The influence of gaslight or electric light on the growth of paraheliotropic trees

black man in the white house — and I’m only twenty seven — “I’m carrying your suitcase outside of Alphabet City” — in someone else’s life — the poetry of others’ poems — the songs that others sing — where will we go when the going goes over, where will we stand when the earth falls away? Dance dance human, dance, dance revolutions around the rosy — all of the modern plagues, or that great big sucking sound at the bottom of your father’s 401(k) — or the broken bridges and broken roads across this Great Exceptional Nation — with a black man in the white house — and I’m only twenty seven — already this is the new normal — what was so strange about it? nothing, nothing so strange, not at all — I love everybody and everybody loves me — city of brotherly love with a knife sticking out of my side — trash in the streets but people singing, people dancing, blissed-out pill-poppers, hello, hello, goodbye, another year is coming, 2009, like 2008 before it, the World Depression Two (as my sister points out, they called World War One the Great War before the sequel came along) but everything will work out eventually, just love each other, buy a kid a toy, donate a meal, do handstands in the dark, take singing lessons, learn to play the flute, run, run back and forth down the block and then further, to the city limits, to the river, past the river, to the ocean, up to the mountains, and down to the mountains on the other side, rucksack on my back now, here I go, I am a wanderer now, the road is my destiny, the people I meet along the way my comfort, the rooms and the clearings, sleeping on the grass while the moon falls across the sky overhead — what’s around the next bend in the road, what cities are there still to see, where else will I be going before the end of days — taste the new optimism, enjoy every sandwich, and die with your loved ones around you — it will be hard for them but wonderful for you so wonderful for you and as you gather up the rucksack for the last final journey into dissolving foam the love in the room will rise up — everything transient about it will be fixed forever in the upper firmament with Artemis, Orion, and all the other old stories of heaven —

and then you’ll be gone — happy!

In the Fall of 2008, Edward Yellow slowly lost his mind. He had moved to New York City in August, changing horses in midstream, transferring out of the middle-tier law school he had done so well at to attempt to graduate from a more prestigious one situated on the lower half of the island of Manhattan. He arrived in a whirlwind, barely having time to say goodbye to all the friends he hadn’t bothered to see that summer. He found a small room in a small apartment on Craigslist. He stayed for a couple of weeks at his aunt’s apartment while she was away traveling, before the lease on the small apartment began.

His girlfriend was headed for Connecticut to study psychology. On the weekends he took the train to see her.

As the weeks went on, he would put on one of his two suits, tie his tie and go interview at large law firms. He tried to smile, but found their questions off-putting. He struggled to explain what he was doing there, why he deserved to be hired, paid so much money. He was not persuasive. The firms did not call. As October dawned, he realized he had struck out – his purpose in coming to law school had been thwarted. After this — he could feel the deep turbulence of his soul come welling up — he tried to keep it pinned down for a moment, knowing that if he despaired, he would be done for, and as best he could, he picked himself up to try again, to start a second round of job searching, even as the wider economy went into a freefall, even as his father called him two weeks later to tell him that he had lost his job —

Characteristics of the Sabi religion (Seboghatullah)

Sābi’ūn know Allah as the Rabb al-‘alihah and ‘ilah al-‘alihah and speak to angels in their meditations^[22] , each of whom they believe dwell in different stars, which has led to the erroneous beliefs among some that Sābi’ūn worship angels while others derogatorily call them star-worshippers (and so it is said in Arabic saba’at al-nujūm, meaning “the stars appeared”). Sābi’ūn read from the Zaboor and use the sun for a Qiblah facing the equator at mid day^{[23][8][9][24]} . Their fundamental teaching is “La ilahah il Allah”^[5][6][18] , but besides this ardent unitarianism, Sābi’ūn are quite akin to Christians^[10][25] . Unlike their Mushrik Sabian cousins, who consider themselves the people of Idris’ son Sabi, Hanif Sabians are more universal looking to Noah as their prophet of the Din^[2] Sābi’ūn have five daily prayers^[26] (though Zohar can join Asr while Ma’ariv can join Isha giving the appearance of three). They believe in all prophets reiterating the Din of Noah and, not in the same way as the Muslims, believe in The Seal of The Prophets^[27] . They also fast for 30 days^[28] .

Sabians who adopt Abram as a patriarch distinguish themselves from other Sabians by calling themselves Hagarim (Hagarenes) and were based around Petra. The culmination of the journey to enlightenment will be marked by a circumcision ceremony for most of those male Hagarim who get to this level called Yagur. This branch of Seboghatullah has thus been dubbed “Hagarism”.

JOHN SHARMAN, young bank trader, has lost his job with hundreds of others in the collapse of one of the largest investman banks in America. He stands in a crowded elevator holding a box full of his belongings. He is surrounded by other people holding their own boxes, blank looks on their facese. In John’s box is a coffee mug, several CDs and folders, a Tyrannosaurus Rex toy, and the Yale Book of Quotations.

