{"id":17077,"date":"2015-08-07T13:16:21","date_gmt":"2015-08-07T17:16:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=17077"},"modified":"2015-08-07T13:16:21","modified_gmt":"2015-08-07T17:16:21","slug":"to-be-not-to-be-or-barely-to-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2015\/08\/to-be-not-to-be-or-barely-to-be\/","title":{"rendered":"To Be, Not to Be, or Barely to Be?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"'unbeing<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: “unbeing dead isn’t being alive,” by Nicole Pierce on Flickr<\/a>. (Used under a Creative Commons license.) The title of this image alludes, apparently, to a quotation by E.E. Cummings — it’s quoted <\/em>everywhere on the Web — but no one ever says exactly what work it comes from. Maybe he muttered it in his sleep?]\n<\/em><\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n

Form is certainty. All nature knows this, and we have no greater adviser. Clouds have forms, porous and shape-shifting, bumptious, fleecy. They are what clouds need to be, to be clouds. See a flock of them come, on the sled of the wind, all kneeling above the blue sea. And in the blue water, see the dolphin built to leap, the sea mouse skittering, see the ropy kelp with its air-filled bladders tugging it upward; see the albatross floating day after day on its three-jointed wings. Each form sets a tone, enables a destiny, strikes a note in the universe unlike any other. How can we ever stop looking? How can we ever turn away?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Mary Oliver)<\/p>\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Statistically, the probability of any one of us being here is so small that you’d think the mere fact of existing would keep us all in a contented dazzlement of surprise.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Lewis Thomas)<\/p>\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Late Hours<\/strong><\/p>\n

On summer nights the world
\nmoves within earshot
\non the interstate with its swish
\nand growl, and occasional siren
\nthat sends chills through us.
\nSometimes, on clear, still nights,
\nvoices float into our bedroom,
\nlunar and fragmented,
\nas if the sky had let them go
\nlong before our birth.<\/p>\n

In winter we close the windows
\nand read Chekhov,
\nnearly weeping for his world.<\/p>\n

What luxury, to be so happy
\nthat we can grieve
\nover imaginary lives.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Lisel Mueller)<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

The Art of Being<\/strong><\/p>\n

The fern in the rain breathes the silver message.
\nStay, lie low. Play your dark reeds
\nand relearn the beauty of absorption.
\nThere is nothing beyond the rotten log
\ncovered with leaves and needles.
\nForget the light emerging with its golden wick.
\nRaise your face to the water-laden frond.
\nA thousand blossoms will fall into your arms.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Anne Coray [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

Wight<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the dark we disappear, pure being.
\nOur mirror images, impure being.<\/p>\n

Being and becoming (Heidegger), being and
\nnothingness (Sartre)—which is purer being?<\/p>\n

Being alone is no way to be: thus
\nloneliness is the test of pure being.<\/p>\n

Nights in love I fell too far or not quite
\nfar enough—one pure, one impure being.<\/p>\n

Clouds, snow, mist, the dragon’s breath on water,
\nsmoke from fire—a metaphor’s pure being.<\/p>\n

Stillness and more stillness and the light locked
\ndeep inside—both pure and impure being.<\/p>\n

Is is the verb of being, I the noun—
\nor pronoun for the purists of being.<\/p>\n

I was, I am, I looked within and saw
\nnothing very clearly: purest being.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Stanley Plumly [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

The universe today is cold; the various forces and patterns of matter are structures frozen into the fabric of the vacuum. We are far from the extreme heat in the aftermath of the Big Bang, but if we were to heat everything up, the patterns and structures would disappear. Atoms and the patterns of Mendeleev’s table have meaning only at temperatures below about 10,000\u00b0; above this temperature atoms are ionized into a plasma of electrons and nuclear particles as in the Sun. At even hotter temperatures, the patterns enshrined in the Standard Model of particles and forces, where the electron is in a family of leptons, with families of quarks and disparate forces, do not survive the heat. Already at energies above 100 GeV, which if ubiquitous would correspond to temperatures exceeding 1015<\/sup> degrees, the electromagnetic force and the weak force that controls beta-radioactivity melt into a symmetric sameness. Theories that describe matter and forces as we see them in the cold imply that all these structures will melt away in the heat. According to theory, the pattern of particles and forces that we are governed by may be randomly frozen accidental remnants of symmetry breaking when the universe ‘froze’ at a temperature of about 1017<\/sup> degrees. We are like the pencil that landed pointing north, or the roulette wheel where the ball landed in the slot that enabled life to arise. Had the ball landed elsewhere, such that the mass of the electron were greater, or the weak force weaker, then we would have been losers in the lottery and life would not have occurred.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Frank Close [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not a religious person but<\/strong><\/p>\n

God sent an angel. One of his least qualified, though. Fluent only in
\nLemme get back to you. The angel sounded like me, early twenties,
\nunpaid interning. Proficient in fetching coffee, sending super
\nvague emails. It got so bad God personally had to speak to me.
\nThis was annoying because I\u2019m not a religious person. I thought
\nI\u2019d made this clear to God by reading Harry Potter & not attending
\nchurch except for gay weddings. God did not listen to me. God is
\nnot a good listener. I said Stop it please, I\u2019ll give you wedding cake,
\nmoney, candy, marijuana. Go talk to married people, politicians,
\nchildren, reality TV stars. I\u2019ll even set up a booth for you,
\nthen everyone who wants to talk to you can do so
\nwithout the stuffy house of worship, the stuffier middlemen,
\n& the football blimps that accidentally intercept prayers
\non their way to heaven. I\u2019ll keep the booth decorations simple
\nbut attractive: stickers of angels & cats, because I\u2019m not religious
\nbut didn\u2019t people worship cats? Thing is, God couldn\u2019t take a hint.
\nMy doctor said to eat an apple every day. My best friend said to stop
\nsleeping with guys with messiah complexes. My mother said she is
\npretty sure she had sex with my father so I can\u2019t be some new
\nAsian Jesus. I tried to enrage God by saying things like When I asked
\nmy mother about you, she was in the middle of making dinner
\nso she just said Too busy. I tried to confuse God by saying I am
\na made-up dinosaur & a real dinosaur & who knows maybe
\nI love you, but then God ended up relating to me. God said I am
\na good dinosaur but also sort of evil & sometimes loving no one.
\nIt rained & we stayed inside. Played a few rounds of backgammon.
\nWe used our indoor voices. It got so quiet I asked God
\nabout the afterlife. Its existence, human continued existence.
\nHe said Oh. That. Then sent his angel again. Who said Ummmmmmm.
\nI never heard from God or his rookie angel after that. I miss them.
\nLike creatures I made up or found in a book, then got to know a bit.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Chen Chen [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “unbeing dead isn’t being alive,” by Nicole Pierce on Flickr. (Used under a Creative Commons license.) The title of this image alludes, apparently, to a quotation by E.E. Cummings — it’s quoted everywhere on the Web — but no one ever says exactly what work it comes from. Maybe he muttered it in his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[247,1393,95,250,5,36,251,324,372],"tags":[595,1140,2023,2314,2813,3910,4124,4125,4126,4127],"class_list":{"0":"post-17077","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ruminations","7":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","8":"category-science-medicine","9":"category-art","10":"category-06_writing","11":"category-reading","12":"category-poetry-writing_cat","13":"category-researchresources","14":"category-style-and-craft","15":"tag-mary-oliver","16":"tag-ee-cummings","17":"tag-lewis-thomas","18":"tag-lisel-mueller","19":"tag-the-universe","20":"tag-stanley-plumly","21":"tag-anne-coray","22":"tag-frank-close","23":"tag-chen-chen","24":"tag-being","25":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-4rr","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17077"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17077\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17085,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17077\/revisions\/17085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}