...and something to fall asleep by
abandoned mcdonald's gazebo, photgraphed by dylan chatain.
good night, everybody.
(thanks to noah beil (via my love for you is a stampede of horses) for leading me here)
entering my pablo neruda period
poetry has been a great part of my reading life in the past few years, but for whatever reason i'd never jumped into pablo neruda until very recently (and even now, only barely). he finally came into my life a couple of months ago by accident, when i stumbled upon this amazing album of "veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada," or "twenty love poems and a song of despair." go here to listen to the first poem of the collection, and just tell me you couldn't listen to that voice (neruda's?) speaking all day long. and i don't even know what he's saying yet.
and then just today i found this:
a 2007 neruda collection with cover design by rodrigo corral and marion bantjes. their work here is so lovely that i am determined to make this the first official neruda book in my collection--and soon. it's about damn time i experience this whole lot of love and a little despair for myself.
(all thanks to it's nice that for my winding road to this book.)
those things that stick
MOVIES: last night my aunt, uncle, rhan and i went to FIRST SIGHT SCENE, an ongoing program of experimental films run by film forum los angeles. it was both my first trip to a film forum event and my first experience at the egyptian theatre, which is lovely and old and exciting. rhan noted that the egyptian was constructed specifically for the release of "ben hur." whoa. not a bad way to spend a rainy sunday night.
the program overall left me a little flat, though i am inspired to see that these events are going on and that there's such an active audience for them. there were a few standouts, however, my favorites being "stare gently" by erik deutschman, "the old noise" by gwenaelle gobe, and, finally, "five more minutes" by dena decola and karin e. wandner.
i need to say something about "five more minutes," because of all the films i saw last night, this one has lodged in my brain the most. in it, two women (dena and karin, the filmmmakers) are acting out some sort of mother/child fantasy, and it is unclear at first whether we are witnessing their psychosexual drama at play or something else enitirely... the result is jarring, intimate and inarguably memorable. and moving, it would seem-- just ask the leggy girl sitting to my left at the screening, whose sniffling and wiping-away-of-tears nearly derailed me from the last five minutes. just let the mascara run, girl.
anyhow, worth seeing out should you ever get the opportunity. the film has received resounding endorsements from both ray carney and miranda july. reason enough?
MUSIC: since seeing them open for the blow & mirah last friday (which was a great, emotional journey of a show) been listening to a lot of HIGH PLACES and their generously downloadable tracks on myspace.
WORDS: i read it first some weeks or months ago, but i am still so moved by THE WRONG KIND OF INSURANCE by john ashbery (and by john ashbery in general). with lines like
All of our lives is a rebus
Of little wooden animals painted shy,
Terrific colors, magnificent and horrible,
Close together.
or
We too are somehow impossible, formed of so many
different things,
Too many to make sense to anybody.
We straggle on as quotients, hard-to-combine
Ingredients, and what continues
Does so with our participation and consent.
"what continues does so with our participation and consent."
listen to john ashbery reading this poem and others in their entirety here.
thank you, john ashbery. much love.
orson
I was finished with a project that had consumed me.
I was over-tired and not feeling so great
I fell into a well...
I was thinking about John Huston and searched for anything about him on youtube
that's when I found this great last interview with Orson Welles
go here
special thanks to matt7333
there are more great interviews on his channel.
watch and be inspired
r s e
what i have to work with
the most stunning addition to our lives in los angeles so far has been the combination pictured above: first, my new and beautiful computer, and second, the stately table where it lives (and purrrrrs).
it's a shame that i don't have a good image of what this office space (or kitchen) used to look like, because the contrast is remarkable. as rhan says, this table will be with us for the rest of our lives. when i'm away lately, i miss it like a friend.
