently <a href="http://billsigler.blogspot.com/2012/09/song-karma.html" rel="nofollow">posted to my site</a> as a video.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-55532047092028202012-09-16T05:50:40.426-07:002012-09-16T05:50:40.426-07:00Interesting dream -- the hero's journey a la t...Interesting dream -- the hero's journey a la the golden bough, mixing contemporary and mythic details.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-88207099408963077102012-09-09T07:26:36.777-07:002012-09-09T07:26:36.777-07:00The words can barely keep up with the passion, and...The words can barely keep up with the passion, and I like that, most races are fixed to have words win by a stretch.<br /><br />I remember reading about Menachem Begin informing President Jimmy Carter that Israel is disposing of its Palestinian problem the same way America disposed of its Indian problem, so (essentially) leave us the fuck alone with your righteous indignation (but keep your welfare checks flowing of course, for we'd die without them). It was strange on many levels, of course, for these Nobel Peace Prize winners to be so undiplomatic in public, but the most surreal thing to me was how conveniently wrong the analogy is. The suffering, the methods, the attitudes are, as you note, exactly the same, but these are brothers squabbling, with the older bully pulling rank and the younger clever one making a cause out of being a victim (I stretch the analogy to make a point). We are being asked like a parent to look the other way while the older brother gouges the younger brothers eyes out, because, after all, the parents fucked them up in the first place. The native experience in the Americas was of different paradigms meeting, hard to call it even a war there was so much distance in perception, and the land so vast was so terrifying to one, and the power of the machines so vast was so heartbreaking for the other. But the ancient ones could go because they had locked in the codes. The Palestinians, if we can conclude anything, are not leaving the Levant. They will remind us for quite some time of the consequences of the casual brutality brought on by man's low self-esteem. WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-36079709684231707292012-09-09T07:05:34.324-07:002012-09-09T07:05:34.324-07:00To contemplate the extermination of the ancient wi...To contemplate the extermination of the ancient wisdom by my people ("the horror") as no different than looking at a dewdrop fall across a leaf...hmm. <br /><br />That final line of the poem is staggeringly good.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-79150093250804341532012-09-09T06:59:54.101-07:002012-09-09T06:59:54.101-07:00Always intriguing writing, with some lines calling...Always intriguing writing, with some lines calling out from another dreamspace: "The ghosts may transcend the locks, and the smell of dead flesh is their very calling."WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-8540337750931738832012-09-09T06:56:02.291-07:002012-09-09T06:56:02.291-07:00This dream account reminds me of Malcolm Lowry'...This dream account reminds me of Malcolm Lowry's "Under the Volcano," how the escapes from shame (into deepest Mexico) only magnify it.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-39388934553271190032012-09-09T06:49:51.750-07:002012-09-09T06:49:51.750-07:00I assume this isn't Arthur C. Clarke, and you&...I assume this isn't Arthur C. Clarke, and you're dream wasn't a clockwork orange ;-) ? I like the brazenness of the poem, saying something real without fear of embarrassment, ineluctable syllables of musical grace that defy the cold, agreed-upon grace of the literary classes, for whom real life is too much the hothouse nursery. WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-51206191688571455212012-08-18T07:46:56.108-07:002012-08-18T07:46:56.108-07:00!!!
This should be required reading, or at least ...!!!<br /><br />This should be required reading, or at least turned into an 800-page exegesis.<br /><br />So much truth, so little time/space. Rock on, Brother! WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-40383778952780958722012-08-15T11:42:15.088-07:002012-08-15T11:42:15.088-07:00The end of that poem is quite shocking and true.The end of that poem is quite shocking and true.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-51997712664472796452012-08-12T07:41:13.124-07:002012-08-12T07:41:13.124-07:00"sacrificed to roaming," the diaspora th..."sacrificed to roaming," the diaspora that is how we earn our wisdom...<br /><br />I appreciate how Ovid explains how Morpheus in the Matrix movie series has "all his action confin'd, / Extending not beyond our human kind."<br /><br />Your dream prose is like William S. Burroughs writing a pulp detective novel. Giddyup!WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-86907388454545303162012-08-12T00:02:29.043-07:002012-08-12T00:02:29.043-07:00eye-opening stimulation of revelatory insight, you...eye-opening stimulation of revelatory insight, your literary insignia is always arresting and begs one to look again at the great seeds of incantatory bravura still firing the grist of resistance against homogeny with the stirring mind of meditative youth, eager to see, learning to listen, ever needing elder minds that bestow direction through the yet unseen, asking, "can you see the darkness ahead? do not look with your eyes." and within a vision.Rusty Kjarvikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03071547323352880050noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-21571235555493371612012-08-10T04:21:06.766-07:002012-08-10T04:21:06.766-07:00I love the continuum here between Petrarch's p...I love the continuum here between Petrarch's post-mystical depression and your (in your poem) learning to accept the small gifts that are left, the oregano and parmesan on the breadcrumbs.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-9989320504434859362012-08-09T17:34:54.735-07:002012-08-09T17:34:54.735-07:00WS, I did write, "Wonder..." thanks as a...WS, I did write, "Wonder..." thanks as always for reading my blog posts so diligently and so deeply, you are a true gem. I learn the most about myself through you, an other, and in that individuated mystery, I am drawn to believe, if only in that moment of reading another perspective, that I am not, if not for you.Rusty Kjarvikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03071547323352880050noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6529780966234338585.post-41953273649281431662012-08-08T07:26:46.872-07:002012-08-08T07:26:46.872-07:00That poem is most interesting. It's sobering h...That poem is most interesting. It's sobering how the wastes of the past, the mistakes that swirl around our heads, are inextricably linked with our spiritual inward path. You usually let the linkages breathe, but here the chains are crystal clear in musical insinuation, the sadness all too real.<br /><br />I also love the dream whereby the reed flute becomes a USB cable, another game of subjectively perceived time and the interpenetration of (Asian) place into all that is.<br /><br />By the way, did you write: "Wonder, the life of an insect, so short, from a human mind. Yet with the indiscernible speed of buzzing flight, an eternal instant, witnessed of countless eyes"? It's beautiful, the wisdom equivalent of slowing down a dragonfly's wings so we can see all the details.WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.com