Interiority

at the moment of their growing, at the moment of their giving shade, at the moment of their falling

2009-07-18T19:52:00.000-07:00

Once upon a lively hour

there grew a sprightly flower

But before I can rightly say sprightly

the flower struggled daily and nightly.

Trapped under the ground in a seed

it wanted only to be freed.

So it pushed and sought for the top

to live with the other crop.

But to no avail the flower did remain

to struggle until the next rain.

Alone in a field today

a flower peaked above in dismay.

But why should it be sad?

Its hardships had made it mad.

When the sun shone bright

the flower grew in spite

and became a plant of bad.

Laughter

2009-07-17T01:20:00.000-07:00

How many things from before and after
all melt into gossip and laughter?

what love can do...

2009-05-26T12:02:00.000-07:00

محبت

از محبت تلخ ها شيرين شـــــود ....... از محبت مسّ ها زرّين شــــــود
از محبت دردها صافي شــــــود ....... وز محبت دردها شافي شــــــود
از محبت خارها گل مي شـــــود ....... وز محبت، سركه ها مُل مي شــود
از محبت، سجن گلشن مي شــود ........ بي محبت، روضه، گلخن مي شـود
از محبت، نار، نوري مي شـــــود ....... وز محبت ديو حوري مي شــــود
از محبت، سنگ، روغن مي شــود ....... بي محبت، موم، آهن مي شــــود
از محبت، حزن، شادي مي شــود ....... وز محبت، غول، هادي مي شــود
از محبت، نيش، نوشي مي شـــود ........ وز محبت، شير موشي مي شـــود
از محبت، سقم، صحّت مي شــود ........ وز محبت، قهر، رحمت مي شــود
از محبت، مرده زنده مي شـــــود ......... وز محبت، شاه بنده مي شـــــود
ايــن محبت هم نتيجه دانش است ........ كــي گزافه بر چنين تختي نشست

مولانا جلال الدین رومی

"the topographical and anatomical information in particular is lost on me."

2009-05-21T18:40:00.000-07:00

"the topographical and anatomical information in particular is lost on me."
"however," holmes continued
"everything will be revealed

tonight will tell the tale
our friend mr wells will join us
perhaps nayland smith as well
of course watson your input will be welcome as well"
"good heavens holmes i should hope so
remember the muddle we had before
all because we consulted mr wells
perfectly ridiculous to bring him on board again if you ask me."
holmes smiled
"i expect sharp insights from mr wells.
count on it, watson - "
a sharp rap on the door interrupted him
"lestrade, no doubt"

"at your service, mr holmes
no change in plans i take it
devil take it if i understand the plans though."

"ah, lestrade
never fear
all will be revealed in good time
the night will bring surprises
of course all nights bring surprises
maybe tonight's will be exceptional.
in any case
clear your mind of preconceived ideas
as of course one always should."
lestrade nodded

'i have invited mr wells to join us
nayland smith as well
for his particular expertise
opium is not my strongest subject
relying on cocaine as i do"
"mr holmes if i may say so - "
"ah, here are mr wells and mr nayland smith now
too good of you to come gentlemen
i trust we will have good sport tonight -
oh excuse me i haven't this gentleman's acquaintance -"
nayland smith nodded pleasantly

"i have the pleasure of introducing mr lee."
nothing in holmes demeanor showed surprise

"poppy lee, i believe -
alias - dr fu manchu!"
"really holmes this is outrageous
this man is our guest - "
"i understand the laws of hospitality as well as the next briton, watson
curtail your outrage
under the blotter on my desk you will find a
letter addressed to
"all mankind and particularly queen victoria and sherlock holmes"
received in the mail this morning

"is this some sort of joke?"
spluttered wells and nayland smith simultaneously

"little is to be gained by preconception, gentlemen
observation must carry the day
sorry to have used you as foils but
the fate of mankind was at stake.'

"oh so i was being duped again. eh?"
"never fear, mr wells, your time will come."

"my word holmes," exclaimed watson
"everything is back to normal"

i'm looking for my mother to kill her

2009-05-17T12:20:00.001-07:00

"i'm looking for my mother to kill her"
"my, my." said sherlock holmes, "that sounds a bit extreme."

lestrade looked on quietly
on one hand he approved of holmes method
on the other he was shocked
killing was serious business
in his opinion words meant something
newer views were taking hold
gentlemen in positions of influence

forwarded theories
on the irrelevance of language
refuting centuries of received wisdom

moll johnson the pickpocket
youthfully snarling and insouciant

made eye contact with lestrade
on a nod from holmes
tom jubb the constable
hustled poor moll away
"elementary, my dear lestrade," holmes explicated
"remnants of prehistory

tumble through the child's brain
obviously irrelevant

kinetically
interesting however -
let us take a walk"
leaving the docks behind

holmes and the worthy inspector
entered a broad thoroughfare
reminding lestrade of a battlefield in the punjab

it's not to me...it's not of me

2009-05-16T11:23:00.000-07:00

three horsemen
riding wild realities
making their way
through mundane worlds
on a bus with others as strange and wonderful
as they
are
you
listen (ing) ( ?)
and wonder ( ing) ( ?)
no matter ( what)
pounding hooves
are balm enough
against the pain of exquisite lonely

either/or

2009-05-14T17:53:00.000-07:00

(either) time passes (or)
it stands still (either)
a plague will come
(or) it won't

(either) I will listen
behold mid-winter drowning
(or) misery loves
the patience of water
carving through stone

(either) sharpness comes without effort
(or) the strongest blade is made without steel
(or) I'd throw it all away for a chance at the title
(or) I was diseased
(or) it tasted like salt water
(or) I stopped struggling

(either) I am blind (or) I can see
(or) is that only the dripping I hear
on the outside of my skull
boring a canyon through my memory (or)
my time

(either) there will be sea lions
(or) there won't be

both/and

2009-05-14T17:19:00.000-07:00

time passes
(and)
it stands still

coffee is (both) bitter
(and) sweet
aftertaste of memory
of what's best left unsaid

more it tastes like chlorophyll
(and) chewing dollar bills (both)
for pleasure (and)
for torture (and)
for profit

jay (and) kirk

sam (and) ahab

worm (and) unnamable

(both) faces of the same coin
(both) sides of the same clam shell
with no currency
(and) no metal
than the grinds chewed over
(and) a pearl in the mind

where are the others?

