James Joyce is the author who has had perhaps the most influence on me. He is a master of language and prose, and his work is one of the great artistic gifts given to the world. I just read the short story "The Boarding House" in his Dubliners collection, and this is how I want to write. No, I do not wish to imitate him, but I do desire to hold such a command of the language, the characters, and the reader's emotions that no one can deny that when I am writing, I am in the hands of Love. His portraits of isolation, internal and external conflict, and suffocating cultural and religious mores and taboos stimulate an acute vision of the nightmarish landscape we have created for ourselves in the modern world. Sure, his works - such as the well known and groundbreaking novels A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Ulysses - are not filled with the plot driven adventures of most popular works of today, but as one who has read these narratives with a close attention to the love that went into Joyce's craft, I can say that one feels more alive and observant after traversing the small-minded Irish world - that embodies the prejudices and corruptions of the world at large - Joyce brings to life in his works.
"The Boarding House" is a short, but excellent example of the power of Joyce's art. Another short story example would be "The Dead," perhaps one of the most analyzed short stories in the English language. Each reading of it reveals more of the genius that went into its creation. To write with such a dedication to the purity of the art of the craft is my chief concern when I put pen to paper. Joyce shows me what is possible if I but remove the obstacles to the creative nature within me.
Thank you, Mr. Joyce, whereever you are now out in the Cosmos. Your example has been inspiring for over 6 years to this fledgling artist.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Murder in Cold Love
When, in but a few moments, you die,
let yourself flow into me.
I will be standing here watching you -
waiting for your comfort.
You have suffered long enough in hands
of cold, life-stealing blood
where you squirm and slither asking me
to take you into us.
What you have done has been a blessing
to each and every one,
and that hand that now holds you is your
blessing in return.
let yourself flow into me.
I will be standing here watching you -
waiting for your comfort.
You have suffered long enough in hands
of cold, life-stealing blood
where you squirm and slither asking me
to take you into us.
What you have done has been a blessing
to each and every one,
and that hand that now holds you is your
blessing in return.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Fish Story
I feel a strange energy today about me. I am vital.
I often leave my office desk at lunch, after eating a nice organic, vegan meal, and retreat to the pond that my office building overlooks. There are children out there fishing with lazy parents and grandparents sitting in lawn chairs giving offhand orders to the children about how to cast the line, hook the worm, catch the fish, and kill the fish.
One little boy caught repeatedly during my forty minutes sitting on the dirty pavement beside the pond little fish. Hooked through and airless, each fish was squished between his unkind hands as he removed the hook and flopped the fish indifferently back into the pond.
There have been dead fish on a string floating just off the bank of the pond, left bloated and wasted by the darkness of our minds. Yet, these have not bothered me as much as watching the little brother of the kid catching small fish catch a large fish and let the large fish suffocate to death on the hook. I did not see the suffocation. When the fish was shown to me, it had already passed. The little child, only about 4 or 5, thought nothing of this.
I said a silent prayer for all the fish in the pond. I apologized to them for the indifference we show them when we take their lives for no particular reason. I felt them alive in me, and they were redeemed in their passing: Souls gone on to greater expressions. I promised that I would teach all children possible that killing any creature is never necessary.
Yet, I feel calm about their passing even if I see no need for human beings to bring that about. Nothing is really harmed unless I think it is. I am a strange energy today. I like it. I feel more alive.
I often leave my office desk at lunch, after eating a nice organic, vegan meal, and retreat to the pond that my office building overlooks. There are children out there fishing with lazy parents and grandparents sitting in lawn chairs giving offhand orders to the children about how to cast the line, hook the worm, catch the fish, and kill the fish.
One little boy caught repeatedly during my forty minutes sitting on the dirty pavement beside the pond little fish. Hooked through and airless, each fish was squished between his unkind hands as he removed the hook and flopped the fish indifferently back into the pond.
There have been dead fish on a string floating just off the bank of the pond, left bloated and wasted by the darkness of our minds. Yet, these have not bothered me as much as watching the little brother of the kid catching small fish catch a large fish and let the large fish suffocate to death on the hook. I did not see the suffocation. When the fish was shown to me, it had already passed. The little child, only about 4 or 5, thought nothing of this.
I said a silent prayer for all the fish in the pond. I apologized to them for the indifference we show them when we take their lives for no particular reason. I felt them alive in me, and they were redeemed in their passing: Souls gone on to greater expressions. I promised that I would teach all children possible that killing any creature is never necessary.
Yet, I feel calm about their passing even if I see no need for human beings to bring that about. Nothing is really harmed unless I think it is. I am a strange energy today. I like it. I feel more alive.
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