The unpurged images of day recede; The Emperor’s drunken soldiery are abed; Night resonance recedes, night walkers’ song After great cathedral gong; A starlit or a moonlit dome disdains All that man is, All mere complexities, The fury and the mire of human veins.
Before me floats an image, man or shade, Shade more than man, more image than a shade; For Hades’ bobbin bound in mummy-cloth May unwind the winding path; A mouth that has no moisture and no breath Breathless mouths may summon; I hail the superhuman; I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.
Miracle, bird or golden handiwork, More miracle than bird or handiwork, Planted on the star-lit golden bough, Can like the cocks of Hades crow, Or, by the moon embittered, scorn aloud In glory of changeless metal Common bird or petal And all complexities of mire or blood.
At midnight on the Emperor’s pavement flit Flames that no faggot feeds, nor steel has lit, Nor storm disturbs, flames begotten of flame, Where blood-begotten spirits come And all complexities of fury leave, Dying into a dance, An agony of trance, An agony of flame that cannot singe a sleeve.
Astraddle on the dolphin’s mire and blood, Spirit after spirit! The smithies break the flood, The golden smithies of the Emperor! Marbles of the dancing floor Break bitter furies of complexity, Those images that yet Fresh images beget, That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea.
– Byzantium, by William Butler Yeats
This is the follow-up poem by Yeats to his Sailing to Byzantium, one of my favorites in my 20s. This poem, written only three years later, is a call-back where the narrator explores the city of legend he aspired to reach in the earlier poem. It makes me realize the aspiration to be a crafted mechanical bird, immortal, singing to lords and ladies of the past, present, or things to come is a way out of the trappings of age and a way into existence of art into posterity, but does not convey the mire, the nature and swamp and meat of life that gives beauty. The poem above seems more sage, an initiate regarding new arrivals. Art as a process of burning and refining. Sensible. Suits an accomplished genius like Yeats. Feels like the only things I have to share are laden messes, to convey the muck and the ooze of it all. I’ve not gained the knack for refinement yet.
While typing this, the itching from a new haircut trickles down my neck through the collar of my t-shirt and sweatshirt. Seeing the amount of silver compared to brown (once natural blonde!) that falls in clumps over the haircut cape while sitting in the chair continues to amuse. The buzzing and tugging and trimming that comes from a woman cutting my hair always feels more intimate than it should be. If there’s not much chit-chat, I tend to tip higher, but I still tip pretty high because in a small way grooming by someone’s hands feels like a moment. The race between my hair turning to silver, and whether I have hair left at all, tends to not amuse. As my hair has waned over the last two decades, I determined to improve my personality to compensate. But, as in so many such resolutions, I’ve let up on THAT a bit. The curmudgeon will out.
As I get to the tasty sludge of a dark hot cocoa at a high end, but not quite aristocratic, chocolateria, three Asian women are having a spirited conversation in a language that is not Japanese nor Chinese. Their pace is quick. Their voices complement each other, and it’s a relief to NOT know enough of their words to eavesdrop. Mild melodic background. Light laughter. I’m tempted to place my smartphone on the small coffee table between them and record their voices for future background noise.
And, like that, I’ve resolved I like Sailing to Byzantium better. The narrator laments, aspires, but is not accomplished enough, it has not yet reached the holy city. November is National Novel Writing Month, and I need to get ramped up on my project.
In the Spring of 1996 I was a new hire at Xerox, and had been flown from home to attend a 3-day customer service & problem-solving training at the vast Xerox Document University (XDU) complex in Leesburg, Virginia. No shit, this place existed. It was HUGE. The armed forces frequently leased buildings and rooms from it.
The GREAT documentary about the start of the Silicon Valley technology industry, Triumph of the Nerds, was on PBS and I was watching it in a wing of a floor of the XDU dorm I was staying in.
Triumph of the Nerds had JUST SHOWN a segment on how the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (Xerox PARC) had developed the graphical user interface, Ethernet, laser printers, and the mouse. The Xerox brass sniffed they were all useless. They made the inventors at Xerox PARC show the punks at Apple all of this stuff.
Xerox could have been HP, Microsoft, Apple, and Adobe all in one, but the Execs pissed it all away.
But my fellow co-trainee knuckleheads at XDU didn’t give a shit. The NBA playoffs were on (who the fuck cares?) and they saw no irony or thrill at watching how their employer was stupid and could have run the world, as we were all being trained by that same company on how to do things. I was outvoted, and found another tv in another dorm wing to resume watching Triumph of the Nerds.
I am proud to say I have never purchased a Windows machine. Mac-only since my dual disk drive Mac SE in 1987 (no hard drive until 1990!).
I have three sheets of these stickers.But the 90s were an UGLY time to be an Apple fan. Their product line an unholy mess of keeping Quadras, Performas, and several clone makers all distinct from each other. Still, we held strong even past when it made little sense to do so. Buy a Windows 386? Get the fuck out! I’ll hold strong with my Quadra 610 and its CD-ROM, thank you very much. I can play Myst on this. It’s magical (and cost a relative fortune)!
But Steve Jobs, Apple’s prodigal co-founder whose pride and bad management style got him booted in the mid 80s, came on screen and got this terrific dig into Microsoft and it was a great thing to see. I squirmed and cheered in the caverns of XDU. He was a fellow Reedie (and like me, left before graduating) so he was already a character I admired. In the moment below, even knowing in great detail he was an asshole, he championed aesthetics. In later years, he partially regretted making this statement, but not entirely:
His personal life didn’t get pulled together until he got booted from Apple, but he managed it, grew up, and within a year of rejoining Apple he got the iMac and iBook and wireless internet in mass production. He hired a kindred spirit in designer Jonathan Ive. He learned to delegate, while still keeping his keen aesthetic eye and compulsion to be a prick in pursuit of the greater good.
To your insanely great work, Steve. You will be missed, and you’ve made countless people happy, do better work, and more connected to each other. Cheers.
Despite driving while intoxicated/stoned in recent years, George Michael, according to YouTube, has given a concert within the last month. Among the songs he sung were covers by two of my favorite artists. “Let Her Down Easy” from Symphony or Damn by Terence Trent D’Arby (who now goes by Sananda Maitreya and still makes great music):
He also covers “Going to a Town” by Rufus Wainwright from the album Release the Stars. Here he admits to being stoned talking to Wainwright on the phone and not remembering the conversation afterward:
Mostly, I’m pleased to see George Michael being charming, lucid, and doing a good job selecting songs to cover. Hope he keeps it together…
Driving home from attending a college football game, I traveled with my kids, who had spent the day with a set of grandparents, back to our home city. My daughter was asleep in the backseat, iPod touch probably still playing. My son was playing a word game on his Nintendo DSi XL. I had finished with listening to the football post-game show on the radio, and had switched to an iPod playlist of authors reading their own work. To the sound of Anne Sexton reading poems on the car stereo, my son asked me questions about his game.
Had there been a transcript of one particular point, it would have read like this:
Oh, darling! Born in that sweet birthday suit and having owned it and known it for so long, now you must watch high noon enter–
[Son: “Papa, what’s a word for a food that needs sauce?” Me: “Barbecue, maybe?”]
noon, that ghost hour. Oh, funny little girl–this one under a blueberry sky,
[Son: “It doesn’t work.” Me: “How about spaghetti?” Son: “How do you spell ‘spaghetti’?” Me: “S-p-a-g-h-e-t-t-i.” Son: “That works!”]
this one! How can I say that I’ve known just what you know and just where you are?
It’s not a strange place, this odd home
[Son: “Papa, how do you spell ‘weight’?” Me: “Like in, heavy?” Son: “Yes.” Me: “W-e-i-g-h-t.”]
where your face sits in my hand so full of distance, so full of its immediate fever.
Upon my arrival, I can tell from her raspy greeting they had been singing at the studio piano then likely singing a capella instead of being at task for this interminable sitting. The walls seem to pulsate with absorbed melodies and laughter. If I put my fingers on the plaster, would they palpate vibrations?
Her mother started this project with Sargent. An expense, as he is known to be slow. But she wanted her daughter portrayed as she was when engaged. Prima del matrimonio. Who knows what I, as the mid-tier career soldier, might do to diminish her daughter? She will tell my children “Your mother was a great beauty.” with a grand gesture toward the portrait.
