What happened that night? Your final night. Double, treble exposure Over everything. Late afternoon, Friday, My last sight of you alive. Burning your letter to me, in the ashtray, With that strange smile. Had I bungled your plan? Had it surprised me sooner than you purposed? Had I rushed it back to you too promptly? One hour later—-you would have been gone Where I could not have traced you. I would have turned from your locked red door That nobody would open Still holding your letter, A thunderbolt that could not earth itself. That would have been electric shock treatment For me. Repeated over and over, all weekend, As often as I read it, or thought of it. That would have remade my brains, and my life. The treatment that you planned needed some time. I cannot imagine How I would have got through that weekend. I cannot imagine. Had you plotted it all? Your note reached me too soon—-that same day, Friday afternoon, posted in the morning. The prevalent devils expedited it. That was one more straw of ill-luck Drawn against you by the Post-Office And added to your load. I moved fast, Through the snow-blue, February, London twilight. Wept with relief when you opened the door. A huddle of riddles in solution. Precocious tears That failed to interpret to me, failed to divulge Their real import. But what did you say Over the smoking shards of that letter So carefully annihilated, so calmly, That let me release you, and leave you To blow its ashes off your plan—-off the ashtray Against which you would lean for me to read The Doctor’s phone-number. My escape Had become such a hunted thing Sleepless, hopeless, all its dreams exhausted, Only wanting to be recaptured, only Wanting to drop, out of its vacuum. Two days of dangling nothing. Two days gratis. Two days in no calendar, but stolen From no world, Beyond actuality, feeling, or name. My love-life grabbed it. My numbed love-life With its two mad needles, Embroidering their rose, piercing and tugging At their tapestry, their bloody tattoo Somewhere behind my navel, Treading that morass of emblazon, Two mad needles, criss-crossing their stitches, Selecting among my nerves For their colours, refashioning me Inside my own skin, each refashioning the other With their self-caricatures, Their obsessed in and out. Two women Each with her needle. That night My dellarobbia Susan. I moved With the circumspection Of a flame in a fuse. My whole fury Was an abandoned effort to blow up The old globe where shadows bent over My telltale track of ashes. I raced From and from, face backwards, a film reversed, Towards what? We went to Rugby St Where you and I began. Why did we go there? Of all places Why did we go there? Perversity In the artistry of our fate Adjusted its refinements for you, for me And for Susan. Solitaire Played by the Minotaur of that maze Even included Helen, in the ground-floor flat. You had noted her—-a girl for a story. You never met her. Few ever met her, Except across the ears and raving mask Of her Alsatian. You had not even glimpsed her. You had only recoiled When her demented animal crashed its weight Against her door, as we slipped through the hallway; And heard it choking on infinite German hatred. That Sunday night she eased her door open Its few permitted inches. Susan greeted the black eyes, the unhappy Overweight, lovely face, that peeped out Across the little chain. The door closed. We heard her consoling her jailor Inside her cell, its kennel, where, days later, She gassed her ferocious kupo, and herself. Susan and I spent that night In our wedding bed. I had not seen it Since we lay there on our wedding day. I did not take her back to my own bed. It had occurred to me, your weekend over, You might appear—-a surprise visitation. Did you appear, to tap at my dark window? So I stayed with Susan, hiding from you, In our own wedding bed—-the same from which Within three years she would be taken to die In that same hospital where, within twelve hours, I would find you dead. Monday morning I drove her to work, in the City, Then parked my van North of Euston Road And returned to where my telephone waited. What happened that night, inside your hours, Is as unknown as if it never happened. What accumulation of your whole life, Like effort unconscious, like birth Pushing through the membrane of each slow second Into the next, happened Only as if it could not happen, As if it was not happening. How often Did the phone ring there in my empty room, You hearing the ring in your receiver—- At both ends the fading memory Of a telephone ringing, in a brain As if already dead. I count How often you walked to the phone-booth At the bottom of St George’s terrace. You are there whenever I look, just turning Out of Fitzroy Road, crossing over Between the heaped up banks of dirty sugar. In your long black coat, With your plait coiled up at the back of your hair You walk unable to move, or wake, and are Already nobody walking Walking by the railings under Primrose Hill Towards the phone booth that can never be reached. Before midnight. After midnight. Again. Again. Again. And, near dawn, again. At what position of the hands on my watch-face Did your last attempt, Already deeply past My being able to hear it, shake the pillow Of that empty bed? A last time Lightly touch at my books, and my papers? By the time I got there my phone was asleep. The pillow innocent. My room slept, Already filled with the snowlit morning light. I lit my fire. I had got out my papers. And I had started to write when the telephone Jerked awake, in a jabbering alarm, Remembering everything. It recovered in my hand. Then a voice like a selected weapon Or a measured injection, Coolly delivered its four words Deep into my ear: ‘Your wife is dead.’
