Goodbye to All That

Weldon Kees

Wonder whether I'm the only person whose first thought on being wheeled into an ambulance was "I have to stop blogging." My guess is no.

Anyway it may have been my second thought because, as you can imagine, things at this point were running together a bit. My first thought was maybe more like "This is incredibly weird."

But there I was with Joe, a sturdy, bear-like human being, and he was cheerfully slapping electrodes under my clothes and we were making a sort of psychedelic small talk.

In any case I'm okay — I just fainted for the first time in my life and had a small seizure (apparently fairly normal when the brain's deprived of oxygen) and scared my husband half to death.

This all happened in a restaurant and he had to shout "Help!" at a certain point and this is not something that Finns (a very reserved people) are wont to do, unless forced to the greatest extremity.

So the whole thing has taken a lot out of both of us and I just thought I'd keep you (faithful reader) in the loop.

Will I stop blogging? Probably not entirely, at least for now — but I do have to change the way I do it and the way I do a lot of other things, or these tangled ganglia are going to assassinate me.

So (speaking of tangled ganglia) here's one of the finest poems of the last century, for my money — one that, as usual, seems strangely apropos.

ROUND

"Wondrous life!" cried Marvell at Appleton House.
Renan admired Jesus Christ "wholeheartedly."
But here dried ferns keep falling to the floor,
And something inside my head
Flaps like a worn-out blind. Royal Cortissoz is dead,
A blow to the Herald-Tribune. A closet mouse
Rattles the wrapper on the breakfast food. Renan
Admired Jesus Christ "wholeheartedly."

Flaps like a worn-out blind. Cezanne
Would break out in the quiet streets of Aix
And shout, "Le monde, c'est terrible!" Royal
Cortissoz is dead. And something inside my head
Flaps like a worn-out blind. The soil
In which the ferns are dying needs more Vigoro.
There is no twilight on the moon, no mist or rain,
No hail or snow, no life. Here in this house

Dried ferns keep falling to the floor, a mouse
Rattles the wrapper on the breakfast food. Cezanne
Would break out in the quiet streets and scream. Renan
Admired Jesus Christ "wholeheartedly." And something inside my head
Flaps like a worn-out blind. Royal Cortissoz is dead.
There is no twilight on the moon, no hail or snow.
One notes fresh desecration of the portico.
"Wondrous life!" cried Marvell at Appleton House.

— Weldon Kees