If you don't know about Tribe 8, allow yourself the masturbation-quality experience of doing a little research. I'm angry tonight- brimming, hot. Wanting bad, just for the sake of satisfaction. I feel like my sexuality has been neglected and tempered lately.
Sometimes music is the closest we can get to where we really need to be...
Showing posts with label Ain't my Art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ain't my Art. Show all posts
Monday, August 3, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Arbus
Recently someone told me that my work is like written Diane Arbus... Word?! I can't turn that one down... (And ever since I've been craving some time behind my camera). Often enough I feel like I come to writing when and where I can't afford the art supplies an image in my head requires. And of course, writing is what I go to for the pictures I imagine in motion.
So if you've never seen any of Arbus' work, here's your start- keep on it!
So if you've never seen any of Arbus' work, here's your start- keep on it!
Friday, March 20, 2009
Portraiture
Of late, I spend a lot of time imagining self-portrait. Transformation of my external. Documentation of contortion. A way to see what I look like with myself as I am have a harder and harder time understanding my time alone. Proof that I am solid and here and now- it has been hard to trust that. Maybe I can get a gig or two that'll find me enough money for a digital camera as I have nowhere to develop film right now.
Here is an interview in two parts of one of my two favorite photographers in the world, Nan Goldin:
Here is an interview in two parts of one of my two favorite photographers in the world, Nan Goldin:
Monday, March 16, 2009
Unexpected Diggin It
My poetry class and I have been bonding over the Oxford Book of American Poetry, (edited by David Lehman), which we fondly refer to as, "the brick." It is brickish, and I think it should come with a set of hands to knead my back on the days I drag it to school and therefore work and wherever else I end up on a given night. I initially railed against the task of reading an entire brickish poetry anthology, but it's turning out to be pretty delicious...
There are pieces I get half way through and then give up on. There are whole poets I give up on. Louise Bogan was one said poet whose pieces I was not particularly turned on by. Oh so contained. Oh so shrouded in eh. And then there was this piece, Evening in the Sanitarium. I considered that maybe I only dug it because my expectations for Louise were low, but after a few careful readings I decided that her contained poetic posture did something perfectly earie to the setting of a woman's sanitarium, (the setting for the piece below). Her poetic posturing- the enjambment, the bare-bones notions like "a little" in line four- is nearly a sanitarium in its own right. And so, caught wholly off-guard, it seems I dig.
EVENING IN THE SANITARIUM
The free evening fades, outside the windows fastened
with decorative iron grilles.
The lamps are lighted; the shades drawn; the nurses
are watching a little.
It is the hour of the complicated knitting on the safe
bone needles; of the games of anagrams and bridge;
The deadly game of chess; the book held up like a mask.
The period of the wildest weeping, the fiercest delusion, is over.
The women rest their tired half-healed hearts; they are
almost well.
Some of them will stay almost well always: the blunt-faced
woman whose thinking dissolved
Under academic discipline; the manic-depressive girl
Now leveling off; one paranoiac afflicted with jealousy,
Another with persecution. Some alleviation has been
possible.
O fortunate bride, who never again will become elated
after childbirth!
O lucky older wife, who has been cured of feeling
unwanted!
To the suburban railway station you will return, return,
To meet forever Jim home on the 5:35.
You will be again as normal and selfish and heartless
as anybody else.
There is life left: the piano says it with its octave smile.
The soft carpets pad the thump and splinter of the suicide
to be.
Everything will be splendid: the grandmother will not
drink habitually.
The fruit salad will bloom on the plate like a bouquet
And the garden produce the blue-ribbon aquilegia.
The cats will be glad; the fathers feel justified; the
mothers relieved.
The sons and husbands will no longer need to pay the bills.
Childhoods will be put away, the obscene nightmare abated.
At the ends of the corridors the baths are running.
Mrs. C. again feels the shadow of the obsessive idea.
Miss R. looks at the mantel-piece, which must mean something.