There are many different kinds (does that word mean families?) of people in the world, all kinds of people, and as I reach the apex of my quarterlife, sad realizations spur me to recognize which kind I might be. I think I am a dreamer; an imaginer; it explains my love of reading and TV and movies — different kinds of dreams. I think the hard real scares me — where a grown man (I don’t feel much like a man, that’s the rub isn’t, this kidlike nervousness) gets off being scared is another question — and eventuallsy I will have to look myself in the mirror and tell myself to cowboy up, geronimo, but there it is — my natural state, or my vulnerable state, or this state — doesn’t like reality, is overwhelmed by it, would prefer to drape such realness in red lampshades like Blanche Dubois reliving her youth.

The hard look. The true gaze. The theory of mind. What are you thinking? I can’t help you — the sad real. The melancholy sadness. The Apollonian fences we build around ourselves, and I realize my Dionysian Revels are mere construction, one more dodge, step to the left and out of the way of the the baby grand piano that’s crashing down from the skyscraper above, oh, yeah, move out of the way, son — dim light, here’s the reality, listen to a song and wait for the next note that’s sort of expected and sort of not, surprise yourself and surprise others, here we go here we go, pedal steel gutiar moving fast typing faster than him here I go – paint the picture with words tell me what you see I see a black computer dell, a magazine open, pile of CDs, cousin and her boyfriend standing in the other room, old 1960s-style house in a part of town that isn’t mine bought my parents from an old woman and her dying lawyer husband — to my right is what they call the sun room the great big and large sun room with a big window that looks out over the back yard and a beautiful creek that is always flowing — it is peaceful here — quiet — a man could rest here — one more dodge? more dim light? maybe.

flyting – ribald insultery — rap battles — but where do they come from — ??

“The term “the dozens” is believed to refer to the devaluing on the auction block of slaves who were past their prime, who were deformed, aged or who, after years of back-breaking toil, no longer were capable of hard labor. These enslaved human beings often were sold by the dozen.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dozens

courtesy of the late (allegedly) great (not that I’m doubting, I just have not yet read) David Foster Wallace –

http://www.salon.com/books/bag/1999/04/12/wallace/index.html

http://www.harpers.org/archive/2008/12/0082284

You speak, he said, with a desperate and turbulent mind.

Can we still remember what it was like? What the fuck is a protest song? We live in the world of Eternal War, where Demons in the Night come to crash jetplanes into our skyscrapers, where muggers without souls stick knives into soft flesh, where no one is safe, where we die in hospital beds, painful tubes shoved down up and into our orifices — painful — dark – black & bleak, bend and break, crack winds, I am Young, Young Tom O’Bedlam, Methinks its not a journey —

Karl Marx was a law student too, once. Famous law students who left to do some thing better. To stand against the abyss, eyes open into the storm, and face it — pure courage, eyes open — the strong death — without regrets — accepting the truth and denying all falsehoods — singing lyrically — not yet cynical about the heroic path you still might tread — living in this artificial world — constructed out of what, wattle and daub? The roads are paved with boneskulls, says Zeddicus to my right. There to my left sits Michael II Transfigured, Metatron. He cannot talk. He is not there. He has been silenced. There is no comfort. I am other people, I say to myself. You know it don’t you — when you dream, you slip into other people’s minds — I don’t know what time it is; I don’t know what day it is; I am losing my mind; slipping, slipping, falling, slipping, down down down down down — dancing with the words to the music — I’ve strung them on a wire, and pulling it this way, make them dance.

What does this have to do with Nixon? says Jehosophat, sitting above me. There is a whitebearded frog floating in the far left upper corner of my room, hovering just there right beneat the sealing. Wait no — that it isn’t happening now — that happened some other time — impenetrable, they will say this — incommunicable — it is communicable to me — this sick sweet madness — this unrepentant lucre — flowing flowing words — wrestling, dancing with these soft and plastic words and thoughts — the word adorns the thought and the thought adorns the word, coming forth, summoned from memory and thought, two crows on my shoulder, play a game of free association, play the game of ring around the rosy, write to music, wheelwright, craftsman, shipbuilder —

Go down to South Ferry and remind yourself its an island. How many beautiful offices of servants have I been to this sad fall while the world collaspes all around them. Glad I’m not in your seat, says I, America America, this Swan Song’s For You — Dance the Dance of the 21st Century, Shiva. Dance the Dance of the 21sts Century, Shiva. One foot front, then one foot back, kinda like the Electric Slide, or 1990s bar bitzvahs, or 1980s danceparty, a genre of music, Chromeo, who needs that, I need a bassline, an electric guitar, and a song that never ends, no rockstasr pretension, just don’t stop playing — don’t stop playing now — we’re jamming now, brother, we’re jamming now — just sound sound and sense and sound without sense rhyme but no reason — be here now — music perfectly duplicates imitates represents the dimension of time in our lives — but if the speakers are good enough, and your eyes are closed, you can see it, see the different strains of music , see the different instruments, lick of electric guitar, drums, bassline, I am the Great Procrastinator