Non-Classical Poetry, Part 3

Part 3 is similar to Part 2 and the original, as far as I can tell, can be found here.

"Your generation would probably 'livetweet' the apocalyspe" you
say, and you laugh
You mean it as an insult, and I understand,
Or you don't
because the word lies awkwardly on your tongue, stumbles as it
leaves your lips, air quotes visible
You meant it as an insult, so you don't understand, when I look into
your eyes and say "Yes"
Because we would.
It would be our duty, as citizens on this earth
to document it's end the best way we know
and if that means a second by second update
of the world going up in flames, or down in rain, or crushed under
the feet of invading monsters
so be it.
It would mean a second by second update of
"I love you"
"I'm scared"
"Are you all right?"
"Stay close"
"Be brave"
It would mean a second by second update of the humanity's
connection with one another,
Proof of empathy, love, and friendship between people who may
have never met in the flesh.
So don't throw the world "Livetweet" at me like a dagger, meant to
tear at my "teenage superiority"
Because if the citizens of Pompeii, before they were consumed by fire,
had a chance to tell their friends and family throughout Rome
"I love you"
"I'm scared"
"Don't forget me"
Don't you think they'd have taken the chance?


Like the previous poem, this one works because it is now. The idea of 'live tweeting' is so new it is hard to comprehend. Until recently, I hadn't live tweeted anything. But then I did. And I felt the appeal. It was a way to share a situation with many people who could not actually be there. And, as opposed to other situations, I wanted to share it with more than one person. I could have set up a mass text, or a group conversation on Facebook Messenger. But that would not have had the same appeal.

When many people decide to live tweet an event, they create a community, for however long that event lasts. They can share their experience of it. There are also phone apps that do the same thing, but most are anonymous, and that is interesting too, just not right now. As I mentioned in Part 2, we are experiencing an increase in the ease of communication, and this is simply another example of that.

A theme across 1, 2, and 3 has been the draw on the past and past peoples and the yearning to know we are not alone. In 1, it was the idea that across time, all people have felt the same sorrow or joy as we feel now. In 2, it was how artists would have used social media to tell their stories. Here it is how the people of Pompeii experienced the end of the world, and how, if we experienced something similar, would experience it. Instead of becoming isolated in this new age of technology (as has been posited elsewhere), I find people have become more connected. And yes, we do need to spend more time with people in person. And yes, the parts of the world that do not have internet access are still too isolated. But that is not reason to despair. It is reason to hope. There isn't a lack of interest or concern or care. It is simply expensive and complicated, and in some places a logistical nightmare. So there is work to be done.

Across time, we shout into the abyss "I love you" "I'm scared" "Don't forget me". And, somewhere, sometime, a voice answers.

Non-Classical Poetry, Part 2

Part 2 of my poetry post is on "Art is a Facebook status about your winter break" by b.e.fitzgerald as found here on Tumblr.

Once again, the full text:

I swear to every heaven ever imagined,
if I hear one more dead-eyed hipster
tell me that art is dead, I will personally summon Shakespeare
from the grave so he can tell them every reason
why he wishes he were born in a time where
he could have a damn Gmail account.
The day after I taught my mother how to send pictures over Iphone she texted
me a blurry image of our cocker spaniel ten times in a row.
Don't you dare try to tell me that that is not beautiful.
But whatever, go ahead and choose to stay in
your backwards-hoping-all-inclusive club
while the rest of us fall in love over Skype.
Send angry letters to state representatives,
as we record the years first sunrise so
we can remember what beginning feels like when
we are inches away from the trigger.
Lock yourself away in your Antoinette castle
while we eat cake and tweet to the whole universe that we did.
Hashtag you're a pretentious ass hole.
Van Gogh would have taken 20 selfies a day.
Sylvia Plath would have texted her lovers
nothing but heart eyed emojis when she ran out of words.
Andy Warhol would have had the worlds weirdest Vine account,
and we all would have checked it every morning while we
Snap Chat out coffee orders to the people
we wish were pressed against out lips instead of lattes.
This life is spilling over with 85 year olds
rewatching JFK's assassination and
7 year olds teaching themselves guitar over Youtube videos.
never again do I have to be afraid of forgetting
what my fathers voice sounds like.
No longer must we sneak into our families phonebook
to look up an eating disorder hotline for out best friend.
No more must I wonder what people in Australia sound like
or how grasshoppers procreate.
I will gleefully continue to take pictures of tulips
in public parks on my cellphone
and you will continue to scoff and that is okay.
But I hope, I pray, that one day you will realize how blessed
you are to say I love you in 164 different languages.