1938
There are pieces I get half way through and then give up on. There are whole poets I give up on. Louise Bogan was one said poet whose pieces I was not particularly turned on by. Oh so contained. Oh so shrouded in eh. And then there was this piece, Evening in the Sanitarium. I considered that maybe I only dug it because my expectations for Louise were low, but after a few careful readings I decided that her contained poetic posture did something perfectly earie to the setting of a woman's sanitarium, (the setting for the piece below). Her poetic posturing- the enjambment, the bare-bones notions like "a little" in line four- is nearly a sanitarium in its own right. And so, caught wholly off-guard, it seems I dig.
EVENING IN THE SANITARIUM
The free evening fades, outside the windows fastened
with decorative iron grilles.
The lamps are lighted; the shades drawn; the nurses
are watching a little.
It is the hour of the complicated knitting on the safe
bone needles; of the games of anagrams and bridge;
The deadly game of chess; the book held up like a mask.
The period of the wildest weeping, the fiercest delusion, is over.
The women rest their tired half-healed hearts; they are
almost well.
Some of them will stay almost well always: the blunt-faced
woman whose thinking dissolved
Under academic discipline; the manic-depressive girl
Now leveling off; one paranoiac afflicted with jealousy,
Another with persecution. Some alleviation has been
possible.
O fortunate bride, who never again will become elated
after childbirth!
O lucky older wife, who has been cured of feeling
unwanted!
To the suburban railway station you will return, return,
To meet forever Jim home on the 5:35.
You will be again as normal and selfish and heartless
as anybody else.
There is life left: the piano says it with its octave smile.
The soft carpets pad the thump and splinter of the suicide
to be.
Everything will be splendid: the grandmother will not
drink habitually.
The fruit salad will bloom on the plate like a bouquet
And the garden produce the blue-ribbon aquilegia.
The cats will be glad; the fathers feel justified; the
mothers relieved.
The sons and husbands will no longer need to pay the bills.
Childhoods will be put away, the obscene nightmare abated.
At the ends of the corridors the baths are running.
Mrs. C. again feels the shadow of the obsessive idea.
Miss R. looks at the mantel-piece, which must mean something.
1938
Monday, March 2, 2009
Feeling of Want in my Belly
What I'm craving this morning:
And of course, if I am stirring with want to hear Toshi, her mama, the honorable Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon follows in suit...
If ever you have the opportunity to see either of them live, do not miss it. It will change you, joy and chills!
And of course, if I am stirring with want to hear Toshi, her mama, the honorable Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon follows in suit...
If ever you have the opportunity to see either of them live, do not miss it. It will change you, joy and chills!
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Love Things for my Heart
I have always been good at collecting small love acts- little tricks to keep me in touch with the bigger than me universe.It is through acknowledging that I am good at doing little love things for myself that I am able to look my big loves in the eye. Truth is I am a big mover and shaker of myself, brazen, hard-ass, tight-holder of myself. More and more I feel like I am doing a good job of letting myself be whole. And the little things really help me own up to it when I am otherwise afraid to take on an identity of self love for fear that I won't be able to sustain such an identity.
Social workers used to make me sign contracts with them consisting of lists of things I could or would do instead of "injuring" myself, which of course only meant injury so far as the eye and the system and their supervisors could see. I hated that those lists were contracts, but even as a first and second grader I had made lists of love things for myself. Litany-like secrets that I was preparing to break out of my fucked up violent, silent, secrets family... For example, I am acutely aware of my spacial and physical surroundings because as a small child I had games for taking in space. I moved around a lot and had a hard time really feeling where I was... I would often see myself standing behind myself watching. It still happens. So I always make a mental map or note of the spaces I'm in- patterns in the floor, art on the walls, books on the shelves.
My love thing lists are not about alternatives to "injuring" myself. As often as being preventative, they are about holding myself after the fact. Knowing how to come home alone after a one night stand and get in bed with Tar Beach or Eloise. Knowing how to get myself the fuck out of the house for a walk. Knowing how to tempt myself with treats- set down the shard of glass from my forearm and go buy a coconut. Draw in meetings or in class when rage rises close to the tip of my tongue. Visit the river. Visit the ocean. Just get on the subway and let the world move me if I'm too tired to do it myself. Know the right music right now...
Study the patterns in the floor.
So here are some Love Things from the past week:
Social workers used to make me sign contracts with them consisting of lists of things I could or would do instead of "injuring" myself, which of course only meant injury so far as the eye and the system and their supervisors could see. I hated that those lists were contracts, but even as a first and second grader I had made lists of love things for myself. Litany-like secrets that I was preparing to break out of my fucked up violent, silent, secrets family... For example, I am acutely aware of my spacial and physical surroundings because as a small child I had games for taking in space. I moved around a lot and had a hard time really feeling where I was... I would often see myself standing behind myself watching. It still happens. So I always make a mental map or note of the spaces I'm in- patterns in the floor, art on the walls, books on the shelves.
My love thing lists are not about alternatives to "injuring" myself. As often as being preventative, they are about holding myself after the fact. Knowing how to come home alone after a one night stand and get in bed with Tar Beach or Eloise. Knowing how to get myself the fuck out of the house for a walk. Knowing how to tempt myself with treats- set down the shard of glass from my forearm and go buy a coconut. Draw in meetings or in class when rage rises close to the tip of my tongue. Visit the river. Visit the ocean. Just get on the subway and let the world move me if I'm too tired to do it myself. Know the right music right now...
Study the patterns in the floor.
So here are some Love Things from the past week:
Saturday, February 28, 2009
(Mis)Translation
I was recently introduced to the "mistranslation" exorcise and have immediately and grateful added it to my list of cathartic-save-my-own-ass activities... The exorcise is to take a poem in a language you do not know, (it may be helpful if it's based in the same alphabet, but then again would be a different and amazing exorcise with an alphabet you don't know), and to translate it line by line, based only on the looks and phonetics of the words and letters in front of you. I was given a poem in Finnish which I know nothing about- not even how it sounds when spoken. Forcing myself to focus on something I knew nothing about and couldn't criticize myself for not understanding was an amazing moment of freedom in my day...
By Merja Virolainen
Sain sinut vain yöksi,
silmänräpäykseksi, pariksi.
Senkin vain leikimme
kotia varjojemme kanssa,
minkä se kesti,
pelko painautui kainaloon,
yksinäisyys rakasteli minua.
Niin tulin siunattuun tilaan:
kannan lasta sinulle, kipua.
Nuku sinä, nuku,
minkä yötä kestää,
niin et kuule, kuinka se varttuu,
soi jo isona lantionkaikukopassa,
vahvistuu, pikku prinsessamme,
huutaa kylkiluuni kruununa,
suu ammollaan kuin taivas,
imee lävitseni kaiken
mitä kuulen, näkee mitä näen,
kasvaa, oppii elämään.
Mirror, Violent Lie
A saint and slut, your veins
Simple paying-- parasitic
Sink veins like mine
Katya, you're vile, me I am cancer
Meet me, say to castrate
Pelt it, pain it, kindly loom
Your saint has robbed, castrated my minute
No tiny saint slut tit
Can last, so sing it quick
None can sing you, none
Meet me, you talk me, castrate, ah...
No instrument could kill like your veins
I go in sleep, insomnia, lay on me kind, passive
Will you pick up a princess name
Or hit, kill, croon, ah...
Your animal craves temperance
Me, I'm only laying here curled
My cunt, naked my name. You
Count, open-- vein alive.
By Merja Virolainen
Sain sinut vain yöksi,
silmänräpäykseksi, pariksi.
Senkin vain leikimme
kotia varjojemme kanssa,
minkä se kesti,
pelko painautui kainaloon,
yksinäisyys rakasteli minua.
Niin tulin siunattuun tilaan:
kannan lasta sinulle, kipua.
Nuku sinä, nuku,
minkä yötä kestää,
niin et kuule, kuinka se varttuu,
soi jo isona lantion
vahvistuu, pikku prinsessamme,
huutaa kylkiluuni kruununa,
suu ammollaan kuin taivas,
imee lävitseni kaiken
mitä kuulen, näkee mitä näen,
kasvaa, oppii elämään.
Mirror, Violent Lie
A saint and slut, your veins
Simple paying-- parasitic
Sink veins like mine
Katya, you're vile, me I am cancer
Meet me, say to castrate
Pelt it, pain it, kindly loom
Your saint has robbed, castrated my minute
No tiny saint slut tit
Can last, so sing it quick
None can sing you, none
Meet me, you talk me, castrate, ah...
