*Original Presence* by Laynie Browne

Octopuswoman [click here]
is one of 12 illustrations by Toni Simon from Laynie Browne's new book of poetry *Original Presence* just published by Shivastan [click here] on handmade paper in Nepal.

"Upon recitation of the verses of the sea
Listeners gather their hems above the salty foam"

The mind's truth needs fiction's face.

Contradicta









Up to your neck in shit and sharks, and still thinking of someone's cold and cutting words...




*********************



In the pharmacopoeia of life, work is the elixir, pleasure the balm.

Contradicta











The endless questioning of youth is balanced by the endless answering of age.



*******************



Where comparison ends. opportunity begins.

Contradicta








It is good to possess at least a nominal acceptance of reality. It doesn't make life easier, or longer, but it does make it funnier.




***********************



To know what interests oneself is half of success; to know what interests others is all of it.

Contradicta








Those who insult themselves all day dislike being slighted, the way an accomplished thief hates being caught.




*************************



Just as sorrow covets compassion, vanity craves praise.

Contradicta








The smile of an ambitious soul rarely assures a safe haven.





**************************



Frequent disppointment, deception and betrayal induce the kind and warm to join the ranks of the cold and cautious.

Contradicta









True, contentment rests within- but it likes to be awakened gently and, even then, only to dance.




******************



Admiration visits; love resides.

Contradicta









The interminable night of rage shuns the mirror in the morning.




***********************



Hatred seeks contempt but escapes kindness.

Contradicta










Worry wonders; courage laughs.




**********************



Knowledge leads to wisdom but courage finds it.

Contradicta







Curiosity battles with boredom but love defeats it.



***************************



Even the heaviest burdens are buoyant on love's wings.


(for Toni)

Contradicta









Malice is spoken in countless barbed dialects and a single lenient one: silence.




**********************



Open ridicule wounds; silent derision poisons.

Contradicta









The jagged peaks of judgment provide a provisional bastion beyond a condescending chorus of criticism.




***********************



Opinion rarely sings solo.

Contradicta









An exceptional appreciation of the ordinary is the source of much that is extraordinary.




************************



Those sophists who dismiss every illusion are also blind to every miracle.

Contradicta











Better to be exiled in a frozen world than find refuge in a unforgiving mind.



**********************


Fear stalks the house bereft of love.

Contradicta









Greed is the opium of the swindler; indifference is the armor of the weary and oppressed.




************************



No sky, no smile; no smile, no sky.

Contradicta








Sometimes the music overwhelms the words, sometimes the poet overshadows the poem.




*************************



When one hand envies the other, nothing can be held.

Contradicta









The recognition of something's value frequently leads to little more than creating increased desire for it. This is how the appetite for acquisition trumps the progression of discernment.



***************************



Knowledge without insight is like humor without wit.

Contradicta






Just as there are shrewd animals who fake death in order to deceive predators, there are artists who feign failure in order to elude imitators. This device does not discourage the bottom feeders, however.



************************



One might as well cloak one's generosity in an air of indifference, since where kindness is viewed as weakness, loneliness prevails.

Contradicta








Victors are careful to conceal their disillusionment with the rules of the games they wish to win. "Confidence" is at the heart of this charade.




*****************************


Artists must get lost in order to discover anything as the freeways lead only to gas stations, malls and parking lots.

Contradicta





As writers climb the ladder to success they are wise to shed their feelings because the clouds, for example, that appear so substantial from below, from the top rung appear flat, where it also lonely because there is only room for one. This is a dilemma, however, for their readers, who expect to feel something in order to be convinced, when they read it, that the work remains substantial.


**********************

Friendship is a game of chess that should be played more gently and appreciatively as time goes on, otherwise the opponants will deprive themselves of the partners who have so steadily inspired them.

Contradicta









Draw contentment from mundane repetition, find a refuge from strident surprise.




*******************************



Too much satisfaction in approbation, too much affliction in disparagement or indifference..

Contradicta









The dream of justice is a rare balm for the wounded giant, humankind.




*********************



The cruel teach the kind how to hide their pain so as to corrupt and enlist them in their ranks.

Contradicta









Acknowledge every part and the whole will shine.




***********************



To value the useless finds its apotheosis in the farthest realms of art. But this is not the same as feeling useless.

Contradicta







To tolerate one's own suffering or that of others without trying or at least wishing to reduce it is itself a kind of evil because, as suffering grows, so does evil.



***************************


Celebrities who are prolific and talk freely inspire affection because they give the impression that at any moment they might blurt out the secrets of their success.

Contradicta









Strength is as important for love as kindness since it is as crucial to challenge the neglect of those whose love we want as it is to challenge our own neglect of those who want our love.



**************************


Perhaps before photography, prior to the omnipresence of the pose, people looked- and therefore felt- more like themselves.

Contradicta








Those that are too easily embarrassed are at the mercy of those that embarrass too easily.




***********************



The high tides of triumph recede in the face of the first waves of regret.

Contradicta










The perpetual satisfaction taken in accomplishments stems from believing they are among your rival's greatest torments; yet soon you begin suspecting they might be one of the competition's greatest spurs.



***********************


Where pride fails doubt prevails.

Contradicta








The sun shines equally on lovers and the heartless.




********************




On a moonless night, my fears, disguised as friends, whisper threats.

Contradicta








Fame is a restless, fickle friend whose flame is greatest near its end.




**********************



Those fruits of thought that ripen slowly are eaten quickly.

Contradicta








The long journey shorter, the heavy load lighter, temper tamed- forget yourself.




********************



That fool is wise who forgot everything except how to laugh.

Contradicta









As a child they looked up to them, and later straight in the eye; in their middle years smiled smugly down on them; now they shake their heads and sigh.



******************


Modesty protects friendship, pride destroys it.

Contradicta









Celebrated names and deeds are so widely remembered, personal help and kindness so readily forgotten.



*********************


Earnestness, the child of conscience, is ignored, sarcasm, a descendant of malice, applauded.

Contradicta










The unbending competitive drive that facilitates taking pleasure in condescending to or disparaging some, while glorifying others, joins stealing elections, the Bush crowd, torture and terrorism in that horrific, intractable slide towards dismantling democracy.


********************


Equality plus empathy equals nobility.

Contradicta








The deeper you dig the harder the rock, the narrower the tunnel, the lonelier the journey.




****************************



Steadiness of purpose and enjoyment of life form an odd, yet incomparable, friendship.

Contradicta








Empty time is a desert- or an embrace- depending on whether you view it through benign or anxious eyes.




**************************



We do not dislike ourselves as much as we imagine- we look forward to things knowing one thing for sure- we will be there.

Contradicta










Principle and perfection have facilitated more pain and harm than anger and failure will ever imagine.




******************



The devil's in the details- the beauty too.

Contradicta











People who have the least to say will try to silence others either by shouting them down or insulting them.



****************


Safer to kick a beehive than to malign a proud philosopher.

Contradicta










A notable difference between being old and being young is that rather than being bored by the calm before storm you enjoy it.



*******************


On the whole, people are more tolerant of a criminal than an unhappy person.

Contradicta









Listen to the whispers- all the bold voices have had their say.



*************



Strategy, shrewdness, brilliance, determination, pride, power, love, all will falter - hope alone remains infallible.

Contradicta








People drive each other crazy more or less continuously and then endlessly deliberate and debate about how others should behave.



**********************


You could multiply the dictionary by a thousand and still not have enough words to describe what most people think and feel in a single day.

Contradicta











Traditions harden into conventions when memory and empathy
are replaced by reverence and the cold devotion that supports it.



*****************************



There can be a useful tradition of unconventionality but conventional
unconventionality is a travesty that subverts its entire aim.

Contradicta





What is the difference between being very patient about the suffering of someone you care about and being indifferent to it? Shouldn't we insist on the other's attempt at happiness- or at least try and make them laugh?


***********************

Because it is so common and yet so unique persistence in caring remains largely invisible. What is occasionally noticed are the results and these are generally ascribed to some special talent, ability or opportunity.

(for Mark Wallace)

Thanks to
The Casual Tee (Trevor Calvert) [click here]
for tagging me

What is a book that changed your life?

Sigmund Freud, The Psychopathology of Everyday Life


What is a book you've read more than once?

Charles Bernstein, Senses of Responsibility


What is a book you'd want to take with you to a desert island?

Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus


What is a book that made you giddy?

Ted Berrigan, The Sonnets


What is a book that made you sad?

Paul Auster, In the Country of Last Things


What is a book you wish you had written?

Bernadette Mayer, Studying Hunger


What is a book you are currently reading?

Sue Grafton, A is for Alibi


What is a book you've been meaning to read?

Mark Wallace, Dead Carnival


tag 5 bloggers:

Toph- Nada- Gary- Drew- Ernesto- Possibly all of these bloggers have been tagged already- haven't been following this thread closely enough this summer to know who hasn't been tagged.

Contradicta








If the essence of life consists of learning to love, why wouldn't every other effort to offer lasting pleasure to others be guided by the same principle?




***********************



Unless accompanied by an ability to love, thinking is mostly painful.

Contradicta










Like so many other endeavors in contemporary life, music too often tries to subdue the beasts instead of charming them like Debussy.




*************************


A light touch may not hold things as long- yet this way they are more likely to return.

Contradicta








Powerful feelings perpetuate themselves by means of a trick- they promise- or threaten- to expand infinitely and eternally. Through moods, they try to install themselves indefinitely. But a mood is a replica of an emotion, only a product of the feelings that generated it.


**************************


An hour of regret is enough for three lifetimes.

Contradicta










Your doubts might be the seeds of unknown flowers, if only you would replant them among your ideas instead of your presentiments.


***************************


Words express meanings but their rhythms express their intentions.

Contradicta







Delight is the first language to be understood and the last to be forgotten. But from birth until death the meaning of pain rests opaque and obscure whose clearest expression is silence or a scream.



******************************


Anyone can think of clever things to say but can you explain to yourself exactly what you were feeling first thing this morning?

Contradicta










Mood, reminiscence, hunch, whimsy, expectation, afterthought- silhouettes that flower into portraits.



********************


Zero wails like a siren.

Contradicta









Kindness might be blindness when the cruel rule.




***************



Good brings about evil by angering the cruel; evil creates good by alarming the kind.

Contradicta

A flame bursts into being; a wave rises and falls; sounds enter the air and, soon enough, they fade away. Each event leaves an immediate and resonating emotion for awhile. There is no thread, no connection. Only final emotions, among the gratitude that somehing existed, exists, and the memory; we look for a pattern, a story- surely we will remember one- but- soon enough we see this is once again a game, child's play-which is enough but can never be complete, only somehow a cloud from which emerges another burst or perhaps some notes behind a pattern of spray.


**********************


Not much traceable in the thread- in the sands where the patch of fog settled there- maybe a bit of moonlight wrapped in the fog-no message- more like a brief and complete arrival on stage, a definable face or presence followed by its immediate disappearance.




[with a wave to Claude Debussy and Nico Vassilakis]

Contradicta









Morning remembers and explains everything but understands and forgives nothing.




***************************



Complexity's cautions dance dolefully amidst simplicity's smiling certainties.

Contradicta









Until you try hope remains in limited supply.



********************



Let your arms grow longer every day and there will be more to hold.

Contradicta



First I embraced my doubts like they were my closest friends and they betrayed me. Then I learned to send them away quickly, with few words, like a known enemy, and they deceived me. Now I greet them warily and entertain them for awhile hoping to persuade them to tell me why they came. Until I extract their secrets-even if I banish and forget them- they will haunt me to the end of my days



******************

You can't be sure until it's done but then how you did it is already a memory.

