A Wave, A Flame
ERIC CHAET
(originally posted at The 100 So-Called Poems)
A wave, a flame
the career of one who, like a dog or horse
accepts whatever role is assigned
by fate or someone stronger
a pimp, tycoon, or the commander
of some empire’s army or some insurgent gang, say
or the career (& its effects) of a psychopath
or of one who, to an unusual degree
masters him or her self
& who therefore can decide what to do
& follow thru
becoming more & more effective
while he or she lasts
the force of programming
& of deeds done more completely under its spell
gradually ebbing
even if there is no one to emulate
who can serve as a sufficient model
achieving the sort of success
less & less nebulously envisioned
even if no one before, however admirable
has wrought the intended transformation
of human behavior
& nearly everyone is engaged
in building roads & vehicles
intended to go elsewhere
that they are certain is more real
& more likely to reward them better.
SEE ALSO
Eric Chaet, born Chicago, 1945, South Side, beaten, denigrated, sinking, swimming—servant of a refractory nation and species, sweating laborer in factories and warehouses, wearing jacket and tie in offices and classrooms—”so-called poems” published and posted around the world, sporadically, for decades—author of People I Met Hitchhiking On USA Highways (read a review) and How To Change the World Forever For Better—perpetual polymath student, synthesizer of specialists’ insights and methods, solo consultant regarding space exploration and accidents involving obsolete industrial machinery—album of songs Solid and Sound—hitchhiked back and forth between the Pacific and Atlantic, sleeping out for years and subsisting on water and sunflower seeds, stapling a series of 1500 posters he made to utility poles, inciting whoever saw them to seize the responsibility for their own lives—governing without coalition or means of or inclination to coerce or confiscate, from below, approximately invisible.
[header photo courtesy of kevin rothwell; Wikimedia Commons]
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