Richard Harris's Blog, page 13

Pieces of You: A Poem

Pieces of You

Still now, I find pieces of myself that belong to you,

Like discovering sand in my pockets long after a trip to the beach,

They burrow in old wounds like grains of salt.

Most of the time, they are quiet, wallflowers amongst the party of my memories.

Introverted, as if they are ashamed to exist;

She’s suffered enough, they must think.

Letting her forget we’re here, this much we can do for her.

Other times, they are confused,

They ask after you-

Why they have not seen you in a while,

If you’ve been well, when you’ll be back,

But I don’t know how to tell them you’re not returning;

So instead, I talk about breaking up,

How it looks like the place we met, the one that has since closed.

Sounds like your favourite song, the one the radio loves to play.

Tastes like your name, and anyone who shares it.

Smells like my lobby, where someone else wears your cologne.

You were the first one to touch my lips, after all,

And every time I kiss now it feels like break-up.

Then there are days when they unravel, snake around my lungs;

On hazy mornings after waking from a dream about you,

When I have never been more disappointed to see sunlight,

They dig their nails into my brain like an archaeologist willing for the past to reignite.

When you post a photo with a prettier girl who shares my smile,

One my wilted muscles have long forgotten how to write,

They sink their teeth into my heart like canines who have just learned how to bite.

There are evenings when I bump into you on the street,

Almost as if we’d planned to meet,

And they plead at me to reach out and hug you.

On nights when I cling to tequila like a lifeline,

They scream at me to call you,

Reciting a series of numbers I’d long since forced myself to forget,

And every time I pull me back into myself, I know I have won a battle

But somehow, this feeling is anything but victorious.

You see, I don’t know how to open the door to these pieces without letting your smile leave too;

The one, I am ashamed to admit, I still use to keep warm on bitter winter nights.

I don’t know how to cut these pieces out without tearing myself apart in the process.

On better days, I sing lullabies to the pieces of you as I tuck them in at night;

About love, about how it’ll return someday.

It may have a little less height, but hug a bit more tight, smile a fraction more bright, and feel oh-so more right.

Sometimes love can adjourn, take a turn, leave a burn, but love will always return.

And sometimes, I can almost believe it myself.

–Melody Chen 

I love this poem from fellow blogger and poet Melody Chen: Word-Experimentalist, especially the part in italics.

Check out Melody’s poetry and her site when you have a chance. It’s well worth the visit.

Quote of the Day

“We all pay for our advantages…There’s not a man in this world who hasn’t, and I include the priests. Every man has his secrets, his costs of doing business. It’s no different in my line. Don’t be fooled by the marble columns – the Romans had those, too, and they fed their prisoners to lions. There’s a good deal of brutality behind institutions like mine, leavened by an equal measure of hypocrisy…Not enough has been written about the treachery of middle life.”

—Jennifer Egan, Manhattan Beach

I’m currently reading Jennifer Egan’s follow-up to her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, A Visit from the Goon Squad, itself a fantastic read, and am enjoying it very much. I’ll save my final thoughts for a full post later on, but it’s a slow, meditative story, not unlike Blade Runner as a film, and a welcome change of pace in an otherwise crazy day of pressing deadlines and a near-ubiquitous now now now culture.

In the quote, the father-in-law, a banker, is talking to his son-in-law, a gangster, at a pivotal point of World War II (and the book – surprise, surprise). What’s great about timeless literature – or art for that matter – is that it never goes out of style. The above little talk from Arthur could be about so many different subjects, and yet the ultimate message rings true in each and every one of the cases, just as it does throughout history.

There was one more quote I was thinking of using from this book, a much shorter one, and I think I’ll include it here to end off this piece.

“It’s a pity we’re forced to make the choices that govern the whole of our lives when we’re so goddamn young.”

P.S. Today’s picture is of Jennifer Egan in full “battle dress” for the book.

“Who Am I?”

Who am I you may well ask

I really wish I knew

If I am not myself at all

Then maybe I am you

To discover who I really am

Is really quite a task

Maybe I am someone else

Who wears a funny mask

I strive so hard to know myself

To discover the “real me”

My thoughts and feelings all confused

Yet still I cannot see

What makes me tick?

What makes me feel?

So very special and unique

My purpose in this glorious world

Is what I truly seek

I wish I could be creative, self confident and smart

Not quiet, shy and insecure

Emotional at heart

I wish I had the confidence to say what I really feel

Instead of fearing criticism

Uttering words that seem unreal

Why at times do I feel so alone

And just yearn for a friendly face

While at others I just long to be

In some far off distant place

With no one else to bother me

And disturb my rambling thoughts,

Until my conscience brings me back

To do the things I ought

And so I continue on my way

On this journey they call life

I try to do the best I can

Though at times the goings tough

I’ll do my part to refine the world

And make it a better place

By being “me” to my capacity

With each trial I have to face

–Faigie Rabin 

Sometimes you get lucky and just blindly stumble on something nice while cruising along the I-interweb. Such was my fortune earlier when looking for something else and taking a completely different off-ramp. The above poem is what I ended up “surfing” into.

I have no idea who Faigie Rabin is, and apparently she has no Twitter handle (the gall!), but wherever you are, Faigie, you did good and goodly with this one.

For those who recognized the name of this poem from Carl Sandburg, here’s his version under the same title:

My head knocks against the stars.

My feet are on the hilltops.

My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of universal life.

Down in the sounding foam of primal things I reach my hands and play with pebbles of destiny.

I have been to hell and back many times.

I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.

I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.

I know the passionate seizure of beauty

And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs reading “Keep Off.”

 

My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive in the universe.

The Psychogeography of Grief

Writing for The Guardian, Deborah Levy has some very nice things to say about the new book on the cusp of international release in English from the award-winning author of The Vegetarian in a piece titled “The White Book by Han Kang review – the fragility of life.”

Han Kang is the South Korean author who shot to worldwide literary fame when her book about a non-meat eater won the Man Booker International Prize in 2016. It also earned its translator, @londonkoreanist (aka Deborah Smith), heaps and heaps of praise for her artistic and articulate translation.

As Ms. Levy contends, Han Kang has maintained her poise as a skilled, humanistic author in The White Book (“흰” in Korean) – a “fragmented autobiographical meditation on the death of the unnamed narrator’s baby sister, who died two hours after her birth” – through “writing [that] edges close to becoming a brilliant psychogeography of grief, moving as it does between place, history and memory.”

For her own part, Deborah Smith has kept up with what is purported to be another excellent translation, like this poignant excerpt from The White Book:

“I wanted to show you clean things. Before brutality, sadness, despair, filth, pain, clean things that were only for you, clean things above all. But it didn’t come off as I intended. Again and again I peered into your eyes, as though searching for form in a deep, black mirror.”

The review ends by saying “If Han’s monotone is relentlessly poised and never flinches from serene dignity, perhaps it could not be written in any other way…The White Book is a mysterious text, perhaps in part a secular prayer book…[that] succeeds in reflecting Han’s urgent desire to transcend pain with language.

PR Trends in 2018

For all you social media gurus, self-promoters and indie authors out there, John Hall has some public relations advice to offer in a piece titled “6 PR trends to check out in 2018” to follow up on my summary of Rachel Thompson and her amazingly informative Dos and Don’ts on Twitter (“Back to Basics: Twitter“).

I’ll let Mr. Hall do the heavy lifting through his own well-researched piece, but the highlights, according to him, are the following:

Personal branding and thought leadership will go beyond executives
Owning your digital landscape will never be more important to attract followers
Internal PR pros will need to bring in specialty firms for support
PR will need to understand business goals besides its own
You will have to consider dark social influence
Separating measurement into qualitative and quantitative metrics will be critical

Publishing-related Jobs

A couple of links to jobs related to…books!

1. Sales & Marketing Coordinator – 1 year contract @ University of Toronto Press

2. Marketing and Sales Intern Position (Paid) @ Canadian Scholars Press

Quote of the Day

“When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world.

I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation.

When I found I couldn’t change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I couldn’t change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family.

Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family. My family and I could have made an impact on our town. Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the world.”

Unknown monk, c. 12th century

I’ve always loved the above quote and for reasons unbeknownst to myself, thought of this morning in conjunction with another one of my favourite quotes from a movie about a woman who is pretty:

: “Tell me one person who it’s worked out for.”

: “What, you want me to name someone? You want like a name? Oh, God, the pressure of a name… I got it. Cindafuckin’rella”

Ha ha ha.

How are those two quotes connected? Beats me. But I like ’em both and don’t have to apologize for nuttin’, honey!

Back to Basics: Twitter

Man alive! Every time I learn something about a social media platform, I feel like I’ve gone back to grade one and can’t master that fine art of tying your own shoelaces.

What the Dynamite! Thank all Napoleons for people like Rachel Thompson over at Bad Redhead Media because at least she gives you ways to fix your stupidity after pointing out a few/many things you’ve probably been doing wrong for months/years on Twitter. (It’s not only frightening how well her whole online world is linked, it’s truly daunting…and inspiring.)

In a piece titled “This Twitter Guide Will Make You See What You’re Doing SO Wrong And How To Make It Right,” Ms. Thompson delicately (YOU DUMBASS!) points out where you’ve gone wrong (yes, engaging in Trump-like behaviour is smart whenever you feel slighted) and where you’ve gone right (you included your name!).

Seriously, though, for anyone who has a passing interest in Twitter and keeping up with the Tweetses, this is a must-read piece, extra-specially so if you run a business, self-promote, are involved in business/advertising/marketing, or if you want to take over the Twitterverse.

Shakespeare in…Poets’ Corner?

 

In a piece for The Guardian titled “I can prove that ‘William Shakespeare’ is buried in Westminster Abbey – scholar,” grandson of the great Evelyn Waugh (NOTE: refer to wickedly funny moment in Lost in Translation for cultural reference) Alexander Waugh claims that “William Shakespeare was in fact Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, and is buried in Westminster Abbey, not the Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon.”

Now, I’m no scholarly sleuth, but after reading this article all I can think is: Has someone read a bit too much Dan Brown for their own good?

Be Aware: Journaling Helps You

 

I wrote a piece last week titled “Beware: Artistry Kills.” Well, now I’m here to turn things around. Of what do I speak?

“There is research out of U.C Davis showing that just writing for a few minutes each day about things that you’re grateful for can dramatically boost your happiness and wellbeing.”

There was a piece in the Daily Informator recently called “A psychologist explains the best way to rewire your brain to let go of negative thoughts” in which social psychologist Alison Ledgerwood discusses the empirical proof that we as humans have a natural inclination to veer towards the negative, even when presented with positive information that overwhelms the negative.

You can watch the TEDx talk by clicking on the above link, but essentially Ms. Ledgerwood conducted an experiment and showed that we suck. Okay, I may be oversimplifying the results. But the point, I think, is that negative thoughts beget more negative thoughts, while positive thoughts can easily be turned to negative thoughts; unfortunately for us, it’s much harder to go from negative thoughts to positive ones.

Although that doesn’t seem like rocket science, her point is that it’s an instinctual trait (so don’t blame yourself for doing it), meaning the only way to make things better is to work at it. And the key? Writing, of course!

She suggests that everyone, but especially people who struggle with negative thoughts on a regular basis, start a gratitude journal. The formula is quite simple: Jot down a thing or two about what you feel grateful for, and try to remember those things as you navigate your way through/around your day.

So, I’ll get the ball rolling on this one and hopefully inspire at least one other person to do the same thing.

I’m very grateful for all of my friends, but I am especially proud of my friend Maria A., who begins a new chapter of her life journey today. She is returning to her new-old home of Mexico to start the exodus process. After four long years of endless hurricanes (literally), she’s found the strength to be grateful for her own experience and know that it’s time to move on. Where that will take her is still up in the air, though I know she’ll conquer whatever mountains she faces along the way and vanquish any unforeseen demons she encounters. As she likes to say, no matter how challenging the circumstances, “Follow your bliss, yo!”