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September 29, 2006
There'll be good times again for me and you
It's been a pretty damned great week. What a fucking relief.
Last night Francis and I went to see John Hodgman interview Neil Gaiman at FIT.
Francis has already written about it in his own blog, so I don't need to say too much else, but I'll add that John was an inspired choice of interlocuter, and that Neil Gaiman is both quick-witted and gracious, and a delight to listen to. He read two poems, and since one of them is a BREAKUP POEM I'm going to quote it here in its entirety in addition to just linking it. A breakup poem that includes zombies. It's like he's writing Just for Me.
The Day the Saucers Came
Neil Gaiman
That day, the saucers landed. Hundreds of them, golden,
Silent, coming down from the sky like great snowflakes,
And the people of Earth stood and stared as they descended,
Waiting, dry-mouthed to find what waited inside for us
And none of us knowing if we would be here tomorrow
But you didn't notice it because
That day, the day the saucers came, by some coincidence,
Was the day that the graves gave up their dead
And the zombies pushed up through soft earth
or erupted, shambling and dull-eyed, unstoppable,
Came towards us, the living, and we screamed and ran,
But you did not notice this because
On the saucer day, which was the zombie day, it was
Ragnarok also, and the television screens showed us
A ship built of dead-man's nails, a serpent, a wolf,
All bigger than the mind could hold, and the cameraman could
Not get far enough away, and then the Gods came out
But you did not see them coming because
On the saucer-zombie-battling gods day the floodgates broke
And each of us was engulfed by genies and sprites
Offering us wishes and wonders and eternities
And charm and cleverness and true brave hearts and pots of gold
While giants feefofummed across the land, and killer bees,
But you had no idea of any of this because
That day, the saucer day the zombie day
The Ragnarok and fairies day, the day the great winds came
And snows, and the cities turned to crystal, the day
All plants died, plastics dissolved, the day the
Computers turned, the screens telling us we would obey, the day
Angels, drunk and muddled, stumbled from the bars,
And all the bells of London were sounded, the day
Animals spoke to us in Assyrian, the Yeti day,
The fluttering capes and arrival of the Time Machine day,
You didn't notice any of this because
you were sitting in your room, not doing anything
not even reading, not really, just
looking at your telephone,
wondering if I was going to call.
Posted by Rose at September 29, 2006 12:09 PM
Comments
It's really good to hear that you're starting to feel better.
And that knitted robot you made Francis? Insanely cute.
Posted by: Trip at September 29, 2006 11:48 PM
wow, meal and neil and poem and wallet returned and WOW!
um, nothing much new here. a new baby red panda at the zoo made me think of you guys today...
Posted by: gotcha at September 30, 2006 12:38 AM
As much as I loved Sandman, there were never enough zombies in it. I suppose Dream really couldn't be bothered, and really, aren't the dead that still have some semblance of theirselves scarier than the mindless dead? :D
Posted by: Matthew at September 30, 2006 01:17 AM