Random Thoughts

*

O the valley in the summer where I and my John
Beside the deep river would walk on and on
While the flowers at our feet and the birds up above
Argued so sweetly on reciprocal love,
And I leaned on his shoulder; 'O Johnny, let's play':
But he frowned like thunder and he went away.


O that Friday near Christmas as I well recall
When we went to the Charity Matinee Ball,
The floor was so smooth and the band was so loud
And Johnny so handsome I felt so proud;
'Squeeze me tighter, dear Johnny, let's dance till it's day':
But he frowned like thunder and he went away.


Shall I ever forget at the Grand Opera
When music poured out of each wonderful star?
Diamonds and pearls they hung dazzling down
Over each silver and golden silk gown;
'O John I'm in heaven,' I whispered to say:
But he frowned like thunder and he went away.


O but he was fair as a garden in flower,
As slender and tall as the great Eiffel Tower,
When the waltz throbbed out on the long promenade
O his eyes and his smile they went straight to my heart;
'O marry me, Johnny, I'll love and obey':
But he frowned like thunder and he went away.


O last night I dreamed of you, Johnny, my lover,
You'd the sun on one arm and the moon on the other,
The sea it was blue and the grass it was green,
Every star rattled a round tambourine;
Ten thousand miles deep in a pit there I lay:
But you frowned like thunder and you went away.

W.H. Auden

That was the blurring facade, the billows of smoke blowing upwards, the lights sparkling in the brown sludge, the cackles of the contented drifting across the office, the shadows that only he could see. He was disrupted, rejected, flirting through the fence at former loves, lost opportunities; and all the while we grew stronger. There were nasty thoughts; there were random splashes of what almost resembled love; and he was being crucified, he didn’t know why.

These things that came so fast, that were abandoned so slowly, that made shape and then disappeared; he was in awe. Stop it, stop it, he shouted; and he didn’t even know what he was yelling at. They had all betrayed him. The police investigators infiltrated the university; and pretended to be his friend. He was smashed in what he saw as a legendary, futuristic fashion, changing the entire public consciousness; our framework of thought. Changing things in an heroic, drunken fashion.

It was these false beliefs, the heroism of the creator, the nobility of the just cause that left him so confused. Not one of them came true. The future was a very different place, that much was true, but nothing else. The greater consciousness of mankind did not change. He wasn’t admired for his heroic adventures in space. For the lurking creatures that came out from behind giant, sparse rocks, fracturing in the vacuum of space. He was missed; as any human being who went for a walk and never came back, but they weren’t the heroes they thought they were.

Instead they died young or mouldered in striking moments; just waiting for the end. He wasn’t sure what had become of any of it. He was gaggled and grief stricken; for no reason. His friends had long died, Colin the last, and that was all to be said. That with them went a million broken dreams was just par for the course, the same for any human who lived too long, who outlived the friends of their youth and saw all their political passions dashed.

These things were so peculiar he wasn’t sure what to make of them. The ballooning bursts of star dust, straight from NASA pictures, contained myriads of living creatures that could be felt across enormous distances. He was shuddering at his core. These semblances of humanity were long lost, decaying, cold, at the bottom of a frosty dead chimney. Surrounded by dead embers. These shattering dead moments, these times of loss, these times when the corporate soul no longer held sway and his own severe thought disorder was itself blanking out, these were the times when he wondered: had any of it been worth a toss?

Calm your language, she said, and he shrank as they all shrank into a time which meant nothing, when there was no resonance, when men had lost their souls, when derelict housing commissions were our natural home, when nothing held together anymore; the white picket fence long gone. And in its place they stumbled drunkenly from bars at 2am, spewing in the gutter, derelict in their own soul. So much effort to so little end. Key integrators. Sufficient to the end. That was it: mark my words, there is no other end. And so it was that they grew out of the mud; that they could see similarities in other forms of intelligent life; they looked across the great divide and rolled their eyes; the universal gesture. And he didn’t know why; and he didn’t know when.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/04/2507336.htm?section=justin

The Australian share market is rebounding after falling in the wake of worse than expected GDP figures.

Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show the economy contracted by 0.5 per cent in the December quarter, putting GDP growth for the year to December 2008 at 0.3 per cent.

Shortly after the GDP announcement, the All Ordinaries dropped 60 points to 3,112, while the ASX 200 lost 2.1 per cent to 3,153.

However, at 3.00pm AEDT the All Ordinaries index had recovered slightly, down 39 points to 3,133 points. The ASX had dropped 1.4 per cent to 3,176.

The Australian dollar had also recovered slightly and was worth about 63.33 US cents.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/04/2507166.htm

Victorian fire authorities will begin to send crews home, with the threat of further outbreaks easing due to the cooler conditions.

Authorities are starting to scale back operations on Victoria's fire fronts.

Four main fires, north of Melbourne and in Gippsland, have been burning for more than three weeks, but are being held within containment lines.

The Emergency Services Commissioner, Bruce Esplin, says people who left their properties at the height of the alert, can now return home.

"We believe it's okay for communities to go home now," he said.

"You can feel safe to return and do what you need to do to start what will be a long, slow and, I have no doubt, painful process for many people of rebuilding their lives.

"It's okay to start that process, and it will be able to be done without the ever-present threat of fire that's been there for the last four weeks."

Fire at Tambar