I love this one because its is so now. The entire premise is social media and communication through non-traditional means--Vine, Snapchat, YouTube. The narrator is railing against a culture that says this new communication is less valid than previous methods. Or maybe not. Hipsters connect through all these mediums. But seem to value the past ones more. But, to me, rejection of social media isn't necessarily limited to hipster-dom; it is also people who say selfies are stupid and narcissistic. Reality check, for hundreds of years, the wealthy commissioned paintings of themselves. If that isn't selfie culture, I don't know what it.

As a historian, I love the way the author includes Shakespeare, Sylvia Plath, and Andy Warhol. It is interesting to think what artists of the past would have thought of the ease with which we can communicate. In many ways, the rise of technology and such has lead to the democratization of art. Sure, Instagram and Facebook are filled to the gills with sunrises, sunsets, and cats, but isn't that wonderful? Why is people finding beauty in life bad? We all (at least in the wealthy countries) have been given the ability to be artists--an opportunity denied our ancestors.

"Hashtag you're a pretentious ass hole" is quite possibly my favorite single line. It's a phrase that many of us are tempted to say to people in reality. Hashtags are confusing, but they are generally used to collect information and make it easier to search sites like Twitter and Tumblr. Additionally, hashtags are starting to be used in conversations, out loud. Or maybe it's just me, but it is a little fun.

Ultimately, to me, this poem is about the increasing ease of communication. And how can that be a bad thing?

Non-Classical Poetry, Part 1

In the last year or so, I have found three poems on Tumblr that I really like. I thought I'd share them with you all. I have decided to separate them into four posts so you don't get inundated with text.

The first I found sometime in England, I don't remember when exactly, but it's one of my favorites. The original source is here. For my own purposes, here it is in full:

scientists tell us that all water

is old water,

that there is no room for originality,

that everything is recycled.

the anguish of Achilles bleeding out

face-down in the Trojan dirt

mingles with that of a stockbroker caught

in the ebb and flow of the markets,

and what I am trying to say is that the tears

navigating south through the canyons on your face

may have once wet the cheeks

of Alexander the Great

for the same reason.

To me, this is a strong statement of emotion, connecting all people across time and space. Since water is a constant and goes through the same cycles again and again, and we, or at least I, have been told water that starts where I am, in a month could be across the globe. It is not crazy, then, to think water has been recycled from the beginning of time, or earlier, given the arbitrary nature of time.

It is the same concept of all of us being made from the matter of the stars, we are made of stardust. I am made from the same particles that have been around from the beginning, whenever--however--that was. As easy as it would be to feel despair at the enormity of the universe and each individual's insignificance in the face of enormity, instead I feel awed.

Which is the same feeling I get from this work. When I am troubled, or sad, or furious, the tears that grace my face could be the same particles that wound down the face of any person who came before me and was troubled, or sad, or furious. When I am alone, or feel alone, I am not truly alone. Nothing is new. No thought. No feeling. I may feel alone, but I am not the first person to feel that way. And that gives me hope.

After all, as Charlotte Bronte said, "crying does not indicate that your are weak. Since birth, it has always been a sign that you are alive." 

Role Models

By now I'm sure all of you know of my, let's go with obsession, with Agent Carter and I'm sure some of you are sick of it. I'm not sorry. At all. Not even a little bit. And the entry point for this post is, you guessed it, Agent Carter.

The show combines a lot of things I love: historical fiction, beautiful cinematography, excellent dialogue, and a plethora of other things. It also is something I connect with on a more personal level. Both of my grandfathers were in the Armed Forces in WWII, albeit the Navy and in the Pacific, and one of my grandmothers was a telephone operator, Carter's fake career. There are other similarities as well. There are also other differences. My grandmother was not a government agent, she wasn't English, she never lived in New York, she didn't meet my grandfather during the War, which he lived through. I'm not going to continue down this path, suffice to say, Agent Carter connects with me.

