Leafing through Leopardi's Zibaldone, Italo Calvino highlights a section which translates as, "...the light of the sun or the moon, seen in a place from which they are invisible and one cannot discern the source of the light; a place only partly illuminated by such light; the reflection of such light, and the various material effects derived from it; the penetration of such light into places where it becomes uncertain and obstructed, and is not easily made out, as through a cane break, in a wood, through half-closed shutters, etc., etc.;" and I have often thought about this (for I have know in for twenty years). And Calvino says Leopardi is asking us to savor the beauty of the vague and indefinite - is this not a persuasive thing? An idea on being open-hearted and open-minded to the possibles of life. And this another thing about being fifty-five, you don't close off to possibilities and ideas and smiles from across a crowded room. Why should we, we still retain the idea that the vague and the indefinite are all stored in the cupboard of possibles - at least that is how I feel about it. The subtlety of vagueness, what an intriguing phrase (which I have just written), perhaps I could incorporate it into a chapter in a book - on Icarus, say, for it intrigues me and while in a academic circles we seek clarity of language and of thought, perhaps the vagaries of vagueness are awaiting instruction on how best to be expressed - hmm. And then there is clarity and I have always been partial to Gary Snyder for that very reason and so why not, if I were in a country mood might read this:I went into the Maverick Bar
In Farmington, New Mexico.
And drank double shots of bourbon
backed with beer.
My long hair was tucked up under a cap
I’d left the earring in the car.
Two cowboys did horseplay
by the pool tables,
A waitress asked us
where are you from?
a country-and-western band began to play
“We don’t smoke Marijuana in Muskokie”
And with the next song,
a couple began to dance.
They held each other like in High School dances
in the fifties;
I recalled when I worked in the woods
and the bars of Madras, Oregon.
That short-haired joy and roughness—
America—your stupidity.
I could almost love you again.
We left—onto the freeway shoulders—
under the tough old stars—
In the shadow of bluffs
I came back to myself,
To the real work, to
“What is to be done.”
And then what music can we get to accompany vagueness and clarity - the wonderful Prefabulous Sprouts, why not let the stars go free, we will still see the light in a place from which they are invisible, will we not:
