scruta

I dream of an art within myself that looks into the shadows, rises above, and then finds a way to keep light burning in the darkness.

The essence of friendship is a conversation that never ends. Even as friends jump into separate taxis, part ways in train stations, board planes across oceans, or leave life entirely, the conversation continues in absentia; the conversation never ends.

I often whisper to myself in the night: “Yes, you have it all already.” I don’t know if that means to keep going, or just to stop and stand still.

One speaks gloom and doom so they might see only happiness before their eyes. Incantations of evil are ultimately harbingers of the good.

Every person represents a way of life, and for each of us a way into life. As a raving vagabond characture artist once told me: “We are attracted to people of like psychoses.”

I wonder if master chefs often have wild ideas for classifying people in their lives according to food types, maybe even silverware. I think our culinary friend would find – much to their chagrin – that most people would be sporks. A couple of passions unable to cut too deeply, but over-all non-threatening, smooth, easy-going and fond of fast food.

I whisper to myself, “For the moment, everything is new.” Then I think, “”For the moment,” eh? It’s qualifications like these that make a person realize they’re getting old.”

I used to think that intimacy meant saying everything, complete transparency, everything bathed in light. Now I know it means being able to say anything, but saying little despite it all. It means comfort in the shadows.

There’s a fat guy who rides the subways in Shanghai, admonishing the onlookers to fight against rampant corruption in Chinese society. Lately people have been finding his overtures a matter of entertainment, a good chuckle. He looked discourged. He shouldn’t be. As everyone knows, ridicule always appears before the fight. The iconoclast suffers, but we, the masses, always laugh into truth.

The timers in the Shanghai subway are changed when the trains are late. In a second, 1:15 to go suddenly becomes 2:09 and counting. A committment to accuracy for those waiting?  Or a way to avoid the consequences of poor service?