scarved and scarf-carved
Oct. 1st, 2001 09:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aslanton cold clear windy sunday morning we went to the mount auburn cemetary, with its long curving paths all labelled with botanical names. we visited longfellow; mary baker eddy and her open-domed marble rotunda on halcyon lake; countless others less famous. saddest were the little marble-carved headstones of the children, with lambs or angels that had eroded into faceless creatures more like prehistoric horses. short snouted bowlegged creations making eyes up at us. their ages listed in months. in cemetaries i always think the causes of death should be listed.
the caretaker offered us information at the gate. he warned c's sister away from running on the grounds. no biking and no picnics and no frisbees. long cadillacs drove past us, the old faces of men inside glaring at us, the invading pedestrians. consulting the map of the dead. peering into a family mausoleum house that contained neat drawers of bones and, in the dim light, one table and one chair where the living or dead must sit to collect their thoughts.
everywhere i saw barnards. (i remember seeing my great grandfather's grave in canada, the odd sight of my father's own name on a gravestone. the land of the giant penny; driving around mining company houses with xenia and ed.)
we walked and i collected shiny acorns, long skinny ones and short glossy black oak ones. i looked in vain for a chestnut tree but found none. perhaps the spiky shells are too volatile for the grounds? like smith, all the trees were labelled. yews, black oaks, willows, ginkos.
on the return.more.blackest moodness. i cannot begin to explain. that night i tried to write it all out in the paper journal, ended up with several confused pages of wanderings. who am i angry at? where did i lose my optimism? we've got to get ourselves back to the garden.
the rage is in my blood. i've lost the oilslick, nothing slides off me. everything jibes ill and close to the nerves. no insulate between fist and bone.
i dreamt of sprinting after a mother who abandoned her twins in my bed. the large eyes. they turned into kittens. i desperately voice to the kitchen mother: ma dov'e andata? e' scapata via, ha lasciato (i want to say dietro but i know that's incorrect)...e' scapata via. she nods sagely, vaguely, disinterested in my panic. the dim yellow light of the rooms close and low like an incubator.
i dreamt of visiting my uncle. we descend a long narrow staircase pretending we can see little children on either side of us. but downstairs we find them everywhere, playing disconsolately and staring at us in dark bewilderment. i realize the ceilings stretch up and out for miles. an uncontained room. the walls, i then see, are covered in patches and tatters of boards and tarps, concealing the blackness below. i realize this orphanage is in the house of leaves. i look everywhere in sudden comprehension. i scream and scream until i wake up, but i was waiting for it, expectant.
read bits of the sunday times this morning. brief and nearly brittle discussion (walking that line, toeing it, gritting my teeth) on the draft, on conscientious objector status. lorde comes to mind. is c.o. status an attempt to dismantle the master's house with the master's tools? i do not know. the "flag fever: the paradox of patriotism" quote that made me snap my fingers in agreement: "for other americans, not just those whose enthnicity make them feel coerced by patriotism, the proliferation of flags and "god bless america" signage can seem a bit too simplistic, a feel-good distraction from trying to understand a monstrously precise act of simultaneous suicide" (4:5). precisely that: it strikes me as an easy out.
the highway sign at the intersection of huron and fresh pond still flashes god bless america and united we stand and something else about road courtesy. flags everywhere, the permanence of three colors behind the eyes, on every lawn and stoop. the simplistic gestures of brotherhood. is irony dead? i mock this sort of intellectual jackoff essay material, but it might be true.
jingoism: [n] extreme nationalism marked especially by belligerent foreign policy.
the caretaker offered us information at the gate. he warned c's sister away from running on the grounds. no biking and no picnics and no frisbees. long cadillacs drove past us, the old faces of men inside glaring at us, the invading pedestrians. consulting the map of the dead. peering into a family mausoleum house that contained neat drawers of bones and, in the dim light, one table and one chair where the living or dead must sit to collect their thoughts.
everywhere i saw barnards. (i remember seeing my great grandfather's grave in canada, the odd sight of my father's own name on a gravestone. the land of the giant penny; driving around mining company houses with xenia and ed.)
we walked and i collected shiny acorns, long skinny ones and short glossy black oak ones. i looked in vain for a chestnut tree but found none. perhaps the spiky shells are too volatile for the grounds? like smith, all the trees were labelled. yews, black oaks, willows, ginkos.
on the return.more.blackest moodness. i cannot begin to explain. that night i tried to write it all out in the paper journal, ended up with several confused pages of wanderings. who am i angry at? where did i lose my optimism? we've got to get ourselves back to the garden.
the rage is in my blood. i've lost the oilslick, nothing slides off me. everything jibes ill and close to the nerves. no insulate between fist and bone.
i dreamt of sprinting after a mother who abandoned her twins in my bed. the large eyes. they turned into kittens. i desperately voice to the kitchen mother: ma dov'e andata? e' scapata via, ha lasciato (i want to say dietro but i know that's incorrect)...e' scapata via. she nods sagely, vaguely, disinterested in my panic. the dim yellow light of the rooms close and low like an incubator.
i dreamt of visiting my uncle. we descend a long narrow staircase pretending we can see little children on either side of us. but downstairs we find them everywhere, playing disconsolately and staring at us in dark bewilderment. i realize the ceilings stretch up and out for miles. an uncontained room. the walls, i then see, are covered in patches and tatters of boards and tarps, concealing the blackness below. i realize this orphanage is in the house of leaves. i look everywhere in sudden comprehension. i scream and scream until i wake up, but i was waiting for it, expectant.
read bits of the sunday times this morning. brief and nearly brittle discussion (walking that line, toeing it, gritting my teeth) on the draft, on conscientious objector status. lorde comes to mind. is c.o. status an attempt to dismantle the master's house with the master's tools? i do not know. the "flag fever: the paradox of patriotism" quote that made me snap my fingers in agreement: "for other americans, not just those whose enthnicity make them feel coerced by patriotism, the proliferation of flags and "god bless america" signage can seem a bit too simplistic, a feel-good distraction from trying to understand a monstrously precise act of simultaneous suicide" (4:5). precisely that: it strikes me as an easy out.
the highway sign at the intersection of huron and fresh pond still flashes god bless america and united we stand and something else about road courtesy. flags everywhere, the permanence of three colors behind the eyes, on every lawn and stoop. the simplistic gestures of brotherhood. is irony dead? i mock this sort of intellectual jackoff essay material, but it might be true.
jingoism: [n] extreme nationalism marked especially by belligerent foreign policy.
