And a gray ship with undelivered Hyundais slipped behind Alcatraz Island into the setting sun as it headed out towards Long Beach and the last rays of the sun reflected off the Chevron refinery at Richmond making it look like two giant 747s waiting to take off and I was anxious to spot some parrots and although I hear a number of birds, none of them sound like parrots to me. And if I climbed even higher what then would I be able to see? And if I climbed even higher what more could I hear? That gray ship is now sailing beneath the Golden Gate or more properly 'through' the Golden Gate and I can now hear a flock parrots squawking.
Hunks of bread glasses of efface a window / high over the empty street / that was how it got him, he didn’t / love anybody any more / & maybe worse – Robert Kelly – Kali Yugen 1970
Motorcycle mama and me, a truck driving man, you have it in for me - don’t you? Ride all day and hide out all night - don’t you, your Harley and you? You say that I embarrass you and that you’re not sure if you want a boyfriend or a girlfriend. Why not have both? I don’t care. As I’m not so sure as to whether I want any friend at all. And we blame each other and you not wanting anything but silence clinging on to you from behind. Your motorcycle daddy wants to talk, but knows that he can’t be heard over the wind and the valves. And to you my voice is just part of the cacophony. The real music of your life is those two wheels screeching around the tight turns down the coastal highway towards Monterey. I an hanging on for my life. You’re my road trophy or am I yours. You slow down. I get off. You ride away. I don't watch you go. I look out towards the ocean, a big grey container ship is heading south. I will call you when I get back from my next haul, but you couldn't hear over the roar of your knuckleheads.
BREAST BIRDS: Breast birds don’t bred true. / Once you let them out of you / their vividness is brief; / their orange or blue / fades back to brown / as quick as your relief. / Oh, love, oh loneliness, oh grief – Kay Ryan – The Best of it, 2010 p78
One sixth of the world’s corn supply is burned in American cars. Enough corn to feed 350m people goes up in smog due to $9b in federal subsidies needed to make ethanol "economical". Worldwide the production of biofuels consumes 6.5% of the grain supply and 8% of the vegetable oil supply with food pieces themselves rising to their highest level since the UN began tracking the prices. Even Al Gore says he made a mistake.
Less stiff and less secretive than pride, the altitude of fatuous vanity [is] the conspicuous badge of amorous merit – Machado De Assis – Epitaph of a Small Winner, 1952 p199
It’s the banality of the programming that gives the advertising its aesthetic qualities
Great novels are always a little more intelligent than their authors – Milan Kundera
Money is one of the few things that naturally floats upstream. Affluence makes maturation run in reverse.
Someone is trying to
Make money
Someone is trying to
Get my attention
Blaring, screaming, blinking
Keep in touch
Using aromatherapy and
Smell’a-vision too
I am an easy touch
Reach out
And touch
Me some time
Ten stamps, ten cappuccinos; new card starts the series again – Zadie Smith – Changing My Mind, 2009 p85
Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won – Duke of Wellington
Blue Dog Democrats in the Nov 2010 elections lost more than half of their members in Congress while the Progressive caucus came in about even – losing three incumbents and gaining two. The election was less a victory of conservatives that the conclusion of the party shift of Southern Democrats to the Republican Party that began in the 60’s. It completes the old ideological alignment of Congress along party lines that began with Civil Rights. It was about time. Now both sides can vote along party lines.
Identity politics, the only authenticity to survive the twentieth century – Zadie Smith – Changing My Mind, 2009 p77
In a zero sum game, what happens to the loser(s)? Does one lose more than the other? Is one who loses less than they might or one who loses less that the other, the winer?
Writers love boozing… The language is all cinema and violence – Colum McCann – The American Scholar, Winter 2011 p18
World’s youngest grandmother – 23 year old Romanian Rifca Stanescu
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