The Road / Cormac McCarthy

Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.
You forget some things, don't you?
Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget.
Cormac McCarthy, The Road
"To live a creative life we must lose our fear of being wrong." Joseph Chilton Pearce

"If you press me to tell why I loved him, I feel that this cannot be expressed,
except by answering: Because it was he, because it was I."
Michel de Montaigne, "Of Friendship"

Saturday, January 22, 2011

There's Nothing I Wouldn't Do

I want to lick your stamps
I want to squeeze your fruit
I want to copy your keys
I want to polish your skis
I want to dry clean your suit
I long to renew your passport
I want to walk your collie
Get you Nova Scotia salmon you can put on your bialy
'Cause baby, when it comes to you,
There's nothing I wouldn't do
I wouldn't do
"There's Nothing I Wouldn't Do"
Music by Marcy Heisler, words by Zina Goldrich

When I first heard it at the concert last night, it made me laugh so hard right on beat. The words are so thoughtful and funny and the nouns are unexpected. I want to write like that. 

Oh, How I Loved You

I could think about the unimpressive way you said goodbye
Relief and immaturity combined
I could recollect the nothing that you made of what we shared
Chalk it up to being young and scared and blind
I could summon all the grace inside me, surely,
And maturely I could leave the past behind
But when I think about you
And I think about you
There's only one small thing that comes to mind

Oh, how I loved you
Oh, how I loved you
Strange and unfamiliar
Ridiculous and true
Oh how I loved you

And you can look at me and tell me I am crazy
It's true I can be crazy now and then
And I can take advantage of the comfort, and believe me,
There is comfort in the arms of other men
On the wall there is a China's worth of writing
And it's citing all the reasons we should part
I can put the past behind me
It's behind me
Save for one small thing that lingers in my heart

Oh, how I loved you
Oh, how I loved you
Dumb and unrelenting
And as the sky is blue
Oh how I loved you

Seasonless and reasonless and infinite and strong
Frightening, enlightening and pure
Cautionless and logicless and limitless and long
Wondrous, all-consuming
And impossible

I could think of your rejection, how it shook me to the core
How your unexpected exit broke my heart
How I learned that love you lose feels like a gently slamming door
A door you keep a lock on if you're smart
I could look into the mirror, and could rightly place some blame
On the histrionic games I love to win
But if I write the story
And I will write the story
I know just how the story will begin

Oh, how I loved you
Oh, how I loved you
Sweet and unbelievable
And if you only knew
Oh, how I loved you
"Oh, How I Loved You"
Words by Marcy Heisler, music by Zina Goldrich

Met Marcy and Zina yesterday and today. During our master class, Zina told us this is her favorite song. 

I love her adjectives, her rhymes, her simile of love to door. How this is a song and yet a poem in itself. 

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Afterword

Because a great many otherwise admirable men do not read books American women write, I wanted to use a decidedly male pseudonym. ... Still i intended to publish the book as A. Dillard, hoping--as we all hope, and hope in vain--someone might notice only the text, not considering its jacket, its picture, or the advertising; and not remembering someone else's impression of the book, or its writer, or its other readers; and not knowing the writer's gender, or age, or nationality--just read the book, starting cold with the first sentence.
Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek