tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-429834059679463072024-03-05T10:15:18.674-08:00gilead in bloomVictoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comBlogger51125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-88793698316989416162023-11-11T08:20:00.003-08:002023-11-11T08:23:25.311-08:00<div style="text-align: left;">NYBG</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSC5DaCpgxVIGkHDciNmdIVQZp7hcSVvWl8zcMJ1MfNeHtMST3lyQpdbKWbGPRRSYLTx_mhuE7zdd4gcsD4iQNKM2SfTqZzEsudiJ7FHh1Le7RXz31keX9LHYn4gRdHqsvhyphenhyphenBwv1fuRw/s1600/thumb_IMG_1981_1024.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="724" data-original-width="1086" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSC5DaCpgxVIGkHDciNmdIVQZp7hcSVvWl8zcMJ1MfNeHtMST3lyQpdbKWbGPRRSYLTx_mhuE7zdd4gcsD4iQNKM2SfTqZzEsudiJ7FHh1Le7RXz31keX9LHYn4gRdHqsvhyphenhyphenBwv1fuRw/w640-h426/thumb_IMG_1981_1024.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
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Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-70127296737007204562023-11-11T08:14:00.000-08:002023-11-11T08:14:24.775-08:00<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">So here I am, hanging one towel after the other, the boys’ underwear,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">their many T-shirts, their socks flecked with the reddish clay from Roussillion</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">which, I hope, will never wash off. I like the smell. I like separating the</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">shirts on the line, leaving no more than half an inch between them. I must</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">manage my pins and use them sparingly, making sure I’ll have enough for</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">the whole load. I know my wife will still find something to criticize in my</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">method. The thought amuses me. I like the work, its mind-numbing pace</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">which makes everything seem so simple, so complacent. I want it never to</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">end. I can see why people take forever to hang clothes out to dry. I like the</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">smell of parched wood on the hanging pins, which are stored in a clay pot.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I like the smell of clay too. I like the sound of drops trickling from our large</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">towels onto the pebbles, on my feet. I like standing barefoot, like the sheets,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">which take forever to hang evenly and need three pins, one at each end,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">and one for good measure in the middle. I turn around and before picking</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">up another shirt, I run my fingers through a stalk of lavender nearby. How</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">easy it is to touch lavender. To think I fussed so much and for so long—and</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">yet here it is, given to me, the way gold was given to the Incas who didn’t</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">think twice before handing it over to strangers. There is nothing to want</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">here. <i>Quod cupio mecum est. </i>What I want, I already have.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Yesterday we went to see the Abbey of Senanques. I took pictures of my</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">sons standing in front of a field of lavender. From a distance, the lavender</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">is so dark it looks like a bruise upon a sea of green. Closer by, each plant</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">looks like an ordinary overgrown bush. I taught them how to rub their</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">hands along lavender blossoms without disturbing the bees. We spoke of</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Cistercian monks and the production of dyes, of spirits, balms and scented</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">extracts, and of St. Bernard de Clervaux, and of medieval commerce routes</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">that still exist today and that spread from these tiny abbeys to the rest of the</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">world. For all I know my love of lavender may have started right here, in</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">an essence gathered from bushes that grow on these very same fields. For</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">all I know this is where it ends, in the beginning. And yet, for all I know,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">everything could start all over again—my father, my mother, the girl with</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">the