ROCCO E I SUOI FRATELLI [ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS]
Luchino Visconti
Italy, 1960
Monday, August 12, 2019
CHARLES TOMLINSON - “The Shadow”
The sun flung out at the foot of the tree
A perfect shadow on snow: we found that we
Were suddenly walking through this replica,
The arteries of this map of winter
Offering a hundred pathways up the hill
Too intricate to follow. We stood still
Among the complications of summit branches
Of a mid-field tree far from all other trees.
Or was it roots were opening through the white
An underworld thoroughfare towards daylight?
There stretched the silence of that dark frontier,
Ignoring the stir of the branches where
A wind was disturbing their quiet and
Rippled the floating shadow without sound
Like a current from beneath, as we strode through
And on into a world of untrodden snow,
The shadow all at once gone out as the sun withdrew.
The sun flung out at the foot of the tree
A perfect shadow on snow: we found that we
Were suddenly walking through this replica,
The arteries of this map of winter
Offering a hundred pathways up the hill
Too intricate to follow. We stood still
Among the complications of summit branches
Of a mid-field tree far from all other trees.
Or was it roots were opening through the white
An underworld thoroughfare towards daylight?
There stretched the silence of that dark frontier,
Ignoring the stir of the branches where
A wind was disturbing their quiet and
Rippled the floating shadow without sound
Like a current from beneath, as we strode through
And on into a world of untrodden snow,
The shadow all at once gone out as the sun withdrew.
Sunday, August 11, 2019
JAMES BROUGHTON - “Tristan at the Seashore”
Apathy and delirium sun themselves on the porch.
All the old dragons loll along the beach.
Such lightning has rather a hazy lurch.
The rabbits are very pink around here, said Tristan.
What twitters the duckling dreams?
Catamount jars wilt away in the sand
for the scalawag sock-maker has long since skipped.
Monkeyshine and mollycoddle walk hand in hand
buying mouse miracles in every shop.
Sloth and wheedling play ball in the hammock.
All the cold boas curl around the deck.
Not much wind for propping up a rope trick.
These glassblowers have very thin bottlenecks, said Tristan.
What withers all goldfish schemes?
Apathy and delirium sun themselves on the porch.
All the old dragons loll along the beach.
Such lightning has rather a hazy lurch.
The rabbits are very pink around here, said Tristan.
What twitters the duckling dreams?
Catamount jars wilt away in the sand
for the scalawag sock-maker has long since skipped.
Monkeyshine and mollycoddle walk hand in hand
buying mouse miracles in every shop.
Sloth and wheedling play ball in the hammock.
All the cold boas curl around the deck.
Not much wind for propping up a rope trick.
These glassblowers have very thin bottlenecks, said Tristan.
What withers all goldfish schemes?
Saturday, August 10, 2019
LI BAI - “Clearing at Dawn”
The fields are chill, the sparse rain has stopped;
The colours of Spring teem on every side.
With leaping fish the blue pond is full;
With singing thrushes the green boughs droop.
The flowers of the field have dabbled their powdered cheeks;
The mountain grasses are bent level at the waist.
By the bamboo stream the last fragment of cloud
Blown by the wind slowly scatters away.
The fields are chill, the sparse rain has stopped;
The colours of Spring teem on every side.
With leaping fish the blue pond is full;
With singing thrushes the green boughs droop.
The flowers of the field have dabbled their powdered cheeks;
The mountain grasses are bent level at the waist.
By the bamboo stream the last fragment of cloud
Blown by the wind slowly scatters away.
Friday, August 9, 2019
HH the XIVth DALAI LAMA
There is an Indian saying: if you are struck by a poisonous arrow, it is important first to pull it out, there is no time to ask who shot it, what sort of poison it is, and so on. First handle the immediate problem, and later we can investigate.
Similarly, when we encounter human suffering, it is important to respond with compassion rather than question the politics of those we help. Instead of asking whether their country is enemy or friend, we must think, “These are human beings, they are suffering, and they have a right to happiness equal to our own.’’
There is an Indian saying: if you are struck by a poisonous arrow, it is important first to pull it out, there is no time to ask who shot it, what sort of poison it is, and so on. First handle the immediate problem, and later we can investigate.
Similarly, when we encounter human suffering, it is important to respond with compassion rather than question the politics of those we help. Instead of asking whether their country is enemy or friend, we must think, “These are human beings, they are suffering, and they have a right to happiness equal to our own.’’
Thursday, August 8, 2019
Wednesday, August 7, 2019
PIONEERS:
FIRST WOMEN FILMMAKERS
Alice Guy Blaché
Mixed Pets -1911 / Tramp Strategy - 1911
Greater Love Hath No Ma - 1911
Algie the Miner - 1912
Falling Leaves - 1912 / Little Rangers -1912
Canned Harmony - 1912
A Fool and His Money - 1912
The High Cost of Living - 191
The Coming of Sunbeam - 1913
Burstup Homes' Murder - 1913
A House Divided - 1913
Matrimony's Speed Limit - 1913
The Ocean Waif - 1916
Gene Gautier
The Colleen Bawn - 1911
Lois Weber
On The Brink - 1911
Elsie Jane Wilson
The Cricket - 1917
MAURICE SENDAK
From their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions, fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can. And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming Wild Things.
From their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions, fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can. And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming Wild Things.
Tuesday, August 6, 2019
BONNIE 'PRINCE' BILLY - “A Strange Form of Life”
A strange form of life kicking through windows, rolling on yards
Heading in loved ones, triggering odds
A strange one
And a hard way to come into a cabin, into the weather
Into a path walking together
A hard one
And the softest lips ever, twenty-five years of waiting to kiss them
Smiling and waiting to bend down and kiss twice
The softest lips
And a dark little room across the nation, you found myself racing
Forgetting the strange and the hard and the soft kiss
In the dark room
And a strange form of life kicking through windows, rolling on yards
Heading in loved ones, triggering odds
A strange one
A strange form of life kicking through windows, rolling on yards
Heading in loved ones, triggering odds
A strange one
And a hard way to come into a cabin, into the weather
Into a path walking together
A hard one
And the softest lips ever, twenty-five years of waiting to kiss them
Smiling and waiting to bend down and kiss twice
The softest lips
And a dark little room across the nation, you found myself racing
Forgetting the strange and the hard and the soft kiss
In the dark room
And a strange form of life kicking through windows, rolling on yards
Heading in loved ones, triggering odds
A strange one
Monday, August 5, 2019
URSULA K. LE GUIN from The Dispossessed
It is our suffering that brings us together. It is not love. Love does not obey the mind, and turns to hate when forced. The bond that binds us is beyond choice. We are brothers. We are brothers in what we share. In pain, which each of us must suffer alone, in hunger, in poverty, in hope, we know our brotherhood.
We know it, because we have had to learn it. We know that there is no help for us but from one another, that no hand will save us if we do not reach out our hand. And the hand that you reach out is empty, as mine is. You have nothing. You possess nothing. You own nothing. You are free. All you have is what you are, and what you give.
It is our suffering that brings us together. It is not love. Love does not obey the mind, and turns to hate when forced. The bond that binds us is beyond choice. We are brothers. We are brothers in what we share. In pain, which each of us must suffer alone, in hunger, in poverty, in hope, we know our brotherhood.
We know it, because we have had to learn it. We know that there is no help for us but from one another, that no hand will save us if we do not reach out our hand. And the hand that you reach out is empty, as mine is. You have nothing. You possess nothing. You own nothing. You are free. All you have is what you are, and what you give.
Sunday, August 4, 2019
ALESSANDRA LYNCH - “Funeral: For Us His Gold”
after Gerald Stern
The insect was yellow with crumpled-black banded legs
and shellacked back that would outlast us
and wistful eyes from what I could discern on that trail between
fields,
and we laid him out in the open air under a sky fast-blue with change,
wedging
a leaf beneath his triple-belted belly so he didn’t rest on plain dirt,
and we placed two cloverblooms by his head and he was old
you said, could tell by how definite the stripes were, how complete
the patterns bold and dark, almost engraved,
and he was beautiful in that pasture of thirty-three cows and we drank
milk in the blaring heat and ate the cake you’d made. We were
the only humans there—unholy-seeming things with two legs,
dismal histories—
drinking and eating around his elegant husk,
and from the furze, fellow insects rose, a frenzied static around
our bodies,
while he remained in situ an unremitting yellow, the color more
vivid, louder now that he was a remnant. Was color the purpose
here?
Yellow had alerted us to him, and we took care
with leaf and clover to make his bed.
The insect’s gold our togetherness, its death from which we fed.
after Gerald Stern
The insect was yellow with crumpled-black banded legs
and shellacked back that would outlast us
and wistful eyes from what I could discern on that trail between
fields,
and we laid him out in the open air under a sky fast-blue with change,
wedging
a leaf beneath his triple-belted belly so he didn’t rest on plain dirt,
and we placed two cloverblooms by his head and he was old
you said, could tell by how definite the stripes were, how complete
the patterns bold and dark, almost engraved,
and he was beautiful in that pasture of thirty-three cows and we drank
milk in the blaring heat and ate the cake you’d made. We were
the only humans there—unholy-seeming things with two legs,
dismal histories—
drinking and eating around his elegant husk,
and from the furze, fellow insects rose, a frenzied static around
our bodies,
while he remained in situ an unremitting yellow, the color more
vivid, louder now that he was a remnant. Was color the purpose
here?
Yellow had alerted us to him, and we took care
with leaf and clover to make his bed.
The insect’s gold our togetherness, its death from which we fed.
Saturday, August 3, 2019
Friday, August 2, 2019
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