Show Me the Crook of Your Arm, the Part From Which Blood is Most Likely Drawn

There are particular seasons that dictate the types of books I read.  The summer, for example, has never been the time for me to read books by Poe.

This year, however, this end-of-spring-beginning-of-summer cusp has placed a strange desire deep in my center.  I have been craving- of all things- to read of, and psychologically within, shadows.

It began with the book I mentioned a while ago, Carlos Ruiz Záfon's The Shadow of the Wind, a gothic and incredibly dark mystery of life, love, and literature. It continued on with Ben Catmull's Ghosts and Ruins, a black and white art book of gorgeous haunted houses  has their slow curling stories.

Presently, the theme pushes on with In Praise of Shadows, an essay written by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki that is, without a doubt, seducing me at night.  As it is fairly short, and has language one would wish to savor, I have only been reading it on nights that I am alone in my room- just before bed, with the window open and the night air pouring or pushing in.  

It is exactly where I want to be, and what I want to be reading.  While it does, indeed, feel strange to be reading such dark and charcoal-ed words during these days of sun-warmed skin and grass-stained knees, the soot of these stories is smearing exactly what needs to be reached inside of me.


k.


(photo: artwork of Magdalena Szymaniec- Hannibal á la Saint Sebastian) 

(The photo, of course, is a wink towards my recent introduction and fascination with True Detective mixed with the everlasting love of my chosen patron saint.)

The Everyday Work of Bodies

I can hear the water running in the apartment below mine. Perhaps it is a bathtub running at the late night end of a long day; perhaps it is the rush to launder tomorrow morning's work clothes. There is an occasional clunk. Besides that and the occasional sound of car tires splitting puddles on pavement, everything is quiet tonight.

I am thankful.  I have been wanting things to just slow down. To let me lay, as I am now, in my bedroom, typing a bit while I rub my legs together. It's a habit of mine and one of the free joys in life: to have recently shaved my legs, lotioned them, and lay across my blankets- on my side, elbow propping my arm up to prop my head up- and just enjoy the smoothness of my legs sliding against each other.

(It is the little things: Things that aren't quite perverse, but are still frowned upon in public.)

In any case, I have been thinking of the body-as-machine. Thinking about  disconnection  and mechanics. Thinking of how I do not like attention. I freeze within it and, when I do, I cannot melt again until I am here, in my room.

I've been disappointed in myself lately, and  just being kind of mean inside myself.  And when that happens, I know that it is time to read, and that it is time to connect the beautiful and thick gold ropes I have in my hands. Knot them together. Tighten them. Make sure that I am constructing- confirming- the safety net made of those who love me- to spread out below me as I perform these tricks.


The sound of a lonesome flag, centered at the top of a hill, flapping in the wind at night,

                                         --k.

Photo:  Artwork by Ron Pillar, New Language
Title: A vague reference to a Rodan album with a similar name

And Above All Else: Sissy That Walk

I don't know much about Roddy Doyle, but I've been reading him.  Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, to be exact. I am enjoying the simplicity and obviousness of his writing. It is something I've been needing, lately.   Here is a group of three sentences that I've enjoyed by him:

We were coming down our road.  Kevin stopped at a gate and bashed it with his stick.  It was Missis Quigley's gate; she was always looking out the window but she never did anything.

In any case, this afternoon, after a long yet strangely productive day in the sun by the water with a particular bikini-and-cowboy-hatted lad, I found a copy of Genet's Querelle, one of the few books of his I have yet to read. (To the right, an incredible blending of St. Sebastian mixed with the heavy hand of Genet's Querelle. Pun, indeed, intended.)

(pause)

Other than that, I've been a bit contemplative and generally internal as of late. This may come with working overnights (as I type this, I am attempting to keep myself awake until 6a). It may also come with the reconnection, disconnection, and overall curious beauty of life that has been falling like unceremonious confetti  as of late.  In the blur of its color splayed winter, one has little choice but to wonder in the face of its skies.


Be well; be loved

-k.


Theme song for the past two weeks, roughly:

People talkin since the beginning of time...

Take Me Down To You

I slip into your dreams, sometimes.

It is not by accident, nor is it by revenge.  I simply want to see you- the rise and fall of your chest.

I'm not sure why.

I sit on the end of your bed, legs folded, and watch you.  An obstinate angel or, simply, a stubborn intruder.

I watch the sands of sleep fall onto your face, and follow to see which sands stick, and which slide down your skin to lay at your side.

It's strange to think, in these dream-like states, that if the house were to go up in flames, I would not move, nor would I wake you.

(click on the photo: kill this by Yannis Angel via Apendixes tumblr)

The Pulsation Inside of My Mouth

Things feel red, lately.

Not red with anger, but red as in human.

Sexual. Messy. Carnal.

No matter how much I try and train my brain to be diligent and to follow the barks of self discipline, my body, with the slightest movement, will hand me a shredded pile of the leather I've tried to harness its wants and memories with.

It happens so quickly and easily.

A thought crosses my mind, and although I attempt to think myself away from it, my pulse has already quickened; the center of my palms already a damp want.

