litlog 2014++

[Senna Jawa]

Irony

My friend was a popular and respected historian over decades. I know him from being in the same class at the university, just after we finished our high school. He is free of any prejudice, he has a very good (and sharp) pen, I had a chance to see that he is musical, ... He has a lot of great articles to his credit.

Nevertheless, an unfortunate exception, I read one of his about several outstanding professional women over centuries. It's an important, exciting and even moving subject--it's just hard to read about the crude, blatant, cruel, insensitive injustices which those women had to endure. So far so good and even great. Except that the article was written in an ironic style. The author was writing on the behalf of the stupid guys--to make fun of them--like he kind of meant it (with the tongue in his cheek). The effect to me was just awful, to me it was next to unreadable.

This reminds me the awful Polish March 1968. It started with an open anti-Semitic attack by the First Secretary of the Polish United Worker Party (a communist party), already back in 1967. And the vicious attacks went on for many-many months. Jews, especially when they talked to their friends and among themselves, reacted with irony. For the sake of irony, Jews would assume the ironic voice of talking like those awful racists. It was very hard, and most of the time to me it was just impossible to listen to.

Thus in years 1967-8 I got my lesson in irony. One should avoid it or apply in a very small measures, very gently. Otherwise the message is impossible to hear, finally you don't know what is true and what is a pretense.

Earlier I wrote about cases where a logical message is rendered useless by the wrong emotional choice of words. This time people were using an emotional construction on purpose but it was a wrong idea.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Voucher

When was it? 1991? 1992? ... Passengers were asked to give up their seat on the next plane (you would go on the next plane). I did, and I got a voucher for a round trip anywhere in the US, good for five years. I foolishly told about it my family and friends, and everybody wanted me to visit them. I felt a lot of pressure. So much that I couldn't find my voucher anymore. I found it right after the five year period was over. It was where it was supposed to be, where I knew very well were it was. It was simply in my wallet. For five years I looked at that voucher many times, but couldn't recognize it. Only after the deadline.

Today I have an invitation just from three places, from three different continents (one across the US). Voucher is not a problem, I don't need any. I just don't feel like moving anywhere. It's too much for me. Not long ago I could do 30 in 30 (but didn't for reasons not related to energy) but today I can't. I still should force myself to buy a really strong computer, and use it. I was planning it for December. Now it's February.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Possessions

Wise old men (women too ) tell you: don't get attached to possessions. But I love books. I don't love to read them, just to possess them. After immigration and so many movings, I am left with a small fraction of them, even if I continuously acquired new books, just at a much slower rate. And my only consolation is that today we can forget books, today we have Internet!

 

[Senna Jawa]

Aren't we all tired...?

Recently Tsotha has rehearsed that question "What is a poem ?" (really, what is poetry?) once again--I mean after many-many-many. It's so silly. After all, advanced poetry exists easily more than 25 centuries (two and a half millennia) and we still don't know what poetry is?! How dumb.

However we just got an interesting answer. Interesting because it allows us for two diametrically opposite interpretations. Here is this somewhat tricky statement:

"Poetry is whatever I decide is poetry."

by bronzeage​

The first interpretation is very reasonable, and I like it:

Poetry is whatever bronzeage decides is poetry.​

Indeed, I've read bronzeage several statements about poetry over the years, and he invariably makes sense. Thus the above definition of poetry is about as good as it can be (granted that it is not the most scientific answer), and I subscribe to it.

Now, the following other interpretation:

Poetry is whatever anyONE decides is poetry.​

would be a total vomit.

 

[twelveoone]

Recently Tsotha has rehearsed that question "What is a poem ?" (really, what is poetry?) once again--I mean after many-many-many. It's so silly. After all, advanced poetry exists easily more than 25 centuries (two and a half millennia) and we still don't know what poetry is?! How dumb.

However we just got an interesting answer. Interesting because it allows us for two diametrically opposite interpretations. Here is this somewhat tricky statement:

"Poetry is whatever I decide is poetry."

by bronzeage​

The first interpretation is very reasonable, and I like it:

Poetry is whatever bronzeage decides is poetry.​

Indeed, I've read bronzeage several statements about poetry over the years, and he invariably makes sense. Thus the above definition of poetry is about as good as it can be (granted that it is not the most scientific answer), and I subscribe to it.

