limerence

is but another word for another shade of grey caught between the borders of emotion; something that is, but isn't, lost between the monochromatic ideals of love and hate. It is no more than the flawed product of a futile effort at rationalising human sentiment.

But who am I to say this? I am human too, and it is only within human nature to attempt to make sense of ineffability. Wild and wondering, I have struggled to make sense of my feelings. They are limerent, I am told. Limerence. It is such a cheap word, but I have not found any other that will do.

How else should I explain the unbidden thoughts that encroach upon my consciousness? The constant fussing, the incessant worrying, the sleepless nights, the torment that no one sees nor understands, are you safe? coping with work? warm? are you eating regularly? have you any new friends? found someone else? does he treat you well? are you happy? does anything at all make you think of me? do you even remember me? the clingy, needy stuff that I now hate myself so much for.

You once called me a child; that I may be, but these are not a child's thoughts. Thoughts may be willed into my head, you might say. But what of the unpleasant dreams, which plague me when I find reprieve from sleeplessness?

How else should I describe my erstwhile joy, or my now set-and-festering despair? or my unyielding, misplaced hope - Hope gone wrong - the deceptive thing with feathers, that broods upon my soul - a siren from the depths?

Love, perhaps. I once said that I believed in it. Still do. Just can't prove that it exists. Can't claim to have something when I can't prove its existence. Limerence will have to do for now. Love? I really don't know love at all.

Don't you remember? My fumbling words, shaking hands, the darkness of the bar, the nervous smiles across the table, the music (A Foggy Day In London Town), our awkward affection - don't you remember? At this very moment of my writing, it will have been exactly a year since the beginning of our commitment to a doomed companionship - don't you remember?

You will find me on my knees at the well of memories. Where the wretched kneel to pray.

Won't you look for me?

clouds

- art by Raynex3

Rows and flows of angel hair,
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere -
I've looked at clouds that way

But now they only block the sun,
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done -
But clouds got in my way

I've looked at clouds from both sides now -
From up and down, and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall,
I really don't know clouds at all

Moons and Junes and Ferris wheels,
The dizzy dancing way you feel
As ev'ry fairy tale comes real -
I've looked at love that way

But now it's just another show,
You leave 'em laughing when you go
And if you care, don't let them know,
Don't give yourself away

I've looked at love from both sides now -
From give and take, and still somehow
It's love's illusions I recall,
I really don't know love at all

Tears and fears and feeling proud,
To say "I love you" right out loud
Dreams and schemes and circus crowds -
I've looked at life that way

But now old friends are acting strange,
They shake their heads, they say I've changed
Well something's lost, but something's gained,
In living every day

I've looked at life from both sides now -
From win and lose and still somehow,
It's life's illusions I recall -
I really don't know life at all.

-- Joni Mitchell

ohh this is really sweet.

- Look At This Lovely Hamster

O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a
king of infinite space—were it not that I have bad dreams.

Hamlet Act 2, scene 2, 251–259

-- William Shakespeare

poor man's mocha

is one part Nescafé and as-many-the-hell parts Milo as you please.

One should do as one wishes with the staples in the office pantry, for the defense budget never shrinks, and can surely accommodate my inexplicable cravings for chocolate-flavoured malt drinks and caffeine.

I can't sleep.

Again.

Not with all these memories in my head.

remedy for physical pain is all very well - painkillers I have - a fair amount of leftover panadiene and hydrocodones from past afflictions - they may bring sleep, or even sleep eternal (I am no fool) - but my agonies are mental - come the morning, come any morning, if I see it - it is nepenthe that I need - sweet mythical nepenthe

I need to forget.

privilege of being

- art by TheJFP

Many are making love. Up above, the angels
in the unshaken ether and crystal of human longing
are braiding one another’s hair, which is strawberry blond
and the texture of cold rivers. They glance
down from time to time at the awkward ecstasy—
it must look to them like featherless birds
splashing in the spring puddle of a bed—
and then one woman, she is about to come,
peels back the man’s shut eyelids and says,
look at me, and he does. Or is it the man
tugging the curtain rope in the dark theater?
Anyway, they do, they look at each other;
two beings with evolved eyes, rapacious,
startled, connected at the belly in an unbelievably sweet
lubricious glue, stare at each other,
and the angels are desolate. They hate it. They shudder pathetically
like lithographs of Victorian beggars
with perfect features and alabaster skin hawking rags
in the lewd alleys of the novel.
All of creation is offended by this distress.
It is like the keening sound the moon makes sometimes,
rising. The lovers especially cannot bear it,
it fills them with unspeakable sadness, so that
they close their eyes again and hold each other, each
feeling the mortal singularity of the body
they have enchanted out of death for an hour or so,
and one day, running at sunset, the woman says to the man,
I woke up feeling so sad this morning because I realized
that you could not, as much as I love you,
dear heart, cure my loneliness,
wherewith she touched his cheek to reassure him
that she did not mean to hurt him with this truth.
And the man is not hurt exactly,
he understands that his life has limits, that people
die young, fail at love,
fail of their ambitions. He runs beside her, he thinks
of the sadness they have gasped and crooned their way out of
coming, clutching each other with old, invented
forms of grace and clumsy gratitude, ready
to be alone again, or dissatisfied, or merely
companionable like the couples on the summer beach
reading magazine articles about intimacy between the sexes
to themselves, and to each other,
and to the immense, illiterate, consoling angels.

