if . . .

Questions are so important but it is important to ask questions that provoke and challenge towards answers that can be lived. Where do the following lead? I often wonder if I sometimes am following mad paths down endless corridors . . . like Andy Warhol looking through Marilyn Munroe. Capitalism begins when you open the dictionary.(Steven McCaffery) bpNichol writes, "the trouble with conclusions is that they conclude. ("Things I don't really understand about myself." - alternate title in Table of Contents "NOTEBOOK: a composition on composition." Open Letter 6. 2-3, p.148) "... to that end should Z reiterate the alphabet? Should it complete the letters by synthesizing meaning, answering possible questions and objections, and setting up goals for future research?" (Peter Jaeger. ABC of reading TRG, p. 121) FMH had a Word of the Day: esemplastic (es-em-PLAS-tik) [adjective]: Having the capability of moulding diverse ideas or things into unity. I tho...

biodic pictures that awe . . . thanks to subterranean notes who comments: Frequently beautiful, they do what few works of art do for me these days, which is fill me with a sense of wonder and connect me to something that is real on a very deep level. I add another link link to the splendor of natural images. 12:35:08 AM

Fell into a stack of recently published books of poetry. All by rather obscure or at least not extensively known poets. The volumes were sent into a magazine editor for reviewing purposes but she had simply stacked them to be passed on though they stayed put for months. Thought I would share some. The concluding poem from Crows Do Not Have Retirement by David Zieroth. The Options When you die here are the options: everything or oblivion A centre of light and around it all you love, those dead and those abiding still and each holding an object of endearment you lost long ago before you came to know land be simultaneously at last at rest beyond words Or else your cells stop their chemical talk, the neurons say no and their warmth leaves you not even the absence of black - nothing of earth's up, round, biomass span just the nonexistence you tried to conjure once by closing your eyes and sleeping, except that dreams fired their figments across space at you and your muscles straining Wh...

. . .there is nothing more beautiful or enchanting than the deep blue sky and the snow covered earth, all things coated in hoarfrost, as the air sparkles dazzling the eye with ice crystals that dart playfully disappearing in a wonderful game of hide-and-seek as the the ground cracks beneath you when the temperature approaches -40 . . .smile at seeing your breath steam in front of you . . . susan jennings to see the other half and much more. "Birds appear in poems to show states of mind that go beyond the human" - Leonard Nathan Diary of a Left-handed Birdwatcher

via : . . .poet and essayist Anne Carson has been named the winner of the TS Eliot Prize for Poetry for 2001. Spent last summer savouring Carson's works. Though she was awarded the prize for The Beauty of the Husband , I found "Part V The Anthropology of Water" in Plainwater captivating. Water is something you cannot hold. Like men. I have tried. Father, brother, lover, true friends, hungry ghosts and God, one by one all took themselves out of my hands. Maybe this is the way it should be - what anthropologists call "normal danger" in the encounter with alien cultures. It was an anthropologist who first taught me about danger. He emphasized the importance of using encounter rather than (say) discovery when talking about such things. "Think of it as the difference," he said "between believing what you want to believe and believing what can be proved." I thought about that. "I dont want to believe anything," I said. (But i was lyin...

photo by shirin neshat "There is a paradox when we look at pictures. We see the beauty and we see the dark side of things. Beauty tinged with sadness. How is it that we must hold what we love tight to us, against our very bones, knowing we must also, when the time comes, let it go....?" - Sally Mann 1995 -

you have to choose what you care about you cannot care about everything so care all the time live compassionately infinitely the action of compassion creates meaning the action of compassion is an essential imagination Feel, perceive, notice, suspect, be conscious of, be sensible of kindness, be alive to the sense of honour, be sensible to shame ". . . see the hundred universes that each . . ." Proust

... the sky continues to reveal the light behind the cloud . . . hugh gentle snowflakes drift down creating a thin breathing layer of the purest white blanketing the surfaces . . . we leave traces all about us which disappear, covered up to be lost and recreated over & over again . . . repetition ... the sky continues to reveal the light behind the cloud . . . hugh gentle snowflakes drift down creating a thin breathing layer of the purest white blanketing the surfaces . . . we leave traces all about us which disappear, covered up to be lost and recreated over & over again . . . repetition . . . "To evolve, something needs to be prepared and the preparation often involves going over the same ground over and over again."( Brook .  The Empty Space , 155) ::Note:: ... orignally written on www.schoolblogs.com  ..

Posted on Jan. 13, 14, 17, 18, 20. 21, 22, 25, 26, 27. They have gone from the web ... not even Wayback Machine can find them ...

. . . believe in the beginning and end . . . the middle is so difficult. . . . too many twists and turns which inevitably result in anguish. . . gentleness does not equal a quiet freedom or choice. Silence is unbearable. Selfishness requests more and more. If is the experiment. Experience inspires but does not overcome. why? "In everyday life 'if' is an evasion, in the theatre 'if' is the truth. In everyday life 'if' is a fiction, in the theatre 'if' is an experiment." (Peter Brook -- The Empty Space) Exploring the empty space & the 'if'.