Bad Poetry - Pandemic version

Where does the beauty lie?

Where does the genius reside?

Is it together, in a well appointed Malibu mansion?

Is that why beautiful people fill my images and my imagination?

Or, is the simulation too real?

Do I exist in the moment?

Is the moment real and the map a lie?

Are beauty and genius troubled constructions of children grasping for once was?

Is life a shadowy remembrance?

Was Plato right?

Or, are the forms all we have to chase?

Is existence always questioning?

Is transcendence always death?

Write Every Da...or, Only In the Midst of a Pandemic

First, and most obviously, I was promised more zombies. 

I should be thankful, I suppose. But, I'm rarely thankful for things I imagined wrongly. 

Second, and more seriously, shit is getting real. I suggested shit got real when the NBA shut down. I suspected shit got real when the NHL closed - especially as a Canadian. But, I knew shit really got real when Disneyland closed its doors. 

The Mouse don't fuck around for no bad flu. When Mickey starts losing money you know shit is serious. 

Shit is real......and it always has been.

This pandemic has provided a nice background tableau for many of us. What matters - your job, which is suspended, or imaginary, or 'done from home''? What matters - your social circle, which is drinking on a patio on the weekend, or a beach trip on Friday night or a party at your house? 

This pandemic has provided a background of what fucking matters. 

You.

Your people - not in the abstract, but in the absolute immediate. 

And....everybody else too. 

You are not alone.

You never were. 

You need to act in the benefit of everyone. You need to embrace us all. 

That is our only chance. 

Fuck difference. 

Fuck petty feuds. 

Fuck this virus built on disconnection and disparity. 

We are one. Let's act as it at once. 

Write (almost) Every Day - Part 4

This isn't news, but life is hard.

I've already failed at the "write every day" thing.

It was never realistic.

I'm busy. I'm middle-aged. My energy isn't boundless, like it once was.

But, I want to write as often as I can.

Today, this week, this time, I am going to write about perspective in media.

I need to stop skimming the surface of our world. It is too easy to fall victim to click-bait headlines and misconstrued summaries. I need to read the whole thing. I need to seek out original sources and original interviews and find the context of the catchy news.

I know this as an academic (using this term loosely).

I know this as an adult.

But, it is so very easy to succumb to headlines and short-cuts and bad takes. It is so easy to not try and understand.

On this day / week / period of writing I want to do better. I will seek the full story. I will look beyond the headline. \

Only then, I will judge.