Growing Younger



Dear Eugene,

Tom Petty has passed away.

Still remember about 25 years ago in a concert celebrating Bob Dylan's 30 years as a recording artist, Petty with a few then and now still well known musicians were on stage doing Dylan's "My Back Pages."

Crimson flames tied through my ears, rollin' high and mighty traps
Pounced with fire on flaming roads using ideas as my maps
"We'll meet on edges, soon, " said I, proud 'neath heated brow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

 Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth, "rip down all hate, " I screamed
Lies that life is black and white spoke from my skull, I dreamed
Romantic facts of musketeers foundationed deep, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

So to Dylan, and by extension to these once rebellious rockers, to "grow younger" is to learn to shut up and stop protesting.

I can understand the sentiment, even the necessity to shut up.  One grows to get disillusioned about The Cause, the government, the church, the One Romance, the family, the other(s).  The self.

We grow to not trust the world.  We grow to disappoint in ourselves.

Girls' faces formed the forward path from phony jealousy
To memorizing politics of ancient history
Flung down by corpse evangelists, unthought of, though somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then. I'm younger than that now

 A self-ordained professor's tongue too serious to fool
Spouted out that liberty is just equality in school
"Equality, " I spoke the word as if a wedding vow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

Dylan grows so "young" now he's singing Sinatra.  Let's face the music and dance.  What else is there to speak about and to this world?  What else can one do?  Massacres happened, too often, and shall happen again.  Liberty, equality, justice--nice work if you can get it.

 In a soldier's stance, I aimed my hand at the mongrel dogs who teach
Fearing not that I'd become my enemy in the instant that I preach
My existence led by confusion boats, mutiny from stern to bow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

 Yes, my guard stood hard when abstract threats too noble to neglect
Deceived me into thinking I had something to protect
Good and bad, I define these terms quite clear, no doubt, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then I'm younger than that now

 I still listen to Dylan, because he is honest about his dishonesty.  It is much better than what one usually gets coming down from a pulpit or whatever pedestal, dishonesty about being honest--and worse still, done sincerely.  How many preacher or politician can admit to this, "I had become my own enemy in the instant that I preached"?

But he’s already made it plain how to live, what to do,  
  what God is looking for in men and women.
It’s quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor,  
  be compassionate and loyal in your love,
And don’t take yourself too seriously—  
  take God seriously.
(Micah 6:8)

God has a case against us, especially those who claim to be his people.  He who does no justice and loves not mercy will be punished, will "eat but not be satisfied."

It is little wonder why we are constantly craving, always thirsty, perpetually hungry.  We could sit in our new car with brand-new winter tires, and still visualize with our eyes of fear how our world would one day inevitably spin out of control.  If we are to die a miserable and meaningless death this afternoon, who would care?  Well, we don't care about this uncaring, miserable world either!

Growing senile, callous, cynical.  Can't get ourselves to give; can't bear the embarrassment to receive.

No, we cannot afford to grow "younger."

Yours, Alex

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

One World, This

Image
Dear Eugene, I am sure some would object to what I said yesterday .  Based on the kind of education we are getting, maybe we should all object. Well, science can explain a lover's kiss , one says, We must know this by now.   Things that go on in a lover's head, bring to bear a series of trigger working together and crossing paths to conjure up what finally a poet would pick up the slack to call "romance."  It's simply a release of chemical cocktail that heroin and cocaine too can effectively concoct, just as "obsessive compulsive" in its serotonin-ian nature to give us a long good memory, just as culturally conditioned, almost like a basic human instinct. Who are we (to answer yesterday's question again) to say what actually  "shapes" us?  Science can explain ourselves to us, and does a better job every next morning.  The rest are just tassels on the fringe, perfunctory footnotes to scientific facts--the only truthful account of actua
Keep reading

He Walks Our Line

Image
Dear Eugene, The sun is brilliant today, best time of year, not too hot, not too cold, not too anything , a good life hangs finely in the balance of a myriad of capricious elements, mostly hidden, many I won't even come to identify let alone make sense of before my little life ends. Two mornings ago I read in the news that a suicide bomber attacked a voter registration center in Afghanistan, killing 31 people.  Yesterday morning the headline was gone, and I had to search online to see the casualty was then more than doubled. If I didn't quickly scan the headlines Sunday morning I would not even know something like this had happened, like the registering voters knew not a bomb was in their midst, and by the time they knew for sure there would be no point in knowing, let alone trying to make sense of the blast or piecing smithereens back together.  A line was drawn to divide before and after, life and death, hope and despair; a line that gives and takes away the meaning of
Keep reading

A Word for the Caveman

Image
Dear Eugene, We could imagine when a caveman was chased by a T-Rex, the nature man would naturally cry for help. His shriek would have been a plead no less earnest than ours when we lost control of our vehicle to an evil sheet of ice.  If after years of high education we could in our final moment at least wrap our spinning head around the physics of skating in a ball of metal into our death, the caveman wouldn't have the luxury of comparable enlightenment to come to terms with his demise under the chicken-feet of a leviathan. Who was the caveman crying to?  In whose name was his prayer going to be answered, if at all?  And if he could not even utter an intelligible syllable comprehensible to himself, who was going to speak on his behalf when he was most in need to be spoken for? Now these are the questions I would ask a Christian if I am not one. Not too long ago a pastor tried to warn me about N. T. Wright by saying he's cool with the dude and all, but make sure I
Keep reading