{"id":20301,"date":"2018-05-25T11:22:27","date_gmt":"2018-05-25T15:22:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=20301"},"modified":"2018-05-25T11:22:27","modified_gmt":"2018-05-25T15:22:27","slug":"no-other-body-no-other-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2018\/05\/no-other-body-no-other-world\/","title":{"rendered":"No Other Body, No Other World"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Image:<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: “Stringed Relief” (1937), by Henry Moore. Nothing in particular suggested a connection between this image and the theme(s) of today’s post. Yet I would say <\/em>everything in <\/em>general suggests such a connection.]<\/em><\/p>\n

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

It does always seem as though making things — including books — ends up a grand compromise, or at least negotiation, between one’s ambition, visions, or inspiration for them, and the actual manifested result. This can seem disheartening or deflating until one has written enough to know that this isn’t an impediment to the process of creating — it is<\/em> the process. Then one can begin to marvel at the sometimes perverse, often surprising, relation between the imagined and the manifest: it can be engaged, expected, enjoyed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Maggie Nelson [source: none canonical, but I trust <\/em>whiskey river])<\/p>\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Wise men have regarded the earth as a tragedy, a farce, even an illusionist’s trick; but all, if they are truly wise, and not merely intellectual rapists, recognize that it is certainly some kind of stage in which we all play roles, most of us being very poorly coached and totally unrehearsed before the curtain rises. Is it too much if I ask, tentatively, that we agree to look upon it as a circus, a touring carnival wandering about the sun for a record season of four billion years and producing new monsters and miracles, hoaxes and bloody mishaps, wonders and blunders, but never quite entertaining the customers well enough to prevent them from leaving, one by one, and returning to their homes for a long and bored winter’s sleep under the dust?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Robert Anton Wilson [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and (from the commonplace book<\/em><\/a>):<\/p>\n

NOTE: An evening at the theatre. It occurred to me that there is something weird about someone wanting to be someone else. And even more so about someone sitting down for a couple of hours to look at someone they don’t know, pretending to be someone else, talking to someone who is also pretending to be someone else. A dialogue, furthermore, invented by somebody who imagined they were pretending to be each of these in turn.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Alan Fletcher [source: none canonical, but a few references including this one<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Within This Tree<\/strong><\/p>\n

Within this tree
\nanother tree
\ninhabits the same body;
\nwithin this stone
\nanother stone rests,
\nits many shades of gray
\nthe same, its identical
\nsurface and weight.
\nAnd within my body,
\nanother body,
\nwhose history, waiting,
\nsings: there is no other body<\/em>,
\nit sings,
\nthere is no other world<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Jane Hirshfield [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

From neither whiskey river<\/em>, nor its commonplace book:<\/p>\n

“The Perfect World”<\/strong>
\n(excerpt)<\/em><\/p>\n

It is a perfect world, a world of consummate excellence, a world of supreme wonders, the ripest fruit in God\u2019s garden, the master-thought of the universe.<\/p>\n

But why should I be here, O God, I a green seed of unfulfilled passion, a mad tempest that seeketh neither east nor west, a bewildered fragment from a burnt planet?<\/p>\n

Why am I here, O God of lost souls, thou who art lost amongst the gods?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Kahlil Gibran [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

The Map of the World Confused with Its Territory<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a drawer I found a map of the world,
\nfolded into eighths and then once again
\nand each country bore the wrong name because
\nthe map of the world is an orphanage.<\/p>\n

The edges of the earth had a margin
\nas frayed as the hem of the falling night
\nand a crease moved down toward the center of
\nthe earth, halving the identical stars.<\/p>\n

Every river ran with its thin blue
\nbrother out from the heart of a country:
\nthere cedars twisted toward the southern sky
\nand reeds plumed eastward like an augur\u2019s pens.<\/p>\n

No dates on the wrinkles of that broad face,
\nno slow grinding of mountains and sand, for—
\nall at once, like a knife on a whetstone—
\nthe map of the world spoke in snakes and tongues.<\/p>\n

The hard-topped roads of the western suburbs
\nand the distant lights of the capitol
\neach pull away from the yellowed beaches
\nand step into the lost sea of daybreak.<\/p>\n

The map of the world is a canvas turning
\naway from the painter\u2019s ink-stained hands
\nwhile the pigments cake in their little glass
\njars and the brushes grow stiff with forgetting.<\/p>\n

There is no model, shy and half-undressed,
\nno open window and flickering lamp,
\nyet someone has left this sealed blue letter,
\nthis gypsy\u2019s bandana on the darkening<\/p>\n

Table, each corner held down by a conch
\nshell. What does the body remember at
\ndusk? That the palms of the hands are a map
\nof the world, erased and drawn again and<\/p>\n

Again, then covered with rivers and earth.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Susan Stewart [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

Our senses define the edge of consciousness, and because we are born explorers and questors after the unknown, we spend a lot of our lives pacing that windswept perimeter: We take drugs; we go to circuses; we tramp through jungles; we listen to loud music; we purchase exotic fragrances; we pay hugely for culinary novelties, and are even willing to risk our lives to sample a new taste. In Japan, chefs offer the flesh of the puffer fish, or fugu<\/em>, which is highly poisonous unless prepared with exquisite care. The most distinguished chefs leave just enough of the poison in the flesh to make the diners\u2019 lips tingle, so that they know how close they are coming to their mortality. Sometimes, of course, a diner comes too<\/em> close, and each year a certain number of fugu<\/em>-lovers die in midmeal.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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

[Image: “Stringed Relief” (1937), by Henry Moore. Nothing in particular suggested a connection between this image and the theme(s) of today’s post. Yet I would say everything in general suggests such a connection.] From whiskey river: It does always seem as though making things — including books — ends up a grand compromise, or at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20311,"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":"Jane Hirshfield, Diane Ackerman, et al. 'No Other Body, No Other World'","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":[247,1393,250,5,50,251,4159],"tags":[270,1254,1438,1477,3061,4383,4732,4733,4734,4735],"class_list":{"0":"post-20301","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ruminations","8":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","9":"category-art","10":"category-06_writing","11":"category-language-writing_cat","12":"category-poetry-writing_cat","13":"category-essays","14":"tag-jane-hirshfield","15":"tag-kahlil-gibran","16":"tag-diane-ackerman","17":"tag-alan-fletcher","18":"tag-robert-anton-wilson","19":"tag-susan-stewart","20":"tag-henry-moore","21":"tag-mind-body-and-vice-versa","22":"tag-what-to-believe","23":"tag-what-not-to-believe","24":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/stringedrelief_henrymoore_thumb.jpg?fit=600%2C446&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-5hr","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20301","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=20301"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20301\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20314,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20301\/revisions\/20314"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}