A cracked lip; raw skin;
I pined for orange flickers
Dancing off a cheery fire.
A gelid blast of arctic air
Had caught me unawares –
Reinforcing my desire.
Turning down an avenue,
I froze; suspicious trees –
Likely destined for a pyre –
Were laughing off the icy chill
Of callous Winter nights.
And I? Simply to retire
Snug, inside a balmy chair
Of warming solitude:
Ah! my carol, my festive choir.
Me: I scorn Fitzgerald’s Gatsby for what may well be the most lackluster ending in the history of plots, and hate myself for craving a mint julep all the while.
Lyss: You didn’t like the ending?! Well, I guess *like* is the wrong word, but did you not appreciate its soul-crushing poetic tragedy?!
Me: But that’s just it - the tragedy isn’t poetic. Daisy is a fickle slut, and Tom Buchanon is the king of all arseholes. They deserve each other. I appreciate the beautiful writing, but the plot fails tremendously. The denouement was far too hurried.
Lyss: No, but that’s the point! Daisy and Tom are careless, and that’s exactly the thing - they just don’t care at all, and they spectacularly get away with it. The messiness and hurried pace of the denouement creates the impression of how quickly everything gets completely ruined, and how people like the Buchanans are able to just escape those ruins and move onto the next. It’s like you could blink and miss it, and the only evidence would be the complete carnage left behind. And it also emphasises how a dream years in the making can be shattered in a flash. It all comes down to money and privilege, both of which the Buchanans have, and that’s their (probably only) saving grace. I think it’s very poetic.
Me: Yes, but the way that the novel is structured seems to split the Daisy character into two people. The transition from one to the other is very badly managed. With absolutely no explanation she evolves from somebody effervescent and effusive to somebody quite selfish, and just when we are able to believe her capable of more depth. In fact, the same can be said for Tom Buchanon - he simply can’t be the philandering bastard AND the proud, loving husband, and even if he could, his actions after Myrtle’s death are still implausible and discordant.
I feel that the most intriguing aspect of the book is the way Gatsby has been portrayed. His notoriety and popularity are starkly juxtaposed, and it culminates in an admirable metaphor for loneliness. Nick Carraway’s narration, with particular reference to his desire to have more people attend the funeral, does much to create sympathy for Gatsby, and in fact, I really liked the portrayal of Gatsby when he is waiting for Daisy to visit Nick. The description of his attire - the white linen suit, silver shirt and gold tie - they are a symbol of his wealth, and yet, manage to communicate his intense vulnerability and discomfort as a person of that class. The dividing factor between he and Daisy is money, and the part where he is throwing his shirts around, and basking in the warmth of her admiration for his things - it is very powerful.
Alas, I feel that the only noteworthy thing to disintegrate rapidly from this point is the quality of the plot. The themes are all over the place, and badly explored. All of the protagonists bar Carraway make an exit from the book, leaving the wise narrator to ramble and preach a la Susann’s Anne Wells. Had there been more substance to the novel, perhaps it would not have seemed so arrogant an ending. It reads as though Fitzgerald was eager for an advance on his publishing payout. Fitzgerald had us in the palm of his hand - he just didn’t know what to do with us.
Care to comment?
