- October 24, 1940 -
6.5.09
Fall To The Floor
i dream of coming home
to you and silently, slowly
pulling down the straps
of your dress and
watching it fall to the floor
to you and silently, slowly
pulling down the straps
of your dress and
watching it fall to the floor
5.5.09
History Of Navigation Aboard The Normandie
(History of Navigation, 1934 by Jean Dupas)
(Detail at Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC)Jean Dupas's gilded-glass mural once adorned the first class salon of the Normandie. An art deco piece of the highest order, his History of Navigation was produced and installed in 1934 by Charles Champigneulle, and accompanied passengers on regular trips between New York and Le Havre, France between 1935 and 1939. The Normandie was seized in 1941 and stripped to be used for a supply transport in WWII when a fire of life preservers was sparked by an acetylene torch and the subsequent pumping of tons of water from New York harbor fire boats caused her to capsize. The panels of the mural had been removed before her sinking.
29.4.09
Woe To Those Who Through Storms Come
RNLI Gorleston lifeboat station was established near Norfolk, England in 1866 - the same year one of its private launches, Rescuer, capsized killing 13 of its 16-man crew. According to the Beccles & Bungay Weekly News, on January 13, 1866 both the Rescuer and Friend of All Nations set out to respond to a distress call when Rescuer hit a sand bar, lost her rudder and was upturned by a wave, trapping its 16-man crew beneath her hull. Two men managed rescue by boat-hooks extended from Friend of All Nations, who continued to pursue the disabled Rescuer saving two more men - both exhausted, one of whom died a few days later in hospital. The 12 others were never seen again. They left behind 9 widows and 22 children.The Rescuer drifted ashore near Wellington Pier and was returned to service shortly thereafter.
27.4.09
Artist: Earl Moran
His dames were a bit more sassy, caged in the clean, soft lines of the 30s and 40s. More of a Norman Rockwell sassy than wayward nudes. Their bodies were streamlined with legs that went all the way up. And those lips, they were as red as a bleeding heart. It was as if Earl Moran's ladies were sifting through the mess of 20th Century sexuality; only later did we realize we were right. Moran was the first to capture Marilyn, and he had painted Betty Grable before. And he was one of the few pin-up artists who actually studied formally - both at the Chicago Art Institute and at the Arts Students League in Manhattan. He'd come a long way from Belle Plaine, Iowa in a short time - all the way to Hollywood by '46 and up into the hills by the early 50s, throwing lavish parties and living the fast lane until he went legit in the final years of his life. Moran was 90 when he passed.
Carry That Weight A Long Time
It adds up. Quick. The weight. The growing list of holes to be filled and hills to climb. And it can break you. It can make you want to just slump over and call it, right then and there. It's never enough. The bills. The broken hearts. The hurt. The nameless, faceless sacrifices. What's the point in a few more yards when you'll just ask yourself for more tomorrow and they'll ask you for more still. The anger builds in you. The frustration. You're down on one knee just trying to get back to your feet. To stand. Not even to walk. To stand. You laugh but you can't seem to find the humor in it. Until you raise your head. Just a bit. You raise your head and you stare upon a monument built for all those that came before you. The ones that kept going.
23.4.09
The Only Easy Days Were Yesterdays
Joseph Campbell said in an interview that 'We are every ancestor we've ever had,' or so I was told by an elder. Perhaps in our world of saturated images and dreams it suggests that the representations of the past share a similar relationship to those of the present, and consequently with us.I find something tranquil in the old Saturday Evening Post covers. Something part pin-up, part elegant and familial. An illustration of the lost Americana, of all the shared acknowledgments of private lives, with a little softer edge. A frame just a little more patient than the angles of today; despite cover headlines that tackle dead space pioneers or racism or Mussolini, they seem warm and inviting. Now, you might say 'well, that time period had plenty of buried secrets and repressed attitudes and those covers did nothing but reinforce that,' which is plenty true. But real or not, there was a sense of buoyancy that was cut down too early in the Seventies and Eighties, as if reality contradicted hope. People wanted a dose of freedom, but they longed for it in the packaging of a simpler time. I guess I just wish that all the pain and strife in the world of now could come with a bow on top inviting enough to untie...
Three Poems From Shore
I.
the watchful crow
follows as we walk
and talk of worms
II.
spider defends his meal
the chase by lamplight
III.
bending over backwards
the leaf makes its distance
from the tree
the watchful crow
follows as we walk
and talk of worms
II.
spider defends his meal
the chase by lamplight
III.
bending over backwards
the leaf makes its distance
from the tree
Naked And Alone We Came Into Exile
Introduction to Look Homeward, Angel (1929)
Thomas Wolfe Dedicated the Book to Aline Bernstein
...a stone, a leaf, an unfound door; of a stone, a leaf, a door. And of all the forgotten faces.
Naked and alone we came into exile. In her dark womb we did not know our mother's face; from the prison of her flesh have we come into the unspeakable and incommunicable prison of this earth.
Which of us has known his brother? Which of us has looked into his father's heart? Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent? Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?
O waste of loss, in the hot mazes, lost, among bright stars on this most weary unbright cinder, lost! Remembering speechlessly we seek the great forgotten language, the lost lane-end into heaven, a stone, a leaf, an unfound door. Where? When?
O lost, and by the wind grieved, ghost, come back again.
22.4.09
Words From Conversation #2
with your song bid me closer
smash my boat on your rocks
shipwreck me there with you
forever
smash my boat on your rocks
shipwreck me there with you
forever
How To: Toggle Release Trigger Mechanism
Kicking off a series of how-to videos for man-trapping, these steps to creating a toggle release trigger mechanism will be used in subsequent videos of similar titling.
Loss Of The Kursk
It's still widely unknown what destroyed the forward torpedo sections of the Russian submarine Kursk. A collision with an American spy sub. A botched training exercise. But whatever the Kursk hit, she hit it hard enough to spring the triggers in her torpedo room, igniting an explosion recorded nearly a 100 miles away. Out of the 118 crewmen, only 23 survived the initial blast huddling together in the aft section of the boat. The escape hatch was busted. There in a dimming light, the Captain scratched a few notes later found his is breast pocket:"All the crew from the sixth, seventh and eighth compartments went over to the ninth. There are 23 people here. We made this decision as a result of the accident. None of us can get to the surface.... I am writing blindly...."
If a rescue had been possible, it would have come too late. The Russian Navy wrote off any hope of survivors almost immediately. So as water leaked in slowly through the propellor shafts, 23 unknowing men waited in darkness. Neither heroes, nor harbingers... just men waiting to die.
20.4.09
I Want To Bury Myself In You
Tsarina Alexandra to Tsar Nicholas II of Russia
- December 30, 1915 -
Off you go again alone and it's with a heavy heart I part from you. No more kisses and tender caresses for ever so long -- I want to bury myself in you, hold you tight in my arms, make you feel the intense love of mine.
You are my very life, Sweetheart, and every separation gives such endless heartache...
Goodbye my angel, husband of my heart. I envy my flowers that will accompany you. I press you tightly to my breast, kiss every sweet place with tender love...
God bless and protect you, guard you from all harm, guide you safely and firmly into the new year. May it bring glory and sure peace, and the reward for all this war has cost you.
I gently press my lips to yours and try to forget everything, gazing into your lovely eyes -- I lay on your precious breast, rested my tired head upon it still. This morning I tried to gain calm and strength for the separation.
Goodbye wee one, lovebird, sunshine, huzy mine, onw!
~Alexandra
19.4.09
17.4.09
16.4.09
Dream Of The Fisherman's Wife
The legend of Tamatori Hime tells of a pearl diver who stole a precious bead protected by the King of the Underworld. The bead had been lost to the sea, intended for the Japanese Emperor -- a gift from his Chinese equivalent. Upon stealing the bead, Tamatori cut herself open in order to hide the bead and swim faster than the pursuing ocean creatures. She made it to shore but died from her wounds - ultimately being interpreted as a warning of the cost of greed and a disharmony with nature.
Hokusai painted The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife in 1820, and while today the images may seem like extreme erotic animisms, audiences of the Edo period would have associated the images with the story of Tamatori. According to a scholarly paper by Danielle Talerico, the accompanying text suggests that while the diver died at odds with the sea, both Tamatori and the Octopi express mutual pleasure and enjoyment from the union.
In the centuries since, many artists have paid homage to Hokusai's work both in style and narrative.
15.4.09
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14.4.09
Don't Wake Up Don't Go
it was easy to forget
i fell asleep
when you were there
before and after
the dream.
i fell asleep
when you were there
before and after
the dream.
Artist: Mel Ramos
It's pop art for sure. Part honorarium to the commercial advertising landscape of the 60s and part parody of it. Sex sells stuff. And we like it when stuff sells... Cigarettes. Candy bars. Motor oil. Bananas. So why not sell it with pinups that resemble Hollywood starlets? Uma Thurman naked on a package of Lifesavers. Drew Barrymore waist deep in a refreshing glass of Coca-Cola. Nicolette Sheridan in a cobra for Corvette. But the pinups in old mechanics calendars were no-namers; it was nudity selling the products. What happens when the nudity has a name? Does it make the product a joke? Does it make more of a product of the nudity? What does Mel Ramos have to say? "I make sure [my pictures] are in good taste."
Wilderness Is Willingness
when wilderness is willingness
we will wander away
no longer lost, no longer found
we will wander away
no longer lost, no longer found
No Future No Hope
It's been nearly 10 years... We were young. We thought young. We loved young. We lived hard and rebellious and young. And we thought that was the end of it.
We all see it different now. Some of us from behind a desk. Some of us from a classroom. Some of us behind bars. But this is what we said when we thought the moment was all we had...
No Future. No Hope. (15 considerations)
We all see it different now. Some of us from behind a desk. Some of us from a classroom. Some of us behind bars. But this is what we said when we thought the moment was all we had...
No Future. No Hope. (15 considerations)
1. eternity (the void). what there is. a meaningless ongoing state of always that renders everything, including existence, impermanent and insignificant. nothing matters but the continual sweep of days.
2. human beings can not live with meaning in such a state. there is no point or purpose to existence if our thoughts, actions and emotions have no importance beyond themselves.
3. we can not disturb the universe that continues on without us; we can only affect ourselves and each other.
4. if all that matters is that nothing does, if we can only affect that which has as little meaning as we do and if that effect, being that it exists between two equally meaningless and temporary points, is so also rendered meaningless, then the only way to live with meaning in the face of such a contradiction is to turn away from it. avoid the void and go on living as though it didn’t exist.
5. human beings are either blessed or burdened by their ability to be blinded by belief, depending on the person and the nature of their belief.
6. belief is the internal artform of creating myth for the purpose of personal survival in a universe which provides us with nothing but a very short period of time in which to either live or wait to die.
7. myths are what brings a believable sense of meaning to our lives. without them we fall victim to the void, deadened and defeated by the obstructing reality of our own end and the worthlessness which precedes it.
8. myths are made real through real experience, through personal interaction with the world as it presents itself to the individual and by the acceptance and internalization of the lessons that our lives provide us. it is reading between the lines of daily life until sense, if any, can be made of the meanings that underlie the moment.
9. if myths are the product of moments, and if every person exists in a series of moments that are completely their own insofar as they perceive themselves individuals by prejudice of past experiences, myths, if they contain actual and life-affirming meaning, must be made by each person for themselves. myths can not be made for the individual.
10. we live in a world that creates an almost all but unavoidable set of external and textual myths in order to sedate the individual and keep them involved and devoted to a cause that is not their own. we accept as such because it has become convenient to accept; little else is offered.
11. these external myths are inherently void of meaning, as they are not discovered by or for the individual, but rather they are weak rationalizations set in front of us to us keep us from seeking our own. they serve no other purpose outside of self-preservation for a system that can’t survive without its total acceptance by the larger majority.
12. in this sense, the world renders both itself and its people lost of meaning and without true inner purpose. such a world is fated to consume itself and all within it. such a world is deadening.
13. humanity can not exist within the truth of the universe which does not allow him to matter. humanity may have no meaning in a place that does not allow him to seek his own.
14. to make our own myths, as we must, we must first abandon and detach ourselves from the external myth and move on as though it never was. the only way out is in, and to turn inward we must also turn away to where the world is no longer the world, but instead something more like the way it feels when a reflection of love tells you that it is all in a world that isn’t.
15. salvation is personal. it is all that matters. all you need is a set of balls, a couple good friends, some sympathy, and a kiss. when it comes it should feel like the only thing that ever was.
(Written by Nicholas Gulig)
Be Morning
i need not know cold
be morning a brittle empty bed
i shall seek you
in rushes against the frost
be morning a brittle empty bed
i shall seek you
in rushes against the frost
13.4.09
Dedicated To Liberty And Love, Pt. 1
He was a philosopher, a political economist, a public servant and a member of parliament, but above all he loved her. More than his philosophies. More than notoriety. More than all his bound volumes, many of whom he credits her with collaborating and writing.
The following reads John Stuart Mill's dedication in the publication of On Liberty to his wife, Harriet Taylor Mill:
The following reads John Stuart Mill's dedication in the publication of On Liberty to his wife, Harriet Taylor Mill:
Dedicated To Liberty And Love, Pt. 2
John Stuart Mill to Harriet Taylor Mill
- March 20, 1854 -
I am but fit to be one wheel in an engine, not to be the self moving engine itself - a real majestic intellect, not to say moral nature like yours, I can only look up and admire.
I shall never be satisfied unless you allow our best book, the book which is to come, to have our two names on the title page. It ought to be so with everything I publish, for the better half of it all is yours, but the book which will contain our best thoughts, if it has only one name to it, that should be yours.
7.4.09
Nicholas Of Myra: The Patron Saint of Sailors
Nicholas of Myra. Nicholas the Wonderworker. The son of wealthy parents, legend has it that Nicholas went to study in Alexandria and while returning on one of his sea voyages to Myra, saved the life of a sailor who tumbled from the ship's rigging in a storm. Upon returning to Myra, Nicholas brought the young sailor to church bestowing on him the virtues of God. At the same time, the Bishop of Myra died and the church elders were instructed in a dream to replace him with a "man who conquers" (greek: Nikei). While discussing the implications of the dream, the church elders heard the sailor telling anyone who would listen of his saviour, the brave Nikei-Laos. 
Upon hearing this, the elders appointed Nicholas the successor. He was born in 270 and died in 330. Sainted for miracles attributed to his intercession, Nicholas of Myra is the patron saint for sailors, fishermen, repentant thieves, prostitutes, children and the falsely accused. His relics, translated in 1087, lie in Bari, Italy.
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