the utmost

weltschmerz

2012-01-30T08:00:00.000-06:00

and you never ask questions when God's on your side

above: countries according to their perceived levels of corruption
via corruptions perceptions index

by new year's night

2011-12-30T08:00:00.000-06:00

woody guthrie's new year's resolutions for 1942 included:

1. work more and better
3. wash teeth if any
18. stay glad
27. help win war - beat fascism
33. wake up and fight

my new year's resolutions for 2012 include:
1. say "yes" more
3. make a dent in my reading list
18. keep my resolutions more creative than these
27. call you more often
33. wake up and fight

landscapes in my arms

2011-12-27T13:10:00.000-06:00

if i were a painter
and could paint a memory
i'd climb inside the swirling skies to be with you

(helen frankenthaler, blue current, 1987)

christmas krampus

2011-12-25T15:02:00.000-06:00

a wink of his eye and a twist of his head
soon gave me to know i had nothing to dread

via peter carsten

you can plan on me

2011-12-24T12:11:00.001-06:00

the search light in the big yard
swings round with the gun
and spotlights the snowflakes
like the dust in the sun
it's christmas in prison
there'll be music tonight
i'll probably get homesick
i love you, goodnight.

same beat groove

2011-12-19T08:00:00.000-06:00

where have you been hiding out lately, honey?
you can't dress trashy until you spend a lot of money

(via)

achilles' heel

2011-11-28T07:29:00.000-06:00

"Most [bulldogs] can’t have sex without help — they’re too short and stocky. Most can’t give birth on their own — their heads are too big. A breed that has trouble doing those two things is, by definition, in trouble."

via

cranberry cantos

2011-11-24T10:07:00.001-06:00

honky tonk woman

2011-11-08T08:00:00.000-06:00

watch out boy, she'll chew you up

no need to be alone

2011-11-07T09:31:00.000-06:00

if i wanted someone to clean me up, i'd find myself a maid
if i wanted someone to spend my money, i wouldn't need to get paid
if i wanted someone to understand me, i'd have so much more to say
i want you to make the days move easy

(via)

the haunting

2011-10-31T13:36:00.000-05:00

dog is my copilot

2011-10-13T20:58:00.000-05:00

Old dogs can be cloudy-eyed and grouchy, gray of muzzle, graceless of gait, odd of habit, hard of hearing, pimply, wheezy, lazy, and lumpy. But to anyone who has ever known an old dog, these flaws are of little consequence. Old dogs are vulnerable. They show exorbitant gratitude and limitless trust. They are without artifice. They are funny in new and unexpected ways.

But, above all, they seem at peace.

(gene weingarten)

look closely

2011-10-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

so they were turning after all, those cameras. life, which can be strangely merciful, had taken pity on norma desmond

(via cinemagraphs)

the year of the duchess

2011-10-05T08:00:00.000-05:00

then she laughed, an absurd, charming little laugh, and i laughed too.

(wallis simpson is having a moment.)

tashlikh

2011-10-03T08:00:00.000-05:00

just to be is a blessing. just to live is holy.

(abraham joshua heschel)

the blues don't change

2011-09-13T08:38:00.000-05:00

"I equate happiness with contentment, and contentment with complacency, and complacency with impending disaster."

(and there it is.)

incredibly close

2011-09-12T20:25:00.000-05:00

via

skies are everywhere as blue as mine

2011-09-11T12:50:00.000-05:00

those who knew
what was going on here
must give way to
those who know little.
and less than little.
and finally as little as nothing.

in the grass which has overgrown
reasons and causes,
someone must be stretched out
blade of grass in his mouth
gazing at the clouds.

(wislawa szymborska)

(via eric cahan)

autumn almanac

2011-09-06T08:27:00.003-05:00

a full year passed (the seasons keep me honest)
since I last noticed this same commotion.
who knew God was an abstract expressionist?