Contradicta









Sadness and joy are not two different songs, but two different refrains of the same song.




**************************



When you can't find the time to get lost in thought you lose your mind.

Contradicta






Who can believe the bellowing blasts of bravery's brass band realizing they are mainly meant to crush or subdue the stricken sighs of insignificance within?




*****************




These days life explodes like a thunderclap but still the clouds move gently.

Contradicta







Once again, disappointment performs its ardent solo when suddenly, with a rumble of drums and a burst of violins, the dreamer is released from a melancholy sojourn in the past.




**********************



Every feeling evokes its reminiscent melody and its tiny surprise.

Contradicta









Happiness is divulged with few words, misery demands a mouthful.




**************************



In today's house I am the host, but I am a guest in the dwelling of yesterday.

Contradicta








Those who do not listen are usually the most desperate to be heard and the least concerned about whether they were.




**********************



Thought is what remains after all the interruptions.

Contradicta








There are three things in life well worth waiting for: sublime passion, a superb meal and an inspired idea. Right now I'd settle for a good book.




**********************


Maturity: the state of mind that allows one to love a friend even when that friend does not admire one's writing.

Contradicta








One truth will produce a thousand lies, one kindness a thousand hurts, one success a thousand uncertainties.




*******************



Of all the potions, balms and drugs there is no more powerful elixir than a smile.

Contradicta











Sufficient exagerration can make any detail of experience fascinating -or frightening- depending on the light.


******************


"The best" is the beast.

Contradicta







There can be no secrets between friends when your silence confides as much as your words.






****************************



Coincidence is a wink in the eye of eternity.

[For Alan Davies]



**
I ran into Alan at St Mark's Bookstore yesterday. He asked me what book I was buying. I showed him-"The Neurotic Personality of Our Time* by Karen Horney. He showed me the book he was carrying in his briefcase, the one he is reading with so much pleasure now: same book. He had purchased his hardbound copy at the Strand. I told him I was carrying in my briefcase, Horney's *Our Inner Conflicts*. We had never discussed our shared admiration for this terrfic writer.

Contradicta








Your fears encompass as much information about your world as your library.




***********************



If you make truth a frequent companion, courage will be your friend.

Contradicta






To be an artist is to be forever hungry for things you have never tasted, to relentlessly search for things you have never seen and can't understand, to repeatedly and warmly welcome back the most confused, lonely and unfair part of yourself, and the world- all for the singular joy of having something you can only experience by releasing it.



*******************


Unforgettable music awakens abandoned hopes and forgotten dreams.

Contradicta









It's the hidden things- like enigmas in dreams- that most often remind us that choices abound.




******************************



Start at the beginning- then work back.

Contradicta









Love restores hope, hope imagination, imagination memory, memory emotion, emotion song.




******************



Truth is a ladder composed of painful steps but at the top one you see from the sky.

Contradicta








Thought is a delicate thing- nearly anything can interrupt or disturb it- particularly- as with most things- if you take too much at one time.




*****************



Come to your own conclusions- or never see anything come to one.

Contradicta








Everything is going downhill so fast- but we'll need the momentum- the next slope could be the steepest one yet.




**********************


God created the world in 7 days- 3 of them waiting to get online, 2 to clear out the spam, 1 to download and 1 to rest.

Contradicta










Even when today's novels, stories and poems eliminate the plots they never eradicate the twists.



*************************


I think I found what I was looking for: looking for.

Contradicta










Everything is pushing my buttons today- except the one that says "on."




******************


Peace and quiet- there goes the diet.

Contradicta









How many nascent ideas, skewered like game, lay dead at your feet?




*******************



Time wasted is time tasted.

Contradicta








As the truth tellers grow more numerous, passionate and articulate, the liars become more organized, cunning and cruel.




******************************


Open your mind quickly and your mouth slowly.

Contradicta









As perplexity frequently foreshadows the new, adoration as often augurs the old.



