A great thank you to everyone! I can even sense that those who did not respond were too full of emotion to do so: I more than most realize that sentiment sometimes acts as a crazy glue to the seat of the pants while an invisible bar rockets repeatedly through the left cheek and out the top of the skull in an explosion of the fuggy black-powder of lugubricity.

Be that as it may, Mr. Schwartz’s poem and other sentiments were printed on scraps of Chinese Hell Money and burnt in a steel brazier in the park (to the accompaniment of Beethoven’s 9the “Ode to Joy”), so that the smoke could wend its way to Braincap in Elysium.

While staring up through these clouded light receptors called my eyes, I believe I saw a flash of a piscine tail among the clouds signalling “all is well.”

Let us hope so,

Jesse

to say the sorrow past the joy of knowing a creature whom we love and live
with

I am sorry, Jess, and think of you now

sheila [Murphy]

From: Joseph Duemer
Subject: Re: The Passing of Braincap

Jesse, I must have fish-consciousness because my politics exactly match that
of Braincap, whom I feel I know through your loving description.

jd

Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 20:05:46 -0400
From: Frederick Pollack
Subject: Re: The Passing of Braincap

Ave atque vale, Braincap, ave atque vale.

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2008 10:08:00 +0100
From: Patrick McManus
Subject: Re: The Passing of Braincap

Sounds like he had a good fishlife exposing him to GW Bush (did you
translate him into Japanese -but could count as cruelty-shame he missed the
results of the election
Us and our pets
Best wishes Patrick

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2008 13:38:37 +0100
From: David Bircumshaw
Subject: Re: The Passing of Braincap

i sympathise on your loss, jesse. Of course, when the braincap goes,
it becomes like Swift, dying like a tree, from the top down. If only
those twittering song-birds, obsessed with their territorial markings,
realised, in their tiny minds, that a tree dies from its roots up.

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:00:20 +0200
From: Anny Ballardini
Subject: Re: The Passing of Braincap

Truely heartbroken,

may the thought of his new existence (freer in spirit) help you, your
family, (and me) in this moment,

Anny

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 28th, 2008

The Passing of Braincap

As Braincap wound a way

through waters, I imagine

a following of a weave, we

cannot hope to flow, one

going among news-cycles

that really change, but do

not change. I wonder

about what and how this

fish pursued. There is no

explanation. So hard for

any of us to see. We look

through glass and water

as Briancap looked

through glass and water

and we get lost. Tragedies

happen– so many people

are destroyed; celebrations

happen– some people are

consecrated; and Braincap

swims and learns and ages.

Nothing Braincap could do

would stop time’s watery

unfolding. None of us ever

wish to let go of the weave.

–Gerald Schwartz

We really like this, but must apologize because this blogging system does not allow us to reproduce the stepped lines of each stanza.