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Dear Zazie, Today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag to his muse.  You can visit us on Twitter at @cowboycoleridge.  Are you in a serious and studious mood?  Ciao, Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2021 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

so much for that
just as well one presumes
right, one has to otherwise
there would be no way
to get a grip on the reins
which is what matters
what this is all about
for the pathway down
and never comin’ back
is losin’ one’s hold,
one’s sense of meanin’

that is what i tell myself

here in neverland

© copyright 2020.2023 mac tag/cowboycoleridge all rights reserved

understand what is meant
either written or sung
the purpose bein’ here,
rapturous, together
closer now, the room
full with the smell
of incense and aural
confirmation of two
goin’ somewhere
believers who never
settle for ordinary

the music plays on
till we wake

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

dreamin’ now
of the never land
as is often the case,
perhaps too

-of course,
in a serious
and studious mood-

night on the High Plains
the windows open
a whisper of wind,
for a change,
writin’ verse for you
hopin’ you will come

do you know
“Yes I know.”

i understand
has somethin’
to do
with the riddle
of my raisin’
i could never
get the hang
of the thing
my cry
never became

to live with…

i dream on and on
till i wake up

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge

Only two topics of interest…

Love and the dead
Love or the lack thereof

this goes both ways
the closer you git
the less you know
the less understood
die young or ride away

© copyright 2016 Mac tag all rights reserved

 

Today is the birthday of J. M. Barrie (James Matthew Barrie; Kirriemuir, Scotland 9 May 1860 – 19 June 1937 London); novelist and playwright, perhaps best remembered today as the creator of Peter Pan.  He was born and educated in Scotland but moved to London, where he wrote a number of successful novels and plays.  There he met the Llewelyn Davies boys, who inspired him to write about a baby boy who has magical adventures in Kensington Gardens (included in The Little White Bird), then to write Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up, a “fairy play” about an ageless boy and an ordinary girl named Wendy who have adventures in the fantasy setting of Neverland.

Barrie became acquainted with actress Mary Ansell in 1891, when he asked his friend Jerome K. Jerome for a pretty actress to play a role in his play Walker, London. The two became friends, and she helped his family to care for him when he fell very ill in 1893 and 1894.  They married in Kirriemuir on 9 July 1894, shortly after Barrie recovered, and Mary retired from the stage. The wedding was a small ceremony in his parents’ home, in the Scottish tradition. The relationship was reportedly unconsummated, and the couple had no children.

Here is an excerpt from the play;

We are dreaming now of the Never Land a year later. It is bed-time on the island, and the blind goes up to the whispers of the lovely Never music. The blue haze that makes the wood below magical by day comes up to the tree-tops to sleep, and through it we see numberless nests all lit up, fairies and birds quarrelling for possession, others flying around just for the fun of the thing and perhaps making bets about where the little house will appear to-night. It always comes and snuggles on some tree-top, but you can never be sure which; here it is again, you see John’s hat first as up comes the house so softly that it knocks some gossips off their perch. When it has settled comfortably it lights up, and out come Peter and Wendy.

Wendy looks a little older, but Peter is just the same. She is cloaked for a journey, and a sad confession must be made about her; she flies so badly now that she has to use a broomstick.

WENDY (who knows better this time than to be demonstrative at partings). Well, good-bye, Peter; and remember not to bite your nails.

PETER. Good-bye, Wendy.

WENDY. I’ll tell mother all about the spring cleaning and the house.

PETER (who sometimes forgets that she has been here before). You do like the house?

WENDY. Of course it is small. But most people of our size wouldn’t have a house at all. (She should not have mentioned size, for he has already expressed displeasure at her growth. Another thing, one he has scarcely noticed, though it disturbs her, is that she does not see him quite so clearly now as she used to do.) When you come for me next year, Peter—you will come, won’t you?

PETER. Yes. (Gloating) To hear stories about me!

WENDY. It is so queer that the stories you like best should be the ones about yourself.

PETER (touchy). Well, then?

WENDY. Fancy your forgetting the lost boys, and even Captain Hook!

PETER. Well, then?

WENDY. I haven’t seen Tink this time.

PETER. Who?

WENDY. Oh dear! I suppose it is because you have so many adventures.

PETER (relieved). ‘Course it is.

WENDY. If another little girl—if one younger than I am—(She can’t go on.) Oh, Peter, how I wish I could take you up and squdge you! (He draws back.) Yes, I know. (She gets astride her broomstick.) Home! (It carries her from him over the tree-tops.

