2 May 2020. Through Time.
Once again, stymied by intention. It had occurred to me, well, if I want to talk about description, I could just as well make another drawing and begin again. But then that’s what happened—in the literal sense. No staying on topic, I’m afraid—the drawing begins, and we go to some place new. As here, for instance—the table got wider and wider until it seemed to incorporate the entire horizon (I’ve since erased it back a bit)—but that made a place for the second figure—who, of course, is my mother, as a young woman, her hair braided up on either side of her head (sometime in the 1940’s). Which also has something of the Chinese, although I couldn’t date the fashion there. A culture a little bit on the formal side—made cautious (or at least more self-aware).
So you see, Solano Avenue has disappeared entirely. As I knew it would. “My evening walks”—too much of a shtick—and the minute they’re so designated, they vaporize. Or become worthless. No, worthless is too strong—better said, something to react against. The walks themselves are beautiful, if a little exhausting, but to force them into a pattern with words is against their nature. So we’ll let them be. No On Solano, no A Guest of Time—although I do like the latter—because it rings true with the Chinese again. Tu Fu. Guest of Rivers and Lakes (thank you B). I looked up Florence Ayscough a few days ago—it was her book that highlighted the phrase, in 1934. But today there’s more, of course. Because you can find out just about anything. So that Rivers and Lakes becomes jianghu, a word-couplet with a long and meaningful history.
But you know, the simple meaning is there, too. Maybe like Gary Snyder, his Highway 99 poems. I read them in Warsaw—transported—they brought me home in an instant…
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So, the drawing continues. The writing as well, God willing. But as for the corrals of titles, we’ll have to let them be. Or make them spontaneous, like everything else…
