64bis. All My Own Words Now:

some pasquinades & squibs consequent to the preceding, that were passed around the crowds, as is the tradition

to write on paper
is an absolute act

 
as an author
             invisible
 

cadences writing poems
& fertile glitters
hallucinatory appeal finished
dead joy spilt

 
the water bubbles & coils
falls down then rises
slowly coming up
                 everywhere

 
& the children gather
learning to be serious as old folk
but breaking into bursts
of occasional glee
 

and we do have free choice
        – in small matters

 
lolloping along
an English bulldog
agape through carefully bred
inherent malformation
 

& how can we make these people real?
– w/ names, attributes & no inner being
endlessly repeated yet fortunately
each operation marred

 
The sun in splendour shines through wintriest skies
 

Perfection:
– oh, that’s brief, alright

64. Some Specimens from the Odes Pinned to the Triumphal Arches

Each time you unscrew the head the truths burn out
But reality is not at the bottom of the abyss
Make it now. They hate our way of life
to be a shard of broken glass, shining like life.

Keston Sutherland, The Odes to TL61P (Enitharmon Press, 2013)

 

Career poets are part of the problem, smearing up the polish, drying out the fire; chucking shit all over the place; not being party to the solution; banking on the nodding head ‘the reader’ saying ‘yes, that’s what it’s like’ so as not to know what it’s for, since meaning is easier that way, gaped at through the defrosted back window of the Audi, hence the spring for a neck; we all know where that shit got us: being what we eat.

Sutherland, p 68

 

Poetry evolves from a vivid play of nerves and confusions into sedative aporiae in mock-heroic marginalese, if you don’t take precautions to prevent it.

Sutherland, p 41

 

The driving forces of the universe, the framework upon which it is built up in all its parts, belong to another phase of manifestation than our physical plane, having other dimensions than the three to which we are habituated, and perceived by other modes of consciousness than those to which we are accustomed. We live in the midst of invisible forces whose effects alone we perceive. We move among invisible forms whose actions we very often do not perceive at all, though we may be profoundly affected by them

Dion Fortune, Psychic Self-Defence (Rider & Co., 1930) p 10   < http://chomikuj.pl/proezekiel666/occultus/Dion+Fortune >

 

Any act performed with intention becomes a rite. We can take a bath with no more in mind than physical cleanliness; in which case the bath will cleanse our bodies and no more. Or we can take a bath with a view to ritual cleanliness, in which case its efficacy will extend beyond the physical plane.

Fortune (1930), p 80

 

no such thing as liberty
sunlight and vitamins, misunderstanding
for the gods upon the tree
free from bondage the misguided soul
– cannot trust unless you give a sign
for in this suit we find the Lords of Pleasure

Fortune (1930 & 1935)

 

And all the others together with them took unto themselves wives, and each chose for himself one, and they began to go in unto them and to defile themselves with them, and they taught them charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots, and made them acquainted with plants.
And they became pregnant, and they bare great giants, whose height was three thousand ells:
Who consumed all the acquisitions of men. And when men could no longer sustain them,
The giants turned against them and devoured mankind.
And they began to sin against birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another’s flesh, and drink the blood.
Then the earth laid accusation against the lawless ones.

The Book of Enoch the Prophet, translated by R H Charles, (Weiser Books, 2012), VII, 1‑6 (pp 5-6)

 

Mein innerstes Gefühl dazu ist: im Augenblick ist alles zu, aber es kann in jedem Augenblick anders werden. Ich stelle dazu folgende Überlegung an: diese Gesellschaft bewegt sich nicht auf einen Wohlfahrtsstaat zu. Diese Gesellschaft, die die Menschen immer mehr erfaßt, wächst gleichzeitig mit ihrer Irrationalität, und zwar konstitutiv. Solange diese Spannung besteht, ist sozusagen der Ausgleich der Wärme nicht herbeigeführt, der notwendig wäre, damit es keine Spontanheit mehr gibt. Ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, daß es eine bis zum Wahnsinn gesteigerte Welt gibt, ohne daß objektive Gegenkräfte entbunden würden.1 TWA

Max Horkheimer und Theodor W.Adorno, Nachtrag zu Band 13: Nachgelassene Schriften 1949-1972; 2. Gespräche: “Diskussion über Theorie und Praxis” (1956) (S. Fischer, 1989), p 47 < http://platypus1917.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/horkheimeradorno_theorieundpraxis1956.pdf >

 

Das was im Zusammenleben der Menschen als das Richtige angelegt ist, steckt in der Sprache: wenn man sagt, es soll gut werden. Wenn man den Mund zum Sprechen auftut, sagt man das immer mit.2 MH

Adorno & Horkheimer, p 36

 

Wir lehnen nicht die Praxis ab, aber das Verfügen. Weil wir noch leben dürfen, sind wir verpflichtet, etwas zu machen.3 MH

Adorno & Horkheimer, p 109

 

 

1 My innermost feeling is that at the moment everything has shut down, but it could all change at a moment’s notice. My own belief is as follows: this society is not moving towards a welfare state. It is gaining increasing control over its citizens but this control grows in tandem with the growth in its irrationality. And the combination of the two is constitutive. As long as this tension persists, you cannot arrive at the equilibrium that would be needed to put an end to all spontaneity. I cannot imagine a world intensified to the point of insanity without objective oppositional forces being unleashed. Theodor Adorno & Max Horkheimer, translated by Rodney Livingstone, Towards a New Manifesto (Verso, 2011), pp 38‑39

 

 

2 Whatever is right about human society is embedded in the language – the idea that all will be well. When you open your mouth to speak, you always say that too. Adorno & Horkheimer, p 5

 

 

3 What we reject is not practice but telling others what to do. Because we are still permitted to live, we are under an obligation to do something. Adorno & Horkheimer, p 109

 

61. A Recipe for Coconut Cream Tapioca with Mango

For Neirin & Ianthe, who I’m sure will like this, &, in a couple of years, try making it as well as eating it

OK then, my little ones, this
like you is very much a work in progress
improving as we go along like you
& like you cheering, even ludicrous
full of potentiality to transform
now, except to you, things are never new
& this recipe gains from its mirroring
throwing back an individual & thus disordered mess
against the commonplace of branded uniformity
except they aren’t, but vary quite pleasingly
like little children again, each a separate self
so we’ll make these as small pots
to eat where & how we wish
sweet transient drops I offer

For it we’ll need
(it’s almost believable)
here to make 2 portions
                        30 g tapioca – not big balls for bubble tea
                                       but littler that’ll grow like seeds
                        30 g sugar
                        160 ml coconut milk – well mixed!
                        40 ml single cream (but rich!)
                        + either a can of mango purée
                          or 1 fresh, soft, ripe mango
                          depending on what you can find
things needed simply thus
                        place all but the mango in a little pan
                        & put on a low heat
                        stir it & check it
                        everything frequent
                        when it sets to boiling
                        lowest heat that’ll simmer
                        still stirring occasionally please
                        & in about 25 minutes or more
                        you’ll find this translated
                        not commonplace but creamy
                        when the tapioca pearls
                        have gained their translucence
                        soft, oh yes, as frogspawn
                        – meanwhile if you’ve got fresh mango
                        perfectly ripe1 & delicious
                        cut off & peel one side
                        then process into mush
                        put this inside 2 little pots
                                          ramekins or jars
                        so it’s a low level
                                            oh a fifth
                        then once the tapioca is ready
                        let it cool a little
                                             but not to set
                        then spoon on top
                        & eat at your leisure
                        just at room temperature2

[I have got this recipe by reconstructing a gorgeous pudding Ginie & I regularly buy at Waitrose, that combines the mango/tapioca/coconut we variously got in some Malaysian dishes at the C & R in Rupert Court3, but gaining a hit of pure West Country cream. The home made version is a little rougher, but fresher. The tapioca cream could be spiced – cook in a cardamom pod or two, sprinkle cinnamon – but, really, it’s just a good specific taste as it is.4 Try it, dear little children! Not just for its own sake, but as a post‑colonial relic, linking these grandparents’ childhoods, one of tropical tastes & Singapore streetfood (and beyond, the exoticism of cassava cultivation – beware the cyanide!), with the other’s stodgy but comforting English nursery food of the days of Empire, what all good children named frogspawn.]

 

 

1 is all, too & absolutely

 

 

2 Yes, it is a Laodicean dish! Embrace this! Never stark antinomies, fit only for Manichees, but all the infinite gradations of actuality.

 

 

3 We look forward to taking you now it’s reopened, as we took your mother & Uncle Nick.

 

 

4 Other variation is to use sago pearls – though our local East Asian store, Oriental Spice (now reborn as Oriental Phoenix), next to the launderette at Hockerill, doesn’t stock them, nor any of the local supermarkets shelve dry sago or tapioca.

53. Here Come the Geldi Again

creeping out in the sunlight
like we all do nowadays
 

birdsong & glitters
unplanned under clear sky
 

hidden safe then
from Satan’s Watch Fiends
what the gods are we can tell
– breathe on the mirror & let
                    us appear
 

“Everything tends towards catastrophe, & collapse
I am interested, geared-up and happy”

Winston Churchill, August 28, 1914, quoted in Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914 (Penguin, 2013), p 201 (citing Hew Strachan, The First World War [Oxford, 2001), p 103)

 

We die, we are born
& in between
scrabble about a bit
 

oh this stormy weather as the year begins
great things might come over or
yet another upwelling of that shit-filled water
 

mongrel warnings now:
true Anglo-Saxons born
already hyphenate
– our new native land
scraped clear then washed
bare rock corroded only by sunlight & rain
will welcome all immigrants
– come spread your fertile filth!
life upswinging here joyous as kitsch
 

largeness & laughing
noisy by nature
curiously lovable
who wouldn’t want
not worship
but welcome
 

i Im Arme der Götter wuchs ich groß.

ii Einig zu sein, ist göttlich und gut; woher ist die Sucht denn
Unter den menschen, daß nur Einer und Eines nur sei?

iii Liebt die Götter und denkt freundlich der Sterblichen!
Haßt den Rausch, wie den Frost! Lehrt und beschreibet nicht!
Wenn der Meister euch ängstigt,
Fragt die große Natur am Rat.

Hölderlin, op. cit, “Hyperions Schicksalslied”, p 27, “Fünf Epigramme: Wurzel alles Übels”, p 36, “An die jungen Dichter”, p 19

 

a hank of hair is a little picking bird
– see it fly away now