perfumed wrist, Frau Noch Einmal, her little boy, my little boy, myself</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">as a little boy, the walk in the evening snow, the genie in the bottle, the Rosetta</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">stone within each one of us which no one, not even love or friendship,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">can unburden, the life we think of each day, and the life not lived, and the</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">life half-lived, and the life we wish we’d learn to live while we still have</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">time, and the life we want to rewrite if only we could, and the life we know</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">remains unwritten and may never be written at all, and the life we hope</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">others may live far better than we have, all of it, for all I know, braided on</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">one thread, into which is spun something as simple as the desire to be one</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">with the world, to find something instead of nothing, and having found</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">something, never to let go, be it even a stalk of lavender.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">from "Lavender" by André Aciman</span></span>Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-9424929919648045812020-07-17T11:01:00.001-07:002020-07-17T11:04:24.001-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Came across some undeveloped film from my time in Utah. First is Spiral Jetty, the rest are Moab.</div>
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Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-34900655277037827492017-05-31T16:18:00.000-07:002017-06-02T14:47:40.157-07:00<style type="text/css">
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Gordon Matta-Clark, Bronx Floors (1972)</div>
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<br />Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-53829796982851499312017-05-29T10:53:00.002-07:002017-06-02T14:52:02.074-07:00<style type="text/css">
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God he's fantastic. I will never get enough of this song.</div>
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Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-35304645821764722382017-05-28T11:04:00.000-07:002020-07-17T11:08:03.752-07:00<style type="text/css">
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And the ghosts<br />
they own everything.<br />
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– Graham Foust<br />
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Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-3113623592377264272017-05-20T14:36:00.001-07:002017-06-02T15:30:42.237-07:00<style type="text/css">
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<div id="text">Petőfi Sándor</div></div>Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-54644336021513930232015-12-08T15:06:00.000-08:002017-05-20T15:19:52.398-07:00So maist thou live, till like ripe Fruit thou drop<br />
Into thy Mothers lap, or be with ease<br />
Gatherd, not harshly pluckt, for death mature:<br />
This is old age.<br />
<br />
<i>Paradise Lost</i>, Book 11 (1674 version)<br />
<br />
<br />
Men must endure<br />
Their going hence even as their coming hither.<br />
Ripeness is all.<br />
<br />
<i>King Lear</i>, 5.2.9–11 (Arden edition)Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-22165370852143164572015-12-07T08:22:00.000-08:002017-06-02T15:28:45.177-07:00<div>A perfect weekend at Yellowstone.</div><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1nv-hyehQRx9Jf4LxRkxdRs_KFu9NVf9S3iZo6NtILd8KBfBKF-FDB0gciV6cMeGPEsDlAVhiJJvx3YYstIZZhNwL77Tk43i0SQNfkF_ZEfGO1qBBI-5Zkv0EB-q_tYqZutexNkLptw/s1600/IMG_1741.JPG"><img border="0" height="511" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1nv-hyehQRx9Jf4LxRkxdRs_KFu9NVf9S3iZo6NtILd8KBfBKF-FDB0gciV6cMeGPEsDlAVhiJJvx3YYstIZZhNwL77Tk43i0SQNfkF_ZEfGO1qBBI-5Zkv0EB-q_tYqZutexNkLptw/s640/IMG_1741.JPG" width="768" /></a>Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-27302291654473895652015-11-18T10:16:00.001-08:002015-11-18T10:16:10.103-08:00On growing old"New poems no longer come to me, with their prodigies of metaphor and assonance. Prose endures. I feel the circles grow smaller, and old age is a ceremony of losses, which is on the whole preferable to dying at forty-seven or fifty-two. When I lament and darken over my diminishments, I accomplish nothing. It’s better to sit at the window all day, pleased to watch birds, barns, and flowers. It is a pleasure to write about what I do."<br />
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Donald Hall on growing old, from <i><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/01/23/out-the-window"><b>Out the Window</b></a></i>, New Yorker January 23, 2012 issue.</div>
Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-82971329603943179162015-11-16T09:22:00.000-08:002015-11-16T09:25:38.995-08:00some poems of Léon Laleau<i>Betrayal</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
