The Fury of Aerial Spraying

–Dallas 2012

“I’m tired of frogs and flies and gnats,” God said,
“So kill a goat. Then, use its blood to cake
Your posts and lintels thick, or I will take
Your sons when I come down and strike them dead.”

Last night we heard planes buzzing overhead.
As pesticides rained down on White Rock Lake,
We laid there, half asleep and half awake.
I thought about the Hebrews: They, in bed,

Had heard Egyptians screaming, or the still
Emptiness of death. The angel came–
Or didn’t–and then left. This was the same,

But with the roles reversed: God not the shrill
Whining of the planes, but the moths and strays
Who’d die–or wouldn’t–gasping in the haze.

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Avonleacidas (Sneak Peek)

In this Preview the Author welcomes his new Progeny,
mercifully born in the Hour
before her Brother’s date of birth, 2011. And by
Occasion fortels Something,
but he hasn’t decided what yet.

Yet once more, oh ye bottles, and once more
Ye diapers browne or amber, like a beer,
I come to fill you up and throw you out,
And tolerate the shout–
Forc’d fingers bar her bellowing from my ear–
Bitter complaints that I can’t help but hear.
They urge me to get up now: they’re my cue,
For Avonlea awakes, wakes ‘ere the dawn!
Young Avonlea: and I must wipe her rear.
You would not stir for Avonlea. You knew
That I’d get up, and with a yawn
Rolled over, feigning sleep. I, lying near,
Unslept and stumbled through the darkness blind
Without disturbing you. You’re in the clear.

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The Roommates’ Song

From The Phantom of Venice.

1st Voice:

Tell me: where’s the fancy bread?
Did you eat it in my bed?
The sheets are full of crumbs and spread!
Reply. Reply!*

2nd Voice:

You mistrust me, and, in your eyes
I see where your suspicion lies.
The secret’s mine and, with me, dies!

1st Voice:
You ate my bread but will not tell!
I’ll evict you–!

2nd Voice:

Go to hell.
Go to hell.

*The first folio stanza reads as follows, although most reputable scholars believe this edition of the song to be spurious:
Tell me, where’s the fancy bread?
In the pantry or the shed?
Where’d it go? And where’s my spread?
Reply, reply!

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“Don What-the-hell-am-I-doing-writing-at-this-hour.” George Boredom, Lord Whine-on. Canto I.i

I want a thesis, a too common want
When published folk have taken every new one
And written them in journals, filled with cant
And theory packed so thick that none could view one!
‘Mongst such as these I do not dare avaunt.
I’ll therefore cry off, and say “Screw one
And all of them!” Is it a crime
To go to bed a bit before my time?

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“Grammatologiad,” I, i,1. By James Wormell (Published 1652)

Hail! Mistress of the fieldes of Academe,
Adopted sister of the holy Nine.
Assist me now, as I unpack a theme
From prose and poems, workes that will align
To forme an argument of my design.
Help me, oh tweed-clad Muse, recall texts crammed
Into my head. In sacrifice, I will consign
A page of Phaedrus to the flames. Exammed
And passed, I’ll praise thee;  failed, first I’ll be–you next–damned.

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The Subtle Thief of Rhyme

I’ve wasted a week of precious time this summer on an entirely frivolous personal week. I’ve had friends up from College Station, visited a friend in Killeen–in order to watch the LOST finale and drink beer–and, now, I’m going to visit the same friends I just had up to my home at theirs in College Station. There’s a meltdown looming on the horizon, when I get home and realize how much work this means I haven’t done. Next up are Pilgrim’s Progress and Leviathan. At some point, this will lead to a Bunyan-esque allegory of the summer (I hope). For now, here’s a Miltonic parody. Enjoy.

How soon hath youth, the raucous thief of time
Stol’n on his wing my summer’s first full week.
My reading days pass by  me in a streak,
My wasted spring in bureaucratic grime.

Perhaps my brain can justify this crime:
If, in my work, I made my mind too weak,
Some books I read would simply seem antique
That with more timely rest I’d find sublime.

But whether I work hard or harder play,
The clock will still in strictest measure tick
And hours, weeks and fortnights pass me by,
Rushing toward examination day.
All hangs, if I work slow or I work quick,
As ever on the grad commitee’s  “Aye.”

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The Phaerie Duchess: Booke I, Post II.

IV.
And as he yode an elder led him out,
That Rhetor hight, well-versed in grammarye,
Whose taske it was to set that young clerke’s route,
For he knew where those spells were said to be
Which lost were to antique catastrophe
And would the titan Ignourance defeate,
So he that clerke advised in his degree,
And oft a proverb old would he repeat:
That spells were hid ’til magi them could list complete.

VI.
This saw the Greatbooke clerke did but frustrate,
For he mote not list spells he never knew,
Nor things he never heard of yet  relate,
And so he knew not what he did pursue:
As when that child of Danaë did subdue
The gorgon, victim both of wrath and love,
And, forced to fight a fiend he mote nat view,
Look’d onely at his shield, and blindly strove,
So he that elder followed wherever he did rove.

VI.
Eftesoons beside the path they did behold
A gorgeous damzell on an iuory mare,
Yclad in verdant dress, and locks of gold,
And well did she her tender tresses wear.
To accent her endowments, and a pair
Of scales shee held, shee Aura hight,
And eke her buxom sister, no less faire,
With face that seem’d to spurn and to invite,
Term’d Fama, looked fair from on her palfrey’s height

VII.
Those two to distant Conference were bound,
And they that clerk bade also to attend,
For sure they were that wizards did abound
Who surely would their wisdomes gladly lend
To one who sought that giant’s reign to end.
The elder daungers dire perceived in this,
And warned his charge what mischiefs did portend,
But here those ladies offered him a kisse:
The smallest fauour, yet to him it seemed the highest bliss.

That would the titan Ignorance defeat,

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The Phaerie Duchess: Booke I, Post I. Contayning The Legende of the Knight of the Great Booke, or Of Higher-Learning

The Student with an antient Writ
Distraction doth defeate:
And Vanity him to entrapp;
To Island doth entreate.

I.
An Elfin Clerke was trotting through the cold
Ycladd in clothing cheap with face sevear
Wherein new lines of age that seemed olde
Did tell of long moneths spent in archives drear.
Yet bookes til that time oft had brought him chear:
His paensive steed his heavy brows did knit
As scanning matters deepe and formes unclear.
Full learned clerke he seem’d, and fair did sitt,
As one for ancient scrolls and lengthy lectures fitt.

II.
But on his back an heavy tome he bore–
The dread tradition of the Phaerie londes–
Which on his frame and minde did weigh full sore,
For in its leaves were writ the dread commaunds
That ancient mages with their mysticke wands
Did chaunt to wield th’ elements diuine.
The same such did he take with him on hondes,
To fashion spells and glammours to design
Though nothing new could make, but old charmes recombine.

III.
Vpon a great aduenture he was sent,
That great Philosophia to him gaue–
That greatest, wisest Duchess–who had leant
The work he bore in order it to saue
From one who hoped its power to enslaue.
And euer as he rode, his hart did earne
To slay the beast who that great booke did crave.
Now other textes abroadde he sought, to learn
The meanes to do’t: ’til then he mote not home return.

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Proem to the First Poste of the Phaerie Duchess

Lo I the man, whose Blogge whilome did maske
When time allowed, in Gallic theorists weeds,
Am now enforst to update, since ye aske
That I doe so, to benefit who reades
With foddre for their syndicated feedes;
Which empty sate, due to my silence long.
I, all too tired, must now disdain my needs
To blabbe abroad in over-learned song:
“Firste!” postes and loud retweets shall sound emongst the throng.

Helpe then, O Joseph Curvo, liquor fine,
Thy weaker Novice to perform thy will.
Draw forth from sweet agave’s bitter brine
The wildest fancies borne of Spanish still,
Of Phaerie clerks and fairest Tenyurquill,
Which solemn student of proud Elfin tong
Sought through the world, and suffered so much ill
That he for worldly skills would often long
So might he pay for bread and thus his days prolong.

And with him eke, O Poet Ireland hates–
And right well so, since you them did oppresse–
Great poet of that period whose dates
I oft forget, and oftener must guess,
Who shone in epick praise of good queene Bess,
Pray, raise no eyebrows at my thoughts too vile
To earn the right to imitate in jests
The least iota of your loftie stile;
Yet if thou can’tst, I prithee, look away a-while.

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Being and Advent

Let it be assumed as an axiom that art is itself a saying of the void, the site of subtraction which reveals the state as only part of the being-multiple and never, in any sense, the whole of multiplicity. We ought not, however, to think art as in any way a wholeness in itself, lest it cease to be art–the suture in the state–and become the state itself. Art expresses the real of the being-multiple–the void–by whatever figurative means are available to it.

Art is a subtraction, it is an eruption of the void into the state situation. But the situation it disrupts is that which we commonly call “culture.” Culture, the supposed sum and total of human existence, the discursive field within and upon and through which the state exists and which insists upon its own summative nature. Art disrupts culture.

We are now at a moment in history–and here I mean not the linear history of the West, but rather the cyclical history of the seasons, of the calendar, and of the liturgy–which is undoubtedly embedded in culture.  We must think “Christmas” not as event, but as part of the state, a situation which rests upon the void and which awaits the marking of the evental site(site evenement) in order to become art. 

The event of the holiday, then, is that which exposes and names the void, and it is not to be found in our constant self-assurances of abundance and overflow. The void is not in the shopping malls. It is not to be found in the economico-cultural beacon of the times: the Christmas special, with its platitudes and  easy answers. These deny the void. They insist on its nonexistence. All is abundance. All is plenitude. Mr. Van Pelt’s declaration–“That is what Christmas is all about”–limits the situation while omitting to state its own stating of that limit. Van Pelt’s Christmas is local, as is the Christmas “miracle” of so many entertainments. It is cultural, and has nothing to say about truth–the saying of the void.

Only in the kitchen does the happening of truth, the beginning of the truth-procedure occur. Here, the cook–a parent or grand-parent (père)—seizes the bird which will be the sign of local plenitude for the Christmas feast, and marks it as void, sweeping out the innards and guts (entrailles) in order to fill it once more with stuffing. The bird is rendered empty: its fullness itself becoming the very articulation of its emptiness. From this site will proceed the truth in all its true universality in its declarations–“This is delicious,” “I’m stuffed,” “I need a nap,”–and in the beings-faithful which follow these declarations: satiation, sleep. Here, the declaration of fullness is itself the articulation of the void of the holiday: I am full now, not yesterday. Christmas thus is not, but rather becomes in the truth procedure of the dinner, where the diners insist on their being fulfilled now, and not in the local cultures of the Van Pelts and Geisels of the world.

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