In a sort of way he understands what she means by ‘Yes, I know,’ but in most sorts of ways he doesn’t. It has something to do with the riddle of his being. If he could get the hang of the thing his cry might become ‘To live would be an awfully big adventure!’ but he can never quite get the hang of it, and so no one is as gay as he. With rapturous face he produces his pipes, and the Never birds and the fairies gather closer, till the roof of the little house is so thick with his admirers that some of them fall down the chimney. He plays on and on till we wake up.)

Today is the birthday of Ralph Goings (Corning, California May 9, 1928 – September 4, 2016 Sacramento); painter closely associated with the Photorealism movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was best known for his highly detailed paintings of hamburger stands, pick-up trucks, and California banks, portrayed in a deliberately objective manner.

Gallery

On this day In 1958 the film Vertigo has its world premiere in San Francisco.  Vertigo is a psychological thriller film directed and produced by Alfred Hitchcock.  The story was based on the 1954 novel D’entre les morts (From Among the Dead) by Boileau-Narcejac.  The screenplay was written by Alec Coppel and Samuel A. Taylor.  The film stars James Stewart as former police detective John “Scottie” Ferguson.  Scottie is forced into early retirement after an incident in the line of duty has caused him to develop acrophobia, an extreme fear of heights, and vertigo, a sensation of false, rotational movement.  Scottie is hired by an acquaintance, Gavin Elster, as a private investigator to follow Gavin’s wife Madeleine (Kim Novak), who he says has been behaving strangely.  The film was shot on location in San Francisco, California.  One of my all-time favorite movies.  Love, suspense, Jimmy and Kim; this movie has it all.  Selected dialogue from Vertigo:

Scottie: Don’t you think it’s a waste, to wander separately?

Madeleine: Only one is a wanderer. Two together are always going somewhere.

Scottie: No, I don’t think that’s necessarily true.

---

Scottie: Madeleine, Madeleine where are you now?

Madeleine: Here with you.

Scottie: Where?

Madeleine: Tall trees.

Scottie: Have you been here before?

Madeleine: Yes.

Scottie: When? When? When were you born?

Madeleine: Long ago.

Scottie: Where? When? Tell me. Madeleine, tell me!

Madeleine: [shaking her head back and forth] No.

Scottie: Madeleine, tell me where? Where do you go? What takes you away? When you jumped into the bay, you didn’t know where you were. You guessed but you didn’t know.

Madeleine: I didn’t jump, I didn’t jump, I fell, you told me I fell.

Scottie: Why did you jump? Why did you jump?

Madeleine: Oh I can’t tell you.

Scottie: Why did you jump? What was there inside that told you to jump?

Madeleine: No please. Please.

Scottie: What? What?

Madeleine: Please don’t ask me. Please don’t ask me. Get me away from here.

Scottie: Shall I take you home?

Madeleine: Somewhere in the light. Promise me something? Promise you won’t ask me again? Please promise me that.

---

Madeleine: Why did you run?

Scottie: Well, I’m responsible for you now. You know, the Chinese say that once you’ve saved a person’s life, you’re responsible for it forever. So, I’m committed. I have to know.

Madeleine: There’s so little that I know.

---

Madeleine: It’s as though I-I were walking down a long corridor that once was mirrored. And fragments of that mirror still hang there. And when I come to the end of the corridor, there’s nothing but darkness. And I know that when I walk into the darkness, that I’ll die. I’ve never come to the end. I’ve always come back before then, except once.

Scottie: Yesterday? [She nods agreement.] And you didn’t know. You didn’t know what happened till you found yourself in the…you didn’t know where you were. But the small scenes, the fragments of the mirror, do you remember those?

Madeleine: Vaguely.

Scottie: What do you remember?

Madeleine: There’s a room and I sit there alone, always alone.

Scottie: What else?

Madeleine: A grave.

Scottie: Where?

Madeleine: I don’t know. It’s an open grave, and I, I stand by the gravestone looking down into it. It’s my grave.

Scottie: But how do you know?

Madeleine: I know.

Scottie: Is there a name on the gravestone?

Madeleine: No. It’s new and clean and waiting.

---

Madeleine: There’s a tower and a bell and a garden below. It seems to be in Spain, a village in Spain, it clicks off, it’s gone.

Scottie: A portrait. Do you see a portrait?

Madeleine: No.

Scottie: If I could just find the key, the beginning and put it together…

Madeleine: …to explain it away? There is a way to explain it you see. If I’m mad, that would explain it, wouldn’t it?

…

Madeleine: Oh Scottie. I’m not mad. I’m not mad. I don’t want to die. There’s someone within me and she says I must die. Oh Scottie, don’t let me go.

Scottie: I’m here. I’ve got you.

Madeleine: I’m so afraid. [They kiss] Don’t leave me. Stay with me.

Scottie: All the time.

---

Madeleine: [describing her dream] It was so very clear for the first time, all of it…It was a village square in a green with trees and an old white-washed Spanish church with a cloister. Across the green, there was a big gray wooden house with a porch and shutters and a balcony above, a small garden, and next to it a livery stable with old carriages lined up inside…At the end of the green, there was a white-washed stone house with a lovely pepper tree at the corner…

Scottie: And an old wooden hotel from the old California days? And a saloon, dark, low ceilings, with hanging oil lamps?

Madeleine: Yes.

Scottie: It’s all there. It’s no dream. You’ve been there before. You’ve seen it.

Madeleine: No never!

---

Scottie: Madeleine, where are you now?

Madeleine: Here with you.

Scottie: And it’s all real. It’s not merely as it was 100 years ago, or a year ago, or six months ago, or whenever it was you were here to see it. Now, Madeleine, think of when you were here.

---

Scottie: I love you, Madeleine.

Madeleine: I love you too. It’s too late.

Scottie: No, no, we’re together.

Madeleine: It’s too late, there’s something I must do.

Scottie: No, there is nothing you must do. There is nothing you must do. No one possesses you. You’re safe with me.

Madeleine: No, it’s too late.

…

Madeleine: Look, it’s not fair. It’s too late. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. It shouldn’t have happened.

Scottie: But it had to happen. We’re in love. That’s all that counts.

Madeleine: Look. Let me go. Please let me go.

Scottie: Listen to me. Listen to me.

Madeleine: You believe I love you?

Scottie: Yes.

Madeleine: And if you lose me, then you’ll know I, I loved you. And I wanted to go on loving you.

Scottie: I won’t lose you.

Madeleine: Let me go into the church – alone.

Scottie: Why?

Judy: Why are you doing this? What, what good will it do?

Scottie: I don’t know. I don’t know. No good, I guess, I don’t know.

Judy: I wish you’d leave me alone. I want to go away.

Scottie: You can, you know.

Judy: No, you wouldn’t let me. And I don’t want to go.

Scottie: Judy, Judy, I’ll tell you this. These past few days have been the first happy days I’ve known in a year.

Judy: I know. I know because, ’cause I remind you of her and not even that very much.

Scottie: No, no Judy, Judy, it’s you, too. There’s something in you…

Judy: You don’t even want to touch me.

Scottie: Yes. Yes, I do.

Judy: Couldn’t you like me, just me the way I am? When we first started out, it was so good. We had fun. And then you started in on the clothes. Well, I’ll wear the darn clothes if you want me to – if-if you’ll just, just like me.

Scottie: I made it. I made it. So this is where it happened. The two of you hid back there and waited for it to clear, and then you sneaked down and drove into town, is that it? And then, you were his girl, huh? Well, what happened to ya? What happened to ya? Did he ditch ya? Oh Judy, with all of his wife’s money and all that freedom and that power and he ditched you. What a shame! But he knew he was safe. He knew you couldn’t talk. Did he give you anything?

Judy: Money.

Scottie: And the necklace, Carlotta’s necklace, there was where you made your mistake, Judy. You shouldn’t keep souvenirs of a killing. You shouldn’t have been, you shouldn’t have been that sentimental. I loved you so, Madeleine!

Judy: I was safe when you found me. There was nothing that you could prove. When I saw you again, I couldn’t run away. I loved you so. I walked into danger, let you change me because I loved you and I wanted you. Oh, Scottie, oh Scottie please. You love me. Please keep me safe, please…

Scottie: It’s too late. It’s too late.

Random Quotes:

I am still of opinion that only two topics can be of the least interest to a serious and studious mood – sex and the dead.

– WB Yeats

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,

And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;

And I will luve thee still, my dear,

While the sands o’ life shall run.

Robert Burns

To pity those that know her not

Is helped by the regret

That those who know her, know her less

The nearer her they get.

Emily Dickinson

As for Dickinson; this goes both ways.  I know you felt like the closer you got to me the less you knew me.  Ed Bruce wrote it and Willie sang it best; “If you don’t understand him and he don’t die young, he’ll probably just ride away.”

I agree with Yeats and I like to think that I am of a serious and studious mind, yet I just do not have the strength to go their yet.

So I will close with a nod to Burns, one of my favorite Scots:

Lovin’ thee still, my dear

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cowboy coleridge, ed bruce, j m barrie, Love, love letter, muse, robert burns, scots, the lovers almanac, the lovers chronicle, vertigo, wb yeats, willie nelson