Say-So

Last night I spent five hours sleeping, tossing and turning on a cramped seat of American Airlines red-eye flight San Francisco - Boston. It was a nightmare scenario, due to a late flight and a missed connection I had to decide whether to pursue my luggage all the way to where it needed to be claimed triggering a cascade of delays which would never (or so it seemed) get me to my destination , or forego the luggage and spend the 2 weeks bare, with only purchased emergency necessities. Luckily it was a decision which did not come about. A coincidence had me cross paths with a personnel who was relaxed, knowledgeable and willing to help. I managed to intercept my luggage in Boston and remained there until the next flight allowing me a few hour’s peak at Boston’s downtown. I came across two events which had me reflect on the fragility and a single face dimension of my middle class, definitely bourguois existence. An incident in chinatown where a woman driver has seemingly hit and possibly injured a pedestrian (it is my imagination filling in the gaps as I did not want to disturb the scene by gawking). She sat in front of her car possibly where the victim once was and cried remorsefully. Consoled by another woman, she was fully oblivious to the busy streets, the pedestrian rubber necks, the high sun at noon and a warm summer day - the fragility of our “safe” daily routines threatened by others but more obviously by our own falliability. Next, in a park I was approached by a stranger who literally invited himself to come and stay with me in San Francisco for what could be a lengthy visit. Ivan, a Ukrainian man approaching 50’s who’s been roaming the US for 2 years, living hand to mouth, with no permanent address, no doubt sleeping frequently under the open skies. He recognized a slavic face. “Am I in your way?” I asked startled by his intense gaze. - “Maybe”, he muttered hinting that I may be of help to him rather than an obstacle. Polish hospitality is historically a subject of national pride. A popular saying loosely translates: “A guest in the house - God in the house”. When somewhat awkwardly the topic of illegal labor came about, he excitedly exclaimed - there is no other country like Poland. He recounted how he could easily find day jobs at flea markets simply by talking to people. He was offered accommodations and once, was able to spend 3 months in his hosts house all by himself. His story has a flavor of old rural Poland and its population, a romantic picture of a simple human interaction, an exchange.
I can’t place it in the context of the current socio-economical reality with very high unemployment rates and people who have been held back for decades under a socialist regime, just bursting to realize the economical opportunities which they believe they were robbed off. Even less so, I can imagine how Ivan was able to survive in the United States, where even an occasional baby sitter is required to be CPR certified. I am not around a milieu which could offer a day job to Ivan and I squirm at an idea of having a long term guest at my apartment. As Ivan pereceptably commented: “you are not like other Poles” noticing my reluctance. “I suppose I am not” I admitted.
Ivan walked away with my email address, which he still has to figure out how to use. I have the time to ponder whether I was unreasonably defensive, being unwelcoming to a stranger bound to me by ethnic origins, or whether I am being outlandishly romantic by reflecting back on the incident.

Is it tasty as a piece of raclette on a fresh baguette, is it refreshing and comforting as vanilla ice cream, is it warm as the sun on my back - why does The Paris Review bring me so much joy? I am barely a quarter into it and I know it will be read back to back. Not only does it allow me to explore and discover my personal likes of poetry, introduces me to names in fiction I am not acquainted with, it also describes the creative process and exposes the person behind the pen in a way of interviews with poets and writers. One such I read, is an interview with Les Murray . As much as the sample of his two poems did not trigger in me a harmonious response, I thoroughly enjoyed reading his personal narrative, I might add: to my surprise.
Having read the biographical introduction to the interview, I was biased by the note that Les Murray was admitted to the Catholic Church in 1964 and has prefaced several of his books with a dedication “To the Glory of God”. An artist following a dogma, is an unambiguous paradox in my mind. There is nothing more thwarting for creativity than a blind acceptance of any doctrine, and yet - Les Murray has proven to be very liekable, and witty and thoughtful and perceptive and a… non conformist.
Here is why. Asked about religion, I was impressed that it was Not the absolute truth which appealed to Murray but the ideology:

Many folk assume I came in because of Valerie, who was and is a Catholic. But not a bit of it - I came in because it is the best and only reliable Big Poem (…) Catholicism was something of a bulwark against the Nazism of sex that I’d observed everywhere in the society already (…) worship of youth and beauty; ruthless relegation of the dowdy, the unhandsome and the shy.”

Murray is also a strong believer in the importance of poetry readings and engages in the “readings over the heads of the elite” bringing poetry to nonacademic audiences. The compassion for the “dowdy, the unhandsome and the shy” as well as the affection towards the uneducated, has everything to do with Murray’s own background and trials of growing up.
On poetry he is quoted to have said that a “thought” is the worst thing to try to write a poem with.

We have three minds, I reckon, one of which is the body, while the other two are forms of mentation: daylight consciousness and dreaming consciousness. (…) Thinking in a fusion of our three minds is how humans do naturally think, at any level above the trivial.

On prose:

Plots are too akin to fates, but even cheaper and nastier, being human attempts to manufacture fate, to stimulate it. It’s a tormenting of mental slaves.

All of the above have brought a smile to my face in understanding or in acknowledgment. “The story” is often exceedingly glorified in the film industry which I am peripherally part of. I personally derive most pleasure from semi formal, surprising assemblies of words or images. Colloquially: I totally get Les Murray.