an empire of drafts

lets start where i seem to notice i always start.

when a band is about to break up, there's always a mention, a rumour, a farewell tour. shit, i would've seen Arab Strap on their way through Nihon if weren't saving my cash for seeing Alex and Jackson in Korea and really didn't need any more of a bummer ride than the one i'm already on. i guess actors are kind of the same - you see them fade, taking shittier roles, dissolving into typecasts or exploding into media derision, shortly followed by ignorant death.

but what of writers (ok, i'm skipping artists and directors)? i have a surprising Pynchon hardcover waiting for me to gather the confidence and backpack space to read. Danielewski has finally released another book not related to HoL. Murakami is still at least releasing short stories even though his last novel was wanting. Shit, there's even been another Marquez novella to pick up.

But where do they go when they dont publish? DeLillo is silent. Where did he go? What has Wallace been doing? what happens to them? how do we know that they've thrown the towel in? where is the the crazy media outburst at the death or retirement of a talent?

i sit here with my milky pink sakura liquor diluted with calpis very late (or early) wondering this for theumteenth time in an empire of drafts thinking if i were ever something with what i do, the same thing would happen and i remember a perth poet talking of a wake held by other perth writers for the passing of Bukowski, and even though in some far away corner of this earth someone notices, but oh how quietly the writer lapses.