Now, the following other interpretation:

Poetry is whatever anyONE decides is poetry.​

would be a total vomit.

Total bullshit, Senna, or rather total puke, if you prefer.
Bronze is an anyone, Senna is an anyone, I am an anyone, anyone is an anyone.
What you are saying (at best) is you respect either or both, his credentials or philosophy of what poetry is about.

The way you are saying it, looks like ass kissing politics, of which you seem to be fond of accusing others off.

What I am saying is all credentials are incomplete, all philosophy is flawed, live with it.

Now if the reader fills in 90% of the poem, can you assume that you are not the only reader, nor your's is the only correct way of reading.

Did the muse sprinkle some magic dust on a select few, as John Calvin would have us assume, or is it something to do with "received knowledge" from the Acknowledged as another would have us assume, or is it something that has worked to, worked at, rethought on a continuous basis?

 

[Angeline]

Here's the poem, SJ. Be kind: I wrote it in 2003.

1942
(for Simon Szerman)

Hollow feet echo the square
cobblestones are scraped
by worn shoes scraping wearing
through ice on stone.

The ground is thick with the hollow cold of winter.
Frozen ruts against a gray empty as coats
worn thin and voices wan inconstant as the wind.

The stones are blind
to the empty faces crossing the square,
blind as stones in their silence in the snow.

Empty hands carry stones instead of hope,
children pull carts filled with cabbages.

At night they dream of bread.
They dream of butter-colored suns
instead of stars.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Here's the poem, SJ. Be kind: I wrote it in 2003.

(What's wrong with 2003?). Thank you, Angeline. It's a moving poem.

1942
(for Simon Szerman)

[...]​

Would you select a link or two (if any) so that I can read about Simon Szerman? (I tried to google but the list didn't seem too useful yet).

Thank you again. Best regards,

 

[Angeline]

(What's wrong with 2003?). Thank you, Angeline. It's a moving poem.



Would you select a link or two (if any) so that I can read about Simon Szerman? (I tried to google but the list didn't seem too useful yet).

Thank you again. Best regards,

That's my fault. I should have given you the full Polish name but I gave you half of it!

http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Szymon_Szerman

That is the Polish Wiki. It was one of his paintings, a gouache of children pulling a cart of cabbages, that put the poem in my head. And you know I was interested in Lodz.

 

[Senna Jawa]

That's my fault. I should have given you the full Polish name but I gave you half of it!

http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Szymon_Szerman

That is the Polish Wiki. It was one of his paintings, a gouache of children pulling a cart of cabbages, that put the poem in my head. And you know I was interested in Lodz.

I should have known, actually I did, that Szymon = Simon. E.g. the great chess player and not a half-bad businessman Szymon Winawer was known also as Simon Winawer.

A number of Jewish artists (and Jews in general, of course) were confined by Germans during WWII to Jewish ghettos, in Warsaw, in Łódź, etc., and they continued doing art to the last moment before Germans murdered them. Some of these artists were poets. Some of their poems survived.

 

[Senna Jawa]

A poetry reading

Email from a local bookstore informed me about a poetry reading by an associate professor from an obscured university. I read the letter only yesterday, Tuesday, but had time to show there on time, at 7pm, that same Tuesday. Still at the computer, I found an extensive interview with that professor, and I also checked ratings by his students. They were very good. The interview described a story about his years of studying literature. The story was impressive. However I could not learn anything about poetry itself from all these kilobytes.

The bookstore's basement, with books on the shelves, was mostly filled up by 20 to 25 people. All of them, but me, undergraduate UofM students, most of them women. Some people in my situation, and of my age, would perhaps leave, but it didn't occur to me (I did ask though if it was ok with them). They belonged to a club, perhaps to the Undergraduate English Association at UM. Not all of them were from the English Department, some were from Business School, and who knows what else.

Actually, there was no associate professor. Instead, among the students, there were four poets, scheduled to read their poems from a nice magazine xylem 2013-2014, published by Xylem Literary Magazine of the above mentioned Association. All four were women. The whole printed issue listed only nine authors, one or most likely two were men, and seven (or eight) were women. I received the issue of the magazine just before the beginning of the reading session.

I checked only on the poems of the performers. Perhaps their education, age, and the fact that they were all women, made somewhat uniform impression on me. Poems were written in nice English, were melodic and scanned well, were very personal, with mostly "I" at the center of the poem, and--finally-- they were strongly focusing on the sensual sensations coming from their own body (i.e. from the lyrical subject's body ).

This was the quietest poetry reading I ever attended. They barely clapped at the introduction of the consecutive poet. Starting with the third performance, they started to clap politely after each poem. At the beginning of the meeting they mentioned a discussion and questions. Nobody showed any reaction. The last poet actually mentioned discussion at the beginning of her performance, and after her reading but nothing happened (except that her friend just mumbled that the poems were nice, something like this). I had my observations and questions, could go either way, but ultimately I said nothing, and left.

Nearly a half of a century walked with me: paper, universities, computers, DOD and computer companies, printouts, intranet, Internet, public and private groups, portals... Warszawa (and other Polish cities and regions), Moscow, Italy, a bunch of States, Canada...--such a quiet occasion, and such a strong echo in space and time.

 

[butters]

it needed one person to start the ball rolling. if you had questions and observations, and with your advanced "knowledge" and years, maybe you could have led the way - opened the discussion.

to be clear: i used the " marks around knowledge not to belittle it or cast aspersions, but because i intended it as an inclusive term - to encompass your education/experience as a writer/life experience.

 

[Senna Jawa]

The gold age of poetic Internet

One of the best poets of the early time of Internet was writing sharp, erotic and sensual poems. (I am not sure how still sensitive are readers these days to such poems when today's texts are much more explicit, graphic, and so on). I couldn't tell from the first name if this poet was a woman or a man. Even the last name, which was Polish, wouldn't give me a clue since the first Polish Americans were avoiding the declination of their name. This ambiguity was adding to the poems' attraction because I was not sure if these poems were straight or gay. As good as these poems were they were still better, kind of mysterious, had a strange glow to it. With the time passing, I learned the author's gender. In general, the Internauts were friendly these days, in an authentic way, without any sugar cover. The fact that we all knew each other name, and who we were, was certainly nice.

Anyway, inspired by one of this author's poem I have written my own but related to the previous one. And in my poem I had one of the characters being gay. It was a pleasure to get privately a comment from the original author. In these days a lot more was happening in the private emails than on the forum. My correspondent saw an affinity of my poem to a piece by another and very recognized author from the same forum (there was virtually only one forum these days). I was so surprised! I indicated the common points with the original. Now the original author was surprised, and said Indeed!, and added still more coincidences.

Years 1989-1990 were the early, pioneering time for Internet poetry. Then 1990-1991 was the golden era. In particular, there was a talented crop of new poets, and each one was a happy discovery. Only one thing became unclear from the time distance, but how could I know? I started the commenting of poems on the Internet. Before me, it was unheard of, except for trivial 2-4 words like "nice poem". Actually, I regret it. Of course, if not me than some 2-3 more years and inevitably the commenting mania would happen anyway, I'm pretty sure of it. Anyway, in old days it made sense.

In the fall of 1991, the sociological and technological developments changed the Internet. In the case of the poetic forum much for the worse. The occasional old "flaming" got replaced by brutal anonymous animalish stupidity and brutality. Since that time the Internet was never the same.

Nevertheless, years 1994-1995 witnessed a silver age. The exchanges were often hostile and prejudiced but a crop of new poetic talents showed up, and together with some "old" poets they provided a lively poetic environment. On the top of it, there was also a super-strong private email list "Zero City". Amazing.

Now the domination of rec.arts.poems was receding. New kind of developments was taking place. But it's still a long story, to me -- fascinating. And think, all these poetic activities are but a particle of the Universe, doomed again and again. Universe sounds wow!, but it's nothing but CHAOS.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Talking about poems and gays/lesbians brings to my mind a charming Literotica episode of a discrimination in reverse . We used to have serious lesbians on this forum, series enough to get married. In one case one of them pumped the other with some foreign elixir of life, and in the time due we were virtual witnesses to a Literotica child birth.

We had at one time a discussion about poems and the so-called other orientations. The conversation certainly went beyond pure poetry, and touched upon life, I guess. Thus one of our lesbians asked me what do you know?, implying that since I am straight I cannot know much. I only smiled. Indeed, she was right.

This nice memory is in a sharp contrast to the degenerated rambling of sick guys, aggressively spilling their filth around Internet, abusing sexual and similar language, trying to be as obnoxious as they can be; and these rude guys easily succeed, at least in this one regard, ugh!

 

[Senna Jawa]

Chaos

World is CHAOS.

There is no God, no sense, no harmony, ... All I have learned, all that I feel, everything tells me:

World is CHAOS​

This leads me to a complete view on humanity, based on one and only one commandment. It's nice that others may believe in God, and they still may arrive at the same view on humanity, based on the same commandment. More about it perhaps on another occasion.

Some people might think that CHAOS is faceless and homogenous. It's just the opposite. A necessary part of chaos are fluctuations or flukes for short. No flukes--no chaos. It's not true that CHAOS doesn't include patterns. It's just that they do not survive forever.

During WWII, German encripters (enciphers) avoided patterns, thinking that it made their code more random (chaotic). That's what Brits took advantage off. Because fluctuations are a part of chaos. At one time suddenly I saw on tv a familiar mathematician, Peter Hilton. well, he looked much younger at the time, on the tv screen. I talked to him a number of times but had no idea that he worked on breaking Enigma messages. All this was highly secret even years after WWII. Anyway, Peter mentioned about the German misunderstanding of chaos.

If there is no sense and no harmony then what is there left for humans?

Why? Flukes! Some flukes are HORRIBLE, some are pathetic, ... but there are also wonderful flukes. We should strive toward fantastic flukes. That's my message. After all, my view is positive. And anyway, the world and the things are the way they are--labels will not make much difference.

Let me illustrate the subtle character of CHAOS. Occasionally you run into people which neglect the (not so) recent progress in physics. They still subscribe to the Newtonian mechanics. Thus they subscribe to deterministic model of the physical world. Deterministic is diametrically opposite to CHAOS. They may consider a question: is the corner sidewalk of State and William going to be wet on 2034-04-12 at noon? To these deterministic guys the answer is simple. They don't care that weather is hard to predict. At the given moment the Universe has only a finite number of atoms, each has its position and velocity vector. Thus you just solve the equation, and you get the answer--in principle, you can do this computation.

But "in principle" means nothing. You cannot collect the necessary data. If you could, there is no computer which can handle this assignment. And if you could build such a huge and energy intensive computer, that would change the Universe, certainly it'd change the situation on Earth (it's climate). And if you still believe in the deterministic Universe, then the following argument will leave you frustrated: the time which it takes to compute the wetness status of the State and William corner would take about the needed twenty years or even longer. The simplest is to do nothing and simply wait for the moment. All the possible computations mean nothing when you cannot predict the events on time. If you cannot predict then it means CHAOS.

I have repeated here the word CHAOS so many times that you can claim a pattern. Naeh, it's just a fluke.

 

[Senna Jawa]

A bit of chaos, nicks (id's), and Zhuk.

My standard nick was and is wlod. I was the first wlod on Internet. In later years occasionally some other guys would also assume the same nick but not for long. And for a longer time I didn't see any wlods anymore. Nevertheless occasionally I needed another nick. Sometimes I try to sign for something on Internet, and as a rule, I mess up the procedure. Then I try to correct it. But the system tells me that my nick is already in use. So I need another nick (user name). These things can drive you crazy. So I took Senna Jawa. Then I use it on other occasions too. As you can see. Then things happen. I don't need any complications but CHAOS loves it. So I still needed another nick. That's where Zhuk comes at one time. A very quiet and peaceful fellow on our Forum here. And he calls me Guru ji. So, I ask him will it be ok if I used Guru ji nick elsewhere on Internet. I could feel his virtual smile when he told me that, hm, others can call you Guru ji but it'd be awkward to do it yourself. This made me laugh. So of course I used Guru ji nick--I don't need to be that serious, I can fool around like this.

