St. Mary’s Square by Adriana Carcu A loud whistle pierces the air. The girl knows where it is coming from without turning her head. She sits on the wooden bench with her back to the crossing and looks straight at the statue. more >>

Presumed Guilty by Carmen Firan It wasn’t even Friday, much less the 13^th, but since early morning I had a premonition that things would not end well, not at all. more >>

The Dream by Irina Murarasu I dreamt of a man stabbed in the heart right in front of me, and I don’t know how, I got his heart in my hands; I was running down the streets searching desperately for a doctor to save his life. more >>

The Beautiful Moments by Phoenix life izz like the weather sometimes it izz Warm&Sunny aaand sometimez ít izz Kold&Wet, it izz a matter how we ride through it more >>

On the Banks of Death by Adrian Sangeorzan We could hear the waving of the thousands of flag strings tied between the trees, the jingle of the bells, and the cracking of wood and of the bones returning gradually to nature. more >>

Red Carpet by Frank Leistner The festival films are featured in most cinemas and one great advantage is that you discuss with film directors and actors after some of those movies. more>>

A Slice of Athens by Irina Murarasu Besides the plenty, the colors and the smells, there is the noise, the shouting out loud what the thing is about and the making you buy it. more>>

Jerusalem – Rome - Santiago by Hanelore Breitenhoffer Out of Jerusalem, with bright sun, he drove down and along the wall. The grey tall concrete, cutting through people’s yards and houses, the check points with lines, passports and guns. more>>

French Riviera by Nina Frauenfeld The French are getting into the “German tradition” of a real Christmas market with vin chaud (mulled wine) and even in the tiniest village, they are creating their own interpretation of a Christmas market. more>>

St. Mary’s Square

by Adriana Carcu

From inside the partition created by a canvas sheet hung in front of the window to keep curious looks away, the girl is watching the window dresser pleating a printed fabric in equal stripes and pinning it on a dummy. Each time he fixes a pleat he takes a pin out of the wrist cushion that looks like a silver hedgehog. In her left hand, deep in her pocket, the girl holds tightly a thin wad of money. The man ignores her and she likes it. She doesn’t need to talk. She doesn’t want to talk. She just stands there watching, mesmerized, how the light summer fabric becomes dresses, skirts and tops under his nimble hands.

When the man has draped the last mannequin and disappears into the shop, the girl emerges from under the striped canvas into the blinding sunshine. She walks a few steps past the entrance to the building where she lives and enters the confectionery. “A savarine and a lemonade, as always?” asks the lady at the counter. The girl nods. She takes the plate with the juicy cake and goes to the table in the corner, where she can eat it unobserved. She eats the cake, drinks the lemonade and walk out into the sun again.

She crosses the noisy street and stops in front of the shoe repair shop. From the window she watches Mr. Miclos put small wooden nails into the rims of a sole. The regularity with which he takes them out of a tin box and hammers them lightly into the tiny holes hypnotizes her. The sun is burning on her back. She turns around and almost bumps into Mrs. Ghioca, her neighbor, who is wearing a summer hat decorated with a bunch of artificial cherries. The cherries shine temptingly. Instinctively the girl reaches out to touch them. The woman stops her hand in the air with a firm grip. The girl looks at her and understands. You are not supposed to touch the decoration on ladies’ hats on the street. Especially not when they are wearing them. She greets her politely, “I kiss your hand”, and crosses the next street to the little square around St. Mary’s statue.

The marble Virgin stands tall inside a crenellated baldachin with the child in her arms. The open chapel is surrounded by an iron fence of a very intricate pattern. The monument is in memory of a martyr who died under torture in this place 450 years ago. The statue is the first thing the girl lays her eyes upon every time she walks out of the building where she lives, over the crossing. She likes the thick iron rods, like the curves of a leaning anchor, which mark the limits of the square; likes the warm smoothness and the feeling of security when she runs her hands along them.

Anica, the crazy girl from the neighborhood, is standing in the middle of the crossing in her dirty blue slacks with the metal whistle hanging from her neck. Cars and trams pass noisily by. Within minutes the whole tram traffic is in havoc. It is always the same. The drivers mistake her whistling with the signals of the traffic coordinators and take the wrong track. Always.

By the time the coordinator spots her and chases her away, Anica has become furious. That is the time when you don’t want to stand in her way. It may be dangerous. She once bit the girl’s shoulder with her sharp teeth. When things have quieted down, and trams are hurling along in their usual way, the girl crosses the street and is again in front of the garment shop. This time she walks inside. In the back of the shop, up the creaking wooden staircase which smells of gasoline, is the hosiers’ counter. The lady is her friend. She can talk to her. From there she can see through the window to the door of her apartment on the second floor of the building on the left.

The girl stands there for hours looking at the myriads of buttons in their little wooden cases; all colors and shapes. She likes the whirls of ribbons, the faint smell of rubber of the elastic bands the lady is measuring with a wooden ruler; her precise, dainty movements when she counts safety pins or garment hooks, and the sweep of her hand when she pours them into the little cones she makes from brown paper packaging. They don’t talk much. Suddenly, the girl hears the noise of the shutters coming down. The shop is closing and as usual she will leave together with the lady through the back door.

The lady disappears briefly behind the tall cupboard made of hundreds of tiny square drawers, each of them containing a different roll of ribbon or colored band, and comes out again holding her white summer purse. They are ready to go. In the street the girl looks at the huge clock right in front of the entrance to the apartment building where she lives. It is exactly six o’clock. The lady knows that she lives there. They pass the confectionery and the bakery, and enter the building where the lady lives. The girl follows her to the door. While looking for her keys in the bag, the lady asks the girl where her parents are. The girl says, “They are not home”. The lady unlocks the door, walks in and turns around. Holding the door with one hand she says: “You can’t come into my house” and closes it softly.

PRESUMED GUILTY IN AMERICA

by carmen firan

It wasn’t even Friday, much less the 13^th, but since early morning I had a premonition that things would not end well, not at all. The lawyer called me at the last minute saying that he could not appear with me in Court, a minor setback that I should get off easy. Not to worry, if I but repeated that which he had taught me to say. That was exactly what made me even more nervous. I spent a sleepless night dreading the bang of the Judge’s gavel as he pronounced me “Guilty”! And God knows what would happen to me next. Surely this was not why I had come to America

However, it seems I had dozed off that morning. In that twilight state the Judge’s head was like that of a bird of prey, towering above me from the heights of his bench, with nostrils shooting flames, and he pecked at the top of my head with his beak hard-as-a rock. I wake up with a throbbing migraine, the top of my head aching. Worriedly, I place my hand there and feel gingerly and carefully, all the while looking at myself in the mirror, but I do not see any marks from the hard beak of justice. I pray to my mother, now with God for many years, just as I always do when faced with a problem, convinced that our departed loved ones, now in a place where sorrows and sadness are no more, will intercede on our behalf. And mother always did.

I then start to carefully think about what to wear, all the while repeating in my head the lines that the lawyer had told me to learn by rote, reminding myself not to be intimidated, for they will try to get rid of all these criminals who are clogging the courtrooms of justice everyday. A cold chill runs down my spine. So, now I am a criminal. These things are taken seriously in America, and the word “crime” is frequently bandied about. It is also a crime when you take a life, or when you cheat, steal or even merely lie. Not to mention my case!

