Esnesnon 27-9-12

My memory is misbehaving again. The fact it's four o' clock and I've had half a bottle of Martini and two big glasses of rum is a pretty big factor in all that. The why of all that might lie in the misdirected desire of self-destruction. On the other hand, these moments of delirium are also moments of clarity, in a sense. The memory isn't doing too well, but I'm better off slightly mad than I am fully sane.
There is this song I looked up around half past three yesterday (as in Wednesday) which would feature as my music Monday if I participated in that. I printed it and started practising, because it's beautiful. I could tell you a long story about the why of it being beautiful, but you can also take my word for it. Take your pick. It may just be enough that a madman told you so. As we know, madmen always tell the truth. It's a French poem put to music. The author of the poem is my all time favourite Verlaine, who was a rather depressed, binge-drinking, homosexual, bohemian, run down Parisian vagabond. The composer is the late Romantic Fauré. If you wish to understand the dark attraction I experience in my drive for inexistence, this is a good artistic indicator. Also, I'm just testing my memory. It is something like this.

'Votre âme est un paysage choisi
Que vont charmant masques et bergamasques
Jouant du luth et dansant et quasi
Tristes sous leurs déguisements fantasques.

Tout en chantant, sur le mode mineur
L'amour vainqueur, et la vie opportune
Ils n'ont pas l'air de croire à leur bonheur
Et leurs chansons mêle au clair de lune.

Oh calme clair de lune, triste et beau
Qui fait rêver les oiseaux dans les arbres
Et sangloter d'extase les jets d'eau
Les grands jets d'eau sveltes parmi les marbres.'

Okay, that took me close to ten minutes or longer to dig up from my noggin. Pretty close to the actual material, though close scrutiny will reveal a couple of mistakes. Only came across it this afternoon, after all. Here's an approximation of the meaning (went over it with a dictionary in the subway):

'Thine soul is a painted landscape,
where charming masked figures go
playing the lute and dancing, nearly
sad below their fantastic disguises.

All are singing, in minor key
Of the love that conquers and the opportunity that is life
They don't seem to believe in their happiness
And their songs blend with the moonlight

Oh calm moonlight, sad and beautiful
That makes birds in the trees dream
and the fountains weep in ecstasy
The great, slender fountains amidst the marble.'

I don't understand how people live; how they keep going. I understand there is another thing awaiting them beyond the horizon, at the dawn of a new day, but why find out? I've seen a thousand sunrises and none of them was meaningful.

If anything, when the day comes they commemorate my passing from this world, I wish no one will say 'they don't understand.' Any such a person is to stay away from such a ceremony, no matter who they are. And I suspect there will be such people. They will turn their heads and look surprised when I go. Possibly they will grieve for the potential wasted, as several already do. They will grieve for their own worlds, threatened by the shame of sin and the fear of death which is suddenly so close to their precious lives.

And maybe I should stop smoking. Not because of the damage to my lungs - I could hardly care less - but because it calms my mind and enables me to do the things my animal self - my Steppenwolf - would stop me from doing.

Decided to copy this to my blog. Might as well. Have been neglecting it for some time already.

Karo