one more obama post.

Elizabeth Alexander's "praise song" written for Obama's inauguration.


Each day we go about our business, walking past each other, catching each others’ eyes or not, about to speak or speaking. All about us is noise. All about us is noise and bramble, thorn and din, each one of our ancestors on our tongues. Someone is stitching up a hem, darning a hole in a uniform, patching a tire, repairing the things in need of repair.

Someone is trying to make music somewhere with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.

ALEXANDER: A farmer consider the changing sky; A teacher says, “Take out your pencils. Begin.”

We encounter each other in words, Words spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed; Words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark the will of someone and then others who said, “I need to see what’s on the other side; I know there’s something better down the road.”

We need to find a place where we are safe; We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain, that many have died for this day. Sing the names of the dead who brought us here, who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges, picked the cotton and the lettuce, built brick by brick the glittering edifices they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle; praise song for the day. Praise song for every hand-lettered sign; The figuring it out at kitchen tables.

Some live by “Love thy neighbor as thy self.”

Others by first do no harm, or take no more than you need.

What if the mightiest word is love, love beyond marital, filial, national. Love that casts a widening pool of light. Love with no need to preempt grievance.

In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air, anything can be made, any sentence begun.

On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp -- praise song for walking forward in that light.

"We're All Gonna Die - 100 meters of existence"

the 100 meter photograph...

Simon Hosberg.

I, too, sing America.

I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.

Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.

Besides,
They'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed--

I, too, am America.


Langston Hughes.

a new day.

christopher david ryan's.

the time has come to set aside childish things...

starting today we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off,
and start again the work of remaking of America.

I hope.

mondays.

image from Daniel Eatock.

Everyone Is Afraid of Something

Dannye Romine Powell

Once I was afraid of ghosts, of the dark,
of climbing down from the highest
limb of the backyard oak. Now I'm afraid

my son will die alone in his apartment.
I'm afraid when I break down the door,
I'll find him among the empties-bloated,
discolored, his face a stranger's face.

My granddaughter is afraid of blood
and spider webs and of messing up.
Also bees. Especially bees. Everyone,
she says, is afraid of something.

Another fear of mine: that it will fall to me
to tell this child her father is dead.

Perhaps I should begin today stringing
her a necklace of bees. When they sting
and welts quilt her face, when her lips
whiten and swell, I'll take her
by the shoulders. Child, listen to me.
One day, you'll see. These stings
Are nothing. Nothing at all.

photographic excursion tomorrow:::

from Loan Nguyen's site

::::

my baby sister is making the drive from san francisco today!

what are all of your plans for this weekend?

da? da.

ice skating in holland, from KAPturer's photostream.

they are skating in the netherlands!

I just heard a whistling skater on NPR. Dutch people are too funny...
when I spent time in Amsterdam I saw my old au pairs EVERYwhere
and realized they must all have been Dutch!

a conversation between Dad (mine) and his ten pound dog (Sophie) as recorded by my mum.

Dad: So Soph, do you want to take a hike over for a skate on Jim's rink?

Sophie: (complete silence)

Dad: Or do you want to go cross country with mum and me?

Sophie: (complete silence)

Dad: I'm going to fire up the 'que for lunch! Do you think I should have ribs or Canadian Bacon?

Sophie: (complete silence)

Dad: And how about those Leafs eh?

Sophie: (complete silence then some chewing sounds as Soph wanders off and finds Dad's slippers...)

more obama style::::

obama style::::more to love!

dominomag.com reports that michael smith
was tapped to decorate the white house.

from the article: Smith describes how as a 10-year-old boy in Newport Beach, CA, he regularly redid his room in the style of various foreign countries, ranging from Spain to Russia.

cassie, my younger sister, used to take it upon herself to report
on various countries worldwide, from Spain to Africa to Russia.

hm....

herb lubalin.

so jen & bob.

12.25.08

pushing ninety degrees today.

walker evans, polaroid prints.

What To Do the First Morning the Sun Comes Back
by Roseann Lloyd

Find a clean cloth for the kitchen table, the red and blue one
you made that cold winter in Montana. Spread out
your paper and books. Tune the radio to the jazz station.
Look at the bright orange safflowers you found last August—
how well they've held their color next to the black-spotted cat.

Make some egg coffee, in honor of all the people
above the Arctic Circle. Give thanks to the Sufis,
who figured out how to brew coffee
from the dark, bitter beans. Remark
on the joyfulness of your dishes: black and yellow stars.

Reminisce with your lover about the history of this kitchen
where, between bites of cashew stir fry,
you first kissed each other on the mouth. Now that you're hungry,
toast some leftover cornbread, spread it with real butter,
honey from bees that fed on basswood blossoms.

The window is frosted over, but the sun's casting an eye
over all the books. Open your Spanish book.
The season for sleeping is over.
The pots and pans: quiet now, let them be.

It will be a short day.
Sit in the kitchen as long as you can, reading and writing.
At sundown, rub a smidgen of butter
on the western windowsill
to ask the sun:
Come back again tomorrow.

all the king's men.

I just finished All The King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren. Good book, although difficult to get through, especially at the beginning – I know Warren is known for his novel approach to Southern speak, but in the beginning… I was going slower’n a bread wagon with biscuit wheels. The story picks up towards the end… overall, the book is an insightful and well informed foray into the world of American politics… all about graft and corruption and hope and promise. As Lydia pointed out, a very fitting read for the times. One of my favorite points: That we will never be OK with the future until we are OK with the past. And vice versa. Inextricably linked to this insight is another Warren makes regarding parents and children. He writes,

When you get born your father and mother lost something out of themselves, and they are going to bust a ham trying to get it back, and you are it. They know they can't get it all back but they will get as big a chunk out of you as they can.

Jack Burden, the main character, describes his mother:

For years I had condemned her as a woman without heart, who loved merely power over men and the momentary satisfaction to vanity or flesh which they could give her, who lived in a strange loveless oscillation between calculation and instinct…

After he sees she isn't this way, and he sees the truth about her:

I had given my mother a present, which was a lie. But in return she had given me a present, too, which was a truth. She gave me a new picture of herself, and that meant, in the end, a new picture of the world. Or rather, that new picture of herself filled in the blank space which was perhaps the center of the new picture of the world…

And that meant that my mother gave me back the past. I could now accept the past which I had before felt was tainted and horrible. I could accept the past now because I could accept her and be at peace with her and myself (433).

banksy-boo

remember this guy? banksy! when I lived in London I made it my sole purpose to find his satirical stencils.

fyi for those of you who think I'm referring to a muppet baby: banksy is the art world's angsty, pimple faced teen. he is sort of anonymous, his art is usually politically and inappropriately placed, he's a cult hero... what more is there? wikipedia.