But seriously though, your brain is a huge weapon. Everything great starts out as a weapon, then gets co-opted for other social uses, like for example, the internet.

The only reason you think so much is that your brain evolved to be a weapon and exert power over others. So if you aren’t waging some militarty campaign to take over the known world you just end up spinning your wheels and inverting all your predatory drives.

So you need to either get a lobotomy or become Alexander the Great.

This sailing trip may be coming at just the right time for me to either initiate or stave off a total meltdown.

One of the members of the Lewis + Clark expedition suffered from some sort of mental illness, probably depression. I believe he eventually committed suicide. During the expedition he was fine. Survival instinct, the need to have absolutely every one of your senses running at full capacity to stay alive warded off his problems. He obviously didn’t want to die or he would’ve died during his travels. You’re right to go with the suffering and not deny it but sometimes you need a break.

But what do I have to teach?

A thirst for knowledge? Some people don’t know that you’re supposed to have your assumptions shaken up every once in a while.

Maybe being a writer is the wrong direction for me.

All writers say this.

What else do I really know?

You know how to go through a crisis without permanently losing your mind. So far.
That’s a skill a lot of people I know could use.

Look, what’s wrong with walking dogs to pay the bills? There are very few dishonorable jobs but a lot of dishonorable ways of doing your job. Dogs are bred for subservience and all they want is a pack to belong to in return. People buy them and coop them up in an apartment. You know how help dogs feel that their lives are worthwhile, that they belong and are loved. That’s a skill!

Tramp, lunatic and good householder

And Jesus was a sailor
when he walked upon the water
and he spent a long time watching
from his lonely wooden tower

and when he knew for certain
only drowing men could see him,
he said ‘all men shall be sailors then
until the sea shall free them!’

But he himself was broken,
long before the sky had opened,
forsaken, almost human
he sunk beneath your wisdom like a stone.

Good luck on your sailing voyage!

the weight,
the weight we carry
is love.

Who can deny?
In dreams
it touches
the body,
in thought
constructs
a miracle,
in imagination
anguishes
till born
in human–
looks out of the heart
burning with purity–
for the burden of life
is love,

but we carry the weight
wearily,
and so must rest
in the arms of love
at last,
must rest in the arms
of love.

No rest
without love,
no sleep
without dreams
of love–
be mad or chill
obsessed with angels
or machines,
the final wish
is love
–cannot be bitter,
cannot deny,
cannot withhold
if denied:

the weight is too heavy

–must give
for no return
as thought
is given
in solitude
in all the excellence
of its excess.

The warm bodies
shine together
in the darkness,
the hand moves
to the center
of the flesh,
the skin trembles
in happiness
and the soul comes
joyful to the eye–

yes, yes,
that’s what
I wanted,
I always wanted,
I always wanted,
to return
to the body
where I was born.

San Jose, 1954

%