: For my Father, Frank :
During, or after, 'doing it',
I cannot help but fear
haphazard insemination,
condom'd or otherwise, as
a tiny new life seems to threaten
my own.
Though I never fail to smile
when imagining
that moment, melodramatic,
of my own conception.
A day, a moment to be sure,
when mothers' menses ceased to trickle
and down they went
into a ditch
somewhere in the flats of Iowa.
Alongside that endless road,
those golden fields,
probably frightening a nest or two,
or perhaps a small herd of cattle
skipping away,
their heads big, and bobbing.
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Saturday, October 15, 2005
Lovers
Pulling hay from her hair
with long stemmed fingers,
we slipped quietly through
leaves, dried and crumbling,
lips swollen from kissing,
over orange mud flats,
to a place where she said
we should go.
I was at once excited by
and terrified of
the gleam in her eye.
I have seen this same look
in the eyes of convicts and
sardines.
In the density
to which I was led,
vegetation,
that smelled like tea.
Felt the barb,
and the too much of my speaking;
bland accompaniment.
Beneath it
a barking dog
a bit of string.
with long stemmed fingers,
we slipped quietly through
leaves, dried and crumbling,
lips swollen from kissing,
over orange mud flats,
to a place where she said
we should go.
I was at once excited by
and terrified of
the gleam in her eye.
I have seen this same look
in the eyes of convicts and
sardines.
In the density
to which I was led,
vegetation,
that smelled like tea.
Felt the barb,
and the too much of my speaking;
bland accompaniment.
Beneath it
a barking dog
a bit of string.
'Together'
The flattening of waves on the sand
seems redundant to some.
The placement of stones
seeming arbitrary,
or the way ice falls into a gimlet glass,
stacked and cracking.
I saw her leap headlong
breasts, agog, agog,
attempting to grapple
and land an open mouth
where it may, or may not belong.
Within the hour I knew
we would be leaving in wide stoops,
laughing and pulling at
each others belt loops.
'Far more complex than
considerations of distance.'
Most of the sidewalks
both new and old,
now damp in the rain
have known these conjunctions.
Above, the branches
tangled as if to prove a point.
(with thanks to Jordan Stempleman, and a rewrite from Professor Rush Rankin)
seems redundant to some.
The placement of stones
seeming arbitrary,
or the way ice falls into a gimlet glass,
stacked and cracking.
I saw her leap headlong
breasts, agog, agog,
attempting to grapple
and land an open mouth
where it may, or may not belong.
Within the hour I knew
we would be leaving in wide stoops,
laughing and pulling at
each others belt loops.
'Far more complex than
considerations of distance.'
Most of the sidewalks
both new and old,
now damp in the rain
have known these conjunctions.
Above, the branches
tangled as if to prove a point.
(with thanks to Jordan Stempleman, and a rewrite from Professor Rush Rankin)
Thursday, September 08, 2005
Celeste and Henry, the Enraged Cardigan.
(updated rough, for a children’s story)
Celeste met Henry at dawn on the day after her 4th birthday.
She was taking her new shoes for a walk, showing them around the neighborhood.
She had seen him crying in a bush outside Mr. Burnbarrel, the local mycologists shop.
Apparently Henry had fallen into the bush while trying to figure out how high he could jump.
Celeste helped him from the thickets and quickly introduced him to her new shoes, Martha and Marty.
Henry asked if he could have a piggy-back ride as he threw his arms around her and she clomped down the road to her house.
They became instant friends, and ceased to spend a single moment apart.
Especially fond of static electricity, Celeste would rub him on her head until he clung there lovingly.
In the early mornings, the school-grounds wet with dew, would welcome them.
Celeste was an amazing climber, an atavistic gift from her great great great great uncle.
They would spend hours in the oak, dropping locust shells on passers by.
Mr. Burnbarrel would turn purple with suspicion as they skipped past his shop window on the way to school.
He was convinced that Henry, Celeste’s companion and confidant, was in fact his old gray cardigan gone missing months ago.
Despite their obvious attachment, Mr. Burnbarrel plotted to get the sweater back, as winter was well on its way.
Nights he would stay awake in his clammy basement laboratory scribbling out methods to use in the safe return of the raggedy gray cardigan.
One day, Celeste and Henry were pretending to fish in the old water works.
Henry had just pulled a shiny red-bellied salmon from the deep concrete pool.
The three of them stood clapping and then dancing round in a circle in celebration of the fish’s birthday.
Today was the fish’s birthday!
When suddenly Henry leapt into the air and disappeared behind one of the abandoned building.
Celeste and the fish stood with big eyes wondering what could have come over him.
Little did they know, inside the building, Mr. Burnbarrel was reeling in the fishing line and hook he used to snag his old cardigan without being seen.
Celeste and the fish searched high and low for Henry.
They searched in the alley.
They searched in the oil drums.
They searched in the fire escape.
Henry was nowhere to be found.
Although the fish wanted to come with Celeste, to walk her home, she needed to be alone to think of where he could have gone.
Also, the fish was having trouble breathing outside of the pool.
So they shook hand and fin, and kissed goodbye.
Celeste walked home, a very unhappy little girl, though deep down she knew that she would find Henry, no matter what it took.
She was a very determined little girl.
Days went by like the clouds in the sky.
Each day after a healthy breakfast of grapefruit and milk, Celeste would sit in her mothers garden, scribbling methods on where she would hide if she were Henry....
Pining for her sweet embrace, the cardigan became enraged.
Celeste met Henry at dawn on the day after her 4th birthday.
She was taking her new shoes for a walk, showing them around the neighborhood.
She had seen him crying in a bush outside Mr. Burnbarrel, the local mycologists shop.
Apparently Henry had fallen into the bush while trying to figure out how high he could jump.
Celeste helped him from the thickets and quickly introduced him to her new shoes, Martha and Marty.
Henry asked if he could have a piggy-back ride as he threw his arms around her and she clomped down the road to her house.
They became instant friends, and ceased to spend a single moment apart.
Especially fond of static electricity, Celeste would rub him on her head until he clung there lovingly.
In the early mornings, the school-grounds wet with dew, would welcome them.
Celeste was an amazing climber, an atavistic gift from her great great great great uncle.
They would spend hours in the oak, dropping locust shells on passers by.
Mr. Burnbarrel would turn purple with suspicion as they skipped past his shop window on the way to school.
He was convinced that Henry, Celeste’s companion and confidant, was in fact his old gray cardigan gone missing months ago.
Despite their obvious attachment, Mr. Burnbarrel plotted to get the sweater back, as winter was well on its way.
Nights he would stay awake in his clammy basement laboratory scribbling out methods to use in the safe return of the raggedy gray cardigan.
One day, Celeste and Henry were pretending to fish in the old water works.
Henry had just pulled a shiny red-bellied salmon from the deep concrete pool.
The three of them stood clapping and then dancing round in a circle in celebration of the fish’s birthday.
Today was the fish’s birthday!
When suddenly Henry leapt into the air and disappeared behind one of the abandoned building.
Celeste and the fish stood with big eyes wondering what could have come over him.
Little did they know, inside the building, Mr. Burnbarrel was reeling in the fishing line and hook he used to snag his old cardigan without being seen.
Celeste and the fish searched high and low for Henry.
They searched in the alley.
They searched in the oil drums.
They searched in the fire escape.
Henry was nowhere to be found.
Although the fish wanted to come with Celeste, to walk her home, she needed to be alone to think of where he could have gone.
Also, the fish was having trouble breathing outside of the pool.
So they shook hand and fin, and kissed goodbye.
Celeste walked home, a very unhappy little girl, though deep down she knew that she would find Henry, no matter what it took.
She was a very determined little girl.
Days went by like the clouds in the sky.
Each day after a healthy breakfast of grapefruit and milk, Celeste would sit in her mothers garden, scribbling methods on where she would hide if she were Henry....
Pining for her sweet embrace, the cardigan became enraged.
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Another Bout for the Memories
In this corner, we see the amiable male, sitting languidly back, in his lazy boy chair. He has just attempted to finish a large plate of overcooked shoestring pasta and cheap ungarnished sauce. Before settling back and watching vapidly the uninventive 5:00 news, we hear the bell ring, a sound he has not yet gotten used to. At the door the famished female strutting a tightly fitting sports jersey and pearlish earrings. She hands him a business envelope thick with what he believes to be, business. He pinches the envelope twixt finger and thumb, and not wanting to let her in, he does. She curls in the unoccupied adjacent lazy boy chair feline-like. He knows the business at hand. Something hidden in her is aware that he knows the business at hand. Mostly this becomes apparent when he says, in a brusquely gruff condescension, ‘so this would be the official, “let’s be friends” letter’. ‘No no no’ she sputters, feigning interest in the news that now features, a fatal car accident. Here he thinks, reclining now, envelope in hand, watching her watch TV, of the times when he would link such symbolic coincidences and ironies to the many scattered moments they seemed to call attention to. This night his mind might decide to do the same, though he doesn’t necessarily see the business at hand as a terrible car accident, nor does he think it symbolizes one in the least. One might, if one knew the business at hand, wonder why he would not, as soon, she begins to cry, still staring at the news and wiping, with both index fingers simultaneously, from bridge of nose to cheekbone, the blackened tears from her mascara lined eyes. As soon, she begins to weep openly, sobbing as though in a great deal of pain and confusion. He has already been at a loss for them, for many months now, his interest was spread thin weeks ago, as it usually does, in a short amount of time. Our fool, as we will now call him for reasons slowly revealing themselves, does not buy this emotive display. He does not find the tears sincere, but tinged with a strange deceit. A charity show, so as not to make him feel bad about the business at hand. He does not believe her and he does not appreciate the display. And so he stares, more in fascination than in disgust, though both are welling up in his eyes. He stares head cocked arms crossed, feeling nearly smug about this uncanny ability he seems to have for reading the desperate actions of others with such exactitude, such poetry. Our fool thinks passively, suddenly, that he should hold her, that he should reach out and touch her, if only on the knee, offer some form of physical comfort. He thinks of how awkward this action would be to perform, to move, slowly from the recliner, to perhaps lift her from hers, sit and let her land on top, or stand from where he sits, and ease himself onto her trembling lap. The latter makes him laugh, though he is swift to repress. Instead he says, quickly and quietly so as not to distract from the unpleasantness at hand, as we will now call it for reasons slowly revealing themselves, ‘you want to sit over here?’ As soon as he says it he realizes how insensitive it sounds, however he also realizes that in the time considering how to offer comfort, he was thinking of something else, that an offering was part of the show, that it was his role now to offer a shoulder if only to further the emotive display, to add support to the unpleasantness at hand. She does not move, but shifts slightly, causing more tears to flow. Here he opens his mouth. Here he stretches the muscles around jaw and lips, and he speaks. He knows as soon as the words are out that he has made a mistake of diabolical proportions. As quickly as his tongue leaves the edge of his teeth and his breath escapes him, he feels the chill of the frost in the look that she shoots him. He feels the shivers in the wind as she passes, and the ice in the air from the slamming of the door behind her.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Monsieur Duchamp and the proceedings
Marcel, wrapped in terrycloth, arms malformed, well, one arm anyway. Marcel, trying desperately to pluck a hair from his nostril with two fat fingertips. Finding a cluster, he realizes the power in numbers. A single hair on its own, dark and oddly thick, is easy prey, but these had clumped and congealed into a mass. At first he winces in a most horrible face looking toward the sky, jaws wide open, as though this would make it any easier. Marcel, draped in his blanket, white, hairy feet protruding. Marcel in his chair, no sound but for the distant whine of a train. Marcel has given up. It’s plain to see who he is, who he really is, for others. Feeling hopeless, burdened to no end, those nostrils stuffed with hair, his eyes wander. Marcel whose eyes are not what they used to be, whose eyes, though still black, still functioning the way eyes do, wander down the wall, across the floor, no, nothing there, and then, feet. He has cast away the thought of an irritatingly hairy nose for the thought of irritatingly hairy feet, though less irritating, less irritating. At first he thinks of the medicine cabinet, just around the corner in the washroom. He thinks of its small aluminum door, with the latch that no longer works. He thinks of the way it squeaks when he opens it, of how he means, has meant, to fix that damned squeak. Next he looses himself, for a second, lost on that damned squeak. As he is lost he flares both hairy nostrils, twice. Both nostrils flare, in sync, and then again. Twice, and now he remembers his feet, and the scissors in the medicine cabinet. He shifts, ever so slightly, in his chair, but he does not move. Marcel has given up.
Outside, just around the corner, Yvonne and Madeleine torn up in tatters. Mistreated by a saguaro apparently, on there way to see him, Marcel, with soup and such. Soup and such for his cold that he has, apparently. ‘Yes, yes. I think that’s it. I received some things in letters…but I don’t know him personally. Is he a friend of Arman?’ ‘Yes, he’s from Nice, like Raysse and Arman. They’re part of what’s called the School of Nice. It’s odd that he never tried to get in touch with you.’ ‘If he’s staying in Nice I should go see him.’ ‘Considering your importance to him, he could come see you…’ ‘Not necessarily. It depends on the state of his finances!’ ‘He sells phonograph records. Apparently his behavior causes huge scandals in Nice.’ ‘I’ll try to see him. The importance that the School of Nice has taken on is funny.’ ‘What’s the difference between the artistic climates in Paris and New York?’ ‘It’s a madhouse in New York…’
Marcel, wrapped in his afghan, hears now, over the distant whine of the train, two women speaking, one after the other, in complete sentences, about someone he doesn’t know, about something he doesn’t know of, and then, a knock. ‘Yess, it’s Open.’ These words escaped him, in a way he knew he hadn’t meant, trembling and soft. Yvonne, in a blue dress and white hat, and Madeleine in the same, wisped into his room as though on roller-skates, immediately leaning him back in his chair, wiping his nose heating the soup sipping him tea covering his feet touching his brow drawing his bath, all the while chattering to one another about those things he knew nothing about.
Outside, just around the corner, Yvonne and Madeleine torn up in tatters. Mistreated by a saguaro apparently, on there way to see him, Marcel, with soup and such. Soup and such for his cold that he has, apparently. ‘Yes, yes. I think that’s it. I received some things in letters…but I don’t know him personally. Is he a friend of Arman?’ ‘Yes, he’s from Nice, like Raysse and Arman. They’re part of what’s called the School of Nice. It’s odd that he never tried to get in touch with you.’ ‘If he’s staying in Nice I should go see him.’ ‘Considering your importance to him, he could come see you…’ ‘Not necessarily. It depends on the state of his finances!’ ‘He sells phonograph records. Apparently his behavior causes huge scandals in Nice.’ ‘I’ll try to see him. The importance that the School of Nice has taken on is funny.’ ‘What’s the difference between the artistic climates in Paris and New York?’ ‘It’s a madhouse in New York…’
Marcel, wrapped in his afghan, hears now, over the distant whine of the train, two women speaking, one after the other, in complete sentences, about someone he doesn’t know, about something he doesn’t know of, and then, a knock. ‘Yess, it’s Open.’ These words escaped him, in a way he knew he hadn’t meant, trembling and soft. Yvonne, in a blue dress and white hat, and Madeleine in the same, wisped into his room as though on roller-skates, immediately leaning him back in his chair, wiping his nose heating the soup sipping him tea covering his feet touching his brow drawing his bath, all the while chattering to one another about those things he knew nothing about.
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Just another guy
The thing here. (Thing, he sd?) Well the travelers cloud dissipated and returned. The thing, or that which, could only be returned. Left Flagstaff on a downfall, sleepily. But nowhere to fucking sleep. So a cowpasture near two guns Arizona and Diablo’s gulch. Wonderful. Hard brakes to save rabbit, everything in back seat now in front. Electric storm, so damn dark, freezing (to pass the time). Wrapped upright in front seat on pills listening to the wind and the birds in their cage ruffling feathers before sleep. Drink more water (for want of letting it all go). That's the first time you've bn chipped like that old boy (no it isnt). Bleary sunrise, and off. Fillup and bad coffee with powdered cream. Scribble in book, clouds rolling in, rain. Next stop..Dalhart TX. Everywhere smlls of cowshit. Quickstop girl, red hair crossed eyes sells me beer. I want to tell her she’s pretty and that she’ll leave this town one day, and to have hope. I don’t. I say, 'have a good night', she grunts and lights a cigarette. Inn keeper doesn’t trust me. NY license, Kansas Plate, ‘where you commin from’ tucson. ‘where are you headed’ east. She is Indian, and the lobby is filled with the smell of curry. I say something stupid and offensive like, ‘I love the smell of curry’. I really do. She grunts and lights a cigarette/ reluctant keys, more pills, beer. Now I wonder if I ever will leave. Ac too loud, trucks pass every 30 seconds, shaking the bed. I watch out the window for some time blowing smoke through the screen. Just trucks and lightning. Sleep. Woke up twisting, shaking the grime of motel bedspread, shower scrub. Fillup and bad coffee with powdered cream. Scribble in book, flies on the make, many dead armadillos. Speed a little through TX, Ok. Get the hell out. Golden plains, flatlands. A pheasant, size of a three year old. It wants to cross. ‘Lift up! Lift up damn you!’ We make eye contact. Snap imagine tear forming, its eye pleading, as if to say... ‘now, lord?’…It bounces off the windshield. First car kill. Drag it off the road by its wing, all those colors, so beautiful. Move on, NPR’s finally coming in, oak trees and sunflower seeds.
That from a long way off look like flies
: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 15:42:41 -0600
To: Ava
Brief Correspondance
The collapse of our age-old distinction between Same and the Other. this passage quotes a "certain Chinese encyclopedia" in which it is written that "animals are divided into: (a) belonging to the Emperor, (b) embalmed, (c) tame, (d) sucking pigs, (e) sirens, (f) fabulous, (g) stray dogs, (h) included in the present classification, (i) frenzied, (j) innumerable, (k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, (l) et cetera, (m) having just broken the water pitcher, (n) that from a long way off look like flies." In the wonderment of this taxonomy, the thing we apprehend in the great leap, the thing that, by means of the fable, is demonstrated as the exotic charm of another system of thought, is the limitation of our own, the stark impossibility of thinking that.
but why is it impossible to think?
and what kind of impossibility are we faced with here?
I don't know who's crazier foucault or the author of that encyclopedia.
how are you mon-amie, you sound well. well enough for now. polyurethaneing your prints is a wonderful idea, I've been sinking a lot of things in resin myself, you're right about the fumes, but it's usually worth it.
i think i may be drinking too much, picking my nose, my belly it grows.
things go well here, I've found more than enough reason to go on living and little reason not to. I love you, I need to see your face, your funny eyebrows and crooked teeth,
You know I know you're beautiful.
don't leave anytime soon, my package must land safely.
ryan
Sun, 20 Jan 2002 17:01:30 -0500
To: Ryan
i see the swarms and think of you...
i need to know WHAT Chinese encyclopedia that was quoted from.
Anna is here. well not in my room, but in NYC. She is a good one as you well know... i want so much to see your work now. are you sending me songs? please do. i want to make things with you from afar. should I send you something or should I wait...
ooh i have to run at this moment.
more soon... meloberschu. ( i love you ) (( very much))
ave
To: Ava
Brief Correspondance
The collapse of our age-old distinction between Same and the Other. this passage quotes a "certain Chinese encyclopedia" in which it is written that "animals are divided into: (a) belonging to the Emperor, (b) embalmed, (c) tame, (d) sucking pigs, (e) sirens, (f) fabulous, (g) stray dogs, (h) included in the present classification, (i) frenzied, (j) innumerable, (k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, (l) et cetera, (m) having just broken the water pitcher, (n) that from a long way off look like flies." In the wonderment of this taxonomy, the thing we apprehend in the great leap, the thing that, by means of the fable, is demonstrated as the exotic charm of another system of thought, is the limitation of our own, the stark impossibility of thinking that.
but why is it impossible to think?
and what kind of impossibility are we faced with here?
I don't know who's crazier foucault or the author of that encyclopedia.
how are you mon-amie, you sound well. well enough for now. polyurethaneing your prints is a wonderful idea, I've been sinking a lot of things in resin myself, you're right about the fumes, but it's usually worth it.
i think i may be drinking too much, picking my nose, my belly it grows.
things go well here, I've found more than enough reason to go on living and little reason not to. I love you, I need to see your face, your funny eyebrows and crooked teeth,
You know I know you're beautiful.
don't leave anytime soon, my package must land safely.
ryan
Sun, 20 Jan 2002 17:01:30 -0500
To: Ryan
i see the swarms and think of you...
i need to know WHAT Chinese encyclopedia that was quoted from.
Anna is here. well not in my room, but in NYC. She is a good one as you well know... i want so much to see your work now. are you sending me songs? please do. i want to make things with you from afar. should I send you something or should I wait...
ooh i have to run at this moment.
more soon... meloberschu. ( i love you ) (( very much))
ave
Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Lengthy Away
Sorry for the lengthy away, if there are any readers left out there. Soon enough there will be more. thank you, though, for checking.
Wednesday, January 05, 2005
Flourishing Current
Flourishing Current
Give them a branch to cling to and cling they will.
Cling they must, for pities sake. In all that rushing about, searching for perishables that are no longer there. Docked in the ports, and in the pews, the fish rise and fall. On the horizon, curled and muted, the chopping waves crest. Salt water, when sprayed through the nostrils, rubbed in the eyes, is severe. When swallowed, is scurrilous. When deeply inhaled, is deafening. And in the ears its oceans withdraw. Too steeping to consider, really. The all sinking and sweeping away.
Friday, December 17, 2004
RICHARD SERRA WITH CHARLIE ROSE
Richard Serra interview with Charlie Rose
Having been an enormous admirer and follower of Serras' work for years, I would like to share this brief interview that took place in 2002. What follows is a partial transcript of the interview. Probably only the first few minutes.
RICHARD SERRA AND CHARLIE ROSE - 2002 TRANSCRIPT of Interview at Gagosian Gallery:
Q: If I went back to the very beginning of Richard Serra's life what would be the earliest thing that I found that might suggest who he is today?
A: Uh, probably a little kid walking along the beach for a couple of miles, turning around, walking back, looking at his footprints, and being amazed that what was on his right in one direction, when he reversed himself, was now on his left, and it was completely different, and it startled him and he never got over it.
Q: He was how old?
A: Four or five.
Q: Yeah, on the beach.
A: On the beach.
Q: This is San Francisco?
A: Yes.
Q: What was it? I mean, in looking back now, even though you wouldn't have captured the profundity of it at that time.
A: I think certain things stick into your claw, or stick into your imagination, and you have a need to come to terms with them. And spacial differences, what's on your left, what's on your right, what it means to walk around a curve; looking at a convexity and looking at a concavity -- just asking fundamental questions about what you don't understand, those things have always interested me.
Q: You are (don't be modest) are judged to be one of our best, if not our best sculptor. What's the connection between the talent you have, and what it was naturally that made you want to look at those footprints?
A: Curiosity, inquisitiveness, and I used to draw everyday, and I used to draw in order to please my parents, because my brother was taller and bigger and stronger, and in order to capture my affection of my parents, really, to compete with my brother, I would draw every night after dinner and my parents would encourage that drawing. So, drawing became for me another language, it became a language that was a kind of key into the world - it kind of mediated reality for me, so I've been drawing since I was four years old. And my parents encouraged it, and encouragement kind of breeds confidence.
Q: Did you have a natural talent?
A: For drawing? Yes, always. I remember when I was in the second grade, about seven years old, the teacher had my mother come to my school because she'd pasted my drawings all over the walls for everyone, for the whole school to see. It was something I had a facility for.
Q: And she said to your mother, 'look this is something that needs to be nurtured'?
A: Yes, and my mother immediately started dragging me to museums. And my mother didn't introduce me as Richard, she used to introduce me as 'Richard the artist' which I was very embarrassed by.
Q: (laughter) Yeah, this could do something to you if you're not careful.
A: No, and because of that I thought I would major in English language, and I did, I majored in English, and I thought 'drawing is something I could always do' and I would find my way into it, and eventually what happened was that I went to the University of California and I transferred to Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara was a tremendous hotbed of intellectual activity. Isherwood was there and ____, and I sent seven drawings to Yale after majoring in English literature, and Yale accepted me saying, 'we think we could teach you something.' Because I hadn't been painting up to that point. And that was the big breakthrough of my life. They made me get their undergraduate Art History degree, and then I stayed two more years and got an MFA -- an MA and an MFA.
Q: The acceptance by Yale did what.
A: Well, I was thrown into a group of students, a couple of them are still here in New York painting very well, Bryce Martin, Chuck Close, a lot of really famous people at the time, and we were all young art students from all over the country, thrown together in a very competitive atmosphere, with terrific professors and up to that point, I could take education seriously, but not that seriously
Thursday, December 16, 2004
Roommate Invertebrate
The Roommate Invertebrate
(section of a letter to Jordan, written in the converted garage that was my room and shared studio workspace in Redhook Brooklyn, Wed. 03/10/04)
So here we begin on an elliptical note. Though the word 'elliptical', should be omitted for a more appropriate word like, paroxysmal, thereby making the word 'elliptical' the most elliptic part of this ellipsoidal note. I will let it remain however in the hopes that the sum of the plane curve that this note is bound to make, will prove constant.
As I write now at my little desk, I feel an occasional tickle in the white hairs on the backs of my hands. Ants. I cannot find the source of where they are coming from or where they are going. They are not in any militant formation as per usual. Most find them in a tiny vibrating single-file line across a linoleum kitchen floor. Now they are emitting pheromones randomly, split-up, and more scavenger-like. I’ve killed 6 already in these two paragraphs of writing. I’m reminded of another time a while back. I was sitting at my little desk writing to you as I battled with a horny cricket. It sat in some non-existent corner rubbing its wings together in desperate search for a mate. It took a week of sleepless nights before I found the little bastard and tossed it in the garden. Only to be surprised by more chirping from several of his relatives. After that it was genocide.
In this little space I have been accosted by:
Spiders as big as your thumbnail, brown with a beige stripped pattern on the thorax, building sticky homes in the cracks of the walls and the open mouths of my unworn shoes. Their diminutive offspring scattering about to build homes of their own. I wiped them out with one of the very same shoes they once dwelled in.
A plague of moth/flies. These started slow around the dampness of my bookshelves. A tiny gray dot on The Trial, a whisper of a movement across Gray’s Anatomy, traces of gray dust on the jacket of Paterson. After a few days their numbers were in the hundreds. Not knowing what they were or how to get rid of them, I looked them up by way of description. The name, Moth/fly /psychoda alternata, is appropriate as they look like a cross between the two. No bigger than a match head, the female will lay up to 300 eggs at a time. As soon as a larva reaches adulthood, which is usually in a few hours, they seek out a mate, “make love”, and die. I wiped these out with a power vacuum from Home Depot, sucking dozens at a time into the bowels of the howling machine. In the end I think it was the cold weather that killed them. As spring arrives, I search for signs of their return.
The horny crickets. (Though “horny” is an appropriate term for all of the insects listed here-in, the cricket will carry its weight as, unlike the rest of the soundless arthropods, it makes its intentions irritatingly know to all creatures with ears and/or feelers as it were) No doubt the rest of these pests turned a blind eye (though the moth/fly hath no eye) to the killing of the crickets. I wiped them out with a can of Dust-Off, freezing them and then depositing them in the bus yard beyond the back wall. I found in this that, Dust-Off, has a strange effect on insects. When inhaled, the chemical released from the can into the jar somehow, I believe, sucks all the oxygen from the brain, causing visual/audio impairment, light-headedness, and an overall minor to acute brain damage. Essentially they appear to fall over in a peaceful death. “What a fantastic way to capture and kill a small insect while keeping his shiny black exo-skeleton perfectly intact, feelers and all, to use for further study in my drawing experiments!” thought I to myself, cold can in one hand, jar of cricket in the other. Alas, this is what happened; after blasting a noisy cricket with a white, scentless shot of Dust-Off, he became instantly silent, paralyzed, dead-seeming. I dropped his body in a jar and placed it on my shelf of other experiments for later observation. That night, (several hours had gone by) I woke from a strange dream (I was playing tether-ball in an empty play ground lot, getting hit repeatedly in the back of the head by the ball as it swung round from my punches), to the distinct sound of, chirp chirrp…chirp chirrp... I climbed down my bed ladder and switched on the lamp. Sure enough, the cricket was up, walking the jars circumference good as new, rubbing those filthy wings in utter delight. Baffled, I shot a spray of the Dust-Off into the jar putting him back to sleep so that I too could climb back into my bed. In the morning I could feel him staring at me, mocking me with his cries. I set him free.
And now the ants will come a marchin in, hurrah! They will be easily dealt with. They are sporadic, despondent. There is no food down here, no water. They are without their Queen, without their system. They are as good as dead.
Enough about my roommates for now... To complete the curve one may say that there was in fact no curve what so ever. The two fixed points are there, the sum is balanced, however the note in and of itself ran linearly, A to B counteracting the intensions of the ellipsis altogether. Though in this final closing paragraph one would see that the over-all hypothesis of elliptical thought and/or writing has in fact proved constant within the last paragraph itself. Joining the locus points of A and B, the sum of the distances of each of which from two fixed points is the same constant. Omitting all, omitting nothing.
(section of a letter to Jordan, written in the converted garage that was my room and shared studio workspace in Redhook Brooklyn, Wed. 03/10/04)
So here we begin on an elliptical note. Though the word 'elliptical', should be omitted for a more appropriate word like, paroxysmal, thereby making the word 'elliptical' the most elliptic part of this ellipsoidal note. I will let it remain however in the hopes that the sum of the plane curve that this note is bound to make, will prove constant.
As I write now at my little desk, I feel an occasional tickle in the white hairs on the backs of my hands. Ants. I cannot find the source of where they are coming from or where they are going. They are not in any militant formation as per usual. Most find them in a tiny vibrating single-file line across a linoleum kitchen floor. Now they are emitting pheromones randomly, split-up, and more scavenger-like. I’ve killed 6 already in these two paragraphs of writing. I’m reminded of another time a while back. I was sitting at my little desk writing to you as I battled with a horny cricket. It sat in some non-existent corner rubbing its wings together in desperate search for a mate. It took a week of sleepless nights before I found the little bastard and tossed it in the garden. Only to be surprised by more chirping from several of his relatives. After that it was genocide.
In this little space I have been accosted by:
Spiders as big as your thumbnail, brown with a beige stripped pattern on the thorax, building sticky homes in the cracks of the walls and the open mouths of my unworn shoes. Their diminutive offspring scattering about to build homes of their own. I wiped them out with one of the very same shoes they once dwelled in.
A plague of moth/flies. These started slow around the dampness of my bookshelves. A tiny gray dot on The Trial, a whisper of a movement across Gray’s Anatomy, traces of gray dust on the jacket of Paterson. After a few days their numbers were in the hundreds. Not knowing what they were or how to get rid of them, I looked them up by way of description. The name, Moth/fly /psychoda alternata, is appropriate as they look like a cross between the two. No bigger than a match head, the female will lay up to 300 eggs at a time. As soon as a larva reaches adulthood, which is usually in a few hours, they seek out a mate, “make love”, and die. I wiped these out with a power vacuum from Home Depot, sucking dozens at a time into the bowels of the howling machine. In the end I think it was the cold weather that killed them. As spring arrives, I search for signs of their return.
The horny crickets. (Though “horny” is an appropriate term for all of the insects listed here-in, the cricket will carry its weight as, unlike the rest of the soundless arthropods, it makes its intentions irritatingly know to all creatures with ears and/or feelers as it were) No doubt the rest of these pests turned a blind eye (though the moth/fly hath no eye) to the killing of the crickets. I wiped them out with a can of Dust-Off, freezing them and then depositing them in the bus yard beyond the back wall. I found in this that, Dust-Off, has a strange effect on insects. When inhaled, the chemical released from the can into the jar somehow, I believe, sucks all the oxygen from the brain, causing visual/audio impairment, light-headedness, and an overall minor to acute brain damage. Essentially they appear to fall over in a peaceful death. “What a fantastic way to capture and kill a small insect while keeping his shiny black exo-skeleton perfectly intact, feelers and all, to use for further study in my drawing experiments!” thought I to myself, cold can in one hand, jar of cricket in the other. Alas, this is what happened; after blasting a noisy cricket with a white, scentless shot of Dust-Off, he became instantly silent, paralyzed, dead-seeming. I dropped his body in a jar and placed it on my shelf of other experiments for later observation. That night, (several hours had gone by) I woke from a strange dream (I was playing tether-ball in an empty play ground lot, getting hit repeatedly in the back of the head by the ball as it swung round from my punches), to the distinct sound of, chirp chirrp…chirp chirrp... I climbed down my bed ladder and switched on the lamp. Sure enough, the cricket was up, walking the jars circumference good as new, rubbing those filthy wings in utter delight. Baffled, I shot a spray of the Dust-Off into the jar putting him back to sleep so that I too could climb back into my bed. In the morning I could feel him staring at me, mocking me with his cries. I set him free.
And now the ants will come a marchin in, hurrah! They will be easily dealt with. They are sporadic, despondent. There is no food down here, no water. They are without their Queen, without their system. They are as good as dead.
Enough about my roommates for now... To complete the curve one may say that there was in fact no curve what so ever. The two fixed points are there, the sum is balanced, however the note in and of itself ran linearly, A to B counteracting the intensions of the ellipsis altogether. Though in this final closing paragraph one would see that the over-all hypothesis of elliptical thought and/or writing has in fact proved constant within the last paragraph itself. Joining the locus points of A and B, the sum of the distances of each of which from two fixed points is the same constant. Omitting all, omitting nothing.
Friday, December 10, 2004
THE PINES
The Pines
(pinus)
"Pines are recognized by their resinous wood and their needle-like leaves which are found in bundles of 1 to 5 and enclosed at base in a papery sheath which may be, sooner or later, deciduous.
The male flower is a long catkin usually grouped with several others on a terminal twig. Each cluster of stamens is surrounded at base by 3 to 6 scales. When ripe the anthes are bright yellow with abundant, buoyant pollen. The female flowers, found on last year's shoots, form short thick catkins furnished with papery bracts which soon disappear, and larger persistent fleshy scales which become the woody scales in the mature cone. At flowering time the scales of the female conelet open wide and recieve the wind-borne pollen.
When pollinated, they close again and do not open until the seed is ripe, or in some cases until years afterward. About one year after pollination, fertilization takes place within the ovules, and the conelet, which has changed little till now, begins a period of rapid growth. The exposed tip of each cone scale is usually more or less thickened and shows the apex of the first season's growth in a scar or protuberance which is frequently provided with a prickle and transversely ridged with a keel."
"This would seem a poor method (seeds fall to the ground in autumn) of distribution, but there is at hand a vicarious one. For hosts of Clark nutcrackers come every year, with their harsh, rolling cries of churrrr, churrr.
With mighty beaks these gray crows thrash open the green cones and extract the seeds."
Donald Culross Peattie
(pinus)
"Pines are recognized by their resinous wood and their needle-like leaves which are found in bundles of 1 to 5 and enclosed at base in a papery sheath which may be, sooner or later, deciduous.
The male flower is a long catkin usually grouped with several others on a terminal twig. Each cluster of stamens is surrounded at base by 3 to 6 scales. When ripe the anthes are bright yellow with abundant, buoyant pollen. The female flowers, found on last year's shoots, form short thick catkins furnished with papery bracts which soon disappear, and larger persistent fleshy scales which become the woody scales in the mature cone. At flowering time the scales of the female conelet open wide and recieve the wind-borne pollen.
When pollinated, they close again and do not open until the seed is ripe, or in some cases until years afterward. About one year after pollination, fertilization takes place within the ovules, and the conelet, which has changed little till now, begins a period of rapid growth. The exposed tip of each cone scale is usually more or less thickened and shows the apex of the first season's growth in a scar or protuberance which is frequently provided with a prickle and transversely ridged with a keel."
"This would seem a poor method (seeds fall to the ground in autumn) of distribution, but there is at hand a vicarious one. For hosts of Clark nutcrackers come every year, with their harsh, rolling cries of churrrr, churrr.
With mighty beaks these gray crows thrash open the green cones and extract the seeds."
Donald Culross Peattie
Thursday, December 09, 2004
THE FINCH
The Finch
The heritability of bigger brain structures in beauteous bouncing birds and the basis of sexual selection due to a better sung song, are recent peculiar interests of mine.
As a recent owner of a pair of Zebra Finches, I have been fascinated by the way they function and communicate, and especially with Werthers' (the male) song. A tinny peeping that fluctuates, usually from a happy springy feeling, to times when he sounds down right pissed off.
As a possibly cruel (though I don’t think so) experiment, I recorded Werthers' singing and occasionally play it back for him. He becomes overly excited, mockingly jumping from perch to perch in, I would guess, a competitive agitation (Charlotte is a beauty after all).
I have this recording on quick rewind and play-back so I’ll play the different (I believe there are 3) variations of the song and surprisingly he, more often than not, responds with the same version as the one played, but seemingly louder, faster and continuous, sometimes over and over, always outdoing the recording of himself.
Charlotte doesn’t seem to notice much of this; I believe she’s preoccupied these days with the nest he’s building in the seed dish.
No doubt the fact that I am currently dealing with the communication and speech/song development in the fledglings of both finch and human these days would account for the sudden interest.
Yesterday on my drive home I heard this incredibly interesting story on NPR that I thought I would share with whoever might be reading this. If you were listening to NPR yesterday, I apologize.
I am going to post my experiments and findings as often as they occur even though I realize I sound like an old lady talking about her birds.
"An elaborate bird song is like a Grand Cherokee in the driveway or an M.D. after the name - a kind of shorthand for all the desirable qualities that a female wants in a mate and wants passed along to the children," said Timoth DeVoogd, professor of psychology and neurobiology and behavior at Cornell.
"Of course these birds are not scholars of evolutionary theory. They don't think Darwin's principle of sexual selection when they make up their minds about which male sings best."
However their choices have an impact on their parenting success, and how they will survive for generations to come.
Apparently, males with the most elaborate songs have bigger brains, a larger HVC (high vocal center) according to Cornell research. And the neurobiologists are intrigued by the fact that the larger brain structures are inherited.
Females consistently choose males with more elaborate songs, though
it has baffled scientists how a female can pick up on the difference between a 38 note song and a 40 note song in just a few minutes.
The heritability of bigger brain structures in beauteous bouncing birds and the basis of sexual selection due to a better sung song, are recent peculiar interests of mine.
As a recent owner of a pair of Zebra Finches, I have been fascinated by the way they function and communicate, and especially with Werthers' (the male) song. A tinny peeping that fluctuates, usually from a happy springy feeling, to times when he sounds down right pissed off.
As a possibly cruel (though I don’t think so) experiment, I recorded Werthers' singing and occasionally play it back for him. He becomes overly excited, mockingly jumping from perch to perch in, I would guess, a competitive agitation (Charlotte is a beauty after all).
I have this recording on quick rewind and play-back so I’ll play the different (I believe there are 3) variations of the song and surprisingly he, more often than not, responds with the same version as the one played, but seemingly louder, faster and continuous, sometimes over and over, always outdoing the recording of himself.
Charlotte doesn’t seem to notice much of this; I believe she’s preoccupied these days with the nest he’s building in the seed dish.
No doubt the fact that I am currently dealing with the communication and speech/song development in the fledglings of both finch and human these days would account for the sudden interest.
Yesterday on my drive home I heard this incredibly interesting story on NPR that I thought I would share with whoever might be reading this. If you were listening to NPR yesterday, I apologize.
I am going to post my experiments and findings as often as they occur even though I realize I sound like an old lady talking about her birds.
"An elaborate bird song is like a Grand Cherokee in the driveway or an M.D. after the name - a kind of shorthand for all the desirable qualities that a female wants in a mate and wants passed along to the children," said Timoth DeVoogd, professor of psychology and neurobiology and behavior at Cornell.
"Of course these birds are not scholars of evolutionary theory. They don't think Darwin's principle of sexual selection when they make up their minds about which male sings best."
However their choices have an impact on their parenting success, and how they will survive for generations to come.
Apparently, males with the most elaborate songs have bigger brains, a larger HVC (high vocal center) according to Cornell research. And the neurobiologists are intrigued by the fact that the larger brain structures are inherited.
Females consistently choose males with more elaborate songs, though
it has baffled scientists how a female can pick up on the difference between a 38 note song and a 40 note song in just a few minutes.
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
Monday, December 06, 2004
THE MILKTREES
The Milktrees
(Sapium)
"These trees are characterized by their leathery, evergreen, simple and alternate leaves and milky sap.The sexes are found in separate flowers on the same plant, each with 2 calyx lobes and no petals. The male flowers, borne in terminal spikes, possess 2 stamens of which the filaments are united at base; the female flowers, solitary or paired at the base of the male spikes, possess a 2-celled ovary. The fruit takes the form of a dry capsule containing large, nearly spherical seeds."
"The Pima Indians used to stupefy fish by macerating the twigs of this tree (JUMPINGBEAN-TREE; Sapium Biloculare (Watson) Pax), then throwing them into the water."
"The name Jumpingbean comes from the fact that this is one of two sorts of seeds which are commonly inhabited by the restless grubs of the moth Carpocapsa saltitans. In their saltations they cause the pods to roll and jerk-to the delight of small boys who buy them at fairs."
Donald Culross Peattie: TREES
(Sapium)
"These trees are characterized by their leathery, evergreen, simple and alternate leaves and milky sap.The sexes are found in separate flowers on the same plant, each with 2 calyx lobes and no petals. The male flowers, borne in terminal spikes, possess 2 stamens of which the filaments are united at base; the female flowers, solitary or paired at the base of the male spikes, possess a 2-celled ovary. The fruit takes the form of a dry capsule containing large, nearly spherical seeds."
"The Pima Indians used to stupefy fish by macerating the twigs of this tree (JUMPINGBEAN-TREE; Sapium Biloculare (Watson) Pax), then throwing them into the water."
"The name Jumpingbean comes from the fact that this is one of two sorts of seeds which are commonly inhabited by the restless grubs of the moth Carpocapsa saltitans. In their saltations they cause the pods to roll and jerk-to the delight of small boys who buy them at fairs."
Donald Culross Peattie: TREES
Saturday, December 04, 2004
Waxing Gibbous
“How difficult it is to speak of the moon and not lose one’s head, the witless moon. It must be her arse she shows us always.” 1
Recently, my 17 month old niece (no relation, though practically) Isabella, daughter of my good friends Jordan (see: Growing Nation) and Marlee Stempleman, has begun to form words and with them, their meanings. On a Thanksgiving road trip to Mexico, one of the only things to satiate the child (she absolutely hates car rides) was to point out the window at the hovering desert moon and say, “moon, Bella…look at the moon.” We all took turns doing this to quell, however briefly, her piercing screams.
Since then she has become obsessed with the moon, running frantically about saying, “moo..moo..moo..moo” whether it’s visible or not, as though she were its astounded discoverer, as she indeed was.
A few days ago she and I went for one of our many walks. As soon as we stepped outside she began, “moo…moo…moo” I gently corrected her saying “Well Bell, the moon is only visible at night, right now, it’s the sun that’s in the sky, we’ll look for the moon tonight.” We continued down the dirt path near the house, pointing out various cacti, birds and lizards, of which she cared little next to the moon. Returning home she began again “moo…moo” this time pointing to the sky. Sure enough, there it was, a waxing gibbous, pale faced and pondering, a mocking smirk on its face. I stood there squinting shamefully to the sky as she convulsed with excitement in my arms, pointing and announcing to the world, that she had in fact been right all along.
And so, in her honor I have decided to share in her obsession.
Tacitus, reported that nearly 2000 years ago, ancient German communities held their meetings at new or full moon. “The seasons most auspicious for beginning business.”
The New moon is celebrated from Ancud, Chile to Nuuk, Greenland.
One can imagine African Bushmen in a heaving dance, chanting praise to the symmetry of it all. Eskimos feasting and exchanging women, all with the moon spinning loftily above.
“Moonstruck”, “moonshine”, “lunacy” and "moonwalk", all meanings derived from the large reflective basaltic rock in the sky.
Its face etched out 3.9 billion years ago2 by the impacts of debris left over from the solar systems formation are recognized through human eyes, as the rolling sockets, bulbous nose, and open mouth of a man.
Serving as the primitive measurer of time, from the Babylonians to the Jews, the Christians to the Muslims, lunar calendars have (though frequently altered and sometimes abandoned over the ages) held to tradition. The Christian world has taken on the Julian, or Gregorian calendar, after Julius Caesar, Copernicus, and the ancient Egyptians.
Islam However continues to live strictly by the cycles of the moon as dictated by the Koran and the words of the prophet Muhammad. Many Muslims hold to the traditionally accepted utterance of Muhammad, “Do not fast until you see the new moon, and do not break the fast until you see it; but when it is hidden from you [by mist or cloud] give it its full measure.” So the beginning and the end of Ramadan are observed at different times in certain villages, if clouds or mist prevent the new moon from being seen. A hotly debated issue in Islam marking the modern revolts against tradition.
“The cycles of the moon had an uncanny correspondence with the menstrual cycle of woman, because a sidereal month, or the time required for the moon to return to the same position in the sky, was a little less than 28 days, and a pregnant woman could expect her child after ten of these moon-months.”3
In lore and literature, movies and comics, a full moon means werewolves and pagan rituals, human sacrifice and generalized insanity. Even now, if something seems off kilter, maybe the events of a day are unusual, or the moods of strangers seem flighty and strange, if there is a full moon in the sky you can be sure it will catch the blame of astrologers and non-believers alike.
As a teenager my friends and I would, though possibly on a subconscious level, celebrate (in our own angst ridden destructive ways) the moon. Drug induced wanderings over city streets, sprinting across pale glowing golf courses, perched smoking on headstones in vast cemeteries, all with the ever-present orb overhead. I recall stumbling drunkenly through a moonlit midwestern forest after learning of a friends deceit with a woman, howling and screaming at the glaring moon, that big therapist beyond the branches.
"And hail their queen, fair regent of the night." 4
1 Samuel Beckett: Molloy, pgs 256. 257
2 National Audubon Society: The Sun and the Moon
3 The Discoverers: Daniel J. Boorstin
4 Botanic Garden (pt. I, canto II, l. 90): Erasmus Darwin
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