This haunted heart that doesn't fit<br />
My language or the clothes I wear<br />
Chafes within the grip of<br />
Borrowed feelings, European ways.<br />
Do you feel my pain,<br />
This anguish like none other<br />
From taming with the words of France<br />
This heart that came to me from Senegal?<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>Cannibal</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
This savage wish on certain days<br />
To mingle blows and blood<br />
With lovers motions,<br />
To feel beneath the bites<br />
That make the kisses last,<br />
The sobbing of the loved one, and her pain:<br />
O fierce unquenched desires<br />
Of my dark forebears<br />
Who partook of human flesh!<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
(translated from the French: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2590513-the-negritude-poets?from_search=true&search_version=service"><b>source</b></a>)Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-67477030050485686232015-11-10T13:11:00.000-08:002017-05-20T15:21:38.850-07:00"Tragedy, then, is a representation of an action that is worth serious attention, complete in itself, and of some amplitude; in language enriched by a variety of artistic devices appropriate to the several parts of the play; presented in the form of action, not narration; by means of pity and fear bringing about the purgation of such emotion."<br />
Aristotle<br />
<br />
"Art is not an imitation of nature but its metaphysical supplement, raised up beside it in order to overcome it . . . Tragedy reveals the essential contrariety at the heart of the universe."<br />
Nietzsche<br />
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Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-35353427440685594822015-11-09T09:34:00.003-08:002015-11-09T09:37:20.694-08:00le paonfrom <i>Le Bestiaire, </i>by Apollinaire<br />
<br />
En faisant la roue, cet oiseau By spreading his tail this bird so fair,<br />
Dont le pennage traîne à terre Whose plumage drags the forest floor,<br />
Apparaît encore plus beau, Appears more lovely than before,<br />
Mais se découvre le derrière. But thus reveals his derrière.<br />
<br />
(trans. Rober Shattuck)Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-49975989955861111292015-10-14T14:11:00.000-07:002017-05-20T14:24:38.404-07:00from Madame BovaryChapter XII<br />
<br />
« Il s'était tant de fois entendu dire ces choses, qu'elles n'avaient pour lui rien d'original. Emma ressemblait à toutes les maîtresses ; et le charme de la nouveauté, peu à peu tombant comme un vêtement, laissait voir à nu l'éternelle monotonie de la passion, qui a toujours les mêmes formes et le même langage. Il ne distinguait pas, cet homme si plein de pratique, la dissemblance des sentiments sous la parité des expressions. Parce que des lèvres libertines ou vénales lui avaient murmuré des phrases pareilles, il ne croyait que faiblement à la candeur de celles-là ; on en devait rabattre, pensait-il, les discours exagérés cachant les affections médiocres ; comme si la plénitude de l'âme ne débordait pas quelquefois par les métaphores les plus vides, puisque personne, jamais, ne peut donner l'exacte mesure de ses besoins, ne de ses conceptions, ni de ses douleurs, et que la parole humaine est comme un chaudron fêlé où nous battons des mélodies à faire danser les ours, quand on voudrait attendrir les étoiles. »<br />
<br />
"He had heard these things so often, that by now they had lost all spice of originality. She was just like all the other mistresses he had had. As the charm of novelty slipped from her like a dress, he saw nothing but the naked horror of an eternal monotony of passion, always with the same face, always speaking the same words. This practiced seducer could see no difference in the sentiments concealed beneath a similarity of surface. Because wanton, mercenary lips had murmured similar protestations in his ear, he had no great belief in the sincerity of this, his latest conquest. Strip away the exaggerations of language, he thought, and there's nothing left but the same old mediocre emotions. As though the fulness of the heart does not sometimes overflow into the emptiest of metaphors. After all, no one can ever give the exact measure of his needs, of his thoughts, of his sorrows. Human language is like a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, when all the time we are longing to move the stars to pity."<br />
<br />
(English translation by Gerard Hopkins, 1949)Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-22104971827647136542015-05-28T10:10:00.001-07:002017-06-02T15:32:57.727-07:00The anniversary of my mom's death is tomorrow. My dad's reflection of what this anniversary means:<br />
<br />