(jacqueline osherow)

our inner elephant

2011-08-15T08:00:00.003-05:00

joyeux anniversaire, babar

there was a shout near orel

2011-07-28T08:00:00.000-05:00

and it echoed in rome

("the metamorphosis of the 'fritzes'" via)

pop fiction

2011-07-27T08:10:00.000-05:00

lest one need more proof that ~~pop~~ music is never original.

old brown shoe

2011-07-26T08:00:00.000-05:00

and i lost you to the summer wind

brilliance via

the final frame

2011-07-25T08:00:00.000-05:00

forever marilyn

2011-07-20T08:00:00.002-05:00

when it gets hot like this, you know what i do? i keep my undies in the icebox!

(why is marilyn in chicago?)

the next great adventure

2011-07-19T08:00:00.000-05:00

no story lives unless someone wants to listen.

after the curtain

2011-07-18T08:00:00.003-05:00

"anytime something big happened, like when brezhnev died, they'd show 'swan lake' on every single channel on tv."

(my perestroika)

photo via

across the universe

2011-07-14T20:28:00.002-05:00

but if you go carrying pictures of chairman mao
you ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow

(via)

the reminder

2011-07-10T16:53:00.001-05:00

(missing & wishing you the deepest happiness. with love.)

stars & stripes

2011-07-04T15:02:00.003-05:00

checkers! shut up or i'll feed you to the chinese.

so beautiful or so what

2011-06-03T20:04:00.000-05:00

ever been to chicago?

I warn you, Jedediah, you’re not going to like it in Chicago. The wind comes howling in off the lake and gosh only knows if they ever heard of lobster Newburg.

(citizen kane)

i can read the writing on the wall

2011-05-31T16:55:00.002-05:00

so mama, don't take my kodachrome away

(abelardo morell)

who runs the world?

2011-05-25T20:28:00.001-05:00

eggshell with romalian type. what do you think?

(the world's most expensive photo)

nothing made sense

2011-05-15T21:54:00.000-05:00

"I was quite disturbed by Andy Warhol but Henri Rousseau made me feel better."

walpurgisnacht

2011-05-03T10:00:00.003-05:00

but honey, i don't blame you

the ballad of john and yoko

2011-05-02T10:45:00.005-05:00

"In a sense, every wedding is a royal wedding, with the bride and groom, king and queen."

the lusty month

2011-05-01T10:45:00.001-05:00

the month after the month they say is cruel
is and is not.

(jonathan galassi)

if dreams are like movies

2011-04-10T16:11:00.001-05:00

well, of course we talk. don't everybody?

mesaper

2011-03-21T08:00:00.007-05:00

to wear a yellow star in a film is an enormous responsibility. you are honoring ghosts.

(ben kingsley)

here comes the sun

2011-03-19T08:00:00.001-05:00

who am i against congo?

2011-03-14T08:30:00.001-05:00

all history is current
all injustice continues on some level,
somewhere in the world

(alice walker)

embrace the gift of loneliness here

born to be posthumous

2011-03-04T14:35:00.002-06:00

"when people are finding meaning in things--beware."

the stars are ageless, aren't they?

2011-02-26T21:00:00.003-06:00

hattie mcdaniels, best supporting actress, gone with the wind, 1939

james lipton: if heaven exists, what would you like to hear God tell you at the pearly gates?
colin firth: “i personally thought you were very good in mamma mia!”

right? of course right

2011-02-26T20:45:00.003-06:00

photo circa 1909. funny, people are just like us.

til things are brighter

2011-02-23T20:13:00.004-06:00

"love. splendid thing. fiery ring. burns."

(of course he's a pisces.)

(what's your six word love story?)

lost in this plastic life

2011-02-23T10:00:00.001-06:00

rihanna's 2007 single "don't stop the music" borrowed heavily from michael jackson's "wanna be starting somethin'." jackson's song was itself a quotation of one by the cameroonian jazz artists manu dibango – who was in turn riffing on 1960s-era james brown funk.

(npr)

(vermeer; gerhard richter)

be a dog or be a bitch

2011-02-19T15:37:00.005-06:00

"two years ago, when I was walking my dog in fulham palace gardens, we overtook an old woman who was wheeling a baby carriage. she was chatting cheerfully to the occupant of it, and it was therefore, perhaps, not unreasonable of me to be surprised to find, when I caught up with her, that this too was a dog."

(jr ackerley)

ever after

2011-02-14T16:58:00.001-06:00

"this is the only short story i've written in ten years or so. i think you'll agree they don't come much shorter."

