Category: language

But then begins a journey in my head

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Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;
But then begins a journey in my head,
To work my mind, when body’s work’s expired:
For then my thoughts, from far where I abide,
Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,
And keep my drooping eyelids open wide,
Looking on darkness which the blind do see:
Save that my soul’s imaginary sight
Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,
Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night,
Makes black night beauteous and her old face new.
    Lo! Thus, by day my limbs, by night my mind,
    For thee and for myself no quiet find.

(Sonnet 27), William Shakespeare

the human form self-records its age while becoming a metaphor for external landscapes

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Seung Ah Paik (b. 1979, Seoul, Korea) lives and works in Pittsburgh, USA. Gratin. Rubell Museum.

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Body Cartography represents skin and the human body as tangible, living records–each blemish, wrinkle, or callous signifying the passage of time. These topographical markers connect moments in time to physical sites of transformation, transfiguring skin into what Paik terms “emotional terrain.” Paik is by no means new to the practice of morphing body and landscape, however. Her paintings serve as testament to the inextricable bond between nature and humanity, gradually eroding this barrier until her paintings become physical maps. With wrinkles as trajectories charting growth and defined lines suggestive of boundaries, the human form self-records its age while becoming a metaphor for external landscapes.

[…]

Paik seamlessly transforms that which is internal into external corporeal maps, meant to be followed and understood as one’s own. She does exactly that by painting entangled limbs and sloping breasts from obscure perspectives, presenting the illusion of looking down on one’s own body to establish a sense of familiarity. Paik reconstructs her body as a collection of objects observed from disjointed angles, complicating relationships between artist, viewer, and the created image.

foto-verde-1.jpg or and such are daffodils

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lamujerdedostoyevski.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/foto-verde-1.jpg
foto-verde-1.jpg via Luz y Tierra (August 2020)

[…]

Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
‘Gainst the hot season; the mid forest brake,
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
All lovely tales that we have heard or read:
An endless fountain of immortal drink,
Pouring unto us from the heaven’s brink.

Endymion, Book I, [A thing of beauty is a joy for ever], John Keats

batch of grainy residue

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the soaring dust of the mortal realm by Fei Ming ??

Translated By Yilin Wang, Translated from the Chinese

not to speak of timely rain falling wondrously upon ethereal mountains,

nor to dwell on footsteps echoing through hollow illusory valleys,

here’s yet another predictable batch of grainy residue,

still the mortal dust of the vast universe—

beyond the eaves, the lone call of a sparrow.

alas, pages of poetry, please become ashes taking flight.

the empty void is a speck of the heart that cherishes deeply.

the universe is a particle of unbroken dust drifting in the air.

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AG2025_1200812a or so very distant

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AG2025_1200812a
When night comes,
                I am so flushed with wine,
I undo my hair slowly:
                a plum calyx is
        stuck on a damaged branch.
I wake dazed when smoke
        breaks my spring sleep.
The dream distant,
                so very distant;
        and it is quiet, so very quiet.
The moon spins and spins.
The kingfisher blinds are drawn;
                and yet I rub the injured bud,
        and yet I twist in my fingers this fragrance,
        and yet I possess these moments of time!

 Poem by Li Ch’ing-chao, translated by Arthur Sze