I eventually decide to wear an impersonal and demure dress, straight and simple, neither too long nor too short, a shade of gray that suggests rueful regret. I intentionally avoid black so as not to appear overly elegant; or white, for that is the color of subliminal innocence; I avoid saucy red as being too fresh and joyful, as well green or yellow, the colors of shy surrender. Certainly, no flowery prints. God forbid jewelry! I did, however, hide my watch well under my sleeve, as it too was inappropriate. Naked arms could have seemed offensive, and mine were not even as comely as Michelle Obama’s. Maybe one of my friends, the one with a mean streak, was right, you should start going to the gym after you reach that “certain age”.

I pick just the right shoes. I think that I should look like a conscientious Internal Revenue Service clerk the thought of that made me dizzy. The tax authorities were to me the best example of Kafka’s world of absurd bureaucracy from which I had emigrated, one where a person’s impending guilt, one who could soon to be caught red-handed, even though totally innocent. Back then, life was full of black cats, lizards and all sort of slimy creatures that could humiliate or put you in the slammer despite having justice on your side.

Some time ago Apostrophe Magazine conducted a survey on fear to which I had responded with an essay in which Kafka and Durrenmatt featured prominently, only to beat around the bush, hiding the fact that I, in fact, did live in fear. I was afraid of any form of authority, of a totalitarian system, from the militia, to the revenue office, and that I felt like a criminal every time I demanded these of institutions respect my rights.

America is totally another story. A normal world, where the individual is respected and institutions are created to serve him not to crush him, so I had nothing to be afraid of. With this invigorating thought, I took a deep breath, a deep breath to relax. Nevertheless, it is but common sense that an individual must be fair and just, to abide by the law. But had I done so? My breath stopped halfway, I did not finish my thought and I pressed my hand against my chest to stop my wildly beating heart. I was told before that I care too much, but I could physically feel how the vital steam which pulsates inside the body was now accumulating in my stomach, it would afterwards wildly rush up and gasp in my temples, or it would go down at full speed mellowing my knees.

I had taken my car for a tune-up the day before, washed it and filled it up, although I was not sure whether I should have left it a bit dustier. It is not a good thing to draw attention to yourself, this I also learnt in my native country where after having satisfied their thirst for gossip, they would ignore you by denying your very existence. Well, you do exist here, exactly the way you are, you are noticed here with all your faults, blemishes and achievements. It was not about achievement in my case. I had made a mistake and I would have to pay for it.

Before me was a long three hour trip to the north of New York State. The hearing was scheduled for seven in the evening, but God knows how long it would last, and then another three hours for the return. I took water and chocolates with me. I wanted to slip a small cross in my purse for added safety, but an old woman’s words drummed in my ears: “In this town you should wear the cross on the back”. It was shortly after I had arrived in this country and at that time I did not understand what she meant. I was not a big fan of necklaces with crosses and virgins anyway. So I left the cross on the table, even though New York had nothing to do with the small town I was going to, the town that no one had ever heard of, somewhere in the countryside, where people actually go to church on Sundays and hunt deer and wild turkeys after the mass.

The migraine would not go away so at the last minute I made myself a turban out of a fine head dress and I wrapped it around my head thinking it would protect me in the car as I would have to drive hours with windows open, like any goof god fearing East European who cannot stand air conditioning and can easily fall victim to a draft. The word victim made me feel uneasy as my mind was already besieged by the words I would utter in front of the prosecutor, policemen and judge, together with God knows how many others that will be in the courtroom: “We were visiting with some friends when my husband who is a doctor was called to the hospital urgently…”

My lawyer had insisted that I be brief, clear, not give many explanations and details and especially avoid metaphors or give away useless details. It would seem hard for someone who comes from a culture of metaphors, where if a language is not plastic then it is poor, where details and parables, ambiguity and exalted gestures, sprinkled with a bit of humor and diminutives is enough as to destroy the communication barriers and to unwind the atmosphere in order to create a false familiarity. But I had learnt my lesson in America: “How are you?” “I’m fine.” “How about you?” “I’m fine, thank you.”

But should I also add that he was a gynecologist, that the patient needed an urgent Caesarian that she had gone into premature labor, she had a cyst that complicated the surgery, the umbilical cord was wrapped around the baby’s neck, that it was a matter of life and death?

I imagined the lawyer making faces especially at the “Matter of life and Death” bit, which was part of the category of metaphors that he despised, so I looked in the mirror one more time, the head dress made me look repentant yet noble, Oh, had I known what it would bring me! -, I grabbed my keys and got into my car feeling as though I was going on the front.

I dreamt of a man stabbed in the heart right in front of me, and I don’t know how, I got his heart in my hands; I was running down the streets searching desperately for a doctor to save his life. Who was that man? Isn’t this kind of a reversed, curing image? Damn it, that was my heart, I know it for sure. That reminded me in a strange, remote way of another dream I had many years ago after parting with my unhappiness provider: had cut a piece of my belly, wrapped it and put it into the fridge. So many wounds, they never seem to cure, still bleeding here and there. These dreams have something to do with it. But who am I to me?

No more playing, we should get back to our false impressions; adjust to what we need to adjust to. Jesus Christ, how many times before have I adjusted to damn situations? Maybe life is more about adjusting, carving, giving up, letting in. Minimalism is not only a trend in luxurious lofts of the rich, well marketed artists fed up with the plenty of things, with the ‘vas et viens’… it is a way of putting up with life.

I have this sheet of paper on my desk; it is from an old agenda… with endless lists of what I should read, should learn and should do. My agendas are motivational. I don’t remember very well when and why I was seized with a sudden interest in Merongivian art, in paleo Christianity… also, in the history of the Mediterranean region. It is a good thing I kept it well written at least. I haven’t thrown it so far but now I think it is high time. Or maybe I should throw all old agendas I have carefully kept so far. I have a pile of them. What’s the use in seeing where I was and what I was doing on the 8^th of September 200X. I know damn well the whole story of it. I know I almost died that day. Those ashes from my agendas… don’t need them anymore.

Impossibility urges us to err. It is the fear we have in front of total dismay. We try to avoid it when we know perfectly well that in certain respects all options are closed.

my life is like a thin-necked
Berzelius glass
where I mix
books mushy films trendy outfits
strangers
I was crying when I met you
instead of past progressive
cutting-pasting
pantomime for my students
and my house like a
send-the-loneliness-away motel

every Tuesday
Laura’s belly
welcomes me
larger and larger
and laughs in my face

The Window and the Door

by Scott Anderson

When the window opens to the sun,
Of a blue sky and the singing dawn,
I sense my breath is moving to,
A way to feel the early morn,
To take the world and show I know it,
Give the love that lives beyond.

The door below, it has been open,
Though in effect is always closed,
I know that I can go and use it,
But I’d rather watch the dawn;

Like the songbird on my tree,
Singing with an early dew,
Flying then, with arms outstretched,
Knowing, that I am free.

SCA, 13 Dec 2010

Theodore Tilton,
This Too Shall Pass Away

Once in Persia reigned a King,
Who upon his signet ring
Graved a maxim true and wise,
Which, if held before his eyes,
Gave him counsel at a glance,
Fit for every change and chance.
Solemn words, and these are they;
"Even this shall pass away."

Trains of camels through the sand
Brought him gems from Samarcand;
Fleets of galleys through the seas
Brought him pearls to match with these;
But he counted not his gain,
Treasures of mine or main;
"What is wealth?" the king would say;
"Even this shall pass away."

Mid the revels of his court,
At the zenith of his sport,
When the palms of all his guests,
Burned with clapping at his jests,
He, amid his figs and wine;
Cried, 'O loving friends of mine;
Pleasures come, but not to stay;
"Even this shall pass away"

Lady, fairest ever seen,
Was the bride he crowned his queen.
Pillowed on his marriage bed,
Softly to his soul he said:
Though no bridegroom ever passed;
Fairer bosom to his breast,
Mortal flesh must come to clay-
"Even this shall pass away"

Fighting on a furious field,
Once a javelin pierced his shield;
Soldiers, with a loud lament,
Bore him bleeding to his tent.
Groaning from his tortured side,
"Pain is hard to bear," he cried;
"But with patience, day by day,
Even this shall pass away.

Towering in the public square,
Twenty cubits in the air,
Rose his statue carved in stone.
Then the king, disguised, unknown,
Stood before his sculptured name,
Musing meekly: "What is fame?"
Fame is but a slow decay;

Even this shall pass away.

Struck with palsy, sore and old,
Waiting at the Gates of Gold,
Said he with his dying breath,
"Life is done, but what is death?"
Then, in answer to the king,
Fell a sun beam on his ring,
"Even this shall pass away."

LIBRARY

Langdon Smith, Evolution

When you were a tadpole and I was a fish
In the Paleozoic time,
And side by side on the ebbing tide
We sprawled through the ooze and slime,
Or skittered with many a caudal flip
Through the depths of the Cambrian fen,
My heart was rife with the joy of life,
For I loved you even then.

Mindless we lived and mindless we loved
And mindless at last we died;
And deep in the rift of the Caradoc drift
We slumbered side by side.
The world turned on in the lathe of time,
The hot lands heaved amain,
Till we caught our breath from the womb of death
And crept into light again.

We were amphibians, scaled and tailed,
And drab as a dead man's hand;
We coiled at ease 'neath the dripping trees
Or trailed through the mud and sand.
Croaking and blind, with our three-clawed feet,
Writing a language dumb,
With never a spark in the empty dark
To hint at a life to come.

Yet happy we lived and happy we loved,
And happy we died once more;
Our forms were rolled in the clinging mold
Of a Neocomian shore.
The eons came and the eons fled
And the sleep that wrapped us fast
Was riven away in a newer day
And the night of death was past.

Then light and swift through the jungle trees
We swung in our airy flights,
Or breathed in the balms of the fronded palms
In the hush of the moonless nights;
And, oh! what beautiful years were there
When our hearts clung each to each;
When life was filled and our senses thrilled
In the first faint dawn of speech.

Thus life by life and love by love
We passed through the cycles strange,
And breath by breath and death by death
We followed the chain of change.
Till there came a time in the law of life
When over the nursing side
The shadows broke and the soul awoke
In a strange, dim dream of God.

I was thewed like an Auroch bull
And tusked like the great cave bear;
And you, my sweet, from head to feet
Were gowned in your glorious hair.
Deep in the gloom of a fireless cave,
When the night fell o'er the plain
And the moon hung red o'er the river bed
We mumbled the bones of the slain.

I flaked a flint to a cutting edge
And shaped it with brutish craft;
I broke a shank from the woodland lank
And fitted it, head and haft;
Then I hid me close to the reedy tarn
Where the mammoth came to drink;
Through the brawn and bone I drove the stone
And slew him upon the brink.

Loud I howled through the moonlit wastes,
Loud answered our kith and kin;
From west to east to the crimson feast
The clan came tramping in.
O'er joint and gristle and padded bone
We fought and clawed and tore,
And cheek by jowl with many a growl
We talked the marvel o'er.

I carved the fight on a reindeer bone
With rude and hairy hand;
I pictured his fall on the cavern wall
That men might understand.
For we lived by blood and the right of might
Ere human laws were drawn,
And the age of sin did not begin
Till our brutal tush were gone.

And that was a million years ago
In a time that no man knows;
Yet here tonight in the mellow light
We sit at Delmonico's.
Your eyes are deep as the Devon springs,
Your hair is dark as jet,
Your years are few, your life is new,
Your soul untried, and yet -

Our trail is on the Kimmeridge clay
And the scarp of the Purbeck flags;
We have left our bones in the Bagshot stones
And deep in the Coralline crags;
Our love is old, our lives are old,
And death shall come amain;
Should it come today, what man may say
We shall not live again?

God wrought our souls from the Tremadoc beds
And furnished them wings to fly;
He sowed our spawn in the world's dim dawn,
And I know that it shall not die,
Though cities have sprung above the graves
Where the crook-bone men make war
And the oxwain creaks o'er the buried caves
Where the mummied mammoths are.

Then as we linger at luncheon here
O'er many a dainty dish,
Let us drink anew to the time when you
Were a tadpole and I was a fish.

Jorge Luis Borges
We are the time. We are the famous

We are the time. We are the famous
metaphor from Heraclitus the Obscure.

We are the water, not the hard diamond,
the one that is lost, not the one that stands still.

We are the river and we are that Greek
that looks himself into the river. His reflection
changes into the waters of the changing mirror,
into the crystal that changes like the fire.

We are the vain predetermined river,
in his travel to his sea.

The shadows have surrounded him.
Everything said goodbye to us, everything goes away.

Memory does not stamp his own coin.

However, there is something that stays
however, there is something that bemoans

Edgar Allan Poe, Ulalume

The skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they were crisped and sere -
The leaves they were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year:
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
In the misty mid region of Weir -
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.

Here once, through and alley Titanic,
Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul -
Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul.
These were days when my heart was volcanic
As the scoriac rivers that roll -
As the lavas that restlessly roll
Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek
In the ultimate climes of the pole -
That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek
In the realms of the boreal pole.

Geoffrey Chaucer, Rondel of Merciless Beauty

Your two great eyes will slay me suddenly;
Their beauty shakes me who was once serene;
Straight through my heart the wound is quick and keen.

Only your word will heal the injury
To my hurt heart, while yet the wound is clean -
Your two great eyes will slay me suddenly;
Their beauty shakes me who was once serene.

Upon my word, I tell you faithfully
Through life and after death you are my queen;
For with my death the whole truth shall be seen.

Your two great eyes will slay me suddenly;
Their beauty shakes me who was once serene;
Straight through my heart the wound is quick and keen.

Dylan Thomas
And Death Shall Have No Dominion

And death shall have no dominion.
Dead mean naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.

And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.

And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.

Federico García Lorca,
Sonnet of the Sweet Complaint

Never let me lose the marvel
of your statue-like eyes, or the accent
the solitary rose of your breath
places on my cheek at night.

I am afraid of being, on this shore,
a branchless trunk, and what I most regret
is having no flower, pulp, or clay
for the worm of my despair.

If you are my hidden treasure,
if you are my cross, my dampened pain,
if I am a dog, and you alone my master,

never let me lose what I have gained,
and adorn the branches of your river
with leaves of my estranged Autumn.

