Thursday, January 31, 2008
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Defining Moments No. 1
lacuna \luh-KYOO-nuh\, noun;
plural lacunae \luh-KYOO-nee\ or lacunas::
1. A blank space; a missing part; a gap.
2. (Biology) A small opening, depression, or cavity in an anatomical structure.
In a sentence:
There's a big lacuna in the place where my ice cream was. I don't know if the lacuna is in the actual place of the ice cream or in my memory of it. But, there's a [ ] .
plural lacunae \luh-KYOO-nee\ or lacunas::
1. A blank space; a missing part; a gap.
2. (Biology) A small opening, depression, or cavity in an anatomical structure.
In a sentence:
There's a big lacuna in the place where my ice cream was. I don't know if the lacuna is in the actual place of the ice cream or in my memory of it. But, there's a [ ] .
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Past Present Future
Thank God for artist Torkwase Dyson!
Check out newer work at Ty Stokes Gallery!
Hurray You're Rich, 2006
Torkwase Dyson
digital print
28" x 42"
Monday, January 28, 2008
A Night Riddle Coz It's Night
At night they come without being fetched, and by day they are lost without being stolen.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Saturday, January 26, 2008
A Noon Riddle for Noon
And yet another one at noon:
Mountains will crumble and temples will fall, and no man can survive its endless call.
What is it?
Mountains will crumble and temples will fall, and no man can survive its endless call.
What is it?
Friday, January 25, 2008
A Morning Riddle for Morning
Up. Going further up.
Here's a riddle:
Each morning I appear to lie at your feet,
All day I will follow no matter how fast you run,
Yet I nearly perish in the midday sun.
Here's a riddle:
Each morning I appear to lie at your feet,
All day I will follow no matter how fast you run,
Yet I nearly perish in the midday sun.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
N.T. Was Here
The Ballad of Nat Turner
Then fled, O brethren, the wicked juba
and wandered wandered far
from curfew joys in the Dismal’s night.
Fool of St. Elmo’s fire
In scary night I wandered, praying,
Lord God my harshener,
speak to me now or let me die;
speak, Lord, to this mourner.
And came at length to livid trees
where Ibo warriors
hung shadowless, turning in wind
that moaned like Africa,
Their belltongue bodies dead, their eyes
alive with the anger deep
in my own heart. Is this the sign,
the sign forepromised me?
The spirits vanished. Afraid and lonely
I wandered on in blackness.
Speak to me now or let me die.
Die, whispered the blackness.
And wild things gasped and scuffled in
the night; seething shapes
of evil frolicked upon the air.
I reeled with fear, I prayed.
Sudden brightness clove the preying
darkness, brightness that was
itself a golden darkness, brightness
so bright that it was darkness.
And there were angels, their faces hidden
from me, angels at war
with one another, angels in dazzling
combat. And oh the splendor,
The fearful splendor of that warring.
Hide me, I cried to rock and bramble.
Hide me, the rock, the bramble cried. . . .
How tell you of that holy battle?
The shock of wing on wing and sword
on sword was the tumult of
a taken city burning. I cannot
say how long they strove,
For the wheel in a turning wheel which is time
in eternity had ceased
its whirling, and owl and moccasin,
panther and nameless beast
And I were held like creatures fixed
in flaming, in fiery amber.
But I saw I saw oh many of
those mighty beings waver,
Waver and fall, go streaking down
into swamp water, and the water
hissed and steamed and bubbled and locked
shuddering shuddering over
The fallen and soon was motionless.
Then that massive light
began a-folding slowly in
upon itself, and I
Beheld the conqueror faces and, lo,
they were like mine, I saw
they were like mine and in joy and terror
wept, praising praising Jehovah.
Oh praised my honer, harshener
till a sleep came over me,
a sleep heavy as death. And when
I awoke at last free
And purified, I rose and prayed
and returned after a time
to the blazing fields, to the humbleness.
And bided my time.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
The Exposed Nest by Robert Frost
You were forever finding some new play.
So when I saw you down on hands and knees
I the meadow, busy with the new-cut hay,
Trying, I thought, to set it up on end,
I went to show you how to make it stay,
If that was your idea, against the breeze,
And, if you asked me, even help pretend
To make it root again and grow afresh.
But 'twas no make-believe with you today,
Nor was the grass itself your real concern,
Though I found your hand full of wilted fern,
Steel-bright June-grass, and blackening heads of clovers.
'Twas a nest full of young birds on the ground
The cutter-bar had just gone champing over
(Miraculously without tasking flesh)
And left defenseless to the heat and light.
You wanted to restore them to their right
Of something interposed between their sight
And too much world at once--could means be found.
The way the nest-full every time we stirred
Stood up to us as to a mother-bird
Whose coming home has been too long deferred,
Made me ask would the mother-bird return
And care for them in such a change of scene
And might out meddling make her more afraid.
That was a thing we could not wait to learn.
We saw the risk we took in doing good,
But dared not spare to do the best we could
Though harm should come of it; so built the screen
You had begun, and gave them back their shade.
All this to prove we cared. Why is there then
No more to tell? We turned to other things.
