Rhapsody in Despair and Wonder, and notes on my return - Jennifer Michael Hecht

Dear Bleaders,

Much have I traveled in the realms of gold. Also spent a lot of time in realms of muck, and the town of what the. But I’m back here in my page away from page, The Lion and the Honeycomb, on BAP. Its title refers to the way Yeats used a phrase from the Biblical story of Samson. I’ll tell you more about it next time, or read back, I talked about it here a few years back. 

For now I just want to say that I'm doing pretty well moodwise but how I feel about the world right now is like the visceral feeling of dropping I got when my son fixed a broken-in-pieces mug handle with a few well-placed wraps of blue masking tape. 

I posted an unpublished poem on Facebook, because it spoke to what I was feeling after the Paris attacks, so I'm publishing it here now. I’d worked on it for some time, but it only got finished in the wake of that tragedy. All the bombings and killing is horrific, in general, and each for their own reasons. I lived in Paris for a year doing my PhD research, which later became my first book, The End of the Soul: Scientific Modernity, Atheism, and Anthropology in France. And a great number of us have visited, it hurts more when you've been there so the place really exists as a physical memory.

But also, Paris means things to us. France was losing at industrialism in the late 19th century, so it consciously chose to go with exquisite beauty experiences: fine art, perfume, wine, jewelry, fine food, haute couture, and romance. Paris is the most visited city in the world because of it. Also, the French Revolution invented some political ideals central to our self image as a secular democracy. I just wanted to point out that we are mourning people and also something pretty and idealistic that we have internalized, and that just got slashed.

 The poem is obviously about all the terror and violence, how history changes, and how it boggles the mind.

 

Rhapsody in Despair and Wonder

He was worst until something worse came.

For gum he used girls fed spearmint for days.

Things repeat, but they are not the same.

 

Blood has been bad, here comes boiling rain.

He combed his beard with the ribs of boys.

He was worst until something worse came.

 

Daily he flayed his dogs, yet later in the game

indignity grew more systematic. Worse.

It repeats. It’s the ever in never again.

 

Now old vile terrors look man-sized and tame.

Look away for air. Rest here in line eleven.

They were the worst until new blades came.

 

Howl, howl, howl, said Lear to Cordelia, too late.

Bark a dirge of lost worlds, and loss again.

The first was worst, and then much worse came.

Things repeat and they are not the same.

 

Jennifer Michael Hecht, Nov 2015

 

I'll be posting again, when I can but at least once a month. I've missed you all terribly, but as we know, there is a season for this and a season for that and if you fight it over here, something gets lost over there. More news and rumination soon.

Love,

Jennifer

Comments

[The Best American Poetry]

Welcome back Jennifer. And thank you for posting your moving poem. Stacey

[Jennifer Michael Hecht]

Thanks Stacey. xo