Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
various, seperate, and numbered
1.
She seldom stops scanning
Walking past a fir
I hear her say
“Smells like Turpentine”.
2.
I tip the glass of apple cider and finish it off
And the sediment streams down to my mouth
Looking like the long trunk of a pine
3.
Sundials are ubiquitous.
A perspectival perch gives one
A sound view of diurnal
Near and farness.
4.
I follow the traces of your breath, closely
Rendering you as every moment’s memory
From where did we each come?
Attatchment.
I think about the mountain
Everything was on sale.
The Antique shop
Was to close on Friday.
Dividing upon entrance, we sifted through the debris
Myriad of minute gestures
Small stones left behind on someone else’s shelves.
A noise of silenced memories.
I believe I got a bargain on the handmade book crafted
From printer paper and wallpaper,
A boy with a feather in his hat cut out and pasted on the cover.
The other book with illustrations of plants
prefaced with a quotation:
“Do you not think that all life comes from the mountain?”
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Craiglist bARTer project
Cheesy name, but a working name.
Back in April I bartered a watercolor portrait of a guy who wanted to replace Cosmos Kramer's image for his, in a poster. I bartered this portrait for an orange weed-wacker so I could straighten up my back yard before moving. This transaction would instate the first of a series of the Craigslist Barter Project.
Currently, I am working out the next dealing in the series. So far it looks like I will be drawing a picture for a tattoo in trade for four wooden pallets to build a compost pile in the back yard with.
I'm not sure how I want to exhibit this series. I'm picturing an installation of sorts, with the various objects displayed around the space alongside adjoining documentation of the process, and evidence of the already absent art that was bartered. Perhaps I could get in touch with the people I worked with and see if they would send up the work for the show, but somehow, I think that the "arts" absence is more powerful. . .
I am thinkiing about creating a new blog site for this project only, to track the process of comings and goings. This should be fun.
Friday, August 22, 2008
RIP RIO RICO
Peter asked me “how is your place in Arizona”
me: it is big and cool. a mess of packaging materials right now, and the center of our lives in Rio Rico. We are excited to be leaving. It is very isolating down here, and substitute teaching is a painful way to make money. though, of course, the weather is pleasant, as I'm sure it is up there.
Rio Rico.
Our house, a cool expanse of ceramic tile and thin windows which rattle when the train heads north or south alongside the I-10 marked in kilometers, taking Chinese plastics down to Mexico, bringing furnished cars and firm produce to the north. Coming home from the middle school where Alexander teaches art in a room without a sink, crossing over the bridge, we feel it quaking from the weight of the semis stalled by myopic city planning, we wait silently for movement or a collapse. Semis line the city like sections of a great wall packed with waxed produce boxes of stickered mangos and tomatoes, oranges. The produce distributors and the schools. And a golf resort that sells land contracts to Midwesterners ready to retire to the sunny southwest.
I take myself to schools in the district to substitute for teachers. The kids are cruel and disrespectful and the only solace for me is the 12 dollars. I am an anchor in muddy water, waiting to take my shoes off and sip beer at the end of the day, trying to give out a lesson that was left, amidst a storm of Spanish words without leverage. Every new day they ask, “Miss, do you know Spanish” And I always respond, “un pocito”. I love to leave campus and sit in the hot dry car, letting the heavy warmth blanket my nerves.
The cockroaches crawl out of the drains, sprint across our floors. Next month the tarantulas will want to come inside from their hibernation in deep burrows along our house’s perimeter. Cling lays on the brick patio in the evening watching the migratory birds, and feeling the dry grass prickling through his thick fur.
Our neighbors are loud, always with something. Their cars speed through the court into their gravel driveway and skid to a halt, mariachi inspired pop music provides entertainment for their whole property, blasting through car stereos that cannot cover the bass notes, and too, rattle our windows. Their trash is offensive, excessive. Their dogs are aggressive. Every time they open or close the door to their huge American truck, they let the car alarm sound luxuriously, as if proud of the working device. The little girls through stones at our wall when they are not ridding around their flat tire bicycles.
Last week I bartered a watercolor portrait of someone for a weed-wacker, and now we can help even out what the cows have done for our lawn.
me: it is big and cool. a mess of packaging materials right now, and the center of our lives in Rio Rico. We are excited to be leaving. It is very isolating down here, and substitute teaching is a painful way to make money. though, of course, the weather is pleasant, as I'm sure it is up there.
Rio Rico.
Our house, a cool expanse of ceramic tile and thin windows which rattle when the train heads north or south alongside the I-10 marked in kilometers, taking Chinese plastics down to Mexico, bringing furnished cars and firm produce to the north. Coming home from the middle school where Alexander teaches art in a room without a sink, crossing over the bridge, we feel it quaking from the weight of the semis stalled by myopic city planning, we wait silently for movement or a collapse. Semis line the city like sections of a great wall packed with waxed produce boxes of stickered mangos and tomatoes, oranges. The produce distributors and the schools. And a golf resort that sells land contracts to Midwesterners ready to retire to the sunny southwest.