I am not a fool. I see an aspect of Elsie coming through. Sargent’s warm regard in wanting her. I lean over his shoulder and note the blush and exaggerated care given to her lips. As I loom he is silent, not from bravery but a worry a tremble in his voice may reveal too much. Famous as he is, he is still vulnerable and must fear a bad report. Yet he knows I will not pounce upon his work. His creation will outlast this room and my review. His desire imbues her portrait and becomes what she exudes for him. I have earned and sustained my higher station, but my victories on the field and maneuvers in this scene may not last as long as this portrait. His strategy is longer.
In her cool appraisal of those who evaluate her, the flush of her cheeks, this portrait is Elizabeth as a maiden. As she stands apart from me now, a laugh still in her stance, has she been girlish with him? I do not think she would be so rude as to bite her lip and act less womanly than she is. That may put him off, too. Knowing her power, and knowing it is accentuated by being not yet attained. She is not flighty here, she is strong. She knows and has lived, much by what we have shared. Her mother is not getting the portrait she wanted. That is gratifying.
And I indulge Elsie. No, too patronizing. I endure from others the whispers, asides, occasional daring remark in my presence that Elsie’s avocation and accomplishments as a concert singer are déclassé.
But it fills her. To see her take savor and draw in the air, bosom rising, delay before her note, knowing she could convey so much in her lilting soprano then drop to a feral resonance. Where will she go? Follow her training? Let the spirit take the moment? She is lost and happy and delirious in the suspension of the world and those fixed on her. We are held in thrall. She is happy. Obliged to perform, but the setting is of her choosing. Let them natter on in parties. She feeds from us. I am among those feeling within her and sustaining her. Admiring her as the room does, coveting my own all the more as others covet her. Then, her decision or spirit assented to, the note selected, force sanctioned, she carries us all along again.
And, my hand will be on the upper side of her hips, John, as her hand is posed off her waist. I will hold her there as she’s straddled over me to fix her in place. And her left hand will be set over mine to pin her even more. She will press on me with the assurance and lovely heft you have conveyed so well, John. And before then the palm of her right hand will tend to my need, wrapped with confidence as on the rim of your sitting chair. Yes, Sargent, those hands are daring and skilled and loving and clever and I know you have made a guess that is so, but I see you do not know from experience. You have posed her hands in speculation. I am amused.
This is a painting of allegation, admiration, want, abundance, poise. Her bosom is a marvel. I have seen our child feed there, and I still have desire and feel relief to take refuge and time there. And she lets me. Her soldier is happy there. And I am happy to make her happy.
“We are obliged to leave soon.” I say glancing at the clock on the wall. Strong chance Sargent’s clock is not accurate. Stronger chance any array of clocks he may have here do not corroborate one another.
Mrs. George Swinton (nee Elizabeth “‘Elsie” Ebsworth) painted by John Singer Sargent
“What time is it?” Elsie says. Her voice evenly modulated. I do not think Sargent would truly do anything untoward. He tantalizes himself. I look at the nearest clock again.
“It’s 22 past six.” Recital at 8. Reception at 9. Would she wear this ensemble? He paints her in white and coppery pearlish taupe. She stands now in royal blue. He is using her expression and proportions. She will not need a change tonight.
After the recital: praise, and flattery, and as she is flush with regard and expression I shall take her home, and we will bid the help good night then gaze upon our infant son asleep in the cradle then adjourn to our chambers. I will pin her down by her left wrist, leaving her right hand and my left to wander as they please, and I shall take her as she is arrayed now. She will see how what she set in motion by my catching her in this scene in the studio and her later scenes this evening will culminate in the light in my eyes fueled from the swells of desire from the crowds of men and envious women channeled and churning through me and she will be well pleased and sleep soundly and it will be a good morning.
“It has so many AWESOME parts. You simply won’t believe how much this book can change your life.”
“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people.”
— Karl Marx, Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right
“Hello. My name is Elder Price, and I would like to share with you the most amazing book.”
— Elder Price, The Book of Mormon
When listening to the Broadway soundtrack (and eventually watching the show: YAY!) to the Tony-sweeping The Book of Mormon, I keep thinking of Marx’s compassionate point preceding the “opiate of the people” line.