I was lucky enough to know my grandparents as I grew up and they helped make me the person I am. (I write this on my grandfather's birthday, he'd have been 103.) In high school, I was frustrated with a situation and feeling uncertain and unconfident and visited my grandmother, who was in the hospital at the time, and I didn't even need to explain, she told me she believed in me. Now, almost 7.5 years after she died, I still remember her saying that and it still helps.

Peggy Carter reminds me of my grandmother, as I'm sure you've already guessed. Both remind me that I am valuable, that I can accomplish whatever I set out to do, to be fierce. And it doesn't matter that one of them is fictional, because what is fiction really? Fiction cannot but be a version of "reality" and what happens in the real world informs and shapes fiction. So when I aim to be Peggy Carter, I am aiming to be like my grandmother.

And that's the thing about role models. We choose them because they live in a way we want to. I find that the people I try to emulate all have the same characteristics. So it doesn't matter whether they are fictional, all that matters is whether they inspire us.

A Bartleby Sort of Feeling

I don't know how many of you are acquainted with Herman Melville's "Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street" but I first read it in my junior year of high school. You can read it here.

A bit of a side-note, upon rereading it, some parts stick out. The narrator, for example, first describes himself and says, "All who know me consider me an eminently safe man. The late John Jacob Astor, a personage little given to poetic enthusiasm, had no hesitation in pronouncing my first grand point to be prudence; my next, method. I do not speak it in vanity, but simply record the fact, that I was not unemployed in my profession by the late John Jacob Astor; a name which, I admit, I love to repeat, for it hath a rounded and orbicular sound to it, and rings like unto bullion." These three sentences do not matter much to the rest of the story, except that they characterize the narrator. A safe man who lives a rather unexciting life. It could be argued Bartleby is the most exciting thing to happen to him.

The main subject of the piece, Bartleby, works as a scrivener--a clerk or scribe. All he does is copy documents for the narrator. When called upon to go over a piece of work with the narrator to confirm the copy, he says, "I would prefer not to." After Bartleby refuses to read the copies a few times the narrator says, "With any other man I should have flown outright into a dreadful passion, scorned all further words, and thrust him ignominiously from my presence. But here was something about Bartleby that not only strangely disarmed me, but in a wonderful manner touched and disconcerted me." Bartleby never says he will not do something, just that he would prefer not to: in response to the question "You will not?" he says, "I prefer not."

As the story progresses, the list of things Bartleby prefers not to do increases. Fetch the mail, fetch one of the other scriveners, help tie a package up, let the narrator into the office at one point. Eventually Bartleby prefers not to work. The narrator cannot rid himself nor the office of Bartleby and eventually moves offices entirely.

But Bartleby prefers not to leave the office, indeed "at present [he] would prefer not to make any change at all."

The landlord has Bartleby arrested and taken away as a vagrant and the narrator visits him. Bartleby turns down a dinner offer. A few days later, the narrator visits him again but this time Bartleby is dead. He preferred not to live, presumedly. The narrator concludes his tail with "Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity!"

A Bartleby sort of feeling is when you would simply prefer not to. When a choice presents itself--what to have for lunch, finding a new job, deciding what is next--your response is "I would prefer not to."  You know you should choose something or do something and you are not saying you will not do it, just that you would prefer not to. Some days are just Bartleby days.

"Do you see the day I've had?"

This is my second "Agent Carter" post. I'll try to avoid spoilers. The title of this one is a line from the third episode. Although I love most of the lines in the show, this line speaks to me. Carter says it after a long day of being underestimated and demeaned by her supposed partner, her boss, and her coworkers. Although Peggy gives into what is being said to her, the audience can see what she's saying. Her day had been hellish.

As I mentioned in my first blog, Peggy Carter takes up space. Even when she is ignore by her coworkers, her presence is noticeable. Although when she wants to be, she can be invisible. She dresses to fit the occasion. When infiltrating a party to steal a bomb, she dresses to the nines. When walking through the sewer, she wears a jumpsuit. In both situations, she gets into fights and wins.

