[Jim Moonan]

Interesting. I hadn't heard that. She has done good things.

[Jennifer Reeser]

It is the Bob Dylan Effect. Expect to see more of it, on a cultural scale.

J

[Ann Drysdale]

Well, what a lot of words. On this thread I mean, when there are so few in the poor little poem.

Much of the problem seems to be with the word “shit”, which surprises me. Nowadays I hear the word used to mean all manner of other things not remotely connected to excrement. All sorts of random “stuff” are now, collectively, “shit”, just as the verbal constructions “to go” , “to be” and “to be like” are now understood to mean “to say”.

It amuses me that when I listened to the recording of the poem, I could not for the life of me hear the word “shit”. I played it again and again, and could only hear “sit”. What a difference an “h” makes!

Over the past few days I’ve considered the poem on several levels. For many years I went everywhere with pockets full of plastic bags so as to remove my dog’s shit from places where people might step in it. I was saddened by the fact that I was taking the world’s most biodegradable substance, the thing that would, theoretically, feed the future, wrapping it in a non-biodegradable membrane and sending it to landfill. I saw that thought in Yoko’s poem.

I am also guilty of shitting in remote rural places, answering what is universally recognised as a “call of nature”. I have proved experientially that one thing you can’t do at the same time is look up at the sky. You fall over backwards and find yourself in… Then I was reminded of a video I posted on Facebook of a two-year-old Asian boy squatting in perfect balance while he fed a twittering group of birds from a dish with a chopstick. I mentioned that I was amazed at his poise and David Wayne Landrum said “People in the east…. know how to squat. They keep perfect poise and balance doing so and can remain in that posture (which we find so difficult and awkward) for long periods of time”. I had a vision of myself sitting in an airport lounge with Yoko, explaining this, and the pair of us falling about in silly woman-laughing.

That airport kept coming back into my thinking. Odd, since I have only flown less than a handful of times. I realised that it was because of a picture I’d seen of Yoko opening it, standing in front of a line of Lennon’s that forms an epigraph below the name of it. LPL (not ACK, which is Nantucket – see how my mind wanders?)

And if you don’t like “shit”, will “fuck” do? We’re in the process of fucking-up the earth while we look romantically towards the bit we haven’t yet shat on. I am put in mind of Oscar’s gutter, and his stars.

If we are dropping dollops of real shit, we nourish the earth and create a paradise for our children. If we cover it with the sort of shit that our lifestyle creates, we leave them a different kind of legacy.

I’ve got all this headshit from those few maligned lines. Even an echo in the uppidowniness of it, “we look up the sky” and “I sat belonely down a tree”

So many head-adventures from such an ugly little thing. The Japanese are good at that. They even have a poetic form that aims to perfect that concept of multum in parvo. What do they call it…?

[Mark McDonnell]

Maybe it's because I'm on a camping holiday right now, but I read the poem this morning and smiled.

And the music Walter linked to is fantastic. Reminded me of Can. Go Yoko!

[Jennifer Reeser]

"It is a sad truth, but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to things. The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled to use one. It is the only thing he is fit for."

-- Oscar Wilde

[Ann Drysdale]

Aaaaagh! Is it just me...?

[James Brancheau]

Greenfield Morning is interesting-- it's not my thing, but I can certainly understand why it might appeal to some. And I'd certainly never claim that she wasn't an artist, whatever that means. But I'm sorry, this poem, no. You really have to contort yourself in order to justify it, and why bother? As was probably mentioned, if Joe Nobody had written this, it would have never seen the light of day. And rightfully so.

[Aaron Novick]

Originally Posted by Mark McDonnell

Can

Compare anything to Can (the best of bands) and I'll listen to it. The songs Walter posted are good indeed.

[Jim Moonan]

x
Who would have predicted this poem would spark such response? Answer: everyone : )

Aaron N.'s response is by far the most enlightening. If that is the kind of thought this poem provokes then I'm the one who doesn't get it. It is too minimalist in its expression for me to flesh it out and feel it. I admit I am largely talking in the dark on this one, though I do fully understand that her art is attractive to some. I truly wish I did understand her work. I just can't grasp it.

Here's one reason why, I think:

In 1973 I was naive. I was excited to think I could walk into Apple Studios and get an interview with Lennon for my school newspaper about his Mind Games album. I was told by the receptionist that he was "marooned in the U.S." and she gave me an address to write to him and send him my questions. I did that, but never heard back.
I'm still naive. I've tried, with some success, to rid myself of it but it has a hold on me.
So, my hunch is that Ono's art is not for the naive...
x

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Coming back to say I'm listening to Greenfield Morning/I Pushed an Empty Baby Carriage All Over the City and reading comments about it and Ono's impact work. Here's one of the comments:

A brilliant sound picture. The title is taken from a poem Yoko had written about her miscarriage the previous year. To me, the loop of Ringo's drumming is like the wheels of the 'baby carriage' going across the cracks in the sidewalk. Yoko's singing brings to mind the ululating of mourning women in many cultures around the world. Genius.

That helps. The piece reminds me of a sparse Revolution #9 that Lennon pieced together (with the help of Ono) on the Beatles' White Album. I listen to that song as much as any the Beatles produced. I know every nuance of it. The White Album was the album that turned me on to the Beatles' work. I've never been a fan of their early work except for it's formative impact on their later work. Their later work (Revolver and later) is stellar IMO.
x

[Jan D. Hodge]

"...Love has pitched his mansion in
The place of excrement;
For nothing can be sole or whole
That has not been rent."

--W.B. Yeats, "Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop"