The Ascetic Ideal as Compared with the Pleasure Principle...

Time Wins

“When the shadow of the sash appeared on the curtains it was between seven and eight o' clock and then I was in time again, hearing the watch. It was Grandfather's and when Father gave it to me he said (Quentin) I give you the mausoleum of all hope and desire; it's rather excruciating-ly apt that you will use it to gain the reducto absurdum of all human experience which can fit your individual needs no better than it fitted his or his father's. I give it to you not that you may remember time, but that you might forget it now and then for a moment and not spend all your breath trying to conquer it. Because no battle is ever won he said. They are not even fought. The field only reveals to man his own folly and despair, and victory is an illusion of philosophers and fools.”  - William Faulkner from the "Quentin" section of  The Sound and the Fury 

My Winter Reading

Finnegan's Wake: An Excerpt

"What then agentlike brought about that tragoady thundersday
this municipal sin business? Our cubehouse still rocks as earwitness
to the thunder of his arafatas but we hear also through successive
ages that shebby choruysh of unkalified muzzlenimiissilehims that
would blackguardise the whitestone ever hurtleturtled out of
heaven. Stay us wherefore in our search for tighteousness, O Sus-
tainer, what time we rise and when we take up to toothmick and
before we lump down upown our leatherbed and in the night and
at the fading of the stars ! For a nod to the nabir is better than wink
to the wabsanti. Otherways wesways like that provost scoffing
bedoueen the jebel and the jpysian sea. Cropherb the crunch-
bracken shall decide. Then we'll know if the feast is a flyday. She
has a gift of seek on site and she allcasually ansars helpers, the
dreamydeary. Heed! Heed !"

[I sort of wish there was an English translation for this language of dreams...]

Riverside, California

The Afterlife

That first vision of green fields...
when as very small children we imagine
endless rolling hills next to a placid lake,
bright continuous sunshine, a few clouds frozen in time,
hovering near a golf course perhaps
or a lawn where a croquet set has been left...
near a large archipelago of pools and mineral baths
peaceful figures slowly meander past in casual white leisure suits;
some old guy on a moped rides off into the woods
maybe a bunch of kids on roller skates are heard ambling along some residential road
in one of those 50's neighborhoods where time stands still
or better yet maybe a parade of grade-schoolers just riding, you know,
riding on their innocent five-speed bikes the way kids do,
toward some always-open convenience store...
as villagers wave from high windows
and a woman stands admiring the view
three other ladies sip tea at a table...
the buzz and hum of a crowded public space with no horns honking...
no traffic jams, no grime, no litter,
no gossip-mongering fools, no savage antagonisms, no predatory stress,
no paparazzi, no surveillance cameras, no enforcers...
flaneurs, yes, pedestrians, yes, eternal vacationers, bien sur...
tables full of quaint souvenirs, clothing, hats, leather belts, shoes, games and books,
scenic vistas, hills, valleys, white-tipped mountains in the distance,
some cows and sheep grazing here and there, a few exotic birds,
tame dogs, cats, rabbits, sheep, a few roaming deer,  impeccably well-behaved,
and a celestial butler, of course,  some elder chap whom everyone calls Morton,
a towel over his arm, keeping tabs, taking notes, dispensing souvenirs and pleasantries...
in charge of scheduling tours and fending off the obvious questions..
this vague and vast, hazy far-away floating island in the clouds...
how many times have we been gathered aloft and transferred there...
to our own cosmic bucolic getaway...
during silent reveries, during long intervals outdoors bathing in light,
during love drives or walks alone thinking the unreachable...
during tumultuous dinner fights and work-related disasters...
extending the sylvan scene as we go...
how when, the older we get, the swerve of mind keeps changing
until age and thought tug us away from the simple meadow on the floating clouds...
until some creeping alternative vision of a long dark sleep
leads us to consider the "blip" of time which swallows all forms
the same way that  bones decay underground
leading us to forsake the infinite extended paradise
for the purity of the brief, unexpected, paltry goodbye.

Andrew Wyeth Understands Winter...