The musical gets a LOT of deep digs in at Mormonism, but makes a profound point in its savage satire with complex, catchy, funny, moving songs. People need stories, and will adapt stories to resonate with them, no matter how ridiculous their sources. The more oppressed the people, the deeper the wish-thinking in their collective sigh for a tale to tie it all together.
“I’m going to take you back to Blblical times: 1823.”
— Elder Price, The Book of Mormon
Referral form used by Mormon missionaries circa 1993. Yes, my copy.
Joseph Smith, the founding “Prophet” of Mormonism, was a multiple-count convicted con-man “money-digger” who charged money to tell people where treasure was buried by using a sham device. The victims would dig where he told him. When they found nothing, the move was to say “Ah! The treasure must have moved, then. But it USED to be here.”
Smith claimed to be directed by an angel named Moroni (!) to dig in a yard in upstate New York, where a series of drilled-hole bound golden plates was buried telling the story of the Mormon people. A tribe of Jews sailed from the Middle East to the Americas and had a bunch of dull-ass adventures and talkity talk. Also, Jesus visited the Americas between the Crucifixion & Ascension. And Eden is in Missouri.
“I believe in 1978 God changed His mind about black people!”
— Elder Price, Book of Mormon
Mormonism was a hobby in my teens & 20s along with my buddy Paul and later on with buddy Fanny. More lore? Dark skinned people were marked because they were cursed, and ineligible to be full Mormons. Jesus and Satan are brothers. Only men are eligible for priesthood (crazy!) but since all men of age are eligible to be priests there is no vow of celibacy (whew!). In the afterlife, the blessed get their own planets (Coo-ol!). In 1978, the Mormon President announced a divine revelation that dark-skinned people could be full Mormons. New demographic for international markets!
Joseph Smith did not allow anyone to see the golden plates he got. He persuaded a neighbor, Martin Harris. to dictate him “translating” the golden plates from behind a suspended blanket. Smith was not even looking directly into the plates, but into magical seer stones set inside of a hat to block out all light. Harris was never allowed to see the plates. It became an obsession for Harris at the expense of maintaining his livelihood. His spouse, the brave Emma Harris, hero for the ages, had enough of this bullshit and swiped away the 116 pages of manuscript and demanded Smith try to reproduce them. No big deal, given he was reading from magical golden tablets still in tact. Right? RIGHT? In pure Imam/Vatican fashion, Smith declared the first manuscript infected by Satan (like the “Satanic Verses” of the Koran) and a new version from OTHER plates, even more pure, was incipient and would be dictated to other writers.
Back to the book. It sucks. It’s boring. It lifts entire sections of The Bible, and clumsily apes the poetry of the King James Bible. But the preface is AMAZING and crazy and ballsy and defensive. Joseph Smith persuading people to sign testimony they saw magical figures beaming in to interact with Joseph Smith. Check it out if you get a chance.
“Did you know that Jesus lived here in the U.S.A.? You can read all about it now. In this nifty book, it’s free, no you don’t have to pay!”
— Elder Young, Book of Mormon
In the 19th century Mormons DESPERATELY wanted to be a separate nation named Deseret that extended from what is now Utah to southern California, Nevada, chunks of Oregon, Nevada, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico. Congress threw them land-locked Utah territory instead. Also, polygamy was an important part of doctrine and critical in swelling LDS numbers. Polygamy isn’t as big a deal to my sensibilities now, so long as it’s between adults – when it leads to childbrides, though, send in the rescue teams! But polygamy got shed from Mormon doctrine more than a century ago.
“Eternal life is super fun! And if you let us in we’ll show you how it can be done!”
So, the Book of Mormon compounds a bunch of American crap with shoddy, all-too-human rubbish imagination and bigotry as a Third Testament to the New Testament, itself a collection of contradictions and tamperings by womb-fearing men written generations after the death of Jesus that ends with a petulant smashing of everyone’s toys and eternal torture of those not in the club. And the New Testament compounds the idiocy and superstitions of the Old Testament, a series of Iron Age myths written and edited and re-edited when Man did not know anything about anything. But the Book of Mormon, unlike the Old and New Testament, at LEAST acknowledges geography beyond the Middle East. So, point awarded to Joseph Smith. Still, a mish-mash glopped onto hash that was already on a pile of hash.
“I’m wet with salvation!”
The musical The Book of Mormon mocks a LOT of that, even starting up a FOURTH Testament to compound on Smith’s book with more absurdities. Magical frogs that cure AIDS. Boba Fett as divine instrument of justice. On and on. Each element hilarious and/or heart-wringing. Each of them adapted by a native people in despair and distress. Joseph Smith’s book evangelized by the Mormon missionairies bores them, but frogs that cure AIDS and holy admonitions to not circumcize people (in this case, women)? That resonates with them NOW!
The musical knows Mormons tend to be “really fucking polite to everyone” and plays it for laughs, then finds its heart there. Video below of a HUGE, grim laugh in the first half of the show. “Turn it Off”, a number about ignoring horrors and troubles, including being a closeted gay, by clicking them off, like a light switch. At this point, the two main missionaries, Elder Price (the tallest, handsomest, charismatic and most destined for greatness) and Elder Cunningham (shlubby, prone to making things up), are experiencing culture shock after arriving in a war-torn Uganda village where their fellow Mormons have failed to convert a single person. This number earned the main singer in the number (supporting player Rory O’Malley) a Tony nomination. Official video is not available, but here’s an amateur production that’s charming:
Nikki M James
Nikki M James has a Tony. She is talented and beautiful. World domination inevitable.After witnessing a violent act by a warlord general, Elder Price begins to doubt his destiny as the next Joseph Smith. His crisis of faith splits him from Elder Cunningham, who must take the lead after being disregarded his whole life. He falls in with a local girl Nabulungi (Nikki M. James, who won a Tony for the role) who is charmed by his imagination and sees him as a way out of the horrors of Uganda to a paradisal land called Sal Tlay Ka Siti. James’s performance of “Sal Tlay Ka Siti” (say it aloud to get the joke) is a turning point that the show will not be completely “Har har!” mockery of its characters. It’s moving, and she does a great job of selling the yearning in a song that ends: “I’m on my way/ Soon life won’t be so shitty./ Now salvation has a name. / Sal Tlay Ka Siti.”
Side note: the actors playing Ugandans have wandering accents, shifting from genero-African-ish to Carribean inflections and, heck, I’m not a dialectitionator. Not gonna go to Uganda to research this point. I’ll drop the pretense.
From the rousing final number: “Who cares what happens when we’re dead? We shouldn’t think that far ahead. The only latter day that matters is tomorrow.”Elder Cunningham flourishes and uses his lying/creativity to adapt and exaggerate and customize stories that resonate with the tribe, as Joseph Smith did. And the people exaggerate the stories even further to suit themselves.
The writers of The Book of Mormon (the dudes who make South Park and the composer behind Avenue Q) have mentioned originally they were going to have Elder Price killed by gunfire, leaving Cunningham completely alone to lead the tribe, as Joseph Smith was fatally shot and left Brigham Young to lead. A severe, intriguing idea. Price does not die (spoiler!) but does go on a divergent path that makes for a richer exploration of ideas about religion, faith, and not needing belief in heavenly reward to work to help people in this realm.
“We are all still Latter-Day-Saints. All of us. Even if we changed some things, or we break the rules, or we have complete doubt that God exists. We can still all work together and make this our paradise planet.”
This guy on staff was really cool about handling people eager to figure out how to get tickets.
The Book of Mormon is the hottest ticket on Broadway, even before reaping Tonys. I love theater, but had never been to a Broadway show, or New York City, before watching it August 13. I’m not much of a musical afficionado. The few musicals I do know, through film, I know deeply: Singin’ in the Rain, An American in Paris, West Side Story, Grease, and … that may be it. Oh, Purple Rain, but that doesn’t really count. The Les Miserables mania in the late 80s? Pass. Phantom of the Opera? Get the fuck outta here. Wicked? May see it before I die, but wouldn’t recognize a single song.
I dig theater. I’ve seen nearly 100+ productions at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival over the last 25 years, modern and classical productions. And I’m competitive about being the first audience member to clap. An embarrassing trait during classical recitals in the break between one musical movement to another.
But The Book of Mormon? I’d listened to the soundtrack maybe 20 times before seeing the show, and it’s the first time in my life I’ve owned a soundtrack for a currently running Broadway show.
