MEANING
THE DYSTOPIA SERIES @ U OF T AND THE SEARCH
FOR MEANING IN CORMAC MCCARTHY
He was 4ft.8 A rotund Milton scholar He used fuck
as if he’d discovered it in an illuminated manuscript
Who the fuck knows what it means! It’s a prose poem
It’s enigmatic re: Cormac Mcarthy’s Blood Meridian
C’mon head of English Dept. U of T I want meaning
with my exegesis or what is it good for? Absolutely
nothing All of your Milton illusions +biblical delusions
are not worth a mote in the eye of the Lord: And God said to
Job I’m fucking God! That’s why I can torture you!
(yes head of English said this)
If you cannot grapple with the deeper meaning of McCarthy
the greatest living writer of the 20th century you are not worth
your substantial weight in salt or your 150K salary Even my
brother a legal scholar at that had an allusion to John Milton’s
Paradise Lost It puts your pithy fucks to shame: (from Animal
House spoken by Donald Sutherland: * plse.see below)
Back in the day 1978 U of T my English professors were elegant
men Musty with bushy eyebrows I fell hard for one of them He
spake Chaucer with his golden tongue: Whan that Aprille with his
shoures soote, the droughte of March hath pierced to the roote..
And yes he tempted me to his rooms where But I digress
Now to McCarthy’s text:
Men’s memories are uncertain and the past that was differs little from
the past that was not (or as my 94 yr. old mother says: what was was)
Cormac adds a new twist to Hassidic wisdom Not only is the past a was
no matter how hard you try you cannot unlive your life
And no matter what you do you will live out the same story (Mother:
Man makes plans God laughs) ie., I’m Fucking God! Do you really
believe in the sanctity +veracity of what happened 40 yrs. ago? When
the Boss released Darkness +you lived with a 24 yr. old husband What’s
the difference anyway? Now you live with another husband 64
And in the night your medical marijuana plays tricks All husbands become
one Cormac: Did you post witnesses? For where is yesterday? Numerous
of my witnesses have fled Some are dead Those who remain grow foggy
And soon their mittens will be affixed with strings
__
Hear me man, he said. There is room on stage for one beast and one alone.
All others are destined for a night that is eternal and without name. One by
one they will step down into the darkness. Bears that dance, bears that don’t.
(Cormac Mcarthy Blood Meridian 1985)
(I don’t dance for the honky amusements Bob Dylan 1965)
SPRING 2018
..if I could take one moment into my hands..
Bruce Springsteen The Promised Land 1978
