On the Psychopath Test by Ronson: I Think I'd Pass

I got this for a friend because I joke that she is a psychopath, and she read it and liked it and passed it back onto me.

The book isn’t just about psychopaths, though it is the frame the whole book hangs on. It is more a look into the various people who try to peer into other people’s minds and try to know them – from the creator of the psychopath test to criminal profilers to the compilers of the DSM.

Overall, Ronson is an engaging writer, putting it all together in a readable, conversational manner. The problem is that he is so focused on some individual examples and hits the surface on a lot of things, but doesn’t establish the depth really needed to draw grand conclusions.

Three Quick Looks 7.5.2017

A people’s history of Chicago

Coval’s poems here both pay homage to and extend the work of Zinn.

Though there are poems honoring more well-known historical bits of the city, several of the later poems become more person centered on people you’ve never heard of. It is the voice of the people of the city – more akin to oral history like Studs than Howard.

Imagine wanting only this

The fire isn’t

Only found in Peshtigo

It is everywhere

The best we could do

Go to encounter

Other challenges than you

And hatred will die

Walks Through the Grass: On Our 9th Anniversary

A single foot disturbs the grass blades.

Rain comes and is replaced by the sun;

The blades spring back, forgetting their disruption.

The rain and the sun will come again.

The birds above and the worms below

Will never see that the blades were trod upon.

More steps. More Steps. More Steps.

The blades doesn’t bounce back

The rain still falls. The sun still shines.

The blades become the dirt.

The root dies. New rain

Only makes mud. Sun dries it to hard-pack.

But this story is not about the blade.

It is the foot and the walker

Going through the grass in the sun.

Making a path where the grass

Once grew. Making a path that grows

Ever deeper with each pass.

Every year as I walk to your embrace

Deep in your arms, that path grows deeper

As does my love for you.