The Last Autumn

В последнюю осень, ни строчки, ни вздоха.
Последние песни осыпались летом.
Прощальным костром догорает эпоха,
И мы наблюдаем за тенью и светом



There are several songs that I listen to almost every day. I have listened to these songs when I was 16, and I will probably listen to them 16 years from now.

There are some streets where I walk every day. Some of them are near my house. Some in my memories.

I have often ridiculed myself for this. Move on, I would say to myself. Move the hell on. Find something new for God's sake, you're not an old man.

No, I am not an old man, and I realize this the older I get. If this will keep on, the most youthful day of my life will be the day of my death.
Life is not without a sense of humor.

But I digress.


I have often wondered why I do this. Why I return to these songs, these streets.
I had my theory, and in a way, it was confirmed today after reading an interview with Jonathan Safran Foer, the author of the recently popular "Everything is Illuminated" and "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close."

In the interview, Foer speaks of how Joyce Carol Oates, (who he was fortunate enough to have as a professor) wrote to him: "You appear to have a very strong and promising talent coupled with that most important of writerly qualities, energy."

Yes - energy. Energy.

Often I can't contain it. Often I sit at the same spot for eight, ten, sixteen hours at a stretch. And I write. By god, I write.
But at other times I have about as much energy as a lamp during a power outage.
The bulb is there. The wire is plugged in.
But there is no current.
None.
Zilch. Zero. Nada.

The last time I saw a grown man cry, it was my father.
He was constipated.

I finally understand him.



But even during the darkest outage, these songs, these memories - they are still there.
Little capsules of energy. A whole case of them.
Break in case of emergency.

This is an emergency.
I turn the player on. To the memories I stretch. In them I draw in every ounce of sunlight. I feel the heat on the leaves. The streets. The people.
Because this what it's all about. Because this is where it all began.
This is where it's going to end.

Some jump from bed to bed. Some develop healthy drug habits. Some walk across continents. All in search for one thing. That one little thing.

But the drugs fade. The sheets empty. Continents sink.
What remains?

You know what.


Someone turn the power back on.