Trillian interrupted.
"Zaphod," she said, "any minute now we will be swinging round to the daylight side of this planet," adding, "whatever it turns out to be."
"Hey, what do you mean by that? The planet's where I predicted it would be, isn't it?"
"Yes, I know there's a planet there. I'm not arguing with anyone, it's just that I wouldn't know Magrathea from any other lump of cold rock. Dawn's coming up if you want it."
"Okay, okay," muttered Zaphod, "let's at least give our eyes a good time. Computer!"
"Hi there! What can I . . ."
"Just shut up and give us a view of the planet again."
A dark featureless mass once more filled the screens--the planet rolling away beneath them.
They watched for a moment in silence, but Zaphod was fidgety with excitement.
"We are now traversing the night side . . ." he said in a hushed voice. The planet rolled on.
"The surface of the planet is now three hundred miles beneath us . . ." he continued. He was trying to restore a sense of occasion to what he felt should have been a great moment., Magrathea! He was piqued by Ford's skeptical reaction. Magrathea!
"In a few seconds," he continued, "we should see . . . there!"
The moment carried itself. Even the most seasoned star tramp can't help but shiver at the spectacular drama of a sunrise seen from space, but a binary sunrise is one of the marvels of the Galaxy.
Out of the utter blackness stabbed a sudden point of blinding light. It crept up by slight degrees and spread sideways in a thin crescent blade, and within seconds two suns were visible, furnaces of light, searing the black edge of the horizon with white fire. Fierce shafts of color streaked through the thin atmosphere beneath them.
"The fires of dawn . . .!" breathed Zaphod. "The twin suns of Soulianis and Rahm . . .!"
"Or whatever," said Ford quietly.
"Soulianis and Rahm!" insisted Zaphod.
The suns blazed into the pitch of space and a low ghostly music floated through the bridge: Marvin was humming ironically because he hated humans so much.
As Ford gazed at the spectacle of the light before them excitement burned inside him, but only the excitement of seeing a strange new planet; it was enough for him to see it as it was. It faintly irritated him that Zaphod had to impose some ludicrous fantasy onto the scene to make it work for him. All this Magrathea nonsense seemed juvenile. Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?
This disagreement over Magrathea is a very human one, even though it's happening between two aliens from Betelgeuse. It's the inherent need for humans to place everything into some kind of context. To understand and label. Ford is happy with simply the discovery of a new planet, without any background or narrative. Zaphod, on the other hand, wants a story, a way to identify what he is seeing, in order for it to make sense to him. Zaphod is also an attention junkie.
I sort of understand the pull of narrative. When someone comes home after a long day of being away, one of the first questions to be asked is "How was your day?" This prompts the someone to launch into the details of his or her hours away from home. Tales of problems with the boss. Flunking or acing tests at school. Bullies on the playground. Sudden attacks of diarrhea. Whatever. It's how human beings communicate.
I like these how-was-your-day stories. They help me to understand the order of things in my life. Let me know if I have something to celebrate or worry about. Help me identify a problem I can help my children or wife cope with. At this time in my life, I'm pretty much viewed as the level-headed, grounded person in my family. I'm a problem-solver, a shoulder to cry on.
I don't know how I inherited this reputation. I'm a poet, for God's sake! Isn't that the definition of ungrounded and unstable? The majority of famous poets and writers that I know suffered from a laundry list of issues: alcoholism, bipolar disorder, abuse, suicidal ideation. There's a reason why so many of the greats of the 20th century ended their lives prematurely. Think about it: Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton, Richard Brautigan, Yukio Mishima, Hunter S. Thompson, Ernest Hemingway . . . It's a pretty long list.
I think that writers (and especially poets) feel the world a lot more fully than other people. It kind of goes with territory. Poets don't turn away from darkness. They dissect it, cook it, slice it up, and eat it for dinner. It's all about truth. At least, that's what it's about for me as a poet. It's about communicating my truth to the world. People can read what I write and either accept my truth or think that I'm full of shit.
Frankly, I don't care which of those two choices my readers make. I care that they're reading and engaging in my truth in some way. I don't mind being told that I'm wrong. I have a ten-year-old son who frequently tells me that I'm wrong. Debates with me on a nightly basis. That's alright. He's speaking his ten-year-old truth.
I don't know where I'm headed with this post tonight. I sat down thinking that I wanted to address the necessity of narrative. Wanted to speak to its power to heal and set things aright. (Yes, I just used the word "aright." Deal with it.) And the best narratives are ones that address deeper truths about life. And poets seek out those deeper (sometimes painful) truths.
And that's Saint Marty's brooding poet story for tonight.
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