heartjump
I am borrowing your word here, Ade. But I'm using it differently - I just had a 'heartjump' thanks to Ginsberg. He's just so good! Whenever I read a good piece of writing my breath catches and my heart skips a beat, and for a joyous moment I feel it expanding with an emotion I can scarcely contain, and I am quivering with anticipation - anticipation at finding something richly evocative, something that reminds me of the capacity of my heart to feel.
I don't ever want to lose that.
I don't ever want to lose that.
Song
The weight of the world
is love.
Under the burden
of solitude,
under the burden
of dissatisfaction
the weight,
the weight we carry
is love.
Who can deny?
In dreams
it touches
the body,
in thought
constructs
a miracle,
in imagination
anguishes
till born
in human--
looks out of the heart
burning with purity--
for the burden of life
is love,
but we carry the weight
wearily,
and so must rest
in the arms of love
at last,
must rest in the arms
of love.
No rest
without love,
no sleep
without dreams
of love--
be mad or chill
obsessed with angels
or machines,
the final wish
is love
--cannot be bitter,
cannot deny,
cannot withhold
if denied:
the weight is too heavy
--must give
for no return
as thought
is given
in solitude
in all the excellence
of its excess.
The warm bodies
shine together
in the darkness,
the hand moves
to the center
of the flesh,
the skin trembles
in happiness
and the soul comes
joyful to the eye--
yes, yes,
that's what
I wanted,
I always wanted,
I always wanted,
to return
to the body
where I was born.Allen Ginsberg
San Jose 1954
2 Comments:
bounced through your blog. it's lovely. abt yr PTSD comments, what if our NA and NT kids have it and we've never bothered to take the time out to intervene b4 they end up in NA or NT and we decide their fates when they're 9 years old???? are some more equal than others? sigh.
a la my undiagnosed ADHD? ;)
But in all seriousness, the way our education system is built, some are definitely more equal than others. as a sorting mechanism to determine 'intelligence' and appropriate future career opportunities for our students we are extraordinarily efficient (and according to the name of the game, effective too).
I think we tend to see people who have PTSD or somehow cannot 'cope' and function 'normally' as intrinsically weak or 'cannot make it'. If you look at how say PSC picks its scholars and their often less-than-understanding attitudes towards scholars who request for, for instance, a school transfer because he or she doesnt think that institution suits him/her - the response is often: other people can cope, so why can't you? you are weak. tough! - and extrapolate that to singaporean society at large then you get an inkling why there is such a stigma associated with things like PTSD or depression or any other indications of 'weaknesses' and 'instability'. Because of that as well, I think a lot of parents and students themselves would rather NOT be diagnosed with mental/psychological conditions of any sort because this is the kind of thing that follows you.
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