the places you knew have changed their names by neon

Apr 30, 2015 11:36

So we had a bit of a situation here yesterday when suddenly just before 4 pm, the power went out. Just our floor and the floor above. We waited around for a few minutes, but when the building said they weren't going to be able to fix it quickly, we all went home. It was nice getting home early. Now it's mostly fixed, but the AC in the server room isn't working, so we are not connected to the network - we can get email and the internet, but no files (and no specialty applications, i.e., accounting software, SPSS, etc.). Though as I said to Boss2, I guess we can't complain when the electrician who caused the problem is in the hospital after being slightly electrocuted. Oops?

Now they're testing the fire alarms and I just want to claw my face off. Ugh.

In better news, I have both Age of Ultron and game 1 of Rangers v. Caps tonight to give my fannish heart palpitations. I'm sure once the movie starts I'll forget about the game, but I'm annoyed with the NHL about the timing. (Though unlike a lot of people I don't mind the 12:30 pm Saturday start. *hands* It beats five hours of Derby coverage and I'm unlikely to be inundated with Mother's Day ads, which I've found particularly trying this year.)

Maybe this movie will kickstart some writing. Who knows?

***

Arrow
Well that was an enjoyable if nonsensical hour of tv.

SPEEDY! \o/ FINALLY. I really hope Thea keeps the red...hood (Jason reference not intentional!) and joins the team next season!

Laurel and Nyssa! I am totally shipping it, which makes ALL of the Laurel/Ollie/Sara/Nyssa stuff completely ridiculously OTT, especially since we finally get Ra's most famous maneuver - trying to marry off his daughter to the vigilante superhero of his choice. Too bad Ollie's no detective. IJS. I'm going to guess that Ra's doesn't much care one way or the other about actually having Oliver as his heir - he wanted Oliver out of the way so he could level Starling City with a virus. I mean, I'm just guessing, but it does seem to be right up in his wheelhouse, as far as diabolical plans go. Maybe Malcolm's even in on it.

Oh, Ollie. I'm not sure how much of that was actually the brainwashing working (killing the hallucinatory Diggle - well, it was a real dude, but he hallucinated Digg's face) and how much of it was Oliver just retreating back into himself as a killer in order to protect himself from the situation. Though I'm really hoping it's the city that breaks him out of it, rather than friendship/love/what have you. Though he doesn't take it quite to Batman's extremes, Oliver's true love is Starling, and having to destroy it might snap him out of the conditioning. I think Maseo at least might have a problem with using the virus. On the plus side, KATANA IN FULL COSTUME NEXT WEEK. (Also, the terrible flashbacks have reached their climax, right? So we should just get nothing but Marc Singer explaining his evil plan before Oliver gets pawned off on the Russians and Anatoly can come back for some hilarity?)

LYLA. THE MICHAELS-DIGGLE MARRIAGE. I DRAW A MILLION SPARKLY HEARTS AROUND IT. "IT'S LIKE JAKARTA" AND THEN LYLA'S GUNNING DOWN ASSASSINS. I was terrified they were going to kill Lyla (and let's face it, the argument that Lyla, who worked for ARGUS, had clean hands was ridiculous; otoh, Nyssa was brave and ready to die and gosh, guys, I kind of love her a lot. Can she stay? She also improves Laurel EVEN MORE and I love that she called Laurel on her secret-keeping tendencies. Just like I loved Thea calling Felicity on handling her. Oh man, ALL THE LADIES WERE GREAT TONIGHT.)

And we finally get back around to HIVE. Wasn't it run by Slade's ex-wife? (or was that just the cartoon HIVE?) I'm guessing Damien Dark is next season's Big Bad. It'll be interesting to see where this all goes, for sure.

***

Today's poem:

Never Go Back

In the bar where the living dead drink all day
and a jukebox reminisces in a cracked voice
there is nothing to say. You talk for hours
in agreed motifs, anecdotes shuffled and dealt
from a well-thumbed pack, snapshots. The smoky mirrors
flatter; your ghost buys a round for the parched,
old faces of the past. Never return
to the space where you left time pining till it died.

Outside, the streets tear litter in their thin hands,
a tired wind whistles through the blackened stumps of houses
at a limping dog. God, this is an awful place
says the friend, the alcoholic, whose head is a negative
of itself. You listen and nod, bereaved. Baby,
what you owe to this place is unpayable
in the only currency you have. So drink up. Shut up,
then get them in again. Again. And never go back.

The house where you were one of the brides
has cancer. It prefers to be left alone
nursing its growth and cracks, each groan and creak
accusing as you climb the stairs to the bedroom
and draw your loved body on blurred air
with the simple power of loss. All the lies
told here, and all the cries of love,
suddenly swarm in the room, sting you, disappear.

You shouldn't be here. You follow your shadow
through the house, discover that objects held
in the hands can fill a room with pain.
You lived here only to stand here now
and half-believe that you did. A small moment
of death by a window myopic with rain.
You learn this lesson hard, speechless, slamming
the front door, shaking plaster confetti from your hair.

A taxi implying a hearse takes you slowly,
the long way round, to the station. The driver
looks like death. The places you knew
have changed their names by neon, cheap tricks
in a theme-park with no name. Sly sums of money
wink at you in the cab. At a red light,
you wipe a slick of cold sweat from the glass
for a drenched whore to stare you full in the face.

You pay to get out, pass the Welcome To sign
on the way to the barrier, an emigrant
for the last time. The train sighs
and pulls you away, rewinding the city like a film,
snapping it off at the river. You go for a drink,
released by a journey into nowhere, nowhen,
and all the way home you forget. Forget. Already
the fires and lights come on wherever you live.

~Carol Ann Duffy

And that ends the 2015 edition of National Poetry Month. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.

***

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national poetry month 2015, poetry, tv: arrow, work, my life so hard, fannishness

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