Sofa

I sing the Sofa. I, who lately sang
Truth, Hope, and Charity, and touched with awe
The solemn chords, and with a trembling hand,
Escaped with pain from that advent’rous flight,
Now seek repose upon a humbler theme:
The theme though humble, yet august and proud
The occasion— for the Fair commands the song.

from The Task by William Cowper

I am the heaven
I am the water
I am the dirt beneath your rollers
I am your secret smut & lost metal money
Down your cracks
I am your cracks & crannies
I am the clouds
I am embroidered
I am the author of all tucks & damask piping
I am the chrome dinette
I am the chrome dinette
I am the eggs of all persuasion
I am all days & nights
I am all days & nights
I am here
And you are my sofa

Frank Zappa, Sofa #2

Sometimes, I just don’t know how to respond to comments. Occasionally I get really sweet emails based on past entries that turn up from random googling. Sometimes, you reach into the sofa and pull out a slug. It’s hard to figure. I know that my writing was forced to change when my site traffic turned to a predominantly random crowd, sucked here by the strangest queries. I wouldn’t mind so much, if they didn’t leave insults quite as frequently. My spirit of fairness makes me want to leave them in place, unmolested most of the time. Often, having comments open on old entries brings new insights rather than insults. It is a bizarre trade-off.

I used to think of this place as a footstool. Maybe it’s more of a sofa.

The more I think about it, the more I think that at their best, blogs are gay.

Whom call we gay? That honour has been long
The boast of mere pretenders to the name.
The innocent are gay–the lark is gay,
That dries his feathers saturate with dew
Beneath the rosy cloud, while yet the beams
Of day-spring overshoot his humble nest.
The peasant too, a witness of his song,
Himself a songster, is as gay as he.
But save me from the gaiety of those
Whose headaches nail them to a noonday bed;
And save me, too, from theirs whose haggard eyes
Flash desperation, and betray their pangs
For property stripped off by cruel chance;
From gaiety that fills the bones with pain,
The mouth with blasphemy, the heart with woe.

from The Task by William Cowper