A statue: (Reuters)
April 1995.
an exceptionally fine: Trained
as a biologist, Milford Fletcher worked for a number years in paleolithic
caves in Spain and France, including the original one at Lascaux, which
is now closed to the public, and is presently mapping the National
Petroglyph Monument, in Albuquerque, NM., by means of a satellite locator
device. All quotes in this paragraph are from notes that Dr. Fletcher
prepared for me.
mutilated
fingers: "Of some 300 hand prints in Gargas,
over 200 have at least one digit mutilated." (Leroi-Gourhan,1986).
Whether these fingers were intentionally severed, or were diseased
remains speculation. One thinks also of the Yakuza, Japan's version
of the Mafia, with their ritual of Yubitsume, the severing
of top joint of the little finger as a gesture of loyalty. In Tokugawa
society this mutation was employed by prostitutes as a sign of
devotion to a special lover.
"the Great
Black Cow: "When linked with the primigenial
goddess Neith, the cow is a mother-symbol, representing the primal
principal of humidity and endowed with a certain androgynous-or
gynandrous, rather-characteristics." (Cirlot,1971). Cirlot
also reminds us that in India the cow is "Vac, the
idea of the world's creation out of sound..." (Ibid.) "It
is not pictorial space, boxed in, but dynamic, always in flux,
creating its own dimensions moment by moment. It has no fixed boundaries;
it is indifferent to background. The eye focuses, pinpoints, abstracts,
locating each object in physical space, against a background; the
ear, however, favors sound from any direction. We hear equally
well from right or left, front or back, above or below. If we lie
down, it makes no difference, whereas in visual space the entire
spectacle is altered." E. Carpenter and M. McLuhen, "Acostic
Space." (Carpenter and McLuhen,1968). "The distinguishing
mark of the space conception of primeval art is the complete independence
and freedom of its vision...In our sense there is no above and
no below, no clear distinction of separateness from an intermingling,
and also, certainly, no rules of proportional size. Gigantic animals
of the Magdalenian era stand alongside tiny deer from Aurignacian
times, as, for example, on the dome of Lascaux. Violent juxtaposition
in size as well as in time is accepted as a matter of course. All
is within the continual present, the perpetual interflow of today,
yesterday, and tomorrow." S. Giedion, "Space Conception
in Prehistoric Art." (Carpenter and McLuhen, 1968). Thus,
in a cave in southern France over 10,000 years ago a Great Black
Cow miraculously began gestating "out of nothing, this world
of art in which communication between individual minds begins." (Bataille,1955)
that rocky: H.D.
Thoreau. "And Moses and Aaron, Nadav, Avihu and the seventy elders
went up. And they saw the God of Israel and under His legs it was like
a paving of sapphire and bright like the sky. And unto the nobles of
the Israelites He did no damage, but they saw God and they ate and
drank." Exod.24 (Boyarin,1990). Boyarin continues: "Normally
one is not permitted to see God, and it is very dangerous to do so,
which is why here the Torah makes explicit the fact that in this special
moment the people were vouchsafed this vision without there being any
danger." (Boyarin, Ibid.)
Ike Eastvold: President
of Friends of the Albuquerque Petroglyphs. "Contemporary Zunis
regard many of the pictographs and petroglyphs in the landscape surrounding
the pueblo as meaningful signs from the past that were made by the
ancestors. For example, one man told me that most Zunis believe the
figures were drawn on the rocks during the time when the rocks were
still soft—back in the time of the beginning, before the earth
was hardened. He described the earth at that time as 'awitelin kabin,
meaning 'raw earth.'" (Young,1980 )
Everett Ruess
wrote: He was a talented teen-ager who trekked Southwest
deserts, sending letters back home that contained his adventures
and observations, and keeping a journal:
"I wandered through the Painted
Desert and spent days serene and tempestuous in Canyon de Chelly,
then traveled up Canyon del Muerto in the shadow of sheer, incurving
cliffs, breathtakingly chiseled and gloriously colored. I passed
the last Navajo encampments and stopped for a space in an abandoned
hogan constructed of smooth clean-limbed cottonwood, with singing
water at the door and sighing leaves overhead. Tall, gracefully
arched trees screened the turquoise sky with a glistening pattern
of dappled green; above and beyond were the gorgeous vermillion
cliffs." (Rusho,1983)
Edward Abbey:
Hunter, brother, companion of
our days:
that blessing which you hunted, hunted too
what you were seeking, this is what you found
(From, "A Sonnet for Everett Ruess." (Ibid.)
In 1934, camping in the Escalante River
region of southern Utah, twenty-year old Everett disappeared. No trace
of his remains was ever found. "It would be easy to make fun of
Ruess, John Nichols wrote, "conjecturing that in the end he must
have literally exploded, his slight body incapable of containing all
the melodramatic sensations he tirelessly ladled into it. But I picture
him simply expiring on the edge of a sandstone cliff, in the shadow
of some high circling buzzard, convinced that he could never again
return to civilization." (Ibid.)
blond: "The
blonde resembles the stammerings of voluptuousness, the piracy of lips,
the tremors of limpid waters. The blonde escapes whatever defines it,
by a kind of whimsical way where I encounter flowers and seashells.
It's a sort of reflection of the woman on stones, a paradoxical shadow
of aerial caresses, a breath of the defeat of reason. What is blonder
than moss? I have often imagined that I saw champagne on the ground
in the forest. And chanterelles! And agaric mushrooms! Hares in flight!
The quick of nails! The colour pink! The blood of plants! The eyes
of does! Memory: memory is truly blonde." (Aragon,1970)
a slender woman: (Rilke,1982)
as in Derrida's: (Benedikt,1991
I have had: A.
Pizarnik. From, "A Dream Where Silence is Made of Gold." The
whole poem reads:
The dog of winter sinks its teeth
into my smile. It was on the bridge. I was naked and wearing a
hat with flowers, I was dragging my corpse, also naked, its hat
made of dry leaves.
I have had many loves, I said,
but the most beautiful was my love for mirrors
my love of
mirrors: "Mirrors minimally are two-dimensional
representations of three-dimensional space which reverse what they
portray. They may be relatively reflective or opaque, may reveal
or hide. They may be reflective of what is presently in front of
them, or they may invite projection of that which is sought. Although
giving only a partial picture of the outside, what is seem can
be altered by shifting mirrors, or one's orientation to them. They
may also allow looking at things which are otherwise inaccessible–such
as one's own face. The resultant images imitate and mock the viewer's
self and immediate situation. They are similar and different to,
more or less then, what they purport to reflect." (Macdonald,1989)
implicit in the
gap: (Sartiliot,1993)
For the instant: W.
Witherup. From, "At the Cafe Intermezzo, On the Street
of Recessive Genes." The poem continues:
This is why sex: this is why
intercourse;
This is why fucking never satisfied
Because the moment you are doing it
Acting it out,
It is already memory.
Although the
culture: "In just two years, 'he,' as Seatmates
tend to call the sculpture, has been saluted by the art establishment
and a porn palace, savaged in newspaper columns and a book, accidentally
smashed on the pavement and lampooned in a beer commercial and
on 'Saturday Night Live.' All that was a prelude to Labor Day,
1993, when a lightning art raid electrified a city accustomed to
public-art causes célèbre. A street youth turned welder turned
guerrilla artist who calls himself Subculture Joe had decided that
if the giant were to 'symbolize the worker in all of us'–as
his creator, Jonathan Borofsky, intended–he should be shackled
with a suitable working accessory: an equally gigantic ball and
chain." (Scigliano,1993)
they had no limbs: (Reichard,1974) "At
times we are tempted to imagine that the vagus forms which float in
our dreams may encounter in the realm of the Possible attractive forces,
having power to fix their lineaments, and shape living beings, out
of these creatures of our slumbers. The Unknown has power over these
strange visions, and out of them composes monsters. Orpheus, Homer,
and Hesiod imagined only the Chimera: Providence has created this terrible
creature of the sea." (Hugo,1900?)
kill by staring: "Every
race of man shares the idea that the human eye penetrates and pierces,
and this fundamental premise of the evil-eye superstition that the
eye injures or alters reality." (Siebers,1983). "It seems
I was in Tokyo after the great earthquake and around me were decomposing
bodies heaped in piles, all of whom were looking right at me. I saw
an eye sitting on the palm of a girl's hand. Suddenly it turned and
leaped into the sky and then it came flying back towards me, so that,
looking up, I could see a great bare eyeball, bigger than life, hovering
over my head, staring point blank at me. I was powerless to move." (Hachiya,1955). "The
dream of this Japanese doctor who was wounded in the world's first
atomic bombing and who ministered to hundreds of victims must be counted
one of the millennial visions of mankind." (Rhodes,1988)
site of passage: (Artaud,1958). "the
soul is severed from the body before departing for the next world.
Through illness or injury, ecstasy or dreaming, the tie to the body
is loosened. Whether extracted by an angel or demon or departing of
its own accord, the soul exists through the gateway of the mouth and
sets out for the other world. (Zaleski,1987)
cause a horrific
wound: (Dvorchak,1994)
maw of his mouth:
There was an Old Man of the
South
Who had an immoderate mouth;
But in swallowing a dish that was quite full of fish,
He was choked that Old Man of the South.
(E. Lear)
Imaginal Body: (Avens,1982)
For example: "Musing over places and images associated with Hiroshima,
it can be helpful to pay close attention to the sensual yet mindful imagination
of the body...the body has its own mind, it's own intelligent imagination.
"Particular bodily sensations or images may now become apparent: where in
the body might they be placed? Bodily sensations contain and embody images--particularly
difficult, sensitive and painful ones resisted by the ego's mind. For instance
I feel a nervous tingling in my hands as I ponder the nuclear situation, then
become aware of an urge to dance and jump. I imagine myself doing so, or, if
I choose to actually embody this urge, I imagine myself as I dance and
jump. In this movement of bodily imagination, I notice the presence of an image.
It is a picture drawn by a hibakusha of a victim whose hands were badly
burnt, so that the skin hangs in strips from the fingertips. I now feel this
image and its exquisite pain with and in my fingers, and yet, as I feel
it, it becomes distinguished from 'my' self. Now 'pictured,' it gains a separate
place in the soul while still very much present in the body." (Perlman,1988)
Li, Yu and I: "Visiting
Yuan Chen with Li and Yu." From, J. Weishaus, "Five Spring
Poems from Po Chu-I."
I think of Henry King's stilted
But desolated Exequy,
Of Yuan Chen's great poem
Unbearably pitiful;
Alone by the Spring river
More alone than I had ever
Imagined I would ever be...
(K. Rexroth. From, "King's River Canyon")
But which of Yuan Chen's poems is Rexroth
referring to as "great"? I would guess, "Three Dreams
at Chiang-ling. The poet's wife had died, and, for political reasons,
he had been sent to a government post at Chiang-ling, leaving their
only child, Fan-tzu, behind in the capital city of Ch'ang-an. One night,
Yuan Chen dreamed of his wife:
When one dreams of another,
Are we both aware of it?
We're apart as darkness is from light
My dream soul exists only for you.
True nothing can be gained from dreams,
But without them how would I see you?
His wife chastises him. He "showed
no interest in the family...took a poet (and) left things behind!...who's
to care for the child?"
Grieved and startled; I am suddenly
awake,
Sitting or sleeping it's as if I were mad;
The shadow of the moon has blackened half the bed
The sounds of insects drift across the gloom of the grass;
My senses come back to me slowly,
Though awakened, I am still distraught;
Alone as I picture your face
Tears come and never seem to end!
Life's final parting is already ours,
How could a single dream bring so many sorrows?
(W.H.
Nienhauser, translator)
He hugged: W.H.
Auden. From, "The Bard."
space has possibilities: "Much
in the way that an acupuncturist seeks to eliminate obstacles to the
flow of energy in his patient's body, the feng shui practitioner
treats a troubled environment by removing impediments to its chi,
usually addressing certain physical features, from a rock in a landscape
to the door of a house. Should he decide, for example, that his clients
are adversely influenced by their parlor's view of a graveyard or a
used-car lot, he might suggest that they hide it behind an opaque screen
that still lets in the light. If they tend to avoid a certain dark
room or corner, they could make it more appealing with a lamp or plant.
Similarly, the right-handed person can move his phone to the right
side of his desk, so he doesn't have to twist to answer it, making
life seem more difficult than it need be. The general feng shui idea
is that if a setting doesn't make you feel welcome, tinker with it
until it does." (Gallagher,1993)
tea: "Nobody
seems quite sure when India began to drink tea, the accounts of early
travelers are silent on the subject. It's true that Marco Polo says
nothing about tea in China, either, but it seems likely that tea was
unknown in India before the seventeenth century. Adam Olearius in Persia
finds his hosts drinking 'tzai,' which he says they boil and drink
bitter with fennel, aniseed, cloves and sugar. 'But the Indians only
put it into seething water, and have for that purpose either Brass,
or Earthen pots, very handsomely made, which are put to no other use.'
These were 'Indians' in Persia... In those days tea wasn't grown in
India, so it had to come from Canton and Tibet, too far to be cheap.
It was a rich man's drink." (Goodwin,1991). "Along with zen
and kung-fu, Bodhidharma (440-528?) reportedly also brought tea (from
India) to China. To keep from falling asleep while meditating, he cut
off his eyelids, and where they fell, tea bushes grew. Since then,
tea has become the beverage of not only monks but everyone in the Orient." (Red
Pine,1987) "Some say that Boddhidharma's (sic) eyelids made the
poppy; some say the tea bush. Each was introduced as a medicine--tea
was a stimulant, opium as a painkiller. The one induced wakefulness;
the other drowsiness. Opium went up in smoke and tea went down the
drain. Tea won devotees, but opium enslaved." (Goodwin,Ibid.)
snarling dogs: J.
Weishaus, "All."
gentlemen's
steep feet: "The philosophy of Tea is not mere
aestheticism in the ordinary acceptance of the term, for it expresses
conjointly with ethics and religion our whole point of view about
man and nature. It is hygiene, for it enforces cleanliness; it
is economics, for it shows comfort in simplicity rather than in
the complex and costly; it is moral geometry, inasmuch as it defines
our sense of proportion to the universe. It represents the true
spirit of Eastern democracy by making all its votaries aristocrats
in taste." (Okakura,1989)
to render reality: "The
important thing is that they start out with what belongs to them, is
in them, and not with that which belongs to others or with what others
discovered....Let them not stop en route! A growing tree does not pose
itself problems of tree-culture. A young artist must forget painting
when he paints. That's the only way he will do original work. To blossom
forth a work of art must ignore, or rather forget all the rules." P.
Picasso. (Parrot,1948)
a more liable gift: "The
most important and delicate part of the tofu-making process is the
curdling. Hot soy milk comes flooding out of the pulp extractor into
a large wheeled vat. When the vat's full, the tofu maker takes up a
paddle and starts to pull through the liquid. Then a pitcher of magnesium
chloride (I'm sorry, it's called nigari so as not to scare off
the customers), an extract of sea water, is poured quickly into the
vat. Next comes the tricky part: the tofu maker must, without hesitation,
perform a perfect, flowing, tai-chi-like yin-yang figure with the paddle.
If this isn't performed correctly, the tofu comes out crumbly, or soft,
or strangely reeking of livestock." (Kaitenbach,1994)
ego
is place: "(The)Yolinga
have two words for being born. One literally translated has the
prosaic meaning 'come out head first', the other, dhawal-wuyangirr,
is a compound made out of dhawal 'named place' and guyangirr (sic?)
'think of'.' Literally, then, the word means 'to think of a named
place'. The concept directly associates the birth of the individual
with ancestral creativity, and begins the process of positioning
the subject within the landscape. Ancestral beings created the
world through transforming themselves into named places, and
each human life represents a continuation of that process." (Morphy,1995)
The
evolutionary roots: (Von Frisch,1983) "The most usual
purpose of building activities in animals is to make a home that
will give protection. Such a home may be constructed for the building
animal itself, for its progeny, for the family as a whole, or,
by social cooperation, for large colonies as, for instance, in
the case of the social insects. The enormous morphological differentiation
of animals and the great differences in their needs and faculties
are reflected in the great variety of the homes they build. But
homes are not the only things they construct. Some animals are
trappers that dig pitfalls or weave nets. The roads built by ants
and termites, and the remarkable dams erected by beavers to regulate
the water of streams to suit their needs are well known." (Ibid.)
Deleuze's
nomadology: (Deleuze,1986)
They
swore to wipe out the nomads, no thought for themselves,
five thousand in sable and brocade, gone to barbarian dust.
Pity them--these bones by the shores of the Uncertain River--
to those who dream in spring chambers, they are still men
(Ch'en Tao, "Song of Lung-hsi." B. Watson, translator.)
Architecture,
Alchemy and Beer: http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/weishaus/Writing/smith.htm
traditional
medicines: Folk medicine "is usually not a random
collection of beliefs and practices; rather, it constitutes a fairly
well-organized and fairly consistent theory of medicine. The body
of 'knowledge' on which it is based often includes ideas about
the nature of man and his relationships with the natural, supernatural,
and human environments. Folk medicine flourishes because it is
a functional and integrated part of the whole culture, and because
it enables members of cultural groups to meet their health needs,
as they define them, in ways that are at least minimally acceptable." (Saunders,1954)
you
keep wanting: (Estés,1993)
"free
soul: "For when the body is
sleeping the free-soul has more or less completely taken over the
role of the ego-soul: it is sometimes in the shape of the free-soul
that the sleeping individual has his dream-experiences." (Hultkrantz,1953) "In
the early stages of OBE (out-of-body experience) activity, you
seem to retain the form of your physical body--head, shoulders,
arms, legs, and so on. As you become more familiar with this other
state of being, you may become less humanoid in shape. It is similar
to gelatin when taken out of the mold. For a short period it retains
the form of the mold; then it begins to melt around the edges and
finally it becomes a liquid or a blob. When this happens in OBE,
it takes only a thought for you to become totally human again in
shape and form." (Monroe,1994)
he
has a vision: "But it is mankind itself, the
very man Mallermé aspires to be: man everywhere dying from the
disintegration of atoms or from the cooling-down of the sun and
murmuring--at the thought of a society he had wished to construct:
'Believe me, it was to be beautiful.'" (Sartre,1988)
coffee
grinder: "In the kitchen, I measured the beans
in a disposable plastic scoop molded in New Jersey and spooned
them into the grinder. The grinder was assembled in China from
imported steel, aluminum, copper, and plastic parts. It was powered
by electricity generated at the Ross Dam on the Skagit River. I
dumped the coffee in a gold-plated mesh filter made in Switzerland
of Russian ore. I put the filter into a plastic-and-steel drip
coffee maker. I poured eight ounces of tap water into the appliance.
The water came by pipe from the Cedar River on the west slope of
the Cascade Mountains..." (Durning,1995)
That
blue mountain: (H.D. Thoreau, Journal iii)
disruptive
subsets: "How can a biological neural net learn a
pattern like a face or a piece of music or the concept of God?
It changes millions of synapses. Zoom in closer and that means
it changes the release rates of neurotransmitters. Electrical spikes
flow down the cable and right before they pour into a neuron they
hit the synaptic junction. Here the electrical signal turns into
a chemical or neurotransmitter signal. The chemical diffuses across
a thin moat of brain juice and onto the surface of the neuron,
where it changes the electrical state of the neuron. Release rates.
Replenish rates. Bags of chemicals dumped into the brain juice." (Kosko,1993). "This
view 'holds that our experience is not a matter of combining at
one master site...all the separate components into one central
perception. As strange as it may sound, there is no master site,
no center of convergence.' Instead, many different sections--although
massively interconnected-- do their work simultaneously in parallel." (Suplec,1994)
"No, the
real is not cut up into regular patterns, it is sporadic, spaces
and times with straits and passes...Therefore I assume there are
fluctuating tatters; I am looking for the passage among these complicated
cuttings. I believe, I see that the state of things consists
of islands sown in archipelagoes on the noisy, poorly-understood
disorder of the sea,...the emergence of sporadic rationalities that
are not evidently nor easily linked. Passages exist, I know, I have
drawn some of them in certain works using certain operators...But
I cannot generalize, obstructions are manifest and counter-examples
abound." (Serres,1980)
Bay
trees: J. Weishaus, "Trees."
"despite
all their efforts 'to express themselves,' they only manage to
repeat a million times over the same expression, the same leaf.
