in my past life, i was an opera diva. i sat with great thinkers. i dressed the wounds of fallen soldiers in the pelopponesian wars. i danced burlesque in paris. i was a lonely sailor. a diver. a cavedweller. i played the flute on the streets of rome during the renaissance. i sculpted the lion headed goddess in egypt. i stood paralyzed by a great love. i leapt into an ocean out of grief. i happily gave a fortune away. i hoarded my gold. i meditated for years in a monk retreat in asia. i was a captive slave. i was an arrogant ruler. i was a generous priestess. insatiable lover. mystic gypsy. a great beauty. a homely junkie. traitor. healer. despot. hero. i go on . .
my horoscope for today: "the stress you are feeling might be coming from knowing what you want. unfortunately, when we do know our heart's desire, we also have to come to grips with what we do not have -- and herein is your dilemma. how much should you risk by expressing what you need . ."
risk everything, i said that . . risk.
the summer 2004 "chicago edition" of
blithe house quarterly edited by aldo alvarez and gregg shapiro has just been released online and features great new writing by some amazing wordsmiths including kurt heintz, dave awl, yvonne zipter, and karen lee osborne. my own story, "time capsule" is included as well!
just discovered this amazing british composer named
jocelyn pook. her music is trance inducing. she's done a great deal of soundtracks including kubrick's "eyes wide shut." i'm looking forward to hearing more from her. simply ravishing!
tell me somewhere there are mermaids singing . .calling to me like the gentle voices in delibes "flower duet" . .calling to me like cresting storm waves beating against a stone jetty . .like the wind through night trees with branches scraping the roof of my sea house, where i'm listening to everything that is faraway . .
over the weekend i visited the white fence farm for dinner with anthony. he put in a quarter in the fortune telling machine for me. a gypsy's wax hand passed over a row of tarot cards, then a card popped out with a message:
"you've been sleeping and having to wake too early for your pleasure. you may find if you relax that you dream a thousand new paths and awake to walk your old one. dreams are the touchstones of our characters. you will probably find an answer to a problem you have through a dreamy sleep. a dream which is not interpreted is like a letter which is not read . .relax and you will be shown great things. the eye sees a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake."
so tonight . .i'm going to bed and sleeping . .and staying in bed later . .to see what i can decipher there . . .
i just couldn't resist playing dido's cd "life for rent" this afternoon in the car . .then driving back home, playing the pet shop boys discofied version of the classic "west side story" tune "somewhere" . .stereo speakers with the bass full blast, racing down the highway at eighty miles per hour, passing every car in sight today. shiny and clean and deceptively fresh with un-self-conscious giggles bursting into the open blue sky. i kept hearing someone whisper, "forever gerry, forever" in my ear as i accelerated into the gap tooth smile of the untrammeled future.
