{"id":22357,"date":"2020-03-27T12:47:40","date_gmt":"2020-03-27T16:47:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=22357"},"modified":"2020-03-27T12:49:21","modified_gmt":"2020-03-27T16:49:21","slug":"tonight-id-really-like-not-to-choose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2020\/03\/tonight-id-really-like-not-to-choose\/","title":{"rendered":"Tonight, I’d Really Like Not to Choose"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

[Image: sculpture in black iron, <\/em>Durante o Sono (“During Sleep”) by Rui Chafes. (Photo by Pedro Ribeiro Sim\u00f5es, found on Flickr<\/a> and used here under a Creative Commons License — thank you!) The photographer’s description of this work says, among other things: “The equilibrium is presented as being solid, but unexpected; the ratio of the image of weight to that of fragility is inverted, the question of gravity is raised. Might the title, <\/em>Durante o Sono, refer to a nightmare moment? Does this organism represent the dream itself? Or a frightening perception of its strangeness?”]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

There’s more than one way to be a person. Actually, there are more than two or three ways. You’d think that was obvious, but I find that often it is not. The world is essentially a collection of teams. Life is a process of deciding which ones we’re going to join.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Meghan Daum [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for this reclusiveness — I think of it as profoundly helpful to my work. Darkness, silence and solitude, by throwing their heavy cloaks over my shoulders, have forced me to recreate all the light, all the music and the joys of nature and society in myself. My spiritual being no longer comes up against the barriers of the visible world and nothing hampers its freedom…<\/p>

When by chance a thin ray of sunlight manages to slip in here… my whole being, like the ancient statue of Memnon, that gave out harmonious sounds when the rays of the rising sun struck it, bursts with joy, and I feel myself transported into realms of radiant light…<\/p>

I have tried to follow life itself, in which unsuspected aspects of a person suddenly reveal themselves to our eyes. — We live alongside people, thinking we know them. All that’s missing is the incident that will make them suddenly appear other than we knew them to be…<\/p>

Throughout our lives we have alongside us like a fellow prisoner shackled by the same chain, a man who is different from our physical self — You see, when you think of yourself, you create a certain idea of yourself. And when one looks in a glass, the mirror reflects our real image. — The other was a stranger — It was the spiritual self. — Well, it is this one alone that matters to me.<\/p>

I only consider my objective self (take this word in the sense meant by philosophers) as an experimental instrument which has no inherent interest but that links me to my spiritual side so that I can penetrate certain realities and especially the shadowy areas of consciousness on which I try to throw light —<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Marcel Proust [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Bookstall<\/strong><\/p>

Just looking at them
I grow greedy, as if they were
freshly baked loaves
waiting on their shelves
to be broken open—that one
and that—and I make my choice
in a mood of exalted luck,
browsing among them
like a cow in sweetest pasture.<\/p>

For life is continuous
as long as they wait
to be read—these inked paths
opening into the future, page
after page, every book
its own receding horizon.
And I hold them, one in each hand,
a curious ballast weighting me
here to the earth.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Linda Pastan [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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

Agoraphobia<\/strong>
(excerpt)<\/em><\/p>

2.<\/p>

Though I cannot leave this house,   
I have memorized the view
from every window—
23 framed landscapes, containing   
each nuance of weather and light.   
And I know the measure
of every room, not as a prisoner   
pacing a cell
but as the embryo knows
the walls of the womb, free
to swim as its body tells it, to nudge   
the softly fleshed walls,
dreading only the moment
of contraction when it will be forced   
into the gaudy world.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Linda Pastan [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…and:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alone! I really seem to be pitying myself for it!<\/p>

“If you live all alone,” [my mentor] Brague has told me, it’s because you’re willing to, isn’t it?”<\/p>

Of course I’m “willing to,” and in fact I just plain want<\/em> to. Only, here it is\u2026 There are some days when solitude, for a person of my age, is an intoxicating wine wine that makes you drunk with freedom, other days when it’s a bitter tonic, and still other days when it is a poison that makes you bang your head on the wall. <\/p>

Tonight, I’d really like not to choose. I’d like to be satisfied with hesitating, with being unable to tell whether the shiver that will come over me as I slip between my cold sheets will be one of fear or one of comfort.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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

…and:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

25. The Solitude of Night<\/strong><\/p>

It was at a wine party.
I lay in a drowse, knowing it not.
The blown flowers fell and filled my lap.
When I arose, still drunken,
The birds had all gone to their nests,
And there remained but few of my comrades.
I went along the river—alone in the moonlight.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Li Po [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…and:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nothing Happened in 1999<\/strong> <\/p>

A king did not die, a president
was not acquitted, a balloon
did not fly around the world
in twenty days, at 84
with white hair, Joe DiMaggio
was not mourned. And air strikes
launched street to street
in order to bring peace, or
a doctor convicted of doctoring
death? No, and no, nothing
happened, except flowers purple
the year before bloomed
white, but no viruses named
after women spread across
the globe, and the word
“columbine” did not enter
the consciousness of a nation.
What about the bomb
that made a mistake, or the famous
son of a famous president
mistaking the ocean for the sky?
That year, the weather was
unpredictable, that happened,
and if anything else did,
like shots fired at people
praying, no one heard them,
and if people prayed for war
to become holy, those prayers
went unanswered. In Turkey,
the ground split open and
the 17,000 who would die, let\u2019s say,
miraculously, they did not, not
in 1999, the year two lifelong
enemies shook hands and said
there will be peace, but
their palms never touched, why
lie about that? Let\u2019s say
the child from Cuba arrived
not an orphan but with his mother,
who loved and did not sink into
the sea. Let\u2019s not talk
about rampages, disasters,
conflicts or coupes that never
ruined a perfectly good year
during which the sun shined
on the moon, the earth,
and six billion who, for once,
got everything right and not
a single thing wrong.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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

[Image: sculpture in black iron, Durante o Sono (“During Sleep”) by Rui Chafes. (Photo by Pedro Ribeiro Sim\u00f5es, found on Flickr and used here under a Creative Commons License — thank you!) The photographer’s description of this work says, among other things: “The equilibrium is presented as being solid, but unexpected; the ratio of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22364,"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":"Marcel Proust, Collette, Linda Pastan, et al.: 'Tonight, I'd Really Like Not to Choose'","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":[247,1393,250,5,4878,36,251,4159],"tags":[1812,3266,3478,4938,5096,5097,5098,5099,5100],"class_list":{"0":"post-22357","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-fiction","12":"category-reading","13":"category-poetry-writing_cat","14":"category-essays","15":"tag-linda-pastan","16":"tag-marcel-proust","17":"tag-collette","18":"tag-hayan-charara","19":"tag-meghan-daum","20":"tag-li-po","21":"tag-social-distancing","22":"tag-the-illusion-of-distancing","23":"tag-resistance-to-distancing","24":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/duringsleep_ruichafes_thumb.jpg?fit=496%2C800&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-5OB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22357","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=22357"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22368,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22357\/revisions\/22368"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}