19

may my heart always be open to little

birds who are the secrets of living

whatever they sing is better than to know

and if men should not hear them men are old

may my mind stroll about hungry

and fearless and thirsty and supple

and even if it's sunday may i be wrong

for whenever men are right they are not young

and may myself do nothing usefully

and love yourself so more than truly

there's never been quite such a fool who could fail

pulling all the sky over him with one smile

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i have no words lately to share or sing or preach or whisper or lay down from pen to paper. so i let ee cummings speak.

i have a book about as thick as your head filled with the writing of this remarkable and sensuous man. you know, the man was truly amazing. his mind so unique. he didn't feel the need to conform to the system of punctuation and grammar; i am sure there were english professors gasping at his absurd behavior. he was like the elvis of literature...way before his time yet utterly beautiful. against the grain. i felt a connection to his awkwardness immediately when i discovered him for the first time in college. his expression of life. it is only awkward, i say, because it is different than the mainstream, boring, mind-numbing jugglers of a ho-hum humanity. generation shocks the one before. not that i am comparing myself to him on any level. i, in my own sense am somewhat average. well, perhaps i am, i have always found it difficult to relate the restraints and gestures of our stiff culture, but i do it. that sounds complicated. i am not fake. if you know me well you know this. back to edward estlin: his words paint not only a verbal but visual ingenuity. the various tones of his different periods of writing are absolutely pensive. take some time out of your routine and experience his creativity. there are nineteen dozen more of his writings i wish to post. here is to those who walk backward through life yet somehow end up forward. and here is to confidence, faith and humility.

looks like i spoke more than i intended. give me art as word or canvas and i can speak for days. the splendor of it takes my breath away.

a monochromatic piece by cummings