Monday, December 31, 2007
The Haves and Have Nots
The Haves and Have-Nots...
Last minute gift shopping at the mall I try to avoid, I tried to avoid spending any money on myself today, but the White Barn Candle Shop with it's 75% off sale lured me over and in so that soon I was rummaging through a bin, searching for a vanilla scented plug in diffuser refill for a diffuser I bought there over a year ago but have been too thrifty to replace. The two-pack refill costs $12.50. So since they were on sale for a mere $5, I thought I might treat myself to one.
While I methodically moved box after box aside, not finding any vanilla refills, a couple, maybe twenty years older than I am, pulled 16 of the refills they needed from the bin and then exchanged polite conversation with another woman about how they have 17 diffusers just on the first floor of their house which are plugged in all year, and they've never had any trouble with them. The couple then walked to the back of the store and found more of their desired scent so that the last number of two-pack refills I saw them load into their shopping basket equaled 25. 25! Even at only $5 a piece, that's $133.75 (with tax). The box says these things last 6-8 weeks. So if each one lasts for two months, that means they have to buy 3x25 refills a year (I'm assuming the remaining 8 were for the upstairs?) That's $401.25 a year, IF they buy them only while they are on sale for $5 instead of their usual price of $12.50.
I know this is all very boring. I'm just saying that I keep forgetting the difference between the haves and have nots is NOT that one class can barely pay their heating bill and the other one can. It's that one class can barely pay their heating bills and the other class can give a shit in four different bathrooms and then cover it up with a pretty scent.
Last minute gift shopping at the mall I try to avoid, I tried to avoid spending any money on myself today, but the White Barn Candle Shop with it's 75% off sale lured me over and in so that soon I was rummaging through a bin, searching for a vanilla scented plug in diffuser refill for a diffuser I bought there over a year ago but have been too thrifty to replace. The two-pack refill costs $12.50. So since they were on sale for a mere $5, I thought I might treat myself to one.
While I methodically moved box after box aside, not finding any vanilla refills, a couple, maybe twenty years older than I am, pulled 16 of the refills they needed from the bin and then exchanged polite conversation with another woman about how they have 17 diffusers just on the first floor of their house which are plugged in all year, and they've never had any trouble with them. The couple then walked to the back of the store and found more of their desired scent so that the last number of two-pack refills I saw them load into their shopping basket equaled 25. 25! Even at only $5 a piece, that's $133.75 (with tax). The box says these things last 6-8 weeks. So if each one lasts for two months, that means they have to buy 3x25 refills a year (I'm assuming the remaining 8 were for the upstairs?) That's $401.25 a year, IF they buy them only while they are on sale for $5 instead of their usual price of $12.50.
I know this is all very boring. I'm just saying that I keep forgetting the difference between the haves and have nots is NOT that one class can barely pay their heating bill and the other one can. It's that one class can barely pay their heating bills and the other class can give a shit in four different bathrooms and then cover it up with a pretty scent.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
As I Lay Me Down To Sleep
As I Lay Me Down To Sleep
Last night, head spasms. The unpredictable
unrhythmic head tics and jolts of breath
I try to steady but can't. Felt it come on me
early. Took my medicine. It didn't grow
any wider. I didn't try to fight it. It only
took half an hour for the tics to stop,
for my breath to settle back down into my chest.
Now today. Let's get through it without my body
spazzing on me, okay? Okay brain? My heart
is fine. It's my brain. It's so crowded in there.
Last night, head spasms. The unpredictable
unrhythmic head tics and jolts of breath
I try to steady but can't. Felt it come on me
early. Took my medicine. It didn't grow
any wider. I didn't try to fight it. It only
took half an hour for the tics to stop,
for my breath to settle back down into my chest.
Now today. Let's get through it without my body
spazzing on me, okay? Okay brain? My heart
is fine. It's my brain. It's so crowded in there.
Friday, December 28, 2007
I dream, I strain.
"All the time I dream I dream of Manhattan
or I dream of home. I strain. I leave, I go,
they leave, they go. " ML
I dreamed I pedaled my bike up the mountainside to the top of the hill where I could see Philadelphia's sky-line towering in the distance. I turned back and looked down on my hometown which was far off in the valley below and then looked again at the sky-line. I thought about a girl I know who is moving to that city and I thought "Well, at least her mother can see her from here." I thought it thinking that she would be safer and her mother would be more content. I thought it thinking that I cannot see my son from where I am.
I dreamed my husband had lovers so I had to leave him and had no where to go but to my mother's home. In the dream, as I realized that I had to leave my own home, I imagined the conversation I would have with my mother and how she would respond to my request. I imagined her sitting at a round table drinking a hot beverage and reading a newspaper near a window where sunlight warmed her shoulders. "Of course" she responded. "This will always be your home."
I woke wondering what if I tell my children that I am their home but then I have no home to offer? What then? What then?
I didn't wonder about my husband's loyalty, but I remembered the disloyalty of my first husband, and although I no longer love him, that hurt still twinges. The possibility of disloyalty, in all its forms -- it twinges.
Everything around me is in motion. People are constantly moving from place to place, leaving, returning. On days after nights like these, when I dream of places and the strain to remain or to leave them, I understand the desire to "die at home." And the dreams, in themselves, linger inside me long after I've woken. On days after nights like these I like to entertain myself with ideas of reincarnation, although I have no "beliefs" about what comes after death, I have fun playing with the stories that conceptualize a soul or something like a soul that may be recycled or even shared. I mostly just think that we humans are more sensitive to our surroundings than we realize.
One day someone is going to discover something very important.
or I dream of home. I strain. I leave, I go,
they leave, they go. " ML
I dreamed I pedaled my bike up the mountainside to the top of the hill where I could see Philadelphia's sky-line towering in the distance. I turned back and looked down on my hometown which was far off in the valley below and then looked again at the sky-line. I thought about a girl I know who is moving to that city and I thought "Well, at least her mother can see her from here." I thought it thinking that she would be safer and her mother would be more content. I thought it thinking that I cannot see my son from where I am.
I dreamed my husband had lovers so I had to leave him and had no where to go but to my mother's home. In the dream, as I realized that I had to leave my own home, I imagined the conversation I would have with my mother and how she would respond to my request. I imagined her sitting at a round table drinking a hot beverage and reading a newspaper near a window where sunlight warmed her shoulders. "Of course" she responded. "This will always be your home."
I woke wondering what if I tell my children that I am their home but then I have no home to offer? What then? What then?
I didn't wonder about my husband's loyalty, but I remembered the disloyalty of my first husband, and although I no longer love him, that hurt still twinges. The possibility of disloyalty, in all its forms -- it twinges.
Everything around me is in motion. People are constantly moving from place to place, leaving, returning. On days after nights like these, when I dream of places and the strain to remain or to leave them, I understand the desire to "die at home." And the dreams, in themselves, linger inside me long after I've woken. On days after nights like these I like to entertain myself with ideas of reincarnation, although I have no "beliefs" about what comes after death, I have fun playing with the stories that conceptualize a soul or something like a soul that may be recycled or even shared. I mostly just think that we humans are more sensitive to our surroundings than we realize.
One day someone is going to discover something very important.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Censorship In Art At The Restaurant
Hi everyone. I'm not a "Bad Penny Poet" though I do offer a venue and enjoy participating. Betty seems to have the best solution I've heard so far: to set time aside at the end of the evening and to hold the uncensored readings only after giving those who'd rather not listen to the pornography -- THAT IS NOT POETRY -- a chance to leave.
Really, if I was that interested in someone's sexual fantasies, I'd go back to seventh grade. There is a huge difference between literature/poetry/visual art/comedy/music et al that is sexual (I, myself have many sexual poems, as well as some artwork) and writing that is pure description of someone's sexual escapades and fantasies, devoid of any real artistic involvement/movement.
I believe that as artists it is impossible for us to ignore what offends us, and that we have a responsibility (those of us who choose to have one) to sometimes offend others -- but when we do, we make certain choices in designing the work that we present. Art without design or intent is not art. Even in our artistic accidents we can identify design. If an "artist's" only desire is to get a hard-on at my expense, I'm not participating.
You see? "Hard-on," in the proper context, may startle just a bit. But I designed it that way. To move you, your mind. Not to move you into my bed.
I am almost certain, from what I've seen, that none of the poets who've attended the open mic nights are what anyone would consider "prudish." They -- I -- we -- can however, distinguish art from smut.
I'll deal art, but not the other.
Thanks for letting me be heard.
Marylisa
Really, if I was that interested in someone's sexual fantasies, I'd go back to seventh grade. There is a huge difference between literature/poetry/visual art/comedy/music et al that is sexual (I, myself have many sexual poems, as well as some artwork) and writing that is pure description of someone's sexual escapades and fantasies, devoid of any real artistic involvement/movement.
I believe that as artists it is impossible for us to ignore what offends us, and that we have a responsibility (those of us who choose to have one) to sometimes offend others -- but when we do, we make certain choices in designing the work that we present. Art without design or intent is not art. Even in our artistic accidents we can identify design. If an "artist's" only desire is to get a hard-on at my expense, I'm not participating.
You see? "Hard-on," in the proper context, may startle just a bit. But I designed it that way. To move you, your mind. Not to move you into my bed.
I am almost certain, from what I've seen, that none of the poets who've attended the open mic nights are what anyone would consider "prudish." They -- I -- we -- can however, distinguish art from smut.
I'll deal art, but not the other.
Thanks for letting me be heard.
Marylisa
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