I'd tell you more about Zhuk, except that he wants his privacy (of course Zhuk was his Literotica nick). Thus just let me mention that he was a serious fellow. He decided to learn haiku from scratch, and poetry in general. It was really nice to see him making progress. He started to publish his haiku already near the end of his staying here, and more once he left Literotica. He even came here back at one time, just once, and shared his success with us a bit. So, we have a nice and positive Literotica story.

 

[Senna Jawa]

A good question

It's 2014-04-16 -- the two last nights in a row the temperatures were well under freezing, -4C and -8C. For you, metrically challenged guys:

-8C = (32 + (-8)*9/5) F = (32 - 14.4) F = +17.6F​

C'mon master Basho et al., am I supposed to write April winter haiku?

 

[Senna Jawa]

two nations

Let's see, my poem two nations features:

• 3 countries
• 3 nations (2 appear dramatically)
• 2 rapes
• 6 characters (2 mothers, 2 fathers, two sons)
• implicitly--two husbands
• 2K-year long history
• 1 religion (or 2)
• ---------------------------------------------------
• 8 lines

 

[Senna Jawa]

Saints and beer

Total strangers bought me a beer about a dozen times. Over several decades. Not too often. Bar owners, some guys, and some women (perhaps women as often as guys).

This came to mu mind because UYS wrote about the Saint George day. Over a month ago I was stopped by three young women on the Saint Patrick day; it had to be on March 17. They were on a balcony of the top, third floor, while I was walking down the street. Thus indeed they stopped me, I didn't shrug them off. They told me that they will meet me in a bar (one day), and will buy me a beer. I believe that was the first time in my experience that instead of actually getting one I got only a promise. It was still nice.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Miami-LA

los angeles is still asleep
miami's already awake

It's been so long ago. Here, recently, in Ann Arbor, I stopped hopelessly at a KROGER shelve, trying to select a vegetable oil. One of the vegetable oils. One of the so many different vegetable oils.

A woman was passing by me down the aisle. She advised me Canola. (Did she smile?)

Canola oil stayed in my kitchen for awhile, doing nothing. Then I boiled brown rice and had a few portions with the said oil. After a few times I couldn't help memories

driving dreaming in fog
about a redhead with green lights​

wh,
1991-01-11​

Thus I checked wikipedia about Canola oil. There was more to it then automobile industry. Was that KROGER's female customer really smiling?

 

[Senna Jawa]

Imagination--the other direction

The more common direction is toward richer, more dimensional, ...

The less attractive but equally profound direction is toward minimality. Can you with the next to nothing achieve everything? By everything we mean the ability to simulate the most abundant situations. Take away the vision, the hearing, the smell... You may feel with your hands the direction, the relative position, e.g. you may read Braille. You read from left to write, then down, and the world and its lively possibilities are still yours.

Now take away the ability of directions. You can't tell which item is to the left of another, and vice-versa. No up-and-down for you, no before and after. How can you tell the difference between similar things with respect to their position, or of any relative position between anything. You don't even a physical sensation of time or any direction in the space. Then what?

May be you need a bit of imagination, right?

Here is the world. Things are contained in shapeless containers or bags (like plastic bags). Either the bags go through each other or for each item you make arbitrary number of identical copies so that you may simulate a reappearance of the same thing in different bags. For the sake of simplicity, let the bags go easily one through another, just to make things a bit easier.

That's all. Can you read? When letters are there but do not form physically any shape. They exist just in shapeless bags, and you cannot say that one is before the other, the another one is after the two. How can you make words and sentences?

That's your imagination challenge. Before you write a sonnet you may have something to think about.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Terry--RIP. Condolences to Angeline.

The news about Terry's death was a shock. The two of you, Angeline and Terry, were a wonderful pair, so fortunate. I feel so sorry. Terry, RIP.

On Literotica, Terry--known as eagleyez--was a good poet. His style in one word can be described as natural, very likable. He was on Literotica a quiet person. And still, when at one time threads on this board were created to stress 100 words, then 10 words, then 3, Terry reacted by creating one of the most popular threads named by Him: not sure how many words. Nothing lasts forever, but His thread will for a while.

