My Howard-to-Muhammad Ratios

More EngMajorHumanities
Kind of Talk
(not to be collapsed, confused
or conflated with Science
Talk, soft of hard.)

“Narcotics cannot still the tooth
that nibbles at the soul." (E.Dickinson)

With regard to the Academics of Humanities
& Fine Arts, and my Muhammad-to-Howard
ratios…

(mostly Howard: I am spectator,
commentator, critical thinker,
evaluator, assessmentalist:
I vote—thumbs up or
thumbs down),

…here's the pickle I'm in:

I am member of Industrialized Hire Education
where high marks & expectations are naturally
given to
clarity,
coherence,
consistency,
accuracy &
overall smartitude:
excellent Finished Product Values.

Few love Confusion, my Mother of Invention;
or easily tolerate Non Sense & No Sense At
All who always father Blessed Common Sense
& Our Work-In-Process Values.

Here’s what makes me more
Howard than Mohammed:

On the one hand: I can’t afford turning up the mess
& guess trial & margins for error & rooms for play
& foolishness it takes to Get Good because frankly:
it’s embarrassing.


Howard Behind Bars:
"embarrassed"

On the other hand: there’s no getting Good without
the mess & guess trial & margins for error & rooms
for play that getting Good takes, damnit.

Rock & Hard Pace.

The only Hope or else Despair
Lies in the choice of pyre or Pyre
To be redeemed from fire by Fire.
Who then devised the torment?
Love.
Love is the unfamiliar name
Behind the hands that wove
the intolerable shirt of flame
which human power can not remove.

We only love, only suspire,
Consumed by either fire or Fire.

T.S. Eliot: “Little Gidding” (reformatted)
(Four Quartets)

.