Howling Into the Night
"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning from the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollowed-out and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz..."
And so begins Allen Ginsberg's epic poem Howl. I've had a few beat-like nights in my day. It is certainly not a perfect answer to the challenges of life, but it is an answer. Howl describes that desperate and exciting life, the horror and the ecstasy that is possible when you go down that counterculture road. It is not hopeful; it is a poet shining the light on a type of life, a dark life, a type of life that he himself lived and described unflinchingly. It is a life that I perhaps wisely saw as a path to ditches and homelessness, or perhaps it was a path that I never quite had the courage to commit to fully.
It is a part of America that most want to bury in a deep hole and deny that it could possibly happen. There are some who want to celebrate that life and deny the insanity and filth that inevitably comes with it. I will argue, however, that the Beats, Ginsberg, and his comrades are imperfect warriors for freedom. They yearned for and even lived a life that was more free than what they saw as their choices in 1950s and 1960s America. Many of them failed, becoming slaves to the drugs, or their insanity, or the penal system due to their choices that were made without the demands of ancient moral codes. But they were the men and women who saw that much was possible, even if they took that knowledge down the path of destruction.
They are an example of rebellion, perhaps a failed rebellion, but a rebellion that does expand just what the fuck is possible in this world. I do not say live the life the Beats. That was tried more than 50 years ago with questionable success, but I do say pay attention to them, listen to them. Learn from their mistakes. Accept their filth and their occasional brilliance, for it is not the path of salvation, but one of many paths that us free men may take, if only for a night.
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning from the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollowed-out and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz..."
And so begins Allen Ginsberg's epic poem Howl. I've had a few beat-like nights in my day. It is certainly not a perfect answer to the challenges of life, but it is an answer. Howl describes that desperate and exciting life, the horror and the ecstasy that is possible when you go down that counterculture road. It is not hopeful; it is a poet shining the light on a type of life, a dark life, a type of life that he himself lived and described unflinchingly. It is a life that I perhaps wisely saw as a path to ditches and homelessness, or perhaps it was a path that I never quite had the courage to commit to fully.
It is a part of America that most want to bury in a deep hole and deny that it could possibly happen. There are some who want to celebrate that life and deny the insanity and filth that inevitably comes with it. I will argue, however, that the Beats, Ginsberg, and his comrades are imperfect warriors for freedom. They yearned for and even lived a life that was more free than what they saw as their choices in 1950s and 1960s America. Many of them failed, becoming slaves to the drugs, or their insanity, or the penal system due to their choices that were made without the demands of ancient moral codes. But they were the men and women who saw that much was possible, even if they took that knowledge down the path of destruction.
They are an example of rebellion, perhaps a failed rebellion, but a rebellion that does expand just what the fuck is possible in this world. I do not say live the life the Beats. That was tried more than 50 years ago with questionable success, but I do say pay attention to them, listen to them. Learn from their mistakes. Accept their filth and their occasional brilliance, for it is not the path of salvation, but one of many paths that us free men may take, if only for a night.
posted by Warrior Poet at 12:47 PM
2 Comments:
Having the adventurous spirit in order to stray from the conventional path to look over the edge of the cliff is a grand view... But, then only a fool would jump off the cliff into the Grand Canyon. Meandering off of the path gives one a full look at this life and bestows wisdom, rather than blind ignorance. Use the wisdom to pass it on to others as they should respect their elders... --Keef
Respect the elders, indeed.
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