Thursday, May 17, 2012

Away for a lengthy weekend


   I am away for a few days
   with some pressing seasonal
   commitments. I wish readers
   to know I feel very content 
   to leave the page with you.


    














Wednesday, May 16, 2012

What we mean when we say, Derek is Canadian


In what feels like one of the authen-tically Wildean moments in Stephen Fry's film on the unforgotten dram-atist - another being the presenta-tion of Jude Law's molded eloquents - he is introducing his devoted friend Robbie Ross on a stroll through the park as, "Canadian, you can tell by his youth." A tumblrist friend and gracious resource of this page - discoverer of our intrepid marginal explorer, Dickie Hakluyt - Derek admits to that nationality as well as its actuarial idiosyncrasy, but his tumblr bears such finish of Hibernian irony that condescension to these charms is summarily rebuffed. We treat with mischief, then, a mischievous new presence.


                  

















Stephen Fry, director
  and screenwriter
Wilde
BBC, Capitol Films, 1997©


i-iii  beggars would ride



Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Who will account to him for what is done in his name?





We take it for granted,
that every man has his
price. But what is the
going rate for a boy,
these days? We've not
only left stark crimes
unaccounted for, from
the previous Presidency.
We've continued them
and expanded upon them,
with such technology as
drones, and one unpub-
lished Executive Order
after another, for ag-
gressive war. 

Now we hear that the
young, "the base," are
to be palliated as if
so many bashful child-
ren, set free to grow
up queer and cheery.




They are said to be
expected to be re-
vitalised by this am-
iable treat, in their
natural adulation for
a sympathetic mentor.
And where did this
congenital disposition
come from, I wonder,
if not where every-
thing congenital does?
exploitation of the soc-
cer mom?

Why fear gay marriage,
indeed. Why fear youth,
if the White House is
right. But my own dog
can tell when he's
being seduced by a bis-
cuit, and can't be dis-
tracted forever.




I happen to anticipate
that the young, who are
more fluent in reconcil-
ing themselves to the
blamelessness of being 
gay than their mid-life
predecessors have said,
are more interested in
remedies for the crimes
conducted in their name
than they are in being
assured they're not a
criminal. They are not,
moreover, the source of
shame which attaches to
their citizenship, and
of guilt which attaches
to the conduct pursued
in their name by their
nation. They know who is,
and my feeling is that
this perception is what
deflates their hopes of
2008. Maybe the President
will try to shave a few
more points for them, in
the loan reduction bill
he'll never pass. 















Sunday, May 13, 2012

A question about art ii


Before we light the fire, let's make 
a piece of Art and burn it. Every-
thing must go. What we are, what 
we do. Let's not be too serious
about it.

a proposal lately considered
at a page often referenced here

My response to hypotheses like these is always a little guarded, even knowing (as we all do) that the ultimate disposition of existence may be as tidy as they suggest. My interest is in that middle ground of things, where narrative has some liberty and necessity to draw breath, where our arguably vain little projects of investigation can sufficiently be absorbed by the mechanisms and matter of experience as to occupy the senses with some notion of what is being destroyed all the while, even as they may refresh with continuing distraction by their charm. Immolation can perform its dour corrective any time.






















  Meanwhile, I mark another
  gratifying occasion of
  stimulation by a cultiv-
  ated mind, and celebrate
  its extract as I go.