Angeline, not long ago a friend of mine lost his brother, then he has lost a companion with whom he lived for years, they were deeply in love. I expressed my sympathy for him. He just said: life goes on.

Best regards Angeline,

Włodek​

 

[Senna Jawa]

Chaos (a minor example)

From wikipedia:

Despite having lived all her life in Estonia, Valentina Golubenko and her parents decided to hold Russian citizenship. Thus, since 2003 she has not been allowed to represent Estonia in the international chess championships, as according to the article 8 of the Sport Act of Estonia only... blah-blah-blah. Golubenko's family claims that the decision of the Federation contradicts FIDE's General Rules for participation in FIDE events. Estonia's leading grandmaster Jaan Ehlvest agrees with this opinion. Still the Estonian Chess Federation has not allowed Golubenko to play under the Estonian flag.... As a solution, the Estonian Chess Federation proposed Golubenko to apply for Estonian citizenship; this proposal was rejected by the Golubenko's family. As Golubenko was denied to play for Estonia and her strength was not enough for Russia she decided to play under the flag of Croatia, which was allowed by FIDE.​

As you see, Golubienko was too weak to play for Russia, but she won the championship !!!

REMARK 1. Estonia would not allow a teenager to represent her country.
REMARK 2. There should be no national elements in sports, including chess and similar. It's a matter of principle. Also, many people in sports were discriminated and persecuted due to national politics around the world.
REMARK 3. The large, centralistic, bureaucratic sport organizations (including and especially the international chess organization FIDE) are as bad as authoritarian regimes--fortunately, just within their relatively limited capacity.

 

[Angeline]

The news about Terry's death was a shock. The two of you, Angeline and Terry, were a wonderful pair, so fortunate. I feel so sorry. Terry, RIP.

On Literotica, Terry--known as eagleyez--was a good poet. His style in one word can be described as natural, very likable. He was on Literotica a quiet person. And still, when at one time threads on this board were created to stress 100 words, then 10 words, then 3, Terry reacted by creating one of the most popular thread named by Him: not sure how many words. Nothing lasts forever, but His thread will for awhile.

Angeline, not long ago a friend of mine lost his brother, then he has lost a companion with whom he lived for years, they were deeply in love. I expressed my sympathy for him. He just said: life goes on.

Best regards Angeline,

Włodek​

Thanks for these words, which are kind and honest. It is a heartbreaking loss for me. Our shared passion for poetry and music (and life) gave me ten of the best years. I just wish there had been more.

Life does go on. I think about Terry--a lot--every day, but I have my kids and my two adopted kids (Terry's sons) to keep me going.

I'm working on a book of his poems for his boys. They know little of his poetry (only that he loved to write it), and it will be like another conversation with their much-loved dad. I'm so happy I can give them that, you know?

 

[Senna Jawa]

[...] I have my kids and my two adopted kids (Terry's sons) to keep me going.

I'm working on a book of his poems for his boys. They know little of his poetry (only that he loved to write it), and it will be like another conversation with their much-loved dad. I'm so happy I can give them that, you know?

Angeline, it's good to have kids. To do things for kids. And to do your Terry poetic project. You are brave. Good luck to you,

Włodek​

 

[Senna Jawa]

Magnus Carlsen just won the world chess championship match against Vishy Anand, with a score 6.5:4.5. It was a rematch. A year ago Anand was the champion but he lost to Carlsen, who was the challenger at the time. The score a year ago was 6.5:3:5 in Carlsen favor. Now Carlsen was the champ, Anand the challenger. Thus Carlsen is still a champion, while Anand is not anymore (he may play again against other candidates though).

I don't have a high opinion about chess. I wish I didn't spend any time on it (just like in the case of poetry). The chess endgame does something good to brain. The rest of the game is just a game--interesting, even exciting at times, but that's all. There is also the artistic element to chess, I should add. Chess elevates the adrenalin level, it may also frustrate--the two go hand in hand . A lot was written about chess players, a lot more than about other people. Nobody else is documented as much as chess players. By themselves and by others. i mean top chess players, but there were a lot of them.