a quote from Oppen, a break/an ending . . .

For everyone who responded with such compassionate and encouraging words to the mugging ordeal, I can't thank you enough. Crag and Kyle, I sincerely apologize for not responding to your comments sooner. I kept trying to find a new & more authentic way of conveying how incredibly touched I was (and am), but I couldn't find the right words -- and so, stupidly, I wound up not saying anything at all. I do this sort of thing way too often.

Although I remain aware of how tenuous and volatile and ephemeral online community can be, the well-wishes I received have brought home, once again, how suddenly that weave of faint, virtual connections can flare into an authentic presence, a compelling and even healing force. Wow. I don't know what else to say other than wow -- and thank you.

As luck (i.e., incredibly good fortune) would have it, I recently stumbled into an opportunity to transcribe Mark Linenthal's delivery of the 8th Annual George Oppen Memorial Lecture 1992), titled George Oppen: The Unacknowledged World. Apparently Linenthal no longer has a written copy of it -- and he had the only copy in existence. Thanks be to the Gods of Magnetic Media that the lecture was videotaped -- for it's portrait of Oppen is a rare and beautiful combination of both philosophical intensity and moving personal reminiscence. For me, listening to the lecture was not unlike having someone pull a landscape painting off the wall -- a painting that's no more than a caricature -- to reveal a window, beyond which lies the real (and genuinely sublime) landscape.

Early on in the lecture, when discussing Heidegger's influence on Oppen's thinking, Linenthal reads excerpts from one of Oppen's letters to his sister.

Surely, there is is-ness [. . .] The point [. . .] is the mind operating in a marvel which contains the mind. Of that marvel, it can really not be thought about because it contains the thought. But it can be felt. It is what all art is about.

The mind operating in a marvel which contains the mind . . . That phrase has reverberated in my mind's ear countless times over the past few months.

I thought this would be a not-inappropriate place to bring this blog to close, at least for now. Since starting school, I've had very little time to post, and I don't expect the situation to change for at least another year-and-a-half. I may continue to post occasionally, but certainly not with greater frequency than I have for the past several months.

To everyone who has read along and contributed, I sincerely hope that we stay in touch. And please keep posting to your blogs! To be honest, worrying about what to post here has kept me from paying as much attention as I'd like to the conversations taking place beyond here.