Genius is the Enemy of Genius

Dear Fiction-ers, Language-ists,
TransRomanticists & Colleagues
Across the Curriculum.

(Courses W/O Borders Series).

Genius is the Enemy of Genius

says Emerson and that’s why I
said Raymond Carver’s words
on writing and writers were full
of crap.

So that his genius don’t mess
with mine.

Of course he’s not full of crap.

I like his fiction. But he was
doing the same doo-dah thing
on experimentalism and slack
mind-drool and all the moves
we're guilty of if we are trying
to MAKE IT NEW in own way.

Opinionating.

It’s got to be a mess before
it gets better and good—if it
ever does, true? Embarrassing.
Slip sliding away.
Oops,
ooff
ouch
damnit
ah, yes Yes YES

That was a FEELING I let fly:
my response to Elsbeth’s reading.

Not a THINKING.
There’s a difference, right?

We decided there was. Indisputable.
The difference between THINKING
and FEELING: do not collapse,
conflate or confuse, or you’re
screwed. Doubly.

And it’s the same with the Buddha
on the road. If you meet him, kill
him. A Zen koan aimed at saying
what Emerson was saying though
not as politically correct.

Genius is the enemy of genius
so maybe we can factor that
in and be friendly about it,
love our enemies.

Finished Product Standards…
Consumer mode

clarity, coherence, consistency,
chills up my spine, the play of
indifference & whelming attachment,
symbolic & diabolic relationships,
dead birds and jelly jars & all that
symbolism and significance that we
may or may not be touched by
when we read Nabokov.. ,

… they do not apply to

Composer Mode
(in process mess & guess

what’s going on in-game,
in-performance, in the middle
of composing, writing, Wimbleton,
downhill powder skiing when you
are LOST in a cloud of be-here-now-
unknowing responding to what comes
to mind and not even THINKING in
that manipulative, control-it, safety-
conscious oh-be-careful-&-correct
way we walk-on-eggs as experts,
commentators, self-help gurus,
teachers....

And so Raymond Carver’s words
are my enemy, detrimental to my
game. I’ve got to kill him for my
own good & proceed to Thebes,
answer the Sphinx, marry my mom
for awhile and then put my eyes out.

Got to walk that lonely valley,
got to walk it on my own.
Mytho-logical..

Damnit.