curiouser and curiouser



“Of two sisters one is always the watcher, one the dancer.”
― Louise Glück




“The great thing
is not having
a mind. Feelings:
oh, I have those;
they govern me.”
― Louise Glück



“The unsaid, for me, exerts great power...”
― Louise Glück

my hair is so long now that i wash it hours before bed, and it stays wet through the night, and even through the next day. some day i will begin a more intimate relationship with my hair dryer, but until then...
-

Luisa Brimble writes here about Synonym Journal.
makes me continue my contemplations on simplifying, decluttering, focusing (re-focusing).

on Synonym Journal:
SYNONYM represents moving toward simplicity, intelligence, and living a life of intention; away from clutter and the expectation of constant content. 

This project was initiated out of a mixed frustration and perplexion with our own online habits and the general disposability that exists in the sharing and consumption of digital content. SYNONYM addresses an awareness of the internet's influences on our own work and inspiration; moving with curiosity toward a new way of connecting with others online; and treating this space as if we did not have an unlimited amount of it. 

This morning, I contemplate the active nature of being alone, that we consciously have to exercise our ability to be by ourselves. That it can become habit, even a small addiction, a luxury, to be without another.

I drove home to the sound of someone else's relationship. It's comforting to know that the ideals of love are still alive somewhere.

--

A new exhibit has begun at the Menil Collection. "The Progress of Love explores romantic love, self-love, friendship, familial affect, love of one’s country, and other bonds in and around [Africa]. Though the exhibition is weighted towards art produced specifically about love in Africa, works that might otherwise be considered more “Western” in orientation are included as well, calling attention to the global exchange through which such concepts develop, and to both the shared and distinct aspects of the experience of love."

--

A 16-people table at a 24-hour diner that reminded me of La Vie Boheme in Rent.

--

Restlessness brews restlessness.

“Until we know the assumptions in which we are drenched, we cannot know ourselves.” 
― Adrienne Rich

the problem with wanting to write about one's life but having a bad memory is that you know you have a lot of stories to write but you can't remember what they are.

“Truthfulness, honor, is not something which springs ablaze of itself; it has to be created between people. This is true in political situations. The quality and depth of the politics evolving from a group depends in large part on their understanding of honor. Much of what is narrowly termed "politics" seems to rest on a longing for certainty even at the cost of honesty, for an analysis which, once given, need not be re-examined…It isn't that to have an honorable relationship with you, I have to understand everything, or tell you everything at once, or that I can know, beforehand, everything I need to tell you. It means that most of the time I am eager, longing for the possibility of telling you. That these possibilities may seem frightening, but not destructive to me. That I feel strong enough to hear your tentative and groping words. That we both know we are trying, all the time, to extend the possibilities of truth between us.” 
― Adrienne Rich

“Sleeping. Turning in turn like planets rotating in their midnight meadow: a touch is enough to let us know we're not alone in the universe, even in sleep.”
― Adrienne Rich

(for those who know of my past trouble with sleep)

“power comes from the same place as our wounds”

—	Adrienne Rich 1978, pp. 3

I previously posted an excerpt from this interview, here. He died a few days ago. 

Interview with Jack Gilbert

INTERVIEWER

Do you think it’s important for American writers to live abroad?

GILBERT

At least at some point—so you have something to compare to what you think is normal, and you encounter things you aren’t used to. One of the great dangers is familiarity.

INTERVIEWER

How did your foreign settings—those places—figure into your poems?

GILBERT

It’s more how those places resonate in me. Rather than writing a poem about those places, they create something I write about.


(...)

INTERVIEWER

Is that why your style is unadorned and not ornamental?

GILBERT

Oh, I like ornament at the right time, but I don’t want a poem to be made out of decoration. If you like that kind of poetry, more power to you, but it doesn’t interest me. When I read the poems that matter to me, it stuns me how much the presence of the heart—in all its forms—is endlessly available there. To experience ourselves in an important way just knocks me out. It puzzles me why people have given that up for cleverness. Some of them are ingenious, more ingenious than I am, but so many of them aren’t any good at being alive.

(...)

NTERVIEWER

It sounds like even in your San Francisco days you sustained a rather remote life away from others. Is solitude important for you?

GILBERT

I don’t know how to answer that because I’ve always lived a life with a lot of quiet in it—either alone or with someone I’m in love with.

INTERVIEWER

Do you think that being reclusive has preserved your career?

GILBERT

Certainly to the point that it gave me some control over my vanity and helped me keep a grip on what really matters.

INTERVIEWER

You expose a lot of yourself in your poetry. Are your poems taken directly from your life?

GILBERT

Yes, why would I invent them?

INTERVIEWER

Do you ever feel uncomfortable about naming the women you’ve been with in your poems?

GILBERT

No, I’m so proud—even the ones that didn’t work out, like Gianna.

INTERVIEWER

What was your life with Michiko like?

GILBERT

Pure. It was all the same piece of cloth—always gentle, always devilish. Always loving.

(...)

INTERVIEWER

When you write, do you read your poems out loud?

GILBERT

Sometimes. If my instincts register that something is wrong with the rhythm then I work on it, but it’s almost always unconscious.
The hard part for me is to find the poem—a poem that matters. To find what the poem knows that’s special. I may think of writing about the same thing that everyone does, but I really like to write a poem that hasn’t been written. And I don’t mean its shape. I want to experience or discover ways of feeling that are fresh. I love it when I have perceived something fresh about being human and being happy.
Ezra Pound said “make it new.” The great tragedy of that saying is he left out the essential word. It should be make it importantly new. So much of the time people are just aiming for novelty, surprise. I like to think that I’ve understood, that I’ve learned about something that matters—what the world should be, what life should be.

(...)

INTERVIEWER

Do you feel you have any flaw as a writer?

GILBERT

I can’t spell. I’m hopeless.

The Invitation

It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living.  I want to know what you ache for, And if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me how old you are.  I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, For your dreams, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon.  I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, If you have been opened by life’s betrayals or Have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain!

I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own; If you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you To the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, Be realistic, or to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn’t interest me if the story you’re telling me is true.  I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself, If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul.

I want to know if you can see beauty Even when it is not pretty every day, And if you can source your life from God’s presence.I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, And still stand on the edge of a lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, “Yes!”

It doesn’t interest me to know where you live or how much money you have, I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair, Weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children.

It doesn’t interest me who you are, how you came here, I want to know if you will stand in the center of the Fire with me and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom you have studied.  I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away,I want to know if you can be alone with yourself, And if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

- Oriah Mountain Dreamer, Canadian Storyteller