March 26, 2013 – Lola's Curmudgeonly Musings

Times Square in the Rain, 1949 by Fred Stein — Times Square in the Rain (1949)
by Fred Stein

Two for Tuesday (plus one): Rain

My dear,

I don’t know what to do today, help me decide.

Should I cut myself open and pour my heart on these pages? Or should I sit here and do nothing, nobody’s asking anything of me after all.

Should I jump off the cliff that has my heart beating so and develop my wings on the way down? Or should I step back from the edge, and let the others deal with this thing called courage.

Should I stare back at the existential abyss that haunts me so and try desperately to grab from it a sense of self? Or should I keep walking half-asleep, only half-looking at it every now and then in times in which I can’t help doing anything but?

Should I kill myself or have a cup of coffee?

Falsely yours,

Albert Camus

Rain

Woke up this morning with
a terrific urge to lie in bed all day
and read. Fought against it for a minute.

Then looked out the window at the rain.
And gave over. Put myself entirely
in the keep of this rainy morning.

Would I live my life over again?
Make the same unforgiveable mistakes?
Yes, given half a chance. Yes.

~ Raymond Carver

Water Damage

Let me destroy everything that I’ve written
that doesn’t have to do with the way you walk like you’re trying to hold
the sky up with your palms.

I’ve been listening to the rain for the past couple of days, have
been listening to songs that sound like what the rain would say if she
spoke English instead of Morse code, and if my
translations are correct, all she wants is for us to stand beneath her
with our mouths open, mouthing — kiss me.

I love like a leaky faucet or I love like a dam breaking.
There is nothing in between.

When I met you, the little Dutch boy pulled his finger
out of my chest and suddenly, everything inside of me spilled out at once.

I puddled an ocean, rounded the corner on Third Ave all the way uptown
to Grand Central like a flash storm, and
suddenly —

I couldn’t touch a thing without inflicting
water damage, without you breaking apart every molecule
that I had ever known.

~ Shinji Moon

Music by Stefano Battaglia Trio, “Ismaro”