Wednesday, January 04, 2006

DR. OMED'S BRAIN DEVOURED BY SNOT DEMONS CHRISTMAS ISN'T OVER 'TIL IT'S OVER. Dr. Omed has the same rotten cold he had last year. The new year was ushered in by the smoke of not-too-distant fires on Sunday evening. High winds and drought conditions (aided and abetted by stupid human tricks) whipped up hundreds of wildfires across Oklahoma, until it seemed like the entire state was on fire. A friend and I were travelling south on Hwy. 99 north of Sand Springs about 6pm, and smoke streaming in from the west lowered visibility as if we were driving through fog. Didn't do much for my cough, either. Friday (January 6) is the Feast of Epiphany, the twelfth and last day of Christmas. No, it isn't over yet. No, Annie, Christmas isn't over 'til it's over. Normally, the City of Tulsa collects discarded (nonartificial) Christmas trees into a big pile at a park down on Riverside Drive, and as Twelfth Night comes on, the Fire Dept. does its once a year role-reversal and ignites one mother of a bonfire. This is a public event with concessions stands and a music stage, but nobody pays much attention to the fripperies. It is the atavistic lure of fire to everyone's inner arsonist that brings out the crowd. Alas, I don't think we'll have a Epiphany bonfire of Christmas trees this year; dry winds waste no tears of mercy on the red dirt of Oklahoma. Epiphany is also known as the Feast of the Three Kings, you know—the Magi—Casper, Melchior, and Balthasar by name, the men who followed the star, according to that little mythmaker who wrote the Gospel of Matthew.  I always liked Yeats' poem The Magi: The Magi Now as at all times I can see in the mind's eye, In their stiff, painted clothes, the pale unsatisfied ones Appear and disappear in the blue depth of the sky With all their ancient faces like rain-beaten stones, And all their helms of silver hovering side by side, And all their eyes still fixed, hoping to find once more, Being by Calvary's turbulence unsatisfied, The uncontrollable mystery on the bestial floor. Then of course there's my favorite bit of Rimbaud: I have finished, I think, the tale of my hell today. It was really hell, the old hell, the one whose doors were opened by the son of man.   From the same desert, in the same night, always my tired eyes awake to the silver star, always, but the kings of life are not moved, the three magi, mind and heart and soul.  When shall we go beyond the mountains and the shores, to greet the birth of new toil, of new wisdom, the flight of tyrants, of demons, the end of superstition, to adore—the first to adore!               Christmas on the earth.                               Arthur Rimbaud, A Season in Hell My local tribe hunkered down and weathered through another episode of Xmas Survivor. I came out of my usual holiday funk early this year, a few days before the solstice, and we had our bit of fun and did our family duties too. I was actually seen to smile on Christmas Day.  Dr. Omed's back at his keyboard, all's well with...well, no, not much is well with the world. I'm not depressed, personally I'm doing ok, but I can't say I feel much hope for the new year for the world at large. What more can I say about that?     At the center of Tulsa's other labyrinth in Hunter Park. 2:08:53 AM    comment []