Was more random statements than a coherent message.
At least, it was meant to be.
Wasn’t it?
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Maybe my shrink is right — maybe I do still have issues about 9/11 that I haven’t dealt with.
I had dreams for the first time in ages about Ground Zero — and I realized, I think, why I can’t talk about having been there.
I keep coming back to Lovecraft: his insistence on speaking of the evil of R’yleh as being manifest in the way the architecture looked, how perspectives and angles were off in ways that the human mind couldn’t comprehend and therefore were prone to induce madness.
And I think that’s what I get from my memory of Ground Zero: the idea that facing it will induce madness.
That and the fucking smell.
I can’t use Lovecraft’s tongue to speak of this without trivializing — and yet, that’s where I keep going.
Jesus.

May 6th, 2004 at 4:01 pm
Re: Acts of madness and how we digest them
When I went, it was still burning.
I won’t go back until there’s something there to see. Until I can find Tara/Neilie/Susan/Christine/Robin/Lisa/Linda on a memorial.
I just can’t use literature for this right now.
I wrote 9/11 poems — some were good, some were not. I’ve never read a one in NYC.
At the end of it all, what is there to be said? Mad people did something mad, as they always do. Other people died as a result, and the cycle continues forever.
Really, what more can be said about that? It’s the oldest story in the world.
May 6th, 2004 at 4:01 pm
Re: Acts of madness and how we digest them
When I went, it was still burning.
I won’t go back until there’s something there to see. Until I can find Tara/Neilie/Susan/Christine/Robin/Lisa/Linda on a memorial.
I just can’t use literature for this right now.
I wrote 9/11 poems — some were good, some were not. I’ve never read a one in NYC.
At the end of it all, what is there to be said? Mad people did something mad, as they always do. Other people died as a result, and the cycle continues forever.
Really, what more can be said about that? It’s the oldest story in the world.
May 6th, 2004 at 4:01 pm
Re: Acts of madness and how we digest them
When I went, it was still burning.
I won’t go back until there’s something there to see. Until I can find Tara/Neilie/Susan/Christine/Robin/Lisa/Linda on a memorial.
I just can’t use literature for this right now.
I wrote 9/11 poems — some were good, some were not. I’ve never read a one in NYC.
At the end of it all, what is there to be said? Mad people did something mad, as they always do. Other people died as a result, and the cycle continues forever.
Really, what more can be said about that? It’s the oldest story in the world.
May 6th, 2004 at 3:49 pm
Acts of madness and how we digest them
“I can’t use Lovecraft’s tongue to speak of this without trivializing”—
I don’t know about that, Tony. I looked at the events of 9/11/01 through various lenses, and for me, it was true that sometimes I needed to come at what happened through literature. The fact of 9/11/01 itself is madness, and I’m thinking that perhaps just as human beings we are entitled to process such events in any way at all that keeps us together. Am I saying go with it? Maybe I am. I was very far away from it – you weren’t and I understand that. My heart breaks to think of how you spent that day, ’cause I remember how you told me that you spent it. I’ve never been to Ground Zero. Do I go? Should I go? Maybe how you answer me will be an answer for you?
in sympathy
May 6th, 2004 at 3:49 pm
Acts of madness and how we digest them
“I can’t use Lovecraft’s tongue to speak of this without trivializing”—
I don’t know about that, Tony. I looked at the events of 9/11/01 through various lenses, and for me, it was true that sometimes I needed to come at what happened through literature. The fact of 9/11/01 itself is madness, and I’m thinking that perhaps just as human beings we are entitled to process such events in any way at all that keeps us together. Am I saying go with it? Maybe I am. I was very far away from it – you weren’t and I understand that. My heart breaks to think of how you spent that day, ’cause I remember how you told me that you spent it. I’ve never been to Ground Zero. Do I go? Should I go? Maybe how you answer me will be an answer for you?
in sympathy
May 6th, 2004 at 3:49 pm
Acts of madness and how we digest them
“I can’t use Lovecraft’s tongue to speak of this without trivializing”—
I don’t know about that, Tony. I looked at the events of 9/11/01 through various lenses, and for me, it was true that sometimes I needed to come at what happened through literature. The fact of 9/11/01 itself is madness, and I’m thinking that perhaps just as human beings we are entitled to process such events in any way at all that keeps us together. Am I saying go with it? Maybe I am. I was very far away from it – you weren’t and I understand that. My heart breaks to think of how you spent that day, ’cause I remember how you told me that you spent it. I’ve never been to Ground Zero. Do I go? Should I go? Maybe how you answer me will be an answer for you?
in sympathy