I take myself to schools in the district to substitute for teachers. The kids are cruel and disrespectful and the only solace for me is the 12 dollars. I am an anchor in muddy water, waiting to take my shoes off and sip beer at the end of the day, trying to give out a lesson that was left, amidst a storm of Spanish words without leverage. Every new day they ask, “Miss, do you know Spanish” And I always respond, “un pocito”. I love to leave campus and sit in the hot dry car, letting the heavy warmth blanket my nerves.
The cockroaches crawl out of the drains, sprint across our floors. Next month the tarantulas will want to come inside from their hibernation in deep burrows along our house’s perimeter. Cling lays on the brick patio in the evening watching the migratory birds, and feeling the dry grass prickling through his thick fur.
Our neighbors are loud, always with something. Their cars speed through the court into their gravel driveway and skid to a halt, mariachi inspired pop music provides entertainment for their whole property, blasting through car stereos that cannot cover the bass notes, and too, rattle our windows. Their trash is offensive, excessive. Their dogs are aggressive. Every time they open or close the door to their huge American truck, they let the car alarm sound luxuriously, as if proud of the working device. The little girls through stones at our wall when they are not ridding around their flat tire bicycles.
Last week I bartered a watercolor portrait of someone for a weed-wacker, and now we can help even out what the cows have done for our lawn.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
hai ku
Plucking a myriad from
My wool sweater
Little seeds without names
Silent moon gazing
We sit for hours
Feeling pagan origins
An empty can and
Aggressive breeze
Make music in the vacant lot
My wool sweater
Little seeds without names
Silent moon gazing
We sit for hours
Feeling pagan origins
An empty can and
Aggressive breeze
Make music in the vacant lot
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
this morning's unevents
i woke from a series of dreams this morning involving canoes and straw shoes and my father. when alex came to sit at the bed, nibbling toast with tahini and holding a travel mug of tea I realized that the plan was to drop him at school. It is my day off and I had to head south to take care of some things. I slipped some clogs over my sleeping socks, a pair of dusty corduroys and threw a hat on over my bed head. I dropped him off and went down to Nogales. A stop at the Safeway for a star bucks cappuccino-- the closest thing to good quality coffee down here, and I headed downtown, parking at the closed library. I walked up the sidewalks in the sunny slightly chilled morning, greeting passers by with buenas dia and little nods, feeling out of place as usual. Street shops began opening like buds in bloom, pulling up their garage doors and revealing deep cavernous interiors stocked with bright plastic goods. The freight train from Mexico passed through the city park where people sat comfortably using their phones or waiting for something. I walked around a hardware store looking for sewing machine oil and listening Mexican talk radio. I walked all the way to where the USA stops at a fence, border patrol SUVs driving idly, talking on their radios. At some parts of the fence I could see the other side, not even a block away, in Mexico. More of the same kinds of shops, and I thought about crossing but knew I'd get a hard time being left alone there, even in my humble outfit. I walked back to the car, perused a Salvation army, buying some glassware, returning two dvds to the library and pulling onto Grande Street. A trip to Wallmart was necessary and then Home Depot for mismatched paint. As I stood in the isle for printer papers trying to locate vellum I overheard a conversation between an employee and his friend. He had just gotten a payday loan and his friend was concerned about the interest. A drive back to Rio Rico, a lunch of last night's salmon and orzo with a chilled glass of chardonnay-- and then another. tomorrow I substitute teach for a special ed. class. Days like these: in the desert, of limited means, uneventful yet memorable.
My mother is under the knife today.
My mother is under the knife today.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
moving rocks
it is January 17th. Anne's new art space opens this evening debuting with a collaborative photographic project she is doing with a friend of hers entitled Hunger: A Metaphor. I wish I could be there. The tickets to fly there are so expensive. It is expensive flying out of Tucson to anywhere really. Anyhow, going to look into going there in mid February--hopefully the tickets will be affordable and Alex can come with me.
The Wedding is a stress point. Is there such a place that we are looking to get married at which is within reason with our budget and meets our aesthetic demands? May 31st is soon approaching. We have no ticket to Ireland, have no ring arrangement, no for sure on the cake, no dress, no one to marry us, and of course no location, so no invitation either. The following few months will be interesting. . .
We have however procured our means of transportation throughout Ireland in the course of our 4-5 week long honeymoon: 2 Rivendell Atlantises. strong and gorgeous bikes, and a pretty penny that we will be paying off incrementally on our credit cards we used to purchase them. On that note we still need pannier racks, panniers and handlebar bags, water bottle cages, clothing, alex needs shoes, we need sleeping bags and stuff sacks and a footprint for our tent, and bed mats--whew--and that is not even mentioning the actual money we'll need to spend in the time we are in Ireland.
Moving also will be a huge expense. Rosciante and Vindaloo and a big U-Haul. We've got a lot to transport. Furniture consists of: a filing cabinet and a desk, a barber's chair and four others, kitchen table, art desk, cd bookcase, LP shelving, two dressers, a bed, a small bookcase, a coffee table, flat file cabinet, a patio set and a Mexican school desk. Then we have five bicycles, a whole shlew of art materials, a lot of framed artwork, all the music, memoirs and papers and such, a large quantity of photographic supplies our clothing, kitchen goods, barbeque, and computer hardware. Oh yeah, we also have about a dozen outdated pieces of audiovisual equipment including three record players, a few 8mm projectors, a few 16mm projectors, an overhead projector, a couple slide machines, a slide viewer, and a few tape players. It will certainly be interesting. well if anyone is reading this and wants to rob us, you know what we have. Be aware though that hardly any of it is of value in the market with the exception of our bicycles which we are getting insured very soon, so really don't bother.
My birthday is in two days. I will be 24 years old. I want to make a big pot of birthday masala chai and do some writing and maybe a self portrait. where should we go? . . I want to go somewhere outdoorsy because I never get to celebrate my birthday in the sun. Arizona: 1 point.
I thought I would try making a compost bin in the backyard today out of the big pile of rocks in the corner of the yard. I worked on breaking them up for about 2 hours, conscientious of spiders and snakes. I must have accidently killed a lizard and I found a couple bugs crawiling up my sock, then upon moving a big rock a fat mouse came out from the dark, black eyes bulging and feverishly looking around from the sunbathed rock. Then he dived back down between a couple of rocks. I found him again hiding in a tight little crevice of chipped brick and stones, his little gray body palpitating. I let him alone and continued moving rocks until I found his nest. I haven't been so touched by such a home before. It was so charming. It was densely composed of nibbled up fibers and soft shredded leaves and bird feathers, a warm comfortable blanket of found materials. I touched it with a stick and could feel how soft yet dense it was. I couldn't do any more after that. The wind picked up and I came inside for a lunch of leftover lasagna and fetzer merlot. I took out a little clump of pecan granola to him and set it on a rock close to his hideout. Second-thinking this compost idea.
The Wedding is a stress point. Is there such a place that we are looking to get married at which is within reason with our budget and meets our aesthetic demands? May 31st is soon approaching. We have no ticket to Ireland, have no ring arrangement, no for sure on the cake, no dress, no one to marry us, and of course no location, so no invitation either. The following few months will be interesting. . .
We have however procured our means of transportation throughout Ireland in the course of our 4-5 week long honeymoon: 2 Rivendell Atlantises. strong and gorgeous bikes, and a pretty penny that we will be paying off incrementally on our credit cards we used to purchase them. On that note we still need pannier racks, panniers and handlebar bags, water bottle cages, clothing, alex needs shoes, we need sleeping bags and stuff sacks and a footprint for our tent, and bed mats--whew--and that is not even mentioning the actual money we'll need to spend in the time we are in Ireland.
Moving also will be a huge expense. Rosciante and Vindaloo and a big U-Haul. We've got a lot to transport. Furniture consists of: a filing cabinet and a desk, a barber's chair and four others, kitchen table, art desk, cd bookcase, LP shelving, two dressers, a bed, a small bookcase, a coffee table, flat file cabinet, a patio set and a Mexican school desk. Then we have five bicycles, a whole shlew of art materials, a lot of framed artwork, all the music, memoirs and papers and such, a large quantity of photographic supplies our clothing, kitchen goods, barbeque, and computer hardware. Oh yeah, we also have about a dozen outdated pieces of audiovisual equipment including three record players, a few 8mm projectors, a few 16mm projectors, an overhead projector, a couple slide machines, a slide viewer, and a few tape players. It will certainly be interesting. well if anyone is reading this and wants to rob us, you know what we have. Be aware though that hardly any of it is of value in the market with the exception of our bicycles which we are getting insured very soon, so really don't bother.
My birthday is in two days. I will be 24 years old. I want to make a big pot of birthday masala chai and do some writing and maybe a self portrait. where should we go? . . I want to go somewhere outdoorsy because I never get to celebrate my birthday in the sun. Arizona: 1 point.
I thought I would try making a compost bin in the backyard today out of the big pile of rocks in the corner of the yard. I worked on breaking them up for about 2 hours, conscientious of spiders and snakes. I must have accidently killed a lizard and I found a couple bugs crawiling up my sock, then upon moving a big rock a fat mouse came out from the dark, black eyes bulging and feverishly looking around from the sunbathed rock. Then he dived back down between a couple of rocks. I found him again hiding in a tight little crevice of chipped brick and stones, his little gray body palpitating. I let him alone and continued moving rocks until I found his nest. I haven't been so touched by such a home before. It was so charming. It was densely composed of nibbled up fibers and soft shredded leaves and bird feathers, a warm comfortable blanket of found materials. I touched it with a stick and could feel how soft yet dense it was. I couldn't do any more after that. The wind picked up and I came inside for a lunch of leftover lasagna and fetzer merlot. I took out a little clump of pecan granola to him and set it on a rock close to his hideout. Second-thinking this compost idea.
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