The Wailing Wall of Sound
It’s been quite a week for music - and poetry. That is, one way or the other music and poetry were in the news.
From the music front there was much that was unspeakable. There was the story that The One who Had No Plastic Surgery (Or A Nose Job) – yes, The One Who Is Not Into Children In A Bad Way – is so ‘grounded in Vegas’ that he wants to share this with the rest of the world.
Then there was the awful sight of the ultimate king maker & puppeteer, Karl Rove, doing to rap what he did to John Kerry.
(Johnny who? Indeed.)
So, thanks to Rove in a few years’ time people may well ask:
“Rap? What’s rap?”
Thirdly, there was this depressing shot of Phil Spector, the guy who brought us the Wall of Sound - and is now on trial for having killed his girlfriend. All in all, it was not a good week for music.
Poetry didn’t fare much better though. Not with the news coming out that Barack Obama has written poetry. There’s not much that’s more depressing than politicians who try to pretend that they’re with it (or perform rap songs or play the sax) but modern, sound-bite candidates playing the philosopher king might just be marginally worse than the ‘Watch daddy make a fool of himself on the dance floor’ nerds or the ‘Sorry but how much does a loaf of bread cost?’ regular guy wannabees.
It’s childish to remind vegetarians that Hitler was one as well – so it would be equally juvenile to say to Obama, apropos his having written poetry: “Guess what, so did Karadzic.”
Oh Hell, who cares; public figures who are disgusting enough to try to get to third base with the voters by playing the Mr Oh So Nice Poet card, deserve all the cheap shots thrown at them. One can only sincerely hope that during his Muse-riddled life the big O. gave some of his books to minors.
Still, what a bloody week it was, with insane pop icons and limelight-leaking politicians, clammering for our attention.
Oh yes, but of course, and to top it all, there was also the news that very soon you might well need health insurance to even go buy a book.
Yup, some weeks it’s simply not worth the effort to get out of bed at all.
So, forgive me, for now that I’m done wishing the most interesting kinds of plagues on all sorts of houses, for me, it’s back to bed again, with a nice pot of Genmaicha tea and Neruda’s 100 Love Sonnets.
Good night and don’t wake me up before Oprah has developed good taste in interior decorating or George Bush can say The rain in Spain falls mainly in the plains without stuttering – whichever comes first.
And now, to sleep, perchance to dream of you, my love… Take me away, señor Pablo:
I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.
I hunger for your sleek laugh,
your hands the color of a savage harvest,
hunger for the pale stones of your fingernails,
I want to eat your skin like a whole almond.
I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,
and I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your hot heart,
like a puma in the barrens of Quitratue.
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