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The fluidity of water is not the result of any effort on the part of the water, but its natural property.

And the virtue of the perfect man is such that even without cultivation there is nothing which can withdraw from his sway. Heaven is naturally high, the earth is naturally solid, the sun and moon are naturally bright.

Do they cultivate these attributes?

-Zhuangzi (Chuang-tzu)

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The human Umwelt

"so I came round in my thinking to the tick that was kept alive in a laboratory for 18 years without nourishment by a zoologist named Jakob von Uexküll. For 18 years the tick hesitated between life and death. Jakob von Uexküll was an Estonian zoologist and philosopher (1864-1944) who invented biosemiotics, suggesting that every animal, human or nonhuman, has a distinct perceptual universe (an Umwelt or "world-surround") in which it exists and acts and makes meaning. The animal's Umwelt encloses it completely and does not refer to anything beyond itself. The human Umwelt, on the other hand, is open toward the future and toward transcendence (Jakob von Uexküll , Foray p. 219). Jakob von Uexküll's work influenced other philosophers, notably Heidegger, who distinguished animals from humans on the grounds that the animal does not perceive the elements of its Umwelt as things-in-themselves. "The behaviour of the animal is not an apprehending of something as something," Heidegger says. The tick does not apprehend waiting as waiting. It simply has no aim in life except to wait for a smell of warm blood to pass nearby, then drop down and drink blood. A tick has no sense of world or self or anything except the smell of warm blood: for Heidegger this is an instance of "the poverty of animals."

Jakob von Uexküll sees the same situation less negatively. For him the tick and the warm blood are two elements of a single musical score, a giant musical score in which everything in the cosmos participates. "Attunement" is what he calls this. You might find his musical creationism quaint or romantic but it does remind us to look at all life in terms of wholeness, perception and purpose. Biologists nowadays understand life as a thermodynamic process in which complex systems harmonize to achieve equilibrium. Jakob von Uexküll seems to be moving toward the same vision by a different path when he celebrates the subjectivity of non-human beings as a pattern of attunement. "Is the tick a machine or a machine operator?" he asks. Other biologists see animal action as a matter of reflex, i.e., a transfer of stimuli by electrical impulse. "But," says Jakob von Uexküll "a stimulus has to be noticed by the subject." Carson, Anne. "HIK: Hesitation." GJGH Lecture Series, University of Iceland.

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Rainer Maria Rilke in a letter to Magda von Hattingberg, Peb. 17, 1914

I love in-seeing. Can you imagine with me how glorious it is to in-see a dog, for example, as you pass…to let yourself precisely into the dog’s center, the point from which it begins to be a dog, the place where God, as it were, would have sat down for a moment when the dog was finished, in order to watch it during its first embarrassments and inspirations and to nod that it was good, that nothing was lacking, that it couldn’t have been better made….Though you may laugh, if I tell you where my very greatest feeling, my world-feeling, my earthly bliss was, I must confess to you: it was, again and again, here and there, in such in-seeing — in the indescribably swift, deep, timeless moments of this godlike in-seeing.

transl. by Stephen Mitchell

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Anamnese "Sócrates - Sacerdotes e sacerdotisas que se aplicaram a investigar tudo quanto respeita ao seu ministério. Também tenho por verdadeiramente divinos Píndaro e outros poetas. É isto que dizem: examina se será justo. Dizem que a alma é imortal, e tão depressa emigra (chamando-se a isto morrer) como reaparece sem nunca ser destruída; por isso convém viver o mais piedosamente possível, porque as almas daqueles que pagaram a Perséfone a dívida das suas antigas faltas, são devolvidas à luz do Sol, ao fim de nove anos. Destas almas saem os reis ilustres, celebres pelo seu poder, os homens notáveis pelo seu saber, honrados como santos heróis pelos mortais. Assim, a alma imortal, nascida muitas vezes, tendo contemplado todas as coisas sobre a terra e na morada de Hades, aprendeu tudo quanto é possível. Portanto, não é para admirar que possua, quer acerca da virtude quer de tudo o mais, reminiscências dos seus conhecimentos anteriores. Sendo solidária toda a natureza e tendo a alma prévio conhecimento de tudo, nada impedirá que, relembrando uma coisa qualquer (é a isto que os homens chamam aprender), encontre todas as outras, por si mesma, sempre que tenha coragem e não se canse de investigar. Com efeito, o que se chama. investigar e aprender não é mais que recordar. Não devemos, portanto, dar crédito ao argumento, para uso de palradores, que apresentaste há pouco; tornar-nos-ia preguiçosos e só agrada aos caracteres frouxos. 0 meu, pelo contrário, incita ao trabalho e à investigação. É por isso que o considero verdadeiro; e quero, por consequência, investigar contigo em que consiste a virtude." Enxerto do diálogo de Mênon (80d-86c) - Platão

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"dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum" "I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am" - René Descartes 

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01 Oren Ambarchi - Salt [Touch]

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p.45 Bell, C. M., & Aslan, R. (2009). Ritual: perspectives and dimensions. Oxford University Press.

