Crossing Nebraska

Gosh, I began this contemplation almost a month ago! It seems like ages. Since that time, however, I’ve been distracted by current events both negative and positive. On one hand, the killings in Aurora , Colorado would seem to represent the very worst that we humans can be. Even as I make that observation, however, I’m tempted to qualify it by noting that the recent drought we’ve been experiencing across the continental United States, and its very likely status as a human-caused climatic event, might be even more representative of the worst that we humans can be. No, the gradual destruction caused by global warming will not be as easily quantified as the loss of life in Aurora (as if even that can be quantified!), but it will certainly be no less real. The Olympics, on the other hand, have the potential to reveal us at our best – not our chest-thumping, blood-doping, win at all cost best, mind you, but our coming together in global goodwill best. I’ve been a fan of the Olympi...

Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose. What are we to make of such a statement? On one hand we might be inclined to interpret it from a post-modern, image-saturated perspective such as: “if you’ve seen one rose you’ve seen them all.” Ah, but would a poet really endeavor to convey such a jaded sentiment? Quite to the contrary, I think that Gertrude Stein is striving with this line in Sacred Emily to deepen our understanding of the nature of the rose, its essence of being, its roseness . The rose is what it is, fully and completely. It is not like anything. It is not like something red; it is red. It is not like something beautifully scented; it is beautifully scented. It is not like something that is pleasing in form, or delicate, or fleeting; it simply is all of those things. But to say that a rose is all of those things might tend to imply that it is simply a collection of attributes, the totality of which somehow add up to roseness . No, roseness precedes and transcends...