5.28.21

It is an inestimable privilege of maturity to find the roots of our ills only in ourselves, whereas the young man cannot help but blame the outside world, and with all the more ferocity the greater his own defects.

—Umberto Saba (trans. Howard Curtis), “The Hen,” in Jhumpa Lahiri, ed., The Penguin Book of Italian Short Stories, 91

Up 8.
Made some changes in our grocery order.
Worked maybe 90 min, 11-12:30. Working out some kinks.
Therapy.
Cooked some mushrooms for dinner later. 
Watched most of a Zoom panel on “The Commune” with Bruno Boestels, Joshua Clover (who kept it short), Jodi Dean, Fred Moten, others. 
Went out w/ an umbrella to E77, read 30 p. Fanon bio, 25 p. Sharp, 10 p. Kovac, wrote 1 p. In poetry notebook (I’ve been running 1 day ahead). Forgot my keys and phone. Came back at 6.
Watched a bizarre 1994 video of “White House Cabaret,” hosted by the Clintons, with Dixie Carter (awful), Bobby Short (brilliant), Blossom Dearie (good), Shirley Horn (a bit misplaced), Len Cariou (doing “Soliloquy” from Carousel, poor choice of material) w/ Bree over dinner. Talked for a while after (difficult).
Didn’t work as much as I’d hoped today - at least 3 things on my to-do list uncompleted.
Read the story quoted above. Watched another 30 min. A Man Vanished.
Read more Sharp in bed.

5.27.21

A cigarette is its own reward.
Nonplussed but pissed past tense.
Like your own voice on tape.
Her girly skirt over her girly heart head.
Bottoms up. In your eye.
Back to Burma with money and a wife.
Dance paint feet hallway arm torch. I always thought I would.
Soecufucs, Specifics. One finger too far right. For this there are heated towels.

—Dierdre Kovack, “Ballyhoo,” Mannerism, 73

Up 7.
Breakfast/coffee. Sliced a mango, cleaned the stove, swept.
Read 30 p. Fanon bio (before 9:30).
Made an inquiry about getting space at a writer’s room in LIC.
Bree’s massage therapist came over for the first time since lockdown. Everyone’s vaxxed, but he sees a lot of clients so we all stayed masked.
10 p. Kovac; took out recycling; watched 20 min. A Man Vanishes.
Worked from 11:30-1:30, but probably only half of that was productive. Looked up some details about “When the Saints Go Marching In,” and found a digital copy of John Work’s spiritual collection. 
Called dad 2-3. Took a break, watched another 10 min. A Man Vanishes, probably enough for today.
Wrote 3 letter-length emails, to Vicky Wheeler, David Nagler, and Simon Joyner. Took a couple hours. I have a backlog of this kind of thing.
Took a walk briefly, before it got dark; found a bench, read a (quite short) story by Alberto Savinio and 10 more p. Kovac.
Finally watched the Impedance and Resistance video I had a song in.
Nothing worth noting after that - lights out 11, listened to part of an NYT podcast on the CRT controversy.

5.26.21

(Didn’t read anything especially quotable yesterday.)

Up at 6, sluggish, went back to sleep for a while. Bree went out to get her ears cleaned at 8.
Breakfast/coffee. Read a — story, about Sicilians getting ripped off trying to emigrate to America.
Therapy.
Went to E77 for coffee; 30 p. Fanon, 1 p. poetry notebook.
Came back about 2, decides to watch A Man Vanishes from the start again, w/ more concentration - even 10 min. at a time.
Worked about 2:30-4. “The Wheels on the Bus.”
Couples therapy.
Cooked some Swiss chard for dinner, at w/ Bree.
Said yes to playing w/ Laura C. at Sid’s on 6/17!
Watched A Man Vanishes up to 30 min. point.
25 p. Margery Sharp.

5.25.21

War and cancer of the blood
To each his death, slow or violent
And it is always the same
For those who have learned
To read in the shadows
And who, eyes closed,
Did not cease writing.
To die in this way is to live.

—Kateb Yacine, quoted in David Macey, Frantz Fanon, 399.

Up at 6.
Lost track of when I did things, but wrote a couple hours.
Went to MoMa - left about 10:30, deposited a check on the way. Subway neither mobbed nor deserted - if I hadn’t known what had happened the last year, I wouldn’t have been saying, “Where is everybody?” 
Forgot the library book I was going to return across the street.
Spent about 90 min. In the museum - post-war drawing show, 1940s-1970s collection and the current stuff on 2nd floor. I liked a video of Hanna Wilke posing in front of/through Duchamp’s Large Glass, a projected film of Cecil Taylor rehearsing and being interviewed in Paris (year?), and Hock E Aye Vi Edgar Heap of Birds: Surviving Active Shooter Cluster. 
Probably need to go back to see the black architecture show before it closes in a week.
Bought a couple of remaindered books in the store, inc. the Helen Molesworth Manny Farber catalog + 2 cheap notebooks.
None of the cafes in the museum were open. Got a half-sandwich and hot dog (the hot dog was better) at a food truck, + a cream soda, ate it outside; then got a coffee. Read two sections of Kovac. Wrote a couple pages in poetry notebook.
Took train back, listened to some Dry Cleaning and Leenachi (“Tiger Is Coming”). Not used to the activity; tired me out. Spent some time resting and responding to a ? about the form of a Taylor Swift song from J. Clover.
Read, somewhat later, 30 p. Fanon bio, and an Itala Svevo story. According to the bio note, he was taught English by James Joyce.
Lights out around 11.

5.24.21

And that one story, which he’s told himself in this way so many times, seemed to him an already printed book, one that was very easy to express mentally but very difficult to write with the letters of the alphabet necessary for thought to be made concrete and visible.

—Antonio Tabucchi (trans. Martha Cooley and Antonio Romano), in  Jhumpa Lahiri, ed., The Penguin Book of Italian Short Stories, 53.

Up for a while around 5:30; up for real at 9.
Wrote about 11-1. 
Called dad.
Therapy.
Read 30 p. Fanon and a story from the Italian anthology, quoted above. Contemporary (post-2008, I guess the anthology isn’t chronological), not unlike Cortazar in its breathlessness.
Discussed Bree’s letter.
A few p. of Kovac, didn’t get far. Read 25 p. Sharp in bed.

I’ve been listening to late-period R.E.M. that I didn’t pay attention to at the time, a few songs/videos here and there. Uneven.