Saturday, November 5, 2011

the nothing

Lax Drawing, from a photo by Jim Forest (self portrait?)

sentences

by no means mention
what's really
on your mind

nothing is
on my mind

don't mention
it
---
whatever you have
to say
will get itself
said

don't worry

who worries?

that's all i'm
telling
you:
don't
---
you go out
to the edge
of the universe,

it'll still be
on your
mind

nothing
is

it'll still
be there
---
you don't have to
try to remember
it

the fact is, you
can't forget

forget what?

the nothing.
whatever it
is

-Robert Lax, from the journal A, p. 36

3 comments:

  1. Beth, Like I said yesterday, peaceful and graceful but also "fun". I tend to grin a lot when I read his poetry and I would imagine that he did so too much of the time when he wrote them. It's as if he's just talking to himself, giggling at life, at himself, and at all of us "cuzz we are all the same". Our silly little humanesses. Great self portrait. It captures that discription of Merton's of Lax where he says that his face is long like a horses. Thanks for the postings. Robert

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  2. I would call it whimsy - Lax was a whimsical kind of guy. Playful and light. The letters between Merton and Lax capture this well. And I think of how well he fit in with the circus people, and the homeless people in France. Even the Greeks accepted him as one of their own.

    Almost incredible that with utter simplicity he can say the most profound things.

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  3. scary - can't remember what it is i need to remember - but i suppose it doesn't really matter (ha , there's a quanta) unless i'm doing invoices at work

    the words between 2 people can create a 3rd the beatniks say

    i hope there is nothing, so this damn superego will get off my back

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