Some Thinking
Does all art aspire to the condition
of music?—While someone
is always prepared to say so I put on
a tape, a CD, instead of writing
or put it on to write to.
As far as the art gets.
A tape rolls quietly—"Light Blue",
"Soul Eyes"—to which I've done
a lot of reading, a lot
of pottering about, a few drawings—
& to which I've 'cleaned house'—
& a lot of writing—or of 'trying to write',
which comes to the same thing. Mal Waldron
wrote both these tunes.
I came acroos him
first in the poem for Billie Holiday—"The Day
Lady Died", with the great last lines
where she whispers to him across the keyboard—
"& everyone & I stopped breathing."
The great thing
about the line is the uncertainty: is it "everyone
& I stopped breathing"? or that Holiday whispers the song
"to Mal Waldron & everyone"—& it is then O'Hara
"stopped breathing"?
It makes for a pause, a hesitation, a number of them—
that evokes the magic & tension
of her timing. And there's Frank, leaning there
—near the door to the toilets? The 'john',
which always suggests the hard American 50s—
& ensures I think of him in a white shirt & narrow tie,
suited. Already the texture of life is disappearing
—exactly how it felt, to be in those suits, in that time, at a nightclub
how anxious or not, how preoccupied & with what—
how people held themselves—is gone. Well,
it survives somehow, unverifiably, hard to quantify,
in poetry . . . we still have the music, films—
but films lie. Cassavetes suggests the era to me—
was he 'the type' of the hipster—cool, up tight, hip, witty?
suited, a drinker, free, & maybe more exploratory—
within limits more circumscribed than now?
Or do we always see ourselves as more free—
& get it wrong? Did he
& O'Hara meet ever?
Different worlds.
The thing I was going to say about nightclubs
was that maybe how people feel & act in them
never changes. (I heard some magical things
at Lark & Tina's, for example. I've been as tense
as anyone, at the Cargo Club—& wore suits there.)
But night clubs themselves might've changed—with the music:
amplified is different? the fashion for recorded
dance music, or for dee-jays, might have altered them.
On tape one of the moments I like best is the voice—
a little shakey, a little spaced—Jim Carroll's by repute,
asking for tuinols, in the space between songs, at a great
Patti Smith gig. Or Velvet Underground—
they're both on that tape. There's some great
& wonderfully casual, relaxed things said, over the music
at a late 50's date that features Miles Davis
guesting with local hero Jimmy Forrest: a type of music, & experience,
continuous with the live recordings of Charlie Parker—
the same carefree ambience & same reason to pay attention
whereas Patti's music gets to you pretty much
whether you listen or not. You don't have to choose of course.
"Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine"
is always great to hear said. This track,
the badly named "Soul Eyes" (how can you not roll it
into one word?), is not live but so sad & so unhurried
it makes time, development, almost its subject. John
Coltrane. Well within his limits—as
somehow imagined—& great the way conservative paintings
by great artists often are—a Gauguin still–life
that looks as though it wants to be Manet, or Fantin-Latour.
Luminous Hum
Maybe
After all these years it turns out
I'm some sort of 'Art Brut' type
— in fact an outsider
artist
Peculiarly focused on the idea
Of being cool
my idea of which (naively)
is the New York School
#
(joke?
#
"on me")
why —tho I have the fee—
they'd never have me
I'd of course pay Ted
I took them 'seriously' (?)
or 'too' seriously ?
The art world
— I tell Grogan
whoever —
gives the art world too much credit
it wasn't Anton's gig
(You don't know him, Ross?
six four
weighs about 70 k
Blond
As I am blond
blonder!
rather Eton—
Oxford—
Wilfred Owen)
The bass players . . .
they do that thing
seen
in the credits, once, every week
in the Gomer Pyle show
of playing catch-up — the
quick
½ step brings you back with the others
left right
Flying High
(was a movie)
(I know)
'Flying Home' might have been the jazz standard —
of around 1950,
1940?
not so much a standard
who plays it now?
but a kind of hit
&
fodder for bands to process
tho
. . . I think I like it,
I think
No idea of it now
two second-order bands
of that era
play it
(on a CD I have)
on a joint gig
something they could agree to do
together
I'm flying on,
— maintaining altitude—
on 4 or 5 short blacks & as many retsina chasers
#
the jazz, then, is some Coltrane—Coltrane 'live' in Europe,
courtesy of Crab—
right at the moment
playing
(not Crab — Coltrane
tho Crab could 'as easily'
be playing it
strange thought
in the suburbs
on his saxophone
in Dulwich
'Bye-
Bye Blackbird'
tamer
than the
'Village Vanguard'
or
'wherever' version
I have &
usually play.
: "Live
in Europe"
it occurs to me, is a very
North American
locution,
like "It was raining in America"
was European
— (Which
journalist tried that?
My sympathy, pal)—
An
American locution itself ("Pal").
#
'Live'.
#
Where in Europe — Spain?
the Netherlands?
Paris?
Anyway, the
bass is very comforting
The thing I love about
the Bye-Bye gig
—"his greatest concert performance"
is the subtitle : I can't find
the booklet
where it says, probably, 'where' it is
—Vanguard,
5 Spot (did he record there, ever?
too early, too late, too hostile, too. . .)
