#Sonic Poem Saint

[scopophilic1997]

scopOphilic_micromessaging_1060 - scopOphilic1997 presents a new micro-messaging series: small, subtle, and often unintentional messages we send and receive verbally and non-verbally.

[harrpyotter]

To Anyone Who’s Ever Written a Poem or Even Is Just Thinking about Trying It Soon: A list of DOs and DON’TsBY

HANNAH GAMBLE

1. DO keep in mind that these things have already been done a lot in contemporary poetry: titillated use of unusual-ish and admittedly sonically pleasing words like cochlea, rivulet, and sluice; desire or need expressed by someone’s open mouth; Russian nesting dolls; making the primary offering of the poem the fact that it is about a mythic/ iconic character (Eve [of Adam and Eve fame], Satan, Captain America, Thor, Buddy Holly, Jon Benet Ramsey)…The best you’ll do is make someone think “Oh, I’ve always pictured Persephone as a victim, but this poem portrays her as kind of a bad-ass, and I like that!”

When I see a poem written in the (tampered with) voice of a well-known figure, I think “This poet does not believe that he will be able to interest readers without clutching the ankle of a figure that culture at-large has already sanctioned as ‘lit-worthy’.” Listen: I remember really loving Stephen Dunn’s Sisyphus poems when I first read them but all the things I loved about them had nothing to do with the main character being Sisyphus. I would have loved poems about a regular old dude buying bagels and feeling terror in the face of a godless existence just as much.

2. DON’T keep a poem around because someone out there might like it or find it interesting  (or even part of a poem—don’t let any part of your poem be a boring bridge to good things. You can do better!); if you’re not excited about it, toss it. Sure, there’s a chance you might be depriving a couple people of a moment’s pleasure, but are those couple of people guaranteed to be better judges of poetry than you? There’s probably a reason you can’t muster any excitement about that line/ stanza/ poem, and if you aren’t in love with it, you’re going to have a hard time selling it to anyone else. It’s your responsibility get yourself to the point of being able to trust your discernments, your final say, about the relative value of your own craft. However,

3. DO consider your reader’s experience. Recognize that putting a poem in a book or magazine (as opposed to leaving it in your journal/ on your laptop) is saying “Reader, I have something for you. Please spend a bit of time with it.”

Now, considering a reader’s needs too soon (in the early stages of a poem’s development) can kill everything good that that poem might become. As a poem is just beginning, the poet’s self-consciousness, which can lead to a “To Do” list approach in writing poetry, is detrimental. In the early stages of writing a poem DO let your eyes roll back into your head; DO try to keep yourself ignorant of what’s happening; DO become an empty vessel, a clean faucet for your unconscious thoughts and maybe something else that comes from somewhere else. It’s in the final stages of a poem that you should take a step back; forget what you love and know about the poem; think about the person who has no access to what’s inside your head; do what you need to do to maximize her experience with your poem. For example:

4. DO spend some time thinking about the difference between a useful generative exercise (thematically-unified listing, googling various saint-sightings in developing countries, consulting the I Ching) and a finished poem that will bring something valuable to the life of your reader. In other words, recognize when the jumping off point that has helped you evade your writing anxiety and made poetry game-like and thus fun (or just doable) again has served its purpose and needs to slip back into the shadows. But on the other hand,

5. DON’T be a poet that the reader can feel hovering in the periphery of the poem with clutched hands saying “I Hope you like it! I spent 2 hours thesaurus-ing adjectives for ragweed for you!!!” The reader doesn’t owe you anything, so don’t be the mother who guilts her kid into appreciating her by reminding him of her 42 hours of labor with him (which was followed by 15 years of thankless work etc.)…If I read a poem that has so clearly been toiled over, I feel like the only appropriate response is admiring the toil and the formidable, gleaming results of that toil. But I don’t like feeling like only one response is appropriate, which is why I don’t like being told jokes (which is very different than being in the presence of someone who spontaneously makes jokes, which is a thing I love): Someone says “I’m going to tell you a by-definition funny thing,” and then they tell me the thing, and if I don’t laugh then we both experience feelings of failure and disappointment. In other words:

6. DO make it look easy. It’s not about you anymore, poet. It’s about the poem, what it has to— really needs to—say to the reader, the bad/good temporary world, and all of us.

[omgchristinaredford-blog]

You better run from me.

you better hit the road

Before I take your soul.

don't you Follow me : light me up >

You BETTER Run from me ; you better say goodbye. before I take you on : Don't you... Follow Me ::: Let Me Go ><]: light, Me Up in ; Flames ☆ light me up : and Go - in, Flames ->

☆☆☆ 》《 ☆☆☆ ::: ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

I don't do this for a Living.

I'm Infected. - i'm always in my head :

I'm gonna do this till I'm dead.

I'm still alive. but ; you didn't think that I'd come back to life >>> i, do This with Conviction - i write truth in Every forgiving Mission >< Truce : in every Conviction ;... bet, you thought that i was Dead. but - I'm not dead... ]: everlasting, How you Fasting?::::::::::::::::::::: you didn't think

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆》》》《 ☆☆☆☆☆ :::

- - - ... all smiles

What it takes to Fool this town.

all through the nighttime

Never ; the right time.

See : Show - I Am. unstoppable :

a Butcher with No Brakes - today > break Down

cry out now : deep down

I'm too afraid now. yeah >>><[:<>>< i, am...

Pusher : with, NO BRAKES - win Every Single Game

unstoppable

Today.

I put my Armor on. See you How Strong I am. I Show you That I am.

I'm : INVINCIBLE. - my name

I SHOW YOU EVERY SINLE DAY

》》》... ::: ~~~ ....

took me down to the water

Try to wash it all away.

Praise my soul : Cause there's no good in the place I'm goin'.

in the middle of the night

We All Got a little bit of Devil inside.

maybe I was for a sinner : I might Never be a Saint.

PRAISE MY SOUL.

PRAY FOR LIFE.

heaven's too far : and I lost My Way

... ... ...

You Should've Never, disrespected Joan.

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆》》》... ... ...

Are you ; Insane like Me?

and all the people say

Run On Gasoline.

I think There's a flaw in my Code.

THESE VOICES WON'T LEAVE ME ALONE.

my Heart is Gold ; and, my Hands are Cold.

Do you Call yourself a Fucking HURRICANE : like me - ????????........

This is not a Dream ; you are a Machine, part of - Not a Human Being... .

Cold.

heart - is Gold :

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆》》》》》》》》《》☆☆☆...

First Thing's First.

oh : oooo ☆

1, 2 - 3

Master ; My Sea. -> MINE

my poems

the few

message

:: lesson ::

You, pick Me up - believer. Believer :

3 : prayer. Above. Hate. dove ; spirit -> UP, above... DROWN

I RAIN DOWN : REIN :::::::::: LIKE. like - believer ☆

Topic, came From - believer.

Last. thing's last - grace, flames, veins ; never >

You Rein DOWN : like, pain.

☆☆☆》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》》☆☆☆☆☆

...

I don't think you know I suffer.

Oh baby don't you know I know you.

> Watching in the dead of night. you set my soul alive

I thought I was a fool for you.

Sill Condition.

Silly ; Super.

super sonic

Soul. Alive. super fragalistic BAG OF BONES

death calls

- FRAGALISTIC BAG OF BONES :: SUPER FRAGALISTIC DEATH CALL.

bag of bones : bat call

》》》 ☆ 》》》》》》》》》》》》 :::

I ain't gonna tell no lies.

You know exactly who I am.

Stealing like the earth is mine.

like I own this Time

》

Can't Stop Me Now

they goin' down

Won't stop Doin' what I do.

ain't Afraid : HEAR THE THUNDER WHEN I STEP

I AIN'T GONNA POLOGIZE.

can't stop me now

Can't Stop : Won't Stop

This Battle Is Never Through.

every bone that I break ; just doin' what I do

Can't STOP ME NOW.

》》》》》》》》》》》¡¿□■●○~`°••••••▪︎▪︎▪︎☆¤¤¤》》》...

let me back it up

Nami.

Fight this in Line.

tear down the kingdom

Pessimist.

Spent too much Money : GLADIATOR.

Tell me what it is. You think you believe?

I'm gonna give you a second. Play it off. Accept it ; THIS.

>>> you got every reason to flee ; I got every reason to fight...

Have you ever Shaken hands with The Devil in the Middle of The Night???????????

GLADIATOR : bone shaker. Wrecking ball -

I'm The Gladiator.

- goodbye (everything, nothing ; now)] goodbye.

{{{09.21.22 :: -> <- :: your am - my, night [pm]}}}

[7-omen-7]

Here are some names that aren’t strictly for females or males

Alpha Astrix/Asterisk Axis Blur Bolt Brick Cube Cyan Data Delta Echo Entity Error Exa/Exo Form Friday Hazard Idea Impulse Infinity Ion Kilo Kite Limit Name Nebula Neon Obsidian Plastic Point Quartz Qwerty Radar Retina Reverb Rocket Scavenger Sigma Sonar Swing Tank Tax Tera Valence Vertex Virus Vortex Audience Beat Binary Brass Cable Canon Canvas Chord Clash Coarse Crash Discord Double Feedback Forte Genre Hack Hollow Hook Impulse/Pulse Ink Key Lyric Mellow Memory Neon Noise Note Omen Phase Quaver Riddle Shallow Sharp Shiny Snare Treble Tune Twang Aloe Arrow Atlas Azure Balsa Bee Beetle Branch Bread Bridge Candle Cedar Cello Chameleon Cherry Cloud Clover Coffee East Echo Egg Ember Fern Finch Flannel Forest Gecko Gem Goose Grey Jay Kale Lake Leaf Mango Maple Moss Oak Pond Poppy Rain Raven Rock Silver Topaz Violet Wednesday Willow Wood Frog Max Alex Shawn/Shawne Kai SCP 834 Nyx Ares War Criminal Cas Sky/Skie Bee Ash Arson Vin Sal Cat/Kat Tax Fraud Liminal Dream Fade Angel Glitch Tooth Centipede Chlorine Crayon Fever Bones Ghost Eye Omen Nurse Band-aid Tape Glow Legs Decay Poison Blowfly Needle Finger Mold Doll Wasp Moth Dirt Bunny Trinket Shell Cicada Ariel Astra Aurora Celeste Luna Nova Starling Starr Stella Sunshine Aldrin Apollo Callisto Castor Comet Hercules Leo Neptune Rocket Solar Aries Eclipse Galaxy Halo Mars Mercury Moon Saturn Star Sun book strawberry cherry tea soup lace butters melody lyric bunny slime apple Saturn star venus kandi/kandy/candy glitter monster zero/zee/z neo gutz/guts brainz/brains trixie roxy rex Moss Bones Arson Rain Feather Cloud Deep Raven Fall captain bone/bones patch/patches sparrow flynn skipper boots hook reef treasure Winter Midnight Crow Corvid Raven Siren Shade Nova Veil Salem Ash Aster Devin Day Hyde Dagger Knife Psyche Osiris Pandora Haven Jade Blade Gray Ember Ebony Blue Dee Day Dove Sky Rain Ash Coin Pax Rex Mick Reef Rory Ari Bug River Dane Finn Lumi Lux Ore Roux Note Tone Melody Piper Sonata Violin Coda Riff Alto Lyre Lyric Calypso Cadence Chorus Canto Chanson Harper Lorelei Octave Song Muse Canon Clef Motif Legato Nonet Pan Rhapsody Trill Vevace Dusk Indigo Orion Onyx Obsidian Somnus Hypnos Morpheus Noctis Noir Nero Umbra Ash Omega Orpheus Crow Jinx Hex Grey Pandora Morrigan Shade Silver Zephyr Storm Crimson sprinkle Bunny cloud Skittle kitty birdie bee flower Grass peach strawberry cherry Berry Apple Berry Apricot Huckleberry Mulberry Honeydew Lychee Peach Cherry Basil Bayleef Pepper Anise Clove Coriander Ginger Nutmeg Rosemary Rue Sesame Thyme Saffron exe/txt/pdf/gif web/website tech emoji sci beta dell chip zip Arson Blue Blur Brick. Cloud Detective Dice Egg Elmers Error Gremlin Icon Jester Lake Leaf Mischief Nike Nintendo Pi Royal Skull Spark Ten Tesla Vortex Yoshi Zero Zoom angela/angelo/angie angelonia/angel andy/andi ann/annie/anny antares andromeda bone/bones biscuit/biskit paw fluffy fetch scout chase skull corpse blade jinx hex bat bandit rogue trick/tricky smoke lee leo/lio pluto mars orion redd avery aster cyrus cleo miles quinn indigo amber ruby sugar lace/lacey boba rosie mae merry dottie plush/plushie cinnabun pompom teddy peach smile/smiles/smiley alphabet blocks bug snail paint crayon slime sticker rainbow gummy candy/kandi button bandaid glitch static disc pixel robot/bot glitter wire/wires code key/keys virus byte bunny/bunnie/bun kitty/kit/kitten plush/plushie milk fluff cloud bubble/bubbles angel ghost tea cookie bow / ribbon bonbon puff / creampuff Nintendo Mossy Quill Spark Vermillion Cotton Candy (or C.C. for short) Cocoa Indigo Sunset Elmers Snowy Sketchpad Frost Jester Poltergeist Spirit Cricket Poem Puck Mischief Truffle Golden Clay Feather Hatchet Gremlin Stone Brad Chad Thad Zoom Crayon Detective Otter Sonic Armadillo Ocelot Puggles (name for baby platypus) Dylan Logan River Fince Ellory Finn Converse Sage Saint Sal Saturday Saxon Scan Scatter Scoop Scorpion Scout Scream Sea Senti Sentinel September Serene Seven Shade Shadow Shake Shatter Shaw Silent/Silence Silver Siphon Skill

[betweenthetimeandsound]

Three Minutes to Eternity: My ESC 250 (#220-211)

#220: Yiannis Dimitras -- Feggari Kalokerino (Greece 1981)

"Κοίτα τον έρημο γυαλό Σου ψιθυρίζω σ’ αγαπώ Τώρα θα χτίσω εκκλησιά Για της αγάπης τα τρελά παιδιά" "Look at the desolate seashore I whisper you “I love you” Now I’ll build a church For the crazy children of love" The opening shot, the rose on the piano, set the stage for such a romantic journey under the summer moon. And the soundscape created through the piano and instrumental throw us into this endearing scene, one which is also tinged with melancholy. Feggari Kalokerino is not only an ode to this beauty, but also an admission of craziness for falling in love. With such pretty lyrics, one can't help but get enveloped in this pretty world, where everything is so beautiful. The combination of Yiannis' singing and the woman's piano playing is also quite cute, albeit with some...interesting undertones to it. Either way, it's classical yet timeless.

Personal ranking: 3rd/20 Actual ranking: 8th/20 in Dublin

#219: Liliane Saint-Pierre -- Soldiers of Love (Belgium 1987)

“Neem elkaars handen Smeed nou die banden toe Hoor je die verre kreet? Geen mens vraagt dat leed” “Take each other’s hands Come on, weld those bonds Do you hear that distant scream? Nobody asks for that suffering” Top ten opening themes of anime, haha. It also helps that "Soldiers of Love" is the English translation for the song "Ai no Senshi" from Sailor Moon (which I've listened to many times but haven't gotten that far into the anime...). That said, Soldiers of Love packs a punch with the instrumentation and the high intensity of the melody. The lyrics are a powerful battle cry, albeit one which advocates for peace amongst people. There’s so much energy and determination in Belgium’s host entry, one would prepare themselves for battle for a good cause. Liliane really delivers this earnestly and with determination, though sometimes the military-style get-up stands out to me the most when I watch it again. Though those two guitarists turning their ends as if they were firing guns is a cool thing to behold.

It's one of the host entries that is better than the song which one it for the country, which is something because J'aime la vie is considered a fan favorite.

Personal ranking: 6th/22 Actual ranking: 11th/22 in Brussels

#218: Beth -- Dime (Spain 2003)

"Cuántas veces te llamé en la noche Cuántas veces te busqué Por mis recuerdos yo vuelvo Y no pierdo la fe" "How many times did I call you in the night? How many times did I look for you? I return for my memories And I don’t lose faith" For some reason, Dime reminds me of "Die for You" from two years earlier--both feature modern pop bops with ethnic influences, both imploring about the state of a relationship (while they both want to make it wor. And they're both in the same key! At the same time, Dime holds its own as one of the strongest 2000s entries from Spain. They had similar flamenco/Latin inspired entries in 2001 and 2004, which were highlights in rather mediocre years because of their uniqueness overall. But the guitar flourishes here work well with the dance beat, and it provides its own fun.

Personal ranking: 3rd/26 Actual ranking: 8th/26 in Riga

#217: Svala -- Paper (Iceland 2017)

“Drawing every bit of my truth Colour me in with your blue” I didn’t actually pay attention to this song in the follow-up to the 2017 contest. I also didn’t watch the semi-finals, which could’ve led to me neglecting the song entirely otherwise, especially I've heard a lot about Blackbird during that time. However, the summer after the contest, I discovered the song and listened to it. And I liked it! (And then I got hooked with Svala's other songs through her different groups) I was interested particularly in the lyrics, which discussed a fight between one’s mental demons and anxiety. I like the English version more than the Icelandic one; the latter is a bit more optimistic on winning against the battle whereas the former really takes the issue seriously. The production, while a bit staid, added to the feeling of helplessness with its electronic coldness. The staging also tries to incorporate this, though it didn't work in making it stand out. (I did like Svala's cape and makeup, though!) While I do love "Hear them Calling" a lot, I had a more interesting journey with Paper--it grew until it became something I highly enjoyed. Personal ranking: 6th/42 Actual ranking: DNQ -- 15th in the first semi-final in Kyiv

#216: Live Report -- Why Do I Always Get it Wrong? (United Kingdom 1989)

“You can do what you want to do now...” Honestly, this has to be one of my favorite British entries ever. While "Go" from the previous year gets a lot of acclaim because of its songwriting and Scott's performance (along with how it ended up second in the end), "Why Do I Always Get it Wrong?" is better on how it envelops a mood and could actually be found from this era (though it sadly didn't do too well commercially afterwards, sigh)

Whenever I do something wrong, or self-hate, this is the song I turn to a lot. The synthesizers drew me in—it fit well with the late 1980s-early 1990s sound elsewhere. It's also helped that Celine performed "Where Does My Heart Beat Now" earlier in the contest, which piqued my interest. And while Ray’s ponytail was a choice, it didn’t distract from how he delivered the song.

Despite getting more 12-points, it ended up losing to Yugoslavia by just six points that year. While not my favorite that year, I think it was the better one of the top three; it equally reflects the times and holds up!

Personal and actual ranking: 2nd/22 in Lausanne

#215: Tommy Nilsson -- En Dag (Sweden 1989)

“En dag vi alla förstår, En dag, när stillheten rår, En dag jag finner din hand, När vägarna möts förstår vi varann,” “One day, we all understand, One day, when silence rules One day, I find your hand When our roads meet, we will understand each other” My two favorites from 1989 are sonically different, diverging between despair and hope. I listen to "Why Do I Always Get it Wrong" a bit more, but "En Dag' would stand out for me in a few different ways, more from being just the optimistic song of the two.

The intro features really good brass, which leads way to the fun instrumental. I like how it builds, and Tommy’s interplay with the backing vocalists is incredibly strong. You get a sense of energy from the both of them as they send the song to new heights.

Basically, it's just glorious!

Personal ranking: 1st/22 Actual ranking: 4th/22 in Lausanne

Final Impressions of 1989: It's a pretty fine year, both in songs in production. There are a number of good songs there, though not many classics which hold out in the long-term (except for Vi maler byen rød, which became famous in Denmark and even became the premise of a musical!). Highlights include an overactive conductor from Turkey, two children, and an awesome interval act involving a crossbow!

#214: Bang -- Stop (Greece 1987)

“Ότι κάνεις για δόξα και λεφτά Δες τι χάνεις, αλλού είναι η χαρά”

“Whatever you do is for fame and money See what you are missing, joy is somewhere else”

I’ve heard this song compared to Wham’s output, especially with its vintage rock-n-roll sound (wake me up before you go go). This doesn’t make it any less bad, with its charming tone and thoughtful lyrics about how a girl who only wants material goods should stop chasing them.

(This is another reason why sometimes, the original-language version is better that any other one--the English version to this song has goes on a completely different tangent)

The performance also falls into vintage aesthetics, with the suits for both Thanos and Vassilis and sock-hop style dresses for the backing vocalists. It's really cute, and the way they dance fits the scene.

On another note, apparently Greeks saw this as a favorite at the time, can someone verify that?

Personal ranking: 5th/22 Actual ranking: 10th/22 in Brussels

#213: Guy Bonnet -- Marie-Blanche (France 1970)

“Nous sommes là dans une douce quiétude Nous avons mis fin à notre solitude Nos corps apprennent de tendres habitudes Et Marie-Blanche est à moi”

“We’re there in a soft stillness We’ve put an end to our loneliness Our bodies learn tender habits And Marie-Blanche is mine”

By 1970, chanson was on its way out; in its place was folk, rock-n-roll (spearheaded in France by Johnny Halladay, who has a great French version of "House of the Rising Sun"), and psychadelia. Within France itself, some of the #1 singles from that year include Comme j'ai toujours envie d'aimer, Let It Be, and Bridge over Troubled Water (a total masterpiece, I tell you).

So, what does one make of Marie-Blanche, in this case?

It's a really sweet love poem, in which Guy declares his love for the girl. and conveys a particularly cute scene. Whenever I listen to this, I envision two lovers cuddling inside while watching the snow fall during the winter. There's a sense of magic and serenity in all this, and the lyrics match the pretty piano melody.

Basically, hits are important to keep the contest alive. But songs like Marie Blanche can pull on the feels in the right ways.

Personal ranking: 2nd/12 Actual ranking: =4th/12 in Amsterdam

#212: Justyna -- Sama (Poland 1995)

“I czuła się tak marnie Poczuła się tak marnie Jakby Bóg, dobry Bóg Nie lubił pcheł..”

“And I feel poor Feeling so poor As if God, the good God Didn’t love little fleas...”

If 1994’s To nie ja represented something classic and hopeful, 1995’s Sama takes it and reverses it. (And in the grand Eurovision timeline, they're only separated by the last song of 1994, Je suis un vrai garcon from France) Instead of a young woman filled with life and singing a decent ballad, we have another one pondering herself, all alone, with nobody to help her.

Also, this is more of an acquired taste with its out-of-tune recordings and Justyna’s scream. But it doesn’t feel out of place within the 1990s, with its alternative influences and production, and I like Sama a lot for that!

Unfortunately, it also caused it to do substantially worse, which is simultaneously explainable and baffling. A good result would've made waves for future Eurovision entries; the 1990s are my favorite decade, but they did misalign quite a bit from the mainstream.

Personal ranking: 7th/23 Actual ranking: 18th/23 in Dublin

#211: The Shadows -- Let Me Be the One (United Kingdom 1975)

"You and I could have an affair/make sweet music, go anywhere"

Isn't this lyric really charming? I couldn't help but have a little giggle because of it; there's a sense of naughtiness (especially with choosing "affair"; are they trying to something illicit?) underneath it.

That said, The Shadows are mainly known for their instrumental rock, but Let Me Be the One has a neat melody line. The rock-n-roll vibe, which could be released within that decade, is light but lovely, and added a jolt of uniqueness to the otherwise poppy contest up to that point. The flubbed line in the beginning ("let me be the one who literally holds you tight", haha) adds to the whole thing, but they were able to carry on, nevertheless.

And while I like all the 1970s winners to some extent, I would switch out "Ding-a-Dong" for Let Me Be the One in terms of winners vs. runners-up; like with Sama, it could've changed the contest in a positive way.

Personal ranking: =3rd/19 Actual ranking: 2nd/19 in Stockholm

[behappykeepclassy]

LOVER Track-by-track Impressions

1. I Forgot That You Existed

catchy AF with the da-da-da in the beginning

“Free rent, living in my mind”

love how she sings “and quieeeetttt”

“It isn’t love, it isn’t hate, it’s just indifference”

“I forgot that you sent me a clear message, taught me some hard lessons”

The “So, yeah” at the end is gold, like vocally shrugging

2. Cruel Summer 

Pure BOP!

Feeling that bass in my soul

“I’m always waiting for you to be waiting below” - 80s John Hughes movie style!

“Devils roll the dice, angels roll their eyes” is perfect

The whole chorus floats and soars and I love it so much

“You say that we’ll just screw it up in these trying times, we’re not trying” - SUCH A GOOD LINE

“So cut the headlights, summer’s knife, I’m always waiting for you just to cut to the bone” Ouf!

“I don’t wanna keep secrets just to keep you”

The raspy roar in her voice when she sings “He looks up, grinning like a devil”

3. Lover

Quiet and precious and sweet and lovely and cozy

So happy we have an album with a title song again

4. The Man

“They’d say I played the field before i found someone to commit to”

“Every conquest I had made would make me more of a boss to you”

“I’m so sick of running as fast as I can, wondering if I’d get there quicker if I was a man” - MY MOTTO FROM NOW ON, just running through my head constantly

“What I was wearing, if I was rude” - I feel like this also doubles for her sexual assault case against that radio DJ (blaming the victim)

“I’d be just like Leo in Saint-Tropez” LOL

The whole bridge, when she switches from “And getting bitches and models” to “If I was out flashing my dollars, I’d be a bitch not a baller” OUF

MY INHERENT FEMALE ANGER AT THE INJUSTICE OF THE PATRIARCHY IS ALIVE AND WELL

5. The Archer

This is one of my favourites, even though I’ve had it longer than most cause it was released earlier

Lyrically, best or second best on the album

Destroys me every time, goddamnit

6. I Think He Knows

“I am an architect, I’m drawing up the plans”

I love how she sings “skipping down 16th avenue”, like so specific and wonderful but universal

I like how she owns how much of a catch she herself is in the second verse - like yassss girl

“Lyrical smile, indigo eyes, hand on my thigh, we can follow the sparks (SPARKS FLYYYYYYYY), I’ll smile”

7. Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince

The way it starts, it made me think of The Killers “Well somebody told me that you had a boyfriend who looked like a girlfriend…”

“American glory faded before me” - her fall from the spotlight

“I saw the scoreboard and ran for my life” - hiding away from media and everyone

I like how she incorporates the “OKAY” school chant in the background of the chorus

This has a lot of “I Know Places” vibes, especially second verse

The switch in the bridge from “And I don’t want you to (Go), I don’t really wanna (Fight), ‘Cause nobody’s gonna (Win)” to “And I’ll never let you (Go), ‘Cause I know this is a (Fight),” That somebody we’re gonna (Win)”

Wish she’d held the the last note that she started before entering back into final chorus (it sounded like it was going to go on longer

8. Paper Rings

Makes me think of the happiness of “Stay, Stay, Stay” with a dash of “Holy Ground” energy

Easily one of my faves

Jack Antonoff counting us into the chorus, just love him

Just such fun, every lyric and beat

“I like shiny things but I’d marry you with paper rings” and “I hate accidents except when we went from friends to this” SO CUTE

“Honey, without all the exes, fights, and flaws, we wouldn’t be standing here so tall” - so mature and wonderful and she’s so happy now!

I love that she brings it up an octave starting at the bridge and into the final chorus

I can’t help but smile listening to this over and over again

Like, I want Lover as my wedding song and Paper Rings as a choreographed 20s swing dance with my future husband

9. Cornelia Street 

Hit me the second time more than the first, like wow I actually love this

“‘I rent a place on Cornelia Street,’ I say casually in the car” CUTEEEEE

“That’s the kinda heartbreak time could never mend, I’d never walk Cornelia Street again”

Second half of the chorus makes me think of Dress

“Windows swung right open, autumn air, jacket ‘round my shoulders is yours” - ALL TOO WELL callback

“Back when we were card sharks, playing games, I thought you were leading me one, I packed my bags, left Cornelia Street before you even knew I was gone” - makes me think of when she sings “If I had known what I know now, I never would have played so nonchalant” in Come Back, Be Here

“Barefoot in the kitchen” - makes me think of All Too Well “dancing in the refrigerator light”

I also think Cornelia Street doubles for love itself, like this is it for her, this is the one big love for her and there won’t be another so she wants to get it right and keep it safe

10. Death By A Thousand Cuts

Ignore the lyrics and you almost think it’s a happy song (classic Jack Antonoff Bleachers thing to do)

“I look through the windows of this love, even though we boarded them up, chandelier still flickering here” - brilliant

THE PIANOOOOOOOOOOOOO (very Bleachers ‘Wild Heart’ outro)

She goes from “We were a fresh page on the desk, filling in the blanks as we go” in Cornelia Street to “But if the story’s over, why am I still writing pages?” in Death By A Thousand Cuts, and that kills me

“My heart, my hips, my body, my love, Tryna find a part of me that you didn’t touch”

“Our songs, our films, united, we stand, our country, guess it was a lawless land”

“Why are my fears at the touch of your hands? Paper cut stains from my paper-thin plans” - some of the best lyrics on the album right there, IMO

“My time, my wine, my sprit, my trust, Tryna find a part of me you didn’t take up” - this destroyed me more than I thought it would because it was so unexpected and raw, especially the second half of the line, like she’s realizing that he took too much and it hurts but it wasn’t good to lose herself like that

11. London Boy

Is the voice talking in the beginning Idris Elba?

“They say home is where the heart is, But that’s not where mine lives” - she says the second half like a secret she’s sharing with us over wine

Gotta go back to London STAT

“Doesn’t have to be Louis V up on Bond Street” LOL fancy baller line

12. Soon You’ll Get Better

This and The Archer are the two songs I cried during, just gutted

“The buttons of my coat were tangled in my hair” - how we think of the mundane things when the worst things are happening to try and distract ourselves

“Holy orange bottles, each night, I pray to you” - I don’t know what to say

“…’Cause you have to”

I love that the Dixie Chicks are lightly assisting the chorus without taking the song away from Taylor and its focus

The bridge and pre-final-chorus have me crying the most and I don’t know what to do

This remind me a lot of Ronan mixed with Never Grow Up and Fleetwood Mac’s Landslide

13. False God

Sax is a bit like the sax in Bleachers’ Everybody Lost Somebody (not complaining at all)

“We were stupid to jump in the ocean separating us

I get Dress sexy vibes from this (“The altar is my hips”)

The feathery way she sings the second “this loooovee)

Reminds me of “So It Goes…”

14. You Need to Calm Down

Still a bop, and always will be a bop - just so fun

15. Afterglow

I like that she owns up to her mistakes and destructive tendency

Makes me think of the Lover lyric “And I’m highly suspicious that everyone who sees you wants you” and in the music video it’s her jealousy that leads to a fight

“Fighting with a true love is boxing with no gloves”

“I lived like an island, punished you in silence”

16. ME!

Lyrically and musically, exactly like what happened with Look What You Made Me Do and Reputation - almost like a red herring to put us off the sonic trail of her album until single 2 came out

17. It’s Nice To Have a Friend

We get a story again! I’ve missed story song! (think Mary’s Song and Everything Has Changed mixed together)

Lovely chill indie vibes

“Something gave you the nerve to touch my hand”

Love me some trumpet

“Church bells ring, carry me home” (like third verse of Mary’s Song)

“Rice on the ground looks like snow” - poetic cute

18. Daylight

“My love was a cruel as the cities I lived in, everyone looked worse in the light” - like Cruel Summer and Getaway Car and even Back to December, she wanted something and got it, only find it wasn’t what she wanted and she ended up hurting someone in the process

Chorus makes me think of You Are in Love floating synth

“I wounded the good and I trusted the wicked” (Back to December, Getaway Car, I Knew You Were Trouble)

“Clearing the air, I breathed in the smoke” harkens back to The Archer’s “The room is on fire, invisible smoke”

“Threw out our cloaks and our daggers because it’s morning now” - she no longer needs I Know Places, no fear or hiding

“I once believe love would be (Black and white) But it’s (Golden) […] I once believed love would be (Burning red) But it’s golden” - Burning red calls back to Red (duh!), Golden calls back to Dress “Made your mark on me, a golden tattoo”, End Game “It’s like your eyes are liquor, it’s like your body is gold”, So It Goes… “Gold cage, hostage to my feelings” and Dancing With Our Hands Tied “Deep blue, but you painted me golden”

“You gotta step into the daylight and let it go” - remind me of the poem The Trick to Holding On that she wrote for Vogue (“The trick to holding on Was all that letting go”)

The talking outro is very Jack Antonoff/Bleachers’ Strange Desire, cause he threads introspective talking throughout, especially when she says “I wanna be defined by the things that I love” and he sings “I wanna be grateful for the experiences that I’ve had” in You’re Still a Mystery

[finishinglinepress]

FLP BOOK OF THE DAY: The Shomer by Ellen Sazzman

TO ORDER GO TO: https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/the-shomer-by-ellen-sazzman/

RESERVE YOUR COPY TODAY

Ellen Sazzman has lived in Washington, D.C. and Montgomery County, Maryland for the last forty years where she raised her family and practiced law for the federal government. Her poetry has been published in numerous journals including Beltway Poetry Quarterly, CALYX, Connecticut River Review, Common Ground Review, Comstock Review, Ekphrastic Review, Innisfree Poetry Journal, Intima, Lilith, Miramar, Moment, PANK, Paterson Literary Review, Poetica, Poetry South, Southword Literary Journal, Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, and Women’s Studies Quarterly. Her poem “Remnants” was a Pushcart Prize nominee. The Shomer is her debut poetry collection. The Shomer was selected as a finalist for the 2020 Blue Lynx Prize, a semifinalist for the 2020 Elixir Press Antivenom Award, and a semifinalist for the 2019 Codhill Press Poetry Award.

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR The Shomer by Ellen Sazzman

The shomer is one who plays the role of watchman in the Jewish traditional shemira, the guarding of the dead. In the old tradition, all shomrim sit and protect the body which cannot protect itself. They guard against desecration before burial. Without the presence of the shomer, the dead are still subjected to the judgment of God, though they lack the agency to act and resist such corruptions of the body. Thus the shomer is the advocate and protector of those who can no longer protect themselves, but one who also gains a special glimpse into the liminal, a witness to what happens in the space between life and burial. In Ellen Sazzman’s moving, revealing, truly dazzling poems, the symbol of the eponymous shomer is used in sections that watch over and witness the passing of three sorts of life force: the parents, the old traditions, and one’s own body. The brilliance of that: that the poet is also the witness to her own corporality, and that she is charged to step away from the body, so to speak, to keep its vigil. I can think of no better metaphor for the role of poetry, and there are few who do this work more elegantly and more truthfully than Ellen Sazzman. She is a writer who has lived in those “neither-worlds,” one who knows about advocacy and the power of exacting speech, and, while this book is a debut, it has been shaping itself a long time. I hope The Shomer is the first of many such books, the first of many such guardianships. Her work holds, seemingly effortlessly, the balance of authority and tenderness.

–David Keplinger, author of six poetry collections, most recently The Long Answer

The Shomer opens on an elegiac note, but make no mistake; this collection teems with life. Intimate, honest, and wryly funny, these poems travel the journey of miles and years, asking us “Who doesn’t hunger, / wouldn’t hunt for more”? That hunger is both metaphoric and literal, as seen in the second section’s one-two punch of “Jewish Girl’s Guide to Guacamole” and “Brisket Wars.” From Cleveland to Cape Cod, from Mexico City to Saint-Malo: complementing Sazzman’s rich imagery and sense of place is her easy touch with the sonnet, the ghazal, and other formal traditions. Having followed this poet’s work for years, I’m delighted for others to join me in appreciating her discerning voice and artistry.

–Sandra Beasley, author most recently of Made to Explode

The Shomer: What an apt title for Ellen Sazzman’s book, which acts as a guardian/custodian of so many deeply important things. Family, the body, love in all its guises, lives lived and deaths experienced — this accomplished collection takes us from Bernini to brisket, from lemon to Leica, in a vast sweep of personal and cultural history. Formally adept, the poems gracefully skirt the line of the subversive: “Eve, Pandora, Lot’s unnamed wife, / curious women who dared to open themselves / to the forbidden with a taste, a touch, a twist.” Lovely sonic patterning and images from all the senses resonate and stay with the reader, an old perfume bottle whose “glass is cloudy / but luminous, a filament of moon flickering.”

—Moira Egan, author most recently of Synæsthesium

#flpauthor #preorder #AwesomeCoverArt #poetry

[graywyvern]

( via "songs without that fifth bit" via nightcafe )

Dirge of the Nameless Saint.

"Only in 1996, when a Jewish surgeon working with a Holocaust scholar demanded an investigation in the letters column of JAMA [Journal of the American Medical Association], did the medical profession admit that it had been teaching students how to become surgeons for nearly sixty years with paintings of the flayed bodies of disabled children and political prisoners [Pernkopf's Topographische Anatomie des Menschen]." --Neurotribes

Novelty Winding.

"NEW TRANSLATION - 1890 Symbolist Con-Langing!

Amidst the schoolwork, this sentence-here & sentence-there translation's accumulated over the last 5 or 6 weeks. It's a very idiosyncratic, half-satirical essay on invented languages by the Virginia-born, franco-American disciple of Mallarmé, Francis Vielé-Griffin. It's a parodic review of a (probably nonexistent) book by his own pseudonym, "Toussaint de Mornes", written in Volapük, a forerunner of Esperanto.

Several years ago I published the passages of his Volapük verse quoted here in the Revenant Editions pamphlet of 19th Century Sound Poetry; here's the entire essay. Parts of it will be esoteric for those who aren't familiar with the specifics of the Symbolists' innovations in prosody and scansion (but I mean, aren't we all?).

Essentially, on one level this essay about the fallacy of traditional rules of scansion, which rigidify syllables into mechanistic units that do not correspond with the rhythmic complexity of spoken language. On another related level, it's a Symbolist polemic ridiculing the previous Parnassian movement's emphasis on this impossible rhythmic/metrical purity.

On yet another level, it's a thought experiment into how Constructed Language might be approached and utilized from an avant-garde poetic standpoint. Tongue-in-cheek, but not without some seriousness, as he did in fact learn the language and write several poems reproduced here, working them into rhyme in a language not conducive to it. He was systematically interested in such radical extensions of language - I've also translated an article by him from this same year speculating on how manipulating phonograph recordings might one day yield new conceptions of poetry's sonic possibilities.

This is from the Paris Anarchist-Symbolist journal 'Entretiens', which he co-edited with Paul Adam.

Okay, back to work with me; enjoy, one or two of you! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 'A NEW BOOK by Francis Vielé-Griffin

The unusual book by Mr. Toussaint des Mornes solicits the benevolent attention of every lover of fine literature: in this work, we find ourselves, in fact, facing one of the most unusual literary attempts of this epoch so productive of surprises. As for us, we confess it without hesitation, from the first lines, the author seduced us through his masculine frankness and aspect, through a personality without vain arrogance, and through the lucid and natural logic of his deductions.

The book is opened – after a filial and respectable dedication: “To my mother” – with a preface where we will gladly linger a moment.

“Without recognising literary dominion I submit, said Mr. Toussaint des Morns, before the Masters and declare myself, proudly and respectfully Parnassian in heart and faith.”

This proclamation vaunts itself at a time when even Maupassant himself is saluting the rising sun of Symbolism; but there is more than courage in this declaration of principles which is merely the announcement of logical consequences of a cogent aesthetic:

“To be sure,” Mr. de Morne continues, “the Parnasse has not fully responded to its programme, the school has gradually become thoughtless regarding the primitive goal which legitimated its birth; but I have never confused the Idea and men, and [for defectives][1] [what/that] [should come today of those] valiant combattants from the outset, their poetic ideal was no less beautiful then and remains no less so the aesthetic Labarum of rising generations.

“Yes,” says the poet farther on, “it is only form that can regenerate the poetry of which it is the essence, for ideas, as Mr. Zola declared again recently after having proved it in twenty resounding volumes,[2] are always as old as human thought; form alone, ever mobile, necessarily tends toward the absolute of a harmony with the idea itself.”

One could not speak more truly and, in these few lines, Mr. des Mornes reviews in excellent terms the renovating tendencies of our times. Could the Symbolists themselves not be found to say the same?

But, summarily dismissing admitted ideas just like those that are contested, the prefacer carries on unstoppably as a logician:

“At certain epochs in the evolution of peoples, at such dates forever glorious in the history of human thought, form has seemed to touch this marmoreal ideal of a perfection equal to the idea’s dazzling beauty; – never, however, by some fatality, has its work of human progress been completed: decadences arose; the human Word[3] fell back into stutters of instincts and appetites; in order to once again rise and fall, just as low. And, if primordial marbles reign in the imperishable and absolute glory of an accomplished form, what thinker will dare affirm that Aeschylus or Virgil or Racine or François Coppée have perfected one eternally radiant work of immutable youth? And why? because the Word evolves, the feeling for what were its ephemeral beauties is obliterated from generation to generation, and this form eventually becomes mummified, an esoteric hieroglyph for the philologists, but an unrecognisable cadaver for that posterity which wails anew the deformed sounds of what was once Speech, matrices for the future of new beauties of the hour.”

Without making us dwell on this implacable and dreadful argument, let’s hear what original and fallacious hope Mr. Des Mornes provides, at the tail of this century, to the adept of the art of the Word:

“For exceptional ills, exceptional remedies: language must be immobilised. To be sure, attempts toward this ideal of a fixed language have taken place and have been scuttled: Latin after five centuries of agony was forced to die in defeat, the French of the grand epoch,[4] defended in vain in the donjons[5] of the University, is contaminated and deformed in spite of everything; every reaction appears to be in vain. Well no; it is within our power to attain that fixity of the language of verse in the perfect form which must finally be able to swathe thought in a gown of youthfulness, for all eternity.

The future is opening up magnificently in the dawn of the century to come: already five thousand men of all countries and all races are practicing the language of masterpieces, possible at last with studious labour to forge verses.”

Mr. Des Mornes is making here an apologia for the “stupidly derided” Volapük and lays out the technical advantages which this language offers to the poet:

“My master, Théodore Banville,[6] based Poetics upon the counting of syllables or feet; this basis in natural, it is to my mind the only logic; but is it not by this means that he left his flank open to the symbolists’ attacks? Could they not observe with infinite veracity that in the French language (as moreover in all known literary languages) it is rare that two syllables should be truly of the same length,[7] and that, consequently, a line of eight feet and a line of ten feet might, not only have the same numerical value, but that the line of eight feet could be longer than that of twelve?

“The objection seemed preemptory, so it effectively is for whatever is in the French language and necessitates for this bastardised language a poetics of tones and semitones that the symbolists can strive to find, if that amuses them; but the poetic principle of Théodore de Banville remains no less absolute and, if the French language is not capable of conforming itself to this reasoning, a rational language – wherein every syllable is equivalent – shall conform to it.

“The factual demonstration, impossible a few years ago enters today into the realm of realities: Volapük has been born: All of the syllables in it are, hypothetically, numerically equal; parnassian verse is possible at last in all its rigidity and chaste magnificence.”

There follow some interesting considerations on “the future of the Parnasse” which only the exigencies of available space force us to neglect here; we are nonetheless convinced that our readers would appreciate reading this preface, one of the most brazen that have ever been offered to our perusal, all the way through within the book . * *. * The work opens, radiantly, with an evocation of the sun of being which we take the liberty of citing in its entirety:

"Soladel

Stals vamik sola de plum Vietoms vatis de flum E faloms flamik as tum Sagits Lofapula!

On âklôdom-ôv das fel Binom logad: lino, Spel Ekômom svidik as smel Flolas ets lulula

Apozendelo, Bied, Te-mens dotik é to ned, Svidom oki: ba poed Obinom fam ola.

Stalol-ôd egelo, Sol! Lifol-ôd, tikal, sus dol, E spunôl rimis ko mol In gad molik vola!"

Later, in an atmosphere simultaneously intimate and mysterious, the pure and noble theory of humanity’s higher aspirations: Mr. Lecomte de Lisle himself would not regret, we believe, having signed his name to such strophes:

"Alina das nëito, Mun, Desipol oba tikâli, Oblekôle kaladâli, Bludom del ofa nedan vun."

Nothing could, to speak truly, be detached from this work without destroying the prestigious harmony of it – however we cannot resist penetrating into this patriarchal interior where Mr. Copée will surely recognise, a humble sister-soul:

"Polü nâta del fatela Cils ekômoms lôbo zi bed; Fukel omsik edlemom, yed Epukôms vips nâtadela.

'Binols-od gudik, cils gâla, Sagom bâledan,' dat, füdo, Got omes cils givom-la, do Man etos no melidom-la!

Bal kid gôlodom alimi Ko givs jônik demü promets; O cils, eko galods pos sets: Pledols-ob; epükols plimi."

Such is the delicate and powerful work that Toussaint des Mornes shall deliver tomorrow to the fervor of the public and the praises of official criticism.

We will add only one more word: in this review of the book of an irreconcilable and redoubtable contender we will have proven, one more time, the impartiality which characterises us and we would like Mr. des Mornes to observe, over his shoulder, if there’s still time, at the premier rank of glory, that, in order to still scan, following its own inspiration and in all the sincerity of our good faith, this French language, where his graceful talent parched for the absolute has found itself hemmed in, we are doing no less here in high hopes for his future and that of the new Parnasse that he is inaugurating; for, we shall repeat along with him:

"Flutakim kanitom in fot; Vôg nata tugonom as vin; Eko zulul dolik ko vot Bledas—zusüdom yelafin!

Viens voboms ya lunu doms; Del palunom as litapol; Ya rabs paboms e pâbs tevoms. Lulul nulik, kiop fügol?"

Oh, most definitely: . ! ! "Rabs poboms e pâbs tevoms!"

Francis Vielé-Griffin.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ from Entretiens, politiques & littéraires. Year 1, No. 1, April 1, 1890. Librairie de ;’Art Indépendant: Paris. pp. 15-21. NOTES [1] V-G seems to be employing an adjective as a noun here – a move which indicates his Symbolist sympathies vis-à-vis the Parnassians. [2] Probably a subtle dig at Zola, who had historically been Symbolism’s most public opponent - suggesting that his voluminous writing contained only banal ideas.. [3] verbe, here and elsewhere with capitalized “Word”. In symbolist poetic discourse, verbe tends to signify a metaphysical sense of the linguistic realm, and of its generative qualities as encapsulated in the beginning of Genesis: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was god. [4] grand siècle. [5] bastille. The french can mean either “fortress” or “prison”, a pun on which Vielé-Griffin is strongly playing here; my rendering attempts to keep this ambiguity via an archaism of which he would hopefully approve, though the association with The Bastille is inevitably lost. [6] Another outspoken opponent of Symbolism, though from a very different perspective than Zola. [7] value."

--Olchar Lindsann on Fb

"...when De Quincey was sheltering from a thunderstorm in the Royal Exchange Hotel, a waiter tapped him on the arm and politely handed over a bundle that had been left there for storage several months before."

"The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children's games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end. Which is a nuisance for the few people who grow up." --G K Chesterton

Bluejay Flying Through Snowfall.

[noiseartists]

UMBRELLA BURNING FESTIVAL: Italogaze from Rome

I was introduced to Umbrella Film Festival by Sara, their bass player. A pretty good one too!

We first connected around Japanese Shoegaze. I was looking for a Japanese translator to help collaboration with Japanese bands that had little English. After a few short and unfruitful contacts with various people, Sara kindly offered to help.

That was a year ago. We have since worked together on Shojoskip, Plant Cell, and have a few more things in store. We get along well and love Shoegaze. With Nicolas Piere Wardell, we are a team, contributors I love working with.

I did not know she also was a bass player in a band. One day, shyly, I was told so and was very impressed by what I heard. You should be too.

One thing is certain, her bass playing is very similar to mine, a mix of support and melodic lines, trying to find solutions, patterns and varying them. She plays better than I ever did, but the intention is still the same.

And the rest is at the same level, with various influences from great indie bands, mixed with their own approach. 

I invite you to discover Umbrella Film Festival, one of Italogaze best, through this collaboration where they present their music and themselves.

 THE BAND

Some history

"Our band’s birth dates back to 2012. However, our lineup has changed a lot so far.

Sara met Luca Barboni, our former guitarist who left the band shortly after Poems in Braille recording and started to play with the aim of forming a garage band (!). As former drummer Francesco Gangeri joined the band the shoegaze idea came in. Gradually we realized how bad we needed a voice and Edoardo joined too. In 2013 Francesco left the band and was substituted by Marco. Since then, we have been writing and playing a bunch of songs and finally put 5 of them in our first EP.

Our only regret is that we could not tour as much as we would have liked, for Luca left UBF. We have been doing literally anything so far to cope with this lack of shoegaze guitarists here in Rome (as a matter of fact we have been trying out like 20 guitarists so far!), at the moment we’re still trying so hard to find another guy to make guitar sound loud, fuzzy and not so guitar-ishly.

We have never given in to this loss, recently Edoardo has decided to put his hands on a guitar and start singing and playing until our man appears. We are still confident he will!"  

Band composition

The line up is:

Edoardo Lelli – vocals, guitar

Sara Massiah – bass

Marco Scarcelli – drums

"As said above, our songwriting process is deeply rooted in the rigging. Most of our songs, including Poems in Braille tracks, were created starting from an improvisation we had recorded (yes, we have a bad habit of recording basically any rehearsal we do).

We would listen to the recorded material later at home, isolate some interesting sections and study our single parts. Then the effective process is kick-started: it could take weeks, months or just a couple of rehearsals until each part is composed, lyrics are written and everything is fine-tuned and arranged as a whole.

However, this is not the only way we compose. Sometimes one of us steps into our cozy studio with some kind of draft, a good riff or vocal line in mind, so everyone starts playing along and if we still like it when we listen back home the song is launched.

Either way, it’s a meticulous process, each of us is quite hard to please and we definitely cannot stop until everyone is satisfied."

 Personal anecdotes…

"If you google UBF you can read of somebody who claims that our name has something to do with the murder of a prostitute, but please don’t trust him. We can say "it’s wrong!"

 Music that is important to them

"We have quite different music tastes. Obviously, we share the love for the 90s Shoegaze scene (Slowdive, MBV, Ride, Swervedriver, Pale Saints, Drop Nineteens etc.) and broadly for the 90s sound we grew up with (Smashing Pumpkins, The Verve, Nirvana, Placebo, Deftones, Foo fighters and so on).

However, Edoardo is more into the 80s alternative scene (The Cure, Joy Division, Bauhaus, Dead Can Dance, Cocteau Twins, Depeche Mode, The Smiths), experimental music (Brian Eno, William Basinksi, Harold Budd), Berlin years Bowie and songwriters (among which Nick Cave and David Sylvian), while Marco doesn’t mind Britpop bands as well as heavy stuff like Tool, SunnO))) and Einstürzende Neubauten.

As for Sara, recent dream-pop artists (The Bilinda butchers, Wild Nothing, Beach House, Radio Dept.) and various groovy-yet-not-that-pop bands are essential (i.e. The Smiths, Interpol, Warpaint, A Perfect Circle, Phoenix, The xx, Japandroids, just to name a few)."

 Why the name of the band?

"Marco: I guess Sara knows better where does the UBF name historically come from. I personally like to consider it a joyful refusal of protection from any kind of weather condition. If it's rainy, then let's get totally soaked. And when the sun hits... she'll be waiting.

Sara: If you really ask me, it came up randomly while I was making research for my Bachelor’s degree thesis. I’ve been studying as a Japanese linguist, so one day I came into this photography book and while flipping through I read about some kind of traditional local festival they hold in Kanagawa prefecture, which is called Soga no Kasayaki Matsuri (namely, the Soga’s Umbrella Burning Festival).

They commemorate a historical event, the attempted murder of a feudal landlord by two young warriors belonging to the powerful Soga family whose father had been deposed. It was a matter of honor, so the two brothers were busted and taken to death but at the same time, their act was seen as a supreme gesture of filial piety. That night, on their way to the landlord’s shelter in the woods, they had burnt their paper umbrellas as to light up their way, therefore it seems that every year since then the local community celebrates by making a huge pile of colorful paper umbrellas which they burn at nightfall in the fourth Saturday of July.

