At Night, When All the Colours Die, They Hide in Pairs and Read About Themselves -- In Colour, with Their Eyelids Shut

That's Jess, our third indoor cat, dumb, jealous, and mean, which I post instead of the ten carefully argued paragraphs I've worked on the past week on reconciling my disgust with this country with my passionate rooting interest in this country's men's soccer team, because fuck that, I promised myself I wouldn't do carefully argued paragraphs at this shuuty bloog.

I asked what would the world's reaction be if USMNT won WC10, but a more important question is what would this country's reaction be, and the more pertinent question being what would my reaction be to this country's reaction if USMNT won?

Surely, motherfucking crackers, who now call soccer fans faggot liberal speed-walkers, parading their pick-up trucks up and down main streets, honking their horns, their drunken buddies in the flat-bed waving flags, chanting U-S-A, U-S-A, would ruin my relationship with the USMNT forever.

Beyond loving soccer, beyond knowing and being invested in the USMNT players, having seen many if not most play in front of my eyes (Clint Dempsey missing the PK in MLS Eastern Conference Championship at RFK six - jeebus, six - freaking years ago, Landon Donovan racing over to taunt LOUD SIDE! whenever he scores for Gax v United), rooting for an American team that isn't a World Asshole, in a sport held in disdain by America's most jingoistic assholes, is an essential aspect of my rooting for USMNT.

The USMNT winning the World Cup? I'm rooting for the end of my rooting. No one asks me anymore how I separate my soccer and my politics.

Meanwhile, here's Gray Cat, one of our ferals, with a blue jay in her mouth she killed yesterday:

She likes jumping on my lap, rolling over, sleeping as I pet her chest and belly. Click, yo.

Any WC updates during the day will be posted here, though don't expect much about USMNT v England until tomorrow.

UPDATE!

1005 EDT - I did say Argentina would either explode or implode. KABOOM!

UPDATE!

Argentina wins but doesn't score again. This was the first of the four games where I saw how fucked the ball really is: it doesn't bounce right. A half-dozen, a dozen times, for both sides, simple passes in the air bounced six inches higher than the balls used in club soccer this past year bounced.And there hasn't been a free kick from 30 yards in that any player didn't sky ten yards high.

I don't say Fuck Adidas enough.

A MARTIAN SENDS A POSTCARD HOME

Craig Raine

Caxtons are mechanical birds with many wings
and some are treasured for their markings--

they cause the eyes to melt
or the body to shriek without pain.

I have never seen one fly, but
sometimes they perch on the hand.

Mist is when the sky is tired of flight
and rests its soft machine on the ground:

then the world is dim and bookish
like engravings under tissue paper.

Rain is when the earth is television.
It has the properites of making colours darker.

Model T is a room with the lock inside --
a key is turned to free the world

for movement, so quick there is a film
to watch for anything missed.

But time is tied to the wrist
or kept in a box, ticking with impatience.

In homes, a haunted apparatus sleeps,
that snores when you pick it up.

If the ghost cries, they carry it
to their lips and soothe it to sleep

with sounds. And yet, they wake it up
deliberately, by tickling with a finger.

Only the young are allowed to suffer
openly. Adults go to a punishment room

with water but nothing to eat.
They lock the door and suffer the noises

alone. No one is exempt
and everyone's pain has a different smell.

At night, when all the colours die,
they hide in pairs

and read about themselves --
in colour, with their eyelids shut.

Sorry, no links today: haven't had time to read, and besides, we be solidly in the Blog Days of Summer: there isn't much being posted anywhere anyway. Meanwhile: