Mar 31, 2005



Went to see the Hiroshi Sugimoto exhibit at the MFA last night amid thoughts of death and Creeley. Sugimoto's cinema photographs have long been a favorite series of mine, and I have recently become acquainted with the seascapes by way of Rachel.

Interesting to view these works through the lens of mortality, or thoughts of mortality. The way the seascapes enhance or blur the binary relationship of sea and sky--fluid and fluid, life and death. Feeding into this, almost ridiculously, thoughts from seeing The Ring 2 last weekend, and its view of the world of the dead as a place of water.

More haunting, though, were the cinemas. Sugimoto makes these images by exposing for the duration of the film, thus the screen becomes a sort of luminous, glowing monolith as the film on the screen burns into the film in the camera. Thus it is a light of simultaneity, everything happening at once. The photos achieve a sort of timelessness by way of flux. Time enbodied in timelessness, not unlike death, and the glowing fields of the cinema not unlike that last light we are reputed to travel towards as we leave this plane. Perhaps these photos do shed light on said light, perhaps it is the film of our lives projected simultaneously onto the screen of our dying minds, travelling to a realm where each thing is happening at once. The parcel of our lives viewed, at long last, from a distance.

Mar 30, 2005

LIKE A LAMB LIKE A LION

Late March, early spring

the first warm wind

may it lift you

to heaven
Creeley and Lacy will play together once again now, but this world won't hear.

Woe to us. Farewell.

Mar 25, 2005

I don't understand why my blog doesn't feed into these RSS/Pinging things that people talk about. I've set all of the options in my "Settings" tab to syndicate or whatever...not sure what else I need to do...
Received a spam email this morning with the subject heading "Great manuscript on how to have sex wit".

Mar 24, 2005

To all of my Ithaca readers, I am reading in Ithaca on April 9 for Soon productions. I realize that my Ithaca readership is more or less comprised by Soon productions itself, but still...
This week has been really busy, so not much in the way of blog posts.

I went to see the reunified Slint with Guillermo on Sunday. It was a pretty fantastic show. Had I realized that they had perfected the Indie Rock mode in the late 80's, I could have saved myself alot of time at shows in the mid-to late 90's... I had actually forgotten that I had heard many of the songs (went to the show thinking that I only remembered "Good Morning, Captain"), but realized as they were playing that I knew the majority of the songs very well. Rock shows in Boston are always a strange mix of townies and hipsters...

I remember listening to "Good Morning, Captain" after breaking up with my first girlfriend in 1994. The song had been given to me by another girl who I had a crush on at the time. I remember feeling like the world was going to end. Hearing Brian McMahan screaming the familiar "I miss you..." at the end of the song I realized that the song still carried the same emotional weight as it did back then, however, I didn't feel anything for any of the people involved. In the end the text outlives the memory, and does, I suppose foretell the end of the world, or at least the time when it will be only a spectre, bodiless, recalling long gone events and people. Said context is rather ironic given that the song is about ghosts to begin with:

"GOOD MORNING, CAPTAIN

Let me in, the voice cried softly,
from outside the wooden door.
Scattered remnants of the ship could be seen in the distance,
Blood stained the icy wall of the shore.

I'm the only one left. The storm, took them all,
He managed as he tried to stand.
The tears ran down his face.
Please, it's cold.

When he woke, there was no trace of the ship.
Only the dawn was left behind by the storm.
He felt the creaking of the stairs beneath him.
That rose, from the sea, to the door.

There was a sound at the window then.
The captain started, his breath was still.
Slowly, he turned.

From behind the edge of the windowsill,
There appeared the delicate hand of a child.
His face was flush and timid.
He stared at the captain through frightened eyes.

The captain reached for something to hold on to,
Help me, he whispered, as he rose slowly to his feet.
The boy's face went pale,
He recognized the sound.

Silently, he pulled down the shade against the shadow.
Lost in the doorstep of the empty house.

I'm trying to find my way home.

I'm sorry...
...and I miss you.

I miss you.
I've grown taller now.
I want the police to be notified.
I'll make it up to you,
I swear, I'll make it up to you.

I miss you"

Mar 20, 2005

Talk softly, but carry a big stick. I've been tagged by Erica.


You're stuck inside Farenheit 451, which book do you want to be?
Hounds and Hunting Through the Ages by Joseph Thomas


Have you ever had a crush on a ficitonal character?
Anna Bloom from In the Country of Last Things by Paul Auster, the Milla Jovovich character in Resident Evil and the robot from Metropolis...


Last book you bought is:
The Crystal Text--Clark Coolidge (for me), Deleuze on Literature (for a gift).


Last book you read is:
Girls on the Run--John Ashbery


What are you currently reading?
Plato's Cratylus (for a class), N.E. Gordon's The Area of Sound Called the Subtone and my fucking French textbook for a test on Tuesday...


5 books I would take to a deserted island:
1. 100 Poems from the Chinese--Kenneth Rexroth
2. Collected Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins
3. The Maximus Poems--Charles Olson
4. A Thousand Plateaus--Deleuze & Guattari
5. The Body: Photographs of the Human Form-- William A. Ewing


I guess I will tag: xtina (because it will piss her off), Geof, and Greg.

Mar 16, 2005

10 Texts



Because I love the herd, here is my list for the 10 reoccurring texts meme. Admittedly, some of these texts are only a few years old (most of the rest are much older, I guess that says something). Like Daniel Nester, I haven't allowed myself too much time to think about/tailor this. I didn't number the list, because the order is of no particular relevance.


* "A Rabbit as King of the Ghosts"--Wallace Stevens
* "Binsey Poplars"--Gerard Manley Hopkins
* "Quia Amore Langueo"--Anonymous, 15th cent.
* "City of Dreadful Night"--James Thomson
* "Dusk Raga"--Philip Nikolayev
* "Spacious"--Brenda Iijima
* "Les Chimeres"--Gerard de Nerval
* "Banquet at the Tso Family Manor"--Tu Fu, Trans. Kenneth Rexroth
* "The Gray Notebook"--Alexander Vvedensky, Trans. Matvei Yankelevich)
* "Falling Forward"--Sara Veglahn

Mar 14, 2005

Blogger remains unstable. Perhaps I will look elsewhere sooner rather than later. Perhaps it is time for a new haircut anyway...

Mar 10, 2005

Blogger has been flailing for the past few days. Really annoying. Am conisdering a shift to a new service. Perhaps when, if I leave Boston.

Am reluctant to post much right now, because getting into the interface is a major pain in the neck...

Mar 9, 2005

Ekphrasis has been on peoples' minds' lately. Eileen has posted an older poem of mine I sent her about a painting from a Monet exhibit she was talking about on her blog in terms of ekphrasis.

The interaction between art and poetry is pretty universal insofar as everyone does it, from traditional elegiac anecdotal poetry to experimentalists alike.
Courtesy of Laura Carter, I couldn't resist this one. I'd probably have been more of an asshole if I knew how to drive a car...

I am 42% Asshole/Bitch.
Part Time Asshole/Bitch.
I may think I am an asshole or a bitch, but the truth is I am a good person at heart. Yeah sure, I can have a mean streak in me, but most of the people I meet like me.

Mar 5, 2005

Jordan discovers the revivifying properties of iTunes shuffle. Perhaps we should read poetry the same way?

Mar 3, 2005

Does anyone know a good secular, academic text on glossolalia?

Thanks.

Mar 2, 2005

Name That Blog



Gina is looking for a new name for her blog. My vote is "The Sybilline." But that's prolly a little highfalutin. Any other suggestions?

Mar 1, 2005

Happy Birthday, Aaron! Please don't try anything like this.