"Well 10 years tomorrow since Misty died. I've been trying to think of something profound and beautiful to say marking the occasion but the ugly reality is her passing left a huge hole in the lives of a lot of people that can never quite be filled. For me there's 18 years of memories that I largely don't have anyone else to reminisce with about. Or the sad knowledge of how much she looked forward to being a grandma which is such an exquisite rip off now that the time is here and she isn't around to enjoy it. Yes the kids grow up and the world moves on with new relationships and unforeseen adventures but it's like getting lost on a strange detour knowing I can never quite find my way back."Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-6201208184421618422015-04-28T12:10:00.000-07:002015-04-28T12:10:48.453-07:00still falling for herby Sharon Olds<br />
<br />
The phlox in the jar is softening,<br />
from the sphere of it a blossom flutters,<br />
and the whole sagging thing makes me think<br />
of my mother's flesh, when she was elderly, and it was<br />
wilting, keeping its prettiness<br />
in its old-fangled gentleness.<br />
It's as if I'm falling in love, again,<br />
with my mother, through the gallowsglass of my <br />
own oncoming elderliness, as if,<br />
now that she has been gone from the earth<br />
as many years as a witch's familiar<br />
has lives, I can catch glimpses of my mother, at<br />
moments when she was alone with herself, and would<br />
pick up her pen, and her Latinate<br />
vocabulary, and describe what it<br />
was like, on their last cruise, when she rose,<br />
by invitation, from the captain's table,<br />
and stood beside the black, grand<br />
Steinway, in the open ocean,<br />
and sang. I do not need a picture to<br />
remind me of the look on my mom's<br />
face, when she sang—extreme yearning,<br />
a yearning out at the edge of what was<br />
socially acceptable<br />
on a ship like that, and you could also see<br />
how happy her face was, to be looked at,<br />
and you could see her listening to her own voice,<br />
to hear if it started to go flat, or anything<br />
she needed to do to get the music<br />
to its hearers intact as itself, I am falling,<br />
and I do not feel that there are rocks, below,<br />
I think I may go on falling for my mother after<br />
my death—or not falling but orbiting,<br />
with her, and maybe we'll take turns<br />
who is the moon, and who is the earth.Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-3776905071946527712015-04-07T15:58:00.000-07:002015-04-07T15:58:49.521-07:00The Spider’s Threadby Akutagawa Ryunosuke<br />translated from the Japanese by Edwan McClellan <br /><br /><br />ONE DAY THE LORD BUDDHA was taking a walk by the edge of the lotus pond in Paradise. The lotus flowers blossoming in the pond were white as pearls, and an indescribably delicate fragrance, rising from their golden stamens, filled the air, never ending. The hour in Paradise was perhaps early morn.<br /><br />Then the lord Buddha paused, and through a clear patch of water between those lotus flowers that covered the surface of the pond, he looked at the scene below. At the bottom of the lotus pond in Paradise was Hell, and through the crystalclear water could be seen, as though in a peep-show, such sights as the River of Death and the Mountain of Needles. And almost immediately the lord Buddha noticed a man named Kandata, writhing in the midst of other sinners. This man Kandata had been a great thief, and had done many wicked deeds on earth, killing men and burning houses. Yet even he had once acted with kindness. One day, when walking through a thick forest, he saw a little spider crawling across his path. IIe lifted his foot, and was about to crush it to death, when he suddenly changed his mind. “Eo,” he said tn himself, “I must ‘not. Even a little creature such as this has life, and to kill it without cause would be a great pity.” And so he spared the life of the spider.<br /><br />The lord Buddha, as he looked at the scene in Hell, remembered Kandata’s kindness to the spider; and he thought that he should save Kandata if he could, in return for his one good deed. Fortunately, beside him, on a lotus leaf the color of dark jade, a spider of Paradise was weaving a silvery web. The lord Buddha picked up the spider gently, and then began to let it down between the pearl-white flowers, straight towards Hell far beneath.<br /><br />Meanwhile, Kandata, with other sinners, was struggling to keep afloat in the Lake of Blood, which was in the lowest depths of Hell. All was darkness, except for an occasional, ghostly glimmer of half-light coming from the fearful Mountain of Needles. The quiet was like that of a graveyard, and the only sound that could be heard was the faint sighing of the sinners. Perhaps those that had come SO far down in Hell had gone through too many torments to have any strength left for loud cries of self-pity. And in the Lake of Blood, even the great thief Kandata could only writhe and choke like a dying frog.<br /><br />But it so happened that Kandata, in the midst of his suffering, raised his head and looked towards the sky above the lake. And he saw, descending gradually towards him in a straight, shimmering line, as though fearful of being seen by man’s eyes, the silvery thread of the spider. It seemed to come from far, far above, through the silent darkness. Kandata clapped his hands for joy. Surely, he thought, if he could once get hold of the thread, and climb far enough, he would eventually get out of Hell. With luck, he might even reach Paradise. And then, he would no more be chased up the Mountain of Needles, or be pushed down into the Lake of Blood.