Lonely Entanglements

Here is a lyric/poem collage, it contains parts of lyrics by Deftones, Lhasa, and Cage; excerpts from the film, Gilda, and a poem by Pablo Neruda. The two photos are by Grace-Kim's series of pictures entitled, Love Hotel.

I'm Her New Cool Meat

Stop I'm drunk

Got you where I want you

Got you where I want you

Luminous mind, bright Devil

of absolute clusterings, of the upright noon--:

here we are at last, alone...

Stop I'm drunk

without loneliness,

far from the savage city's delirium.

But hate can be a very exciting emotion. Very exciting. Haven't you ever noticed that?...There is heat in it, that one can feel. Didn't you feel it tonight?...I did. It warmed me. Hate is the only thing that has ever warmed me.

Just as a pure line describes a dove's curve,

as the fire honors and nourishes peace,

so you and I made this heavenly outcome.

The mind and love live naked in this house.

Now my jaw and my teeth hurt. I'm choking from gnawing on the ball. And just before I come to move to the back of the car she makes me touch the machine. New murderer.

Lovely Lady Spider loves you best

Begs you to come live in her own nest

Feed you clothes you gives her heart to you

Just as pure...fire...nourishes peace...

Hate is the only thing that has ever warmed me.

Stop I'm drunk

Got you where I want you

Its like the sky opened and God handed you directly to me!

Furious dreams, rivers of bitter certainty,

decisions harder than the dreams of a hammer

flowed into the lovers' double cup,

Lonely Spider waiting in her web

Hoping she can catch some happiness

Then who should stumble into here but you

First untie me (Stop! I'm drunk) untie me for now. You said you would, right? And you were right (stop I'm drunk!)

Got you where I want you

Soon I'll let you go

Got you where I want you

Soon I'll let you go

until those twins were lifted into balance

on a scale: the mind and love, like two wings.

--So this transparency was built

Feeling like your heart is beating, its only for me!

Stop I'm drunk

Gilda Spins a Web

My Monthly Aresian Horoscope

March 21 - April 19

You will see a spider and you will recognize a fellow artist, and abstract designer, pattern-maker who creates elaborate, tenuous pieces whose sole function is in fact a practical one, nutrition. For this spider, like many others, spins its web to catch its meal; its meal is that which in turn keeps the spider from a morte fame.

Like many other Aries you do not kill spiders and have a very special appreciation for this insect that mainly feeds on other insects. You sit yourself seated and follow as the spider seemingly descends, suspended in air. You listen as the spider begins to sing you a song, its one you as an Aries have always known.

Spiders and What they Spin

I was watching Charlotte's Web with my niece last night. Or so the evening began, because as usually is the case, halfway through the film my two year old niece wanders off and I am left fully immersed, entangled as one rightfully should in Charlotte's Web.

I remember the story from third grade, Ms. Smith read it to us, or we read it with her. After the book we watched the movie. I don't think I've set eyes on either the book or the movie since. In the way that first impressions from childhood carry over into adulthood, sometimes even covertly, I remember a few things about the story. Charlotte, Wilbur, the messages on the web, Charlotte's death, and Wilbur's prize; vaguely are these plot points available to me yet I still found myself surprised by my reintroduction to a childhood story that I'd be lying if I said I cared at all about.

Reviewing Charlotte's Web I realized on some level, especially to an adult viewer, this story is about mortality. I also realized how much I hate Wilbur who has so hard a time dealing with that mortality. Not only does he fear dying but he is also selfish and naive, but then again so are children. The fear of dying, of course is okay, since he's a pig who is raised to be killed; I kind of get that but Wilbur also has a problem with Charlotte's death and the death of even the insects that are caught on Charlotte's web, which Charlotte herself gains nourishment from.

Charlotte is amazing, Debbie Reynolds supplies her voice. The lonely spider who spins a web and is at the same time, friend and philosopher to Wilbur. On the best song in the movie, titled Mother Earth and Father Time, she states,

How very special are we

For just a moment to be

Part of life's eternal rhyme

How very special are we

To have on our family tree

Mother Earth and Father Time

That about sums it up for me. How infinitely random that we fit into such an everlasting indefinition, definitely. To be a part of the universe on such microcosmic terms and yet contribute so absolutely to its macrocosmic orchestration is as clear as any reason why life is worth living. Camus talks of absurdism and the futility of life and why its still an experience worth experiencing even if its end result is nothing. Camus also talks of happiness as a side effect of dueling it out with futility,

What matters to me is a certain quality of happiness. I can only find it in a certain struggle with its opposite--a stubborn and violent struggle...

And about the consciousness of happiness while admitting the absurd:

Just as there is a moment when the artist must stop, when the sculpture must be left as it is, the painting untouched--just as a determination not to know serves the maker more than all the resources of clairvoyance--so there must be a minimum of ignorance in order to perfect a life in happiness. Those who lack such a thing must set about acquiring it; unintelligence must be earned.

Spiders know better than we do. The best creation is life and even though it ends it still happens. While it happens is all that matters.

Bunny Lake is _______

Bunny Lake is Missing - (1965) Directed by Otto Preminger

Starring Laurence Olivier, Carol Lynley, Keir Dullea

Otto Preminger is the master of opening titles. Anatomy of a Murder, The Man with the Golden Arm, and now Bunny Lake is Missing; the opening credits to these films are executed so stylishly, Preminger's choices for soundtracks and design are really something else, they weren't ahead of their time (I won't settle for that cliche) No, Otto won't be simply judged as anachronism, he just made others notice how behind the times they were.

As good as the opening credits are, they are just that, the opening credits; and therefore only the beginning of this great film. Black and white never looked so good, unsteady cameras and long shots that kept you with unease while you attempt to resolve for yourself what's happening to the main character, Ann Lake, played by Carol Lynley. Preminger keeps giving you information, but its never enough to piece it together before the film does it for you, this is a good thing. I'd definitely plan on owning and viewing this film many more times.

There's something to be said about films in the 60s and the cameras that were available at that time, as well as cinemascope and color. Especially color, by the time this film was released, color films were finally at a place where it truly worked, this happened sometime in the 50s and it only improved. The manner in which this affected black and white films is both good and bad. On one hand, the cameras and cinemascope format made for such a beautiful black and white image on screen, in the hands of a good director and cinematographer (in thos case Denys Coop), this was such a treasure to the viewer. Orson Welles, I think once said, that a beautiful could not be made in color. I partially agree, I believe they could definitely be made now or even as early as the late 70s but in the 50s and 60s, this was the height of the power of black and white films. Proof of this, for me, is found in the fact that if you shoot a black and white film today it would still look as if it were filmed in the 50s or 60s. I could be wrong...

I'm no director or film buff.

I'm just a jerk with two eyes and an ego.

She Makes Me Touch the Machine

The Lady from Shanghai - (1948) Directed by Orson Welles

Starring Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles

Not too crazy about the story, even though it does get better as the plot thickens. Welles still manages an interesting film through his direction.

The Death Dance

Welcome my dear to the last 31 days of the year. The first ten years of the 21st century are now coming to a close. Celebrate my dear, because we'll never see the close of the first decade of another century, or rarer still, another millennium again.

A Happy Death

I'm Going In

by Lhasa De Sela

from the album Lhasa,

released Apr. 2009

When my lifetime had just ended

and my death had just begun

I told you I'd never leave you

but I knew this day would come

Give me blood for my blood wedding

I am ready to be born

I feel new as if this body

were the first I'd ever worn

I need straw for the straw fire

I need hard earth for the plow

Don't ask me to reconsider

I am ready to go now

I'm going in, I'm going in

This is how it starts

I can see in so far

but afterwards we always forget

who we are

I'm going in, I'm going in

I can stand the pain

and the blinding heat

'cause I won't remember you

the next time we meet

You'll be making the arrangements

you'll be trying to set me free

Not a moment for the meeting

I'll be busy as a bee

You'll be talking to me

but I just won't understand

I'll be falling by the wayside

you'll be holding out your hand

Don't you tempt me with perfection

I have other things to do

I didn't burrow this far in

just to come right back to you

I'm going in, I'm going in

I have never been so ugly

I have never been so slow

These prison walls get closer now

the further in I go

I'm going in, I'm going in

I like to see you from a distance

and just barely believe

and think that

even lost and blind

I still invented love

I'm going in, I'm going in

I'm going in