Rhapsody #109 – Entropy and Disorder

On By Swarn GillIn Prose and Poetry

Recently I wonder,
Why don’t more of us just spend our days crying?
I’m just so tired of being outraged,
But the things people do to each other.
It’s enough to really make you question: What’s it all for?

I’m also tired, of being tired.
But what right do I have to complain?

The very essence of life is survive,
And there are some strong people out there,
Who have been at the receiving end
Of senseless and unimaginable cruelty,
And there is a toughness there that often goes unnoticed
The toughness to choose to stand on this Earth another day
To try and move through each moment
While painful memories gnaw at them
Trying to drag them back down into a hole of despair.

And people have the gall to criticize safe spaces,
You can’t really know what another person’s been through,
Yeah you may be tougher, but so what,
Life isn’t all about toughness,
Toughness is just the cost of life,
It ain’t none of the flavor.
And everybody…I mean everybody has their safe spaces
Just for some people their safe space is in their head,
Manifesting into a black and white world,
Full of a few simple rules that will keep them alive,
Those rules are the fiction they cling to,
Just to feel safe while they rail angrily at everybody,

Word to the wise,
None of us are safe.

The only real rules are in physics,
And it’s like a chess board.
The set up looks ordered and tidy,
But the universe isn’t the set up, it’s the game.
We don’t know how the game will play out,
And it might amaze you to know,
There are more possible moves in a game of chess,
Than electrons in the universe,
And somehow the universe has chess in it.

One thing makes me feel better and also worries me,
Is that from the perspective of the universe we are all idiots
The universe is behaving exactly as it should
We are too,
There are so many mysteries about us to discover
And the universe has us in it
So many people think they understand
The nature of the universe
The nature of us
What happened to humility?

You may think now that this should all come back to a single unifying point,
So that the strands of what I said could clump together,
Maybe a hammer that swings down and crushes life.
But that’s not this universe.
The last time we were one thing,
The last time we were all the same,
Somewhere in the neighborhood of 14 billion years
We were hurled off into space and change began
Branching into smaller and smaller strands,
Moment by moment,
And we’re all unique and we’re all beautiful
We’re all kinds of freaks of nature,
And that’s how we’re all equal
And maybe accepting and loving that thought,
Is all we can really hope for.

And then I ask myself,
Is all this self-indulgent pondering of the grandeur of the universe,
Just a way to make myself feel better?
Maybe it keeps me strong to take on the world,
Maybe it’s my safe space
But if we all have a safe space
The best we can do is try to move that space
Into something, bigger and more elastic
With lots of blurred edges
Because learning never stops
And change, is our only certainty

30 thoughts on “Rhapsody #109 – Entropy and Disorder”

  2. Love that last paragraph too. I immediately thought of this song ‘I’m Only Human’ which goes well with the piece I think. The video is an interesting one, it reminds me of the famous Godley and Creme one ‘Cry’ one the best early videos made and just as good today.

    – Esme enjoying Swarns pondering upon the Cloud

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    1. Thank you Esme! And amazingly fitting song and yes a great video, definitely reminiscent of Godley and Creme there. It should be no surprise that the Godley and Creme is a source of mutual appreciate. Still one of my favorites from the 80s. One hit wonders can be gems!

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  3. You mention safe spaces and say, rightly, that those spaces are in our heads (multiple meanings there). As a retired teacher I recall being required to create a “safe learning environment.” This was not a “safe space.” We were not talking about being able to handle suicide bombers or anarchists bombs or mass shootings, that kind of safe, what we were to do is create a mental space in which students felt comfortable sharing what they thought and felt, without being attacked unfairly by their class mates or professors. This promoted people being able to air out their thinking so that they could see whether it holds up.

    Many of these concepts have been distorted to the point that Steve Martin’s music video is now being described as racist. (The racism claim wasn’t expected, I was expecting cultural appropriation.) I suspect reality will eventually smack down this nonsense, but you never know.

