The Great Laugh < The Happy Monk Baking Company

Laugh until the rock thoughts crack and snap off ... — Wave after wave of laughter!

Have you ever had one of those fits of uncontrollable laughter, so contagious and overpowering that you have no idea what started it in the first place? Once it gets going, everything someone says, every look, every facial tick sets off a new round of hilarity, shrieking, sore stomach muscles, shaken bladders.

All you know is you’re laughing; you can’t stop. And you wonder if it ever will. It may be cannabis-induced, yes, but it can happen without “stimulants.” It goes beyond mere humour; there is no joke.

I think it must be some kind of soul connection, some mutual need to blow off tension. A spark between two people beyond understanding. It happens because it happens!

Two strangers inconsolable

In a workshop many years ago, I was in a “process” with another man I’d never met. We were to work out a problem, then report what we’d discussed to the group. Our process lasted only a few minutes then we erupted into wild laughter. Two strangers, inconsolable!

It was disruptive to the group! I think the other participants found it amusing, some laughed along with us, but my partner and I were the only ones in on the joke — whatever it was. It went on many minutes.

Our wise facilitator, Jim, watched, bemused. I could see his narrowed eyes; he seemed to be observing something deeper below the surface of things. How was he going to explain it? This made me laugh even harder.

Things eventually petered out: a few residual giggles, someone said, “Man, oh man … Man, oh man!” A few pleasurable sighs. And a moment of silence. I was worn out; a strange peace had come over me.

The facilitator suggested it was a “soul connection of a high level,” something neither of us could explain. Nor anyone else. That it happened, he said, was a gift!

No ring of truth

His words had the ring of truth. But I didn’t think much of it until it happened a second time a few years later. “Here we go again,” I thought. And I remembered Jim’s Yoda-like face (the facilitator). I realized there really was no explanation, no ring of truth. It didn’t need one!

That’s what prompted my poem, “The Great Laugh.”

The Great Laugh

Laugh until the rock thoughts crack and snap off
fall away and shatter on the cold floor
let those tremors rise from stomach pit
burst into throat and shatter teeth
as the great laugh explodes into the room
whatever it is, where ever it comes from
tears running down your sweet face

oh and let the pressing bladder go
let it flow, what the hell,
let it run into the rivers and oceans
and melt the polar ice caps,
for all you care it’s gonna happen anyway

and let the room in on the joke, fer chrissake,
with your shrieks and gasps for air
let it join the great laugh,
feel those gusting fits bouncing off the rafters and dustballs
until the walls heave and the ceiling buckles
and the house turns upside down,
cups and saucers falling upwards
smashing into hysterical shards

and scare the cat, that old sourpuss,
and lob a laugh over the fence
(it’s gonna be history, soon, too)
and watch those fucking neighbours
run back indoors spilling drinks,
tripping over tangled hoses

the firemen may come, and the ambulance and police
but as the laughing torrent softens to a current, a trickle, a dribble
you may find yourself outta town, anyway,
on a beach near Mauna Loa, maybe,
or skimming into the sands of Bora Bora
the salt water washing under your aching stomach
the slow crash of waves falling off in the distance
and your breath sighs into the gentle beach breeze
and into sleep.

Now wasn’t that something?

— David Morton

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Two strangers inconsolable

No ring of truth

The Great Laugh

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