Charles Baudelaire, Meditation
Calm down, my Sorrow, we must move with care.
You called for evening; it descends, it's here.
The town is coffined in its atmosphere,
bringing relief to some, to others care.

Now while the common multitude strips bare,
feels pleasure's cat o' nine tails on its back,
and fights off anguish at the great bazaar,
give me your hand, my Sorrow. Let's stand back;

back from these people! Look, the dead years dressed
in old clothes crowd the balconies of the sky.
Regret emerges smiling from the sea,

the sick sun slumbers underneath an arch,
and like a shroud strung out from east to west,
listen, my Dearest, hear the sweet night march!

Robert Lowell, from Marthiel & Jackson Matthews, eds., The Flowers of Evil (NY: New Directions, 1963)

LUCIAN BLAGA, I do not crush the world's corolla of wonders
I do not crush the world's corolla of wonders
and I do not kill
with my mind the secrets I encounter
in my way
in flowers or in eyes, on lips or tombs.
The light of others
chokes the spell of the arcane hidden
in depths of dark
but I
with my own light I heighten the world's mystery

and just as with its white beams the moon
does not abate, but quivering
increases the secrets of the night,
so I enrich the dark horizon
with ample shivers of holy mystery,
and all that's recondite
gains greater depths
under my very eyes -
for I do love
the flowers, and the eyes, and lips, and tombs.

Emily Dickinson, There's a Certain Slant of Light
Winter Afternoons -
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes -

Heavenly Hurt, it gives us -
We can find no scar,
But internal difference,
Where the Meanings, are -

None may teach it - Any -
'Tis the Seal Despair -
An imperial affliction
Sent us of the Air -

When it comes, the Landscape listens -
Shadows - hold their breath -
When it goes, 'tis like the Distance
On the look of Death -

On beatitude, happiness and change...

Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet, pp. 143-154

In a time of constant transformation, beatitude is the joy that comes with belief, with certainty. The beatific bathe in almighty love, wear smug grins and play their harps and acoustic guitars. Safe in their cocoon from the storms of metamorphosis, the blessed give thanks for their unchangingness, and ignore the iron biting into their ankles. It's eternal bliss, but nix nix, you can keep that jailhouse cell. The Beats and their Generation were wrong. Beatitude is the prisoner's surrender to his chains.

Happiness, now, that's something else again. Happiness is human, not divine, and the pursuit of happiness is what we may call love. This love, earthly love, is a truce between metamorphs, a temporary agreement not to shape-shift while kissing and holding hands. Love is intimate democracy, a compact that insists on renewals, and you can be voted out overnight, however big your majority. It's fragile, precarious and it is all we can get without selling our soul to one party or the other. It's what we can have while remaining free. (...) All treatises can be broken, all promises end up as lies. Sign nothing, make no promises. Make a provisional reconciliation, a fragile peace. If you are lucky it may last five days; or fifty years.

James Joyce, Ulysses, pp. 282-286

(...)

I have no money but if you will lend me your attention I shall endeavour to sing to you of a heart bowed down.

By the sandwichbell in screening shadow, Lydia her bronze and rose, a lady's grace, grave and withheld: is in cool glaucous eau de Nil Mina to tankards two pinnacles of gold.

The harping chords of prelude closed. A chord longdrawn, expectant drew a voice away.

- When I first saw thy form endearing

Richie turned.

- Si Dedalus's voice, he said.

Braintipped, cheek touched with flame, they listened feeling that flow endearing flow over skin limbs human heart soul spine. Bloom signed to Pat, bald Pat is a waiter hard of hearing, to set ajar the door of the bar. The door of the bar . So. That will do. Pat, waiter, waited, waiting to hear, for he was hard of hear by the door.

- Sorrow from me seemed to depart.

Through the hush of air a voice sang to them, low, not rain, not leaves in murmur, like no voice of strings of reeds or whatdoyoucallthem dulcimers, touching their still ears with words, still hearts of their each his remembered lives. Good, good to hear: sorrow from them each seemed to from both depart when first they heard. When first they saw, lost Richie, Poldy, mercy of beauty, heard from a person wouldn't expect it in the least, her first merciful lovesoft oftloved word.

Love that is singing: love's old sweet song: Bloom unwound slowly the elastic band of his packet. Love's old sweet sonnez la gold. Bloom wound a skein round four forkfingers, stretched it, relaxed, and wound it round his troubled double, fourfold, in octave, gyved them fast.

- Full of hope and all delighted ...

Tenors get women by the score. Increase their flow. Throw flower at his feel when will we meet? My head is simply. Jingle all delighted. He can't sing for tall hats. Your head it simply swurls. Perfumed for him. What perfume does your wife? I want to know. Jing. Stop. Knock. Last look at mirror always before she answers he door. The hall. There? How do you do? I do well. There? What? Or? Phila of cachous, kissing comfits, in her satchel. Yes? Hands felt for the opulent.

Alas! The voice rose, sighing, changed: loud, full, shining, proud.

- But alas, 'twas idle dreaming ...

Glorious tone he has still. Cork air softer also their brogue. Silly man! Could have made oceans of money. Singing wrong words. Wore out his wife: now sings. But hard to tell. Only the two themselves. Id he doesn't break down. Keep a trot for the avenue. His hands and feet sing too. Drink. Nerves overstrung. Must be abstemious to sing. Jenny Lind soup: stock, sage, raw eggs, half pint of cream. For creamy dreamy.

Tenderness is welled: slow, swelling. Full is throbbed. That's the chat. Ha, give! Take! Throb, a throb, a pulsing proud erect.

Words? Music? No: it's what's behind.

Bloom looped, unlooped, nodded, disnoded.

Bloom. Flood of warm jimjam lickit up secretness flowed to flow in music out, in desire, dark to lick flow, invading. Tipping her tepping her tapping her topping her. Tup. Pores to dilate dilating. Tup. The joy the feel the warm the. Tup. To pour o'er sluices pouring gushes. Flood, gush, flow, joygush, tupthorp. Now! Language of love.

- ... ray of hope ...

Beaming. Lydia for Lidwell squeak scarcely hear so ladylike the muse unsqueaked a ray of hope.

Martha it is. Coincidence. Just going to write. Lione's song. Lovely name you have. Can't write. Accept my little pres. Play on her heartstrings pursestrings too. She's a. I called you naughty boy. Still the name: Martha. How strange. Today.

The voice of Lionel returned, weaker but unwearied. It sang again to Richie Poldy Lydia Lidwell also sang to Pat open mouth ear waiting, to wait. How first he saw that form endearing, how sorrow seemed to part, how look, form, word charmed him Gould Lindwell, won Pat Bloom's heart.

Wish I could see his face, though. Explain better. Why the barber in Drago's always looked my face when I spoke his face in the grass. Still hear it better here than in the bar though farther.

- Each graceful look ...

First night when I first saw her at Mat Dillon's in Terenure. Yellow, black lace she wore. Musical chairs. We two the last. Fate. After her. Fate. Round and round slow. Quick round. We two. All looked. Halt. Down she sat. All oused looked. Lips laughing. Yellow Knees.

- Charmed my eye ...

Singing. Waiting she sang. I turned her music. Full voice of perfume of what perfume does your lilactrees. Bosom I saw, both full, throat warbling. First I saw. She thanked me. Why did she me? Fate. Spanish eyes. Under a peartree alone patio this hour in old Madrid one side in shadow Dolores shedolores. At me. Luring. Ah, alluring.

