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Ginsberg Had Pisces

March 16th, 2011 @ 8:00 am by Nota

Hopefully Coherent Ramblings

This was post the House on Fry St. Era. Chris and I had moved into a small brick apartment building one street over.

I befriended one of our Indian neighbors. His name was Harsh which he said meant happiness. “I know, I know, that is like the opposite of happiness, Whoa, Harsh! But I assure you, it means happiness.”

Harsh had a 10th house Leo Sun/Cancer Moon combo and was into rock climbing. He frequently tried to coerce me into joining him at the rock climbing gym

One afternoon Harsh came knocking at the door, not an unusual occurrence. But this time, instead of wanting to hang out and practice guitar, he had a question. “What do you know about poetry?”

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

“No, that won’t be necessary. I need to select a poem for my American Poetry class.”

“American Poetry, eh? Well let’s see what we got.”

I went to the shelf and pulled down some Frost, some Whitman, Dickenson and even ee cummings. A little William Carlos Williams. Nothing was really making an impact. Then I spied my Viking Portable Beat reader jammed in sideways on the top shelf. The one with no cover because the dog ate it.

I pulled it down and allowed the crack in the spine to open to “Howl.” I asked Harsh if he had ever heard of Allen Ginsberg. He said “no.” So I read aloud to him.

Right around “the last gyzym of consciousness” He threw his hands up and chanted “whoa, whoa, whoa.”

“What is it Harsh?”

“This person…” He swallowed hard and made an unforgiving face “…is a person with NO boundaries!”

“Do you want to read something else then?”

“Yes, please, very much so.”

According to astrotheme, Ginsberg had Pisces rising, Mars and Moon in the 12th. Plus Neptune square Saturn. It was all just a little too nebulous for Harsh’s 10th house sensibilities to handle.

What pushes your boundaries? And/Or Do you have a favorite American poet?

Consult with Nota about whatever.

Or just follow her on Twitter.

Astrology, 10th-house, boundaries, Ginsberg, Harsh, Neptune, Pisces, poetry, ramblings, Saturn, 13 comments | Posted at 8:00 am

13 Responses to “Ginsberg Had Pisces”

spacerockz

my college ex introduced me to the Beatniks..

Ginsberg
Cassidy
Kerouac
Burroughs

good shit

3/16/11 @ 8:27 am (reply)

spacerockz

come to think of it I’ve learned a lot about the Arts through very close Libra’s -being Venus ruled, beauty IS in the eye of the beholder

3/16/11 @ 8:30 am (reply)

Josi

Whitman, Poe, Jesse Stuart, Twain, Sandburg, Maya Angelou, Cather,
Longfellow, Erioa Jong, Alcott
that’s the top ten.

What are these boundary things that you speak of?

3/16/11 @ 8:44 am (reply)

Kashmiri

What pushes my boundaries is when I’m trying to explain myself, and the other person says “Oh, is it ________? Are you ___________?”
I have a friend who does this and it drives me mental. It feels like putting words in my mouth. Why not just ask a direct question, like “How DO you feel?”
I want to say, can’t I be trusted to name my own experience, with the words I choose?

I’m sensitive today, sorry!

We Real Cool by Gwendolyn Brooks

We real cool. We
Left School. We

Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We

Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We

Jazz June. We
Die soon.

3/16/11 @ 9:29 am (reply)

Kashmiri

Gwendolyn Brooks was a Virgo ASC with Moon in Capricorn. Her 8th House Mars/Mercury in Taurus trined her ASC.

Her Chiron was 29 degrees Pisces. Hmmmmm….

3/16/11 @ 9:32 am (reply)

venusflytrap

mary oliver, denise levertov, ws merwin, louise gluck, wcw, not sure if they’re American though! I like the ginsberg poem “my sad self”

3/16/11 @ 9:57 am (reply)

CP Griffin

heh-I love how you’ve captured this exchange, N.

Ginsberg makes me squidgy, too. I can appreciate his poetry, but don’t much like it or seek it out.

Bukowski, otoh, makes me squidgy in all the ways that have real resonance for me…go figure.

I don’t see Collins here yet, either. “Litany” is such a masterful poem. His insertion of…(ok..I’ll stop w the deep dive right there!)

3/16/11 @ 11:45 am (reply)

lolo

@CP: yeah, it was perfectly rambled, Nota. ; )

Sexton
Hughes
Rumi

I dig Bukowski’s longer reads. Man. What a misogonyst. I suppose that’s my Libra moon who can at once be shy to it but also appreciate his sense of timing.

3/16/11 @ 2:59 pm (reply)

Anna in Canada

I met Bukowski when I was still very new to publishing. He showed up drunk for a reading in Vancouver back in 1979 or 1980 and proceeded to read a piece involving sex with a lap dog but the crowd loved him. Over 500 people came out to his reading if you can believe that. I met him early in the evening when he was still quite charming but by the end of the night, he could barely stand and was referring to every woman in sight as “Maria.” And not in a nice way…

3/16/11 @ 4:34 pm (reply)

10.

Anna in Canada

I’m a Ted Huges fan myself and met him on one of his many trips to the west coast. He was so modest, so quiet, but an avid sports fisherman.

3/16/11 @ 4:35 pm (reply)

11.

CP Griffin

Oh yes, AiC. Hughes has such a gift. His poems never leave you.
Sometimes when I am with my Papa, snatches of “Old Age Gets Up” fly into my head and I have to excuse and compose myself.

Bukowski-Yeah about the women-and so much else, right?…and then, reading “An Almost Made Up Poem”, these glimpses of an unabashedly f*cked up, conflicted man…of fragmented love…

There’s a Main Board thread tickling at me here. Will see if something comes of it.

How I do love poetry…thank you muchly, Nota.

3/16/11 @ 10:44 pm (reply)

12.

Anna in Canada

CP, a colleague read Hughes’ Old Age Gets Up at a memorial service last week. It was the first time I had heard this poem–loved it. Along the same lines is Aubade by Philip Larkin. I had this poem taped to my fridge for about a month until my son complained that his teenage buddies “were getting freaked out” by the message. “Well, they shouldn’t be mooching in my kitchen, should they?” LOL.

3/17/11 @ 10:48 am (reply)

13.