<br /><br />With this hope in his heart, he reached for the thread, and grasping it firmly with both hands, he began to climb up, up, and up, with all his might. Having once been a burglar, he was a skilful climber. But the ascent was by no means an easy one, for thousands of miles separated Paradise from Hell. After a time, Kandata grew very tired, and could climb no more. Reluctantly, he paused to rest, and still clinging firmly to the thread, he looked down into the depths below.<br /><br />He must have come a long way up indeed, for already, the Lake of Blood was no longer visible, and even the top of the dully gleaming Mountain of Needles was beneath him. At this rate, he thought, getting out of Hell might not be so difficult after all. In a tone of voice he had not used for many a year, he cried, “Good, good!” and began to laugh. Then suddenly he espied far below a procession of sinners, numberless as a column of anis, coming after him up the spider’s thread. For a while, Kandata, struck dumb with amazement and fear, could only stare openmouthed at the scene. How could such a thin spider’s thread, which seemed too fragile to bear the weight of one man, bear the added burden of so many others! And if the thread did break, he would drop straight back into Hell. And as such frightening thoughts passed through his mind, hundreds, nay thousands, more sinners were crawling out of the darkness of the Lake of Blood, and were climbing up the thread. Unless Kandata stopped them, the thread would surely break in the middle, and they would all fall.<br /><br />And so Kandata with a loud voice began to scream at his fellow-sinners. “Listen to me, you sinners! This spider’s thread is mine! Who said you could come up after me? Get off! Get off!” It was at this moment that the spider’s thread, which until then had shown no signs of breaking, snapped just above Kandata’s clinging hands. Spinning round and round through the air like a top, Kandata’s body plunged into the darkness.<br /><br />All that now remained in the moonless and starless sky was the thin thread of the spider of Paradise, shimmering softly in the dark.<br /><br />The lord Buddha, standing by the lotus pond of Paradise, saw all that passed below. And when at last the body of Kandata had sunk like a stone to the bottom of the Lake of Blood, he resumed his walk, sadly. There was probably much pity in the lord Buddha’s heart for Kandata, who was sent back to Hell for his heartlessness. But the pearl-white flowers in the lotus pond of Paradise, innocent of wickedness or sorrow, swayed gently about the feet of the lord Buddha, and from the golden stamens, there came the same delicate fragrance, filling the air as always. The hour in Paradise was perhaps near noon. Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-84066666336869726052015-03-31T11:37:00.000-07:002015-03-31T11:37:30.721-07:00Ozymandiasby Percy Bysshe Shelley<br />
<br />
I met a traveller from an antique land,<br />
Who said—"Two vast and trunkless legs of stone<br />
Stand in the desart....Near them, on the sand,<br />
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,<br />
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, <br />
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read<br />
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, <br />
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;<br />
And on the pedestal, these words appear:<br />
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,<br />
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!<br />
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay<br />
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare<br />
The lone and level sands stretch far away."Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-54323615556539291142014-11-10T05:06:00.001-08:002014-11-10T05:08:05.274-08:00Principles of Feminist CritiqueI. Gender is historically contingent (located in time).<br />
<br />
II. Gender is culturally specific (located in material practices and specific places).<br />
<br />
III. Gender is an interpretation of what female and male bodies mean in relation to what we believe about the world (our philosophy).<br />
<br />
IV. There is a cultural reciprocity between gender practices and perceptions of biology, and there is a tendency to forget that a fact is both observed and interpreted.<br />
<br />
V. Frequently, even though a gender practice has been discarded, the perspective it created on "nature" can be difficult to eliminate.<br />
<br />
VI. Our systems of social policy and cultural practice reflect a tendency to conserve the ideological result of practices that are no longer apparent. E.g.—Women no longer wear corsets, but the medical establishment treats them as if they do.<br />
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VII. We let competing ideologies undermine healthful practices. E.g.—After surgery, one should rest and recover vs. after childbirth, the mother should care for the child.<br />