(pause)

Last night I was sitting at an open air cafe talking with the Spanish architect I have befriended.  Everything around us smelled of liquor and gravel. I was engrossed in our conversation and didn't notice the people on the street as they walked by the cafe's large windowless window, until one person walked by whose movements reminded me of someone I used to touch. And- like that- my chin snapped in the direction of the person as they walked by.  Following my gaze the Spanish architect asked, purely,

Do you know him?

The question didn't register right away. Then I shook my head trying, discreetly, to calm my body.

No,... no.  I thought it was someone I knew, and lifted a steady glass of water to my lips.



(photo : La Naissance des Pieuvres by Nathan Duarte via Gacougnol tumblr)

[This entry may be read listening to Idioteque somewhat loudly for the pounding and urgency of sound]

Bedroom Entanglement

Recently, I've been all about off-the-shoulder sweaters and glasses while reading late at night.

There is nothing better.

Lost-in-a-sweater with thigh high opaque socks, a spill of hair tied ridiculously on the top on my head, and panties as obscene as they are silky to be seen by no one but my locked bedroom door and tangle of sheets.

What can I say? I'm in my Book Romancer stage.  It's something I do from time to time when I feel like there have been too many people scratching at my door, talking at me on my phone, or simply expecting too much from me.  I reach my tipping point, grab the most brain-tantalizing book I can get my fingers on (The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafón as the case is, currently), and march directly into my room. I lock the door, shut off the phone, and make a promise to myself to never come out again.  I make vague checklists in my head pondering the viability of this plan between the chapters that I read (where will I pee? who will pay my rent? can one live off of books if one eats every page after they read it? i won't miss the outside world. is it cheating if I email to have a pizza delivered through my window?) and eventually, fall asleep: my defiant face pressed half upon my pillow, half upon the beauty of a thick and printed page.

(pause)

Other than that: I feel myself craving salt and pepper hair'ed adventures again as of late.  I am mid-air (think: trapeze), knees slipping from the novelty of fresh faced babes as my hands reach to grasp the smoke-laced creak and season of older spines.




Be well; be loved. 


-k.

(photo by reka nyari via slimgrape tumblr)

Deep Sea Diver, or, Message Bottles Bubbling Up From the Bottom of the Ocean

Yesterday I saw a photograph of a watch, an anniversary present, that had been found in a burned up van that was teetering on the edge of a cliff. Of course there is more to this story, but what is relevant to what I want to write, here, is that, aesthetically, it looked like something pulled out of the depths of the sea.

How things are submerged and then resurface has it's own murky history.  We push down into the pressured depths of memory at times, in order to search for particular lost or favorite images.  But there are other times that the memories surround us without our conjuring.  An instant and complete submersion. And what is seen in these instant envelopings can be as surprising as it is consuming.

What I cannot control (thoughts; memory) I research in order to understand.  It's childish, really.  Reading about the neurology of memory in hopes that some of these memories will fade away when, in honesty, I don't want them to.

I've thought about returning to that photo booth. White placards smelling of black markers.

But they have yet to make a photo booth that fits: One that plummets downward into the nautical abyss, equipped with a waterproof camera and adequate pop flash, its backdrop curtain staying put.



-k.


(image from airows tumblr)

[title is a nod towards the Angel Haze song I can't stop listening to, lately, for exact and general reasons.  Check it out, but ignore the video. (It's a lyric video and thus is just corny). Just listen, instead.]

The Fortune of a Black Winged Home Upon Your Shoulders

And as I sit by a vase holding seven bright yellow tulips to write to you, I want you to know that I have not forgotten. A mug of steaming mint tea, two ice cubes added and melted (the shit is always too damn hot and I'm always too damn impatient) next to me so that I may cup it with my hands from time to time to remind us both that I can feel.

Take the mug, wrap it with both hands, breathe mint deep the into my eyes; my nose. Swallow.

(pause)

I've had thieves try to convince me that they were my home.  Did they really think I would fall for it?  It's like experiencing something from a romance novel that has been reverse-engineered by an asshole: It's too easy to see.

Let me remind you that I am an expert witness.  And while I have yet to define or justify my expert status, I can tell you this: 

These eyes and this heart may love as fully as the bright of these tulips, but this dart-eyed crow upon my shoulder remembers what I have come from, and whispers reminders to me based upon the direction of my feet.  Cautions me.  Makes certain of the direction of my toes.

I may forgive as easily as a turn of the page, but this is coffin-closing different from returning to a rotten house disguised as a home.

When I write home- in pen; in thoughts- I know exactly who I am writing to.

(pause)

Glory be to the ink-spilt feathers that look over me. People find you leering and crude, but they secretly envy your loyalty and insight all the same.


be well; be loved.

-k.


(image credit to: cabinhome tumblr)

Why Stalking Victims Do Not Enjoy Anonymous Flowers and Other Should-Be-Obvious Shit

Most women have experienced some kind of violence by men.  Usually in multiple forms, on multiple occasions. This whole "acting like survivors of violence are new or rare" is bullshit, statistically and based-in-reality speaking.

I was talking with a friend of mine this morning about a book I read a long time ago.  The book said- in total binary and heteronormative language, but go with me here- that the main experiential difference between men and women is that a man's biggest fear with a woman is that she will laugh at him, while a woman's biggest fear with a man is that he will kill her.

To folks who did not grow up as girls/women and do not live as one:

Be aware of this huge ass difference, and let it inform your actions.




(photo credit: Kayama Matazo's Frozen Forest)