lamentoftrois

[lamentoftrois]

[lamentoftrois]

[lamentoftrois]

Donald is speaking at the UN this morning. I was reminded what the Brits think of him.

Someone on Quora asked the question, “Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?”

Nate White, a witty writer from England wrote the perfect response.

“A few things spring to mind…

Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem.

For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed.

So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever.

I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman.

But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.

Trump is a troll.

And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers.

And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface.

Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront.

Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul.

And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist.

Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that.

He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat.

He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully.

That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.

There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think “Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy” is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss.

After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form;

He is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit.

His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum.

God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid.

He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart.

In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish:

‘My God… what�� have… I… created?

If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.”

[lamentoftrois]

( Nobody But You )

nobody can save you but

yourself.

you will be put again and again

into nearly impossible

situations.

they will attempt again and again

through subterfuge, guise and

force

to make you submit, quit and /or die quietly

inside.

nobody can save you but

yourself

and it will be easy enough to fail

so very easily

but don’t, don’t, don’t.

just watch them.

listen to them.

do you want to be like that?

a faceless, mindless, heartless

being?

do you want to experience

death before death?

nobody can save you but

yourself

and you’re worth saving.

it’s a war not easily won

but if anything is worth winning then

this is it.

think about it.

think about saving your self.

your spiritual self.

your gut self.

your singing magical self and

your beautiful self.

save it.

don’t join the dead-in-spirit.

maintain your self

with humor and grace

and finally

if necessary

wager your self as you struggle,

damn the odds, damn

the price.

only you can save your

self.

do it! do it!

then you’ll know exactly what

I am talking about.

( Charles Bukowski )

[lamentoftrois]

The Undertaker: By Patricia Smith

When a bullet enters the brain, the head explodes.

I can think of no softer warning for the mothers

who sit doubled before my desk,

knotting their smooth brown hands,

and begging: fix my boy, fix my boy.

Here’s his high school picture.

And the smirking, mildly mustachioed player

in the crinkling snapshot

looks nothing like the plastic bag of boy

stored and dated in the cold room downstairs.

In the picture, he is cocky and chiseled,

clutching the world by the balls. I know the look.

Now he is flaps of cheek,

slivers of jawbone, a surprised eye,

assorted teeth, bloody tufts of napped hair.

The building blocks of my business.

So I swallow hard, turn the photo face down

and talk numbers instead. The high price

of miracles startles the still-young woman,

but she is prepared. I know she has sold

everything she owns, that cousins and uncles

have emptied their empty bank accounts,

that she dreams of her baby

in tuxedoed satin, flawless in an open casket,

a cross or blood-red rose tacked to his fingers,

his halo set at a cocky angle.

I write a figure on a piece of paper

and push it across to her

while her chest heaves with hoping.

She stares at the number, pulls

a slow weepy breath: “Jesus.”

But Jesus isn’t on my payroll. I work alone

until the dim insistence of morning,

bent over my grisly puzzle pieces, gluing,

stitching, creating a chin with a brushstroke.

I pop glass eyes into rigid sockets,

then carve eyelids from a forearm, an inner thigh.

I plump shattered skulls, and paint the skin

to suggest warmth, an impending breath.

I reach into the collapsed cavities to rescue

a tongue, and ear. Lips are never easy to recreate.

And I try not to remember the stories,

the tales the mothers must bring me

to ease their own heart. Oh, they cry,

My Ronnie, my Willie, my Michael, my Chico.

It was self-defense. He was on his way home,

a dark car slowed down, they must have thought

he was someone else. He stepped between

two warring gang members at a party.

Really, he was trying to get off the streets,

to pull away from the crowd.

He was just trying to help a friend.

He was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Fix my boy; he was a good boy.

Make him the way he was.

But I have explored the jagged gaps

in the boy’s body, smoothed the angry edges

of bullet holes. I have touched him in places

no mother knows, and I have birthed

his new face. I know he believed himself

invincible, that he most likely hissed

“Fuck you, man” before the bullets lifted him

off his feet. I try not to imagine

his swagger, his lizard-lidded gaze,

his young mother screaming into the phone.

She says she will find the money, and I know

this is the truth that fuels her, forces her

to place one foot in front of the other.

Suddenly, I want to take her down

to the chilly room, open the bag

and shake its terrible bounty onto the

gleaming steel table. I want her to see him,

to touch him, to press her lips to the flap of cheek.

The woman needs to wither, finally, and move on.

We both jump as the phone rattles the hook.

I pray it’s my wife, a bill collector, a wrong number.

But the wide, questioning silence on the other end

is too familiar. Another mother needing a miracle.

Another homeboy coming home.

[lamentoftrois]

[lamentoftrois]

Hey hey, you you 

I don’t like my body

No way, no way 

I think I need a new one

[lamentoftrois]

You hurt me so incredibly much but I never told you.

[lamentoftrois]

It’s the loneliest people who love books the most.

Etaf Rum, “A Woman is No Man”

[lamentoftrois]

You don't know pain until you gotta force your heart to stop loving somebody.

[lamentoftrois]

I crave your touch more and more everyday

[lamentoftrois]

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You’ll have an easier time letting go of people if you stopped attaching them to your future. You are your only constant.

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