Actually, this medieval revenge story has quite nothing to do with shoegaze music, but I found the photo of those burning umbrellas pretty evocative and fascinating. I showed it to my band fellows and we agreed upon this curious name.  "

 WHAT is your music about?

"Marco: I guess the sound part, detached from lyrics, is about contexts, and space/time. I really like when guitars don't actually sound like guitars. We rig up a lot when we meet and play, so we are just stuck and focused on what's going on in that particular moment, and we crave to do what seems to be magic instead of just what has to be done. We are looking for a giant, howling, and yet invisible ghost. We know it knows that we are there, the only way to catch it is to record its voice.

Sara: Well, about that ghost… I guess some of us just call it creativity. Rather than specific messages or stories, our aim is to suggest some kind of emotional landscape. While playing, we are constantly trying to reach a particular climax, which doesn’t necessarily mean the wall of sound (well, it does mean that more than often though). It’s some kind of emotional peak, the release of something we probably could not express any other way.

We like to think that our audience, especially those longtime Shoegaze fans, are able to grasp it and relate, but personally, I consider this aspect a nice side effect better than a specific aim of the songwriting process. Our music is a pure expression, secondarily the more can relate to the product, the better.

Edoardo: Sara has already said it perfectly: our aim is to set up emotional landscapes. Apart from that, a peculiar aspect of our work is that there's often something hidden or intentionally left unclear so that the listener can give its own meaning to the music or to the lyrics. I guess this is some kind of natural approach to us, as we tend to use ourselves as the test subjects to the evocative power of our songs.

Talking about lyrics writing process, what I'm always looking for is to go beyond the limits and create some reaction in a hypothetical listener. More than telling stories, images depicting. The verses I prefer are the ones where sensitivity and fury collide giving birth to something different, could it be bittersweet or fascinatingly disgusting. I think As Everything Falls Apart is a good example of this approach."

 THE MUSIC

Why we like them

The influences: Pale Saint, Ride, My Bloody Valentine! All drips into UBF' music.

The basslines: The line on Losing myself again is a killer, and the rest is as good

The voice: It is rare in Shoegaze and Dream Pop to hear powerful yet melodic voices. Edoardo pulls this out beautifully.

 Poems in Braille, EP, May 2016

1. Intro  02:14

"We were looking for a short track to work as an introduction to both the mood and the sonic landscape of the EP. We just wanted it to tell the listener something like “This is where we’re going to be for the next 20 minutes. So get ready and let yourself go.” We’re very satisfied with the result, as we think we’ve reached that aim pretty well."

This intro brings a vast palette of sounds. Some part reminds me of Ride's Grasshopper, some of some Japanese bands. A great introduction for the listener.

2. Track 5  02:52

"Track 5 is Umbrella Burning Festival’s take on the classic Shoegaze song: it’s straightforward, melodic, blurry and psychedelic. It’s a bad trip, both musically and lyrically."

This song reminds me of the first Pale Saints album, Comfort of Madness. Edoardo vocals are on par with Ian Masters. The title, track 5, for the second song is quite nice as it misleads the listener.

3. Stargazer  05:24

"When thinking of Stargazer an image always comes to mind: floating in space. Sonically speaking, this song places somewhere in between the space rock of The Verve's first album and the dream pop of Cocteau Twins."

The start of the song is also in the sonic universe of the same Pale Saints album. It is a calm song. It invites you to contemplate de sky full of stars, building tension slowly, without exploding. Subtle.

I love the title. In the 90's, I played often with a band called The SIgh. One of the best I heard. They had a song called Skygazer.

4. Losing Myself Again  05:12

"Losing Myself Again is a bipolar song. In the first part, with its in-your-face attitude, it's still lucid; in the second part, where it's pure chaos, it goes completely crazy."

This song has one of the best basslines I know: round, powerful. It is like getting into a warm whirlpool of sound.

This song has psychedelic sire to it, in the way it pulls the listener into it, both physically and mentally, and keeps you there, happy in the sonic chaos you are surrounded by.

Edoardo's voice adds a great intensity to a song already intense in all the right ways. I love this song.

5. As Everything Falls Apart  07:30

"This is the most intense track in Poems in Braille. Its slow, sinuous pace is meant to be trance inductive as if it was conceived as the soundtrack of a collapse."

In 2017, my favorite album was Camille Claudel 's eponymous album. This song could belong in this album in so many ways: the sound, Edoardo's voice and voice melody that so much like Frederico's, the intensity and trance-inducing. To understand, just listen to the following song. It is difficult not to find similarities. Did I say they were my favorite album of 2017? Maybe a hint as to why I love UBF too.

 THE ENVIRONMENT

Tell us about the artists you have worked with

"We have had the pleasure to mix and master our EP at WAX Recording Studio in Rome, which is run by Alessio Pindinelli who happens to be the talented guitarist of La Casa al Mare. I guess many of you Shoegazers around the world know his band and we are really thankful to them."

 The band's presence on the web

Social media:

Facebook

YouTube

Listening / buying their music:

Bandcamp

Soundcloud

 Other bands

"Marco: I saw Human Colonies live set last year, and it was really good. Out of the ItaloGaze scene, I MUST recommend you all Musica Per Bambini, BRUUNO, and Lantern.

Sara: I absolutely agree upon Human Colonies. Then if you’re into alternative genres and don’t mind some Italian vocals I would say Verdena is a good band to discover. I grew up as a teenager and a musician with their music. Their second album (Solo un grande sasso, 2001) has some Shoegaze influences too. And if you’re looking for something closer to the shoegaze classics, with lyrics in English and sharp riffs, my suggestion is In Her Eye. Even though I’ve discovered them not long ago I love their works (especially Borderline, 2015). I’m looking forward to their upcoming release (Change, off on June 1st) since I’ve listened to the launching single Closer to me.

Edoardo: Speaking of Italian music, I would suggest Verdena (especially Solo un grande sasso), our friends La Casa al Mare (This Astro is such a great album – listen to M and tell me I'm wrong!) and Port-Royal from Genova (I've listened to their 2009 album Dying in Time at least a thousand times!)."

 Thanks to

Our friends and families. Mervyn Peake. Modulated reverb. 2290.

[gigsoupmusic]

The Flowers of Hell, Japanese Television, Sterling Roswell (28 Feb 2020)

Being the infidel atheists that we are, we normally only ever set foot in a church when someone gets married or dies, and lately it's been much more of the latter. So, it is largely thanks to musical events that we get our occasional ecclesiastical hit that doesn't involve being surrounded by family, whether dead or alive. Bit-Phalanx put on an amazing electronic festival last year in a church in Covent Garden, which you can read all about here. We were not expecting another chance to enjoy music inside a London church so soon. But, enjoy we did. Last Friday night we were congregated in the small but perfectly-formed St Pancras Old Church just north of the famous station named after it, looking forward to a triple bill of the Spacemen 3's ex-drummer Sterling 'Rosco' Roswell, current BBC6 darlings Japanese Television, and 'Lou Reed approved trans-Atlantic symphonic psych group' The Flowers of Hell.

Rosco's main percussionist had had to cancel last minute – let's just say it's a 'sign of the times' and leave it there – so Max Peak stood in on bongos, and started tapping away at them as Rosco kicked into his beautiful opening song, "Like Wild Horses".

"Heartbeat" was followed by his slightly off-the-wall "Nobody Loves the Hulk", and then into one the more recent tracks that we fell in love with when we first heard it a few years ago, "Atom Brain Monster", the lyrics of which Sterling has recently updated to refer to Boris Johnson instead of Tony Blair. We recorded the performance and would like to share it with you here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQSBpeXNUAo However, things sadly were not going well for our Rosco tonight as his string broke right in the middle of his next track, "Venus Honey Dew". It would have taken him at least twenty minutes to source and fix a new string and, whilst most of us there would have gladly waited to hear his classic "Give Peace Another Chance", which he was scheduled to sing next, it would not have been fair on the following act.

As we therefore do not have much more to add about Rosco's gig, we'd love you to read an article we wrote for GIGsoup about 'Being Sterling Roswell', following an interview with him in his studio last October. Next up were a very tight band from London called Japanese Television. We've been seeing their name a lot in the gig listings over the past year but this was our first chance to see them live. They are so different to everything else out there at the moment, so it is no wonder that they caught the eye of Marc Riley on BBC6. The tracks they recorded last July at the Marc Riley session have made it onto their new double-EP reissue, now available in all good record shops and which we were able to buy that night, the night before its official release!

But what makes Japanese Television so special? Well, for a start, there's no singer. And we like that, because it's different. Not having vocals means that the audience can really concentrate on the music, which is very surfy and very psychedelic. Not as surfy as, say, the Beach Boys, or as psych as say The Roaring 420s, but somewhere in-between, and without a singer. I think the best thing we can do here is to share here a bit of video we filmed. Here are two of their songs on one video – "Crocodile Dentist" (which, incidentally, was originally recorded for their EP in one take on an 8-track) and "Tick Tock". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsGNCu4IR6I Before this they played most of their back catalogue, kicking off with "Lizard Moon", and then their brand new track "Moon Glider", which is so new it's not even on the new release! We loved how psychedelic "Mood Glider" was, and how it slowed down towards the end.

"Surfing Saucers" came next, which has a really good organ sound to it which just sounded perfect given the church setting. Which brings me onto the instruments. Tim Jones plays his pale-blue surf guitar in a very unique way, hoisted right up underneath his beard, which must not be comfortable! He plays in a slightly different tempo, it seems, to the rest of the band, which is a truly marvellous effect. Ian Thorn is on keyboards, but also uses a taishōgoto, which is a form of Japanese harp which first came out in 1912, and looks almost like something you would type on (in fact, these instruments are also collectively known as 'typewriter zithers'). The sound is, as you would expect, very Japanese. Just something else that marks out this band as being pretty unique.

Alex Lawton on bass and Al Brown on drums make up the remainder of the foursome. They were buried by the dark shadows at the back of the stage, but kept time immaculately. We chatted both to Alex and to Ian after the gig, such lovely chaps. We recommended they give Young Georgian Lolitaz a listen, and if they ever play a gig in the former USSR republic of Georgia they should get together, as we think they would merge and make some really nice spacey music! After a short break, it was time for the main event. But first, a bit of background knowledge about The Flowers of Hell. They were formed in 2005 and were mentored by Sterling Roswell's erstwhile bandmate from Spacemen 3, Pete 'Sonic Boom' Kember.

Their second album was Come Hell or High Water, and the album cover features in the Aubrey Beardsley exhibition which opens tomorrow 4th March at Tate Britain. This is going to be the largest exhibition of the late-Victorian artist's drawings for over 50 years, and The Flowers of Hell's album will feature among the exhibits, as an example of how influential Beardsley was, whose life was so sadly cut short by tuberculosis at the tender age of twenty-five. Other artists' albums featured at the exhibition include The Beatles, Procol Harum and Humble Pie, so The Flowers of Hell are in very good company indeed.

Toronto-born band-leader Greg Jarvis suffers from, or in his case is blessed by, a unique neurological condition called timbre-to-shape synæsthesia, which basically means that he sees all sounds as layers of three-dimensional shapes. He went on to found the Canadian Synesthesia Association in 2013. Whereas many albums from artists on the psych scene are influenced by visions from LSD and other psychedelics, Come Hell or High Water is actually based and arranged on Jarvis's synæsthesthetic visions, which is what makes his sound so very unique. There were thirty musicians performing on that album, recorded over a mammoth forty sessions in four different countries. Knowing how much Jarvis likes to surround himself with a crowd, we were not altogether surprised that we counted eight musicians on Friday's small stage – nine, if you include the contribution of Anna-Nicole Ziesche (on the left in the photo below), Hamburg-born visual artist and former alumnus of Central Saint Martins, who got up on stage to read out a German poem from 1955 that her mother had taught her, over a trumpet solo.

Jarvis was everywhere on stage. Sometimes playing keyboards, sometimes harmonica and, towards the end, at the front of stage on his trusted guitar. One of the three trumpeters who featured on the original Come Hell or High Water album was our taishōgoto-player from Japanese Television, and therefore was also on stage for The Flowers of Hell, as was a sax player, a violinist, a female singer who had a hauntingly angelic voice, and various other performers, most of whom were lost in the darkness at the back of the stage.

Back in the 90s, before The Flowers of Hell, Jarvis was living, among other places, in Prague, playing in various underground rock bands. They played their version of "Muchomůrky bílé", a protest song by Milan Hlasva, who was the original bassist and songwriter for PPU (Plastic People of the Universe), who were forbidden from performing this (or indeed any other song!) by the then Communist government, which was one of the many catalysts that spurred PPU fan Václav Havel in 1976 to create Charter 77 which took on the government and eventually lead to the Velvet Revolution in 1989. The rest, as they say, is history. To be honest, it's not our favourite song of The Flowers of Hell, and certainly the least psych, but we filmed it because it means so much to Greg Jarvis. Here is our footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6CznGOsrR0 Far more atmospheric was the next song, "Pipe Dreams", which was truly quite beautiful, it made the hairs on our arms stand on end. The violin intro, the pipes, the singing, the slow introduction of the percussion, it all works so well together. We'll let you make up your own minds: https://youtu.be/bZF_5WmXxuo "The Joy of Sleeping" came next, which was a fantastic duel between the female singer's haunting voice, and Thorn's trumpet sounds, with violins and keyboards and guitar and percussion adding to the quite breathtaking sound. Here's the footage. Enjoy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsTvjcrWrME After a couple of other tracks, Jarvis took to the front of the stage, turned around, and literally conducted the band to play his very experimental piece which is largely made up of rehearsed improvisations. Originally, this piece lasts over 46 minutes long (it is a classic example of 'absolute' music, in other words, music that is not about anything in particular, and is a term first invented by Richard Wagner to describe this abstract, non-representational form). Jarvis's synæsthesia is largely helping him direct the band to perform the sound that he is seeing, in a really interesting symbiosis. We did not get the full 46-minute treatment (or else there's no way we'd have made the tube home), but we certainly got a good crack at it.

The song finally ended on a real crescendo, with Jarvis whirling his arms around like crazy. Imagine Pete Townshend meets Simon Rattle and you're halfway there.

Lou Reed was a big fan of The Flowers of Hell, so it is no surprise that the band always like to fit in at least one Velvet Underground or Lou Reed classic into their set. Their cover of "Heroin" had a great build-up with the drums and the violin, with Jarvis on vocals and playing guitar. As with "O", it had a really exciting and cacophonous dénouement. There was something nicely cyclical about the way the evening ended. Sterling Roswell, whose set had earlier been so cruelly curtailed by a broken guitar string, was encouraged onto the stage for the closing encore. He sat on drums and joined The Flowers of Hell on Spacemen 3's iconic hit from 1988, "Take Me to the Other Side". This was a real treat for us, and was the perfect end to the evening. We filmed it and we're delighted to be able to share it with you here, though unfortunately the drums were right at the back of the stage so you can't see Rosco, but you can certainly hear his trademark drumming style. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIbn0J9J-Os And that was the end of another epic night of great entertainment. Armed with a copy of Japanese Television's EPs, and with a bounce in our step, we bade our fairwell to the lovely church and the lovely musicians who had entertained us for the prior three and a half hours. We are also looking forward to The Flowers of Hell's new greatest hits compilation album called 15 Years of Soft Labour, which is coming out this summer. It is going to include a 10-minute extended version of "White Out", featuring the sadly recently deceased Ivan Král, who was Jarvis's mentor and 'rock'n'roll uncle' for the past two decades. We at GIGsoup would like to also pay our respects to Král, who played with and wrote music for so many musical greats, from Iggy Pop to David Bowie and Patti Smith, among many many more, and who lost his fight to cancer last month. Čest jeho památce. Read the full article

[scopophilic1997]

scopOphilic_micromessaging_1059 - scopOphilic1997 presents a new micro-messaging series: small, subtle, and often unintentional messages we send and receive verbally and non-verbally.

[pattismithpoet]

Excerpt From M Train

In 1965 I had come to New York City from South Jersey just to roam around, and nothing seemed more romantic than to write poetry in a Greenwich Village café. I finally got the courage to enter Caffè Dante on MacDougal Street. The walls were covered with printed murals of the city of Florence and scenes from The Divine Comedy.

A few years later I would sit by a low window that looked out into a small alley, reading Mrabet’s The Beach Café. A young fish-seller named Driss meets a reclusive, uncongenial codger who has a café with only one table and one chair on a rocky stretch of shore near Tangier. The slow-moving atmosphere surrounding the café captivated me. Like Driss, I dreamed of opening a place of my own: the Café Nerval, a small haven where poets and travelers might find the simplicity of asylum.

I imagined threadbare Persian rugs on wide-planked floors, two long wood tables with benches, a few smaller tables, and an oven for baking bread. No music no menus. Just silence black coffee olive oil fresh mint brown bread. Photographs adorning the walls: a melancholic portrait of the café’s namesake, and a smaller image of the forlorn poet Paul Verlaine in his overcoat, slumped before a glass of absinthe.

In 1978 I came into a little money and was able to pay a security deposit toward the lease of a one-story building on East Tenth Street. It had once been a beauty parlor but stood empty save for three white ceiling fans and a few folding chairs. My brother, Todd, and I whitewashed the walls and waxed the wood floors. Two wide skylights flooded the space with light. I spent several days sitting beneath them at a card table, drinking deli coffee and plotting my next move.

In the end I was obliged to abandon my café. Two years before, I had met the musician Fred Sonic Smith in Detroit. It was an unexpected encounter that slowly altered the course of my life. My yearning for him permeated everything—my poems, my songs, my heart. We endured a parallel existence, shuttling back and forth between New York and Detroit, brief rendezvous that always ended in wrenching separations. Just as I was mapping out where to install a sink and a coffee machine, Fred implored me to come and live with him in Detroit. I said goodbye to New York City and the aspirations it contained. I packed what was most precious and left all else behind. I didn’t mind. The solitary hours I’d spent drinking coffee at the card table, awash in the radiance of my café dream, were enough for me.

Some months before our first wedding anniversary Fred told me that if I promised to give him a child he would first take me anywhere in the world. I chose Saint-Laurent du Maroni, a border town in northwest French Guiana. I had long wished to see the remains of the French penal colony where hard-core criminals were once shipped before being transferred to Devil’s Island. In The Thief’s Journal Jean Genet had written of Saint-Laurent as hallowed ground and of its inmates with devotional empathy. He had ascended the ladder toward them: reform school, petty thief, and three-time loser; but as he was sentenced, the prison he’d held in such reverence was closed, the last living inmates returned to France. Genet served his time in Fresnes Prison. Devastated, he wrote: I am shorn of my infamy.

At 70, Genet was reportedly in poor health and most likely would never go to Saint-Laurent himself. I envisioned bringing him its earth and stone. Though often amused by my quixotic notions, Fred did not make light of this self-imposed task. He agreed without argument. I wrote a letter to William Burroughs, whom I had known since my early 20s. William, close to Genet and possessing his own romantic sensibility, promised to assist me in delivering the stones.

Preparing for our trip, Fred and I spent our days in the Detroit Public Library studying the history of Suriname and French Guiana. Fred bought maps, khaki clothing, traveler’s checks, and a compass; cut his long, lank hair; and bought a French dictionary. When he embraced an idea he looked at things from every angle. He did not read Genet, however. He left that up to me.

We flew on a Sunday to Miami and stayed for two nights in a roadside motel. We ate red beans and yellow rice in Little Havana and visited Crocodile World. The short stay readied us for the extreme heat we were about to face. In Grenada and Haiti, all passengers had to deplane while the hold was searched for smuggled goods. We finally landed in Suriname at dawn; a handful of young soldiers armed with automatic weapons waited as we were herded into a bus that transported us to a vetted hotel. The first anniversary of the 1980 military coup that overthrew the democratic government was looming: an anniversary just days before our own.

After a few days bending in the heat of the capital city of Paramaribo, a guide drove us 150 kilometers to the town of Albina on the west bank of the Maroni River bordering French Guiana. The pink sky was veined in lightning. Our guide found a young boy who agreed to take us across by pirogue, a long dugout canoe. We pushed off in a light rain that swiftly escalated into a torrential downpour. The boy handed me an umbrella and warned us not to trail our fingers in the water. I suddenly noticed the river teeming with tiny black fish. Piranha! He laughed as I quickly withdrew my hand.

In an hour or so the boy dropped us off at the foot of a muddy embankment. He dragged his pirogue onto land and joined some workers beneath a length of black oilcloth stretched over four wooden posts. They seemed amused by our momentary confusion and pointed us in the direction of the main road. As we struggled up a slippery knoll, the calypso beat of Mighty Swallow’s “Soca Dance” wafted from a boom box. We tramped through the empty town, finally taking cover in a bar. Two men were drinking Calvados. Fred engaged in a broken French-English conversation with a leathery-skinned fellow who presided over the nearby turtle reserves. As the rains subsided, the owner of the local hotel appeared, offering his services. Then a younger, sulkier version emerged to take our bags, and we followed them along a muddied trail down a hill to our lodgings. We had not even booked a hotel and yet a room awaited us.

The Hôtel Galibi was spartan yet comfortable. A small bottle of watered-down cognac and two plastic cups were set on the dresser. Spent, we slept, even as the returning rain beat relentlessly upon the corrugated tin roof. The morning sun was strong. I left our clothes to dry on the patio and spread the contents of our pockets on a small table: damp receipts, dismembered fruits, Fred’s ever-present guitar picks.

Around noon a cement worker drove us outside the ruins of the Saint-Laurent prison. There were a few stray chickens scratching in the dirt and an overturned bicycle, but no one seemed to be around. Our driver entered with us through a low stone archway and then just slipped away. The compound had the air of a tragically defunct boomtown. Fred and I moved about in alchemical silence, mindful not to disturb the reigning spirits.

In search of the right stones, I entered the solitary cells, examining the faded graffiti tattooing the walls. Hairy balls, cocks with wings, the prime organ of Genet’s angels. Not here, I thought. I looked around for Fred. He had found a small graveyard. I saw him paused before a headstone that read, "Son your mother is praying for you." He stood there for a long time looking up at the sky. I left him alone and inspected the outbuildings, finally choosing the earthen floor of the mass cell to gather the stones. It was a dank place the size of a small airplane hangar. Heavy, rusted chains were anchored into the walls illuminated by slim shafts of light. Yet there was still some scent of life: manure, earth, and an array of scuttling beetles.

As we approached Kourou we sensed a shift. We were entering a military zone

I dug a few inches seeking stones that might have been pressed by the hard-calloused feet of the inmates or the soles of heavy boots worn by the guards. I carefully chose three and put them in an oversize Gitanes matchbox, leaving the bits of earth clinging to them. Fred offered his handkerchief to wipe the dirt from my hands and then made a little sack for the matchbox. He placed it in my hands, the first step toward placing them in the hands of Genet.

We didn’t stay long in Saint-Laurent. We went seaside but the turtle reserves were off-limits, as they were spawning. Fred spent a lot of time in the bar, talking to the fellows. The men seemed to respect him, regarding him without irony. He had that effect on other men. I was content just sitting on a crate outside the bar staring down an empty street I had never seen and might never see again.

For the most part I kept to myself. Occasionally I caught glimpses of the maid, a barefoot girl with long, dark hair. She smiled and gestured but spoke no English. She tidied our room and washed our clothes. In gratitude I gave her one of my bracelets, a gold chain with a four-leaf clover, which I saw dangling from her wrist as we departed.

There was no rail service in French Guiana. The fellow from the bar had found us a driver, who carried himself like an extra in The Harder They Come with a cocked cap, aviator sunglasses, and a leopard-print shirt. We arranged a price and he agreed to drive us the 268 kilometers to Cayenne. He insisted our bags stay with him in the front seat of his beat-up tan Peugeot as chickens were normally transported in the trunk. We drove along Route Nationale, listening to reggae on a station riddled with static.

Every once in a while I untied the handkerchief to look at the Gitanes matchbox with its silhouette of a Gypsy posturing with her tambourine in a swirl of indigo-tinged smoke. But I did not open it. I pictured a small yet triumphal moment passing the stones to Genet. Fred held my hand as we wound through dense forests and passed short, sturdy Amerindians balancing iguanas squarely on their heads. We traveled through a tiny commune that had just a few houses and one six-foot crucifix. We asked the driver to stop. He got out and examined his tires. Fred took a photograph of the sign that read "Tonate. Population 9," and I said a little prayer.

The primary mission accomplished, we had no ultimate destination; we were free. But as we approached Kourou we sensed a shift. We were entering a military zone and hit a checkpoint. The driver’s identity card was inspected and after an interminable stretch of silence we were ordered to get out of the car. Two officers searched the front and back seats, finding a switchblade with a broken spring in the glove box. That can’t be so bad, I thought, but as they knocked on the trunk our driver became markedly agitated. Dead chickens? Maybe drugs. They circled around the car, and then asked him for the keys. He threw them in a shallow ravine and bolted but was swiftly wrestled to the ground. I glanced sidelong at Fred. He betrayed no emotion and I followed his lead.

They opened the trunk. Inside was a man who looked to be in his early 30s curled up like a slug in a rusting conch shell. He seemed terrified as they poked him with a rifle and ordered him to get out. We were all herded to the police headquarters, put in separate rooms, and interrogated in French. The commander arrived, and we were brought before him. He was barrel-chested with dark, sad eyes and a thick mustache that dominated his careworn face. Fred quickly took stock of things. I slipped into the role of compliant female, for in this obscure annex of the Foreign Legion it was definitely a man’s world. I watched silently as the human contraband, stripped and shackled, was led away. Fred was ordered into the commander’s office. He turned and looked at me. stay calm was the message telegraphed from his pale blue eyes.

An officer brought in our bags, and another wearing white gloves went through everything. I sat holding the handkerchief, relieved I was not asked to surrender it. An interrogator brought me a black coffee on an oval tray with an inlay of a blue butterfly and entered the commander’s office. I could see Fred’s profile. After a time they all came out. They seemed in amiable spirits. The commander gave Fred a manly embrace and we were placed in a private car. Neither of us said a word as we pulled into the capital city of Cayenne. Fred had the address of a hotel given to him by the commander. We were dropped off at the foot of a hill. It’s somewhere up there, the driver motioned, and we carried our bags up the stone steps.

