The Inner Valley

Fleas dream of buying themselves a dog, and nobodies dream of escaping poverty: that one magical day good luck will suddenly rain down on them–will rain down in buckets. But good luck doesn’t rain down yesterday, today, tomorrow, or ever. Good luck doesn’t even fall in a fine drizzle, no matter how hard the nobodies summon it, even if their left hand is tickling, or if they begin the new day with their right foot, or start the new year with a change of brooms. The nobodies: nobody’s children, owners of nothing. The nobodies: the no ones, the nobodied, running like rabbits, dying through life, screwed every which way. Who are not, but could be. Who don’t speak languages, but dialects. Who don’t have religions, but superstitions. Who don’t create art, but handicrafts. Who don’t have culture, but folklore. Who are not human beings, but human resources. Who do not have faces, but arms. Who do not have names, but numbers. Who do not appear in the history of the world,

“Beauty is no material thing. Beauty cannot be copied. Beauty is the sensation of pleasure on the mind of the seer. No thing is beautiful. But all things await the sensitive and imaginative mind that may be aroused to pleasurable emotion at sight of them. This is beauty.” ******* ✍ Robert Henri (Cincinnati, Ohio, 24 June 1865 ~ New York City, 12 July, 1929). ◙ Artwork: 'Laughing Gypsy Girl' (1915), Robert Henri.

We can't complain. We're not out of work. We don't go hungry. We eat. The grass grows, the social product, the fingernail, the past. The streets are empty. The deals are closed. The sirens are silent. All that will pass. The dead have made their wills. The rain's become a drizzle. The war's not yet been declared. There's no hurry for that. We eat the grass. We eat the social product. We eat the fingernails. We eat the past. We have nothing to conceal. We have nothing to miss. We have nothing to say. We have. The watch has been wound up. The bills have been paid. The washing-up has been done. The last bus is passing by. It is empty. We aren't complaining. What are we waiting for? ******* Hans Magnus Enzensberger (Kaufbeuren,Germany, 11 November 1929). ◙ Artwork: Pierre Bonnard