Thursday, June 21, 2007

INTERNET VERISIMILITUDE AND CATHEXIS

How familiar can we get online or in front of a monitor ? I wrote this poem to elaborate on the draw of consciousness that Internet has over us - a gateway of thought and communication, as close and as intimate as a few inches from our eyes...can ever be. How well can we ever know another person ? How easily can you ever get to know a screen. We often project and get caught up in this cyber world. We have too many attacks, mostly because too few people have discovered Macs. ( Even though I am writing this on a PC , you see). My first PC was an Osborne. Here I am going Orthogonal in this poem. Is not life and existence multi vectored ?
You'll also notice an interspersal of Yiddish and Sanskrit. Here I issue my own poetic licence.


Draft- Please do not read and catch cold

Internet verisimilitude and cathexis

Can take you hopping and popping throughout the global online nexus

Multimedia, video a search engine query

Transfers vibration with little tarry

Friendship at first can be temporarily although ersatz effective

Interactions can invoke several of the 10 commandments, let alone the prime directive

The true Self may be omniscient, omnipresent, through the light of the Lord

But can the same be said of the monitor and keyboard ?

Use Sechel and avoid the invective

Consciousness can travel orthogonally, in simultaneous multi vector

Geographically diverse images, webcams, videos, almost instantly over to any Terran sector

Imagination may easily disperse

To the far regions of the local universe

Cyber communication, oh so speedy

Can traverse defense mechanisms of beings oh so needy

For expression and communication, love and caring

Sometimes our hearts bleed for sharing

Problem is it may be all the rage

Not only does the cyber surfer need to be aware of age, but really act their age

Be ethically and morally responsible before in any conversation you engage

Health and lifestyle may be nutritious

But bloggery and gossip is often delicious

We need to go from a little darkness to a bit more light

In the current internet reiteration night or day

Nothing these days is that hidden or secret, wrong or right

Try not to slip on slime, or get soiled with schmootz – do this sans delay

Otherwise there might be a bit of karma to pay

So many people to be in touch with you see

How well I can know you if even you hardly know me

No matter how your mind and societal defenses may be affected

Ultimately through the divine spark know it or nor we’re connected

I knew you once do you remember me

Content and interrelationships can be rather sophisticated, at least…they seem to be

The numbers may make you pale

If one considers the number of people we connect to via IM and e-mail

Spatial temporal scintillation, our insatiable imaginations seek, knowledge, news, entertainment and thrills without resting

As well as projective desires less reality testing

There’s all this drama, but it’s a one way Samyama

Are you now ready to share your thoughts and experiences with your papa or mama ?

E-mail and the chat room

These days it’s a more evolved verbal/texting gaming form of doom

Your mind may be in a cyberspatial stew

But in a sense the sense object can communicate subtly back to you

Be careful of your wishes, and these you should carefully edit

So as not to give free ranging wings to your cards of bondage by credit

Don’t feel how can I live without this, and seem bereft

Watch out for viruses and spyware, that can lead to identity theft

Those scammers and phishers

Are really little pishers

Set up mail rules and filters, delete those attachments, graphics…and kaboom

Let all the cyber goniffs gay cocken auf in yum

Infatuation and attraction, verisimilitudinal projection oh heavenly distraction…in alienation and loneliness such things sweetly come back to you

In the cosmic dance, divine play of Lila, our vritti’s create such a brew

Mind is far from the here and now

So many Samskaras and new seeds it needs to sow

It’s often quite fun to dream and fantasize, to be in denial and rationalization for a while

And even after your cyber session and physical removal

Your monitor beckons and offers that tempting tacit approval

Not just love, but these days friendship is such a proposition so tenuous

You kind have got to watch out for intentions and acts that turn out disingenuous

In the mid 90’s I could say with glee

E-mailing a stranger could result in such a nice camaraderie

Then with increasing popularity the firewalls, filters, voicemail evolved to their present level and came up, and presented new challenges for interrelationships and sales…cold calling often is masochistic frustration in every pore

But if you use the phone and e-mail as a tool, there’s occasional elation

Of such rewards, I often wish there were more

While artistic endeavors are inspiring

Coldness, rejection is still a bit frustrating if not tiring

Challenges, however fuel ones creative fire

Nuances in language and marketing never fail to inspire

We all like to play till the proverbial end of the day

Even for the distant and aloof

Existence in our physical form along with all the knowledge goes poof!

But a little wisdom and divine knowledge, gracefully acquired along life’s path may show you a way

In this conundrum of joy and travail, called life’s game

Whether one seeks, fame, fortune, recognition, power, knowledge, in the end it’s really not the same

Health needs to balance wealth, caring, warmth, and sharing are fine

Try not to be the type that buries the elderly before their time, and if the same happens to you, you may have made your own bed and be the one to blame

True friendship, camaraderie, and love are sadly enough exceedingly rare, since defense mechanisms are more common shown if not already known

Here’s a hint, it will help overcome reticence and fear

When you’re with a kindred spirit, real friend, and most luckily your love…time will disappear

Clarity will over take delusion

Eternity will overtake time, which in itself is, in the right context and setting of course, an illusion

( Hadn’t love better be singular at the time ? If it’s Cingular we might really be in trouble ) J)

Cathexis is after all a vibration

Mutually it can overcome alienation

No matter how the unrestrained team of horses present in our mind may engage in their daily trots

Beware that unrequited desires, food, drinking, substances, or over indulgences can cause one to Plotz.

Latinos have a solution that has a rather far reach

After dancing, partying , feasting all weekend

Monday morning retire, recuperate, and go read my poetry on the nearest beach.

It’s not that I’m trying to be literary or flaunting my talent as a poet

If you have read this far you might have an inkling or you might already even know it J

Do I take myself seriously in my poetry or art

It may set us a little less further apart

After all good intellectual interaction, and discussion is what we truly seek

I am pleased to have shared my thoughts and given my reader a little peek.

Copyright Shel Stein 2006

Notes:

From Yiddish -

Sechel= wisdom, common sense

Schmootz – various and sundry qualities or gradations of dirt – humorous schmootz can make for a good joke

Plotz= explode figuratively, can refer to ether embarrassment or overeating

pishers=pissers; goniffs=thieves;yum=body of water as in lake , ocean, or river

From Sanskrit -

Samyama = Deep and intense concentration and focus. Leading to knowledge intuition and understanding from Sanskrit

Vritti refers to the thought process and modification of mind; Samaskara’s are residual seeds in the mind from past actions, even lives; Lila- perhaps the cosmic macro chasm of human interaction and existence.

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