---Iris M.
the saddest smile, also the most enigmatic. for me, for you? the saddest smile, that remains inward.
so, there it is, there y
ou go.i remeber it well
you didn't turn around to say:
i need you, i don't need you.
i remember you well...
you held the world up for me
even though it wasn't real!
a clown in the moon
or the moon in the clown
still, always my clown.
the ritual of departures,
that some call life.
the tyranny of not knowing you
against the easy familairity of the hours.
how did it come to pass:
which is to say: how does time pass?
what is real, what most so?
the innermost: the universal: Truth, Freedom..?
or orange pyjamas? too late on the scene, a witness to ashes and grey embers, like the memory of a stone, a door that wasn't opened for you, a dream within a dream. is that not a kind of reality?
why is saying 'regards' a way of saying goodbye? that's no way...
v. re·gard·ed, re·gard·ing, re·gards
v.tr.
1. To look at attentively; observe closely.
2. To look upon or consider in a particular way: I regard him as a fool.
3. To hold in esteem or respect
4. To relate or refer to; concern
5. To take into account; consider.
6. Obsolete To take care of.
v.intr.
1. To look or gaze.
2. To give heed; pay attention.
n.
1. A look or gaze.
2. Careful thought or attention; heed:
3.
a. Respect, affection, or esteem
b. regards Good wishes expressing such sentiment.
4. A particular point or aspect; respect.
5. Basis for action; motive.
6. Obsolete Appearance or aspect.
[Middle English regarden, from Old French regarder : re-, re- + guarder, to guard (of Germanic origin; see guard).]
taking leave. what is taken?
"what M is trying to do is to see D not just accurately but to see her justly, lovingly"
---Iris. M.
[the names have been changed to protect D]
change the names, change your mind. repentance. how will you give a label to these thoughts? a reassessing, a redifining, re-vision. nothing is given. capstones shift. how will you escape the world? by a leap of the will? into the blue. a different world, or the old one where i meet you five minutes earlier, where you wear a hat for me, over your straight/curly hair, to make yourself known.
'love is knowledge of the individual'.
this-ness. not: that-ness.
'we grow by looking' looking out for one another, and in for one another.
'the idea of a patient loving regard, directed upon a person, a thing, a situation, presents the will not as unimpeded movement but as something very much more like 'obedience'.'
like being in a white room, where everything is made clear. or even there, will you turn your face from mine and say:
'we are not always the individual in pursuit of the individual'?
19 comments:
hi b,
this moved me, to read this, very many true things in it.
hey, get out of here anton, you're embarrassing me!
looks like you are the last of my readers, dear anton..which also means the first.
I can't keep up with your film fest!:-0 I need you to tell me what to watch, to make distinctions for me. On the other hand, so little is available here...
khair...
keep well,
b.
the ritual of departures,
that some call life.
a lot in your post, but this above really spoke to me.
from humid, sweaty phnom penh, hello dear b.
hello, mani.. i think that line was stolen from somewhere! (like most of the stuff on this blog, i'm afraid to say)
i hope you packed your anti-deodrant with you! :-)
from smoggy, foggy, un-romantic, terrorist-ridden lahore:
hello!
and now, goodbye.
sleep well,
b.
what time is it there btw?
oh, b, now i say something nice to you, it isn;t good either :)
actually i download the movies from the internet (torrent) and i watch relatively randomly everything, because i haven't seen any movies since ages and am clueless.
oh no, anton, the tone didn't come across in my reply..it was more like :_) "get out of here" :-)
:_)
hmm..i realise that i can't describe in words the feeling!
i think my first reaction whenever anyone says something nice is to start off with "no" ..really is a terrible habit, lacking the good grace, as they say, to accept things.
torrent. i see. wish i could do that as well. nabil, you rascal, if you're reading this...
do you ever go to the cinema? just wondering..strange that we only 'see' slices of one another's life, no? i don't know why, but i'm less interested in what people who visit on this blog have read than what they had for breakfast!
i get what you wanted to say b. :)
no. yes. the accepting of good things...
i have sculpting in time at home here, but not yet read entirely. you're right. breakfast is much more important. today i will have a simple one: ruskbread with butter and salami and drinking cocoa and then tea.
and you. what was your breakfast today?
torrent is simple. one only needs to find a good site where to download the stuff. (no i don't often go to the cinema here, they are not so great. do you?)
hello, anton.
breakfast is usually, 5 days a week: porridge and bran bread.
Friday: halva puri (local stuff)
Sunday: scrambled eggs, hash brown, sausages, baked beans.
ruskbread sounds good. Used to have it with something we call 'malai' (cream).
you're the first person I've ever known to have cocoa in the morning. But yes, I like that a lot as well.
cinema..not any longer..too much of a risk. but in general: yes, i love to go! in any case , the cinema experience in Pakistan is something else! (i think I've written about it somewhere)
torrent..yes, will try and work it out.
have a good day.
salaams,
b.
sounds good. sunday is always advanced egg-day.
and marmite? do you like marmite? i like it when it goes in the zillions of little holes of toasted crumpet.
i have never eaten porride, but i am very well soon in for it.
yeah cocoa, a bit of a kids thing maybe but i like it too.
pity about the danger of cinemas in pakistan. do you know whether there are any good cinemas in brum?
have a good day too.
hey b.
i find there's less need for deodorant here than in cold canada - may be for the same reason you don't need a deodorant in a sauna...
breakfast: whole wheat toast with crunchy peanut butter and orange marmalade, instant coffee
you've put words to a feeling i've been having about your blog-comments dichotomy - often there seems a split between the blog writer b and the comment-ator b. sometimes feels like you write the posts for yourself, and the comment section is more for contact, less for actual comments on the posts. the fact that you only allow comments for those logged in, that helps in that.
which is just meant as an observation - how does it sound to you?
hello, mani! :-)
yes, the peanut butter sounds good to me! :-)
sorry, joking, joking..
err {he says, putting his serious hat on]...yes, I think you're right in one way. The post itself is , I guess "for myself" (I don't know how else it could be). How else could one write a post when there is no human interaction, face-to face dialogue , or at least something like this where there's a response?
On the other hand, though, I've got to say that I would have given up blogging a while ago if it hadn't been for the responses of antonia, roxana, and nichole. And I think it's fair to say that some of what I write has been a response to their own writing, images etc.
hmm..need to think about what you've said, though...
"actual comments" on the post...not sure there, mani. you could be right. I think the friendly banter is more important that any "points" or arguments or discussion, now that you mention it. I mean, yeah, I also like a good argument but the problem with some of the commenters here is that they're too clever! And so it's easier for me just to chat than respond to their points. All these discussions are so, I dunno, undergraduate-ish (if you know what I mean).
In any case, I've learnt over time never to argue with women! :-)
Keep well,
b.
p.s what are you doing in sweaty Vietnam? (it's okay if you don't want to answer that..peanut butter and marmalade is enough of a revelation..for now)
err..I meant Cambodia :-)
yes, writing on a blog is inherently for the self, but not only, I don't think. otherwise we'd all write private journals instead. and even those... reminds me of umberto eco saying that everything he wrote, he wrote in the hope of it being read by someone someday, and that the only thing you can write entirely for yourself is a shopping list.
in your case, because sometimes you write stuff but don't necessarily want to engage with it in conversation with others, then i as a reader can feel used. as in, you need to write something, need to let it out, and to complete that need me/others to read it, and full stop. if after reading what you wrote, me the reader have the need to engage with it and you further, that's not so interesting to you anymore, because your need was met.
and to be clear, this is not all the time, because you do engage quite a bit. only sometimes.
wow, thanks for the prompt, it feels good to be able to articulate something previously unclear - thanks for the nudge!
sweaty cambodia, a long story which in a nutshell says that i decided to give up the phd in toronto and this job immediately sprung up at the right time and here i am, working as a volunteer for undp, away from winter and academia and close to people.
be safe in laden lahore, b.!
Err..gosh, I should have known never to ask a shrink/woman for her comments! ;-0
No, i think there's some truth in what you say, mani. But only 'some'.
Well, I must say that I don't think of writing as a "need", and certainly not in terms of a need to "let it out". That sounds a bit too desperate to me! And nor do I think we should think in terms of need when it comes to friendship. At least I don't. I just enjoy writing and friendship. Perhaps anton will say that is too naive but it really is that: I enjoy conversation and light-hearted banter, joking around and so this comment section is good for that usually.
and sometimes there will be very clever replies or the sharing of texts, links to stuff , which has all been really stimulating, and I'm grateful to the people who write here for sharing that stuff.
But I don't think "need" is the right word, and if it is: reason not the need.
Perhaps you're right in that there's a desire to connect. Yeah, okay, is that what you're saying? But this whole notion of a reader "completing" what someone writes is, to my mind, really not what it's about. I don't think anyone talks (or should talk) to get to a "conclusion", or what the Americans call 'closure'! I prefer to talk much more freely (and that also means the hardest of things: listening). Once one starts to think in terms of need/use then we're already buggered, no?
Khair, fantastic points, mani.
danke.
b.
i must say i find this discussion really interesting, of you both, b & m. many interesting points and things i thought of as well, occasionally, on and of.
and first i don't think it's naive, banter and such in the comment section, i enjoy that too.
this question of engagement to others is interesting. and which form this takes. and i have to think of your other quote, the illich one "Silence is necessary for the emergence of persons" and what it says is i think a major reason for i made comments go away on my blog so i can mentally potter around (and it is certainly pottering about rather than anything else) somewhat unencumbered. that both things are necessary somehow, the possibility of silence, and the freedom of not having to engage and then again to engage and say hi, how is life to you and sharing one's breakfasthabits or so.
b., why is the need to reach out, the urge to see others, to make oneself visible, to be seen, why is that desperate?? is this some macho 'i depend on no one' thing? (since you brought the gender in...) isn't that need part of why you feel face-to-face to be better than blogging?
i think we need friends, and we need connection, and yes, breakfast banter is one of the comforts of friendship.
hello, anton.
I really like your idea of pottering about. Not that I feel any pressure by having a comments section. But being free to roam around this space, pick up on what other people say (if one wants to) , respond to someone else's comments and also clarify one's own thoughts in the process is really helpful. But, but..just talking to someone in a 'useless' way, without thinking too much is pleasurable..i.e without having to argue, justify, explain. This, I find, is much easier in a direct conversation rather than writing).
mani, I'm not saying that it "is" desperate.
"a bit too.." is more ambiguous.
Well, it could be a macho thing but it's probably more a male thing (if you want to look it in those terms , and if that distinction means anything).
But no, I personally don't think it is that (hey, you'd expect me to say that!).
I don't like phones either and this technology does little for me. Maybe I'm just too old-fashioned (I still prefer letters, for instance).
But yeah, I think there is something desperate in the need to be seen. As if one needed some sort of public recognition to be "complete" (to use your words again).
In fact, isn't what I'm saying a 'feminine' position?
of course, I'm not against appearances but just think that conversation, direct face to face, is something I enjoy more, am more at home with. I can joke around a lot more easily that way (gestures etc).
And I've got nothing against "need" per se..so yes, agree with you: we do need friends, love and lots of other things. What I'm a bit sceptical of is *defining* ourselves in terms of a lack (as the Allama would say: finitude is not a misfortune).
And I think recognizing and being aware of one's dependence is really important. But so is the ability to be on one's own, with silence. and so what I'm trying to say (rather clumsily) is that I'm rather uneasy with this mania for confession, for revealing all, "letting it all out" (which sounds too Oprah-ish to me..too American, if you know what I mean).
Of course, too much reticence and restraint can be, well, plain old anal, but I still think there's much to be said for it...especially in an age that believes in "expressing yourself". I think a lot of that is New Age mumbo jumbo.
Gosh, you've raised lots of interesting points, mani. I can see where you're coming from, but I'm not sure that the whole macho/man thing is the only (or best) way to think about it. Maybe it is, though. need to think about it.
keep well,
b.
Post a Comment