Chicago again, after 7 years! The monster sprawled out through the cold night. A wide scattering of lights flickering through its humps and tentacles.
[This next poem has been scratched out]
Paris,
To a Friend at Reaching the Age of Fifty Years
So swifty is fifty!
His years haven't caught up.
Judging by his molar state,
I'd say he's but a pup.
I can't be sure however
Since his teeth are used to dissever
The opposition, to which I do not relate,
Fortunately.
So swifty is fifty that
I should marry off my daughter
Lest the lamb be led to slaughter
On a passing social spree
Where I would have my hands full
Guarding my positions vis-à-vis
My wife, for fifty,
Who is swifty, is quite a ball,
"But nice".
Not swifty is fifty
When the groaning board is set up *
But sweetly he moves through the haunch
As though the bloody thing were Campbell's soup
Nor fruit fumé or aromatic potage,
escape damage
There would be few ships to launch
If he passed upon the champagne bottles
For fifty is thirsty.
Now all who take alarm
At these possible types of flame
Will pray that fifty will soon be sixty,
But I who know him well
Will cheer that swifty is fifty.
Things will get worse before they get better
Men who fear swifty at fifty
Will be non compos mentis at seventy
And at four score, much more.
* Pronounced Scottishly, of course. Rémy-Martin
Poetry is often ambiguous and tribiguous, the more the better provided the whole pattern doesn't fall apart. Especially nowadays that rhymes may be scientifically searched (and even especially by computer), that the written word is a roaring broken dam of chaotic waters, and that no one listens to anybody, old meanings and thrills depart. Poetry must now be multidimensional as no other verbal form can be -- suggestive, symbolic, multidimensional, and with a logic all its own that can compete with the photograph and cinema, other great new art forms that can lead the mind through a set of symbols.
Paris,
[the following poem has been scratched out]
Where the water pooled, as do the stream,
a pan of sandy bottom showed a frog
crouched warily but comfortably.
A bright white cloud mirrored over him
haloing the face of a watchful boy.
"How long can I wait?" thought he.
"How long can he wait?"
The frog was still, green, soft,
His flanks blew gently outwards as he breathed
As the cloud moved and the
Sun shone bright, his white flanks
Grew whiter. The bottom moved up to show its
Fineness. The seconds passed. The frog
was in no hurry. The boy was.
"I've waited an hour, I can't wait any more.
The breeze rippled the surface and
the boy thought the frog had gone.
But he reappeared, calm, crouched,
clearly visible though he thought not
The boy tries. He misses. Distortions of air.
"I shall slowly ever so slowly reach for him
And at the last moment, lunge."
His hand held now a thousand grains
of gold, that dripped and fell in
delicate splashes. The guardian angel
Refraction kindly let the boy touch
the beauty of water and sand
while her protected frog doubled
and kicked his legs
Smoothly to safety.
February 1966
In planning --
1. Planning good
2. Central Planning of whole doubtful
3. Decentralized planning is doubtful when goal is unified.
4. Decentralized planning good when each aggregate planner is autonomous and plans for a diversity of things.
5. I. e. numerous little governments, diversified as the American States are.
Unmentioned important features of capitalism, provable by empirical studies: e. g.
1. In central planning, flexibility is an unsolved problem. The strategy and method are simple enough. To learn what is and give to it to get what may be. But the constant solicitous 'avidity' of the businessmen for what belongs to him is the actualization of the adjusting process; it scarcely exists in state planning.
2. Nor does the political (by which I mean the utterly political) enter into most discussions of planning as economics. yet it is the 'political' decision which must be compared with the 'selfish' decision of the businessman, not the mythical 'rational' decision which is typically used by way of contrasts.
February-March 1966;Returning to U.S.A. with the boys, John & Paul
Items bought abroad and included in baggage under inspection:
1. 1 pair of pants, (German) $11.00 For personal use (now used)
2. 3 bottles of perfume (Spain), $10.00 for gifts
3. 1 radio (German) $47.00 For personal use (now used)
4. 1 watch (Spain) $40.00 For personal use (now used)
5. 1 handbag (Italian) $8.00 for Gift.
6. 1 pair shoes (Italian) $4.00 For personal use (now used)
7. 3 sweaters (Italian) $8.00 For personal use (now used)
8. 9 objects of ceramics $10.00 (Italian). Possibly classifiable as art)
For personal use (2 broken now)
9. 1 shirt (Moroccan) $14.00 For personal use (now used)
Total Amount: 11.-- + 10.00 + 47.00 + 40.00 + 8.00 + 4.00 + 8.00 + 4.00 = $143.00
Coming Later; Triumph Car, used $1,600 original price ; now has 7700 miles
less 35% (104.00) = 1,046 - 216.60 = $823.50 Dutiable purchase
(February-April, 1966?)
Carl
Chris
Jessie
Vicki
Madelon Levy
Sara Miller
Dr. Lesse (stanley)
Sidney Roth?
Livio and Dorothy Stecchini
Mom
Anna Maria
Gifts for: What:
Jill: Art and Dishes
Charles and Dorothy Glucksburg - Wallet and Perfume
Mom = Vase
Robin's kids: coins
Jerry Smith: Silk
Sara Miller: Red wallet
Stephanie: perfume
Herb: knife
Cathy and Dante: Purse
Teas: perfume
Annabelle: wallet purse
Baroody: wallet
Roberta Lewis: vase from Turkey
Maddy Levy:
To do March 21
Change money ($40)
Change airline Reservations (TWA)
Get boat tickets for Tunis
Buy art from Carla
Get distilled water
Buy canned goods
Buy swimming trunks
Buy pot
Buy bottle grappon
Letters written while on trip: (February-April 1966)
Car Shipment
Louise Shelton
Tom Frelinhuysen
Reuben de Hoyos
Ted Gurr
John Appel
Alfred and Beatrice Appel
George Shapiro
Stephanie Neuman
Edward de Grazia
Dick Swift
Bill Baroody
Tom Johnson (yes)
Earl Voss
Harold Lasswell
Malcolm Moos
Jay Gordon Hall
Dick Ware
Dick Cornuelle
Dante Matelli
Suzanne Farkas
Sebastian de Grazia
Edward Greenfield
Record Press
Jerry Gottlieb
Charles Glicksberg
Gil and Liz Bettman
Miriam de Grazia
Robert Lochuer
Cairo Mail Room
John Dryfoos
Carla di Mora
Zia
Statistics
Jack McCarthy
Ted McNulty
Pen Herring
Anita Horwich
Maya Kulkarni
Juan Lenz
Charles Lieber
Samuel Labell
Kemel Karpat
Perry Knowlton
Karnig Nalbandian
Kenneth G. Olson
Melvin Peebles
David Sills
Hadley Cantril
Calvin Stillman
Immanuel Velikovsky
Romesh Shah
Jill de Grazia
Paul Oppenheim
Daisy Blum
Renee Mitler
Victor de Grazia