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“Why is this Haggadah different from traditional Haggadoth?” “Because this Haggadah deals with the exodus of women.” “Why have our mothers on this night been bitter?” “Because they did the preparation but not the ritual. They did the serving but not the conducting. They read of their fathers but not of their mothers.” “Why on this night do we recline?” “We recline on this night for the unhurried telling of the legacy of Miriam.” E. M. Broner, “Honor and Ceremony in Women’s Rituals,” in Spretnak, ed., The Politics of Women’s Spirituality, pp. 237–38

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A Hand

A hand is not four fingers and a thumb.

Nor is it palm and knuckles, not ligaments or the fat's yellow pillow, not tendons, star of the wristbone, meander of veins.

A hand is not the thick thatch of its lines with their infinite dramas, nor what it has written, not on the page, not on the ecstatic body.

Nor is the hand its meadows of holding, of shaping— not sponge of rising yeast-bread, not rotor pin's smoothness, not ink.

The maple's green hands do not cup the proliferant rain. What empties itself falls into the place that is open.

A hand turned upward holds only a single, transparent question.

Unanswerable, humming like bees, it rises, swarms, departs.

Jane Hirshfield - 1953

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A hand turned upward holds only a single, transparent question. Jane Hirshfield, A Hand

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Hans Bellmer – Untitled (Hands Triptych), 1933-1934

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Ablution 

Juan Manuel Castro Prieto

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Charlotte Perriand

Block of ice in the forest of Fontainebleau. 1935

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amigos vam os

a tal fonte de ondas tal lh'eu madre deille o mar cervo ferido do meu veer amiga foss'eu font'u amor fremoso bever meu irá ferido do vai morrer vai no amor

© Manoel T, 2024

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Fleurs du mal / Flowers of Evil

L'Héautontimorouménos

À J.G.F.

Je te frapperai sans colère Et sans haine, comme un boucher, Comme Moïse le rocher! Et je ferai de ta paupière,

Pour abreuver mon Saharah, Jaillir les eaux de la souffrance. Mon désir gonflé d'espérance Sur tes pleurs salés nagera

Comme un vaisseau qui prend le large, Et dans mon coeur qu'ils soûleront Tes chers sanglots retentiront Comme un tambour qui bat la charge!

Ne suis-je pas un faux accord Dans la divine symphonie, Grâce à la vorace Ironie Qui me secoue et qui me mord?

Elle est dans ma voix, la criarde! C'est tout mon sang ce poison noir! Je suis le sinistre miroir Où la mégère se regarde.

Je suis la plaie et le couteau! Je suis le soufflet et la joue! Je suis les membres et la roue, Et la victime et le bourreau!

Je suis de mon coeur le vampire, — Un de ces grands abandonnés Au rire éternel condamnés Et qui ne peuvent plus sourire!

— Charles Baudelaire

The Man Who Tortures Himself

To J. G. F.

I shall strike you without anger And without hate, like a butcher, As Moses struck the rock! And from your eyelids I shall make

The waters of suffering gush forth To inundate my Sahara. My desire swollen with hope Will float upon your salty tears

Like a vessel which puts to sea, And in my heart that they'll make drunk Your beloved sobs will resound Like a drum beating the charge!

Am I not a discord In the heavenly symphony, Thanks to voracious Irony Who shakes me and who bites me?

She's in my voice, the termagant! All my blood is her black poison! I am the sinister mirror In which the vixen looks.

I am the wound and the dagger! I am the blow and the cheek! I am the members and the wheel, Victim and executioner!

I'm the vampire of my own heart — One of those utter derelicts Condemned to eternal laughter, But who can no longer smile!

— William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)

Heautontimoroumenos

To J. G. F.

I'll strike you, but without the least Anger — as butchers poll an ox, Or Moses, when he struck the rocks — That from your eyelid thus released,

The lymph of suffering may brim To slake my desert of its drought. So my desire, by hope made stout, Upon your salty tears may swim,

Like a proud ship, far out from shore. Within my heart, which they'll confound With drunken joy, your sobs will sound Like drums that beat a charge in war.

Am I not a faulty chord In all this symphony divine, Thanks to the irony malign That shakes and cuts me like a sword?

It's in my voice, the raucous jade! It's in my blood's black venom too! I am the looking-glass, wherethrough Megera sees herself portrayed!

I am the wound, and yet the blade! The smack, and yet the cheek that takes it! The limb, and yet the wheel that breaks it, The torturer, and he who's flayed!

One of the sort whom all revile, A Vampire, my own blood I quaff, Condemned to an eternal laugh Because I know not how to smile.

— Roy Campbell, Poems of Baudelaire (New York: Pantheon Books, 1952)

Heauton Timoroumenos

I mean to strike you without hate, As butchers do; as Moses did The rock. From under either lid Your tears will flow to inundate

This huge Sahara which is I. My heart, insensible with pain, Caught in that flood will live again: Will care whether it live or die —

Will strive as in the salty sea, Drunken with brine and all but drowned, Yet driven onward by the sound Of your wild sobbing endlessly!