- Martha! Ah, Martha!

Quitting all languor Lionel cried in grief, in cry of passion dominant of love to return with deepening yet with rising chords of harmony. In cry of lionel loneliness that she should know, must Martha feel. For only her he waited. Where? Here there try there here all thy where. Somewhere.

- Co-me, thou lost one!

Alone. One love. One hope. One comfort me. Martha, chestnote, return.

- Come!

It soared, a bird, it held its flight, a swift pure cry, soar silver orb it leaped serene, speeding, sustained, to come, don't spin it out too long long breath he breath long life, soaring high vast irradiation everywhere all soaring all around about the all, the endlessnessnessnessness ...

- To me!

Siopold!

Consumed.

Come. Well sung. All clapped. She ought to. Come. To me, to him, to her, you too, me, us.

- Bravo! Clipclap. Goodman, Simon. Clappyclapclaa. Encore! Clapclipclap. Sound as a bell. Bravo, Simon! Clapclipclap. Encore, enclap, said, cried, clapped all, Ben Dollard, Lydia Douce, George Lidwell, Pat, Mina, two gentlemen with two tankards, Cowley, first gent wit tank and bronze Miss Douce and gold Miss Mina.

Blazes <boylen's smart tan shoes crecked on the barfloor, said before. Jingle by monuments of sir John Gray, Horatio onehanded Nelson, reverend father Theobald Matthew, jaunted as said before just now. Atrot, in heat, heatseated. Cloche. Sonnez la. Cloche: Sonnez la. Slower the mare went up the hill by Rotunda, Rutland square. Too slow for Boylan, blazes Boylan, impatience Boylan, joggled the mare.

An afterclang of Cowley's chords closed, died in the air made richer. (...)

James Joyce, Ullyses, pp. 282-286

Nicole Kraus, from The History of Love

Franz Kafka is Dead

He died in a tree from which he wouldn't come down. "Come down!" they cried to him. "Come down! Come down!" Silence filled the night and the night filled the silence, while they waited for Kafka to speak. "I can't," he finally said with a note of wistfulness. "Why?" they cried. Stars spilled across the black sky. "Because then you won't stop asking for me."The people whispered and nodded among themselves. They put their arms around each other, and touched their children's hair. They took off their hats and raised them to the small, sickly man with the ears of a strange animal, sitting in his black velvet suit in the dark tree. Then they turned and started for home under the canopy of leaves. Children were carried on their fathers' shoulder, sleepy form having been taken to see a man who wrote his books on pieces of bark he tore off the trees form which he refused to come down. In his delicate illegible handwriting. And they admired those books, and they admired his will and stamina. After all: who does wish to make a spectacle of their loneliness? One by one, families broke off with a goodnight and a squeeze of the hands, suddenly grateful for the company of the neighbors. Door closed to warm houses. Candles were lit in the windows. Farr off, in his perch in the trees, Kafka listened to it all: the rustle of clothes being dropped to the floor, of lips fluttering along naked shoulders, beds creaking under the weight of tenderness. It all caught in the delicate pointed shells of his ears and rolled like pinballs through the great hall of his mind.

That night, a freezing wind blew in. When the children woke up, they went to the windows and found the world encased in ice. One child, the smallest, shrieked out in delight and her cry tore through the silence and exploded the ice of a giant oak tree.

The world shone.

They found him frozen on the ground like a bird, It's said that when they put their ears to the shell of his ears, they could hear themselves.

Virginia Woolf, On Words (Transcript of a BBC Interview)
Words, English words, are full of echoes, memories, associations. They've been out and about on peoples lips, in their houses, in the streets, in the fields, for so many centuries. And that is one of the chief difficulties of writing today. They are stored with other meanings, with other memories and they have contracted so many famous marriages in the past. The splendid word, incarnadine, for example, who can use that without remembering multitudinous seas*? In the old days, of course, when English was a new language, writers could invent new words and use them. Nowadays it's easy enough to invent new words; they spring to the lips whenever we see a new sight or feel a new sensation. But we don't use them because the English language is old. You cannot use a brand new word in an old language. The cause is obvious. This mysterious fact is that a word is not a single and sacred entity; it is part of all our words. Indeed it is not a word; indeed it is part of a sentence. Words belong to each other. And of course only a great poet knows that the word incarnadine belongs to the multitudinous seas. To combine new words with old words is painful to the constitution of the sentence. In order to use new words properly, you will have to invent a whole new language and that, no doubt, is not at the moment our business. Our business is to see what we can do with the old English language as it is. How can we combine the old words in new orders, so that they survive, so that they create beauty, so that they tell the truth? That is the question.

________________________________

* Whence is that knocking?
How is't with me, when every noise appalls me?
What hands are here? Hah! They pluck out mine eyes.
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
Clean from my hand? No; this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green one red.
Macbeth Act 2, scene 2, 54-60

Leonard Cohen, How to Speak Poetry
Take the word butterfly. To use this word it is not necessary to make the voice weigh less than an ounce or equip it with small dusty wings. It is not necessary to invent a sunny day or a field of daffodils. It is not necessary to be in love, or to be in love with butterflies. The word butterfly is not a real butterfly. There is the word and there is the butterfly. If you confuse these two items people have the right to laugh at you. Do not make so much of the word. Are you trying to suggest that you love butterflies more perfectly than anyone else, or really understand their nature? The word butterfly is merely data. It is not an opportunity for you to hover, soar, befriend flowers, symbolize beauty and frailty, or in any way impersonate a butterfly. Do not act out words. Never act out words. Never try to leave the floor when you talk about flying. Never close your eyes and jerk your head to one side when you talk about death. Do not fix your burning eyes on me when you speak about love. If you want to impress me when you speak about love put your hand in your pocket or under your dress and play with yourself. If ambition and the hunger for applause have driven you to speak about love you should learn how to do it without disgracing yourself or the material.

What is the expression which the age demands? The age demands no expression whatever. We have seen photographs of bereaved Asian mothers. We are not interested in the agony of your fumbled organs. There is nothing you can show on your face that can match the horror of this time. Do not even try. You will only hold yourself up to the scorn of those who have felt things deeply. We have seen newsreels of humans in the extremities of pain and dislocation. Everyone knows you are eating well and are even being paid to stand up there. You are playing to people who have experienced a catastrophe. This should make you very quiet. Speak the words, convey the data, step aside. Everyone knows you are in pain. You cannot tell the audience everything you know about love in every line of love you speak. Step aside and they will know what you know because you know it already. You have nothing to teach them. You are not more beautiful than they are. You are not wiser. Do not shout at them. Do not force a dry entry. That is bad sex. If you show the lines of your genitals, then deliver what you promise. And remember that people do not really want an acrobat in bed. What is our need? To be close to the natural man, to be close to the natural woman. Do not pretend that you are a beloved singer with a vast loyal audience which has followed the ups and downs of your life to this very moment. The bombs, flame-throwers, and all the shit have destroyed more than just the trees and villages. They have also destroyed the stage. Did you think that your profession would escape the general destruction? There is no more stage. There are no more footlights. You are among the people. Then be modest. Speak the words, convey the data, step aside. Be by yourself. Be in your own room. Do not put yourself on.

This is an interior landscape. It is inside. It is private. Respect the privacy of the material. These pieces were written in silence. The courage of the play is to speak them. The discipline of the play is not to violate them. Let the audience feel your love of privacy even though there is no privacy. Be good whores. The poem is not a slogan. It cannot advertise you. It cannot promote your reputation for sensitivity. You are not a stud. You are not a killer lady. All this junk about the gangsters of love. You are students of discipline. Do not act out the words. The words die when you act them out, they wither, and we are left with nothing but your ambition.

Speak the words with the exact precision with which you would check out a laundry list. Do not become emotional about the lace blouse. Do not get a hard-on when you say panties. Do not get all shivery just because of the towel. The sheets should not provoke a dreamy expression about the eyes. There is no need to weep into the handkerchief. The socks are not there to remind you of strange and distant voyages. It is just your laundry. It is just your clothes. Don't peep through them. Just wear them.

The poem is nothing but information. It is the Constitution of the inner country. If you declaim it and blow it up with noble intentions then you are no better than the politicians whom you despise. You are just someone waving a flag and making the cheapest kind of appeal to a kind of emotional patriotism. Think of the words as science, not as art. They are a report. You are speaking before a meeting of the Explorers' Club of the National Geographic Society. These people know all the risks of mountain climbing. They honour you by taking this for granted. If you rub their faces in it that is an insult to their hospitality. Tell them about the height of the mountain, the equipment you used, be specific about the surfaces and the time it took to scale it. Do not work the audience for gasps ans sighs. If you are worthy of gasps and sighs it will not be from your appreciation of the event but from theirs. It will be in the statistics and not the trembling of the voice or the cutting of the air with your hands. It will be in the data and the quiet organization of your presence.

Avoid the flourish. Do not be afraid to be weak. Do not be ashamed to be tired. You look good when you're tired. You look like you could go on forever. Now come into my arms. You are the image of my beauty.

Giacomo Leopardi, Infinite
These solitary hills have always been dear to me.
Seated here, this sweet hedge, which blocks the distant horizon opening inner silences and interminable distances.
I plunge in thought to where my heart, frightened, pulls back.
Like the wind which I hear tossing the trembling plants which surround me, a voice from the inner depths of spirit shakes the certitudes of thought.
Eternity breaks through time, past and present intermingle in her image.
In the inner shadows I lose myself,
drowning in the sea-depths of timeless love.

Jorge Luis Borges, The Art of Poetry
To gaze at a river made of time and water
and remember Time is another river.
To know we stray like a river
and our faces vanish like water.

To feel that waking is another dream
that dreams of not dreaming and that the death
we fear in our bones is the death
that every night we call a dream.

To see in every day and year a symbol
of all the days of man and his years,
and convert the outrage of the years
into a music, a sound, and a symbol.

To see in death a dream, in the sunset
a golden sadness such is poetry,
humble and immortal, poetry,
returning, like dawn and the sunset.

Sometimes at evening there's a face
that sees us from the deeps of a mirror.
Art must be that sort of mirror,
disclosing to each of us his face.

They say Ulysses, wearied of wonders,
wept with love on seeing Ithaca,
humble and green. Art is that Ithaca,
a green eternity, not wonders.

Art is endless like a river flowing,
passing, yet remaining, a mirror to the same
inconstant Heraclitus, who is the same
and yet another, like the river flowing.

Philip Larkin, Going
There is an evening coming in
Across the fields, one never seen before,
That lights no lamps.

Silken it seems at a distance, yet
When it is drawn up over the knees and breast
It brings no comfort.

Where has the tree gone, that locked
Earth to the sky? What is under my hands,
That I cannot feel?

What loads my hands down?

John Updike, Perfection Wasted
And another regrettable thing about death
is the ceasing of your own brand of magic,
which took a whole life to develop and market-
the quips, the witticisms, the slant
adjusted to a few, those loved ones nearest
the lip of the stage, their soft faces blanched
in the footlight glow, their laughter close to tears,
their warm pooled breath in and out with your heartbeat,
their response and your performance twinned.
The jokes over the phone. The memories packed
in the rapid-access file. The whole act.
Who will do it again? That's it: no one;
imitators and descendants aren't the same.

Charles Bukowski, 8 Count
from my bed
I watch
3 birds
on a telephone
wire.
one flies
off.
then
another.
one is left,
then
it too
is gone.
my typewriter is
tombstone
still.
and I am
reduced to bird
watching.
just thought I'd
let you
know,
fucker.

Lord Byron, The Tear
When Friendship or Love
Our sympathies move;
When Truth, in a glance, should appear,
The lips may beguile,
With a dimple or smile,
But the test of affection's a Tear:

Too oft is a smile
But the hypocrite's wile,
To mask detestation, or fear;
Give me the soft sigh,
Whilst the soultelling eye
Is dimm'd, for a time, with a Tear:

Mild Charity's glow,
To us mortals below,
Shows the soul from barbarity clear;
Compassion will melt,
Where this virtue is felt,
And its dew is diffused in a Tear:

The man, doom'd to sail
With the blast of the gale,
Through billows Atlantic to steer,
As he bends o'er the wave
Which may soon be his grave,
The green sparkles bright with a Tear;

The Soldier braves death
For a fanciful wreath
In Glory's romantic career;
But he raises the foe
When in battle laid low,
And bathes every wound with a Tear.

If, with high-bounding pride,
He return to his bride!
Renouncing the gore-crimson'd spear;
All his toils are repaid
When, embracing the maid,
From her eyelid he kisses the Tear.

Sweet scene of my youth!
Seat of Friendship and Truth,
Where Love chas'd each fast-fleeting year
Loth to leave thee, I mourn'd,
For a last look I turn'd,
But thy spire was scarce seen through a Tear:

Though my vows I can pour,
To my Mary no more,
My Mary, to Love once so dear,
In the shade of her bow'r,
I remember the hour,
She rewarded those vows with a Tear.

By another possest,
May she live ever blest!
Her name still my heart must revere:
With a sigh I resign,
What I once thought was mine,
And forgive her deceit with a Tear.

Ye friends of my heart,
Ere from you I depart,
This hope to my breast is most near:
If again we shall meet,
In this rural retreat,
May we meet, as we part, with a Tear.

When my soul wings her flight
To the regions of night,
And my corse shall recline on its bier;
As ye pass by the tomb,
Where my ashes consume,
Oh! moisten their dust with a Tear.

Kenneth Patchen

THIS ROOM HAS MYSTERY LIKE A TRANCE

This room has mystery like a trance

Of wine; forget-me-nots of you

Are chair and couch, the books your

Fingers touched. And now that you

Are absent here the silence scrapes

A secret rust from everything;

While sudden wreath of sorrow's

Dust uncover emptiness like halls

To stumble through, and terror falls.

Paul Verlaine, Autumn Song
With long sobs
the violin-throbs
of autumn wound
my heart with languorous
and monotonous
sound.

Choking and pale
When I mind the tale
the hours keep,
my memory strays
down other days
and I weep;

and I let me go
where ill winds blow
now here, now there,
harried and sped,
even as a dead
leaf, anywhere.

