I have been thinking about P. Larkin's "Church-Going" off and on for months. I think it's the sight on the news of many formerly sacred places in Iraq decimated + Katrina + (bizarrely) home and garden shows that feature old banks and churches rezoned for living spaces. So weird. This constant imagery of places stripped of their sanctity. I woke this morning with the last chunk of the poem in my head:

A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognised, and robed as destinies.
And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round


Prediction: Sometime not too long from now somebody will write an essay about how Erma Bombeck affected literature, the graphic novel and journalism. She was a significantly transitional person, with no overt connections to something like comix, but I think they're there. I rilly do! I had one of those blinding flashes where the whole sphere of influence became clear, then disappeared. Still grabbling for it.

Fox News gets away with its baiting headlines by using the question mark. Former President Clinton a Coke-Addicted He-Slut? Dept of Defense Says Fewer Dying in Iraq?

Why yes, I did watch Bridget Jones's's's's's Diary on Bravo last night. The only line that really twerks is ever Hugh Grant saying through his cigarette, "Fuck me, I love Keats" after BJ misquotes it.

It occurs to me that it's amazing I haven't done more Larkin-quoting here, since it's a fairly constant activitiy in my head. Must be judicious.