Sherlock Holmes is a tremendous film!! Sad, sorry soul that I am, I went to see it today with my brother, and we both loved it. I fear that my next comment may bring much shame upon me, and well understand if my fellow booklovers wish to cast me off after reading it, but…I have never read Sherlock Holmes. Fear not though, gentle scribblers - so spiffing was this movie, that I plan to be first in line at Dymocks tomorrow, where I shall proceed to purchase everything in the Conan Doyle canon.
That is, everything that I can afford after buying a new pair of shoes with my hard-earned Christmas cash…
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.
This is one of my favorite George Carlin bits - “If I was in charge of the networks” from Brain Droppings. I wish I was smart enough to follow his suggestions and correct people accordingly when they don’t follow them.
•••
I’m tired of television announcers, hosts, newscasters, and commentators, nibbling away at the English language, making obvious and ignorant mistakes. If I were in charge of America’s broadcast stations and networks, I would gather together all the people whose jobs include speaking to the public, and I would not let them out of the room until they had absorbed the following suggestions. And I’m aware that media personalities are not selected on the basis of intelligence, I know that, and I try to make allowances for it. Believe me, I really try, but still… There are some liberties taken with speech that I think require intervention, if only for my own sake. I won’t feel right if this chance goes by, and I keep my silence.
The English word forte, meaning “specialty” or “strong point,” is not pronounced “for-tay.” Got that? It’s pronounced “fort.” The Italian word forte, used in music notation, is pronounced “for-tay,” and it instructs the musician to play loud: “She plays the skin flute, and her forte [fort] is playing forte [for-tay].” Look it up. And don’t give me that whiny shit, “For-tay” is listed as the second preference.” There’s a reason it’s second: because it’s not first!
Irony deals with opposites; it has nothing to do with coincidence. If two baseball players from the same hometown, on different teams, receive the same uniform number, it is not ironic. It is a coincidence. If Barry Bonds attains lifetime statistics identical to his father’s, it will not be ironic. It will be a coincidence. Irony is “a state of affairs that is the reverse of what was to be expected; a result opposite to an in mockery of the appropriate result.” For instance:
•If a diabetic, on his way to buy insulin, is killed by a runaway truck, he is the victim of an accident. If the truck was delivering sugar, he is the victim of an oddly poetic coincidence. But if that truck was delivering insulin, ah! Then he is the victim of an irony.
•If a Kurd, after surviving a bloody battle with Saddam Hussein’s army and a long, difficult escape through the mountains, is crushed and killed by a parachute drop of humanitarian aid, that, my friend, is irony writ large.
•Darryl Stingley, the pro football player, was paralyzed after a brutal hit by Jack Tatum. Now Darryl Stingley’s son plays football, and if the son should become paralyzed while playing, it will not be ironic. It will be coincidental. If Darryl Stingley’s son paralyzes someone else, that will be closer to ironic. If he paralyzes Jack Tatum’s son that will be precisely ironic.
I’m tired of hearing prodigal being used to mean “wandering, given to running away or leaving and returning.” The parable in the Book of Luke tells of a son who squandered his father’s money. Prodigal means “recklessly wasteful or extravagant.” And it you say popular usage has changed that, I say, fuck popular usage!
The phrase sour grapes does not refer to jealousy or envy. Nor is it related to being a sore loser. It deals with the rationalization of failure to attain a desired end. In the original fable by Aesop, “The Fox and the Grapes,” when the fox realizes he cannot leap high enough to reach the grapes, he rationalizes that even if he had gotten them, they would probably have been sour anyway. Rationalization. That’s all sour grapes means. It doesn’t deal with jealousy or sore losing. Yeah, I know, you say, “Well, many people are using it that way, so the meaning is changing.” And I say, “Well many people are really fuckin’ stupid, too, shall we just adopt all their standards?”
Strictly speaking, celibate does not mean not having sex, it means not being married. No wedding. The practice of refraining from sex is called chastity or sexual abstinence. No fucking. Priests don’t take a vow of celibacy, they take a vow of chastity. Sometimes referred to as the “no-nookie clause.”
