The Dragons of Shakespeare

Today I worked all day on a book of translations of Hamlet and Macbeth. I feel dizzy, a strange feeling one gets after poring over thick text all day, attempting to make just the right choices. I had thought, and I have thought, numerous times now, that I was finished--that I was ready to send it off to the printers. But then, the choices are innumerable, and looking through the text again, things were found which were not just right. Although I am tired, and wishing it will all be finished soon, I am gratified that some very important errors were caught and corrected. Are the dragons of Shakespeare finally slain this day? Time will tell....

Oh My God

Yesterday I got off work early, the off-shore winds where going and there was a little swell. I haven’t surfed in over a year. I’ve been really focused on a book and at times in the past, when I’m focused on literary work, I smoke cigarettes. This last stint, the three years on this book, near the end of it I was almost chain-smoking.

Smoking, my history: smoked Marlborough Reds for a couple years in my twenties, and remember once from back then, paddling out in big surf, that smoking affected my stamina, and I got out of the water thinking, “Dude, either quit or lose surfing top notch.”

I remember the year or so of quitting, breaking down, quitting, and the real struggle that smokers go through in quitting. Finally I lifted off and didn’t smoke or think about it for ten years or so. Then somewhere in my thirties I smoked at a wedding or something, and really enjoyed it, but the next day didn’t feel the urge to buy a pack. I went along like that for a handful of years, and then somewhere near the completion of my first novel, I actually tried to become a smoker. For some reason I couldn’t take to smoking--tried different brands for the one that delivered the nicotine best, but couldn’t find it. Then several more years, and I’m into my latest book, and again I tried to be a smoker, and I found a brand I liked--an organic blend, hit the spot, I was able to enjoy all the great things there are to enjoy in smoking: the one after a movie, the one after a meal, the one after a lot of work, and of course, the best cigarette.

And so this late book was so intense that I was smoking like I never had before. I was actually waking up in the morning with a cigarette, and smoking a pack a day (I’ve never been able to smoke more than a pack in a day). But I'd made a deal with myself, soon as I finished the book, I’d flip the leaf, and get back out in the water.

So I did, and yesterday was the first day I’d been back out in a while. It was great. It was awesome. The offshore winds had glassed off, and there were these sweet, bowly, rights that came in along Miramar. The reason I titled this Oh My God is based on what I said today when feeling my surfing muscles--my shoulders/upper-back are worked.

But I’m really glad I finished this book. It’s taken three years, and part of that is because last February, when I was ready to publish the book as it was, I’d read an essay then, and realized I had to totally dive back into it and rewrite and add a lot of stuff. In fact today when I was looking at the ISBN/Library of Congress info, that back then it was listed as being 254 pages, where published sometime in the next few weeks it will be 288 pages.

But because of the nature of it, there was a period last year where I really wondered if I had gotten myself in over my head. It was pretty intense for about two weeks, so fraught between believing in it or if it had fatal flaws and was therefore not worth publishing.

I recently turned in the final edits I could find (it was a list of ten on the back of a page, which just thinking about it now, I think I threw away in past couple days, and am wondering if I might be able to retrieve it tomorrow--it would be a cool thing to frame if the book does find its mark). The cover is looking really neat.

The political science project you would not believe. Lately I’ve taken to describing it as a three-part national discussion. First I ask the person what they think is killing America. If they’re Republican they fire off it’s the Democrats; or if it’s Democrats they fire Republican--but I interject and say--“Politics as Usual.” That’s what’s killing America, Politics as Usual. And I explain how the convention clause in actuality is a three-part national discussion (the part about electing delegates [who are they, what they think a good amendment], the part about the actual deliberative assembly [what the delegates vote up or down as amendment proposal], the part of ratification [what the people lobby to have ratified]).

Three Poems

Here are three late poems. I'm hoping to use this blog more, sometime soon--so much going on in life, so much changing. Anyway, these poems are recent, so I'm not sure if they're set. I'm pretty sure the last one should be expanded to include more verses. We'll see. Wishing you peace and joy.


(untitled)

There is bravery in the world, and hope
is its bed. You are gone, while we
now live on with choices made.
I wanted you for us, if only we could
escape who we’ve been for so long.
But truth has shown its face, so it seems
we’ll never again pick the fruit
which used to lie so low.

I wouldn’t have had you laboring with our past,
but out with others whose labors are done.
If there is such thing as mates whose souls were
two halves of one, I suspect we would have
come through this folly
to comfort the will,
which perhaps now
will never be known.
There is bravery in the world,
and hope is its bed.

(untitled)

I suppose I will always love you
though just not in the way I wanted to.
So I’ve lost that hope I so
heartily believed,
where now,
day by day,
that song
becomes a
faded
memory.

Oh that I would have waited until
I was ready--oh that I would have
known much less; but perhaps
we shall meet again one day--perhaps
when we’re older and gray;
where you will understand all I meant,
and what that means then and there,
for you and those you love.
Whereupon we could laugh and carry on,
thanking the stars for that happiness
hidden in their dim and bright mysteries.

(untitled)

Oh that I would see the world,
that in seeing it so,
saves it from what it should not be.
For a rose, it’s form and fragrance,
does not exist to be damned,
its petals ripped
and dispersed to space.
So the earth should
turn in grace,
and the scent it holds
remain in place.
Oh that I would see the world,
that in seeing it so,
saves it from what it should not be.

Late Poem

A Reply To Sonnet 65

I know it’s been noted before how nothing--
not metal, not stone, not even the seas--
hold their own against this globe’s contract with time.

And I know the poet’s love has come and gone
for centuries, only to now shine for
you and me. You the muse, I the lover
who delights in and burns for who you are;
me the big spender of black ink
and unknown pages.

And I know it’s been noted before
that poetry may be nothing but
a facet of adolescence,
nothing but words
next to none care to know.

But I defy that, I forswear it; I renounce it all
and will bring it to its knees with me,
while holding close that
which still lives,
for you.

The First Post

This is the first post to this blog. I posted diaries over on Daily Kos for awhile, but the efforts there in regards to a political science project seemed to have run their course. I've been screwing around on Facebook, and now am wondering if this is the way to go. Of course I need to figure everything out, all the bells and whistles, etc.

Because like most writers and artists I'm fascinated by existence, humanity, and the objective truth as we know it this late moment, I chose a title to reflect that in the sense of consciousness and instinct journeying together on towards a horizon. I have definite ideas about who we are and where we came from, and I hope this blog will do well in articulating those things--alongside of poetry, photography, and whatever else makes its way across my mind. Hope you enjoy.