**************************


Opinions and affections mixed together, like vinegar and oil, may spice something bland, but left to themselves they quickly separate.

Contradicta









It's molting season: shed the old regrets and fly.




*****************************



Don't be too nicey to those who are icy.

Contradicta






Wit is used more often to silence than to say.




******************




Ipod therefore I am.




**********************************

A Writer's Lament: the Bipolar side of Blake

Came across this surprisingly personal poem by Blake, written in a letter to Thomas Butts, August 16, 1803.


"O why was I born with a different face?
Why was I not born like the rest of my race?
When I look each one starts! When I speak I offend;
Then I'm silent & passive & lose every Friend.

Then my verse I dishonor. My pictures despise,
My person degrade & my temper chastise;
And the pen is my terror, the pencil my shame;
All my Talents I bury, and dead is my Fame.

I am either too low or too highly priz'd;
When Elate I am Envied, when Meek I'm despis'd."


[Penguin Classics Blake
edited by Alicia Ostriker]

Contradicta








Your shadow's quicksands will also follow you: beware the abyss.




*************************



There's more to you than meets the I.

Contradicta









Decision's pendulum can seem slow- but let it sway until you know.




**********************


Cynical, wary- alert, prepared; vulerable, earnest- dreamy, astonished.

Contradicta







The more you know what's new the less you learn what's true.






***************************




To know is more enlightening, but less comforting, than to be known.

Contradicta









Futility in the morning, despair at noon, devastation at night: next news update 11 p. m.





*********************


The essence of happiness: don't give up.

Contradicta









The admirable attributes of who and what you love have captured your devotion but it is the enigmatic qualities you think about.



*********************

Originality is impossible where imitation is universal.

Contradicta









Regarding mistakes with a degree of tolerant affection lessens worry and enhances change.




**************************


Spend your whole life annoyed with the rules of others or take a few moments creating your own.

Contradicta









If you forget what it is like to go hungry you will forget what it's like to taste anything.




**************************


Stumble- discover.

Contradicta








About the same time a generation of men perceive how uncertain their fathers are they prepare for war.




*********************************


Violence enrages but the numb and frozen aftermath is silent.

Contradicta









To want to do most things you have to do creates energy and invites contentment.




******************************


Sharpen your mind's teeth on your mistakes.

Contradicta









The pleasure in viewing the belongings of the great masters derives from the inability to believe that they did things in the same way and places that everyone else does.


*********************


My father never spoke so now I can't stop listening.

[for Tom Beckett]

Contradicta








Aphorisms remind us there is more to be understood in a world that suggests mostly there is more to be owned.

[for Jordan Davis]




***************************

Everything can be known in an instant. That's all there ever was.

Contradicta









The center will not hold-no matter-everything is in orbit anyway-keep turning.



**************************



Celebrate your sensitivity-don't be numb.The greatest danger in the world's ever increasing intrusiveness lies in accepting it.

Contradicta








The first inkling is that no one else seems to understand what you want. Then you realize you do not know. Then you know.



********************************

The movement of life is like the wind. You can't see it but then a breeze comes along and you notice it's there; or it rushes at you suddenly and almost knocks you off your feet.

Contradicta








When I'm outside I feel more inside myself; when I'm inside I look out.




**************************



Ahead of myself, behind the others....

Contradicta











Tried and true convictions don't raise heads but they don't lower minds either.



****************************

Convictions without empathy can justify anything.

Contradicta






What writing begins only committment to a point of view completes.




**********************************



Talk opens a possibility to listening, listening to understanding, understanding to insight, insight to change. But anywhere along the line the chain might break.

Contradicta








At the heart of some poems there is no meaning but at the heart of every meaning there is a poem.



**************************



What hasn't been said in what is said is the part that sings.

Contradicta








There's no time for remembering- savor everything to the quick.




******************************


Everything gets clearer and clearer- then you realize you don't have to understand.

Contradicta






The ever vigilant ape within us (who remains, not out of necessity, but sheer compassion) continues to protect us, in spite of ourselves:- knowing full well that- out of vanity- we will deny its very existence should it reveal its face to us, or anyone else, even for an instant.


******************************


Our affection for the books we love is similar to that of a parent for a child- as much for the fact that they very likely will outlive us as for the qualities we hold so dear.

Contradicta









Cruelty conquers briefly what kindness alone can keep.



************************



There is no escape: breathe deep.

Contradicta








The complacent regard the truth the way some regard a panorama of sky: too obvious for these, too distant for those.




***********************


Even the useless isn't useless.

Contradicta


As you read further into the past writers were more often hopeful but desperately earnest; as you come closer to the present they are more often hopeless yet desperately funny.


*********************************


To span the space between the known and the unknown begin with the gulf between the thought and the said.


****************************************
****************************************

*Shadows Within Shadows* Within Shadows

I googled Tom Beckett's blog Shadows Within Shadows today and found the dreaded Blogger: 404 Page Not Found.

Hopefully, Tom will return to blogging soon. I took this opportunity to reread all the chapbooks by him that I have. They are: *Wagers of Synthesis^ (Zasterle, 1997); *Separations* (Generator, 1988) and *Vanishing Points of Resemblance* (Generator, 2004). Here is a beautiful passage from "Vanishing Points of Resemblance*:

"For years I thought I knew that the accident occurred when I was five. My parents now tell me I was more like two years old at the time. Maw-maw, my grandmother, was driving and stopped abruptly. We'd just, so it has been said, purchased a goldfish. My little head smashed against the dash. Although it wasn't immediately apparent, my brain got scrambled. Up to that point, I'd been developing normally, could do somersaults, perceived spatial relations appropriately, etc. However, one day at the dinner table I flopped forward, began having convulsions. and all that changed. This was in the mid-1950's, an era that didn't celebrate differance. Unlike our current era which pretends to. I became extremely uncoordinated, the physical trauma having created a disconnect between body and brain. All cylinders weren't firing right. My mother's perfect baby wasn't perfect anymore. the coordination problem became worse still as I became ridiculously tall, having reached six feet by sixth grade and eventually topping out at 6'7" during high school."


..

Contradicta

The wise philosophize well but are lax about the obvious. Dolts are inarticulate but wary and watchful. Who rules?

*******************************
The warmer the luck the colder the attitude.
4/11
***********************
************************


Which is more important the word or the idea?
Which is more important your feet or the ground?

************************

Be decent- dissent.

4/10
*************************
*************************

Magic remains invisible and unknown because it must by discovered unconsciously and by accident.
It cannot be located, only noticed.

*************************

Words descending like snowflakes or rain.
A few too many and I think about shelter.

4/9

A Friend in Need

My deepest appreciation goes out to Christy Church, known to his blogger friends as Toph, whose blog Topher Tune's Times [click here] has been a favorite on my blogging trail from the moment I started out. Toph and I have occasionally stayed in touch by email over the years, and I can't begin to express my gratitude for his work in getting ::fait accompli:: back in working order. What began as a clumsy effort on my part last week to get my site meter back in working order escalated into a major nightmare when I clumsily tried to do things with html I don't know how to do. My thanks also to Toni Simon, Nada Gordon and Drew Gardner whose quick response, support and advice were very helpful as well. Toni put many hours in on an emergency basis immediately and soon made it possible for me to post my Contradicta on the::fait accompli:: sidebar.

Although I never doubted it for a moment, it brings to mind the kind of community we have here as bloggers. I think of all the blogs that have played a crucial role in my daily life for three years now - how much it means, has meant to me:- the ideas, the shared experiences, the links, the responses, the encouragement, the interactive energy- our ongoing community of bloggers.

As Ernesto Priego (Never Neutral) [click here] put it recently "Never underestimate
the power of the blog."

Toph, you're quite a guy in my archive!

As I said in the maxim just below, "Caring eyes think they can see and do anything. They are right." I was right.