The Widening Gyre (and other musings)

"The Second Coming," arguably W. B. Yeats' most celebrated piece of work, has lately become something of an LDS pulpit cliche, thanks in large measure to the late Elder Maxwell. He it was that first recited the lines, "things fall apart, the center cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed upon the world" in General Conference. I'm not sure that Yeats intended the poem, composed in the political and financial chaos following World War I, to be interpreted so literally as we LDS have done. Nevertheless, as with everything C.S. Lewis ever wrote, Pope's observations on vice in his Essay on Man, and some fragments of Wordsworth that hint of his then-heretical suspicions of a pre-mortal life, we Latter-Day Saints have taken Yeats' words to our collective bosom -- canonization by popular acclaim, as it were.

At this very moment, Yeats' words ring true for me, both at an impersonal and a personal level. The unsteady foundations of our financial system -- a house built on the most fickle of sands since our unwise abandonment of the gold standard several generations ago -- are in danger of utter collapse. More accurately put, they are in danger of imminent collapse; the fact that they will collapse ultimately is not a hazard but a certainty. Foolish were our leaders of the mid-twentieth century, who listened to the siren song of that economic Pied Piper Keynes, and cast off the restraints of gold and silver in favor of dollars that could be manufactured out of thin air (or even worse, out of debt) at the whim of politicians and their kept central bankers. Not suprisingly, these men, who have pleaded for decades on behalf of the superiority of a "flexible" monetary system, have taken advantage of it to print money in support of burgeoning debts and crippling deficits. All that worked well enough in the short run, at least for those positioned to take advantage of the fantastic and unnatural runups in asset values that printing money always creates. Now, it seems, the long-delayed crackup seen by the prescient few is upon us; the emperor's nakedness is visible to all except his courtiers, and utter dissolution is a real possibility.

These are not matters to be taken lightly. The deliberate debasement of money by venal rulers has undermined civilization from the time of Diocletian to present-day Zimbabwe. It destroyed the currency and all savings in post-WWI Germany and Austria. Germany, like America, was saddled with unpayable debts and resorted to the printing press in a last-ditch effort to stave off national bankruptcy.

And the solution our enlightened leadership has set forth? More debts, more deficits, and vastly more government. Foolish people, who have allowed yourselves to be seduced by the enemies of liberty! The free market (i.e., freedom) does not work, we are now being told incessantly. We must therefore purchase the chains of security with our own (and our granchildren's) money.

On a personal level, the falcon has veered away from the falconer, but I'm expecting him to return someday. My divorce was final two weeks ago, and I am left with lawyer fees and heavy taxes on the horizon. I've always striven to live frugally and avoid debt but now, for the next few months at least, debt will be my attendant. At least in the summer my gas bill will be almost nil. I unfortunately inhabit the very middle of the middle class, income -wise, and so take it on the chin more than any other tax-paying group. Earn ten or fifteen thousand less, and taxes become nugatory. Earn fifteen or twenty thousand more, and tithes and offerings become deductible. But at my income level, the thousands I paid last year in tithes and offerings are not deductible; they are subsumed by the standard deduction.

As you can imagine, such musings have sometimes tempted me to something close to despair over the past few weeks, but there is nothing to do but go forward. Elaine needs me now more than ever, and I must not fail her. So I put my trust that, at some future time, the Lord will again magnify me somehow; but for now, mine is the lot of metaphorical sackcloth and ashes.

Last week I made my monthly temple visit. It's a different experience without my ex-wife, who never manifested much enthusiasm for the temple. On the rare occasions when she accompanied me, she often seemed disoriented. But we did share some things in the celestial room, and she wept often. Now, I am alone with my thoughts and, perhaps, the most diffuse of spiritual promptings, in the celestial room. Sometimes too I weep, in church and at home, but not for joy.

To end on a purely positive note: today was the first calendar day of spring. This does not mean much in the tropical or even subtropical climes, where winter is barely remarked, or in the far north, where snow melts are still many weeks off. But here in this blessed, temperate latitude, the late days of March often confer a jewel of a spring day, when the unexpected can and does happen. Today, a wintry relapse, was not such a day, but Wednesday was. I took Elaine up to Pocky and Nanna's mountaintop farm to enjoy the 70 degree sunny weather on Wednesday afternoon, and signs of spring were everywhere. Along the road below the house the first few yellow coltsfoots -- the first wildflower to bloom in northern Appalachia -- were out, and flies and bees zipped about, obviously elated to have survived the winter cold. By the ruined stone well I found a prenuptial tangle of garter snakes, which Elaine enjoyed spooking, and in the tiny pothole-pond in the lower field a few wood frogs were croaking. Turkey vultures, which do not overwinter in these parts, were bouncing on the updrafts above the ridgeline, and the first phoebe was hawking flies off the white barn wall.

Interesting, I thought, how my own moods have so closely mimicked the turn of the seasons lately. On such a day as this, it was impossible to be overburdened by life's many cares and sorrows. May there come a springtime into every heart.