TRP as Presence

[MASCARO at humnet.ucla.edu]

Henry M. dares voice the uncool question:
>
>Maybe not a new idea, but:
>Could TRP be lurking on this list, or perhaps pseudonymously 
>participating?

for which I applaud his courage.  I have been thinking that all of us harbor the 
secret thought. more a visceral feeling, at least for me, that TRP is--here--somehow, 
among us, like Jesus on the road to wherever, or as Eliot writes about (Wasteland?) 
that phenomenon, also noted by soldiers in foxholes, the sense that there is an 
unseen but felt companion lurking nearby.  Does Tommy haunt us like the Holy 
Grail?  Are we Apostles awaiting the descent of the flickering tongue of fire? Or 
doubting Thomases doubting  Thomas,  looking to probe the wounds with our 
own hands? What difference would it make it he were--here?  Are we all, with one 
or two synapses at least, partly talking to him (resisting the temptation to type: 
Him) when we talk to each other.  Do people on the Joyce list feel as though Jimmy  
is also lurking nearby?  (I'll bet they do.  Maybe it's the nature of this discourse 
medium, partly real, partly ethereal, so ripe for--construction.  Or as hag sez, we're 
all lying anyway.)

But, speaking of tongues of fire, the real question is: suppose TRP announces 
himself, sez, hey, I've been lurking for awhile and I'd like, in this my first post, to 
weigh in w/ this opinion .  .  .  . Who would be the first to FLAME him? (I'm 
betting  STEELY).

john m