but make it hot by striking.”
Last night pondering poems as noted for my colleagues’ request, the epochal “The Second Coming” by William Butler Yeats rose to mind. Alas, once again, this utterly formidable touchstone speaks to people with as much directness and precision as it did over a century ago in the ruins of a first world war.
I don’t want to take you on a ride through those apocalyptic lines on an otherwise resplendent and shiny October morning. Not to advocate denial, never, just not today, not this morning, not now.
Instead here’s another all-global poem from the great word magus to keep always in your medicine bag, an antidote, an alchemical stone to transmute any emotion into a better one.
Sparks Fly Upwards
This magical verse was first brought to my attention by no less a sainted tribal shaman than Ken Kesey, who recited it from memory. Somehow or another I met nearly all of the legend leaders of that renaissance, and of all those deeply-revered Prometheans who were so immortally accomplished and whose likes we’ve certainly never seen again, no one was more talented and true, less incorruptible and tainted by ego than this absolutely sublime storyteller, prankster and creator. Sparks fly upwards.
Someday will do a proper rundown of Ken and the stories and anecdotes in my possession. The secret of Neal Cassady that he revealed, the riotous time in Berkeley when he drove up to Moe’s in the bus and why he had a certain look in his eye, very nearly dying going down the summit of Grant’s Pass in a total whiteout after refusing mandatory chains from a state police officer because I was scheduled to be at Ken’s show and refuse to be late, the time I was reading a brand new interview with him early Sunday morning in a sparse coffee shop in California and his biographer-to-be who conducted the interview just happened to be passing through the area that moment and spotted me all the way across the room.
Then there’s the time a steam train came rolling through downtown Eugene and Ken stood by the siding raising his arms in victory and cheering with all his might, vying like the champion wrestler he was to match the high roaring glorious tones of the engine.
And then…..
Yes there’s everything to say about Ken Kesey but for now, have a beautiful week sparked by our fellow peace-loving Irishman warrior Mr. William Butler Yeats:
The Song Of Wandering Aengus
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire a-flame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And someone called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.Though I am old with wandering
~ William Butler Yeats
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done,
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
❏