There are numerous parallels between Peggy Carter and Captain America. It becomes difficult to separate the two. After watching the first Captain America movie and "Agent Carter", their fighting styles are very similar--brute force-- and what they are fighting for is identical. Throughout the season, we see Peggy deal with the lingering grief over Steve Rogers' death (at least as far as anyone in 1946 knows). She isn't turned into a vigilante superhero by her grief like Batman. She moves through grief like the rest of us. Eventually she accepts that they have to let him go, but that doesn't mean forgetting.

Halfway through the season, there is a confrontation between Peggy and one of her friends/allies. She has been lied to and reacts by punching him in the face. To be fair, this is one of Peggy's main reactions. She says, "You don't get to use my reaction to your lies as a reason for your lies." I love this line. Lying friend is trying to justify his actions with saying he knew Peggy would react this way and she refuses to let him off the hook.

A lot of what she says resonates. She is a character I can identify with and that makes me happy.

Within half an hour of starting the show, I had found a new role model. Peggy Carter can stick up for herself and knows what she can do. She is fashionable and smart, classy and strong. While her entire office plays right into the hands of the bad guys, she works faster, smarter, and better than them. By the end of the season, she says "I know my value, anyone else's opinion doesn't really matter." And that is something hard to fully believe. Society inundates us with images of what we should be, especially women and it is hard to find value in yourself sometimes, especially when the people around you, without meaning to often, don't. "I know my value, anyone else's opinion doesn't really matter."

Peggy Carter: The Hero We Need

This is one half of a blog about the TV show "Agent Carter". You won't have to read both for them to make sense, so if one or the other isn't you're cup of tea, don't worry. This first one will be about the place "Agent Carter" has in the bigger media landscape; the second about why I love it.

Some of you might recognize the second half of the title from the end of "The Dark Knight", the second of Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. The quote, as said by Commissioner Gordon, is, "Because he's the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now." Having finished the first season of "Agent Carter" I believe she's the hero we need in TV today. Peggy Carter is not a superhero.

First a little background. Agent Peggy Carter is first introduced in Marvel's Captain America: The First Avenger and in her first scene, knocks a guy flat on his face when he underestimates her. Between 2011 and 2015, Peggy Carter was in a short film and as an old woman in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. "Agent Carter" is Marvel's foray into having a woman-lead film or show. "Agents of SHIELD" is more an ensemble show. "Captain Marvel", scheduled for release in 2018, will feature the story of Ms. Marvel.

"Agent Carter" is not only a first in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) but also a first in terms of the larger TV/film retellings of comics. In between "Wonder Woman" (1975-1979) and now, women have not lead the way. Although women make up much of the audience, they are still denied representation. (Please do your own research on this, if it interests you.) Since 1975, there have been more than 20 film and television productions of Superman. In the same time span, roughly the same number of productions for Batman. Recently, The Flash, Green Lantern, the Green Hornet, the Green Arrow, Thor, Iron Man, and the Hulk have all been the subject of TV shows or films.

I've done a lot of reading about "Agent Carter" and I've found a lot I love about Hayley Atwell's portrayal of the character and how she is written. I love the show. Peggy Carter takes up space unapologetically and fights in a way that is unique among current Marvel women. Most noticeably to me is how she differs from Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow. Black Widow fights with ruthless grace. Peggy Carter bulldozes through opponents, using whatever blunt object is near at hand. Men underestimate her, and the other women in the show, and they use it to their advantage.

A further reason to love "Agent Cater" is the supporting cast. I won't go on at length about most of them. The characters that start the show as somewhat two-dimensional sexists jerks (products of the time that seem almost cartoonish) evolve to become fleshed-out, with back stories and lives that are not immediately visible. In 8 episodes it is difficult to have too much character development, but the men Carter works with become less like cartoon villains and more like people. The best characters are the other women in Carter's life, although there are not many.

In judging shows and films there is a test called the Bechdel test. It is used to judge gender bias and has three requirements: the production being judged has to have two women in it, who talk to each other, about something other than a man. (Wikipedia is a good starting place for more info.) In the first scene of "Agent Carter", Carter's roommate comes home and they discuss her work as a riveter and their plans for the weekend. Later on in the series, Carter discusses her friend Angie's acting career and sites to see in New York with a new woman, Dottie.

The cinematography is excellent as is the casting, the writing, and the acting. I can't recommend a show more. And it is only 8 episodes currently. I am unsure if the first few are currently available, but if you can watch it, you should.