This last poem is like the meeting at the train station in the firebrand television show about people who work with no memory of their lives
and who also live their lives with no memory of their work. Astounding in precision, heartbreaking and then liberating. It’s the liberation we’re
working ourselves up to here. In this tawdry diary. Oh, don’t feign that you never knew. The essence of all of this is but a record of existence. Not a cold
and scientific record, no. One with all of the foibles of a 13-year old’s locked journal.
Please compose a short poem in the manner of poet Del Ray Cross, using his blog Anachronizms at anachronizms.blogspot.com as inspiration.
ChatGPT said: Sure! Del Ray Cross often blends a haunting sense of time and
place with a tinge of nostalgia and reflective melancholy in his writing. He writes
with a kind of fragmented lyricism, exploring the delicate layers of memory and
history. Here’s a short poem inspired by his style:
The Field at Dusk
There are days when the light hums—
a pulse beneath the tattered map
of every place I've left behind.
A clouded road, still haunting the hill’s edge,
bristles with the rust of forgotten years.
In the field, the wind carries stories—
half-heard names and the soft echoes
of children’s laughter that no one remembers.
We walked here once,
on the day the sky split in two.
Time wraps around these bones,
and still, the grass does not care.
It pushes through cracks in the earth
like forgotten words,
lost before they could be spoken.
I tried to evoke a sense of temporal dislocation, common in Del Ray Cross’s work, while keeping the atmosphere wistful yet unresolved. Does this capture what you had in mind?
author’s note: this is the second Anachronizm with which I’ve utilized ChatGPT (in the first one, posted many months ago, ChatGPT is uncredited)
There are no secrets in the room, so I go outside. I’m Hercule Poirot or Mrs.
Marple looking for clues. Stick out my
tongue for a sun lozenge. Sit on a bench
and doodle in the margins of my—well,
it’s where i write, it’s leather-bound and
has emblazoned in gold, all lower caps on the front, thoughts—until the lozenge has
fully dissolved. It’s a lovely day, and I’d love to keep it that way. I step into the bee-chat line hoping for clues, for a bit of engagement, it’s almost time for lunch.
I’m good with lunch, I like lunch. But do I have the cash on hand for any? Rather than dig around to find out, I step into a bookstore. This will keep me busy for an
hour or two, I’m thinking. I do wonder what’s happening at home, but I live alone. As I step out of the bookstore, I stop to adjust to the sun, and to get
acquainted with the breeze. I haven’t solved any mysteries thus far. There hasn’t been anything the least bit myst
erious. I think about the very important
phone call I took last night. But what
was important about it? Something about elephants.... Idiosyncrasies sway like chaises longues in the afternoon breeze.
I’m not sure about this experiment as it seems impossible to land on your point. Here I am, going about my daily routine, as if there is one,
the carousel clicks, and a new image appears on the off-white wall in front of me. What might this scene be? And who are the characters that
inhabit it? The projection of the negative image is in black and white, so it is likely one of my grandmother’s, handed down to me several years back.
I stare into the lit rectangular patch on my wall, trying to ascertain any of what might be transpiring, scrutinizing the hues for a hint at a particular decade,
screwing my focus in on each of the several faces, one by one, trying to see in each any significant character istic and, as objectively as possible,
trying to catch a glimmer of similarity or familiarity until I am left craving any con nection I might have with the faraway place that’s lit before me, or either face.
I have such important things going on that I want to tell you, but I can’t stop thinking about the idea of being made fun of for doing something rude and being obviously unaware of it. Of what I was doing that was rude. This is a hypothetical, actually, that is based on a
voluminous list of redundant
and grim incidents. I realize it
could happen anywhere at any
time and I’d be none the wiser.
Perhaps this is normal, happens
to all of us, but I worry about
performing acts of unintentional
rudeness or being caught totally
unaware that what just came out
of my mouth or off of my page is
derogatory or embarrassingly
inaccurate. Or getting caught
using outdated language. Or reacting
inappropriately just because I have
completely misunderstood some new
lippity smack. When I know this has
just occurred, I will accept my mistake,
promptly apologize for doing whatever
it was that I did. Is everyone just
making fun of me because I’m older?
And all this time I’d been waiting my turn so that I could go around preaching at all the younger folks about how things were in my day
and how never to sass, etc. When
I’d have the upper hand in such
matters. But of course there’s always been generation gap lingo. Elders would tut-tut or act mortally offended when whippersnappers sling out their newfangled catch- phrases. The upstarts never seem bothered by this. These days the new lingo of the lithest of our
populous seem complex, twisting
traditional definitions of words or phrases in ways meant specifically
to insult anyone over a certain age.
Was it always this way? Where the intent lies so specifically in confusing,
I remember getting dressed all spiffily just to get undressed. Those were the days of sex. The delight of a mustache over a
cool drink of jalapeños. Juice me this, juice me that, I’ve no requests except that you come back with some hair product. The
usual, please. Don’t you hate dreams that are a little too aligned with reality? I say this aloud, or would if I were awake, because I
like using my voice. When it can be heard. I keep trying to press the issue of us pressing the flesh, but we’re both out of rocket fuel.
Which sucks bigtime, I have to say. But I’ve picked up all of the maps and all of the forms and am a professional at making travel arrange
ments. Or I used to be. No, I am. I love being new places but hate traveling. That’s not true. I love seeing you but am frightened of air traffic
and (today) of air traffic control and flippant
and especially mean government officials. Heads of state with no imagination, no wiggle-room.
I flew first class once. My one and only business flight. I mean I’ve made hundreds if not thousands of arrangements for businessfolk
but only one for me. That was for paid work.
From Boston to Boca Raton. There were pelicans. Everything was pink. And the ocean was so warm
I’d surreptitiously excuse myself to it as often as possible without giving the impression that I wasn’t on the ball with regard to the official business
of the whole thing. That was my one trip to Florida, ever, and I plan never to go again. I have, however,
trekked through most of the states coast-to-coast several
times. But I very much prefer never mixing business
with pleasure, even though the boundaries of both
have grown quite porous over the years. And I swear
that as I get older there’s more surface area in the overlap of one over the other.
I can be a bit dramatic sometimes. When I pause over this (sure, it’s a dramatic pause), I begin to know that it isn’t just an art that came from discipline and apprenticeship, but it also comes quite naturally
(both of my parents were pretty seductive—if not subtle—spotlight magnets). However, if you were acquainted with my folks, you’d likely feel that I was putting you on. This isn’t a ruse, though. It is not
hyperbolic. And, sure, I’d have been surprised not even so long ago at my telling you this in earnest today. Acting is an art, as they say; it’s the art of putting on a face. Of lying. The art of being not
who you, from the most reliable perspectives, really are. Utilizing deceit to reveal myself is truly what I do.
The Delight of a Mustache Over a Drink of Cool Water
Love-scratches, drugged-out rants and other deranged scribbles that had been scraped into the sidewalks next to apartment buildings, the so-
called poetry that drips from the bricks of alleyways, these were all as ephemeral as the missing or wanted or advertised lesson sheafs stapled to telephone and
electric poles and to trees throughout each neighborhood. These were city segments once noted with amusement and pride by the city’s inhabitants, as
well as the people who crowded into these denizens’ personal living spaces during each peak season. As the larger buildings that once held these countless
citizens along with their friends or families or newfound flings from faraway places melted into liquid metal during this great erasure, the rivers of lava that
formed momentarily held the spirits of those who’d lived within. These were quickly let go, disappeared into the vapor with the loudest hisses and
moans ever to have been heard, would they have been. No ears here, however. The screams belonging to the beings that had such instruments are long gone,
skin and flesh being the most ephemeral of all of the ephemera. So, in a soulless manner, this scalding swamp holds no reticence with regard to their demise,
is as wild and full of freedom as anything has ever been flying hurly-burly into space, vaporizing in all directions until all is nothing.
get up, get out, get busy engage, revel in the ephemera the beauty that is everywhere, that won’t be here tomorrow
—the author does not lie
Our faces, dripping from the bricks of alleyways, were face down, their surfaces hidden as much as they could be with waxen hands.