No instrument could kill like your veins
I go in sleep, insomnia, lay on me kind, passive
Will you pick up a princess name
Or hit, kill, croon, ah...
Your animal craves temperance
Me, I'm only laying here curled
My cunt, naked my name. You
Count, open-- vein alive.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Almost Poetry Poker
As another class activity my tiny Brooklyn College poetry class all brought in poems we liked- Marti, Plath, Pinero, Lorde and others- and cut each line out to throw in a mixed up pile. We each pulled 8 lines from the pile and spent five minutes writing a poem that incorporated the 8 lines we'd selected. Here's my piece, ripe for revisions, (other poet's words in italics)...
Cinder Song
Hana Malia 2009
In my tomb of green leaves
Our body wears the smile of accomplishment,
Because I has you under surveillance y I has you slick chlorophyll mood light
We, bright jungle eyes with cocaine nose- cocaine nose
In our thighs burnin cocaine holes
Baby, don't check your reflection in still river run
Don't need to see your acid face
Scorch lines, deep stretchmarks snake
Like river run, river run run
that that that stands erect in the spirit's glare.
Stop. We ain't seen sun
Canopy got us green flesh
Cocoa thigh lovin
Baby, your shit is spinnin, your marks are stretching
to the point of bursting. Hush,
here, grip this steering wheel I've gripped before.
Cinder Song
Hana Malia 2009
In my tomb of green leaves
Our body wears the smile of accomplishment,
Because I has you under surveillance y I has you slick chlorophyll mood light
We, bright jungle eyes with cocaine nose- cocaine nose
In our thighs burnin cocaine holes
Baby, don't check your reflection in still river run
Don't need to see your acid face
Scorch lines, deep stretchmarks snake
Like river run, river run run
that that that stands erect in the spirit's glare.
Stop. We ain't seen sun
Canopy got us green flesh
Cocoa thigh lovin
Baby, your shit is spinnin, your marks are stretching
to the point of bursting. Hush,
here, grip this steering wheel I've gripped before.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
A Response to Lorde
As a class assignment, I was asked to take a poem, quadruple space it, and then respond to each individual line of the poem in the open pace below. It was an exercise in letting go of the whole piece- in writing without knowing where the next line would come from or go. I expected it to be disjointed and awkward, but it came out as what feels for me like a true honoring response to Lorde's piece, Litany for Survival.
I suspect this is at once a poem for myself and my mother in these days where thoughts of closeness to her make my skin burn...
What We Know in Winter (temporary working title)
by Hana Malia 2009
for you who finds rest in concrete cracks
laying, seemingly floating just above a bed of nails
like they are orderly lines of school children.
for you who believes you are too much to be swallowed down whole
the welcome of rape- if no means no what does silence mean?
who fucks when you're bleeding so the mess has a name
on the avenues between sunrise East River, sunset Hudson
flailing and coiling
both fetal and nearly gone
pleading with a lover's strong back for
a moment more than right now.
you must have been breastfed to want the insides this bad-
the cycles red and inevitable
the release unbearable
for you
who knows no uncertain moves
wrinkles, stretchmarks have etched soft skin
you do not trust food to settle you
this kind of peace
this too honest tale
become mantra on tongue
in your children's sleep
this faltering straight line,
they were never meant to survive
and when the winter is not over you forget
today will be short
when the days get longer you fret
how fast your hair will grow
and when you are naked you beg for burlap coverage
turtlenecks make you fear the indoors
when your children leave you cook large meals
can only take small bites
when someone has your hip in hand, you imagine
its inevitable droop
when you are at the mercy of your own hands, you are sure
they will be the last
and when you finish in only small quiet breaths, you are amazed
at how naked a person can be
when no one else is looking
but when you cry out,
you are unconvinced
so it is better to sing into your thick pillows
remembering
this moment, just now
is enough
Litany for Survival
by Audre Lorde
For those of us who live at the shoreline
standing upon the constant edges of decision
crucial and alone
for those of us who cannot indulge
the passing dreams of choice
who love in doorways coming and going
in the hours between dawns
looking inward and outward
at once before and after
seeking a now that can breed
futures
like bread in our children's mouths
so their dreams will not reflect
the death of ours:
For those of us
who were imprinted with fear
like a faint line in the center of our foreheads
learning to be afraid with our mother's milk
for by this weapon
this illusion of some safety to be found
the heavy-footed hoped to silence us
For all of us
this instant and this triumph
We were never meant to survive.
And when the sun rises we are afraid
it might not remain
when the sun sets we are afraid
it might not rise in the morning
when our stomachs are full we are afraid
of indigestion
when our stomachs are empty we are afraid
we may never eat again
when we are loved we are afraid
love will vanish
when we are alone we are afraid
love will never return
and when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid
So it is better to speak
remembering
we were never meant to survive
I suspect this is at once a poem for myself and my mother in these days where thoughts of closeness to her make my skin burn...
What We Know in Winter (temporary working title)
by Hana Malia 2009
for you who finds rest in concrete cracks
laying, seemingly floating just above a bed of nails
like they are orderly lines of school children.
for you who believes you are too much to be swallowed down whole
the welcome of rape- if no means no what does silence mean?
who fucks when you're bleeding so the mess has a name
on the avenues between sunrise East River, sunset Hudson
flailing and coiling
both fetal and nearly gone
pleading with a lover's strong back for
a moment more than right now.
you must have been breastfed to want the insides this bad-
the cycles red and inevitable
the release unbearable
for you
who knows no uncertain moves
wrinkles, stretchmarks have etched soft skin
you do not trust food to settle you
this kind of peace
this too honest tale
become mantra on tongue
in your children's sleep
this faltering straight line,
they were never meant to survive
and when the winter is not over you forget
today will be short
when the days get longer you fret
how fast your hair will grow
and when you are naked you beg for burlap coverage
turtlenecks make you fear the indoors
when your children leave you cook large meals
can only take small bites
when someone has your hip in hand, you imagine
its inevitable droop
when you are at the mercy of your own hands, you are sure
they will be the last
and when you finish in only small quiet breaths, you are amazed
at how naked a person can be
when no one else is looking
but when you cry out,
you are unconvinced
so it is better to sing into your thick pillows
remembering
this moment, just now
is enough
Litany for Survival
by Audre Lorde
For those of us who live at the shoreline
standing upon the constant edges of decision
crucial and alone
for those of us who cannot indulge
the passing dreams of choice
who love in doorways coming and going
in the hours between dawns
looking inward and outward
at once before and after
seeking a now that can breed
futures
like bread in our children's mouths
so their dreams will not reflect
the death of ours:
For those of us
who were imprinted with fear
like a faint line in the center of our foreheads
learning to be afraid with our mother's milk
for by this weapon
this illusion of some safety to be found
the heavy-footed hoped to silence us
For all of us
this instant and this triumph
We were never meant to survive.
And when the sun rises we are afraid
it might not remain
when the sun sets we are afraid
it might not rise in the morning
when our stomachs are full we are afraid
of indigestion
when our stomachs are empty we are afraid
we may never eat again
when we are loved we are afraid
love will vanish
when we are alone we are afraid
love will never return
and when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid
So it is better to speak
remembering
we were never meant to survive
When Little Boys Call You Fat Albert
I am watching PBS, and Phillips just said, "I do know one thing, Cass Elliot died a very happy woman."
It's been a rough week for this fat girl! I will make myself find the time to write about it this weekend, but for now, for my own peace, I channel Cass Elliot and Beth Ditto
It's been a rough week for this fat girl! I will make myself find the time to write about it this weekend, but for now, for my own peace, I channel Cass Elliot and Beth Ditto
Friday, January 23, 2009
Thursday, January 22, 2009
It warms my... Heart?
Oh Athens Boys Choir...
Oh tiny queer world...
Go to LOGO online and vote for "Fagette" on the Click-list Top 10
This warms my heart and other places a decent girl like myself doesn't name. Really, after a year of masses of queers down on their knees pledging to be good, clean, law-abiding homosexuals, this video puts a smile on your deviant, pervy, chubby cheeked face!
Oh tiny queer world...
Go to LOGO online and vote for "Fagette" on the Click-list Top 10
This warms my heart and other places a decent girl like myself doesn't name. Really, after a year of masses of queers down on their knees pledging to be good, clean, law-abiding homosexuals, this video puts a smile on your deviant, pervy, chubby cheeked face!
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