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Tuesday 23 August 2011

Pulp (Carleton E. Watkins: Mine and Mill, Marysville, California)


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http://brbl-images.library.yale.edu/WAPHOTOIMG/size4/D0189/1064053.jpg

View of the mines at Marysville, Montana,
including the Maskelyne Tunnel, established 1883, of the Drumlummon mine: photo by Carleton E. Watkins, 1884, 1885 or 1890 (Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University)



"Then, [Presidential candidate Rick] Perry pointed his left finger skyward, raised his voice and declared: 'We don't need anybody apologizing anywhere in this world about America''"-- Associated Press, 15 August 2011



Under the huge disinterested sky of Big Country
the restlessness since inception, the drifting
the barren pursuit of wealth wrested from Earth
the temporary encampment the beans and coffee
the excavation of the arid lands with abandon
the reduction of natural substance to fossil and pulp
the resistance to permanent settlement
the pick up stakes and go once the money's gone
under the huge disinterested sky





http://brbl-images.library.yale.edu/WAPHOTOIMG/size4/D0189/1064059.jpg

Interior view of mill at Marysville, Montana
: photo by Carleton E. Watkins, 1884, 1885 or 1890 (Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University)

3 comments:

STEPHEN RATCLIFFE said...

Tom,

Can't get the pictures to show up here, but Rick Perry sounds loud and clear ("under the huge disinterested sky"). . . .

8.23

grey whiteness of fog against invisible
ridge, motion of green leaves on branch
in foreground, wave sounding in channel

falls into “oblivion,” that
pause in which “thing”

is in sight, the subject of
thought, say about in

grey white of fog reflected in channel,
shadowed green pine on tip of sandspit

TC said...

Steve,

You have given us pause, amid a day of bedlam building projects going on all around us, by instilling the chilling fear that everything in this modest little post -- EXCEPT, that is, the immortal appeal of the ex pornographer to the moronism of the American Xian masses --

falls into “oblivion,” that
pause in which “thing”

is in sight, the subject of
thought,

but no, no, it cannot be true.

Still mystery lingered until I worked up the nerve to ask someone down the block, who took a look, and said, it all looks good from here, maybe your commenter was just lost in the grey whiteness of fog.

(Another chapter in the great epic of Fun on the Net.)

In any case, while we're here, let me simply, on behalf of Mr. Perry, apologize right here to everybody in this world for absolutely everything.

STEPHEN RATCLIFFE said...

Tom,

Ah! more "grey whiteness of fog" and drizzle, but it's lightening (maybe all is not lost, at least not yet). . . .