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    1. Thanks Steve. I agree. I think being honest with what you are feeling and thinking is extremely important. I think that is a much better “safe space”. But I was more addressing the kind of triggers that people have as a result of trauma. It is also helpful in certain situations to just have a space where you can feel safe. It shouldn’t be a crutch, but sometimes we all need a break from the anxiety that trauma can induce. But I think all of us attempt to try and be safe. Some ways are healthier than others.

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  4. With a background and experience in clinical Psych/A&D therapy Swarn, for myself included during any and all of my own personal traumas, the healthy AND unhealthy reactions are typically centered around “control.” Trying to find some sort of control over life, those around us, and sometimes over ourselves.

    It’s funny that in the end and during MY own searches for regaining control of circumstances directly effecting me, I eventually reached the conclusion and realization — with the help of others and sound science — that I can NEVER completely control anything outside of my mind and body! And even THAT conclusion is somewhat erroneous. On a biological cellular level, I could be struck by some terminal disease, cancer, or tumor and STILL not have full control of the circumstance, duration, or outcome. HAH! Once I came to that realization, then I was free to live life more fully, as best I could and for others. 🙂 ❤

    This was a provocative, stimulating post Swarn. Thank you.

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          3. As previously stated many a time, Esme is wicked and you take your chances – *holds up a huge magnifying glass to the small print embossed upon the side of the Cloud.*

            – Esme Cloud just finishing wrapping a litre of Jack Daniels for Hariod for Christmas to keep his antics as entertaining as possible.

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    2. Sorry I somehow missed this comment. Professor. Thank you for the kind words and excellent thoughts. I agree with you in that I think one the most important journeys we have to take in this life is to figure out what are the things that we can and cannot control. It’s a painful lesson at times. Stress tends to disappear and you feel more in control, knowing what you can’t control.

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  6. ” . . . there are more possible moves in a game of chess than there are electrons in the universe . . .” I never knew that; it’s mind-boggling, isn’t it? And Donald Trump plays three-dimensional chess, he says — holy shit! Hey Swarn, sorry I’ve not been around for a while old bean but I’ve been rather bogged down in other things. Hope you are well brother. H ❤

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    1. Wonderful to see you back Hariod! Esme had mentioned you were doing a lot of writing. I have been errant as well because I had wanted to e-mail you and let you know that I did read The Third Policeman on your recommendation. I am not sure how to describe the experience. It was a book that I could not put down, yet at the same time it was frustrating, which makes it perfect because it was really all supposed to be that way. Hellish. All in all it was a worthwhile trip to hell I guess. LOL The prose was wonderful.

      And yes it is mind-boggling…both Trump and that fact about Chess! lol I’ve been rather bogged down too since I became department chair this semester. As you can see posting have been sparser. Christmas break is soon though!

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      1. Thanks Swarn. It sounds as if The Third Policeman was a bit of a mixed bag for you, which I quite understand as it is that way for many others too. There’s a wry and covert humour in there that may not click beyond these islands, and as a classic Irish allegory of the absurd alone it probably doesn’t offer enough. Rather embarrassingly, I’ve only recently begun reading Virginia Woolf, and am finding it a revelation; so poetic and lyrical, with quite exquisite imagery and razor-sharp insight into the human condition. Congratulations on your new appointment! All best wishes to you and yours, Hariod.

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        1. Thanks Hariod! I wouldn’t even call it a mixed bag, in the sense that I think it evoked the emotions it was meant to evoke. Like I said, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. I think, like the main character in the book, I assumed it was heading in a different direction instead of looping back around. lol Let’s just put it this way…I was a well written book, and I am genuinely glad to have read it, as it is a very unique story. I would actually recommend it to others who like good writing.

          I was just thinking the other day that there are some classic authors I would like to get more familiar with. Twain and Woolf were two I was thinking about. I have not read any of their works other than a couple of essays.

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          1. Okay, Woolf’s essays are beautifully crafted, powerfully expressed, and of course are insightful, though they give absolutely no indication of the poetic sensibility Woolf exhibits in her fiction — such as, say, in Mrs Dalloway. Being a poet yourself I feel certain you’d appreciate that novel in particular. 🙂

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