Allen Ginsberg on William Blake’s Auguries of Innocence continued from here
“A Riddle or the Crickets Cry/Is to Doubt a fit Reply”
AG: ..Is a fit reply to doubt. Well, these are riddles. “Whatta ya mean, you gotta, you gotta be nice to oxes, whatta ya mean you gotta be nice to oxes?” Well, a riddle is a fit reply to that kind of doubt. “Yes, if you’re not nice to oxes, you’ll.. no woman will ever love you.” “Whatta ya mean, no woman will ever love me?” – “A Riddle or the Crickets Cry/is to Doubt a fit Reply”.
“The Emmets Inch….” (The emmet is an ant) – .”The Emmets Inch & Eagles Mile/Make Lame Philosophy to smile”
That’s philosophy (that) is limping along. The emmet can only go an inch at a time, whereas his territory is an inch, two inches, five inches, ten inches, twenty inches. At the same time the eagle goes a whole mile and then suddenly.. and then you’ve got Einstein saying everything is relative and “lame philosophy” smiles.
“He who Doubts from what he sees/ Will ne’er Believe do what you Please”
So, well, they showed these pictures of these cops beating up (Rodney) King and what was the response from the Policeman’s Association – “Well, we’re not sure. What did he do before they beat him up?” I mean, they’re now looking to find out if he was struggling beforehand – it’s in today’s papers. “He who Doubts from what he sees/Will neer Believe do what you Please.”
“If the Sun & Moon should doubt/They’d immediately go out.”
I don’t see how that could happen. But, anyway. I mean, how could they doubt? But, anyway, if the sun and moon of your affection. “
To be….”, (this is a good one) – “To be in a Passion you Good may do/But no good if a Passion is in you”
Because I have a tendency to get really irritable and getting into a righteous wrath raving, you know, accusational state. Sometimes I do it consciously and it’s fun, but sometimes it overpowers me and it goes beyond what I can handle and what other people can take. Like, remember Jonathan Robbins (Jacob Rabinowitz) from last summer? He was making fun of the Iraq war in a car and he was driving me to New York and I started screaming at him that he was an idiot and a mass murderer and Good German, and a Nazi, and he’s really Jewish and he actually, he threatened to stop the car and put me out and I began to realize I’d gone too far. You know, I thought I could dominate him but I couldn’t. So. “To be in a Passion you Good may do/But no Good if a Passion is in you.”
“The Whore & Gambler by the State/Licencd build that Nations fate”
That’s really interesting now that we have licensed state gambling. You know, because, what is it for? To raise money because there’s not enough money being raised from normal taxes, and the rich are getting richer and all the money is being siphoned off, not into education or anything, anything good but into the military in the long run, so we gotta have legal gambling – “The Whore & Gambler by the State/Licencd build that Nations fate.” There may be a little bit of moralism in here.
“The Harlots cry from Street to Street/Shall weave Old Englands winding Sheet”
Assuming that a harlot is forced into that set-up by the social conditions, so that means that the social conditions are such that the state is already sick.
“The Winners Shout the Losers Curse/Dance before dead Englands Hearse”….
to be continued