— Étienne de La Boétie, born in 1530
All writing is a form of prayer
— John Keats, born in 1795
Prose is not to be read aloud but to oneself alone at night, and it is not quick as poetry but rather a gathering web of insinuations ... Prose should be a long intimacy between strangers with no direct appeal to what both may have known. It should slowly appeal to feelings unexpressed, it should in the end draw tears out of the stone.
— Henry Green, born in 1905
The Book
“Send me books with happy endings”
— Nazim Hikmet
The traveler, at last, finds lodging for the night.
The wholesome blondy hero punches villains.
The peasant looks at trees
and latches up the barn
upon the last page
of the books
with happy endings.
The aforementioned constellations drip into silence,
onto windows shut, eyelashes closing.
… In chapter one, the trees
lean mutely on a window,
and the sick cry like the birds in hospitals that sleep.
Some roman-fleuves conclude in daylight.
The scientist makes all clear, having found predictability.
That traveler
disappears behind a hill,
the others meet at lunchtime.
The economy grows stout,
the sociologist grows free from doubt.
Chic automobiles
glint by trendy bars.
All wars are over. Generations spring up.
The man-to-woman ratio has evened out.
Blond men elaborate the difference
between the good and evil.
At midday sharp, all trees give shade to peasants.
All airplanes
return to ground, safe and sound.
All captains
clearly behold, land ho!
Fools smarten up and liars cease to lie.
The villain fails again, predictably unkind.
… In chapter one, if someone screams blue murder,
it matters no more by chapter thirty.
Compulsive sex and social positivism,
nice epigraphs from sonnets, villanelles, canzoni,
semi-detective plot known as life.
… Oh, send me those books with happy endings!
* * * * *
Jack Kerouac, the “poet of jazz” who found Nirvana in Mexico | AL DÍA News
After many visits, Kerouac decided to stay in Mexico DF. He lived in a muddy apartment, on the rooftop of a poor building in the “Colonia Roma”; there wasn’t any water or light, except for a candle that the writer used for meditating.
Socrates argued that the connection between life and death, without a loss of the gains of individuality, could be found once more if the individual could readjust their sight to appreciate eternal life in this life. In the Phaedo dialogue, for example, Plato portrays Socrates as ready for death because he has one eye settled on the side of life that doesn’t die, which he has befriended in the here and now. “Those who philosophize rightly make dying their care,” Socrates remarks. It’s another aspect of philosophy as a way of life. The philosopher steps back from the commonplace fears of frightened mortals and awakens to a forgotten ground. They’re facing death to discover life.
The Hero Of This ‘Hamilton’ Is The One Who Wrangles 200 Women In And Out Of 16 Bathroom Stalls At Intermission
Head usher Tanya Heath at the Forrest Theatre in Philadelphia begins working her miracle with a talk like this: “May I have your attention, please. We are at minute five out of a 20-minute intermission, which means I have 15 minutes to get you into this bathroom. I’ve formed a serpentine line. And it works. It only takes about six minutes from that door to get you in this bathroom. All I need you to do is trust me and trust your sisters.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer
Painting Spotted In Woman’s Kitchen Sells At Auction For $26 Million
An auctioneer spotted the painting in June while inspecting a woman’s house in Compiegne in northern France and suggested she bring it to experts for an evaluation. It hung on a wall between the kitchen and dining room. – Washington Post (AP)
That’s what makes them so good …
His images raise plenty of questions, but there aren’t any hard-and-fast answers. Hopper rarely sheds any light on the subjects in his figural paintings, not even when he shows them in the brightest of sunshine.