10-31-2023, 11:02 PM
Never did drugs with any romantic partners. Once upon a time, my great love when I was about 25, Reggie, found out I had a tab of LSD. She wanted to be my "guide", but I suspected she had an agenda after she said "It's like truth serum". Anyway one night when my housemate was gone, a Sunday night, on a whim, I took it alone. I'd never done acid alone before.
I lived in a pretty rundown house in East Austin, a somewhat iffy part of town. There was a full moon. I don't remember much, except when it first hit, I ended up sitting in a fetal position on the livingroom floor, laughing hysterically. I migrated to the bed, lay staring at the full moon, thinking about how I'd stolen Reggie from a guy who had been my supervisor at the library where we all worked, and laughing that I'd come out on top for once. I actually respected the guy a lot, he was a poet who published a magazine called Interstate, even though he didn't seem to respect me very much. He was married and Reggie was his extra girl. It took a couple of years, but I had my short time romance with Reggie. My only other vision was a rat tightroping across an electric wire from the detached garage into our attic.
Reggie was hurt that I hadn't let her be in on it. I think she dropped me pretty soon after that. So I guess it was a bad move, but I wanted to see God alone. Or at least I didn't trust her motives. And I did see God in the form of a rat. Or myself. Or something. Wrote an early poem about that too.
One of my favorite lines from Self-reliance was the one about being the devil's child. Not one of the great lines, but showed he had a sense of humor:
On my saying, What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I live wholly from within? my friend suggested, — “But these impulses may be from below, not from above.” I replied, “They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil’s child, I will live then from the Devil.”
I saw that Ashbery has TWO Collected Poems (1951-1987 & 1991-2000) in the Library of America, both almost 1,000 pages. Must be some really long poems in that second volume. I don't think I can immerse myself to that extent, but I may get his Selected Poems. I need something New and Strange right now.
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I'm finding that facing a life threatening dis-ease (possibly, it's early in the game I'll be playing for the next few months with doctors, lab tests and my own instinct for self-preservation) I'm actually having moments of inner peace that I haven't experienced before. Of course, no one really believes they are going to die, once it comes down to it. There's always something hopeful to grab hold of. Or you simply exhaust your mind, taking it as far as you can know/go.
I asked the I Ching specifically what hopes I should be nurturing and I got the "Peace" hexagram, which of course can be read in two very different ways.
It's finally autumn here. And I saw my first flock of starlings. Cold is a good remedy for anxiety. Just keeping warm leaves little time for choking (where the word anxiety originated).
____________________________________________
I watched a good exorcist film recently, Deliver Us from Evil, mainly worth watching for Sean Harris' possessed Iraq war veteran. I originally watched it because I'm a bit gay for Eric Bana. But the exorcism scene is worth sitting through the film for.
I lived in a pretty rundown house in East Austin, a somewhat iffy part of town. There was a full moon. I don't remember much, except when it first hit, I ended up sitting in a fetal position on the livingroom floor, laughing hysterically. I migrated to the bed, lay staring at the full moon, thinking about how I'd stolen Reggie from a guy who had been my supervisor at the library where we all worked, and laughing that I'd come out on top for once. I actually respected the guy a lot, he was a poet who published a magazine called Interstate, even though he didn't seem to respect me very much. He was married and Reggie was his extra girl. It took a couple of years, but I had my short time romance with Reggie. My only other vision was a rat tightroping across an electric wire from the detached garage into our attic.
Reggie was hurt that I hadn't let her be in on it. I think she dropped me pretty soon after that. So I guess it was a bad move, but I wanted to see God alone. Or at least I didn't trust her motives. And I did see God in the form of a rat. Or myself. Or something. Wrote an early poem about that too.
One of my favorite lines from Self-reliance was the one about being the devil's child. Not one of the great lines, but showed he had a sense of humor:
On my saying, What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I live wholly from within? my friend suggested, — “But these impulses may be from below, not from above.” I replied, “They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil’s child, I will live then from the Devil.”
I saw that Ashbery has TWO Collected Poems (1951-1987 & 1991-2000) in the Library of America, both almost 1,000 pages. Must be some really long poems in that second volume. I don't think I can immerse myself to that extent, but I may get his Selected Poems. I need something New and Strange right now.
________________________________________________________________________________
I'm finding that facing a life threatening dis-ease (possibly, it's early in the game I'll be playing for the next few months with doctors, lab tests and my own instinct for self-preservation) I'm actually having moments of inner peace that I haven't experienced before. Of course, no one really believes they are going to die, once it comes down to it. There's always something hopeful to grab hold of. Or you simply exhaust your mind, taking it as far as you can know/go.
I asked the I Ching specifically what hopes I should be nurturing and I got the "Peace" hexagram, which of course can be read in two very different ways.
It's finally autumn here. And I saw my first flock of starlings. Cold is a good remedy for anxiety. Just keeping warm leaves little time for choking (where the word anxiety originated).
____________________________________________
I watched a good exorcist film recently, Deliver Us from Evil, mainly worth watching for Sean Harris' possessed Iraq war veteran. I originally watched it because I'm a bit gay for Eric Bana. But the exorcism scene is worth sitting through the film for.