Nothing lasts. Nothing ever did. Not in this city. The concrete blown roadside and into the tall, craven structures through chutes by the
hard-hatted battalions were the most vulnerable. It’s not that our armed service crew were particularly sloppy. Just that, when viewed from great
distances, things that could be discerned through the magnification systems from the perimeters of galaxies were always the ones mostly likely to be targeted.
When such things would burst into miniature tornadoes dense with shrapnel and molecular concrete, the living beings would dance as if
to impress greater powers, divinities, gods that did not exist, believing their hotshot means of showcasing their personalized look at me’s might
eliminate the imminent danger, would postpone their ultimate and immediate demise.
The Urgent Violence That Is Honesty Calls Me Out of a Long Nap,
like a cat smashed between a row of books and the wall on the bookshelf you lost when evicted some eight years ago. A cat you thought you knew. A cat who knew you as
food. Oh, well. Friendship doesn’t matter. What matters is love, right? And your salary. And the economy. What else matters? I had an interview today. Sure, okay, it was a,
what do they call them, a phone screen? It was supposed to be just a five minute call, but it turned out to last at least 20 minutes. Or at least that’s my estimation. I’ve been
walking things over from the old apartment to this new one for days now. There was a fire at the old place when I rented the SUV to drive the brunt of the stuff I’ve accumulated
over seven and a half years from there to here, the awkward stuff. It’s a short walk. It’s been kind of nice, actually. But am I ever ready to have everything under this new and improved
roof. Nevertheless, I’ve been taking it in stride, on the phone with Zipcar about the $70 they overcharged me, AT&T about the $100 they should never have charged me (that doesn’t
count the $140 that the app, if I choose to open it, shows that I also owe. They’re sending me a new hotspot. The last one was sent erroneously. It was supposed to
save me $10 each month. I’ve been on the phone with Zipcar 3 times, considerably less hours than those which I’ve been on with AT&T. But still no resolution there, either.
Customer service! Am I right? Sigh. Oh, and my television was stolen. So I’ve been watching my streaming services on a laptop that’s on its last legs. Cue
My truth is a shambles. But I get at it. There are, of course, ways in which I might divert my mind away from a truth so that I convince myself, at least
momentarily, that the aspect I’m avoiding isn’t me. To believe that I would never. I’ve been thinking about this recently, dealing with customer service at various
companies to which some of the tiny
amount of income that comes my way
then goes. I’ll be promised a reduction in
fees, a deletion of a charge, or a way to save
a buck or two each month by doing this or
that. I rarely give in to the sales pitch, and
when I do, I get bombarded with why I
rarely give in. An extra charge shows up.
The ten dollars I was expecting to save per
month turns out to be an extra twenty that
appears on each monthly invoice. Or like over
the weekend, when thanks to a fire that
flooded out my old apartment building and
shut down the elevators for a couple of days,
I asked if I could switch the reservations date
for the Zipcar with which I’d planned to move
my most important items from the old place to
the new one without getting charged for two
trips. I had tried to log in to change it before
the three hours previous to pick-up deadline
but I was having issues with the laptop internet connection and could not find a way to switch it before that deadline arrived. So, I quickly called customer
service, asked if it would be possible to just switch the date and time of my service without an additional charge, and I was told that would be no problem. You can imagine
how the rest of the story goes. Two days later, after numerous such unexpected expenses completely undo my budget, I see two $65
dollar charges on my account. Which is one
too many, per the man’s promise on the phone. So I call Zipcar, and am told that the person with whom I spoke did not promise me what he actually did. And even if he did, he was
a subordinate that could not have even made such a promise to me so it’d not count? But he
did. Thus seems to be the nature of dealing
with any and all of the entities to which I
pay regular fees. Often, I’m finally able to have a promised credit or reduction in fees met, but this almost always involves spending hours on the phone or in town at some local
spot for whatever service from whom I’m simply trying to get what was promised. Fun and games. Such is life. Etc. And I think of times when money more peacefully
and easily flowed through my hands. To dwell on such things, even to write these few lines, can have me reliving the experience in such a way that I feel defeated, unfocused and
unmotivated. But this is just one of so many things with which we must deal. If one is me.
