A Concrete Life
When you open up the book to your life and thumb through the pages, maybe you pause halfway and take a peek at what's to come. Your finger slides up the page that reads "Middle Age" and as you delve into the chapter, you become bored. A thrashing wave of disappointment knocks you over as you realize your life isn't what you thought it would be at 10, 15 or even 25. Maybe you put off your life's passions for practical things like health benefits, settling down and a decent bedtime. Instead of writing life affirming manifestos you write out bills; instead of fucking your lover like a maniac you opt for whacking off in the shower; taking shot after shot of decadence until your mouth glistens with the sweet poison of temptation has faded into countless nights of Prime Time TV and leftovers.
Or if you never lived life hard, you lived it fast instead; the excitement of flying over a snow covered edge and landing perfectly with you and your board still in tact has given way to taking Zantac before even daring to fit your fat ass into the seat of a rollercoaster.
Maybe you once followed your heart and now that sticky part of grey matter controlling common sense has blurred your heart's vision.
As you turn through the pages of middle age you remember what your creative writing professor in college explained to you about poetry:
"Poetry is the art of describing abstract ideas with concrete language."
The other students in your class didn't get it. They argued with the professor endlessly, demanding that poetry be adequately structured and should most certainly rhyme.
But you got it...hardcore.
After all, if the first line of Ginsberg's Howl read:
"I saw my brilliant friends go insane because they were degraded by society"
instead of
"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix..."
It just wouldn't have been the same...
Or if he had written "amazing people" instead of "angel headed hipsters" would an entire generation of disgruntled youths have followed him down that Beaten path?
I doubt they would have.
So, why do we demand such high standards for poetry but such mediocre standards for life?
Instead of sleepwalking through life holding tightly onto abstractions, why don't we live life concretely? Why don't we take our stagnant stanzas and manifest it into chaotic backwards prose?
After all, you do want your life to be tangible enough...edible enough ... fragrant enough...that when you pick up your life's story and turn to the chapter on Middle Age, you aren't so disappointed.
Or if you never lived life hard, you lived it fast instead; the excitement of flying over a snow covered edge and landing perfectly with you and your board still in tact has given way to taking Zantac before even daring to fit your fat ass into the seat of a rollercoaster.
Maybe you once followed your heart and now that sticky part of grey matter controlling common sense has blurred your heart's vision.
As you turn through the pages of middle age you remember what your creative writing professor in college explained to you about poetry:
"Poetry is the art of describing abstract ideas with concrete language."
The other students in your class didn't get it. They argued with the professor endlessly, demanding that poetry be adequately structured and should most certainly rhyme.
But you got it...hardcore.
After all, if the first line of Ginsberg's Howl read:
"I saw my brilliant friends go insane because they were degraded by society"
instead of
"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix..."
It just wouldn't have been the same...
Or if he had written "amazing people" instead of "angel headed hipsters" would an entire generation of disgruntled youths have followed him down that Beaten path?
I doubt they would have.
So, why do we demand such high standards for poetry but such mediocre standards for life?
Instead of sleepwalking through life holding tightly onto abstractions, why don't we live life concretely? Why don't we take our stagnant stanzas and manifest it into chaotic backwards prose?
After all, you do want your life to be tangible enough...edible enough ... fragrant enough...that when you pick up your life's story and turn to the chapter on Middle Age, you aren't so disappointed.