I feel, therefore I am

"I think, therefore I am is the statement of an intellectual who underrates toothaches. I feel, therefore I am is a truth much more universally valid, and it applies to everything that's alive. My self does not differ substantially from yours in terms of its thought. Many people, few ideas: we all think more or less the same, and we exchange, borrow, steal thoughts from one another. However, when someone steps on my foot, only I feel the pain. The basis of the self is not thought but suffering, which is the most fundamental of all feelings. While it suffers, not even a cat can doubt its unique and uninterchangeable self. In intense suffering the world disappears and each of us is alone with his self. Suffering is the university of egocentrism." - Milan Kundera, Immortality (205)

No wonder its afterglow survived defeat and death:

somnambulating waves caress the face of the moon

catastrophic appendages flounder in the distance

Tetris calculations obscure the vision of curators and ideologues

under the bridge, skirts and hairnets hide true natures to the detriment of the whole


basement ontologist

closed doors that creak

open legs that don't think

vanishing windows

an unearthed passion


producing varying effects
nipples that right off taxes

drunken candles and eaten airships

by the terror stricken vandals and their captors

and if then eyes could neither close nor cry

the end result would be pi times why and divided by the time you sang a Donny Hathaway song to a girl on a rainy summer night in Brooklyn

Wanderer by Antonio Machado

a terrific poem I stole from this fine blog I just discovered. Enjoy.

Wanderer, your footsteps are
the road, and nothing more;
wanderer, there is no road,
the road is made by walking.
By walking one makes the road,
and upon glancing behind
one sees the path
that never will be trod again.
Wanderer, there is no road--
Only wakes upon the sea.

"There is no surer method of evading the world than by following Art, and no surer method of linking oneself to it than by Art."

- Goethe
























crazy art work on a door in Barri Gotic, Barcelona
















Paul Gauguin's Arii Matamoe (The Royal End) at The Getty Center in Los Angeles




















Gaudi's Park Guell in Barcelona



















Nice, France



















Marina Del Rey, California



















View of San Francisco from Oakland, CA





















Pinocchio and the Bug in Le Suquet, the old quarter of Cannes, France
























Rogier van Otterloo draped in red on a bench. Haight, San Francisco

Songs: For An Untitled Lady

It's a lil past Valentine's Day but...

1. Shuggie Otis - Inspiration Information
2. Freddie McGregor - Apple Of My Eyes
3. Os Diagonais - Eliana
4. The Guinness Cassanovas - Ain't No Loving
5. Con Funk Shun - (Let Me Put) Love On Your Mind
6. Bobbi Humphrey - You Make Me Feel So Good
7. The Fuzz - I Love You For All Seasons
8. Bill Withers - Let Me Be The One You Need
9. Terry Callier - You And Me (Will Always Be In Love)
10. Conjunto Libre - Risque
11. Donny Hathaway - Misty
12. The Velvet Underground - I Found A Reason
13. The Beach Boys - Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)
14. Joao Gilberto - 's Wonderful
15. Natalie Cole - La Costa
16. John Betsch Society - Song For An Untitled Lady
17. Tim Maia - Contacto com o Mundo Racional
18. Linda Perhacs - Dolphin
19. Love Unlimited Orchestra - Whisper Softly

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QM4JZFO0

"The Mindmeld" and "Building My Own lil' Inferno"

what do you stare out at in midthought?
what tangents does your mind take?
are you more likely to think about sex or food at a random moment?
if you could have sex in huge pot of any food, what dish would you choose?

do you wear contacts?
were you a dorky child? were you popular? a cheerleader?
are you a fashionista, do you own 1000 pair of shoes?
did you get laid last night?
or are you a born again virgin?

how do you like to be touched?
bitten, smacked, licked, loved, massaged, cajoled, nibbled, crawled up slowly by the fingers like a spider

do you love the smell of lavender more than anything?
do you dream in chocolate?
do you tap your foot when you become impatient?
do you wonder how many times, like me, this ceiling fan above us revolves in a minute?

should we count? together?
now



or what if we sat opposite each other reading the same book, the same page, the same words at the same time, laughing at different intervals, turning our bodies, slinking or slouching in the chair like this to make the body comfortable, the mind flexible and free
would our enjoyment intensify, would we become preoccupied, would we fuse and meld together, the text building an ink-stained bridge between two unhappy quiet countries?

would we raise our eyes up from the text at the same time and meet eyes and maybe giggle like schoolchildren or return quickly and clumsily to the page in embarrassment or in the absence of a better idea, in order to escape Intimacy?

maybe our minds would dual, our swords would cross like words on a sunday paper or fingers in prayer or legs in meditation, our lips would meet like hands in applause or in a casual and meaningful embrace that people don't let go of so soon

our eyes would slide all around the dancefloor of each other like feet

it may be that what would make me cry would make you laugh and what would make you strong would make me weak and what would make you die would make me rise and wings would break and light would crack, sound would fold and sun go black
we'd both curse yoko ono and then go back to our separate ways

would i tell you your nose is too small and your hair is too yellow and there is too much gray in this place and that i don't appreciate the contrast it creates in the world (gray that is)?

would you agree, would you not care, would you stand to leave, would you shrink
do i ask too many questions?
people aren't prepared with answers most of the time
and they're afraid of what their spontaneous reactions might be
maybe too shallow and too imperceptive

maybe i don't wanna hear what's going on in you
i don't wanna know a damn thing about your pain or your darkness
maybe if the seal is broken and the gloves go off, and all the preapproved modes of behavior are done away with, things could get too ugly for me and i'd whimper like a dog being hit with a newspaper in the nose before i scamper home, having learned nothing and lost my fantasy for now after attempting to indulge it

did you run track, play volleyball, collect hello kitty memorabilia, watch baseball with your dad in the summer, play with polly pocket, join the chess club, learn card tricks, jump rope all recess long, paint with your fingers, wipe your nose with the back of your hand, smile more than you do now and without shame?

do your socks match your shoes and your pants and your panties do your pictureframes match your candlesticks and your coffeetable
how many times a week do you wish aloud things were less complicated?

i wish too, and i wish sensation were enough
i wish emptiness of the mind were a crime
and you were taxed if you had more money than books
penalized if you had more false self confidence than you groped for wisdom
more balls than common sense
more determination than talent

Happy Thedayafter Valentine's Day

"He ended up recommending to all of them . . . that they forget everything he had taught them about the world and the human heart, that they shit on Horace, and that wherever they might be they always remember that the past was a lie, that memory has no return, that every spring gone by could never be recovered, and that the wildest and most tenacious love was an ephemeral truth in the end." - Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude