I've been obsessively watching Aki Kaurismäki films lately. Not only are the films simultaneously bleak and uplifting - in a way that only eastern Europeans can effortlessly create - but the music selections from his films are always great (e.g., see below, Joe Strummer's "Burning Lights" from the wonderful film I Hired A Contract Killer starring Jean-Pierre Léaud).
Varjoja Paratiisissa ("Shadows In Paradise") (1986)Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Monday, April 20, 2009
Waning Gibbous
The weight of the moon
at night
is heavy.
Looking up,
I see
that it is already waning.
Soon, there will be
unsettling nights lacking luminescence.
at night
is heavy.
Looking up,
I see
that it is already waning.
Soon, there will be
unsettling nights lacking luminescence.
Current 93: Moonlight, You Will Say
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Back Sea Blues (Song for M)
Falling rain cracksthe surface of dirty water.
Radial ripples on the lake
slipping underneath
busy bridge archways
soon to be
waves upon the shore.
Cigarette smoke drifts,
passing slowly
through the air,
above damp streets
floating.
Creaky revolutions
of bicycle chains
and the slash of tires
through puddles of rain.
All the lakeside is
tip-tip-tapping
like the sound
of slow
typing, juxtaposing
future
and past.

Through the windowpane
of a bar with no name,
jet lagged and wild-eyed awake,
we watched the falling rain.
In a place where students and stars
drink to become someone
other than who they are -
no matter who they are.
But on this night
when we've just arrived
from a land afar
(where the night
has not overtaken
the day before),
it's only you and I.
And who's to say
we aren't the same
as Parisian lovers
sitting on the Left Bank
of the Seine?
when the rain has gone,
everyone will be dancing
and having fun,
or on crowded trains chasing
Chang'e to the moon.
it seems,
we must head
towards the metropolitan cities
of the sweltering south.
Sooner still,
we must return
on a trade wind
to where you and I
are further apart
than where we've just gone.
If ever you should cross the seas
away from me,
no matter how far you've flown,
I will follow
(this time)
with a ticket I purchased
all on my own -
one step ahead of
tomorrow.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Illumination
As I walked through my neighborhood yesterday afternoon, I noticed a bunch of items that had been left out for garbage. I found this lamp. Although this is an IKEA lamp, it is special and of personal significance to me (and not only because it still works). It has now been discontinued and cheaper IKEA lamps have made this model obsolete. Other people's trash are the treasures I cherish.
There now exists a matching pair of these lamps on opposite nightstands in my mind.
There now exists a matching pair of these lamps on opposite nightstands in my mind.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)



