William Carlos Williams, in 1923, a year after Kerouac was born, published "To Elise," with its opening lines, The pure products of America go crazy - … devil-may-care men who have taken to railroading out of sheer lust of adventure— lines which remarkably presaged Kerouac, who was as pure a product of America as has ever been. Kerouac loved America with the intensity St. John of the Cross had in his love of the Lord. He was saintly in his empathy and power to see divinity in all the very alive American people he met on the road. There is a mythical Buddhist figure called Never Disparaging Buddha, who in his practice as a compassionate bodhisattva told everyone he saw that they were a Buddha. In return, he was reviled, laughed at, attacked with sticks, had to dodge stones thrown his way.
Thank you very much, Micki... You may be thinking of St John of the Gospels, but St. John of the Cross was a Spanish priest, mystic, and poet from the 1500's, and he wrote a lot about his spiritual experiences and love of the Lord.
Thank you very much, Micki... You may be thinking of St John of the Gospels, but St. John of the Cross was a Spanish priest, mystic, and poet from the 1500's, and he wrote a lot about his spiritual experiences and love of the Lord.
Excellent piece. Only question: how do you really know St John of the Cross's true love of his "Lord"? A little hard to fact check from first century.