Daniel Klawitter
The Philosopher's Resentment of Male LifeguardsSocrates: Well, my excellent fellow, do you think
that expertise in swimming is a grand thing? Callicles: No, by Zeus, I don’t. –Plato, Gorgias. Perhaps they protect us from way up there on their lofty perches. Well-oiled and eagle-eyed in red shorts, dark shades no shirts. Who are they trying to impress? They scan the horizon in search of danger or distress- looking for signs of panic or maybe an undertow or eddy. But a drowning is as infrequent as a shark attack. Still, their whistles are always at the ready. Who needs them really? It’s strictly a summer job for the young and muscular- who in spite of the windy conditions have immaculate hair and a superior cardiovascular system. It’s not a competition. (Though my physique could use some slimming). I just want to enjoy the beach and think on all the things more excellent than swimming. Doing it Well
Once upon a time
our legs entwined around each other like vines. Reaching for something more beyond the veil-- behind the door of ourselves. Your body laid out a landscape like dunes on the beach. The gentle slopes and curves shifting as I reached for the two crescent moons of your rising tasting sand and wild peach. I remember you above me like some desperate dark angel-- your fierce black hair hung in tangles and me below, transfixed-- my voice strangled no longer able to resist the epiphany of our nakedness. And so, we clung to each other like rain-soaked birds of prey. Our prayers and promises murmured in a haze of…dare I say it? Dionysian bliss. We did many things badly, it’s true-- until those promises went to hell. But not this. This we did quite well. Hell ☊
is living like a cold fish
at the bottom of a well swimming in dark circles you cannot tell if down is up or up is down. Hell is a perpetual frown and a never-ending curse. Or perhaps hell is a midnight colored hearse you hope will never arrive? “I’m afraid not” the literalist replies. “Hell is merely the smell of you being burned alive.” Advice To A Reformed Vampire On His First Date In Centuries
...strangely are our souls constructed, and by such slight ligaments are we bound to prosperity or ruin. —Mary Shelly
And yet, unless my senses deceive me, the old centuries had, and have, a power of their own which mere ‘modernity’ cannot kill. —Bram Stoker The most important lesson is don’t be overhasty. To make a good impression don’t tell her she looks “tasty.” And what is essential is that you must resist showing her your teeth sharp as pencils before you have been kissed. Otherwise she might insist you take her home on time. And instead of romance all you’ll find is that you got torched like Frankenstein. Comments?
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Speech PathologyThe most important thing to say
hasn’t been said yet. –Plato, The Republic II They whisper in your ear But stop just short of what You hope to hear And can’t articulate. Your mouth is mush- The unsaid phrase You anticipate Becomes: “hush child, hush.” Why so hard to speak When the garden of words Is so lush? Why do your eyes Leak and your heart beat thus? That fearful fluency That others trust In us is non-transparency, A dam that won’t bust. But even those who speak Extemporaneously on their feet With such seeming ease And compelling candor- Cannot exhaust or appease The desire for language To be more than precise. It wants instead to meander Beyond the limits of grammar To the unthought-of thought That causes one to stammer In the fraught-filled speaking. The best has not yet been said; How hopeful to have overheard- And silence is no cause for dread, For it precedes the spoken Word. The Most Shameful Thing"And now we’ve agreed that injustice, and
corruption of soul as a whole, is the most shameful thing." –Socrates, in Plato’s Gorgias. Forgive me father, for I have lived with good intentions. But we all know what the road to hell is paved with. Brick by brick I’ve built my house of horrors. Slowly, over time my deposits gather relevance and my closets contain a graveyard of skeletons. Who am I, an Augustus of injustice to ask for absolution? My sackcloth soul is a waste of windswept ashes-- a hermitage of pollution. As undisputed king of the most shameful thing, the distance between my words and actions grew gradually. An accumulation of small hypocrisies like a Greek tragedy everyone else can see coming except the hero himself. Overflow & Commitment ☊There is an old proverb, legislator, which we poets
never tire of telling and which all laymen confirm, to the effect that when a poet takes his seat at the tripod of the Muse, he cannot control his thoughts. He’s like a fountain where the water is allowed to gush forth unchecked. –Plato, Laws IV. The truth is the muse is often fickle. She likes to be wooed. Sometimes she wants to be tickled, On other days, she is rude just to Start a quarrel that ends in a kiss. You scribble a line, but she Wants to hear it oral, recited with A twist of the tongue. Or she may Want it sung with full lungs, before She will bestow a laurel for your crown. If you try to force it, you will only Make her frown and bring yourself A world of woe. Courting her Requires daily discipline, attention To form, detail, and apprehensions. Then, the slow hard work accumulates Into the occasional grace of inspiration: The poem that seems to spring from Nowhere, fully-formed and articulate, An omnipotent storm of exaltation. And then it flows like a fountain- And you are drenched in words You composed but don’t know how You did it. But the muse knows Where water goes—it’s all about Commitment. What All Cats Know
Dogs are prose, and prone to please.
Mice are good for eating. When moonlight splinters through the trees, We watch humans while they're sleeping. Disobedience is heroic. It's wrong to persecute witches. Hell is a world with no poets--- And heaven a charm of finches. |