Everyone Sometimes Does a Little Something Stupid†

"I’m not sure what weapons the Third World War will be fought with, but the Fourth World War will be fought with sticks and stones."*—Albert Einstein

How did we ever come to this—

By what mad game of hit or miss?

Are things really what they seem?

La vida es sueño, "Life's a dream,"

says Calderón.

We'll wake up, then? If so, how soon

—and to what song?

"Everyone Sometimes Does a Little Something Stupid"†?

Is that reflection still of use

When human trash degrades the Moon??

Shouldn't we now speak in tongues?

Our rulers flash their dirty fingernails (they're none too bright).

Remember this if all else fails:

Time is the elephant in the street

Where doomèd lovers used to meet,

But luck's the [R]hino in the room.

*"Ich bin nicht sicher, mit welchen Waffen der dritte Weltkrieg ausgetragen wird, aber im vierten Weltkrieg werden sie mit Stöcken und Steinen kämpfen."

†Musical accompaniment: "Jeder macht mal eine Dummheit" / "Everyone Sometimes Does Something Stupid," title of the slow foxtrot in Nicholas Brodszky’s 1933 movie “Scandal in Budapest” (Skandal in Budapest), https://youtu.be/Itv9GkSh9ZY?si=CbNACbwYRdI1kcN8

Tchotchkes

Gauguin, Jug in the Form of a Head, Self-portrait (1889). Kunstindustrimuseet, Copenhagen. Based on a severed head that Gauguin had seen at a guillotining.*

Our ancestors' credenzas were crammed with bric-à-brac:

Wax flowers under glass domes, centennial mugs,

Hand-painted teacups, porcelain figures, Toby jugs,

And old family portraits in rococo frames

Perched on sideboards and buffets in each drawing room,

Beloved photographs of long-forgotten names,

Household shrines of old-fashioned family fancies—

You might say, latter-day "lares and penates."†

Gauguin made a jug of Prado's ensanguined head.

Parlorless, we "curate" such tchotchkes of the dead

Accessorizing our minds, instead, with knickknacks,

Gleaned from the influential online scandal stacks,

Bold salacities of contemporary celebrities,

And fancied heroes of the awesome scene.

How time flies! One picks, one chooses, dude, and then one goes.

Goodbye, it seems, to those amazing bibelots!

*https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jug_in_the_Form_of_a_Head,_Self-Portrait?origin=serp_auto. The jug has a severed ear, in homage (?) to van Gogh.

†Lares et penates: The household deities of ancient Rome; https://roman.mythologyworldwide.com/spirits-of-the-roman-household-the-importance-of-lares-and-penates/?amp=1.

Truth Telling

"Alexandra Meets Diogenes." Postcard. M. Toumbis, Athens

The most revolutionary act is a clear view of the world as it really is.—Rosa Luxemburg

Rosa was quoting Lassalle, that brave, that foolish man.

To tell truth to killers you must be both brave and foolish.

She knew that all too well. Her enemies murdered her

and threw her bleeding into Berlin's Landwehr Canal.

Not being all that brave, I recline here in my tub

Death springs from parrhesia*—via the barrel of a gun.†

"The grave’s a fine and private place,

But none, I think, do there embrace."”‡

The Landwehr Canal at night, October 2024

*Parrhesia = freedom of speech, outspokenness; https://foucault.info/parrhesia/?origin=serp_auto

†Cf. Mao Zedong, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_power_grows_out_of_the_barrel_of_a_gun?origin=serp_auto

‡Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress"