Tuesday, April 27, 2010

864. A THEORY OF ART DESIGNED TO UPHOLD THE VALUE OF SERENITY

A THEORY OF ART DESIGNED
TO UPHOLD THE VALUE OF
SERENITY

The ships are sailing where nothing
else runs...antediluvian smokestacks
and pennants with flames. They've
manned all the catwalks and bridges
with clumps of people now dedicated
to the onset of Love and Freedom.
-
Apparently - fleeting and gull-like
though this may be - I am alone in
sensing that nothing exists. Sensations
and manifestations, my flags and all
the buntings, have been scattered and
blown about. Distant, farther fields
await, someplace, where matter - like
the girl nearby, talking fast, to a friend -
takes yet another form.
-
This is both speed and stillness together -
everyone clapping in a soundless noise.
They've registered the floral path up along
the roadway to the alley. Those who
come first can pass. All others must
bow and genuflect or curtsy, as if
it was another place and time.
-
I sense nothing now left but a
rambunctious format where the
cut-outs used to be : and, oh, all
you empty-headed rascals, the
trimming and the cutting I can do
without. 'Where there are no bones,
anyone can serve a goose.' *
------
*T. S. Eliot (last sentence, marked)

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