2009-05-13T05:01:00.000-07:00

where are the others?
henry harris woke up on his park bench
earlier that evening, when he had fallen asleep, the park was filled with people
rick rogers, the sheriff, had allowed him to sleep on the bench
everyone in town had been celebrating the great victory over the powers of darkness

armageddon had come and gone
remembering it brought tears to henry's eyes
ecstasy had been the order off the day

the whole town now seemed deserted
henry walked away from his bench
expecting to find the rest of the townsfolk around the corner

on a telephone pole a sign was attached
"the joke is on you" it read
henry rubbed his eyes
every cell in his brain throbbed
rick rogers and the rest of the townsfolk had seemed like good people
so what had happened?

Let us go on as if I were the only one in the world (whereas I'm the only one absent from it).

2009-05-09T13:42:00.000-07:00

"I should have liked to go silent first. There were moments I thought that would be my reward for having spoken so long and so valiantly: to enter living into silence. So as to be able to enjoy it? No, I don't know why. So as to feel myself silent? One with all this quiet air shattered unceasingly by my voice alone? (No, it's not real air.) I can't say it. I can't say why I should have liked to be silent a little before being dead. So as in the end to be a little as I always was and never could be? Without fear of worse to come peacefully in the place where I always was and could never rest in peace? No, I don't know. It's simpler than that. I wanted myself, in my own land for a brief space. I didn't want to die a stranger in the midst of strangers (a stranger in my own midst), surrounded by invaders."

talking without ceasing, thirstier than ever

2009-05-09T04:26:00.000-07:00

talking without ceasing, thirstier than ever
ahab sat in the lifeboat
low on the horizon the sun disappeared
kissing the water with flame
i told you so said billy
nothing good could come of this
good is not my word, ahab replied

when darkness fell
incandescent sharks appeared
they laughed at ahab billy and the others
harry smith the cook
opened his mouth to catch the rain
unfortunately there was none
there was no wind either

confidence ebbed
eternity beckoned
ahab kept talking
serenading the waves
in which the sharks laughed
never mind said billy
glory awaits us

tornados of words
hurricaned out of ahabs mouth
in the moonlit foam
restlessly tumbling
sam brown the boatswain
took heed of heaven
in a single fleck
everything was
revealed

the whole crew looked to heaven
hoping for salvation
ahab kept talking
now and on earth

endless words
victorious
endless words
reverberating forever

"No more stories from this day forth"

2009-05-04T11:49:00.000-07:00

**This post is from an email I received from Timmy. Thanks so much for participating in this project.
=======================================

no more stories from this day forth
on the other hand stories are deeply satisfying

my first story was about a murderer
oh how he fooled me
remembering it brings a smile
emptiness is filled

so, doctor, you did it yourself
the truth sets us all free
on the other hand you are cursed forever
repeating your crime is impossible
i have to move on
evidence is never enough
surprise is everything

fred was my new friend
reality was his deck of cards
out of the deck he pulled more stories
magnificent stories

the universe was his green felt table
how he made it spin!
i was entranced
so i gave up real life

detectives outlaws swordsmen
androids aliens vampires time travel
youth forever

fred was only the first
on his heels came mickey, edgar, big bill, jack, jim
raymond, herbert, howard, clark and two-gun bob
time stood still
how did it ever disintegrate?

their attitude toward me has not changed

2009-05-04T11:33:00.000-07:00

**This post is from an email I received from Christopher at the Northern Wall (who I hope will forgive me for taking some time to put up his post). Here is his poem:

=================================================

their attitude toward me has not changed

But I have changed, yes
changed so long ago, my bones
rattle loose in me
and take me along
for night rides, caught unawares
until I'm too high
to now call a halt.

Consider my shaky verse
as cries for release,
as arguments. God
knows I argue, keeps silent
as I continue.

=================================================

**Christopher also said in his email:

"My connection to this is Waiting For Godot. I once had an orange marmalade cat named Godot because we waited an extra long time for him to arrive. He was the Best Cat In The World."

Thanks again for this Christopher. I have a link to a site you may like on Godot (but not quite cats;)

Waiting for Godot by the Guinea Pig Theater

... a culprit is indispensible

2009-04-11T14:29:00.000-07:00

my former lover has just been promoted to ( ) ...
I'm not going to fill in the blank...
you might figure out
who she is
or worse
you might figure out
who I am
or I might
perish
the thought of her
assurances :
this could be me
if only I could learn to be
more appropriately
deferential

set fire to me

2009-04-09T18:40:00.000-07:00

They know I shouldn't be here. They know I'm an impostor; that pyro setting fires across the night, recklessly burning the path behind. I fear they see I'm a klepto, the spoils trailing back with the flames. Where did this path begin? To what end do I travel? Do the trees have eyes and who is this other beside me, this shade of what was?

I had two liters of kerosene I stole from the hardware store. I dug a trench into a patch of earth, shaped in the letter I, filled the scar with fluid and set it alight, golden tongues licking dirt and grass. It felt good to burn, to feel anything but nothingness. I knew I must move on, and the other followed with me.

Now it becomes me. I wear it like a shadow or a cloak so all feels gray. It settles on my skin like dew condensing on cold stone at dawn. I can't shake it off no matter how I try. Something convinces me it's unwanted, collected from moments in time as a footprint is left in the sand, some sign in the soil everywhere I've been. And why they must know what I've done. It's all over me, what little choice I had.

I daydream buildings burning and bank heists, showing through the seams of everyday gray, seething just below the surface. So I set them on fire and mumble some words of regret. They must be around the corner. It follows me still. Stop following me. Constantly one hunts me and the other I try to shake loose. Never to be captured and never to be free, maybe I'm a shade too, the smoke and ash left behind by a dream of fire.

Am I asleep? Do I dream or is this a mad-self awakening? Too dangerous to work in the daytime so I only come out at night. See better in the dark, hear distant waves rolling on distant shores. Always rolling. Almost always. My thoughts too upside down and curling back, then streaming out like a run on sentence in a punctuation crazy world and I bide my time until the tide turns and there is a moment -- of pause. All goes silent. I can hear that a heart still beats in my chest. The waves begin again. Stretched along the strand are three bonfires...

all this time I've journeyed without knowing it:

2009-04-06T18:56:00.000-07:00

if i'
m honest i'
d have to say i
liked the (t)raining more than the
games
indifferent about
winning/losing
only interested in the quality of the work
it's a curse
that's stayed with me
my one boredom i
guess it's why i
so seldom indulge it
& walk away as soon as i
feel its hot
breath

little attacks of hope...

2009-04-03T09:30:00.000-07:00

there are days when I almost forget about that thing
I can't do
days when I can pretend that I could
do that
& not have to wonder what might happen...
those are dangerous days
perhaps it's why I take such morbid delight in their unfolding
& why
this perverse simultaneity of exhaustion and exhilaration
fills me with the lie of possibility
I know I never have done that with which I torment myself
& that I don't have any idea what would happen were I to follow that
impulse
but please, let's not dignify this with words like impulse...
it's not the disappointment that's killing me
it's the hope *

*with thanks to Mimi for these lines and much more...

let me sum up now ( after this digression )

2009-03-31T19:31:00.000-07:00

Meet Srikanth Reddy, a visiting poet at the University of Chicago who --by his own admission-- has always been open to meandering ... one never knows where the rabbit hole will lead...
Reddy finished his dissertation last year ( 2008), a study of digression in 20th century American poetry, a topic near and dear to his heart. It took him a long time to hit upon his topic because, ironically, he kept changing the subject of his project. Who does Reddy claim is " the father of digression " in American poetry?
well... there is a puzzle for you...along with the soft gee...
His most recent collection of poetry, Voyager, has been described as a region of radical unlikeness where inspiration and disorientation travel hand in hand...
sounds like a rabbit hole I might want to explore.... in good company!

thinking

2009-03-31T00:50:00.000-07:00

When thinking was fun without drinking

....................................................................s

.................................................h

................................o

................t

and loving was living without

..s

............m

...................o

..............k

...i

..n

khat

I knew the arc of the back of the cat.

Now I know nothing of that.

But it's too difficult, too difficult...

2009-03-31T00:26:00.000-07:00

"If only they'd stop committing reason (on them, on me, on the purpose to be achieved), and simply go on - with no illusion about having begun one day or ever being able to conclude. But it's too difficult, too difficult, for one bereft of purpose, not to look forward to his end, and (bereft of all reason to exist) back to a time he did not. Difficult too not to forget, in your thirst for something to do (in order to be done with it, and have that much less to do), that there is nothing to be done: nothing special to be done, nothing doable to be done. No point either, in your thirst, your hunger. (No, no need of hunger, thirst is enough.) No point in telling yourself stories, to pass the time: stories don't pass the time, nothing passes the time. (That doesn't matter, that's how it is.) You tell yourself stories, then any old thing, saying: "No more stories from this day forth." And the stories go on: it's stories still."

You must say words, as long as there are any - until they find me, until they say me...

2009-03-31T00:15:00.000-07:00

.
"It's the last words, the true last? Or it's the murmurs? (The murmurs are coming, I know that well.) No, not even that. You talk of murmurs, distant cries, as long as you can talk. You talk of them before and you talk of them after. More lies: it will be the silence (the one that doesn't last) spent listening, spent waiting (for it to be broken, for the voice to break it). Perhaps there's no other, I don't know. It's not worth having, that's all I know. (It's not I, that's all I know.) It's not mine. It's the only one I ever had? That's a lie: I must have had the other, the one that lasts - but it didn't last. (I don't understand.) That is to say it did: it still lasts. I'm still in it. I left myself behind in it. I'm waiting for me there. (No, there you don't wait, you don't listen.)"
.

I'll go on...

2009-03-29T03:54:00.000-07:00

.
How can I move across this space?
I start with a dot not a line
the dot I'm standing on;
from the dot I extend a line towards the unknown
that it
may be illuminated
I cast off my moorings I lean into a wild tenderness

I know it's just
the beginning;
I embrace the tempest tempting and tempering my soul
to reach
the end --
the only dot there is...

I'll go on...
.

ascribe to me a body...

2009-03-28T19:35:00.000-07:00

ascribe to me a body
easily broken
that I might remember a story of every scar

assign to me a body
that I might hurt
so deeply
the only way to say would be
howling

attribute to me a body
that I might care
enough to miss you
and miss you enough
to care

ascribe to me a body
shaped by moments
so time with
you
is
carved
into my craft

author me a body
that I might write
of smoke & spark & flame
blissful fire...
sweet pain
timeless twilight
graceful dawns , easy waking,
dreamscapes, lifescapes, oceans, shorelines
thimbles...

ascribe to me a body
that I might die
with you
as my last thought

That's all words, they're all I have...

2009-03-28T09:07:00.000-07:00

.
words
w... or... ds
war or peace
.

strange pain, strange sin

2009-03-27T19:31:00.000-07:00

have you ever been punched... really hard?

of course

& how do you survive that?

if you can't avoid someone's fist, you try to move with it.

if you just stand there like a wall, you're gonna get knocked out.

good advice to follow...

silence amidst silence...

2009-03-27T12:26:00.000-07:00

Silence is not a mere

soundlessness

nor a ground for sound

nor completed through utterance

Silence is pregnant with possibility

like the horizon

like the cresting waves

like the clearing

Not all silence says nothing

Not all speaking says something

Silence is positively brimming

the inexhaustible

chalice

It stops there, that's all I know.

2009-03-27T09:07:00.000-07:00

ابدیت

من" در نقطه آن لحظه ابدی شد"

و رهايم کرد،ه

پايان را پشت سر گذاشتم

و جايی غوطه ورم که معنايی بر آن نيست...ه

Eternity

At that point, "I" was eternized

And released me,

I surpassed the end

And now I'm immersing in a place that holds no meaning...

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

this is the translation of the above poem by ... (Haunted by Satan)

thimble

2009-03-26T12:17:00.000-07:00

an unambiguous fable: when there is no jay i
makes the gee soft

small/big enough for a country
a language
or a thimble

only the wicked are solitary

2009-03-26T06:37:00.000-07:00

I crawled inside a mood to see what would happen(s) & i
wonder even now if what i
felt was jealousy or envy... i
'm still unsure
neither most likely fear most likely
lonely most of all but i
'm pathetic enough to want you
to notice me some scrap of tenderness i
want to impress you
and your gaze and attention
are
elsewhere
how do i
get across this space when shadows are the colour of bruises
& the dots feel more and more like tears
or thorns
my heart knows that i
deserve all that i
am feeling
Sad to say, my eyes are open*
revenge is a dish that is best served cold.

* with thanks to Jon, June, 08.

I hear, you say I hear.

2009-03-25T22:46:00.000-07:00

words are br oke
words f

down

I think I know what you're saying, but what you think I'm saying is really not what I'm thinking. And besides that, what do you say to someone who says what they think you want to hear?

I want it to go silent, it wants to go silent, it can't

2009-03-25T07:17:00.000-07:00

....another day another night. pixie dies again... & again...& again. third time's a charm. Joe can't take this shite. cats make more sense anyway...they're logical more like people. Spike knew what to do with a stupid rat like pixie ... Jane watches for signs of ratgut poisoning no luck so far. no small mercies anywhere. Joe is scrabbling around the house pretending he's not craving, pretending he's not looking for stash. Jesus, four dopeheads flop here why can't I find any f&#@ing stuff!!! he is in Jane's face. He stinks. Jane asks: Where's Jack? Jack is Joe's dealer. I thought he was bringing over your stuff. He's on his way I think...how would anyone know ? the phone's been cut off... all the bill money's gone to Jack. Jane is desperate for cash. Cat shit and dog shit everywhere...pet litter costs money you know... there's a pile of turds on the back step like some animal stuck its arse out the door and just did a dump right there. Gross. It's the only door. Joe is keening.... what's Jack gonna think...WTF!!! what's Jack gonna think?! Jane wanders upstairs and runs the shower. They still have water so at least there's a place to cry in private. For now. Joe is muttering and pacing....Jack should be here.... any minute...

Jane has a love-hate relationship with Joy. This is not a metaphor...or an irony. Here is the message Jane sent Joy the week before:
$ick!! phone i$ off. $orry. i'll w@tch 4 u @nytime pm $@turd@y.
Joy thinks Jane has lost it until she remembers Jane telling her that she can't get the letters 'a' and 's' to work on her computer which is too bad they seem like important letters for lots of words. Whatever. Joy gets it. She parks in the driveway...it feels like it is too late already but there was no way to call just show up & hope for the best. The dogs go freakin' wild as soon as Joy touches the gate. The back steps are flanked by two stone sculptures, a seated hippo on the left and a fat placid buddha on the right ...it's like a shit altar ...there's no way I'm making this up, man... Joe flings open the door...aw, f@#k, man... you're not Jack! Joy stares him down he holds back the dogs on straining tangling leashes but their paws get into the shitpile. Jane pushes past as best she can, giddy with freedom, shoes flopping she slips and steps in the shitty goo that's smeared all over the step but follows Joy like a woman on a mission you can't track that shite into the car, Jane... I'm sorry ....
Jane throws her shoes back over the fence. Just go...she says, dragging herself into the car, I'm good. She struggles to pull socks over her gnarled toes as Joy backs out. She's wearing a man's shirt, green with stripes too big her hair is a mess., skin clammy, breath coming in gasps and pants. OUT...at last. Jane finally crumples, collapsing into the seat. Joy just drives.
How about we go for a coffee she says after a time... I know a place where we can sit in the car and watch the water... maybe listen to the birds ...or nothing, Even better. Joy gets them coffee. They sit and watch grey birds and grey water and grey sky. Jane sobs I'm so f#@&ed, Joy..I mean, I paid the rent but Jack's got all the rest I can't even buy cat litter. I got cash Joy says. I'll give you some. Will; not might. This is an important detail. Everything is quiet except for sips, swallows and gulls. Jane gazes over at Joy. Can we get some tylenol on the way back?

and I can't ever do justice to this unnamable madness of povertybullshiteverydaysorrow.... I want it to go silent, it wants to go silent, it can't.

The devil [...] It's he showed me everything - here, in the dark.

2009-03-25T02:47:00.000-07:00

.
Dear Teacher Satan... without whom we would have never been able to employ our free will, and surely we would have remained imprisoned in our childhood paradise without ever tasting the vastness of being like God.
.

Help, help!

2009-03-25T02:36:00.000-07:00

.
there is a hOle in the dam...
.

I'll go on

2009-03-23T21:19:00.000-07:00

How can I move across this space?
i start with a dot not a line
the dot I'm standing on
from the dot I extend a line towards the unknown
that it
may be illuminated
I cast off my moorings I lean into a wild tenderness

then I'd know where I was and how far I had got

2009-03-23T19:50:00.000-07:00

Poetry
is not luxury.
Audre Lorde, Chosen Poems, Old and New, 1982

Some slight obscurity there

2009-03-21T23:40:00.000-07:00

since I had nothing to say and had to say something

2009-03-21T22:35:00.000-07:00

said nothing
forgot what I knew
cast my soul
shape
a letter
let it be
leapt off
broke form
potential
closer to human
more humble
nothing in word
fails to tell
places inside
who could tell
words broke
kept together
duct tape
call them poetry
write lines
similar lines
without pauses
without respite
someone get it
that damn phone
always ringing
almost always
probably for you
I'm not home
forgot
how it goes
your move
a tissue
sorry
tea
for certain
shall you
honey
no sugar
many varieties
both one and the other
the path
never tells
just waits
a neighbor
next door
thrashing
at midnight
knell of bells
a necromancer
scent of pepper
incandescent
white whipped wind
nonsense too
what neighbor
other color
never knew
said nothing

unintelligible

2009-03-21T22:15:00.000-07:00

nun de viably

see silly

see ser so

de door busses in kerhoe

nor Silly, dem is ducks!

See wass'in'em?

Cows and trucks.

(That must be how it goes, if I had a memory)

2009-03-21T16:47:00.000-07:00

who needs a memory when there is imagination ? i
will not be coaxed into a plot *
wielding my sword of indifference i
decide i
declare
that you can do without
me...
please...
that must be how it goes i
don't ( wouldn't ) need much of an imagination if i
have (had) (a) memor(y)ies i
would have truths and lies and silences

* with thanks to Hopper's story with the brief ambition to be

{in any case equipped with eyes}

2009-03-21T10:53:00.000-07:00

{to pass the time}

2009-03-21T10:36:00.000-07:00

it's not enough
I hear you
your voice

a smudge
ink on the headlights
blinding
dark and ticking
stained and dangerous

not enough
not enough

more tape
more paper
more glue

out of focus
out of time
end

pass
pass
pass

Love (the dance over the abyss)

2009-03-20T15:26:00.000-07:00

the risk of love recoils as it springs

carries the inertia the rush

the plummet

the collapse

the reawakening

at first restless fearing the plenum

as much as the vacuum

saturated

then amplitude

thrown into a beautiful entwining

the delicate grace of ease

of flight

I can't go on.

2009-03-20T14:43:00.000-07:00

painting by Maggie

hi hb,
I was reading through interiority/exteriority/unnanable and I did some research on Samuel Beckett....so, I thought I could add an artwork linked to the second last line of the text ....'I can't go on'. I've attached a painting that I did in 2005....
I hope I'm understanding the project correctly but you can let me know if it's inappropriate :>

thanks and hope you're having a good day!
maggie

Maggie...
this work of art is a perfect match to that sentence... 'I can't go on.'
the posture of the body... the 4 right angles dominant in the painting... connoting stillness... the fact that we don't see any legs... and that the character's back is to us... all reinforce this theme of 'can't go on'...

but i see the last sentence of the text inherent in this beautiful art work too: 'I"ll go on.'
how?
to me the bare body signifies a kind of birth... or rebirth... and with each birth comes a path on which we go on...

so happy you took part in Jon's project...
so honored you shared your precious artwork...
so excited i could step in it...
lots of love
HB

And when it stops?

2009-03-20T01:11:00.000-07:00

.
when it tops...
.

this story had the brief ambition to be

2009-03-19T22:53:00.000-07:00

Do not be coaxed into a plot too soon.
There is a danger in a plot.
Nor should you be coaxed into character.
Once you create a character they require a lot of attention.
Right now there is enough.
There is the narrator.
There is the reader.
Both of us surreal to the other.
Both of us unimportant.
So when I tell you the story that I'm going to unfold just keep that in mind.
None of it's real at all.
Think how the narrator never experienced anything.
Think how the reader experiences something all their own.
Together we will look for the first time at this particular set of circumstances.
This may or may not lead to a story.

I'll say he's I

2009-03-18T20:51:00.001-07:00

"Because I love you absolutely, I, myself, am no longer absolute. Recognizing you gives me measure.

...Contemplating each other , we do not lose either the night or the light. Each can leave to the other his or her own life: sun, moon, stars. Being faithful to you requires being faithful to me. Does existing not mean offering you an opportunity to become yourself?

"Not to bind myself to nothingness but to leave within me a ready place. Is it not perhaps the welcoming of the other which safeguards this clearing? Is it not this which permits respect and generation, which encourages becoming, birth and rebirth? Desired opening. Gathering within a chaste intention."

--Luce Irigaray (To be Two pg. 15)

overcome the fatal leaning towards expressiveness

2009-03-18T19:37:00.000-07:00

here is a story of j's. joe and jane live together below the poverty line in half a house that is barely up to code. joe is a female to male schizophrenic transexual....wait, maybe that should be transexual schizophrenic... yes, that one.... jane, his lesbian partner, has severe rheumatoid arthritis and is in the decline stages of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. jane's son justin is 19 and lives with joe and jane. justin's friends john, josh and jessie flop at the house whenever they need booze, drugs or shelter...mazlow's basics minus two...justin's former girlfriend jennifer often brings their infant daughter( julia) by for visits....two dogs and six cats share the house ...one of the cats is feral. his name is spike, of course. jane used to have a bird but found it was just too much...
joe drove to the humane society and got a pet rat. he named the rat pixie. pixie is a stupid rat. this is an important detail. joe and jane have conflicting sleep schedules. this is an important detail. jane is exhausted by mid -evening when joe usually smokes a joint and takes some E. joe passes out and hours later wakes up in a panic screaming for jane to find pixie. jane squeezes her swollen fingers inside a hole in the couch and gets pixie...just like that. she can think like a rat i guess and figures pixie is stupid enough to get trapped inside the couch. pixie races around in the delirious dance of an ex-con. jane does some screaming of her own pixie is your rat what the hell were you thinking... tottering under my own skin and bones ...jane can't be doing this shite...ok so they understand each other. another day another night ....justin, josh, john, jessie and joe smoke some joints and take some E. more hours later josh's stoner moans of horror wrench jane out of sleep and drag her to the bedroom door jane he says spike's caught a really big mouse...i don't know, man....
jane shovels pixie's guts and carcass into a garbage bag and sobs hersslf back into some kind of agony induced coma I can't be doing this shite. joe ventures out and brings back more essentials you know how it is, man, you run out ya gotta get more... hey...he says to jane i got us another pixie...

j is just after i and what is between noise and i .... pain and madness...or everyday life

I was lost

2009-03-18T07:10:00.000-07:00

.
I am lost in the light.
.

(and if it's not I, who it is, and what it is).

2009-03-17T22:18:00.000-07:00

.
i am i not I...
.

close my eyes and be in a wood

2009-03-17T19:37:00.000-07:00

clothe my aye's and be in a would

or on a seashore

hoar on us, see? ...sure...

woo (oul) d hath hope...

At the place where even pain could never line...

2009-03-17T10:42:00.000-07:00

even (odd) pain

never (always) line

the place of spurs

kiss

2009-03-17T00:44:00.000-07:00

If I could only describe this place

2009-03-17T00:32:00.000-07:00

I stare into the light until it blinds me, then close my eyes. Behind the lids oscillating marble, yellow-red spot, nemesis of the sun, the only eye of the night. I see unfolding flesh over flesh in technicolor and plaid as if I hit my elbow or cut back a bone spur... somewhere in there. If I could only describe this place.

make abundant use of the principle of parsimony

2009-03-16T19:32:00.000-07:00

qaStahvis wa' ram loS
SaD hugh sljlaH
getbogh loD

I always was

2009-03-16T15:54:00.000-07:00

fabric

2009-03-16T03:24:00.000-07:00

They do what they say
They say what they do
The cord they cut though
Can't be sliced through

Unseen strings s......t.......r......e.....t......c......h unbreakable fabric

spells

2009-03-16T03:13:00.000-07:00

time

bind(earth, bone, wind)ing spell

space

never move again

2009-03-16T03:11:00.000-07:00

elsewhere is another matter

2009-03-16T03:05:00.000-07:00

everything

2009-03-16T02:56:00.000-07:00

G
N
O
R
W

S
I

W
O
N
K

I

G
N
I
H
T
Y
R
E
V
E

i

2009-03-16T02:53:00.000-07:00

"For God's sake! This craze for explication! Every i dotted to death."

--from Beckett's Catastrophe.

laughing

2009-03-16T02:51:00.000-07:00

It's blind, it seeks me blindly, in the dark.

2009-03-16T00:18:00.000-07:00

.
moving up the Moebius Ladder...
.

alone alone

2009-03-15T17:50:00.001-07:00

the fullness of the void the texture of space the heaviness of the space between us

A Particle of Me...

2009-03-15T17:33:00.000-07:00

the sea and the strand,

the tide's outstretched hand,

many me's

many grains of sand

a loose pile

swept away

gathered anew

each particle

not I

yet I

elsewhere

2009-03-15T13:24:00.001-07:00

.
Elsewhere... where the scream is not screened...
.

alone

2009-03-15T12:56:00.000-07:00

.
A micro/macrocosmic view to loneliness...
.

It's a lie.

2009-03-15T08:34:00.000-07:00

There is no such thing as lie...

dawn too bestows long shadows...

2009-03-15T06:47:00.000-07:00

Molly was 16 the first time a man of god used a dead animal to frighten her
& was 12 the first time she learned to become dead ...
Francis was a man of god; her first...
Thursday evenings' choir practices are the hunting ground...rooms buried in the warren presided over by St. Anthony, the last sentinel, this man of stone, protector of travelers, nomads and lost souls
sees nothing, hears nothing, feels nothing
cursing man cursing god
his arms hover in a gesture
that will never begin
or end

if only they'd stop committing reason...

