Why should not old men be mad?
William Butler Yeats
Why should not old men be mad?
Some have known a likely lad
That had a sound fly-fisher’s wrist
Turn to a drunken journalist;
A girl that knew all Dante once
Live to bear children to a dunce;
A Helen of social welfare dream,
Climb on a wagonette to scream.
Some think it a matter of course that chance
Should starve good men and bad advance,
That if their neighbours figured plain,
As though upon a lighted screen,
No single story would they find
Of an unbroken happy mind,
A finish worthy of the start.
Young men know nothing of this sort,
Observant old men know it well;
And when they know what old books tell
And that no better can be had,
Know why an old man should be mad.
WB Yeats said all that.
I came into my office this morning and sat down at my desk only to discover there was a dirty sock on the right corner of the desk “sleeping” on top of the unopened mail. In my old days this might not have struck me as unusual but these days I rarely find articles of clothing lying around the house and office where they should not be. I decided not to take a picture of it and realized that I am not yet socially media literate, meaning that I would still like to write a thousand words that are worth a picture. I have been trying to write something for a few days now about what’s going on but it has not been easy going as I have been finding it difficult to connect my thoughts with my words; as is often the case the blank page finally wins.
I have been looking at this picture below and thinking about why I find it so appealing. I like the texture of the reeds. The action on the water awakens my sense of a storm coming in and my hope that the reeds will survive the worst of the storm and that they will be here when I come back again … whenever that may be.
There is no guarantee of my returning to this place that I may renew my acquaintance with these reeds. In truth it may never happen. Not because of some personally fatal occurrence but because the running event that would bring me back to this particular lake has been canceled for the foreseeable future. Unlike the reeds, the event itself eventually broke down as a storm of demands were made and something of value came to an end except as memory and stories to tell in the places where absent friends gather. There is something in the reflection that I find appealing almost as if discovering a secret harbor, refuge in a Kingdom of distance and dreams. The reflection itself is dislocating because it is so close to the surface of the water as if the sky and water had finally merged. I find it peaceful with the ruffled surface of the water under the cloud disappearing into the reeds I shot it in a quiet moment during a very active day and so when I look at it now , I remember the peace of that moment made up as it was of stolen time and the drifting memory of someone I loved who was no longer there.
I took the sock off the desk and tossed it into the laundry basket and so today began.
Photo Credits
Recent Michael Lebowitz Articles:
- Tarmac Meditations #205: Images in the Sunrise
- Tarmac Meditations #204: Images From the Road - Smoke Risin'
- Tarmac Meditations #203: Images From the Road
- Tarmac Meditations #202: Images From the Road
- Tarmac Meditations: Haiku # 42
You are the wind beneath my wings, duuude….
from Yeats to Bette Midler—that is some Journey
Thank you Ross,I appreciate your referring to the work as poetry
Beautiful, Michael. You have reached down deep, no doubt with some difficulty, and you have found and retrieved the memories and the images and the right words to describe them and how you feel about them – the essence of poetry indeed. And I love the Yeats poem. Thank you.