Eleutheromania

Got a nice mention in this week's Next Line, Please.

The new

The new is the old dream of the old.

Becomes

The discernment of pattern becomes the recognition of patterns becomes the frisson of familiarity.

New poems

+15

On plausibility

Plausibility is a lie.

The Animal Commitments

Received my author copies of The Animal Commitments! The pre-orders should ship in the next week or two. If anyone hasn't gotten a copy and still wants one, they are available at Finishing Line Press.

Don't

Don't respect people who promote or practice horrible things.

Bullies

You can compel obedience but not respect.

On identity

Identity is measured in intimacies.

An exact copy

An exact copy is not identical, but it participates in identity.

The lesson of life

The lesson of life is to learn to love life less.

Flaw

There is a flaw in the notion of a flaw.

If it matters

It doesn't matter if it matters.

Half-truth (Gibran)

He who is moderate in announcing the truth is presenting half-truth. He conceals the other half out of fear of the people's wrath.

Kahlil Gibran, Thoughts and Meditations

New poems

+15

The search

We search for someone unknown
and, finding them, find them unknowable.

The Aim of the Nightingale (Shah)

A nightingale who happened to have no home of his own decided that he would try to settle in a certain forest. The birds who were already there, however, had their own ideas about the matter, and soon drove him out.
    One day, sitting disconsolately by the dusty road nearby, he was spied by another nightingale, who stopped to ask why he looked so forlorn.
    "I tried," said the first bird, "to make my home among other birds, but they pecked, and they mobbed me, and they flapped at me until I had to leave yonder forest."
    "Perhaps you were boastful," said the other nightingale. "When, in a similar situation, I sought a tree of my own, all the birds first collected and asked me what I was doing, why I was singing."
    "Yes, those birds did the same with me," said the first nightingale.
    "And what did you say?"
    "I said: 'I am singing because I simply cannot help it.'"
    "And then?"
    "And then they attacked me, as I have described."
    "Ah," said the other bird, "that was your mistake. They thought that you had no self-control, that you might be mad and that you might try to make them behave in a similar manner. When I was asked the same question, I said: 'I am trying to please you with my song.' That was an aim which they could understand."

Idries Shah, The Magic Monastery

On purity

Purity is the greatest perversion.

Irrelevancies (Shah)

Irrelevancies are often more striking than relevancies. Interesting yourselves in the striking rather than the significant thing is usual but not useful.

Idries Shah, The Magic Monastery

Change

Change something and you change everything.