—What did you two talk about? I asked.

—I really can’t say for sure, he only spoke French.

—How did you communicate?

—Cognac.

Fred seemed deep in thought.

—I know that you are concerned about the fate of the driver, he said, but it’s out of our hands. He placed us in real jeopardy and in the end my concern was for you.

—Oh, I wasn’t afraid.

—Yes, he said, that’s why I was concerned.

The hotel was to our liking. We drank French brandy from a paper sack and slept wrapped in layers of mosquito netting. In the morning we explored Cayenne. It was Carnival time, and the city was all but deserted. Overcrowded ferries departed for Devil’s Island. Calypso music poured from a mammoth disco in the shape of an armadillo. There were a few small souvenir stands with identical fare: thin, red blankets made in China and metallic blue raincoats. But mostly there were lighters, all kinds of lighters, with images of parrots, spaceships, and men of the Foreign Legion. There was nothing much to keep one there, yet we stayed in Cayenne until our anniversary as if bewitched.

On our last Sunday, women in bright dresses and men in top hats were celebrating the end of Carnival. Following their makeshift parade on foot, we ended up at Rémire-Montjoly, a commune southeast of the city. The revelers dispersed. Fred and I stood mesmerized by the emptiness of the long, sweeping beaches. It was a perfect day for our anniversary and I couldn’t help thinking it was the perfect spot for a beach café. Fred went on before me, whistling to a black dog somewhat up ahead. There was no sign of his master. Fred threw a stick into the water and the dog fetched it. I knelt down in the sand and sketched out plans for an imaginary café with my finger.

From the book M Train by Patti Smith. © 2015 by Patti Smith

[amanharwara]

Thoughts On: Kailasa - Jhoomo Re

Jhoomo Re is the sophomore studio album by the popular Indian Fusion band Kailasa lead by Kailash Kher. It's a very solid pop-folk/fusion album and I've been listening to it quite a lot in the past few weeks. The album has 9 songs with a runtime of around 41 minutes. The album mostly revolves around the topics of love, inequality and God. Kailash Kher's raw, soulful voice adds quite a lot of character to most of the songs on the album. Most of the songs on the album were written by Kailash Kher himself, except for the fourth track "Chhaap Tilak" which is a ghazal written by the 14th-century Sufi mystic Amir Khusro. The album features one of Kailash Kher's most popular songs, Saiyyan. By the way, this review won't necessarily be a proper review, rather just my thoughts on it.

Bum Lahiri / Babam Bam

The first track off the album, called "Bum Lahiri" / "Babam Bam", is a very daring song written by Kailash Kher. While the song might seem to first-time listeners as a devotional song, that is not the sole purpose that the song intends to fulfil. The first three verses of the song are written from the perspective of Parvati's penance to achieve marriage with Lord Shiva, detailing her devotion and love for Shiva in each of the verses. Lord Shiva finally responds to Parvati in the third verse telling her that it is a bad idea for her to marry Shiva as the life he leads is not an easy one. Lord Shiva asks her what will she get in the jungles that Shiva resides in. He tells her that her penance (or "tapasya") might even lead to her death. He tells her how in the jungle the elephant trumpets and the lion roars. He tells her that his home is in the caves where he does the Tandav (or "the dance of fury") while wearing garlands made of rocks and ghosts. Shiv cautions her how this life is not suitable for her. He advises her to find a handsome, rich king and live in a palace, instead of living with him in the jungle. Kher's vocals are soulful and full of energy in this song that fit almost perfectly with the sounds of the tablas and damrus in the background. Song Rating: 8 / 10

Saiyyan

The second track is quite possibly the most popular song off the album. Saiyyan, as I understand, is about to lovers who are separated and yearning for each other to be re-united again. The song starts implying that the lovers need not any form of riches such as pearls and gemstones, but are rather content just by being with each other; they only wish for love. Lyrics of the song are quite touching and induce quite some emotions when listening to it. Some of my favourite lines from the song include "Baithoon naiyya preet ki, sansaar se thar jaaun mein", "Koi prem ki pujaaran mandir sajaaye", "Mere din khushi se jhumein, gaaye raatein". The song rightfully deserves all the praise that it gets, really. The background melody paired with the acoustic guitar and tabla sounds, compliment the pleasant and mellow, but very soulful and raw vocals sung by Kher. Similar to a lot of songs by Kailasa, the song can not only be interpreted as a song of love, but also as a song of devotion. Just like a person in love longs for their lover, a devotee constantly longs for God. For a devotee, their love for God is what makes their days lively with joy and their nights sing. Akin to the love of the lover, the devotee's service to God is an addiction. Of course, that is how you can interpret it if you wish to. For some people, the song is a melodious depiction of the craving of a lover's affection; and for others, it is a very soulful rendering of a hymn of devotion. Song Rating: 9 / 10

Joban Chhalke

The third song from the album is "Joban Chhalke", a song which is a celebration of youth. The song starts with some amazing horns (or maybe trumpets, I can't really figure it out) that continue to mix in further as the drums and tablas start playing. A melodious flute rhythm starts playing before the verse hits. The song has some very good lyrics as well. The chorus itself, "Oh Joban Chalke, Joban Chalke" means a figurative "spilling" of youth. "Bhaara maare aise jor, moonh ki khaavein sab chhor" refers vaguely to the idea of karma stating that when karma hits a person who has done bad deeds, it hits so hard that the person ends up falling face first onto the ground. "Bijli si kadke ghanghor, bhitar bhitar barle bor" talks about an impending sense of doom and torture in the form of heavy lightning and how the people sitting inside their houses are afraid of it. The song goes on to talk about the pureness of youth in further lines. Overall I think it's a pretty solid song. Song Rating: 7 / 10

Chhaap Tilak

The fourth song off the album, "Chhaap Tilak", is a song adaptation of the 14th-century ghazal of the same name written in the Braj language by the Sufi mystic Amir Khusro. The original poem named "Chhaap Tilak Sab Chheeni" has been sung in a Qawwali format by many notable Qawwals from India and Pakistan. While most of the song on the album is just a song version of the poem, there is a very harmonic introduction before the main verse. The song has a very good piano melody at the start accompanied by sounds of rain which transitions to another very nice flute melody before the chorus. The chorus contains melodies of tablas, drums, shakers and a piano. The lyrics of the song do have a romantic expression, but are indeed a devotional verse written by Amir Khusro in respect of his spiritual mentor Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya who was a Sufi saint. When interpreted in the romantical form, the lyrics are quite passionate and fanciful. The subject describes how their looks and identity were taken just by a glance from their lover, how they were intoxicated in love just by a glance. There is also very beautiful flute piece before the "Gori gori baiyyan" verse. Song Rating: 8 / 10

Tere Naina

The fifth song on the album might be the most mellow song on the track listing with melodious, soft, but powerful vocals on top of some basic music containing flutes, acoustic guitars, shakers and simple drums. However, don't let yourself think that just because these musical melodies might sound simple, that they cannot induce emotions in you. In fact, it's the opposite of that. These melodies have been composed in a manner that they aren't overdone, but still manage to make you immersed into the contents of the song. Also, the placement of the background vocals in the song is almost perfect - I have nothing but praise for that. The song is also the most lengthy song on the album, coming in at 6 and a half minutes of runtime. But that is not something that hinders the enjoyability of the song, as the song manages to immerse you for the whole runtime, and not bore you. The lyrics, while staying relatively simple compared to other Kailasa's other songs, do make you feel a connection to them. The lyrics will touch you even more if you yourself are in love; but even if you aren't, the lyrics will manage to move you. Song Rating: 8 / 10

Jhoomo Re

The next track, "Jhoomo Re" is a very powerful song in terms of the message. The song deals with caste-based and religious inequality. The song is introduced with some powerful lines from a poem by 17th-18th century poet Bulleh Shah. The introduction goes, "Chal Bulla chal othe chaliye, jitthe saare anhe; Naa koi saaddi jaat pehchane, naa koi saanu manne." In these lines, the poet Bulleh Shah – referring to himself as Bulla – tells himself to go to a place where the people are metaphorically blind; blind to a person's caste, religion and class. He wants to go to a place where nobody knows his caste and where nobody looks up to him with respect – exhibiting his need for equality. The first verse depicts a figurative scene of a person of lower caste fallen in a bazaar, covered in dirt, where the rich and pretentious kick him and the rational, astute people of the society help him. This has then been sarcastically and ironically referred to as the "brokerage" of the person. The second verse talks about how God doesn't need a scale to keep the world in balance and measure the good and evil. "Tere rom rom mein Ram-Ram, tu patthar mein sar kyu maare" might be questioning idol worship, stating that there is presence of God within you, so you don't need to figuratively hit your head on a stone. The third verse might be the most controversial and daring one, stating that there is no problem in destroying and breaking down temples and mosques, but God requests you to not break another person's heart as the heart is the special home of God. Song Rating: 9 / 10

Daulat Shohrat

Daulat Shohrat is another song that revolves around the topic of how the feeling of love trumps the greed for money and other material objects. Kher's vocals compliment the lyrics and the mood of the song perfectly and seem very emotional. However, I don't feel the song is anything special. I feel like I've heard a lot of songs that sound very much like this. The song is good, don't get me wrong there, but, whenever I put this song on, it doesn't really sound that much interesting to me. I don't have much to say other than the fact this is a pretty average song by Kailasa standards, although good nonetheless. Song Rating: 6 / 10

Yaar Sajan

Yaar Sajan is a step-up from Daulat Shohrat, sonically. It is a fusion of reggaetón drums and weeping strings. The song goes into feelings of love, as usual. The first pre-verse/introduction describes how the lover is his faith and what he worships. There is no one else of that much importance to him. He describes how his heart has blossomed in happiness after seeing the lover. He does not want to separate from the lover even for a moment. He thinks he is increasing the status of his love by kissing the lover's feet as they walk. The lyrics continue the theme of devotion of the lover throughout the song. It's a pretty good that you might want to listen to when you have recently fallen in love with someone. Song Rating: 6.5 / 10

Tu Meri Jaan Hai

The final song of the album is a very touching and beautiful Sufi song. The vocals by Kher on this one are just really really tear-jerking and touching and will most definitely induce some kind of emotion in you. The tone of the song might sound sad, but it is just a very impressive and energetic declaration of love for a person. The lyrics aren't hard to understand, but I'll try and break it down as good as possible. The song is from the perspective of a girl and she is celebrating her love. She is praying to God for her love. She doesn't care whether people will call her a mad girl, but she will keep reciting that her lover is her life and her desire. She often forgets about the world because she is immersed in love. She will set fire to the world if her lover isn't with her as the world would be pointless. She wants to have heart-to-heart conversations with her lover. She prays a million times that nothing bad should happen to her love. Song Rating: 8 / 10

Overall Album Rating: 8 / 10

[mirrorlab]

https://www.facebook.com/events/2022620991333421/?active_tab=discussion

Taralie Peterson & Ka Baird of the legendary psych folk outfit "Spires that in the Sunset Rise" will be performing in various combos with local musicians. Three sets of sonic exploration will include: • Taralie Peterson & Elaine Evans • Ka Baird & Paul Metzger • Taralie Peterson, Ka Baird, Tim Glenn, Paul Metzger, John Saint Pelvyn ------ • Ka Baird: "Ka Baird is a multi-instrumentalist and vocalist living and working in NYC. She is one of the founding and continuing members of the long running avant psych project Spires That In The Sunset Rise. Described by Jack Rose as a “female Sun City Girls” STITSR have contributed a different slant to the New Folk movement by incorporating various avant-garde and world music influences into their music. Their sound has been compared to the Raincoats, Meredith Monk, Comus and Harry Partch. Their most recent album Beasts In The Garden was described by Marc Masters  as “some kind of long-lost Terry Riley/Angus MacLise collaboration, equally devoted to divine repetition and centre-seeking ritual.”  Since 2001, they have released eight full length records and several side releases. Since relocating to NYC in November 2014, Baird has set off in numerous directions apart from Spires with new collaborations as well as honing in on her own solo work. Her current work explores piano improvisation, electroacoustic interventions, extended vocal techniques, physical movement, and her unusual electronic manipulation of the flute. She released an album of piano improvisations through Brooklyn label Perfect Wave See Sun Think Shadow in November of 2015 and a tribute record A Love Supreme dedicated to John Coltrane through Chicago label No Index in January of 2016. Her latest album Sapropelic Pycnic was released on Drag City Records in September 2017. Reaching toward the ancient roots of music, Ka utilizes electronic manipulation (primarily using the flute as the sound source) to take the ear past preconception, combining the linearity of the physical with the abstraction of the cerebral, crafting textural rhythmic noise with lush operatic passages." ------ • Taralie Peterson (Tar Pet): "Tar Pet is the solo project of Taralie Peterson from the legendary psych veterans Spires That In The Sunset Rise. Both projects recapture creative music by bringing it into a timeless, acoustically sourced domain. You may hear a dream-state soliloquy sung that was once told to her by her five year old son, while a cello veers unexpectedly, interweaving with unknown sounds. You are liquified by unusual folk instruments from around the world, strange tunings, and existential lyrics. There is a constant disintegration of oppositions in her ritualistic music – meandering yet simultaneously focused, beautiful and melodic but unnerving and discordant. Great for opening the mind to the cracks between worlds. Tar Pet is completely riveting, mysterious, and a very rare occasion to listen again, as if for the first time."      “existential meanderings, hollow acoustic mawps, and       flagrant haunting all settle in before its songs even       have legs. “Poem By Fineus”, a subtle acoustic track       that features waverings and experimental       ups-and-downs, is fruitful in its ability to feel       cleansing and pure…. a little psychedelic unrooting       is all the heart needs to shake through to clarity.”                  – Dayna Evans, IMPOSE http://qujunktions.com/artists/ka-baird https://www.kabaird.com/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uayJNLmKsIQ

[changingbirdpoems]

poems about stefan going forward in time

sonic youth

it was 2:45 in the morning sunday morning it was two songs nestled in my ear, beat & struck with the chord of time that I keep curled inside my seventeenth rib cage, this year’s molecules. it’s east out here, but i see in every direction

eternal sin sky eyes again

falling or rising to this, the sun is broken on a mist beam… kindred, what a word, just like people who are made out of clay or something else you would use in elementary school muse

-

         I’ll teach you to sleep

She said into concrete, baseball field lights singing at trees

It’s meditation, really Air for skin, feathers replacing hands to brush-                                                                  you could be from this same bird

Who sang up that we should love each side equally, with sleepless bedroom eyes Buddhism aside, this is gentle suffering

-

body blue as toes, shriveled with moisture but glowing bursting out with skylines and horizons on your shoulders shuddering through daybreak, clutching to nothing jump the fence undress

        using your eyes as lungs

breathe-blink, breathe-blink, breathe-blink skinned by the second

-

The Way We Get By

Another dappled late summer afternoon with papers in hand, golden sound waves beneath my fingertips, rising and falling with the leafy pressure of my palms- hoping you will taste like this air, nothing shining, whistles, cicadas, cigarette, honey bees braided through my clean hair, like the stillest, tallest branches of every tree in this circle of a day, tugging at my morning lily terraces like a gentle reminder of how I used to lean my arm out of the window and count each breath in french, un deux trois quatre cinq six sept huit neuf dix onze douze treize quatorze quinze seize dix-sept dix-huit dix-neuf

vingt Just waiting in the most being way possible, purple glow across parking lots, lettuce climbing out of garden beds, rustling light. End everything and begin again, remembering to stretch afterwards I can receive anything from here forward Tender sky, flailing grass, feather tucked behind one ear and pure lungs, melting ice, blue dictionaries, the way we get by firmly in hand, freckles and nothing and no one, but everything. Smooth skin fresh like soap, childhood whispering away and your eyes a song 5 minutes, 41 seconds long. Clouds beginning to realize to fly, airplanes made of twigs–

leave all your treasure behind, you need only oxygen in your lungs to float.

-

Your Debutante Just Knows What You Need, But I Know What You Want (a head full of pesticides)

and

             old       river way

silent amongst thunder, rustles in its creaking waves and breaks through every one

I can use my words my way. ambivalence no more

Red wine makes me suicidal/ Blood in glass/ My mind grows idle/

and I curl up beneath and I hold my breath and I hold yours in and I cup each hands, a Dickensian prayer

And I touch the Mona Lisa.   and like a fool I mixed them and I have no sense of time. Bun nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh Well I see

Honey Please Don’t

Soaring through the keys, I sit on blankets and know what he really loves you for. But she breaks just like tiny girls, enter Saxophones

From now on I will call you Cellar Door. So touch my hand and my shirt and swallow down every liquid cure you can find.

-

Another 11:11 on Another Sunday Morning (a description of a surreal, visually intoxicating dream I had last night)

“When do you have to leave?”

“Oh, you know, after,” those widening eyes, the knowing giggle of rainstained grass I lead you by the hand through my mountain home, the sun ricocheting through yellow green rooms and sheds, moss beneath bare feet, like therapy.

Your fish-blue eyes darting, feeling everything, content in your five senses, your biology, softly giving the laws of nature your small redeeming glance. You know already that we will be sleeping in a Spirit Ditch. Small talk with my father, and we explore into a basement reminiscent of trashy middle school fantasy. Subtle hands, featherless, at my waist, my neck, brushing and gone, some salvation across a Western-set sun, and a kiss beneath my ear.

Has-been fireworks strewn on sidetables, tumultuous furniture; we immediately acknowledge an abandoned silence in this space, with the soft impact of hand on hand.

Becoming a force beyond a presence, your arm turns my body in place. We in your motion turn and you may move us. Three words released, convictionless, significant, searching, bare, unexpected.. Not out of the blue; some warmer color: “I love you.” Your words like a rumbling resonating electric guitar solo soaring over highways, cathartic, a blanket or sheet of static and pounding, threading nothing and I think of songs as you press in, a rolling pin without a coat of flour, pulling me in your motion, moving me, Gentle Brother “Will you still mean that in the morning?” Because that is the mark. Some movie-scene answer of always meaning it, and I know exactly where you are. You have adapted to the mountains, with so many places left to go. You have forgotten your restlessness in my little shoulder touches, my kingdom.

We will never show sleeve but for when we show arm, because we are good men and Luciana is lost.

  I brought you to this house as a partner in crime, fellow renegade, to dip into lakes and leap down stone thousands of miles high. We sit in the bright, lampless basement of broken glass and blue mattresses, and then you are somewhere else, but this makes every sense. A girl walks in and suddenly she shows me television in the absence of your eyes of blue; I wait for the men who want to rule the world. She needs to record something, and I direct her towards the box of VHS. Her pixie hair and sullen face suggest she’s not alone; soon enough a party seeps in. I only wanted moss. You return looking for me, become spellbound by the lights and heroin, and watch with an arm melting into mine. We stand in real-time together as the party becomes color streaks around us Buzzes to us: Teach me, dear creature, how to think and speak; Lay open to my earthly-gross conceit Smother’d in errors, feeble, shallow, weak             The folded meanings of your words’ deceit. Against my soul’s pure truth why labour you

To make it wander in an unknown field?          Are you a god? would you create me new? Transform me then, and to your power I’ll yield. We are princes in the galaxy that spans from where they are to where we are now. And then we return to light. In a simple country room. “Will you still mean it in the morning?” But I crawl in. It is thyself, mine own self’s better part, mine eye’s clear eye. Gently, with the minutes, we are air, too real, everything I knew was beneath and above.

-

as though, if you touch gently enough, you’ll believe you don’t have fingers tendrils of nothing seeping out of sea silence evaporating

like haiku is breath (marble binocular eyes) like you are exhale my palms melt to milk I feel your quiet shaking me awake; last touch.

-

“im not concerned with Love and law. im not saying these words to impress you. i will die alone but that in itself is destiny. i need you to Know.”

Honey & Gravel I laughed and I don’t care I love sin

the fact that you are married-

sleep

I burn to touch everything with a heart of darkness

but some things make me pure (the one I really need) Linger on because what the fuck are we here for anyway

but to feel that emptiness, but to convince Somebody that we are nothing. Don’t forget astronomy, honey, please don’t. As if we are here.

I don’t care about any destiny What is is is is and destiny doesn’t care about me, daytripper, nighttripper, mindsoul nothingness

WHAT are mirrors made to do, and why does my mouth crave everything So who would I be if I didn’t want you inside

I mean that with incredible writhing warmth

is is is pure pure pure Children of cathartic silence, soar across me

feel me into earth I will never Know anything but mountains so give me nothing that is not green and touch touch touch touch no, shhhhhhhh Jimmy the strings of everything, and destiny on a wheel of Jesusblood

my entire network of matter is there already the way you should be held Nobody Has Eyes so I do not care except for the muscles throughout my frame who remind me to crawl in Crawl in like something that once learned to fly

FLY

everything I knew was beneath and above crawl inside me

fly inside me if you have a voice (I am the sun, I am the air)                                             You can break your molecules apart by sheer will.

-

Let Me Play It

When morning is like the sugary sensation of wing-bone ripping the delicate flesh of my shoulder bones, there is a readiness, a readiness to let me in, let me be here, and count the curvatures of my spine into the cigarette-strewn robin blue paneling beneath even water

My Sweet Lord, somewhere nowhere eyes, parting hands and lips, wounds, wing-membrane and tender ginger headaches sprinkling spices in my hair, sandalwood oil between my fingers, sex and absynthe and disfiguring, luminous heroin like levitation and you the patron saint of travellers, or the first Catholic martyr stoned to death, but who would not feel so alone if everybody must Palm to palm, you breathe nothing like I do, a separate anatomy and chemistry: I a bird You a feather, borne out on nothing, brahman nirvana heaven darkness making pure even sorrow, granulated and unadulterated, white opium of mutual understanding, two bird cages wired together, doors swinging wide open

-

hear me make a noise I have felt your ears and know they received sound once

choosing not to hear is just to break me, is just blue swirling forget

you felt everything in the pale whites of your eyes linger on, hear me

-

3D

There’s the part that loves, and the part that still loves

There’s the line folded, twisted, the möbius strip, the breath

Color flowing with shape, sound, taste interchangeable guitar strings, warming air, pain unacknowledged, and being pulled by my center to all the things I would like to be a part of.

There’s whom we love, and whom we still love

One the heart, one the hand

-

My lost muse   below the blanket of chemicals, I remember you The pure messiah, a field by the road, a man-made lake We jumped the fence and took off our clothes Songs of honeysuckle and time   desperate hopes in rhyme It broke me in two   my fickle prophet My salvation, the one

from days long gone

[finishinglinepress]

FLP POETRY BOOK OF THE DAY: Walking into Daylight by Basia Miller

TO ORDER GO TO: https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/walking-into-daylight-by-basia-miller/

RESERVE YOUR COPY TODAY

Basia Miller’s collection Walking into Daylight traces the arc of a woman emerging from the darkness of patriarchy and walking into the daylight shed by the goddess of compassion, Kwan Yin, by Saint Brigid and by the winged Medusa, as well as by various friends who have helped her walk the distance for water, the archetypal element of Medusa.

Miller came late to her love for writing poetry after teaching for twenty years at St. John’s College-Santa Fe. Prior to her career at the college, she had translated Montesquieu’s Spirit of the Laws (Cambridge University Press) with Anne Cohler and Harold Stone. Miller holds M.A. and Ph.D degrees from the University of Chicago. Her poetry is published here and abroad by The Santa Fe Literary Review, Trickster, Poésie-sur-Seine andPortulan bleu and has been anthologized in Malala: Poems for Malala Yousefzai (FutureCyle Press); Mo’ Joe (Beatlick Press); and Voyage—Grand Tournesol (Z4 Editions, Paris). Her translations of Francine Caron’s poems are published in collector’s editions from Transignum Press (Paris) and in Lummox, where her translations of Pierre Seghers’s poems also appear. In addition to her translations, she has published a chapbook, Carrying Words, and two books of poetry, The Next Village/Le prochain village and Backyard Tree/L’Arbre côté cour (Société des Intuitistes, Paris, 2017).

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR Walking into Daylight by Basia Miller

The original poems and translations in Basia Miller’s Walking into Daylightare exquisite meditations on the multiplicity of the world and one observant person’s response to it. Grounded in natural world experiences, they continually surprise with their poetic strategies and satori-like insight. Her poems puzzle over the counter-intuitive growth of honeysuckles and dwell in the “timeless space/of dew-dappled ferns.” She honors working persons–the sharp gardener, the “ministers of roofing,” her grandmother doing laundry with buckets of water and bars of lye soap. In unexpected ways, Miller’s poems meld down-to-earth-problems, such as perforated tires and “unhoused umbrellas,” to spiritual considerations. Her poems are big enough to contain a range from tragedy to bliss, and personal enough to invite the reader into them with their well-crafted language.

–Donald Levering, winner of the Robinson Jeffers Tor House Prize and the author of Any Song Will Do and Coltrane’s God.

Lyric and evocative, these poems track moments of perception in both inner and outer worlds. The poet may not own a literal compass, but is indeed good at locating us in our complex human situation. Nature and the wellspring of language—including translation—are companions on this path. Time spent with these poems has enlightened and refreshed me.

–Miriam Sagan

With Walking Into Daylight, Basia Miller grants us a window into one woman’s journey to connect with the particular beauty and the just-out-of-sight meaning of a life lived with vivid observation and heart. Her keen sensory pictures and honest confessions of their impacts open us to a dancing truth, inviting us to touch the multi-layered life we share and wish to understand in the reflection of each other. Curl up in a comfortable chair with a cup of tea and enjoy this traverse of the meeting of the ordinary and the profound.

–Julie Tato, mindfulness meditation leader, Lama Foundation

Set in American and foreign locales and voices, in response to works of art, in translated poems and her own sensuous and sonic lines, Basia Miller gathers the daily alongside memory and history. In poems that are playful and poems that are somber with loss, Miller does “the first necessary thing, . . . to bring one woman back to life.” In poems that celebrate, “Though scarcity . . . haunts like a second nature,” this collection is abundant with delight and wisdom. The poet asks, “Can one’s footsteps be both delicate and firm?”

“Walking Into Daylight” is the answer.

–Barbara Rockman, author of to cleave, and Sting and Nest

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