My Mother in the New Fade, Part 2

skipping around the narrative
a little, one of the key elements
of what can be called
my mother's mythology
ties into my father's as well:

both of them lost their mothers
before i was born

my father lost his in what became
the end of his tenure
with the Air Force

my mother lost hers in what became
for her
an equally impactful piece
of what helped shape her life
and brought my parents,
inevitably and finally,
together

she was still living at home
when her mother died
and could vividly recall
years later
the mystery the doctors
could not solve
and still baffled her years later,
the strange discolored legs,
and how she seemed to die,
just like that

so that my mother decided
to continue living at home
to help her father out

and it was this decision
that kept her in town long enough
to finally meet the man who had grown up
not so far away, a state but really just
a short walk away


it was a strange bit about family
that helped bring my family
together,
and a sad twist about mothers
that helped shape my mother's life
and then my own

The Unobserved Life in the New Fade

sometimes i think that the social dynamic
in the New Fade demands that everyone
be seen in some public capacity,
and that if they are not, if they are not
relevant in that sense, then they have no
chance to be heard; yes, in many ways
that's what it always was, but
it was supposed to be different now,
and the fact that it isn't suggests
that we've put an inordinate pressure
on all the developments that were
supposed to make it easier

i call that an irony

My Mother in the New Fade, Part 1

i wish i had more to tell you
about the specifics of my mother's life
in the New Fade, but what follows
will have to suffice

at the start of it, there is a vast community
like many Americans
of immigrant descent
these particular ones
from French-speaking Canada
settling in New England
and finding home among their own kind
finding dignity in respectability
and forging a new life
of new possibility

there were war stories
barbershops
and mills
to be had
floating in the backdrop
and a love of the violin
all before my mother was born

it's easy to imagine that
no language but French
was spoken during all this time
and for someone who does not speak French now
that's a little startling to believe
because i'm only two generations removed...

Wisdom in the New Fade

sometimes what you think you know
and all the logic you understand
does not actually converge
to make the same conclusion
others reach

and that's the difference
between wisdom and knowledge

Everyone Else is Crazy in the New Fade

i'm serious, everyone else is crazy
yeah, except me

the problem is that everyone else
is absolutely convinced
that they've got everything
figured out
they know what's sane and rational
when an objective analysis
reveals just how crazy
and unbalanced
they really are

the problem is that this
is a shared psychoses
and that the majority of people
share this delusion
this flawed interpretation
of reality

i know that makes me sound crazy
but the most sane individual
is the one who sees where others ere

it just so happens that the natural reaction
to this understanding
looks to all the world
like madness

Survivors of the New Fade

sometimes there's an impulse
much less an imperative
to justify despicable behavior
and sometimes it's possible
and sometimes it isn't

the challenge in the New Fade
is to know the difference

Index of the New Fade

in the beginning there were dynasties
gods and kings and men in trees

it was like that for centuries
millennia and years like bees

and then there was a reformation
that threw all things into question

so that perspective falls into many hands
and falls all around likes grains and sands

and that's where the New Fade stands
and why for answers we follow bands

chronicles come from Billy Joel, R.E.M.
this is what you learn from them

from the bottom of every hem
and the scrambling for every gem

there's a constant struggle for the future
and, yes, a fight against wearing fur

when everyone's clever and you're all dumb
it's okay to feel a little numb

because when everyone's a bum
your instinct is to throw out a thumb

and hitchhike to another planet
but that's just it

you can't hide because it's all the same
a mad dash for fortune and fame

no time for shame
even when that's the name of the game