Birdland?—
it's surely in summer, a fairly hot night (?)
euphoric is the word I always want to reach for
the sense of release, potted palms, the urge to drink
take drugs, breathe in know that you're alive
& others, other constituents—the moon, probably,
somewhere visible
offering
encouragement
Granpa Simpson
—a novelty, benign, 'Granpa Simpson' cork—
is stuck in my bottle
keeping the last glass of
retsina
fresh
#
Must get ice.
( Gets ice. )
#
The band
is now Chasin the Trane
Coltrane
sounding
both 'elixir-happy' & 'effortful' & THE DRUMMING
IS FANTASTIC : Elvin
Elvin!
it is great the way art
hands this sort of thing
on
#
even poetry
#
For more
people,
tho,
music must do it.
I'm with them.
You people,
don't be so
stand–offish
I'm clearly drunk?
Clearly ?
Drink up then.
Tho it isn't so—I'm not
Tho the spirit
—the spirits —
of the great dead
watch over me
& laugh
or nod
(they're
not entirely against)
: Philip Whalen,
Ted,
Larkin
YIKE!
Dame Edith Sitwell
— Go To Bed (!)
John Forbes
John, how funny how appropriate how
ironic
but in any case John! how are you
it's your line
of course
you saluted "their luminous hum"
I don't believe there
Is anything
after death
Which doesn't preclude, I guess,
that there should be
This urge
a sort of Willed Short Circuit
where the present winds the past forward
to talk to it
#
solace
#
"if you insist on doing that you'll tangle the
hose
& have to come back to it iron out the kinks"
—an image this from my watering.
John,
You were so un-suburban (as I imagine you)
You were never very thoughtless.
Can I see you standing, holding a hose?
Thoughtless thought.
Maybe you did.
Is it such a joy? your 'speed'?? Speed was
was more your speed. Ha ha.
But I don't say that
laughing at you : you did what you did & I liked
you.
Do the dead "hum", "luminously"?
Last week
they celebrated the anniversary of your death
commemorated the death /
celebrated the poems, you.
Predictable?
A good
turnout—
the young were there in force, the old
(people your age if you'd hung on
John Forbes at 58
No doubt you'd have carried it
off)
all there.
Some Japanese people down the front . . .
'curiously'.
—the kind of "curious" you'd have
applauded
as a detail—
a further guarantee of your future
you who have none
who
don't exist.
I cling on
— & remember you —
tenaciously
—what, "cling"? "remember"?
cling:
I remember okay
In fact I don't even 'cling'
tenaciously (" ")
but swing & sway here from my branch,
a
happy sloth
while Charlie Parker, Coltrane,
Art Pepper, Art
Blakey
Pepper Adams
play
Tho it could just as easily be
? & the Mysterions
remember them, or
Thane
Russall
'& Three'
Voom–voom voom–voom, voom–voom voom–vcoom Voom
"I want s–e–c–u–r–i–t–y!"
ha ha
It is
permitted
to laugh?
Pal?
( a thread I forgot )
Finally
I recognise this track — it is "My Old Flame"
The album
—(I think Crabby made this tape
thank you, Crab
— my pal —
my old pal) —
it's not listed on the cover, it just says
Conception
#
Not one I know
#
I know enough to put
ice in this glass—
Phil, Ted?
Edith!
"go to bed"
which I take to be their luminous numinous
humorous hum
Schuyler,
Frank,
Joe . . . are up there too, an
unlikely scenario
Auden, I suppose
would give me
some kind of talking to
#
I'll go I think & find my sandals hose the
bamboo quietly
go to bed
#
Cath's away —
Anna & Chris down the back.
Pola / has disappeared
to be with them & share the air-conditioner.
Will
jazz make me cool?
Phil ??
will Joey Ramone?
The 'Conception' stuff sounds straighter.
Tho was Coltarne ever straight?
That was
Miles' problem
— 'with' him —
& Miles'
problem later
this track too sounds like 'My Old Flame'
transposed
weirded
made strange
strangely freighted
with a more abstract
foreboding
or a withholding of trust
it has none of the original's reassurance
more the recollection of the old flame's
unreliability
#
shit, how 'mature'
at this hour of the night
#
will
my spirits recover
John, my guardian angel,
what a funny idea
who would Wim Wenders get
to play you? You'd say "Yeah, he'll recover" —
referring to me —
speaking from experience
#
I tend to see everyone
as more serious than me
tho they can't all be —
or I'd take them more seriously
#
"See, that's
what I mean!" you say to Ted, Whalen, Joe —
"he'll be okay."
John, thank you.
Grace to be awake
& stay awake
as long as possible!
Will I sleep the sleep of the dead, now, luminously?
Grace to be awake
That will be my endeavour
& tomorrow "Ring Crab"!
Ekleksographia:
Wave Two
May, 2010
Poetry
Ken Bolton
A gaunt, wizened figure, rather ghostly, rather forbidding–& yet gay, light–hearted, a funny bastard, withal – Ken Bolton cuts a moodily romantic figure within the dun Australian literary scene, some say dun, some say teal, puce in certain lights. In whatever hue we agree to see him in, his name inevitably conjures perhaps that best known image of him, bow–tie askew, lipstick–smeared, grinning cheerfully, at the wheel of his 1958 Jaguar D–type, El Cid. Born in Sydney in 1949 in a dappled light he works at the Experimental Art Foundation in Adelaide, South Australia, under fluoro, writes art criticism & edits Little Esther books.