Archive for the ‘1983’ Category

1983-04-11

Monday, April 11th, 1983

We erode against our experiences.

In the end we have nothing but our name

and our memories

All the things we were going to do

All those things we believed in

All that we thought we had become

Is washed from us by our own historical dialectic.

We give birth to ourselves, but do not survive.

I try in the mornings to focus my intent

but in the evenings seldom have more

than just the memories of where I’ve been

These paper scraps, the only trail I leave.

Gallagher

11 April 83, Irvine


— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

1983-05-22

Sunday, May 22nd, 1983
      Yes, I'm coming to believe some people are smarter than I.
         Oh, I knew it before but not in the same way.
      I saw them above me, running corporations
         but I never really got to know them.
      Occasionally I'd shake their hand or speak with them
         and I'd feel like an object being patronized;
            suppressing my resentment or my urge to please;
               they left me doubtful.
      But they were easy to ignore, because they were so rare or so distant
         and I could live the illusion of being the equal of anyone,
            on this, my chosen ground, raw intelligence.
      But hey, brothers, they've found me or I them now;
         I speak now as often as I'm quiet.
            and I judge as often as I'm judged.
      Now I have only my poetry to make me different
         which I never show....

                           05-22-83
                           Irvine, CA

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

1983-06-21

Tuesday, June 21st, 1983
      The thought that you might be mad because
      you can't handle everything...is crazy.
      I want my life to require courage.
      There's another concept that I wish there was a word for:
      It's the act of honing into the essence of something.
      It's non-dichotomous solutions to the problems of being.
      It's the strategies and methods to accomplish something that all fall short
      in that they achiever and the achieved remain one step apart
      separated by the method.
      In the end, as you hone in,
      the wish and the action and the result should merge
      and the planner must depart, and the waiting evaporate
      and the 'you' becomes a unity of wish/action
      as the ever-present moment forms.
      Greater awareness through meditation
      won't increase one's abilities at social games
      but that doesn't keep us from looking for that transference
      and being surprised that it's missing.
      Why should an increased ability to contemplation
      yield more skill at being shallow?
                                 gallagher
                                 22 jun 83 - collage of thoughts
                                             on the freeway

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —