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| Poem | ||
| to James Schuyler | ||
| There I could never be a boy, | ||
| though I rode like a god when the horse reared. | ||
| At a cry from mother I fell to my knees! | ||
| there I fell, clumsy and sick and good, | ||
| though I bloomed on the back of a frightened black mare | ||
| who had leaped windily at the start of a leaf | ||
| and she never threw me. | ||
| I had a quick heart | ||
| and my thighs clutched her back. | ||
| I loved her fright, which was against me | ||
| into the air! and the diamond white of her forelock | ||
| which seemed to smart with thoughts as my heart smarted with life! | ||
| and she'd toss her head with the pain | ||
| and paw the air and champ the bit, as if I were Endymion | ||
| and she, moon-like, hated to love me. | ||
| All things are tragic | ||
| when a mother watches! and she wishes upon herself | ||
| the random fears of a scarlet soul, as it breathes in and out | ||
| and nothing chokes, or breaks from triumph to triumph! | ||
| I knew her but I could not be a boy, | ||
| for in the billowing air I was fleet and green | ||
| riding blackly through the ethereal night | ||
| towards men's words which I gracefully understood, | ||
| and it was given to me | ||
| as the soul is given the hands | ||
| to hold the ribbons of life! | ||
| as miles streak by beneath the moon's sharp hooves | ||
| and I have mastered the speed and strength which is the armor of the world. | ||
| Frank O'Hara | ||
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CDs I purchased, played repeatedly, and enjoyed in the past few months: D.J. Sprinkles, Takemitsu film scores, Cole Porter sung by everyone who was anyone in 1991 & Boulez (handily there, all in one box, with the resplendent early recording of marteau). |
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Christmas card. Some years I steal a few hours from work and create one of these with Lilypond. I don't mail them out or anything - just pass them out by hand.
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I heard this on the radio at lunch today...
| Ecclesiastes | |
| The trick is that you’re willing to help them. | |
| The rule is to sound like you’re doing them a favor. | |
| The rule is to create a commission system. | |
| The trick is to get their number. | |
| The trick is to make it personal: | |
| No one in the world suffers like you. | |
| The trick is that you’re providing a service. | |
| The rule is to keep the conversation going. | |
| The rule is their parents were foolish, | |
| their children are greedy or insane. | |
| The rule is to make them feel they’ve come too late. | |
| The trick is that you’re willing to make exceptions. | |
| The rule is to assume their parents abused them. | |
| The trick is to sound like the one teacher they loved. | |
| And when they say “too much," | |
| give them a plan. | |
| And when they say “anger” or “rage” or “love," | |
| say “give me an example.” | |
| The rule is everyone is a gypsy now. | |
| Everyone is searching for his tribe. | |
| The rule is you don’t care if they ever find it. | |
| The trick is that they feel they can. | |
| Khaled Mattawa, b. 1964 | |
The 60 Most Surprising Photos Of 2013
Children beating a gay rights activist protesting in Russia, following the proposal of a new law that would effectively prohibit gay rights rallies. http://all-that-is-interesting.com/60-surprising-photos-2013/3/#IXeoAbrRLKXWtLda.21
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Sunday Morning
Teal blue and grey, and
several shades of orange -
a history of ties.
Half Windsor or full?
The fingers will know.
Earlier they stepped
through several keys - tunes
by Lowell Mason.
A quick text to Zorn:
We'll have a descant,
so bring your horn today.
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fishing for airline tickets
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Israel's niece is getting married in the California wine country in February. We both wanted to go if we could travel inexpensively. Nothing was quite low enough the few times I checked. But last night when Virgin suddenly had $132 one-ways from DFW to SFO, I pounced: $550 for two roundtrips from DFW to SFO with $24 of travel insurance thrown in. I'm using frequent flyer miles for my commute flights to Dallas, so .5K is the total for 6 flights. Not too bad. |
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I was off work from Christmas Day to January 5th. I had been plagued with a skin disorder for a little over two months. A dermatologist put me on Prednisone three days before Christmas Eve, and it was a relief! to get back to normal. I spent Christmas day and most of the weekend in Fort Worth, then flew back home to quickly play a service, then packed & flew to San Francisco for a week of just walking around. I implored Israel to come with me but he was determined to use the time (re)photographing New Mexico. My guess is that I walked about 12 - 15 miles a day. I only used the rental car on two days. I used the transit system intermittently. I tried to see a movie every day. Lots of art. Good food. Nice drafts all over town in San Francisco. I even managed to have a little fun.
Museums: Hopper in Dallas, the new Piano Pavilion @ the Kimbell, the vapid Mexican show @ the Modern in Fort Worth, the charming Lobel show @ the Contemporary Jewish Museum, Anders Zorn and Matisse @ the Legion of Honor, and most spectacularly - the Hockney and Bulgari shows @ the de Young. If you have a chance to see them, you should not pass it up!
Movies:
Dallas: American Hustle, Inside Llewyn Davis. Fort Worth: The Wolf of Wall Street. San Francisco: Reaching for the Moon, Her, Breakfast at Tiffany's (@ the Castro), The Past, Raising Arizona (@ the Castro), Blue is the warmest color.
A flickr set.
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These are the CDs I acquired in 2013 that I liked the best and listened to the most: Morton Feldman's Triadic Memories and For Samuel Beckett, Nick Edwards - Plekzationz, Lusine's A Certain Distance, and Wolfgang Rihm's Jagden und Formen. Morton Feldman was a composer that I'm afraid I used to dismiss. How foolish was that. The Nick Edwards CD is obscure. I picked it up at Wall of Sound in Seattle. I discovered Lusine using Shazam, since then I've downloaded or bought most of his CDs. A Certain Distance is my favorite. There is very little pop/techno/electronica I can listen to more than once or twice. Lusine has become a large exception to that. I wish I had more time! to explore electronic music for myself. |
Parsifal in Chicago
...the road was denied me by a curse that made me stray...
Doch ach! den Weg des Heiles nie zu finden, in pfadlosen Irren trieb ein wilder Fluch mich umher.
Last May,
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
muckefuck surprised me with a text message enquiring if I was coming to Bear Pride. I had flight reservations but wasn't sure my annual trip was possible this year. I did express a desire to visit Chicago sometime during the Lyric Opera's season, inspired partly by his regular opera reviews. Later this fall, it was slim pickings when I was scrambling at the last minute to find some remnant of the Wagner bicentennial. Only two events left - both new productions of Parsifal, one in London, one in Chicago. So I opted for Chicago and made some reservations.And surprisingly it all came about and we went to the opera together. It was a pleasure to be in
muckefuck's affable company, to be in his civilized home, to meet the warm & thoughtful people in his life, and to ramble around on a sunny Sunday afternoon.About the Parsifal production, I can only say how much it moved me. The staging was a little too eclectic for my taste, but it played its part to set afloat the Medieval tale with its most sublime music.
A flickr set from the weekend.
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An update to an older post: Kira's movie "Prisoners" opens today in US. In this coming week also in London,Paris,Zurich,Berlin,San Sebastian.
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Haven't done this in a while! Of the many CDs I acquired last year, these are some of my favorites: Paul Lewis' Schubert is without peer. The sonatas themselves are transcendental. Pierre Hantaï's Well-tempered Clavier on the harpsichord is the best recording I've ever heard of the piece. Alexandre Tharaud's Scarlatti is charming, lively, & thoroughly Gallic. I bought the re-release of Elliott Carter's early Nonesuch albums when he died last year to revisit these pieces & their original performances. |
call me maybe
god i'm sick today, but nevermind that. you should watch this video before Youtube takes it down: