Sunrise.

But he’s not all about restaurants in Venice.

The New York Police Department reassured the public that it was “not a terrorist attack.”

… we’ll know soon enough.

***************

Probably terrorist. Definitely dead.

***************

‘An ISIS flag was attached to the pickup rear hitch.’

“Even after losing his own fingers as a result of his homemade explosive materials, [Brad Spafford] made the apparent remarkable decision to keep an extraordinarily dangerous explosive material in the home’s freezer next to food items that could be accessed by the entire family,” prosecutors said… [Spafford] acknowledged keeping a jar in his freezer of HMTD, an explosive material that is so unstable it can be exploded merely as a result of friction or temperature changes.” Investigators found the jar stored next to food items and labeled “dangerous” and “do not touch.”

Shot secretly in Iran, ‘The Seed of the Sacred Fig’ has received international acclaim. It has won awards at Cannes and other major film festivals…

Here’s part of what you can’t see in India.

I'm doing what I did last year:

Standing on a cold Venetian balcony, listening.
The others have gone off to the canal
To see the fireworks.  For me, enough to hear
The crack and blast of the show from a distance.

Under the stars, the sky flashes pink and green
With each explosion.  The balcony rattles a bit
And, from dark corners of the city, unseen
Voices shout that a new year begins.

Strange to be here again for this strange
Light show, a sort of conceptual art,
Postmodern version of pitched battle,
Gunfight, terror, striking the heart

But sparing the body.  Some of it
Sounds like gunshots, and then my frame,
Like the balcony, rattles a bit.
Absurd.  But who can blame

Me for going there?  The only bombing campaign
I'll ever know simply smokes up the air
And leaves me standing there
Wondering about skirmish scrimmage and war.

Take a loose rein and a deep seat,
John, my father-in-law, would say
To someone starting out on a long journey, meaning, take it easy,
Relax, let what’s taking you take you.

A dinner-as-marathon joint where zillions of never before imagined dishes/drinks are whisked about you.

...here day after tomorrow. Will blog about it.

**********************

Also in the ordine del giorno – A second round of warhorses at La Fenice. Far as UD can tell, it’s exactly the same concert we went to in Venice last year: First half, rousing orchestral warhorses. Second, rousing vocal. Loved all of it – the best part was watching the local audience loving it.

We all rise for Libiamo at the end. SUPER rousing. This year, I’ll remember to bring the lyrics, so I can sing along.

... with words taken from an article.

Traffic Control

A tragedy of the uncommon in
Low-earth orbit impends.  Some old craft can't
Even move on command; spaceship can burn
Their engines to put off junk at a slant

But the daemons of dead satellites and
Rocket bodies, fairings, wrenches, and gloves
Make a hazard zone for explosive wrecks.

A hypervelocity culture loves
And fears its hypervelocity tech.

On festive and non-festive days, old UD loves to read the poems of James Merrill. In the last weeks of his life, he wrote Christmas Tree, in which his wasting body is compared to a holiday tree taken in and decorated by a celebrating family — he is made to feel loved and cared for and even prettied up, shined up, in his last days, although the poet/tree knows that, having been cut down, his/its days are very much numbered. The hospital was the tree farm, where the poet has been “looked after, kept still,” but now it’s clear “there [is] nothing more to do,” and the poet will have to leave the hospital and go home to die.

Yet it’s Merrill, the poet, who inexhaustibly, to the end, elaborates, accessorizes, decorates, warms, and bejewels life — as I said in my last post about him, he’s no discouraged Prufrock. He keeps going, keeps embellishing. He’s an artist, mes petites. We can’t rescue the family jewels from the fire, but he can. Even as he’s dying, he can. Surrounded by loved ones in his warm home, covered in thick “sables,” nonetheless jewels from life continue to “flash forth” around him from these coverings. He’s not buried yet. Propitiating miracle-makers (amulets, milagros) hang from his body and a song plays and replays – brilliant, magical life continues to be wound about him.

And in shadow behind me, a primitive IV
To keep the show going.

The holiday and the primitive at-home IV/ivy. To keep the blood going. Heart-stopping poetry if you ask me.

Yes, yes, what lay ahead
Was clear: the stripping, the cold street, my chemicals
Plowed back into the Earth for lives to come—

No bullshit about it, I’m all lit up and about to die; my festive duties done, my poems written, I’m about to be stripped of my jewels, with my poor naked trunk about to be revealed for the rail-thin thing it is. I’m about to be buried, pine/IV “needles and bone.” And I’m ready to go.

Last image from last moments – a world in dusk, to be sure, but dusk “aglow,” with candlelight, loving faces, gifts brought to the tree, brought by the tree.

Still to be so poised, so
Receptive. Still to recall, praise.

The last lines of the last poem echo Merrill’s endless reverberating theme, as in his great poem “Santorini: Stopping the Leak,” where he insists on walking the volcanic, gorgeous island, staying poised and balanced and upright, despite serious pain from ailments in his feet. The imperative always is to stay in the game, to remain receptive to all of life, to call and recall, and above all to lyrically praise.

Christmas Tree

⭐

To be
Brought down at last
From the cold sighing mountain
Where I and the others
Had been fed, looked after, kept still,
Meant, I knew—of course I knew—
That it would be only a matter of weeks,
That there was nothing more to do.
Warmly they took me in, made much of me,
The point from the start was to keep my spirits up.
I could assent to that. For honestly,
It did help to be wound in jewels, to send
Their colors flashing forth from vents in the deep
Fragrant sables that cloaked me head to foot.

Over me then they wove a spell of shining—
Purple and silver chains, eavesdripping tinsel,
Amulets, milagros: software of silver,
A heart, a little girl, a Model T,
Two staring eyes. Then angels, trumpets, BUD and BEA
(The children’s names) in clownlike capitals,
Somewhere a music box whose tiny song
Played and replayed I ended before long
By loving. And in shadow behind me, a primitive IV
To keep the show going. Yes, yes, what lay ahead
Was clear: the stripping, the cold street, my chemicals
Plowed back into the Earth for lives to come—
No doubt a blessing, a harvest, but one that doesn’t bear,
Now or ever, dwelling upon. To have grown so thin.
Needles and bone. The little boy’s hands meeting
About my spine. The mother’s voice: Holding up wonderfully!
No dread. No bitterness. The end beginning. Today’s

Dusk room aglow
For the last time
With candlelight.
Faces love-lit
Gifts underfoot.
Still to be so poised, so
Receptive. Still to recall, praise.

***************************

Similar themes here.