For look — I am at war, my dear, With the whole universe. I know There is no medicine for my woe. Believe me, it is called Despair.

It runs in all my veins. I pray: It cries in all my words. I am The very glass where what I damn Leers and admires itself all day.

I am the wound — I am the knife The deep wound scabbards; the outdrawn Rack, and the writhing thereupon; The lifeless, and the taker of life.

I murder what I most adore, Laughing: I am indeed of those Condemned for ever without repose To laugh — but who can smile no more.

— George Dillon, Flowers of Evil (NY: Harper and Brothers, 1936)

Heautontimoroumenos

Like a butcher I will strike you Without anger and without hate As Moses struck the rock! And from your eyelid I will cause,

In order to irrigate my Sahara, The waters of suffering to gush forth. My desire swollen with hope Will float on your salty tears

Like a vessel moving out from shore, And in my heart which they will intoxicate Your dear sobs will resound Like a drum beating the charge!

Am I not a false chord In the divine symphony, Thanks to the voracious Irony Which shakes and bites me?

The raucous girl is in my voice! This black poison is my blood! I am the sinister mirror In which the megara looks at herself!

I am the wound and the blade! I am the slap and the cheek! I am the limbs and the wheel, The victim and the executioner!

I am the vampire of my own heart — One of the deserted men Condemned to eternal laughter, And who can no longer smile!

— Wallace Fowlie, Flowers of Evil (New York: Dover Publications, 1964)

Heautontimoroumenos The Man Who Tortures Himself

I shall cleave without scrape or shock, And, like a butcher, without hate, Like Moses, when he struck the rock. From your eyes I shall generate Waters of woe throughout the years To quench my fierce Sahara fires, Swollen with vast hope, my desires Shall float upon your bitter tears Like a proud vessel, sailing large; And in my heart, drunk at the sound, Your cherished sobbing shall resound Like drums beating the long lost charge.

Am I not a discordant note In the celestial symphony, Thanks to voracious Irony Who shakes and bites me at the throat? She's in my voice, the scold; her black Poison is all my blood, alas! I am the direful looking glass Which flashes her reflection back. I am the wound, the knives that strike, The blows that crush, the head that reels, I am wrenched limbs and grinding wheels, Victim and hangman, as you like!

Vampire of my own heart, meanwhile, A derelict, I am of those Doomed to eternal laughter's throes, Yet powerless to frame a smile!

— Jacques LeClercq, Flowers of Evil (Mt Vernon, NY: Peter Pauper Press, 1958)

Heautontimoroumenos

I'd slip it to you Without the least qualm or queasiness Like a butcher slitting the throat of a chimp Or Bunuel turning the bourgeois into a limp gallery Of frustrated meat.

What, the waters of suffering to Slake the Saharas of my desire? Your few tears won't ever sell In the dead and tedious ocean That swims through my heart Of war.

I was born into this dissonant symphony To be a puncturing chord among the factions, Spite has been my spirit's Unadministerable poison And I am locked in the show That wants most of all To have itself.

There is an inconsolable ache In this member's voice, a lust for unhappeningness In Borges' library or endlessly branching plot trees Excited testaments of paper.

I can be the wound And simultaneously the knife Be the active thought And a catacomb piled with unidentifiable bones The Latin American Terrorist incarcerated And the sadistic attaching Electrodes to his balls.

I am the Judas who plays both parts And whom all try to revile A vampire of my own blood Condemned to a hysterical laugh And ferocious smile.

— Will Schmitz

L'Héautontimouroménos

I'll strike thee without enmity nor wrath, like butchers at the block, like Moses when he smote the rock! I'll make those eyelids gush for me

with springs of suffering, whose flow shall slake the desert of my thirst; — a salt flood, where my lust accurst, with Hope to plump her sail, shall go

as from the port a pitching barge, and in my heart they satiate thy sobs I love shall fulminate loud as a drum that beats a charge!

for am I not a clashing chord in all Thy heavenly symphony, thanks to this vulture Irony that shakes and bites me always, Lord?

she's in my voice, the screaming elf! my poisoned blood came all from her! I am the mirror sinister in which the vixen sees herself!

I am the wound and I the knife! I am the blow I give, and feel! I am the broken limbs, the wheel, the hangman and the strangled life!

I am my heart's own vampire, for God has forsaken me, and men, these lips can never smile again, but laugh they must, and evermore!

— Lewis Piaget Shanks, Flowers of Evil (New York: Ives Washburn, 1931)

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Two editions of Fleurs du mal were published in Baudelaire's lifetime — one in 1857 and an expanded edition in 1861. "Scraps" and censored poems were collected in Les Épaves in 1866. After Baudelaire died the following year, a "definitive" edition appeared in 1868. SOURCE: https://fleursdumal.org/poem/151