-- Robert Hass

H/T - 3quarksdaily

I grew up

listening to Clement Freud on the radio. I was Primary 5 when I first heard him as a panelist on Nicolas Parsons' Just A Minute. It was 11 'o clock at night, or was it 10..? Those were the days when the BBC had simply not condescended to us by providing regional programming on the World Service, when one could tune in to radio plays or entire dramas, and even poetry readings over lunch. These wonderful things are all gone, now, on the ostensible charges of being too elitist.

There was a slot for radio comedy at 10 or 11 'o clock at night. It was then when I was first introduced to British comedy (referred affectionately to as BritCom). As a child, I didn't understand very many of the shows immediately, but they proved to be the humble beginnings of a very long love affair. There were several iconic shows which I could not do without - Just A Minute, of course, I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue (chaired by the dear, dear late Humphrey Lyttelton) and predecessor to all things absurdist and Pythonesque, the seminal Goon Show by Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers and Neddy Seacombe. I always slept on time - just so that I could listen to them, and if I missed them, there was always a second broadcast at five in the morning to catch. Internet archiving, alas, had never quite caught on yet. I was a rabid fan.

To what purpose have I written all this? Sir Clement's passing counts as one amongst many of the very last nails that have found their way into the coffin of first-generation BritCom. As an anglophone, I find it tragic when the significance of such events is lost upon all but the faithful few, us faithful few, who have had our lives brightened up by the great work of great men such as Sir Clement.

I suppose, however, that all good things, and good people, must meet their ends.

Clement Freud was a charming individual, a gem of intellect, and an absolute master of deadpan wit. He was a gentleman.

He will be missed.

Obits:
Time 1, 2, | Independent | Guardian | BBC (Stephen Fry) | Daily Mail | Telegraph | A wonderful one by Neil Gaiman

when one door closes

another opens. But not always to one's favour.

An opportunity brings only the promise of reward; it never promises reward. And who are we to know which way the wind blows, so that we may catch it full upon an unfurled sail, to go forth, rudderless, to either our fates or redemption?

I am having a little trouble with my doors. I do not know which of them to close, and which to open; some do not close, and others do not open at all.

I have choices to make, and they are all very hard indeed.

so long and thanks for all the fish

but they need to be renamed, eh?

one of us cannot be wrong

- art by sadir89

I lit a thin green candle
To make you jealous of me,
But the room just filled up with mosquitoes
They heard that my body was free
Then I took the dust of a long sleepless night
And I put it in your little shoe
Then I confess that I tortured the dress
That you wore for the world to look through.

I showed my heart to the doctor
He said I'd just have to quit
Then he wrote himself a prescription
And your name was mentioned in it -
Then he locked himself in a library shelf
With the details of our honeymoon
And I hear from the nurse that hes gotten much worse
And his practice is all in a ruin.

I heard of a saint who had loved you
So I studied all night in his school
He taught that the duty of lovers
Is to tarnish the golden rule,
And just when I was sure that his teachings were pure
He drowned himself in the pool,
His body is gone, but back here on the lawn
His spirit continues to drool.

An Eskimo showed me a movie
He'd recently taken of you
The poor man could hardly stop shivering,
His lips and his fingers were blue
I suppose that he froze when the wind took your clothes
And I guess he just never got warm
But you stand there so nice in your blizzard of ice
Oh please let me come into the storm.

-- Leonard Cohen

choices

Should I

1. Spend $600*, not including expenses, on a trip to Australia to perform the Rite of Spring et al with the fairly established Western Australian Youth Orchestra?
2. Help out in an old friend's independent production of Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by auditioning for the bit parts of Hamlet, Claudius or Polonius?

Comments via usual channels welcome.

a follow-up

of sorts to my last post.

The British press has had a field day.

Some interesting tidbits that didn't make the main outlets:

- Queen gets annoyed with Il Cavaliere.
- Queen gets touchy with Michelle.
- Queen's companion apparently not as gaffe-less as initially thought.
- Quentin Letts outdoes himself in this piece on the Portugese water dog.

NB: I have sunken to such depths as to have taken to trawling the Daily Mail.

Lastly, things were not quite what they seemed behind the scenes at the summit. (ABC)

If true, I'm impressed.

am following

events at the G20.

Sarkozy tickles me. He cuts a comical figure - the big little man trying too hard at being Summit Villain.

And if the presidential motorcade cannot fit Downing Street, one immediately knows that it has got to be American.

Gordon's not on first name terms with Barack anymore; good move. Still as eager as a caffeinated seal though, and putting up a passably fine show. There is breath in him yet.

Give him credit for trying; at least he does. Sarah looks like a fish out of water beside Michelle. Frigid. Cold. Dead.

Tea and biscuits with the Queen. Looking good in pink, Your Majesty. Prince Philip refrained from making any gaffes. Must have been sedated.

Finally, chuckled at Diamond Geezer's April 1st coverage of the protests.

maurice jarre

passed away on the 29th of March, 2009. He was 84.

He wrote music for a great many films, but I will always remember him for his work in the monumental Lawrence of Arabia (which so happens to be one of my favourite films of all time).

A frenzied timpani motif followed by the keening of woodwinds and a lush, yet desolate theme on the strings - that was the first thing that ran through my mind when I heard the news over the BBC in the morning. That, and images of Peter O' Toole robed in white, and Anthony Quinn riding in from the yawning horizon upon a shimmering wave of desert heat.

His music will live on long after his passing.

----
In Concert -
Lawrence of Arabia | Dr Zhivago (Lara's theme) | A Passage To India