Welcome to the party, there are no refreshments, help yourself
channeling "Fifty Years" by L.E. Aleman
art by hilma af Klimt
link to this weeks poem, “Fifty Years,” by L.E. Aleman is here.
in order to re-orient our enjoyments, we have to first re-orient our desires. its time to be clear about what we want and where we got our ideas about what we want and that time is every day and that time is now. I will tell you how your desires work: since you were a little kid you have been observing everyone and everything very closely (even sometimes when you did not know!) and you have been making little judgments about how it worked out for them, and when you find someone who seems to really get things straight, you tell yourself you want what they want. you will subconsciously mimic their fashion, their mannerisms, and even their diet.
bc of course its not really very easy to figure out what you want for dinner let alone, should I move away to one of the thousand cities n which one?? your decisions are usually concerning one of a few interlocking illusions, such as should I find a new job, or am I happy? both the body n the mind are frustrating resilient, happy doesn’t matter so much, question is : are you able to sleep? if so, that is enough. New job, then a return to happiness, the expression returns to neutral, as on the face. upside is that you can have McDonald’s Land Sea and Air once, and ur body survives. You can have immense pain n keep trucvkin on.
Dreams are as good as ashes.// Give it a hundred years, you’ll see.
And ashes as good as dreams.. Today. Aleman’s poem wrestles with an existential guilt. Blood on the hands being washed in a manner that recalls CDC guidance. She has the trademark BURNING PALACE curse, desire for impossible truth, the, as it were. Rub-a-dub-dub. The drain sucks the tub/.
A smile and a kiss on a winter morning//I close my eyes and say that I am dying.
I think Death is like a little friend that grows up with you and becomes a big friend.
Our happieness is significantly less resilient than our unhappiness, tho. Aleman wrestles with existential guilt in that she is born in blood like “Dexter.” The blood is everywhereIn the land of the free, freedom too, is pretty resilient, it doesn’t let up in its onslaught. When a company is free it robs its employees. When a government is free it pressed the thumb down., N person who is free is topsy turvy to impulse of sex. Perhaps when **** becomes dove, crying we can destroy our enemies, crucially . . . without guilt, but until then, there is the falling to the knees again, and how can the persons nature be so unrepentable>?
Still, like terrifying biblical angels, we at Burning Palace have a hundred eyes and have come down to heaven teach you how they rock n roll above heaven. Be not afraid.
Aleman’s poem says “welcome to the party, there are no refreshments, help yourself.”
then let us spin the wheel of waking up the next day. I don’t mean to be crude but the blood on at the hand could be from menstrual sex. I don’t meant to be crude but There is complete alternate interpretation of the poem where it is about insatiable lust, n a taste for dominance over sexual partener. perhaps at the end of the poem, as at the end of a life, enjoyments n desires can cross perfectly like the cross shape lens flare of eclipsed sun, for one brief moment before the death sets in n puts its hand on scalp massage mode, n scratches head in the melancholy light. perhaps we can all be together like Harry Potter when wand explodes. imagine one day they can play our song on the Spotify of souls^tm
But still while we r “chillin” there is still the invisible struggle between the rich n the poor going on. N the situation with desire only serves to consolidate our rich-poor pathology, in which, I think for some pain infliction is like handbag, see: emo rock icon, n dorian christian grey. Handbag you cannot afford.
So we need new desires. I am inspired by this poem to offer practical advice to reader: give up on idea of success. Even if you r kid of Elite Yale Harvard CiA Brazil Druglord, you might get passed over for Job of Energy Corporation board member. :(
Look up Peter Turchin n Elite overproduction means end of America. Everyone is elite these days in the ways of betray with gusto n pluck.
I take no commands and die peacefully.
Be satisfied to cultivate in yourself a deep resentment. Give yourself time n patience n self-care to cultivate huge gaping inner rebellion, n one day you will look back n say, huh . . .N u will remember winter morning . . .