It does skim ONE problem with regarding religion as stories – it’s okay to let other people follow whatever myths they want. But the evangelism, telling other people what to do, is where the true harm comes in. Why can’t people imbued with the Great Cosmic Answer seem content and happy? Why the need to bully others? Not so much a Mormon trait, but a general lamentation about the self-Elected.
Seeing the production, the script and plot points not conveyed by the songs themselves (though the songs do a great job of moving the story) was a great experience. Inspired acting and direction, catchy tunes, fun choreography. Toward the end of the show, I got teary-eyed from being so happy to be there and see the show with great wit and heart. It was fun watching the show with a friend who didn’t know what to expect. And even knowing what to expect, the show exceeded my hopes.
What I’m saying is: the story of The Book of Mormon really resonated with me. And I want to share its story with you.
Writing on an airplane is HUGELY productive. An expensive habit. Is it the boredom? Disinterest in the in-flight movie, especially compared to the delights of parsing the safety video? Sustained physical discomfort resulting in yoga-ish inward journeys? Mid-conscious realization that flight in a huge metal tube at lethally cold low-pressure altitudes is an hours-long defiance of the designs of Nature, and Nature ALWAYS wins?
Jay-Z seems a nice enough fellow, very much of his time. Kanye West is more forward-thinking and entertaining. I sympathize with his egomania, but it so echoes my own solipsism that his songs as they bounce within my ear canals give temporary relief at forming my own self-aggrandizing thoughts. Doesn’t count as entertainment, more a palliative.
And his pronouncements/stunts usually make 100% sense to me. Still have a hair-trigger wildly intense response to defending his bumrush of Taylor Swift in the name of Beyoncé and the integrity of art itself. Drumming fingers over lips contemplating a post about this. Three years late, sure, but the power of Internet Posterity compels it!
Any-hoo, gonna let the world chew on their joint album Watch the Throne, and see what singles come out of it. If I hear three singles I like, or two that I REALLY like, I’ll buy it.
In the meantime, here’s a cute photo of Jay-Z sitting next to Kanye who may be having a stroke. Anyone who reads this is HEARTILY welcome to come up with a caption.
Not that strokes are funny. If you are having one and reading this, for gosh sakes leave your mobile device/laptop/tablet/desk/WebTV and seek medical attention immediately. Unless you’re a faith healer, in which case goodbye and you may wanna close those browser windows of fetish porn in your last few flails and gasps.
So far with the writing project, it’s been writing by hand while out ‘n’ about, then getting around to typing that writing up by hand on the computer. Doing some editing in that process, especially hiting spots of leaning into the notes and thinking “Wha-a-at the heck?” and reinterpreting.
Finished up typing up manuscript up to the end of May. Broke 127,000 words, still in the middle chapter.
Neil Gaiman, a writer I like in interviews but have never read, said in an interview that waiting for inspiration to strike is something for poets. Novelists need to sit and be at task or it’ll never get done. That’s echoed by a LOT of writers. I’m finding that to be true.
Haven’t had Writer’s Block, but DO suffer from acute Writer’s Avoidance. Finding distractions to keep from the physical effort.
And it is often dreary typing up notes, not liking what I’m going over. But then a gem or scene or description comes on that I like and it’s a relief. Promise of the project restored.
I’m really getting excited for the process of revision after the First Draft is done. It’ll be a while from now, and it’ll be brutal, but the prospect of slimming this thing down to something elegant makes me antsy and happy.
The unpurged images of day recede;
This is the follow-up poem by Yeats to his Sailing to Byzantium, one of my favorites in my 20s. This poem, written only three years later, is a call-back where the narrator explores the city of legend he aspired to reach in the earlier poem. It makes me realize the aspiration to be a crafted mechanical bird, immortal, singing to lords and ladies of the past, present, or things to come is a way out of the trappings of age and a way into existence of art into posterity, but does not convey the mire, the nature and swamp and meat of life that gives beauty. The poem above seems more sage, an initiate regarding new arrivals. Art as a process of burning and refining. Sensible. Suits an accomplished genius like Yeats. Feels like the only things I have to share are laden messes, to convey the muck and the ooze of it all. I’ve not gained the knack for refinement yet.