I haven't any memory--have you?--
Of ever coming to the place again
To see if the birds lived the first night through,
And so at last to learn to use their wing
So when I saw you down on hands and knees
I the meadow, busy with the new-cut hay,
Trying, I thought, to set it up on end,
I went to show you how to make it stay,
If that was your idea, against the breeze,
And, if you asked me, even help pretend
To make it root again and grow afresh.
But 'twas no make-believe with you today,
Nor was the grass itself your real concern,
Though I found your hand full of wilted fern,
Steel-bright June-grass, and blackening heads of clovers.
'Twas a nest full of young birds on the ground
The cutter-bar had just gone champing over
(Miraculously without tasking flesh)
And left defenseless to the heat and light.
You wanted to restore them to their right
Of something interposed between their sight
And too much world at once--could means be found.
The way the nest-full every time we stirred
Stood up to us as to a mother-bird
Whose coming home has been too long deferred,
Made me ask would the mother-bird return
And care for them in such a change of scene
And might out meddling make her more afraid.
That was a thing we could not wait to learn.
We saw the risk we took in doing good,
But dared not spare to do the best we could
Though harm should come of it; so built the screen
You had begun, and gave them back their shade.
All this to prove we cared. Why is there then
No more to tell? We turned to other things.
I haven't any memory--have you?--
Of ever coming to the place again
To see if the birds lived the first night through,
And so at last to learn to use their wing
Monday, January 21, 2008
Poetry for the People
Domestic
If, when studying road atlases
while taking, as you call it, your
morning dump, you shout down to
me names like Miami City, Franconia,
Cancún, as places for you to take
me to from here, can I help it if
all I can think is things that are
stupid, like he loves me he loves me
not? I don’t think so. No more
than, some mornings, waking to your
hands around me, and remembering
these are the fingers, the hands I’ve
over and over given myself to, I can
stop myself from wondering does that
mean they’re the same I’ll grow
old with. Yesterday, in the café I
keep meaning to show you, I thought
this is how I’ll die maybe, alone,
somewhere too far away from wherever
you are then, my heart racing from
espresso and too many cigarettes,
my head down on the table’s cool
marble, and the ceiling fan turning
slowly above me, like fortune, the
part of fortune that’s half-wished-
for only—it did not seem the worst
way. I thought this is another of
those things I’m always forgetting
to tell you, or don’t choose to
tell you, or I tell you but only
in the same way, each morning, I
keep myself from saying too loud I
love you until the moment you flush
the toilet, then I say it, when the
rumble of water running down through
the house could mean anything: flood,
your feet descending the stairs any
moment; any moment the whole world,
all I want of the world, coming down.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Night After Flight
Sputum & Acrylic on Certainty
AY08-night4
The Linguist
Slept through a still ill twilight...
Yes. We will persevere.
The Sea by Sheree MackCheck out Sheree's pieces everyday. It is a large circle, a small globe. It's amazing to be inspired and then re-inspired. To know that even though we are separated by many hours of time, we are each engaged in a creative act. Mirroring and calling to each other.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
from Ben Okri, Infinite Riches
Night of wondrous transformations
Then it occurred to me that in other realms, new worlds were being dreamt up, were being born. New things were emerging from the turbulence of people speaking the only language that is understood--the language of violence. On other spheres new realities were coming into being. On which sphere was I? It seemed I dwelt in several of them at once. The different spheres seemed all superimposed, existing concurrently within the same space. All this confused me. I wandered amongst the rioting people. There were six hot moons in my head.
Then it occurred to me that in other realms, new worlds were being dreamt up, were being born. New things were emerging from the turbulence of people speaking the only language that is understood--the language of violence. On other spheres new realities were coming into being. On which sphere was I? It seemed I dwelt in several of them at once. The different spheres seemed all superimposed, existing concurrently within the same space. All this confused me. I wandered amongst the rioting people. There were six hot moons in my head.
Art Day 5, Twilight
Earth Series: RemainsNote: It started out as something else. But it seems like everytime I put a nail in, a new story wants to come out. This is how the entire Earth Series started. Because of a nail.
The Conceptualist
Art Day 5, Twilight
Friday, January 18, 2008
Thursday, January 17, 2008
"We saw it and yet we didn't see it. ...
thinking that the real action was metropolitan and all this was just
boring hinterland. It was a puzzling thing. The truth knocks on your
door and you say, 'Go away, I'm looking for the truth,' and so it goes
away. Puzzling."
--from "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" by Robert M. Pirsig
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Place Setting by Kiyana Horton
From: Kiyana Horton
the word...the scroll..the scrolling...the place...the ring...the place setting
Place Setting
the word...the scroll..the scrolling...the place...the ring...the place setting
Poetry for the People
every one of us we leave that night. john don't say a
thing.
we just walk off
ain't no plantation no more never since that time/not
on these grounds.
us
we come here.
this been our home
free
for a long time now.
love conjure/blues by Sharon Bridgforth
thing.
we just walk off
ain't no plantation no more never since that time/not
on these grounds.
us
we come here.
this been our home
free
for a long time now.
love conjure/blues by Sharon Bridgforth
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
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