And speaking of sex, the Immaculate Conception does not mean Jesus was conceived in the absence of sex. It means Mary was conceived without Original Sin. That’s all it has ever meant. And according to the tabloids, Mary is apparently the only one who can make such a claim. The Jesus thing is called virgin birth.
Proverbial is now being used to describe things that don’t appear in proverbs. For instance, “the proverbial drop in the bucket” is incorrect because “a drop in the bucket” is not a proverb, it’s a metaphor. You wouldn’t say, “as welcome as a turd in the proverbial punchbowl,” or “as cold as the proverbial nun’s box,” because neither refers to a proverb. The former is a metaphor, the latter is a simile.
Momentarily means for a moment, not in a moment. The word for “in a moment” is presently. “I will be there presently, Dad, and then, after pausing momentarily, I will kick you in the nuts.”
No other option and no other alternative are redundant. The words option and alternative already imply otherness. “I had no option, Mom, I got this huge erection because there was no alternative.” This rule is not optional; the alternative is to be wrong.
You should not use criteria when you mean criterion for the same reason that you should not use criterion when you mean criteria. These is my only criterions.
A light-year is a measurement of distance, not time. “It will take light years for young basketball players to catch up with the number of women Wilt Chamberlain has fucked,” is a scientific impossibility. Probably in more ways than one.
An acronym is not just any set of initials. It applies only to those that are pronounced as words. MADD, DARE, NATO, and UNICEF are acronyms. FBI, CIA, and KGB are not. They’re just pricks.
I know I’m fighting a losing battle with this one, but I refuse to surrender: Collapsing a building with explosive is not an implosion. An implosion is a very specific scientific phenomenon. The collapsing of a building with explosives is the collapsing of a building with explosives. The explosives explode, and the building collapses inwardly. That is not an implosion. It is an inward collapsing of a building, following a series of smaller explosions designed to make it collapse inwardly. Period. Fuck you!
Here’s another pointless, thankless objection I’d like to register. I say it that way, because I know you people and your goddamn “popular usage” slammed the door on this one a long time ago. But here goes anyway: A cop out is not an excuse, not even a weak one; it is an admission of guilt. When someone “cops a plea,” he admits guilt to some charge, in exchange for better treatment. He has “copped out.” When a guy says, “I didn’t get to fuck her because I reminded her of her little brother,” he is making an excuse. But if he says, “I didn’t get to fuck her because I’m an unattractive schmuck,” he is copping out. The trouble arises when an excuse contains a small amount of self-incriminating truth.
This one is directed to the sports people: You are destroying a perfectly good figure of speech: “Getting the monkey off one’s back” does not mean breaking a losing streak. It refers only to ending a dependency. That’s all. The monkey represents a strong yen. A losing streak does not compare even remotely. Not in a literary sense and not in real life.
Here’s one you hear from the truly dense: “The proof is in the pudding.” Well, the proof is not in the pudding; the rice and the raisins are in the pudding. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. In this case, proof means “test.” The same is true of “the exception that proves (tests) the rule.”
An eye for an eye is not a call for revenge, it is an argument for fairness. In the time of the Bible, it was standard to take a life in exchange for an eye. But the Bible said, No, the punishment should fit the crime. Only an eye for an eye, nothing more. It is not vindictive, it is mitigatory.
Don’t make the same mistake twice seems to indicate three mistakes, doesn’t it? First you make the mistake. Then you make the same mistake. Then you make the same mistake twice. If you simply say, “Don’t make the same mistake,” you’ll avoid the first mistake.
Unique really needs no modifier. Very unique, quite unique, more unique, real unique, fairly unique, and extremely unique are wrong, and they mark you as dumb. Although certainly not unique.
Healthy does not mean “healthful.” Healthy is a condition, healthful is a property. Vegetables aren’t healthy, they’re dead. No food is healthy. Unless you have an eggplant that’s doing push-ups. Push-ups are healthful.
There is no such thing or word as kudo. Kudos is a singular noun meaning praise, and it is pronounced kyoo-dose. There is also a plural form, spelled the same, but pronounced kyoo-doze. Please stop telling me, “So-and-so picked up another kudo today.”
Race, creed, or color is wrong. Race and color, as used in this phrase, describe the same property. And “creed” is a stilted, outmoded way of saying “religion”. Leave this tired phrase alone; it has lost its usefulness. Besides, it reeks of insincerity no matter who uses it.
As of yet is simply stupid. As yet, I’ve seen no progress on this one, but of course I’m speaking as of now.
Here’s on you can win money on in a bar if you’re within reach of the right reference book: Chomping at the bit and old stomping ground are incorrect. Some Saturday afternoon when you’re gettin’ bombed on your old stamping ground, you’ll be champing at the bit to use this one.
Sorry to sound so picky, folks, but I listen to a lot of radio and TV, and these things have bothered me for a long time.
This tirade needs to be framed and hung above the mantle of every English-speaking home in the universe.
We are like roses that have never bothered to
bloom when we should have bloomed and
it is as if
the sun has become disgusted with
waiting
How can one find something so beautiful and terrifying, quite at the same time?
Extinguish Thou my eyes:I still can see Thee,
deprive my ears of sound:I still can hear Thee,
and without feet I still can come to Thee,
and without voice I still can call to Thee.
Sever my arms from me, I still will hold Thee
with all my heart as with a single hand,
arrest my heart, my brain will keep on beating,
and Should Thy fire at last my brain consume,
the flowing of my blood will carry Thee.
I have a secret soft spot for this sort of poetry. Bukowski is still one of my reigning favourites, but between Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame; the amount of tea I have been consuming lately, and the altogether dismal prospects of my own torpid romantic life, I needed a little break from bitterness.
Shh, don’t tell anybody.
Dear Tumblers: I apologise profusely for having been so entirely slack with posting! Winter is in the air, which elates me! Here’s to red wine, cold nights, and pens a’scratching!
J.D. Salinger- Kids who don’t fit in (duh).
Stephanie Meyer- People who type like this: OMG. Mah fAvvv <3 <3.
J.K. Rowling- Smart geeks.
Jack Kerouac- Umphrey’s McGee fans.
Lauren Weisberger- Girls who can’t read. Or think.
Jodi Picoult- Your mom when she’s at her time of the month.
Jane Austen (or Bronte Sisters)- Girls who made out with other girls in college when they were going through a “phase”.
Charles Dickens- Ninth graders who think they’re going to be authors someday but end up in marketing.
William Shakespeare- People who like bondage.
Mark Twain- Liars.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle- People who drink scotch.
Anne Rice- People who don’t use conditioner in their hair.
Edgar Allan Poe- Men who live in their mother’s basements. Or goth seventh graders.
John Grisham- Doctors who went to medical schools in the Dominican Republic.
Dan Brown- People who used to get lost in supermarkets when they were kids.
Emily Griffin- Women who give their boyfriend marriage ultimatums.
Margaret Atwood- Women whose favorite color is hunter green.
Jackie Collins- Your drunk stepmother.
Nicholas Sparks- Women who are usually constipated.
James Patterson- Men who score a 153 on their LSAT exam.
Sylvia Plath- Girls who keep journals (too easy).
George Orwell- Conspiracy theorists (too easy).
Aldous Huxley- People who are bigger conspiracy theorists than Orwell fans.
Harper Lee- People who have read only one book in their life and it was To Kill A Mockingbird (and it was their assigned reading in the ninth grade).
Ernest Hemingway- Men who own cottages.
Thomas Aquinas- Premature ejaculators.
Brothers Grimm- Only children with Oedipal complexes.
Lewis Carroll- People who move to Thailand after high school for the drug scene.
C.S. Lewis- Youth group leaders who picked their nose in the 4th grade.
Virginia Woolf- Female high-school French teachers who have their master’s degree.
Ray Bradbury- People who own golf head covers.
There were several more, but these made me laugh the most. Of all the tongue-in-cheek lists I’ve ever read, this is by far the best.
