Falling
Falling in order to rise….
The destruction of received models and forms is necessary in order to clear a space for spontaneous thought to arise.
From the cathedral of our own feelings, from the void of the blank canvas, then, comes the space for revelation.
We are fragments of an unutterable whole. Meaning is always in search of itself. Unsuspected revelations await us around the next corner.
—Charles Simic, Dime-store alchemy: The Art of Joseph Cornell
Returning as if from another country, after spending 3 days in the north woods of Eagle River Wisconsin, I am at home in Illinois. The woods are always close at hand in Eagle River. Deer can be seen outside the window at just about any time of day. While at the local dump four eagles kept an eye on us from the tops of nearby pines. On our way out of town it was necessary to tap the brakes as a half grown adolescent bear dashed across the highway at a run.
All of this wild life and beauty must be given up if one is to have development. The choice is between one and the other. What I mean by development is the rapid clearing and utilization of land funded by capital for the purpose of producing more capital. And there is no bright line to indicate where the sacrifice of nature begins, and what is appropriate human behavior, that which conserves, and minimizes damage to nature. What behavior is exponentially destructive? And there is the thought too that development is often funded by the expropriation of the labor of one’s fellowman, unfair wages, “slavery” by other terms. We avoid calling injustice by it’s true name. “Hatred, bigotry, and violence on many sides” was the circumlocution preferred by our president. “What’s the big deal, 
everyone does it.” is how I would translate his words into ordinary language.
So from the land of the eagle, bear, and the stars I return to the developed world, to Illinois. Return to video of the murderous melee in Charlottesville, to the bloviating pundits on Fox News and on CNBC, to a State that is billions in debt due to promises made that cannot be kept, and to a civil war for power within the political class in this State.
Familiar spirit, within whose care I grew, within whose disappointment I twist, may we at last see by what necessity the double-bind is in the end the figure for human life, why what we love is precluded always by something else we love, as if each no we speak is yes, each yes, no.
–Frank Bidart,, If See No End In Is