Emily Dickinson, A Secret Told
A Secret told -
Ceases to be a Secret - then -
A Secret - kept -
That - can appall but One -

Better of it - continual be afraid –

Than it -
And Whom you told it to - beside –

Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin, Friendship
What's friendship? The hangover's faction,
The gratis talk of outrage,
Exchange by vanity, inaction,
Or bitter shame of patronage.

William Wordsworth, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed---and gazed---but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

Rudyard Kipling, IF
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream-and not make dreams your master;
If you can think-and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings-nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And-which is more-you'll be a Man, my son!

Michelangelo Buonarroti, CELESTIAL LOVE
No mortal thing enthralled these longing eyes
When perfect peace in thy fair face I found;
But far within, where all is holy ground,
My soul felt Love, her comrade of the skies:
For she was born with God in Paradise;
Nor all the shows of beauty shed around
This fair false world her wings to earth have bound:
Unto the Love of Loves aloft she flies.
Nay, things that suffer death quench not the fire
Of deathless spirits; nor eternity
Serves sordid Time that withers all things rare.
Not love but lawless impulse is desire:
That slays the soul; our love makes still more fair
Our friends on earth, fairer in death on high.

Robert Frost, A Dream Pang
I had withdrawn in forest, and my song
Was swallowed up in leaves that blew away;
And to the forest edge you came one day
(This was my dream) and looked and pondered long,
But did not enter, though the wish was strong:
you shook your pensive head as who should say,
'I dare not--to far in his footsteps stray-
He must seek me would he undo the wrong.'

Not far, but near, I stood and saw it all
behind low boughs the trees let down outside;
And the sweet pang it cost me not to call
And tell you that I saw does still abide.
But 'tis not true that thus I dwelt aloof,
For the wood wakes, and you are here for proof.

Francois Villon, Ballad Of The Ladies Of Yore
Tell me where, in what country,
Is Flora the beautiful Roman,
Archipiada or Thais
Who was first cousin to her once,
Echo who speaks when there's a sound
On a pond or a river
Whose beauty was more than human?
But where are the snows of yesteryear?

Where is the leamed Heloise
For whom they castrated Pierre Abelard
And made him a monk at Saint-Denis,
For his love he took this pain,
Likewise where is the queen
Who commanded that Buridan
Be thrown in a sack into the Seine?
But where are the snows of yesteryear?

The queen white as a lily
Who sang with a siren's voice,
Big-footed Bertha, Beatrice, Alice,
Haremburgis who held Maine
And Jeanne the good maid of Lorraine
Whom the English bumt at Rouen, where,
Where are they, sovereign Virgin?
But where are the snows of yesteryear?

Prince, don't ask me in a week
or in a year what place they are;
I can only give you this refrain:
Where are the snows of yesteryear?

Robert Burns, O, My Luve is Like a Red Red Rose
O, my luve is like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June.
O, my luve is like a melodie,
That's sweetly play'd in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonie lass,
So deep in luve am I,
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry.

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi the sun!
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
While the sands o life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my only luve!
And fare thee weel, a while!
And I will come again, my luve,
Tho it were ten thousand mile!

Edgar Allan Poe, A Dream Within A Dream
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Erl-King
Who rides there so late through the night dark and drear?
The father it is, with his infant so dear;
He holdeth the boy tightly clasp'd in his arm,
He holdeth him safely, he keepeth him warm.

"My son, wherefore seek'st thou thy face thus to hide?"
"Look, father, the Erl-King is close by our side!
Dost see not the Erl-King, with crown and with train?"
"My son, 'tis the mist rising over the plain."

"Oh, come, thou dear infant! Oh, come thou with me!
Full many a game I will play there with thee;
On my strand, lovely flowers their blossoms unfold,
My mother shall grace thee with garments of gold."

"My father, my father, and dost thou not hear
The words that the Erl-King now breathes in mine ear?"
"Be calm, dearest child, 'tis thy fancy deceives;
'Tis the sad wind that sighs through the withering leaves."

"Wilt go, then, dear infant, wilt go with me there?
My daughters shall tend thee with sisterly care
My daughters by night their glad festival keep,
They'll dance thee, and rock thee, and sing thee to sleep."

"My father, my father, and dost thou not see,
How the Erl-King his daughters has brought here for me?"
"My darling, my darling, I see it aright,
'Tis the aged grey willows deceiving thy sight."

"I love thee, I'm charm'd by thy beauty, dear boy!
And if thou'rt unwilling, then force I'll employ."
"My father, my father, he seizes me fast,
Full sorely the Erl-King has hurt me at last."

The father now gallops, with terror half wild,
He grasps in his arms the poor shuddering child;
He reaches his courtyard with toil and with dread,--
The child in his arms finds he motionless, dead.

DA WANDERIN ONION

The Beautiful Moments

By Phoenix

Helloooo Readers&Readettes DaWanderinOnion last story 4 2010 well how was your year AAAHHH mine was Krazy/Kool dig life izz like the weather sometimes it izz Warm&Sunny aaaaaand sometimez ít izz Kold&Wet, it izz a matter how we ride through it like it or not
we all know people who just want the PERFECT Xistance NOO stress HMMP what do they eat 4 breakfastwell 2010 was a personal highl-light 4 me played almost 50times YIPPEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
my partners from my many projects stress me sometimes the konditons kould B better this or that way BUT I am a believer in moving, yes one must have a plan BUT only discussing does not get U 2 your destination

THE musical high-light this year was playing on the street I recommend any musician 2 enjoy the Xperince it has its ups&downs BUT the joy watching Children dance AND making their parents wait till they R satisfied izz priceless
FUNNY they have what we somehow have lost the ability 2 B Free of shame & just 2 enjoy LIFE 4 what it really izzz

Well Readers&Readettes bring the NewYear in on ya KNEESS HAHAHAHA & don 4get the beautiful moments of 2010

Cyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

DaWanderinOnion

Luxembourg, situated in the Western part of Europe, and Sibiu (Hermannstadt), a historical town in the Romanian province of Transylvania, have been designated as the Cultural Capitals of Europe in the year of 2007. The two cities are hosting all through the year a rich range of cultural events including performances, workshops, jam sessions, conferences and debates from the domains of literature, art, music, film and dance. It is the first time in history that a city from Eastern Europe has been granted the privilege of hosting a cultural event of such magnitude.

Quite a few reputed manifestations, like the Festival of the Cultures and Arts and the cultural week Africa, the Cradle of Humanity, or a show with Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana are taking place in Luxembourg in the month of August. If you happen to be there this summer, don’t miss the art project Trans(ient) City by Jiu Yue jiu de Jiu and Xu Tan in the Place of Martyrs.

Some of the highlights of the 300 events planned during the months of August and September in Sibiu are: The National Festival of Folk Traditions, permanent Dali and Chagall exhibitions or the Sibiu International Salon of Photographic Art with the participation of some 1,500 photographers from all over the world, including approximately 8,000 photos.

The common program called “A European Marathon of Poetry” includes philharmonic concerts in both cities, as well as historical films of the two “European Cultural Capitals”.

On September 1 -2, the traditional Bognor Birdman in Bognor Regis, West Sussex – England, is again giving those who seek just 15 seconds of celebrity the opportunity to jump-fly off Bognor pier with their human powered flying machines in an attempt to win a big distance prize. An absolute must if you are visiting England in those days.

