Chopin waltz abandoned on music stand
until it is not: I return to it. I wonder why
my fingers feel free playing "Bemsha Swing" but not
Chopin.
If you ask someone their favorite word
they will say love, not their favorite word
at all (if you ask me) but some pet idea;
they will never say naif or another
word quirky or fun to pronounce.
The same with sentences, they will
offer you a sentence that they endorse
but not one that has an interesting ring to it
like Beckett's "Je dors peu, et le peu que je dors,
je le dors le jour."
The idea that
if you could just adopt the proper attitude
toward everything, find not just terminology
but the right tone of voice to say those words,
that would settle things. Tweak your damn verbiage
and you'll do fine!
A recitation of a poem
is a musical performance, I read in a book on
Arabic Poetics. If so, what bad musicians you are,
poets and literary critics, actors.
***
Zen cured my earworm: there are still tunes
rattling around in the rafters, but they aren't
bothersome. Anxiety, too,
is just a normal emotion waxing
and waning. An anxiety
disorder is just giving too much importance to these
ebbs and flows. Is insomnia just
the fear of insomnia? Nothing in itself?
The relief at falling asleep can only be felt
on waking up, refreshed,
if even then: often the waking will be groggy.
Often, I'll only know I've slept
if I have also dreamt. That is my measuring rod.
***
I think of the absurdly detailed instruction manual
for the new water bottle, in several languages. My instruction
would be "fill, drink."
***
Why does prosaic mean dull? Where does my fear
of "flat" language come from? Why does bacon
sizzle in the pan?
***
I don't like those little "lyrical moments" but often I have wondered
why bacon sizzles in the pan. What is vibrating, exactly? I understand
the vibrating drum head, how it moves the air, but not
the bacon, yet it seems dumb to ask.
I wonder
why I don't like most poetry I read. I wait for packages to arrive,
books I've ordered myself. Many are disappointments,
nobody's fault.
My observational skills aren't great,
I've noticed. I don't have little epiphany puffs
just sometimes a funny phrase will pop into my head.