All I can do is expect such things and work like hell on ways to make the entire
process more efficient than it is, less of a drain on my finances, not to mention my life. Because living is the thing, right? Living as well as one can, come what may.
We are old and dated and cannot of our lives make any sense. —John Ashbery
I cringed over thirteen years ago. I’m such a snotty flacon of prescience, which isn’t science and is definitely not precious. Or at least I’m neither. But behold, the
allergic reactions. Maybe back then I thought I was all that. But it had taken me so very long. By my standards, at any rate. Not that I have any of those.
Daddy, is it okay to take thirty-five to forty years to grow up? But I know what he’d say if he were here to say anything. It’s something of his I love to repeat, and probably couldn’t
agree more: You were much more mature at the age of three than you have been ever since.
Who are we gathered here in this room but rotund puffs of self-importance lemming for a tweaked-out spotlight. We steal stuff from many of our colleagues just to put on
a popularity show. As referenced before, I like stealing; rearranging a sentence or a couple of lines of my own from many years back is a fine example. I’m not who I used
to be. I wonder if there is anyone out there who’d beg to differ. I doubt it. Not, at least, until I cross over the Bridge of Lost Souls into celebrity. That’s bound to happen soon,
right? I can say that, knowing what soon will get me. I wonder sometimes if there are any people who have themselves figured out as well as I do me. “You do you!” “That voodoo, too!”
I’m sorry you lost to Bette Davis, though I’m surprised you still have the gumption after all these decades.
Can moving from one place to the next, as in tiny apartments, be a kind of post-traumatic stress disorder. Or I suppose cause such? This was Marvin’s thought.
I don’t much like lethargy. I mean there’s a time and a place for it. I just haven’t entered such a space in a while. By which...the right time and place. Although I do fantasize about doing so quite a bit lately.
We went to the museum back in 1968. It was a pleasant experience.
That piece on John Waters. The link I was sent. Very informative. I remember being so grossed out by that first movie or two I caught under happenstance. But then.
For example, his notion of how to build a party, one that he’s hosting. The way he explained it was of course a bit antiquated, a bit cringy, as we’d say, at least this year. Would we use that word? Maybe a decade or two ago, but probably not at the moment.
Lip-readers everywhere are put off by the word, I’m just sure of it. There should be a word for when someone says a word the speaker’s face defines it one hundred percent. That’s too easy.
And has it not been proven somewhere that it’s three or four times harder to wipe distaste off of one’s fast than it is to do the same to an expression
Today, a day that makes very little sense, like America, in clear disarray everything’s getting worse. —John Ashbery
Could this be the destruction that I have so forcefully dreamt of all these years? Wishing, hoping. Sorry, kiddos, but I’ve no kink for the end of times, do you? I see a few hands. Open your personal time machines and look at your day in history for today. Our lives are so accessible that at any given moment we can find our trajectory and plot a different course if we are unsatisfied or keep that vector’s gradient rising if we’re feeling good about what we see. Everyone has goals, and mine conflicts with yours and yours, I’m sure. So what then? There was a time when we could go for a swing in our sling (I prefer mine on the rooftop terrace and not in the dungeon).
The very next day, his doctor terminated all of his prescriptions for medications meant to elevate his spirits. Everyone could see that he was soaring, had broken through. We in the medical profession are always the last to know, thought the doc, rubbing the creases on his forehead and sighing as if literally affected.
Take a pass at this ask if you will, but if I say hey clean your goddamned souls would you know where to begin?