In the spring, when tired of restraining themselves and no longer
able to hold out, they let loose a flood, a vomiting of green,
and think they are humming a tuneful hymn, coming out of themselves,
spreading out over all of nature, embracing it--they are still
only producing in thousands of copies the same note, the same word,
the same leaf. ("There is no way out for trees by means of
trees." F. Ponge. From, "Fauna and Flora.")
came
later to remain: (Eliade, 1958) "Who among the living
is capable of having more than sentiment in an old temple? Yes,
it is aesthetic, it is beautiful, but do you understand what an
antique God means? How is it possible that they came to the conclusion
that there was such a thing as Apollo or Ceres? Of course we can
be sentimental about it, but it is very rarely really experienced.
Old Wotan has now been resuscitated but what is Wotan to us? He
was experienced once, but now it is only historical sentimentality.
Our intellect, our discrimination, has killed all these things.
When the Christian missionaries cut down the oaks of Wotan and
destroyed the poles or sacred idols, it was their discriminating
minds which said it was impossible for a divine presence to be
present in such man-made figures, in such clumsy dirty idols smeared
with blood or dirt; their mental knife cut them down and they were
obliterated, they crumbled away. So here the old king is gone,
he is obsolete, and that is done with the knife. That means that
the idea of the Self is obliterated, sacrificed, and instead appears
a man..." (Jung,1976)
"reminded
me: (Leiris,1986) "Fred Astaire bare-headed in
a tuxedo, Fred Astaire in Prince of Wales check and a boater, Fred
Astaire in a bowler hat with an umbrella, Fred Astaire in a fedora
without gloves, Fred Astaire in a double-breasted suit wearing
gloves...there is a whole gallery of Astaires..." (Ibid.)
elegant
skeletons: "One professional faster, Giovanni
Bucci, became a sort of champion of the art in 1888 by fasting
in Florence for one whole month 'under true scientific observation'
He took up a position inside a huge barrel in a covered marketplace
and received every day a number of visitors, with whom he engaged
in long conversations and bandied jokes. Another artist of this
kind was Claude Ambroise Seurat, styled 'the living skeleton,'
who signed a contract according to which he had to appear in a
show six times a day, crawling on his arms and legs around a stage
while allowing spectators to seize him now and then by his waist
to get the feel of his extreme emaciation." (Grandleman,1991)
Chaplin
is not: (Duras,1990)
inspired
cripple: "Fulgentius, in his discussion of Achilles'
life (Mitologiarum, II, 7), mentions a belief among doctors
which he says goes back to the time of Orpheus: that veins ran
from the kidneys and genitals, through the thigh, to the heel.
Aristotle quotes the similar belief of Polybus (sic): "There
are four parts of veins. The first extends from the back of the
head...until it reaches the loins and passes on to the legs...to
the outer side of the ankles and on to the feet. Another pair...goes
on inside along the backbone, past the muscles of the loins, on
to the testicles, and onwards to the thighs...to the inside of
the ankles and to the feet. This concept of anatomy helps to explain
why foot wounds are so quickly fatal in mythology--not only to
Achilles, but to Pholus, Diarmuid, Paris--who dies not from his
head wound but a heal wound, and Talos--whose vein structure resembles
that described by the early physiologists: "He had a single
vein extending from his neck to his ankles. (Apollodorus, I ix,
26, Frazer's translation). It also explains also explains why the
myths contain so many leg wounds. They are the rationalized remains,
in sophisticated stories, of more primitive rituals, of live sacrifices
that involves the genital organs or legs..." (Hays,1971)
In
his void: "Desperate as he was, he thought: lost
is lost. But he could not help turning around once more in his
longing for the Good. How terribly embittered he had become against
the very longing, a longing that reveals that, just as a man in
all his defience has not power enough wholly to loose himself from
the God, because it is the stronger, so he has not even the power
wholly to will it." (Kierkegaard,1956)
not
in the portentous: G. Davenport, "The
Geography of Imagination" (Davenport,1981).
a
Buddhist ceremony:
May the divine
vidyadharas think of me
and with great love lead me on the path
When through intense tendencies I wander in samsara
on the luminous light-path of the innate wisdom
may vidyadharas and warriors go before me,
their consorts the dakinis behind me;
help me to cross the bardo's dangerous pathway
and bring me to the Pure Realm of Space.
(Fremantle, 1975)
what
Perseus: (Napier,1986)
before
the sight: From, "Quetzalcoatl's Hero Journey." In,
(Markman & Markman,1992).
sorting
through the midden: The fine spiritual endeavors,
as when Leslie Silko talks about how "cobs and husks, the
rinds and stalks and animal bones were not regarded by the ancient
(Pueblo) people as filth or garbage. The remains were merely resting
at a midpoint in the journey back to dust....because for the ancient
people all these things have spirit and being." L.M. Silko, "Landscape,
History, and the Pueblo Imagination." (Halpern,1987) These
fine sensibilities make no sense to the coarse world of Western
civilization, where today neighbors slam doors, rock music blasts
out an open door, car horns, sirens, beer cans and other waste
float on a skummy lake, along with floating ducks coming into heat
quacking, and expectant fishing lines. Here there's a stridency
of Christianity, the belief in an the straight lines of an ancient
book, not the circle, or spiral, of life and death.
marvels: R.
Smithson,"A Museum of Language in the Vicinity of Art." (Holt,1979).
the
soul of an individual: (Paulson,1964)
actual
entrances:
Saif-Baba asks
some animals why it is that "a mere cat and a tiny sparrow
can tell me things which I, with the miraculous benefits which I
have received, cannot see?" "That is simple," they
both said together. "It is that you have become so accustomed
to looking at things in only one way that your shortcomings are visible
even to the most ordinary mind." This worried Saif-Baba. "So
I could have found the Door of the Third Piece of Advice long ago,
if I had been properly attuned to it?" he asked. "Yes," said
the dog, joining the discussion. "The door has opened a dozen
times in the past years, but you did not see it. We did, but because
we are animals, we could not tell you." "Then how
can you tell me now?" "You can understand our speech
because you yourself have lately become more human. But you have
only one more chance, for age is overcoming you." (Shah,1967)
cars
hang corners: J. Weishaus, "Barn."
In
a recent interview: "So let's see: Joel-Peter
Witkin goes to Budapest and finds an asylum which houses profoundly
disturbed people to whom he cannot speak. He dresses them up in
costumes and takes their pictures, one of which is published in
Santa Fe and New York. He actually spent two weeks-two whole weeks--in
Budapest gaining the insight that we are to see in his pictures...." (Lawrence,1993)
Coney
Island: "People probably enjoyed
Coney for a number of reasons. First, the experience of the rides
and the bustling midway was structured, fast-paced and extroverted.
It allowed ordinary people to escape into a fantasy land. Second,
the atmosphere was sensuous and sensual. The crowds, the bands,
the lights, the food and drink were seductive in themselves; the
rides and amusements also offered the promise of sanitized sex.
Air jets in the funhouses lifted girls' skirts, couples were squeezed
together by the force of the rides, and the promise of the sign
by the roller coaster that, 'she will throw her arms around your
neck,' was not lost on the crowd....Fourth and finally, Coney's
technological wonders allowed people to participate vicariously
in the myth of progress, and to us technology for escape--as a
contrast to their common experience of growing constraints and
frustrations imposed upon daily life by the engine of technical
change." (Snow,1975)
A
boy named Willie: (Kazin,1994)
white,
of course: "Here one might be so dazzled by the new
brilliance of mind as to take white literally, as if white meant
only and literally one thing--whiteness--thereby forgetting the
multiplicity which made the whiteness possible. The multiplicity
must already have been built into the mind as the vibrations, shadings
and subtleties that are not only there in things but are there
in the eyes of the mind by which things are seen as images. It
is as if we enter the world without preconceptions, startled by
the phenomena where everything is given and nothing taken for granted.
To experience in this manner is to recover innocence--hence the
brilliant white lustre." (Hillman,1981)
white
soul: (Edinger,1985)
the
zoo: Zoos 'appeared only after the domestication of humanity.
There is no evidence of desire by any hunter-gatherer culture or
primitive, agriculturally based society to collect numbers of wild
animals for display. But the moment civilizations, wealthy royalty,
and cities appear in history, zoos also appear." (Luoma,1987).
To demonstrate their power over the world, the Romans staged "games" in
which they slaughtered thousands of animals. For much the same
reason, most all rulers kept large collections of animals, destroying
them at will. "The Roman games no longer exist, though bullfights
and rodeos (and circuses) follow in their tradition. Nowadays the
power of our leaders is amply demonstrated by their command of
nuclear weapons. Yet we still have zoos. Why?" (
Old
Town: "The first Spanish settlement near modern
Albuquerque was a farm, ranch and orchard built by Diego de Trujillo
on the site of Old Town in 1632. He named his small estate El
Paraje de las Huertas (Place of the Gardens)." On August
10, 1680, many of the Pueblos revolted against the cruelty of the
Spanish missionaries and colonists, kicking them back to Mexico.
