in the tower of knowledge

An hour's worth of unfinished discussion about Hiroshima, the Cold War, Beat Poetry, and what I kept calling (borrowing from Lauren Berlant) a national fantasy of normalcy in the 1950s. Over and over, I repeat the line "Go fuck yourself with your atom bomb," from Ginsberg's poem "America." "What," I ask, "does it mean when you tell someone 'Go fuck yourself'?"

Hesitation, then a few answers: That person thinks he is better than you. That person has a bad ego problem. That person thinks he's great and isn't.

Right, I reply, but what does it mean, more specifically?

Silence. Smiles.

Next: "Let's try to visualize it. Can you picture it? I mean, what it might actually look like?" Suddenly I realize that I am skating on thin ice, but I cannot help it. I go ahead and try to rescue the moment, "Do you think it is possible that when Ginsberg writes the line 'Go fuck yourself with your atom bomb' that he wants to reader to wonder what is more obscene, the curse word "fuck" or the mass death caused by the U.S. in 1945 by using nuclear weapons on a civilian population?" This gets nods. "Is it possible that Ginsberg wants to show us that what is considered to be a crass vulgarity -- 'Go fuck yourself' -- might be considered highly poetic?" This gets nods. "Okay, then, write it down: Ginsberg teaches us that 'Go fuck yourself' is highly poetic, and that it is more obscene to bomb civilian populations than to utter the words "Go fuck yourself' in public."

I am looking forward to Spring Break.