May Seventeenth

Would I had someone to wed this day

Too long in coming for my life’s pure love,

Snatched by fate and death from me

With nothing to keep my hope

And body from the winds of fortune,

Which too easily severed the tie we made.

Too long in coming to stay those fickle hearts

Left so free that whim could wreak

Destruction of a life and home.

Too long coming to give me future peace

Though I kept my bargains with care and toil

Loyal, faithful, beyond all calling, tending the

Heart and garden of my lovers’ lives,

Seeing in their happiness my own.

Now the parade of ghosts marches through my past;

Would wedded one of them have stayed at last? 

May 17,2004

The Mad Genius

Today is the birthday of  Aramis Guisasola Valverde, "The Mad Genius." 

 TEARS

For Aramis Valverde 

March, 2002

Tears well up, from within, when the shaking of 

emotion creates waves of turmoil

on the placid sea of our souls.

They come from pain, from hurt, from the storms of love.

They come from loneliness, from loss and 

from grief

They come from fear,  from apprehension and from confusion.

But they can also come from thanks for a simple 

gesture of humanity,

And they come when a ray of hope breaks through the clouds of desperate times,

And they can also come from relief, as the 

last winds dissipate

and the storm gives way to the clarity of a 

star filled sky.

Mike Scanlon

Moments Musicaux: AH!

Is it only for myself that the currents of coincidence play to an appropriate score, usually provided by WGBH, Emmanuel Music, in some very dramatic cases the car radio- and in one perfectly absurd case the ring tone of a perfect stranger's cell phone!? I started this blog this week to honor the anniversary of the passing of the "Mad Genius" and today we had Buxtehude: for the prelude; for the cantata (Kommst du, kommst du, Licht der Heiden?) and for the Postlude; Praeludium in G minor. the connection with the Mad Genius is that he was a passionate advocate of the idea that everything of value in Bach was inspired by Buxtehude. I can't speak to that, only for his love of Buxtehude. The music was sublime. Thanks to Nancy Granert our organist and Emmanuel music.

I particularly enjoy the intimacy with the musicians in this setting, the closeness as they process by my seat and their clear sense of prayer through their music.

The Buxtehude Cantata starts with a quintet for strings. After the first bars I heard from behind me a joyous AHHHHH! the intonation was so sweet and the sound so true. 

My thanks to Emmanuel Music.

Here I am again- on my own

Greetings, is it not customary to introduce and explain oneself when entering the "Blogosphere?" For me the former is much easier than the later! 

This is not my first appearance here, though it is my first effort at producing my own blog, and to introduce myself, and explain the allusion contained in this title, I refer to an earlier blog that had not a little popularity, called Lucubrations of a Mad Genius. The "Mad Genius" was my much lamented partner Aramis and I am Michael about whom he spoke so frequently. I am afraid that since his passing 5 years ago this week I have been a guest of Job in the land of Utz, but have decided to try and write my way out of that strange place.

Here are some things I would like you to know about me:

As did the Mad Genius, I live in Boston MA.

I am a man "of a certain age" and was not taught to type in school. That was the time before computers and even hand held calculators. Whoever would have thought...........

The consequence is that you may expect entries to appear at a rather sluggish pace.

I am, as you might guess from the other "Lucubrations" I am a very "Out" homosexualist (and a snide grammarian.) The case is more accurately described as society never succeeding in putting me "In" that particular closet; and I have a very interesting case of AIDS. I warn you in advance that I will speak on those topics; how could I not? To do otherwise would rob me of integrity and you of many funny stories. But fear not, these circumstances are not in any way oppressive to me. please trust that I view them with interest and joy, and hope you can do the same.

A closet I have been in for may years is the closet that contains the "Unchurched." Matters of the spirit and my relationship with the eternal have for me been always very pressing and serious, but as so often happens my meditations have tended more to drive me away from rather than toward churches. Alas I keep trying and keep feeling like a "Stranger from a strange land." But just recently I have found a church which is quite happy to welcome such strangers. Emmanuel Church in Boston is a subject I will share with you.

I am a man of many interests: the visual arts; architecture and design; literature and poetry, and science as it bears on the above and on the affairs of the spirit. The mad genius has mentioned my poetry- you will see some of it shortly.

I also collect aphorisms:

"Art without science is nothing"  L.B.Alberti

Interesting, no? It actually explain a lot about me!

I am endlessly fascinated by my fellow man. I do not watch television, and will tell you that folks often react negatively and even aggressively when I tell them that. I say sometimes that I abstain as a courtesy to my friends- it allows me to entertain the fantasy that everything they say is original; but the real reason is that there is nothing on T.V. that is half as amusing as life. You will hear about this in my "Comedy of manners"

I must tell you that I have my personal "Historia Calamitatem" (the spell check dislikes latin!) It occured in 2006, and is still a very difficult thing for me to speak of. As a result of confusion about whether I owned a building in town (I didn't) where the police claimed to find a "Meth Lab" (they were wrong) my house was was destroyed and I was jailed. It took a year to sort that out. I bring this up just after speaking of the "comedy of manners" because as terrifying as the experience was what I saw and experienced has changed me in such fundamental ways that it can not be ignored, and frankly is the source of some really hysterical stories, which I could not tell if you didn't know this!

Friends ask how I have survived the years since Aramis's passing. My answer concerns the two great gifts I have been given- a clean conscience and a very perverse sense of humor; they will take you far in dealing with adversity.

It is my hope and my intention to amuse you all, and while some of my subjects will be serious you will find my take on them to be interesting at least, usually ironic, if not sardonic. But then, it was not for nothing that the mad Genius and I shared so much!

Before proceeding I have a debt of honor to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center to address. It is my response to the "eye on the BI" advertisements that are appearing around town. Not my most amusing post, but honor calls- and those who remember "The Mad Genuis" will learn a little of his end.

Blogspot still keeps some of "Lucubrations of a mad genius" up, and I have it all on my hard drive, so we may return to parts of it from time to time. He will be as present in my blog as I was in his.