Irrational Grace

My name is David. I'm a writer, poet, actor, painter, the last Renaissance man, compulsive book reader, student of theology, lover of wisdom and women and travel to New Orleans to do street poetry in Jackson Square.

[bnmxfld]

Benjamin Alire Sáenz / He Forgot to Say Goodbye

[violentwavesofemotion-deactivat]

And the need to read is like an awful raging hunger.

Susan Sontag, from a diary entry featured in As Consciousness Is Harnessed To Flesh: Journals & Notebooks, 1964 - 1980 (via violentwavesofemotion)

Yes!!

[irrationalgraceistaken]

spontaneous me

[freelance-philosopher]

I believe that, in this country, the press exerts a greater and a more pernicious influence than the church did in its worst period. We are not a religious people, but we are a nation of politicians.

Henry David Thoreau, Slavery in Massachusetts  (via freelance-philosopher)

Wow, how prophetic

[bnmxfld]

F. Scott Fitzgerald / This Side of Paradise

[irrationalgraceistaken]

[irrationalgraceistaken]

meteor

[irrationalgraceistaken]

[pelicandensity]

Bone Dancing

I grit my teeth

as I cut deep

to the bone

of my existence

carving away illusions

I have created

for my own comfort

hope is a leather strap

which I chew upon

to block the pain

as my personal

rationalizations

flow away in a

red river of shame

I am compelled

to remove all trace

of pretense

to strip bare my soul

and by shedding this skin

I hope to find

something

anything

which will save my spirit

so as I stand here

in the darkness

eviscerating my existence

for the sake of lost love

knowing I can carve no further

than gristle and bone

for the knife has become

dull with use and age

[irrationalgraceistaken]

Notes from New Orleans too

Are these clever poets mocking themselves?  It is a kind of American doublespeak they practice hunting for community in a sea of currency.  Or is it bravery to expose a figment of your soul to strangers while homeless men and women go mad from one end of the French Quarter to the other?

I think they lack the right aesthetic, a good aesthetic, or any aesthetic.  I think beauty should be hungered after.  We treat our hearts so poorly, don’t you think?  Whitman wrote that the true poets are not followers of beauty, but the august masters of beauty.  

Maybe Whitman had it backwards.  Can you be a master of beauty and a follower?  It’s a contradiction worthy of a poet trying to become a greater poet.  If I fail spectacularly, that will also give me something to write about.

[irrationalgraceistaken]

Notes from New Orleans too

Are these clever poets mocking themselves?  It is a kind of American doublespeak they practice hunting for community in a sea of currency.  Or is it bravery to expose a figment of your soul to strangers while homeless men and women go mad from one end of the French Quarter to the other?

I think they lack the right aesthetic, a good aesthetic, or any aesthetic.  I think beauty should be hungered after.  We treat our hearts so poorly, don’t you think?  Whitman wrote that the true poets are not followers of beauty, but the august masters of beauty.  

Maybe Whitman had it backwards.  Can you be a master of beauty and a follower?  It’s a contradiction worthy of a poet trying to become a greater poet.  If I fail spectacularly, that will also give me something to write about.

[irrationalgraceistaken]

finding your place

[freelance-philosopher]

There is no more Herculean task than to think a thought about this life and then get it expressed.

Henry David Thoreau in his Journal [May 6, 1858] (via freelance-philosopher)

[irrationalgraceistaken]

a beautiful lady

[marianapalova]

“Voices of Power: a study of Ectoplasm” Artwork by #marianapalova 2019

[irrationalgraceistaken]

This

[irrationalgraceistaken]

Quietness of Being

I feel like I have this quality, this quietness of being, that seems to escape a lot of people in this postmodern world.  I’m easy to overlook in a crowd and despite being a Gemini, I don’t want to be the center of attention.  I want someone’s attention, but I don’t mind solitude.  I have two teenage boys who keep me in a state of awe and frustration, they look to me for guidance.  I look to them for optimism and we meet in the middle in a kind of super symmetry.  

I want them to love and be loved, to be confident and take risks.  There will always be suffering in the world.  I can’t fix it, but I can raise men who know that kindness is a superpower and no political ideology or religion is stronger than the idea of mercy.

I read too much.  This is not the whole story, but I do not draw conclusions here.  I only pose questions.

[irrationalgraceistaken]

Spontaneous Prose #2

At lunch, yesterday in the humid glow of the French Quarter, I wrote a poem for Suzie, an attractive New Yorker spending time with her mom before a cruise trip to Cozumel.  Hard to write a poem about the color purple with her bold, brazen eyes looking at me looking at her, her soft midriff and random tattoos telling the story of her life.  I spoke to her as the enchanted words popped across the typewriter ribbon onto the white paper.  She thought I was interesting, which distracted me as my pulse rocketed.  I have come to recognize the ethereal glow of women who look at me with a romanticism that is both opaque and unequivocal.  I have not yet figured out how to flirt with a young woman whose mother is standing next to her.  I should have complimented the mother perhaps, joking about the good genes in her family or written my phone number on the back of the envelope that contained the poem.  I thought of all this later after the arousal had faded, a brief glimpse into an alternate reality where reckless passion led to an adventure worthy of a novel or two.