AT THE PRIMITIVE CAMPGROUND IN THE GORGE A ghost cannot gather itself inside a tree, or a peregrine, or a creek, or heaven. It cannot draw stars through the window of a building in Beijing, or on a cabin near Woolwine with spring peepers chorusing music to fit the sky. It cannot revive its mind in a trout lily, as much as I wish. I can’t tell it my name. I can’t share one flapjack, smoke, or a sip…
The Monkey Climbs a Tree I. With words come the square, the block Of sound, time and space With words, you fill the square And we bounce you hither and yon The block of time and space, ex nihilo Becomes something you see, touch, hear Smell if you’re advanced Taste if you leap beyond the possible II. An image does more, because it is The thing in a sense A copy of the thing at least But words can never…
Some things are meant to be in pairs. They’re meant to be twinned, coupled, one and one. Not because dualism wins. Not because we’ve lost out to dualism, in all of its permutations. After all, it’s dualistic to think in terms of the pairs and us, of the pairs not existing and us. Even of the need for pairs in this world, as if it isn’t already that way, and so. Fix You and Run, by Coldplay and Snow…
I When Einstein was asked Do you believe in God? He replied I believe in Spinoza’s god And who is that, one wonders? All that is and ought to be Now and forever Blue waves without end Stars and green mountains and red rivers Dark roiling matter without end II The eternal reunions and disbursements of Nature As it is and ought to be Though we can’t see it Blinded by this and that Preset premade chain/anchor On rational thought…
It’s something we really don’t know much about at all. In our own lives. The absence of war. Even to the extent that we’re not involved, we see it elsewhere, hear about it, note its presence on the news, in books, in history, on film. It surrounds us, this absence, this lack of the presence of anything remotely akin to peace — again, whether or not we’ve ever experienced its opposite. In. The. Air. It’s with us wherever we…
Gary Clark Jr. is one of those guitarists other guitarists, and musicians in general, just love. Just love to be on stage with. Born in Austin, Texas, in 1984, he quickly gained a reputation as one of the finest guitar players of his generation. In 2011, Rolling Stone named him “Best Young Gun.” Extreme skills on that instrument, even after some 60 years of Rock N Roll, still carry a great deal of weight. And when they’re Bluesy and Root’s…
Directed by Geoffrey Orthwein and Andrew Sullivan, Bokeh is a beautifully understated Sci-Fi movie about the last two humans and what life might mean in that end of days context. Jenai (Maika Monroe) and Riley (Matt O’Leary), a young couple from America, take a romantic trip of a lifetime to Iceland, and only the first day is “normal.” Deep into that first night, Jenai wakes up, goes over to the hotel window, sees what looks like the Aurora Borealis, and…
Brains trick us. Not just those who use them, and use them carefully, creatively. Those who never use them are tricked too. We see things not as they are, but as our minds want us to see them. This provides a great deal of amusement for our brains, which is their sole reason for existing anyway. We seriously amuse them; they love this about us; and they tolerate us because of that. Take away our comedic efforts, and they’d shut…