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VIII. Sexual inequality is the single most prevalent form of inequality in the world. The majority of those in poverty, in dire need of improved health care, without access to education, without access to political rights, etc., are women.<br />
<br />Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-75690622018794786332014-10-30T12:29:00.000-07:002017-05-20T15:07:45.599-07:00In case you're wondering, this is how I feel this week:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigmnMldBXG10vqHElea-ofGD2XhIbc4K-vlARB_DhsAy4VYZMW6hERU48FujlODohtIxrkceWSVSFidQ9A_ckgo3iai_7Rj03yoSKXPMR6M1MtRXdbf6-8UIB88_zDQlcYR5V2yoR16A/s1600/save+yourselves.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigmnMldBXG10vqHElea-ofGD2XhIbc4K-vlARB_DhsAy4VYZMW6hERU48FujlODohtIxrkceWSVSFidQ9A_ckgo3iai_7Rj03yoSKXPMR6M1MtRXdbf6-8UIB88_zDQlcYR5V2yoR16A/s1600/save+yourselves.jpg" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheo46bYQhKY0d_wb3tQ4MVx-RTw-wxgfYPPd1seGt9Zy8ZA43csYfKsxA9SX4HBahdUiSfz7MR1wxs8hvT03jU5abxG_Ucu1Y-MxjCbxMqhmWYLiq2LX4cxx3bAlEwZjF58fhpbnI-KA/s1600/at+eternity's+gate+van+gogh.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheo46bYQhKY0d_wb3tQ4MVx-RTw-wxgfYPPd1seGt9Zy8ZA43csYfKsxA9SX4HBahdUiSfz7MR1wxs8hvT03jU5abxG_Ucu1Y-MxjCbxMqhmWYLiq2LX4cxx3bAlEwZjF58fhpbnI-KA/s1600/at+eternity's+gate+van+gogh.jpg" /></a></div>
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<i>At Eternity's Gate</i>, Vincent van Gogh (1890)<br />
<br />Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-19500489211881316492014-02-28T13:38:00.000-08:002014-03-04T18:17:05.182-08:00Courage<i>Anne Sexton</i> <i>1928-1974</i><br />
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It is in the small things we see it.<br />
The child’s first step,<br />
as awesome as an earthquake.<br />
The first time you rode a bike,<br />
wallowing up the sidewalk.<br />
The first spanking when your heart<br />
went on a journey all alone.<br />
When they called you crybaby<br />
or poor or fatty or crazy<br />
and made you into an alien,<br />
you drank their acid<br />
and concealed it.<br />
<br />
Later,<br />
if you faced the death of bombs and bullets<br />
you did not do it with a banner,<br />
you did it with only a hat to<br />
cover your heart.<br />
You did not fondle the weakness inside you<br />
though it was there.<br />
Your courage was a small coal<br />
that you kept swallowing.<br />
If your buddy saved you<br />
and died himself in so doing,<br />
then his courage was not courage,<br />
it was love; love as simple as shaving soap.<br />
<br />
Later,<br />
if you have endured a great despair,<br />
then you did it alone,<br />
getting a transfusion from the fire,<br />
picking the scabs off our heart,<br />
then wringing it out like a sock.<br />
Next, my kinsman, you powdered your sorrow,<br />
you gave it a back rub<br />
and then you covered it with a blanket<br />
and after it had slept a while<br />
it woke to the wings of the roses<br />
and was transformed.<br />
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Later,<br />
when you face old age and its natural conclusion<br />
your courage will still be shown in the little ways,<br />
each spring will be a sword you’ll sharpen,<br />
those you love will live in a fever of love,<br />
and you’ll bargain with the calendar<br />
and at the last moment<br />
when death opens the back door<br />
you’ll put on your carpet slippers<br />
and stride out.Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-15166137572754166612014-02-27T10:05:00.000-08:002017-05-21T13:01:54.503-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Cold beaches are what I miss most about home—camping on those beaches is the last time I can remember that feeling, <i>home. </i>I worry more than I should that I will never feel that way again.</div>
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I have a good life, and should stop searching for a feeling that may only exist in my memory of it.</div>
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Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42983405967946307.post-68695769472669957282014-02-10T17:33:00.003-08:002014-02-10T17:37:48.672-08:00The Noisy Joys of Thoughtless Years Are Spent The noisy joys of thoughtless years are spent;<br />
And all, like head confused with drink, is dulled.<br />
But, as with wine, the woe of days gone by<br />
With force more strong than newer woe torments.<br />
A dreary path before me lies. Fresh toils<br />
To drown me in a sea of trouble threat.<br />
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And yet, dear friends of youth, I would not die!<br />
I wish to live, that I may muse and toil;<br />
I feel that joy shall mingle with my woe,<br />
Relieve my care, and heal my doubtings sad<br />
Once more, I'll drink the cup of harmony,<br />
And drown my thoughts in flood of soothing tears;<br />
And, haply, in the setting hour of life<br />
Love's farewell smile shall lighten up the dark.<br />
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—Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin (1799-1837)<br />
(Translation by Charles Edward Turner)Victoriahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09798740063008353044noreply@blogger.com