Humility Or Humbug 2011
29 Apr 2012 Leave a Comment
in circling round vanities, a sense of the ridiculous, circling round reality, 2011, 2012 Tags: corruption, disrespect, downfall, everywhere
It’s a rainy, thund’ry day here in Härryda, Sweden (where Kent and I live in the country). The telephone is out. Somebody’s or somebodies have stolen the copper cables that have been hanging temptingly for months now (we live in a sad, corrupted conscience-free world). So here I was, doing the dishes, energized by coffee and wondering about the difference between humility and insecurity, they looking very much like each other.
Humility Or Humbug
It was a humdrum day.
Nothing on my mind,
I looked up humble
Where I found humdingers:
Humus
Humorous
For fingers.
Not a humph of sound,
For, humanized I pondered on
The difference ’tween
Low self-esteem
And lack of self-importance:
One, humility,
The other, well, -
Just plain old insecurities.
It is a fine line, hard to recognize.
The insecure seem often humble
And the humble insecure.
Good to analyze,
Who is the one to tell?
Then we come to arrogance.
Humility Or Humbug 7.5.2011
A Sense Of The Ridiculous; Circling Round Vanities; Circling Round Reality;
Arlene Corwin
-
No, the grass is never greener. Stay home and enjoy your Detroit could-be paradise. Help it along.
By the way, I worked in a wonderful jazz club in the 50′s! I don’t remember the name, but Detroit was the place then.
- Comment by Sue Shoemaker on Tuesday
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In your intro, Arlene, you mention someone stealing copper cables. Being from MI … we have heard so much about the destruction of old homes and other properties due to the theft of copper lines in Detroit. It’s interesting to hear that this is not just a Detroit or even just a USA phenomena. Sometimes it is easy to think that the ‘grass is greener’ in other places in the world.
- Comment by ARLENE CORWIN on Monday
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Pardon if this comes into your mail more than once.
Out this week -
Vaguely About Music
Arlene Corwin
The seventh in a series circling around some aspect of life: time, woman, the creative process, mysticism, vanity, our times and culture,Vaguely About Music deals with aspects of jazz, performance, criticism, celebration, mourning – all to do with music, the players, the performance.
Available on
Amazon.com, Xlibris.com, Barnes& Noble.
Also available as ebook
- Comment by ARLENE CORWIN on July 7, 2011 at 10:31
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I forgot to mention, – as a starting point I was fooling around with the hum’s. So in the seriousness of the message is the fooling around-ness too. Even in the most serious matters there must be and is fun – and (conversely) and perhaps even more important, even in the fun and under the fun lies always the serious. Contiguous walls. (see next blog).
Fondly,
Arlene, Sweden
- Comment by Marian Van Eyk McCain on July 6, 2011 at 20:48
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“…within the nowness of seconds, if you live in them, there is wisdom, and in that wisdom, security.” That’s a really profound statement, Arlene. I like it. And as Sue so rightly says, control is a total illusion.
Yes, that’s the beauty of poems. They are like Rorschach blots in the way they trigger associations, impressions, ideas, insights…
- Comment by Sue Shoemaker on July 6, 2011 at 19:01
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Not sure where I first heard the phrase … THE ILLUSION OF CONTROL … but it seems to relate to the discussion here. When speaking of “security” and/or ”change” … as much as we would like to think that we have “control” over these things … the fact of the matter is that the idea of CONTROL is just an ILLUSION.
- Comment by ARLENE CORWIN on July 6, 2011 at 18:47
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As the I Ching or Book of Changes says, there is nothing else but change. So, of course, all things being dynamic, there can’t be security (as we usually use the word) absolute. But within the nowness of seconds, if you live in them, there is wisdom, and in that wisdom, security.
And no, it isn’t what I meant in the poem, but your (Betty) and Marian’s response show what delicious things can come from a little poem.
Fondly,
Arlene
- Comment by Marian Van Eyk McCain on July 6, 2011 at 8:51
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That is SO true, Betty. And I guess that’s why Voltaire called life “a daring adventure.” Facing that, square on, is what ‘radical aliveness’ is all about.
- Comment by Betty Taylor on July 5, 2011 at 23:24
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There is no such thing as “security” in this life and it’s pursuit is a fruitless dead-end.
Think of all the empires built upon our fears and our pursuit of security–insurance businesses, financial markets, hospitals and health care businesses, nursing homes–the list goes on and on. We invest precious dollars in a futile attempt to ensure our safety. Life is not safe. Investing in these things out of fear becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. We end up creating the end we fear.
I know this may not be the road you were going down, but this is what your post stimulated in me.
Thanks,
Betty
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Critical Thinker 2011
18 Dec 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, circling round vanities, the processes II
Critical Thinker
I am the critical thinker,
Taking in then analyzing,
Struggling
Between advantage,
Vanity
And sharing;
Even to the point of
Owning up to struggles
In themselves.
Not vanity
But offering.
Still embarrassed to read I
As I re-read
“I am”,
But cannot change a word.
Critical Thinker 4.1.2011
The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Circling Round Vanity;
Arlene Corwin
Vanity Re-named Perhaps 2011
09 Dec 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2005, circling round vanities, I Is Always You is We
Vanity Re-named, Perhaps
Not reveling in one’s run,
Who wants to be remembered
Only when they’re gone?
You a memory in time: a force
Whose praise you always thought would be
A nice thing to enjoy while here.
You are not here to give it ear.
No wonder great religions
Call for dwindling interest in the ego,
Foster focusing on source.
Loving all as brothers,
Comforted in knowing that you share with others
Something that is you at bottom.
You could rest in peace.
The rest a vanity and arrogance.
Vanity Re-named, Perhaps 9.22.2005/rewritten11.1.2011
I Is Always You Is We; Circling Round Vanities;
Arlene Corwin
Zapping Vanity 2011
07 Dec 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, circling round vanities
Zapping Vanity
If everything is vanity,
Is all in vain?
Wrong to relish beauty
In, around
With tricks at hand
To purify intention
For awareness,
Extricating motives there -
Secret, meager;
Underlying, steering;
Using what technique you can
To zap a handicap
And liberate desire
From the mire of appearance?
No.
Zapping Vanity 12.4.2011
Circling Round Vanities;
Arlene Corwin
Zapping Vanity 2011
05 Dec 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, circling round vanities
Zapping Vanity
If everything is vanity,
Is all in vain?
Wrong to relish beauty
In, around
Using tricks at hand
To purify intention
For awareness,
Extricating motives there -
Secret, meager;
Underlying, steering;
Using what technique you can
To zap a handicap
And liberate desire
From the mire of appearance?
No.
Zapping Vanity 12.4.2011
Circling Round Vanities;
Arlene Corwin
The Losses 2011
27 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, birth death & in between II, circling round vanities
The Losses
Not the losses,
But the watching:
Changes, alterations in
A generation
Aging, dying, disappearing.
Knowledge which,
Though solace to the vanity,
(you’re still alive – whoopee!)
Craves the ring of answer
That has not yet come.
The Losses 10.21.2008 (found on a scrap – reworked 11.26.2011)
Circling Round Vanities; Birth Death & In Between II;
Arlene Corwin
Loss Of Vanity 2011
18 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, circling round vanities, pure nakedness
Loss Of Vanity
Loss noticed:
Gradual and un-dramatic -
As if letting go.
It is a letting go.
No longer yearning for approval
From the neighbor; from the culture.
Free from fashion factory’s syndrome,
Factory fashions altogether.
They won’t know the why
Or even that there is no vanity.
They might say “Oh,
She’s letting herself go”,
And they’d be right. She’s undergone
A distancing,
A retrograde,
An understanding
That it doesn’t make a difference,
Self-importance an illusion.
Loss of fear – that’s what it is
That’s come at last.
Loss Of Vanity 11.18.2011
Circling Round Vanities; Pure Nakedness;
Arlene Corwin
Bubbles & Futility 2011
17 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, circling round vanities
Bubbles & Futility
The vanities; the list:
Ambition, status;
Looking good and thinking that
The looking good will last:
Boobies and big lips brigade,
A tattooed blip on sex’s radar;
Pretty houses much too big,
Only to be sold (when old),
The shindig over.
Pretty clothes – lots of them;
Fashions passing – left: the thread.
Day away trips. Tempered tedium,
Exchanging happiness you miss
For bliss that stays in photos, memories
That shred.
Varieties that render meaning to the days
Where strivings, yearnings,
Earnings, disappointments
All sit on a nothingness,
A vacuous futility that ends in coffins
Or empiric or pragmatic laugh-ins.
After all, how much of muchness
can you chase
Before the soap-bubbly balloon
Blows up your metaphoric face?
Vanity that underlies undermines,
Encouraging the crooked
Road years of our lies, er, lives.
Whereof, wherein, herein this book.
Bubbles & Futility 11.17.2011
Circling Round Vanities;
Arlene Corwin
Hitler 2011
07 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, circling round vanities, our times our culture
Hitler
I’ve decided
Hitler died
Of pride,
Pride being a perverted
Vanity,
That is to say,
He died in vain.
☠
Think if he took back,
‘Fessed up – in a word,
Repented;
Went back to the church,
Became a priest,
At least a monk
(He was already celibate:
Couldn’t screw, or wouldn’t screw,
Whatever motivations, lewd
Or not)
To make amends.
In any case, this man
Died of perverted pride
Or vanity:
Twin sins.
Quirky moustache, he missed the mark:
Love of life, life of love the Quality.
Totally.
Hitler 11.6.2011
Our Times, Our Culture; Circling Round Vanities;
Arlene Corwin
I was listening to the radio where there seemed to be a number of programs relating to Hitler.
This particular program dealt with his last meal in the bunker, which was, spaghetti and tomato sauce.
Old Girl 2011
07 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in 2011, birth death & in between II, birthday book, circling round vanities, nature of & in reality
Love being seventy-seven.
Not a threat to anyone,
You hug, you flirt.
You’re not a threat! It’s great!
The essence is your circumstance,
Your circumstances essence.
Of course the vanities
Are there to work through.
(It’s still you,
And you’re not perfect.)
On the list of pros and cons
The pros win out.
One reads the obits.
It’s
A game:
Which year, which name,
How old this name became.
You try to find the oldest,
And you notice
Young ones.
It’s the mixture
That you learn from:
Paradigms. You persevere.
The world is also older,
Answering to laws
Which parallel the laws
In your existence
Because
There is nothing close
As hand to lose.
The olds, the news: old hat,
The words old girl
Take on new meaning.
Old Girl 8.22.2011
Nature of & In Reality; Birth, Death & In Between II;
Circling Round Vanities; Birthday Book;
Arlene Corwin
