Monday, August 31, 2020

Home

Greetings regular readers,

I am happy to report that after eight days of evacuation, being away from our home and neighborhood, not knowing if we would have either to return to, we are safely back home. We owe an eternal debt of gratitude to our friends who took us in during this terrifying time full of anxiety and worry. And thanks to all who reached out to check in on us. We appreciate your concern and good wishes.

And most of all, an enormous thank you to the men and women of Cal Fire who worked tirelessly, back to back shifts at the start of the fires, for their bravery and dedication.

Finally, my heart goes out to all those in our neighboring areas who have lost their homes and all their possessions.

If you can, consider donating to these institutions that are helping those who have lost homes.

--California Community Foundation Wildfire Relief Fund
--California Wildfire Relief Fund sponsored by Go Fund Me (they organize the donations into grants to individuals, organizations, and communities that have either been impacted themselves or are dedicated to helping those affected by the California wildfires)
--Monterey County Community Resilience Program
--North Valley Community Foundation Wildfire Relief and Recovery Fund

JEF

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Wildfires

Dear regular readers,

If you have read my short bio to the right, you have seen that I am a California resident--Northern California to be exact. And I have been affected by the horrific, unprecedented wildfires that are raging throughout our state.

The last several days of postings were ones I wrote and scheduled last week, before the destruction began. I have been displaced from my home and my neighborhood, and we as well as an enormous portion of Northern California are under mandatory evacuation, not allowed to return until an all clear has been given by Cal Fire and government authorities.

Because of this, I am taking a little break from the blog--as well as my career and most of my life--to reserve my mental and emotional energy in order to check the status of my home, monitor the fires, and track the daily progress. Seems like things are moving in a good direction, but it could be up to 2 weeks before I am back in my home, if I have one to return to, knock wood. We are worried and frightened but hopefully soon I will be knocking the wood of my own home with joy and relief.

Of course my thoughts and utter empathy are with those whose homes are destroyed.

Stand by, and if you have a spare burst of mental energy, send it our way and envision the fire getting smaller and smaller...

JEF

PS: I have some sporadic posts already written and queued up starting September 1st. I will let you all know when I am officially back and safe.

Thursday, August 20, 2020

BEAUTY: Collage and Painting--Darla McKenna

Darla McKenna uses classic typography, typeface, and text as a basis for her satisfying paintings and collage work. I love how she recalls the text-based Cubist works of Georges Braque and Picasso.


Top to bottom: Coronet; Free Age; July; Let's Go; Mmmm...Good; Quintessential; Sherbert [sic]; Sleeper; Swell; Taking Stock

https://www.instagram.com/darla.mckenna/

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

"2020: An Isolation Odyssey"

Brooklyn filmmaker, artist, and designer Lydia Cambron has created a wonderfully filmic, shot-for-shot remake of the last section of Kubrick's iconic film "2001: A Space Odyssey." She explains:

"2020: an isolation odyssey is a reenactment of the iconic finale of 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968). Restaged in the context of home quarantine, the journey through time adapts to the mundane dramas of self-isolation–poking fun at the navel-gazing saga of life alone and indoors.

This project began in late March and was completed in late May, spanning the height of the pandemic in New York City. Staged in a one bedroom Brooklyn apartment, 2020 presents an obvious similarity to the domestic setting of 2001. The stacked videos and synced movements also reveal parallels in emotion. The narrowness of daily life in a single space, transitioning from confusion to acceptance, a distorted sense of time, and ‘returning’ after a transformational event–all experiences analogous to quarantine.

The adapted version delineates the passing of time through wardrobe rather than age, identifying each phase of the character’s journey with a product of self care or PPE. Tools of private entertainment or self betterment are also used as props, questioning our confidence in products and productivity as anchors during times of uncertainty. Multitasking while #wfh, conjuring guilt or longing with unused exercise equipment, your entire being reduced to a measure of time–these scenes all illustrate the absurd comedy of trying to maintain control during this unprecedented and unpredictable time."

Do stick around for the hilarious credits at the end!



http://lydiacambron.com/

Tuesday, August 18, 2020

The First Lady at the DNC, 2020

Michelle Obama spoke beautifully at the Democratic National Convention:


Good evening, everyone. It's a hard time, and everyone's feeling it in different ways. And I know a lot of folks are reluctant to tune into a political convention right now or to politics in general. Believe me, I get that. But I am here tonight because I love this country with all my heart, and it pains me to see so many people hurting.

I've met so many of you. I've heard your stories. And through you, I have seen this country's promise. And thanks to so many who came before me, thanks to their toil and sweat and blood, I've been able to live that promise myself.

That's the story of America. All those folks who sacrificed and overcame so much in their own times because they wanted something more, something better for their kids.

There's a lot of beauty in that story. There's a lot of pain in it, too, a lot of struggle and injustice and work left to do. And who we choose as our president in this election will determine whether or not we honor that struggle and chip away at that injustice and keep alive the very possibility of finishing that work.

I am one of a handful of people living today who have seen firsthand the immense weight and awesome power of the presidency. And let me once again tell you this: the job is hard. It requires clear-headed judgment, a mastery of complex and competing issues, a devotion to facts and history, a moral compass, and an ability to listen—and an abiding belief that each of the 330,000,000 lives in this country has meaning and worth.

A president's words have the power to move markets. They can start wars or broker peace. They can summon our better angels or awaken our worst instincts. You simply cannot fake your way through this job.

As I've said before, being president doesn't change who you are; it reveals who you are. Well, a presidential election can reveal who we are, too. And four years ago, too many people chose to believe that their votes didn't matter. Maybe they were fed up. Maybe they thought the outcome wouldn't be close. Maybe the barriers felt too steep. Whatever the reason, in the end, those choices sent someone to the Oval Office who lost the national popular vote by nearly 3,000,000 votes.

In one of the states that determined the outcome, the winning margin averaged out to just two votes per precinct—two votes. And we've all been living with the consequences.

When my husband left office with Joe Biden at his side, we had a record-breaking stretch of job creation. We'd secured the right to health care for 20,000,000 people. We were respected around the world, rallying our allies to confront climate change. And our leaders had worked hand-in-hand with scientists to help prevent an Ebola outbreak from becoming a global pandemic.

Four years later, the state of this nation is very different. More than 150,000 people have died, and our economy is in shambles because of a virus that this president downplayed for too long. It has left millions of people jobless. Too many have lost their health care; too many are struggling to take care of basic necessities like food and rent; too many communities have been left in the lurch to grapple with whether and how to open our schools safely. Internationally, we've turned our back, not just on agreements forged by my husband, but on alliances championed by presidents like Reagan and Eisenhower.

And here at home, as George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and a never-ending list of innocent people of color continue to be murdered, stating the simple fact that a Black life matters is still met with derision from the nation's highest office.

Because whenever we look to this White House for some leadership or consolation or any semblance of steadiness, what we get instead is chaos, division, and a total and utter lack of empathy.

Empathy: that's something I've been thinking a lot about lately. The ability to walk in someone else's shoes; the recognition that someone else's experience has value, too. Most of us practice this without a second thought. If we see someone suffering or struggling, we don't stand in judgment. We reach out because, "There, but for the grace of God, go I." It is not a hard concept to grasp. It's what we teach our children.

And like so many of you, Barack and I have tried our best to instill in our girls a strong moral foundation to carry forward the values that our parents and grandparents poured into us. But right now, kids in this country are seeing what happens when we stop requiring empathy of one another. They're looking around wondering if we've been lying to them this whole time about who we are and what we truly value.

They see people shouting in grocery stores, unwilling to wear a mask to keep us all safe. They see people calling the police on folks minding their own business just because of the color of their skin. They see an entitlement that says only certain people belong here, that greed is good, and winning is everything because as long as you come out on top, it doesn't matter what happens to everyone else. And they see what happens when that lack of empathy is ginned up into outright disdain.

They see our leaders labeling fellow citizens enemies of the state while emboldening torch-bearing white supremacists. They watch in horror as children are torn from their families and thrown into cages, and pepper spray and rubber bullets are used on peaceful protestors for a photo-op.

Sadly, this is the America that is on display for the next generation. A nation that's underperforming not simply on matters of policy but on matters of character. And that's not just disappointing; it's downright infuriating, because I know the goodness and the grace that is out there in households and neighborhoods all across this nation.

And I know that regardless of our race, age, religion, or politics, when we close out the noise and the fear and truly open our hearts, we know that what's going on in this country is just not right. This is not who we want to be.

So what do we do now? What's our strategy? Over the past four years, a lot of people have asked me, "When others are going so low, does going high still really work?" My answer: going high is the only thing that works, because when we go low, when we use those same tactics of degrading and dehumanizing others, we just become part of the ugly noise that's drowning out everything else. We degrade ourselves. We degrade the very causes for which we fight.

But let's be clear: going high does not mean putting on a smile and saying nice things when confronted by viciousness and cruelty. Going high means taking the harder path. It means scraping and clawing our way to that mountain top. Going high means standing fierce against hatred while remembering that we are one nation under God, and if we want to survive, we've got to find a way to live together and work together across our differences.

And going high means unlocking the shackles of lies and mistrust with the only thing that can truly set us free: the cold hard truth.

So let me be as honest and clear as I possibly can. Donald Trump is the wrong president for our country. He has had more than enough time to prove that he can do the job, but he is clearly in over his head. He cannot meet this moment. He simply cannot be who we need him to be for us. It is what it is.

Now, I understand that my message won't be heard by some people. We live in a nation that is deeply divided, and I am a Black woman speaking at the Democratic Convention. But enough of you know me by now. You know that I tell you exactly what I'm feeling. You know I hate politics. But you also know that I care about this nation. You know how much I care about all of our children.

So if you take one thing from my words tonight, it is this: if you think things cannot possibly get worse, trust me, they can; and they will if we don't make a change in this election. If we have any hope of ending this chaos, we have got to vote for Joe Biden like our lives depend on it.

I know Joe. He is a profoundly decent man, guided by faith. He was a terrific vice president. He knows what it takes to rescue an economy, beat back a pandemic, and lead our country. And he listens. He will tell the truth and trust science. He will make smart plans and manage a good team. And he will govern as someone who's lived a life that the rest of us can recognize.

When he was a kid, Joe's father lost his job. When he was a young senator, Joe lost his wife and his baby daughter. And when he was vice president, he lost his beloved son. So Joe knows the anguish of sitting at a table with an empty chair, which is why he gives his time so freely to grieving parents. Joe knows what it's like to struggle, which is why he gives his personal phone number to kids overcoming a stutter of their own.

His life is a testament to getting back up, and he is going to channel that same grit and passion to pick us all up, to help us heal and guide us forward.

Now, Joe is not perfect. And he'd be the first to tell you that. But there is no perfect candidate, no perfect president. And his ability to learn and grow—we find in that the kind of humility and maturity that so many of us yearn for right now. Because Joe Biden has served this nation his entire life without ever losing sight of who he is; but more than that, he has never lost sight of who we are, all of us.

Joe Biden wants all of our kids to go to a good school, see a doctor when they're sick, live on a healthy planet. And he's got plans to make all of that happen. Joe Biden wants all of our kids, no matter what they look like, to be able to walk out the door without worrying about being harassed or arrested or killed. He wants all of our kids to be able to go to a movie or a math class without being afraid of getting shot. He wants all our kids to grow up with leaders who won't just serve themselves and their wealthy peers but will provide a safety net for people facing hard times.

And if we want a chance to pursue any of these goals, any of these most basic requirements for a functioning society, we have to vote for Joe Biden in numbers that cannot be ignored. Because right now, folks who know they cannot win fair and square at the ballot box are doing everything they can to stop us from voting. They're closing down polling places in minority neighborhoods. They're purging voter rolls. They're sending people out to intimidate voters, and they're lying about the security of our ballots. These tactics are not new.

But this is not the time to withhold our votes in protest or play games with candidates who have no chance of winning. We have got to vote like we did in 2008 and 2012. We've got to show up with the same level of passion and hope for Joe Biden. We've got to vote early, in person if we can. We've got to request our mail-in ballots right now, tonight, and send them back immediately and follow-up to make sure they're received. And then, make sure our friends and families do the same.

We have got to grab our comfortable shoes, put on our masks, pack a brown bag dinner and maybe breakfast too, because we've got to be willing to stand in line all night if we have to.

Look, we have already sacrificed so much this year. So many of you are already going that extra mile. Even when you're exhausted, you're mustering up unimaginable courage to put on those scrubs and give our loved ones a fighting chance. Even when you're anxious, you're delivering those packages, stocking those shelves, and doing all that essential work so that all of us can keep moving forward.

Even when it all feels so overwhelming, working parents are somehow piecing it all together without child care. Teachers are getting creative so that our kids can still learn and grow. Our young people are desperately fighting to pursue their dreams.

And when the horrors of systemic racism shook our country and our consciences, millions of Americans of every age, every background rose up to march for each other, crying out for justice and progress.

This is who we still are: compassionate, resilient, decent people whose fortunes are bound up with one another. And it is well past time for our leaders to once again reflect our truth.

So, it is up to us to add our voices and our votes to the course of history, echoing heroes like John Lewis who said, "When you see something that is not right, you must say something. You must do something." That is the truest form of empathy: not just feeling, but doing; not just for ourselves or our kids, but for everyone, for all our kids.

BEAUTY: Painting--Jan Voss

The imagery of painter Jan Voss is intriguing--despite the seeming chaos, each work is highly organized in its own way. The doodle-y lines and dense composition remind me of the works of Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring and also bring to mind a kind of fantasy comic book and typography collage, while Artsy says his work is aligned with Wassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee.


Top to bottom: A Mix of Tricks; Approximation I; Deep Dip; Followers; L'attrape-couer; Ratures; Sur la bonne voie; Un K isolé; untitled; untitled

Voss does not have a dedicated site but he is listed on Artsy and Artnet.
http://www.artnet.com/artists/jan-voss/
https://www.artsy.net/artist/jan-voss

Monday, August 17, 2020

Absentee ballots don't need to be returned through the mail. Here are other options.

This is very valuable information. Please pass it along to all who might need to know this. As long as the Fascist-in-Chief is trying to actively PREVENT people from voting by sabotaging the postal service, there ARE other ways to get your ballot counted. If you are worried about COVID and do not want to or cannot vote in person on voting day perhaps for a reason other than COVID, there are other places you can drop off your ballot BEFORE the election. Here in California, in addition to numerous drop boxes in my county, I can return my ballot anytime before election day to my county clerk's office. Some states even allow a proxy to drop it off for you. Read below to find out more! Don't let the Monster thwart your vote for Biden.

Absentee ballots don't need to be returned through the mail. Here are other options.
BY SOPHIE LEWIS

AUGUST 15, 2020 / 12:59 PM / CBS NEWS

As the United States Postal Service faces a financial crisis and nationwide in-person voting seems less and less likely due to the coronavirus pandemic, voters around the country are concerned that their votes will be compromised. But absentee ballots do not need to be returned through the mail — there are several other options to make sure your ballot arrives on time.

President Trump requested an absentee ballot himself, but his positions on funding USPS and voting-by-mail have been inconsistent. And on Friday, USPS warned 41 states that it may not be able to deliver all mail-in ballots on time.

According to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, casting a ballot using a voting machine at a polling place has declined steadily in popularity over the last several election cycles, with more voters choosing early voting, absentee voting and vote-by-mail. More than 50% of voters in 16 states cast their votes in one of these ways in 2016.

USPS is the only way to receive an absentee or mail-in ballot in most states. However, there are many ways to vote by mail that do not involve returning your ballots through USPS.

"In the states where election officials mail ballots to all registered voters, recent data shows the majority of those voters do not return their ballots in the mail," a 2017 EAC report stated. "They either drop them off at designated locations or at drop boxes."

Click here for up-to-date information on voting in your state during the pandemic.

- In-Person Early Voting
Forty states and the District of Columbia have some form of early voting in place, allowing voters to cast their ballot in person while avoiding crowds. Some states have even extended early voting due to the pandemic.

The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) website has information on early voting by state.

- Local Election Office or Polling Location
Almost all states allow voters to deliver their ballots in person at their local election office. To find a list of local election offices, you can search your state Board of Elections website or Secretary of State website.

However, many voters may not live close enough to return their ballot to a location election office. In this case, they may be able to instead return it to an alternative location.

According to the NCSL, eleven states and Washington D.C. allow voters to drop off ballots at any in-person voting locations in the county, including Arizona, California, Colorado, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Kansas, Montana, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Utah and Washington.

Two states, New Hampshire and Vermont, allow voters to return their ballots to a polling place. In these cases, a voter must return their ballot to their assigned precinct polling place on Election Day.

Twenty-six states and the District of Columbia allow someone else to return ballots on behalf of voters. Communities can designate a single person to collect ballots for the community, keeping voters with higher risks of contracting coronavirus safe in their homes.

Ten states permit an absentee ballot to be returned by the voter's family member: Arizona, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio and Oklahoma.

In some states, the number of ballots a single person can collect may be limited. Check the NCSL website for details on ballot collection in each state.

Remember to wear a mask and maintain social distancing when delivering your ballot in person.

- Drop Boxes
Drop boxes — special containers for voters to drop off absentee ballots in sealed envelopes — have become more commonplace in the last decade, and are an efficient and secure way to return your ballot while entirely skipping the mail process. Those monitored by surveillance cameras are often available 24 hours per day, seven days per week, while others that are monitored by election workers have specified hours of operation.

Boxes are often placed in convenient and accessible locations, including city or county office buildings, libraries, college campuses, community centers and along public transit routes.

Eleven states — Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah and Washington — have ballot drop boxes set up in some or all counties, NCSL says.

The EAC recommends counties install one drop box for every 15,000 to 20,000 registered voters. It also advises that officials make the locations of these drop boxes publicly known 80 days before an election — which is Saturday, August 15.

The number of drop boxes varies widely by state. Michigan says that it has nearly 1,000 drop boxes ready to go ahead of the election, and Connecticut recently installed around 200 drop boxes just one month before its primary election.

But Ohio's Secretary of State Frank LaRose said this week that he is banning counties from adding any more drop boxes, saying its too close to the election to make new changes. Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett said his state does not allow drop boxes for fear voters may feel pressured by peers to vote a certain way.

In June, President Trump and the RNC sued election officials in Pennsylvania to prevent the state from using drop boxes. This week, a federal judge ordered them to provide evidence of vote-by-mail fraud in the state.

Typically, election officials need to receive absentee/mailed ballots by the time polls close on Election Day, November 3. Some states accept ballots received after this date if they were postmarked before the election.

Check with your local election office to figure out which option is best for you.

Link to original article:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/absentee-ballot-alternatives-usps-mail-in-voting-presidential-election/

Thank you CBS and journalist Sophie Lewis for getting this information out to the public in this age of lies and disinformation!

"Cannibal" by Jónsi with Elizabeth Fraser

Two angels sing together...I never thought I would hear them on the same track, but here are Jónsi (previously here and here) and the legendary Elizabeth Fraser (previously here) singing "Cannibal" from Jónsi's forthcoming album "Shiver."

Wow.




https://jonsi.com/
http://elizabethfraser.com/

Sunday, August 16, 2020

BEAUTY: Painting--Jeff Faust

Nature and surrealism blend in the magical work of Jeff Faust. The recurring motifs of birds, eggs, leaves, and clouds feels like a secret mystical language of symbols.


Top to bottom: A Capella; Assembling Ancient Poems; Clouds Above A Small Sea; Clouds For The Poets; The Coming Fog; Prelude To A Tempest; The Quiet Dance; Saint Of Small Travels; Santo de los Innocent; The Dock; Waiting For Scotland

https://www.jefffaust.com/

Saturday, August 15, 2020

"Flow, River Of My Soul"

I am feeling great love and nostalgia today for "Flow, river of my soul," an album released in 1994 by Single Gun Theory, an Australian band formed in 1986 consisting of members Jacqui Hunt on lead vocals, Kath Power on vocal melodies and synthesiser, and Peter Rivett-Carnac on guitar, synthesiser and sampling.

This incredible album was unlike pretty much anything else out there at the time and this still holds true. An electronic album, it was awash with a phenomenal mix of song and spoken word samples as well as influences from world music and spirituality.

But the underlying sense of the entire album is one of paradox. There are references to enlightenment and higher thoughts and beliefs while simultaneously referencing the horrors we perpetrate on each other. It was C.G. Jung who said, "The sad truth is that man’s real life consists of a complex of inexorable opposites—day and night, birth and death, happiness and misery, good and evil. We are not even sure that one will prevail against the other, that good will overcome evil, or joy defeat pain. Life is a battleground. It always has been and always will be; and if it were not so, existence would come to an end."

It speaks to this exact paradox of life with great highs and great lows, that we are spiritual beings having a temporary physical experience. But that realization does not mean that one is exempt from physical reality and whatever suffering that may bring. It is a complicated psychological juxtaposition, one that requires care and attention. And it seems to be particularly timely now which is perhaps why the album flashed through my mind recently. We are certainly living in a paradoxical world with so much attention brought to the inequities and torture so many must endure at the hands of those who are either willfully oblivious or filled with malice. But at the same time, we see so much hope among people who believe in the best of humankind, people who know that things can get better, and are willing to work toward that goal. It is hard to get through a day sometimes, seeing and feeling this overwhelming moment in history.

With that in mind, here are some select tracks from "Flow, river of my soul" by Single Gun Theory.

The opening track, "Transmission" acts as a kind of prologue with the following vocal sample setting up a motif for the reset of the album:
"I give you this for your consideration. The most important factor in any metaphysical exercise is the release of belief systems, boundaries, and fears. All limitations are self-imposed."



"Fall" is a gorgeous track that begins with the quote, "Energy never dies, it just changes form." We also hear a sample from Robert Fripp's legendary track "Exposure" which in turn sampled a talk by author and mystic J.G. Bennett saying "It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering," as well as Rod Serling from his television series "The Twilight Zone."


"Energy never dies, it just changes form."

"It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering."

The sea calls me to the end of the pier
The sky is clear
So is the ending
The termination
In this moment of realization

I had a vision of a very calming place
Where we fall like lovers into embrace

We fall like mist on mountains
Sensibilities lost
Like meteors from heaven
A stone in water

I had a vision of a very calming place
Where we fall like lovers into embrace

"Energy never dies, it just changes form."

"The time is now."

"I'm going to count from 1 to 3 and when I count the number 3, your feet will be lifted off the ground and you will be pulled by that silver white cord.
1, 2, 3."

I had a vision of a very calming place
Where we fall like lovers into embrace

"It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering."

"Energy never dies."

"The time is now."

This next song "The Sea of Core Experience" beings with another great quote:
"I dedicate my life to the mystic law of cause and effect with the vibration in my voice."



"I dedicate my life to the mystic law of cause and effect with the vibration in my voice."

Here above the clouds
My porous body floats
Transcending my thoughts
To essence

Flow, the river of my soul
To the sea of core experience
A thousand million hands are joined
In embrace here

Wind is rushing past my face
And streaming through me
I am rarefied
And abstract

I will come to you
And kiss you in a dream
The still of night
Roaring through me

"Decimated" is where things start to take a turn. It contains a recording of Robert Oppenheimer, known as the father of the atomic bomb, recalling what went through his head as he witnessed the first detonation of a nuclear weapon on July 16, 1945. Air raid sirens can be heard on this track.



A chemical haze falling around me
It's a bright sunset on this day

So decimated

"I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita: 'Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.'"


"Phenomena" plays like the soundtrack to the film "Poltergeist" with a sample of a paranormal investigator narrating some film footage of an alleged metaphysical incident.



The song "Metaphysical" is another supreme juxtaposition with words of rapture occupying the same space as predictions of war and the words of an American military strategist recalling the conditions on the day of the bombing of Hiroshima.



I can feel the rapture of spiritual love

Thank you forces of good
Thank you positivity
Thank you joy
Thank you alive

"As a result of my study in markets and economics I applied...I applied my predictive techniques to the subject of war. I formulated a US war clock. The probabilities are 78% that the US will be involved in a major military confrontation between 1988 and 1992."

"The day was clear..."

Thank you god
Metaphysical love

"The day was clear when we dropped that bomb..."

Thank you god
Metaphysical love

"The Point Beyond Which Something Will Happen" contains a reading of the words of a Hiroshima survivor describing his surroundings ten minutes before the blast.



"You are about to experience it in its reality. In this moment, know yourself, and abide in that state."

I lie down in a river of love
Go to the edge and fall
Plunge to the deep and hold my breath
Braced against the oncoming

I lie down in a river of blood
Go to the edge and die a thousand times
Look to the viscous barrier
I might end, I might heal this night

At the point beyond which something will happen
At the point beyond which something will occur

"The morning was fine. I saw a red dragonfly land on the wall in front of me."

"Thetan" is an elegy, an ode to a departed loved one. Grief is the price we pay for love, another aspect of being here in a body, in this physical reality. The opening sample here comes from the 1991 film "Whore" starring Theresa Russell.



"I must be some use to somebody. I mean, there must be a reason for me, right?"

"1. Consider the probable reality that all time is simultaneous."

Like fallen autumn leaves lying on the ground
I hate to think it's over
It's just that you were so young
And didn't seem to have a chance to make it good
The skies are grey with the loss of you
My heart sighs

It's in the way that I feel
It's in the way that I breathe
It's in the way that I see for you
It's in the way I believe
You are my reprieve
I can't accept
It's over

Like fallen autumn leaves
A morbid wind through barren trees
I hate to think, I hate to think
You were so young

"2. You are the universal consciousness.
3. The pendulum must swim both ways before it is brought to rest in the middle.
4. All limitations are self-imposed.
5. The mind has every potential and all knowledge"

Like fallen autumn leaves lying on the ground
I hate to think it's over

"Consider the probable reality that all time is simultaneous.
You are the universal consciousness, at ease as your consciousness drifts more deeply into the state of all that is."

And if love is a tide
Then it's taking me down to the depths of despair


The album closes with the track "Still Closest to My Heart," the epilogue to the collection's prologue. It is a recording of a translation of the words of Pope John XXIII (1881 – 1963): "My day has ended. My final thought is again for those closest to my heart, multiplied and diffused throughout the world."




http://sgt.com.au/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Gun_Theory

Friday, August 14, 2020

BEAUTY: Painting--Laurent Cabras

The freedom in the abstract works of Laurent Cabras is inspiring on many levels.


Top to bottom: Circus; Mirrors; Printemps; untitled; untitled; untitled; untitled; untitled

https://www.laurentcabras.com/