(arthur c. clarke)

via

that's what makes the jukebox play

2011-02-13T16:49:00.004-06:00

when the conversation stops and we're facing our defeat
i'll be next to you and you'll be right there next to me

valentine via

can i be ethel?

2011-02-09T19:25:00.002-06:00

as often as not, we are homesick most for the places we have never known.

(carson mccullers)

zebras are reactionaries

2011-02-07T19:48:00.003-06:00

from time immemorial, the same voice spells the same alphabet in the same child's brain...ordinary words, for nothing and no one in particular. it is only about love.

(jean-michel maulpoix)

via

neverending story

2011-02-06T21:28:00.003-06:00

i will not be just a tourist in a world of images.

(anais nin)

bibliophilia here

the implacable me

2011-02-05T16:18:00.004-06:00

if i said i was madly in love with you you'd know i was lying.

(a fresh look)

i've had it up to here

2011-02-02T11:06:00.003-06:00

"it's snowing still. and freezing. however, we haven't had an earthquake lately."

(eeyore)

such a february face

2011-02-01T16:26:00.003-06:00

black and white tux

2011-01-30T21:40:00.003-06:00

no she does not really see me
cause she sees her own reflection

via

how can they see with sequins in their eyes?

2011-01-26T20:06:00.003-06:00

and i'd rather be damned if i don't.

(razzle dazzle them)

the venetian vespers

2011-01-14T13:24:00.002-06:00

you fling the window open and the room is instantly flooded with this outer, pearl-laden haze, which is part damp oxygen, part coffee and prayers.
(joseph brodsky)

image via

a handful of dust

2011-01-12T18:40:00.002-06:00

warte nur, balde
ruhest du auch

in memoriam

via

words words words

2011-01-11T21:34:00.002-06:00

"i sold flowers. i didn't sell myself. now you've made a lady of me i'm not fit to sell anything else."

oh so much more here

hemingway humor

2011-01-09T21:12:00.001-06:00

q: how many blondes does it take to change a lightbulb?
a: margot preferred darkness.

(via)

that's true

2011-01-06T19:44:00.003-06:00

subsumed

2011-01-03T19:07:00.004-06:00

dreams do come true.

i mean all disrespect

2011-01-02T16:07:00.001-06:00

that's how i think of New York. someone
jonesing for Grace Jones at the party,
and someone jonesing for grace.

(terrance hayes)

i'll probably get homesick

2011-01-01T19:30:00.006-06:00

this new year snuck in
before i had looked up
from twisting the dials--
i was sure of a melody somewhere
in the static.
and then there she stood,
looking as surprised as i did
and wholly unprepared.
i had lost track of the time
for my heart had gone north--
there! it wandered off again.
and here
the new year's snuck in,
my memories only half-bottled.

photo via (and nuss)

maybe this year will be better than the last

2010-12-30T20:59:00.002-06:00

retrospective

2010-12-29T19:52:00.004-06:00

my apologies to chance for calling it necessity.
my apologies to necessity if i'm mistaken, after all.

my apologies to time for all the world i overlook each second.

forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home.

pardon me, hounded hope, for laughing from time to time.

don't bear me ill will, speech, that i borrow weighty words, then labor heavily so that they may seem light.

(wislawa szymborska, selections from "under one small star")

here we come a-wandering

2010-12-25T15:20:00.005-06:00

I know what I'm going to do tomorrow, and the next day, and the next year, and the year after that.

"winter" via

i want a hippopotamus

2010-12-22T16:57:00.005-06:00

the child wants a teddy bear and tracks and engines that light up and go; the youth wants a lettered sweater or a million dollars or a sweetheart; mr. mussolini wants the earth; the poet wants the moon; the saint wants God. here we all are, wanting something--and usually the unattainable.

(harriet monroe)

via julianna swaney

oh, yoko!

2010-12-18T09:39:00.006-06:00

and what have you done?

comfortable earth and sumptuous heaven

2010-12-14T21:19:00.003-06:00

some say we are living at the end of time,
but i believe a thousand pagan ministers
will arrive tomorrow to baptize the wind.

there's nothing we need to do about John. the Baptist
has been laying his hands on earth for so long
that the well water is sweet for a hundred miles.

(robert bly)

alec soth, sleeping by the mississippi

winter lights

2010-12-14T14:20:00.003-06:00

stranger than fiction

2010-12-03T13:11:00.001-06:00

and eternal i shall endure.

do you see the story? do you see anything?

2010-12-02T19:22:00.002-06:00

"doubt" by jenny keith-hughes

thanksgiving, dark of the moon

2010-11-25T16:25:00.003-06:00

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.

It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

(joy harjo)

photo via

the mad farmer

2010-11-16T13:10:00.003-06:00

again i resume the long
lesson: how small a thing
can be pleasing, how little
in this hard world it takes
to satisfy the mind
and bring it to its rest.
(wendell berry)

photo by the lovely ann.

because you're mine

2010-11-02T19:27:00.002-05:00

put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. that's relativity. (albert einstein)

please be brief

2010-10-28T12:07:00.002-05:00

i have to smile to myself when i realize that people don't know how to address me. some say "mr. president," others say "mr. former president," some say "mr. havel," and it's only a matter of time before someone addresses me as "mr. former havel."

but not this one, jim

2010-10-23T13:06:00.002-05:00

reflection/refraction

2010-10-12T18:32:00.001-05:00

i'm not young enough to know everything. (oscar wilde)

take silence and respect it.

2010-10-07T10:40:00.004-05:00

p.s. a brilliant post with a surprise ending.

like a mirror in the stone

2010-10-06T16:39:00.001-05:00

painting by carly waito

lyrics

invest in a girl and she will do the rest

2010-09-27T14:14:00.007-05:00

girleffect.org

miles from minnesota

2010-07-25T13:08:00.000-05:00

...The older metaphor of farming (life as hard labor that is subject to weather and quirks of blind fate and may return no reward whatsoever and don't be surprised) is still in our blood, especially those of us raised on holy scripture. The young men and women leading cows around the show ring are relatives of Abraham and Job and the faithful father of the prodigal son. They subscribe to the Love Thy Neighbor doctrine. They know about late-summer hailstorms. You could learn something from these people.
(garrison keillor)

the other side of a tapestry

2010-06-13T15:01:00.000-05:00

"God's hand is in every translation...All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of a book, but translated into a better language." (john donne, meditation xvii)

learn more about st. john's illuminated bible here.

the rebellious spirit

2010-05-16T14:39:00.000-05:00

"Miss Sokolow cares--if only to the extent of pointing out that the world is bleeding. I find hope in such pessimism."

above: Anna Sokolow in "Slaughter of the Innocents," 1937.

une morte glorieuse

2010-03-25T20:51:00.001-05:00

"odd planet, odd problems, odd language. maybe there is a star where life is simple." (saint-exupery)

(photo, diane arbus)

don't make a mess of it

2010-03-20T16:11:00.000-05:00

I saw a man this morning
Who did not wish to die;
I ask, and cannot answer,
if otherwise wish I.

Fair broke the day this morning
Upon the Dardanelles:
The breeze blew soft, the morn's cheeks
Were cold as cold sea-shells.

But other shells are waiting
Across the Aegean Sea;
Shrapnel and high explosives,
Shells and hells for me.

Oh Hell of ships and cities,
Hell of men like me,
Fatal second Helen,
Why must I follow thee?

Achilles came to Troyland
And I to Chersonese;
He turned from wrath to battle,
And I from three days' peace.

Was it so hard, Achilles,
So very hard to die?
Thou knowest, and I know not;
So much the happier am I.

I will go back this morning
From Imbros o'er the sea.
Stand in the trench, Achilles,
Flame-capped, and shout for me.

(patrick shaw-stewart)

v is for vaggio

2010-03-10T15:09:00.001-06:00

Caravaggio...exemplifies the modern antihero, a hyperrealist whose art is instantly accessible. His doe-eyed, tousle-haired boys with puffy lips and bubble buttocks look as if they’ve just tumbled out of bed, not descended from heaven. Coarse not godly, locked into dark, ambiguous spaces by a strict geometry then picked out of deep shadow by an oracular light, his models come straight off the street. Cupid is clearly a hired urchin on whom Caravaggio strapped a pair of fake wings. The angel in his “Annunciation” dangles like Chaplin’s tramp on the high wire in “The Circus,” from what must have been a rope contraption Caravaggio devised...

“The only way to understand old art is to make it participate in our own artistic life” is how Venturi phrased it in 1925. That Caravaggio left behind no drawings, no letters, no will or estate record, only police and court records, makes him a perfect Rorschach for our obsessions. He was outed in the 1970s by gender studies scholars, notwithstanding the absence of documents to indicate he was gay. Pop novelists and moviemakers have naturally had a field day with his life. Exhibition organizers cook up any excuse (“Caravaggio-Bacon,” “Caravaggio-Rembrandt”) to capitalize on his bankability. Newly discovered “Caravaggios” test the market every year...

...Caravaggio, wrestling art back to the ground, distilled scenes into a theatrical instant at which time seems suddenly stopped. That’s why his pictures can bring to mind movie stills. The art historian Michael Fried, who has just written a book about Caravaggio, notes the quality of the figures’ absorption. Life-size images, they share our space and we theirs, face to face, as another art historian, Catherine Puglisi, has pointed out (something that doesn’t happen with Michelangelo’s enormous sculptures or his frescoed ceiling that we only see from far away). The immediacy somehow dovetails with the tabloid tawdriness of his biography, with the whole modern celebrity drama.

from march 10, 2010 nyt front page

who may sing gregorian chants?

2010-03-09T22:05:00.000-06:00

"it was not a sentimental faith. it was not something extraordinary. it was a very solid faith, that was put to the test and was not found wanting." (lesley maber)

the Nazis had declared a thousand-year reich and had appeared triumphant. but for the people of the area of Le Chambon, that was beside the point. here, in the course of four long years, 5,000 Jews were sheltered by 5,000 Christians.

dangling conversation

2010-03-07T12:53:00.000-06:00

how the hell can a person go to work in the morning
and come home in the evening, and have nothing to say?

to have and to hold

2010-03-04T19:24:00.002-06:00

you become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. (antoine de saint-exupery)

unexpected collections

2010-02-14T20:42:00.007-06:00

rout • a rout of wolves
clowder • a clowder of cats
descension • a descension of woodpeckers
disworship • a disworship of Scots
mute • a mute of hounds
raft • a raft of ducks
unbrewing • an unbrewing of carvers
neverthriving • a neverthriving of jugglers
drunkenship • a drunkenship of cobblers
shrewdness • a shrewdness of apes

fleeing the interview

2010-02-13T23:29:00.002-06:00

''We five women (nominees) were fortunate to have the choice, not just the opportunity, but choice to play such rich, complex female characters...And I encourage writers and directors to keep these really interesting female roles coming, and while you're at it you can throw in a few for the men as well."

201 (yesterday)

2010-02-13T15:54:00.001-06:00

poca favilla gran fiamma seconda (dante)

there and back again

2010-01-24T13:20:00.004-06:00

"someday, after mastering winds, waves, tides and gravity, we shall harness the energy of love, and for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire." (pierre teilhard de chardin)

the frost performs its secret ministry

2010-01-19T16:38:00.003-06:00

snow, snow over the whole land
across all boundaries.
the candle burned on the table,
the candle burned.
(boris pasternak)

envy slays the simple

2010-01-10T16:13:00.003-06:00

and now rocky raccoon, he fell back in his room
only to find gideon's bible
gideon checked out and he left it, no doubt
to help with good rocky's revival

listen

2010-01-09T23:55:00.001-06:00

life may be sad, but it's always beautiful.

new year's day is every man's birthday

2010-01-02T17:01:00.002-06:00

"The new year begins in a snowstorm of white vows."

Perhaps we dream too big. Rather than aiming to get it right, let's aim to get it better. Rather than chalking up a list too ominous to tackle, and viewed only as an obligation waiting to be failed, may our resolutions be full of promise, joy, and hope. Gladly welcome in a fresh start.

Perhaps the New Year is our chance at doing it all over again. Rather than traveling back in time, we are lucky enough to move forward, equipped with the knowledge of our failures and successes, more prepared than ever to do as right as we can.

(via beautyineverything)