Dr. Ding Sings The Blues
Picture it: Paris, 1961.
A solitary, sparrow-like figure, clad in trenchcoat and beret, clutching several thin notebooks and sheafs of paper with grim certainty; her countenance is pale and wan yet somehow she is as luminous as a thousand Jardin des Luxembourg Café candles. Listlessly smoking a Gauloise, she sags against a doorframe as the rain beats down a solemn grey tattoo. “Mon Dieu!” she whispers, her eyes feverish with longing, thinking of her now-faraway lover, of warm, soft sheets, of harsh words that pierce her heart as carelessly as a knife would an apple, if the apple happened to get in the way of the knife, as apples often do. Foolish apples! For what do they know of life?
And now this. She is alone and freshly grieving, cold and soaked-through by the very tears of Montmarte herself, the snooty French bitch. She realizes only now that he would never love her, not as she loved him. Never! The rain would beat on, relentless, her own tears unnoticed, unmourned. Her writings would so too pass on, unread. All in vain. All for nothing. “Alors!” she cries, and throws herself bodily in front of the next passing streetcar, her fragile soul a mere hiccup after a particularly rich meal of foie gras.
“Alors!” indeed mon ami; alors forever.
Bet you thought Dr. Ding Sings The Blues was going to incoporate some Edith Piafian/late-stage French poet tropes, eh? Yeah, well, Dr. Ding ain’t no angsty, beanie-sporting Beatnik writerchick. Screw all that unrequited gloomy existential shit with a self-consciously seriocomic ending. Life is for the living. Get to it.
In the meantime, however, it’s highly recommended that you sing the blues every once in awhile. Blows the dust out of the asscracks of whatever personal demons are troubling you. Here are some of my favorites.
At Last — Etta James
Shotgun — Jr. Walker and the All-Stars
Hellhound On My Trail — Robert Johnson
They’re Red Hot — Robert Johnson
Pride and Joy — Stevie Ray Vaughan
Dearest Darling — Bo Diddley
Who Do You Love — Bo Diddley
Going Down Slow — Little Walter
I’m Tore Down — Eric Clapton
It Hurts Me Too — Junior Wells
The Same Thing — KoKo Taylor
Voodoo Woman — KoKo Taylor
Wang Dang Doodle — KoKo Taylor
Killing Floor — Howlin’ Wolf
Built For Comfort — Howlin’ Wolf
BOOM BOOM — John Lee Hooker
Sugar Mama — The Bel Airs
Going to the River — The Bel Airs
That oughta get your mojo workin’.
| Etsy: QueenBodacious |
Words To Live By
Dr. Ding finally decided she wanted to understand the full lyrics, and so here they are, courtesy of Lyrics Freak. Enjoy!
Town Called Malice
The Jam
Better stop dreaming of the quiet life -
Cos its the one well never know
And quit running for that runaway bus -
Cos those rosy days are few
And – stop apologizing for the things you’ve never done,
Cos time is short and life is cruel -
But its up to us to change
This town called malice.
Rows and rows of disused milk floats
Stand dying in the dairy yard
And a hundred lonely housewives clutch empty milk
Bottles to their hearts
Hanging out their old love letters on the line to dry
Its enough to make you stop believing when tears come
Fast and furious
In a town called malice.
Struggle after struggle – year after year
The atmospheres a fine blend of ice -
I’m almost stone cold dead
In a town called malice.
A whole streets belief in Sundays roast beef
Gets dashed against the co-op
To either cut down on beer or the kids new gear
Its a big decision in a town called malice.
The ghost of a steam train – echoes down my track
Its at the moment bound for nowhere -
Just going round and round
Playground kids and creaking swings -
Lost laughter in the breeze
I could go on for hours and I probably will -
But Id sooner put some joy back
In this town called malice.
| Etsy: QueenBodacious |
Laissez Les Bontemps Roulez
The Irreverent Heartfelt Thanksgiving Credo Of Dr. Ding
Fret not. It will all work out. Shit invariably does.
Be present enough to listen with your whole heart. Embrace the stranger at the table.
And remember that in order to benefit, there must be room to receive.
The meal will eventually be ready, bellies will be filled, and thankfulness abounded.
There will of course be airport delays, ill-mannered guests, and bad weather.
Fret not. It will all work out. Shit invariably does.
Live while you’re still alive enough to do it.
And remember that if life were perfect, it would be awfully damn boring.
There will be joy. And laughter. And hope.
There will be regret. And irritation. And sorrow.
Fret not. It will all work out. Shit invariably does.
| Etsy: QueenBodacious |
The Dearest Freshness Of Deep Down Things
God’s Grandeur
Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889)
The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; Bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
Peeps:
Gerard Manley Hopkins was a very painfully closeted Jesuit priest who lived during the Victorian era and wasn’t famous in his lifetime. Although Dr. Ding is a decidedly retired Catholic, this poem elucidates the ineluctably beautiful relationship between nature and the Divine presence like few others I’ve read. Drink it in; it’s best read aloud and takes 4 or 5 read-throughs before the multiple layers of meaning emerge clearly, which is half the fun.
Toodles!
| Etsy: QueenBodacious |
Dr. Ding’s Favorite Poem
Wild Geese by Mary Oliver
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
from Dream Work by Mary Oliver
published by Atlantic Monthly Press
© Mary Oliver
| Etsy: QueenBodacious |
