buzzsawmonkey 11/7/2021 5:01:36 PM

1

Why should Kosh be the only one to post depressing poetry?

Four Preludes on the Playthings of the Wind
---Carl Sandburg

The past is a bucket of ashes.

1
The woman named Tomorrow 
sits with a hairpin in her teeth 
and takes her time 
and does her hair the way she wants it 
and fastens at last the last braid and coil 
and puts the hairpin where it belongs 
and turns and drawls: Well, what of it? 
My grandmother, Yesterday, is gone. 
What of it? Let the dead be dead.

2
The doors were cedar
and the panels strips of gold 
and the girls were golden girls 
and the panels read and the girls chanted: 
We are the greatest city, 
the greatest nation:
nothing like us ever was.

The doors are twisted on broken hinges. 
Sheets of rain swish through on the wind 
where the golden girls ran and the panels read: 
We are the greatest city,
the greatest nation, 
nothing like us ever was.

3
It has happened before. 
Strong men put up a city and got 
a nation together,
And paid singers to sing and women 
to warble: We are the greatest city, 
the greatest nation, 
nothing like us ever was.

And while the singers sang
and the strong men listened 
and paid the singers well 
and felt good about it all, 
there were rats and lizards who listened 
… and the only listeners left now
… are … the rats … and the lizards.

And there are black crows 
crying, "Caw, caw," 
bringing mud and sticks 
building a nest
over the words carved 
on the doors where the panels were cedar 
and the strips on the panels were gold 
and the golden girls came singing: 
We are the greatest city,
the greatest nation: 
nothing like us ever was.

The only singers now are crows crying, "Caw, caw," 
And the sheets of rain whine in the wind and doorways. 
And the only listeners now are … the rats … and the lizards.

4
The feet of the rats 
scribble on the door sills; 
the hieroglyphs of the rat footprints 
chatter the pedigrees of the rats 
and babble of the blood
and gabble of the breed 
of the grandfathers and the great-grandfathers 
of the rats.

And the wind shifts 
and the dust on a door sill shifts
and even the writing of the rat footprints 
tells us nothing, nothing at all 
about the greatest city, the greatest nation 
where the strong men listened 
and the women warbled: Nothing like us ever was.

Kosh's Shadow 11/7/2021 5:11:44 PM

2

We now know the identity of the seamount the Connecticut hit, and why they are being so secretive.

The seamount was R'lyeh, and here is a smuggled out picture of the sub now:

buzzsawmonkey 11/7/2021 5:23:38 PM

3

Reply to Kosh's Shadow in 2:

You think you have a civilization that is gonna last

Then you find about some elder terrors that leave you aghast

Well, you can't imagine all that lurks around you in this land

Those Elder Beings from the stars you just can't understand.

Are you R'lyeh in the years?

Discovering Cthulhu?

And now you have felt the fears

What are you going to to?

---the little-known Steely Dan "Lovecraft" album

Kosh's Shadow 11/7/2021 5:54:18 PM

4

Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 3:

++++++

Kosh's Shadow 11/7/2021 6:07:42 PM

5

Occasional Reader 11/7/2021 6:51:16 PM

6

Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 3:

+++++++

Occasional Reader 11/7/2021 6:54:35 PM

7

Greetings from Undisclosed Location in Exurbia.  I agreed to stay in my son’s mom’s house this week while she is on vacation, and of course take care of Little OR, take him to the school bus stop in the mornings, etc.  (His school is here, and it’s too far for me to commute with him from DC.)

Kind of a weird feeling.  

Also, it’s quiet here… TOO quiet.

Actually, I’m loving that aspect.

Alice in Dairyland 11/7/2021 8:06:56 PM

8

Reply to Occasional Reader in 7:

Sounds kind of like a working vacation for you too.  Hope you both have a good time.  I bet Little OR loves having you stay with him in "his" house.