Twelve years later they returned.
"Early in
1706 acting Governor Cuervo decided to found an administrative center
in the Middle Rio Grande Valley. He was drawn to an area...near the
present site of Old Town." Ten soldiers were stationed in the
area, handing out grants of land to the settlers. "On April 23,
1706, acting Governor Cuervo notified the king and Viceroy that he
had founded the Villa de San Francisco de Alburquerque:
I, Don Francisco
Cuervo y Valdéz, Knight of the Order of Santiago, Governor and
Captain General of this Kingdom and the province of New Mexico...certify
to His Majesty (whom my God guard for many years), to his Viceroys,
Presidents, Governors and other Officials: That I have founded
a Villa on the margin and meadows of the River of the North in
a place of good fields, waters, pastures, and timber, distant from
this villa of Santa Fe about twenty-two leagues, giving to it as
Parton the most glorious Apostle of the Indies San Francisco Xavier,
calling it and naming it the Villa of Alburquerque.
(The Albuquerque Museum,1990)
Coyote: (Snyder,1978)
the
shock of his life: Mokuyi-Kinasi, or Wolf Head, was "a
medicine man of the Blackfoot nation. He was one of the most celebrated
medicine men of the northeastern plains. He was feared and venerated
because he was thought to possess the power of thunder. His initiation,
triggered by a profound spiritual experience, took place during
his early years when he was on a journey with three friends. As
they were crossing the flat, treeless prairie, a storm broke over
them with tremendous force. Lightning shot down from heaven and
struck all around them. They took shelter in a nearby thicket,
cowering in the underbrush. The next thing Wolk Head remembers
was red and blue lightning bolts that bathed the scene in gleaming
light. Hours later, he awoke from a strange dream. He jumped up
and in his distress began running around in circles. He was bleeding
all over, and his whole body hurt. Looking down at his body, he
saw that he was stark naked. The lightning had hit them; one of
his companions was dead....After this near-dead experience, Wolf
Head developed extraordinary abilities in the truest sense of the
word." (Kalweit,1992)
the
hanged man: Addressing the Tarot card, The Hanged Man "hangs
suspended upside down from a cross of living wood. Arms folded
behind his back, forming a living cross with his unfettered leg,
his head hangs down in a bright cloud of deep entrancement. He
is in a position of reversal of mind, paying off old debts as he
surrenders to the redemption of absorption in matters both spiritual
and occult. This card in the upright position suggests the reversal
of a man's way of life. It is during this prophetic pause, that
he suspends decisions, as he verges on yielding completely to personal
consciousness. Reversed, the card implies false prophecy, arrogance
and resistance to spiritual influences...."Spiritual absorption
and surrender to occult/unconscious concerns have led me to write
this book, seeking knowledge of the patterns and powers that shape
our lives. Risking that my Hanged Man will come up in reversed
position, I will struggle with my arrogant temptation to false
prophecy. Only in this way may I learn whether I am headed for
Redemption or just 'hung up.'" (Kopp,1974)
Still
it is: (J. Grahn. From, "Spider")
If we knew the
point
where something is going to break,
where the thread of kisses will be cut,
where a look will no longer meet another,
where the heart will leap toward another place
we could put another point on that point
or at least go with it to its breaking.
(R. Juarroz. From, "Fourth Vertical Poetry (1969)."
I
have assembled: (Ou-yang Hsiu [1007-1072]) "He would
take only those books he needed to teach from, the poetry, the
criticism, small reference books...and when he made a gap in the
shelves he would push other books into the gap so that nothing
looked disarranged." (Shapiro,1990)
"you're
a pig:
Pigs must have
hot blood, they feel like ovens
Their bite is worse than a horse's--
They chop a half-moon clean out
They eat cinders, dead cats.
(T. Hughes. From, "View of a Pig.")
A few years later,
a former neighbor told me that the landlord had had a heart attack,
and a valve from the heart of a pig replaced his.
the
impression: (Thévoz,1994)