When I am considering big questions and even bigger decisions, I always call upon the unacknowledged legislators of my soul, poets.  And it is nearly accidental, but I grab an anthology of some kind and just open it up. Today I ran into my old mentor, James Wright. You can read it below or listen here.

BY JAMES WRIGHT
Over my head, I see the bronze butterfly,
Asleep on the black trunk,
Blowing like a leaf in green shadow.
Down the ravine behind the empty house,
The cowbells follow one another
Into the distances of the afternoon.
To my right,
In a field of sunlight between two pines,
The droppings of last year’s horses
Blaze up into golden stones.
I lean back, as the evening darkens and comes on.
A chicken hawk floats over, looking for home.
I have wasted my life.

Poems are oracular? Are they breathy musings from eternity? Are they circuit breakers that having been tripped and flipped reconnect you to the mains power of the universe?

This morning I was seated on the swing with my best friend, Elaine. Drinking coffee. In much the same mood as Wright must have been.  The air was expectant and still, the deep mute of a hollar nested in the hills.  I knew what was going to happen. I knew that as the dawn sun arced across some mysterious angle that the first freshet of the morning would unstill the quiet. It did.  Except I heard it  before I saw it.  I heard the indescribable convection of the air rising and falling through the leaf cover all around me.  I have wasted my life thinking I understand.

The oracle speaks, but only to me. Go get your own damned oracle. Check out the one below.

Oblique Strategies

Brian Eno’s Oblique Strategies card set reimplemented as a dynamic web page.

Good licks to all.