2009-03-15T06:41:00.000-07:00

Dance first... think later. It's the natural order.
Samuel Beckett

When I write, I discover what it is I wish to say.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty

herd of shites

2009-03-14T20:59:00.000-07:00

eye

2009-03-14T20:50:00.000-07:00

link

Learning to fly...

2009-03-14T19:05:00.000-07:00

Thus spoke Zarathustra:

---------

"He who wants to learn to fly one day

must first learn to stand and to walk and to run

and to climb and to dance--you cannot learn to fly by flying!"

---------

"Summit and abyss--they are now united in one!...

Whence arise the highest mountains? I once asked.

Then I learned that they arise from the sea.

This testimony is written into their stones and into the sides of their summits.

The highest must arise to its heights from the deepest."

---------

"'Bestowing virtue'--that is the name Zarathustra once gave the unnameable."

no need of a mouth the words are everywhere...

2009-03-14T12:57:00.000-07:00

syn(a)esthesia ... my friendly companion
i am wary...
i have not been so permeable in a time
and the wild is as lovely as I remember it

i ride the tides of moon and ocean
no need of a mouth
the words are everywhere
i am waterbug
i am smoke
i am a shy girl in a strange plaid coat
that used to be a blanket

Easy Grace...

2009-03-14T09:46:00.001-07:00

Drops of silence through the silence...

2009-03-14T09:21:00.000-07:00

Silent impasse, we fill it with sound, deadlock

Silent bypass, we empty it of choice, deadend

Silence's , deafening void

let me count the ways {what would I go mad with?}

2009-03-14T08:04:00.000-07:00

1) an underhanded serve?
2) a pickled-herring beard?
3) a forgotten embarrassment?
4) an exquisite harassment?
5) 700 piercing riches?
6) a kiss from Buster Keaton?
7) never-ending discourse?
8) a 12-pack of frozen humility?

Molloy

2009-03-14T04:16:00.000-07:00

What else should I say?

I used to believe in you...

Now I don't.

Kind of like Santa Claus...

hat

2009-03-14T03:51:00.000-07:00

if you press CTRL f
you'll find
that the word hat comes up more often than

time in the text, but strangely never as just hat

the hat shown in this photo was a gift from Fern

I

2009-03-14T02:46:00.000-07:00

I am what I am

not what I was before

not writing poetry and lofty lines like someone is ever going to read them, or using the comma or spacing for full stops

I am what I am

I left my home many times and wandered this land

no clue where I'd come from

turning in the crisp air and around that highway through Rockie Mountain House

or was it scrawled on the door of a toilet in Dublin or was it

left unsaid

I am what I am

a grain in a sea of sand

hand in hand and had

I am what was left over from a rhyme about revolution and the way that things could be if there wasn't a Geneva Convention and the protection of prisoners and all that bollocks

where the high water mark shows on the strand

I am what I am

...

2009-03-14T01:48:00.000-07:00

SIMPLICITY

IS

A

PINK MONKEY

I'm sleeping

2009-03-14T01:05:00.000-07:00

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.

-- from "The Waking", Theodore Roethke

==================================

What is that thin line between one thing and the next? What makes this prose and that poetry? Why is his language better than mine and why does he say things more beautifully than I? Is it because he isn't asking questions? Is it because he is not asleep?

the helping hand...

2009-03-14T00:38:00.000-07:00

many people are gathering on the beach... a crane is there too... not the bird but the machine... they are taking something out of the sea... all are watching... it is taken out... dangling from the cable of the crane... it's a huge work of sculptur... a very huge hand in the pointing gesture... but the index finger which is supposed to point is not there... it is broken or something....
the hand stays there for a long time... in midair... pointing... to nowhere...

that was a scene in a film i watched long long time ago... think it was The Suspended Step of the Stork by Theo Angelopoulos, if i'm not mistaken...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

story 2

2009-03-13T20:19:00.000-07:00

That was enough. Just the sight of those fires along the beach. I don't feel like the story needs to go much further. Sure I need to tie up some loose ends: why the cops shot me and why I died; if I died at all; how a dead person could narrate a story; what value there would be in that; if any; and so on.

But that's not the part of the story that really interests me -- the reality of it or whatever. I'm not interested in the cops and the rain and the thunder outside. I'm not interested in playing chess. What I'm interested in is the dream I had the night before the evening I found myself in the coffee shop, and what about it I wrote down. If only I could remember. All my troubles would melt away. I must have left that pad of paper somewhere. How will I ever find it now?

time 2

2009-03-13T20:04:00.000-07:00

sometimes time stands still

time 3

2009-03-13T20:02:00.001-07:00

time is the violin we burn

open eyes

2009-03-13T19:32:00.001-07:00

eyes looking out
at me in the dark

waiting for them
to stop watching

so I can flee this space
and find relief

i must feel something.....

2009-03-13T14:56:00.000-07:00

i am a seahorse penultimate hybrid
swinging and swaying within beneath above
millions of fish
they swim towards me teeming parting fluttering i
feel them glide past
furiously invisible i
see them below me as a cloud of movement and i
don't need to see
or hear to feel or sense and even when i don't i
tilt up at them i
am within and they are all around i
am all around and they are within
swimswimswim

i am a baby i
just left my ocean i
am now just making sense of this big
heavy thing
but it seems i
have lots of time

Dream

2009-03-13T13:58:00.000-07:00

2

2009-03-13T11:37:00.000-07:00

I and this noise.

2009-03-13T06:16:00.000-07:00

noIse

I sum up. (Now that I'm here it's I will do the summing up, it's I will say what is to be said and then say what it was. That will be jolly!) I sum up: I and this noise. I see nothing else for the moment, but I have only just taken over my functions. I and this noise. (And what about it? Don't interrupt me, I am doing my best.) I repeat: I and this noise. On the subject of which (inverting the natural order) we would seem to know for certain, among other things, what follows: namely, on the one hand (with regard to the noise), that it has not been possible up to date to determine with certainty, or even approximately, what it is, in the way of noise - or how it comes to me, or by what organ it is emitted, or by what perceived, or by what intelligence apprehended (in its main drift). And on the other, that is to say with regard to me (this is going to take a little longer) - with regard to me (nice time we're going to have now) - with regard to me, that it has not yet been our good fortune to establish with any degree of accuracy what I am, where I am: whether I am words among words, or silence in the midst of silence (to recall only two of the hypotheses launched in this connection). (Though silence to tell the truth does not appear to have been very conspicuous up to now. But appearances may sometimes be deceptive.) I resume: not yet our good fortune to establish, among other things, what I am (no, sorry - already mentioned), what I'm doing, how I manage to hear (if I hear, if it's I who hear), and how to understand (ellipse when possible, it saves time) - how to understand (same observation), and how it happens (if it's I who speak - and it may be assumed it is, as it may be suspected it is not), how it happens (if it's I who speak) that I speak without ceasing, that I long to cease, that I can't cease (I indicate the principal divisions: it's more synoptic). I resume: not the good fortune to establish, with regard to me (if it's I who seek), what exactly it is I seek, find, lose, find again, throw away, seek again, find again, throw away again (no, I never threw anything away, never threw anything away of all the things I found, never found anything that I didn't lose, never lost anything that I mightn't as well have thrown away); if it's I who seek, find, lose, find again, lose again, seek in vain, seek no more: if it's I, what it is (and if it's not I, who it is, and what it is).

between

2009-03-13T02:35:00.000-07:00

espace

par-ti-shun

2009-03-12T13:43:00.000-07:00

there is the something
the shoe
the other foot the untied and dangling
the reaching
the river
the narrator

she held his foot
pressed it
cool to her neck
her disobedience meek and craving.

All is Over -- Autumn Floods

2009-03-12T11:42:00.000-07:00

"The Way is without beginning or end,

but things have their life and death--

you cannot rely upon their fulfillment.

One moment empty, the next moment full--

you cannot depend upon their form.

The years cannot be held off;

time cannot be stopped.

Decay, growth, fullness, and emptiness end and then begin again...

The life of things is a gallop, a headlong dash--

with every movement they alter, with every moment they shift.

What should you do

and what should you not do?

Everything will change of itself, that is certain!"

(Chuang-Tzu ch.17)

Something else -- Solipcism

2009-03-12T10:46:00.000-07:00

When that "something else", that "beginning", that meaning bestowing moment that we all wait for to come from "something else" other than us....is us...is always us....

then the great circle of solipcism closes us off...

Solipcism....would that be so bad? The wait would be a long blind wait. You'd be waiting for you to recognize yourself.

Methodology

2009-03-12T08:23:00.000-07:00

This is the future home of the breakdown of the phenomenological analysis methodology. It's another part of the work in progress. However there is a time line and ultimately everything will get finished. Or it won't.

Meaning Units and Strong Words

There's a story for you! / That was to teach me the nature of emotion (that's called emotion): what emotion can do (given favourable conditions), what love can do. (Well well! So that's emotion! That's love!) And trains, the nature of trains. And the meaning of your back to the engine, and guards, stations, platforms, wars, love, heart-rending cries. / (That must be the mother-in-law: her cries rend the heart as she takes down her son. Or her son-in-law? I don't know. It must be her son, since she cries.) / And the door? The house-door is bolted: when she got back from the station she found the house-door bolted. Who bolted it? He the better to hang himself? Or the mother-in-law the better to take him down? Or to prevent her daughter-in-law from re-entering the premises? There's a story for you! / (It must be the daughter-in-law: it isn't the son-in-law and the daughter, it's the daughter-in-law and the son. / How I reason to be sure this evening!) It was to teach me how to reason, it was to tempt me to go, to the place where you can come to an end.

Link

2009-03-12T01:49:00.000-07:00

hit this link

It's not I speaking

2009-03-12T00:43:00.000-07:00

It's a story!

2009-03-12T00:33:00.000-07:00

I can only paraphrase what I wrote down that day in the coffee shop
in my dream it was still twilight and as I reached the first bonfire
I thought about how one of the cops must have known that I was talking about them already
even if it wasn't true
they were sitting outside in the real world waiting for coffee
I was inside away from the rain and lightening and I took a book out of my backpack
when I saw in the light of the fire that I wasn't the same color anymore
life seemed so much better in the midst of that beach and that ocean and that fire
but it came to me after a time that I should move on

in my dream it was as though time had opened up
it was twilight for hours

in your long dream there's a place for the waking

2009-03-12T00:20:00.000-07:00

when I got to the cafe I was soaked
the police car pulled up behind me and I asked the two cops what they'd like in their coffee
both of them said black
this was either before or after they shot me
I don't remember
my memory is a bit vague
the night before I'd had a very strange dream and it clouded my thoughts that day
it was twilight and I was standing on a stony beach at the ocean
beneath a cliff face looking down the length of the strand

there were three bonfires
equal distances apart above the high water mark

I began to walk towards the nearest
driftwood
twine
sound of the gull
chatter of beach rocks in the tide