Next day we traveled with a small bust to the place from where you could see the Everest. We couldn’t see a thing because of the weather, but we were happy to come out of it alive. The wheels of the car were constantly rolling inches away from the abyss. In Nepal there are no trains. Only cars and the surviving travelers, planes and birds.

After lunch we made a stop at Pashupatinath, the holy temple. On the pyres they were burning the third shift of dead people. Up in the mountains, where there’s no wood, the burnings are replaced with the aerial burials. The bodies are chopped into pieces and are thrown on the rocks to be eaten by animals and birds. The body without life and soul doesn’t mean anything anymore. Nepal is a place without graveyards. We walked among temples that climb high up the hills and I took pictures of the so-called ascetic hermits, who for a couple of rupees would take strange catatonic postures, and for another couple would pierce their cheeks with a blunt needle. For a decent amount one of them would lift a 60 Pound weight tied to his penis. Others who already had their fill were eating or smoking sitting on the temple stones happy with the pray of the day. Their faces are made up like those of sad clowns of stagnation because they know that one day they will end on the pyres across the street.

The real performance, that of the un-raddled death, is happening on the banks of the almost dry river. Here nobody is begging, nobody is pushing and nobody is looking into your eyes. You can get as close to the pyres as you wish, not like in India, where we were kept at distance. Around the river there are hospices with dying people waiting peacefully their turn. In Nepal the tourists are allowed everything, like the idols of a new cast.

Dozens of pyres like tongues of stone point to the water. Those closer to it are for the rich. On the side there’s almost everywhere a body already waiting. Beyond the pyres, there’s a big sign: Center for cornea donation. Cornea is the part of the eye that can be removed with a lance. It is the last sacrifice that the dead can bring to the living. In the world beyond there’s no need for eyes and in the next reincarnation we will see through a different cornea. Besides, the Center is supporting a share of the burial costs. Death is profitable even here.

I have seen from very near the burial of a man. He was very thin, clad in orange robes, covered with flower garlands and lots of paper money. He was brought on a bamboo bier and placed directly on the pyre. Three cubic feet, hardwood. The guide tells us that if a tourist happens to die here they need 12 feet, because we are fatter. The priest who was celebrating the ceremony has thrown the flowers into the water and had gathered carefully the money. Then he oiled the body with special essences that facilitate the burning. There was no bad smell anywhere. He walked around the pyre three times with a torch in his hand followed by the eldest son who was lighting the fire. During the burning, that can take hours, the sons of the dead shave their heads but for a lock at the top of their heads. The women sit on the other bank of the river and cry. They are allowed to come near at the end when they will throw the ashes into the water. The wife of the dead can, at the most, practice the sathi, that is, to jump into the fire and burn along with her husband. A practice that was usual in India, and, some say, although forbidden, it is still practiced in isolated places, nowadays. The widow used to be drugged and helped by the relatives to jump into the fire. Nobody needs a widow.

On the other hand, Nepal and Tibet are the only places in the world where feminine polygamy is practiced. In the alpine zone a woman can marry more than one man, usually the relatives of the husband. The motives are in most cases, the preserving of the family wealth. The women are programming the men upon preference and accessibility, because most of them are away most of the time, and paternity is never discusses: the children belong to all.

When the fire of the pyre got high we took a walk on silence on the banks of death. The wind coming down from Himalaya got stronger getting up the fires. We could hear the waving of the thousands of flag strings tied between the trees, the jingle of the bells, and the cracking of wood and of the bones returning gradually to nature. After two hours the ashes left by the incandescent embers are thrown into the river while still warm. The water is sizzling. On the river wreath of flowers, lit candles, but mostly plastic bags and bottles float on the river that is avidly waiting for the Monsoon to raise its water and carry everything into the valley.

In my earlier articles on Switzerland I had talked occasionally about going to cinema. This month I want to dedicate this article fully to the topic. What is special about movies in Switzerland? For one it has a well established film festival every year that draws a number of the big stars to the city. The festival films are featured in most cinemas and one great advantage is that you discuss with film directors and actors after some of those movies.

But going to the movies is also a regular activity for Swiss people. Yes, DVDs and movie-downloads, are also putting pressures on cinemas around here, and sometimes the movie halls can be a bit empty. But on weekends, when it comes to monumental, 3D or foreign language films it is still very popular to spend a night at the movies.

There are two things about going to the movies around here that I had not experienced in other countries. First of all in Zurich movies have a break, and it doesn't matter if it is a 70min or 200min movie, towards the middle and often at a pretty exciting spot the light goes on and you get a chance to stretch, go to the bathroom or pick up some popcorn. It is usually really only about 5 minutes, but you can be pretty sure there will be one.

The second thing that struck me about going to the movies here is that people are usually coming pretty much last minute. Increasingly people buy their tickets at home on-line and then just walk to the actual cinema with a printout or they just use a code to print a ticket at a machine in the hallway in front of the cinema. So you got your seat. Why should you come early? As a result it could be that you are sitting there 5 minutes before the official starting time and you are almost alone. By the time the film starts the place is packed, though.

One thing that I really like is that movies are available in a range of languages. While you might get the block busters dubbed in German, a lot of the French, English or Italian movies come in original language (sometimes with sub-titles in one or more languages), and sometimes, in some of the smaller Arthouse type cinemas, they come without subtitles.

I really like the original voices of American or British actors. Translation usually loses a lot of the jokes and can hardly ever be as good as the original, I have found.

Of course there are also movies in Swiss German, the language spoken around here. We had an interesting episode when we went to one of those movies. The ticket agent who was not the most friendly example of this profession asked a little brisk: "Well you know this movie is in Mundart (Swiss German), right?" With a smile I replied, "Thank you, yes we know, in fact that is the point of us wanting to see it."

One special initiative to fill the cinemas is the so-called "Lunch-Kino", which is a feature film shown around noon for special price. It is usually pretty packed with retirees but if you have the luxury of a day off during the week, it is a great alternative to watching a movie around dinner time.

So all in all going to the movies is something we always have in our portfolio of things to do. What makes it also very nice here in Zürich is the quality of public transportation. If we don't follow the movie with a drink at a bar, we can be home from almost any of the mentioned cinemas in about 15 minutes after the closing curtain.

The best cure ever for feeling low is to go shopping on a Saturday morning in one of Athens’ markets. If you only feel like strolling you should bear in mind the fact that there is absolutely no way to leave without actually buying something in a market stretching over more than half a mile; that flavors, colors, lights will bring you back in a wink some Italian ‘mercato’ or a ‘marché de dimanche’ in southern France but as a matter of fact, in Greece you have more than that because here you can get simply lost among Athenians carrying their heavy shopping carts filled with fruit and vegetables for their big families, among the numberless stands filled with everything you’ve ever dreamt of finding in a market even though it is the end of December: salads, tasty fennels, onions of all colors and sizes, cabbages, broccolis, cauliflowers, tomatoes, cucumbers, small zucchinis with yellow flowers for edible flowers aficionados, big, orange slices of pumpkin reigning among some other unknown fruit of a reddish color; a bit farther you have nuts, pistachios and spices carefully wrapped in small bags (vegetarians are really happy in this country). Oranges, mandarins and lemons are simply pouring out of the market stands… they’re so many and fill the air with citric scent, also so cheap that it is simply indecent to buy only a few. Then you walk to a nice guy’s table selling all sorts of olives and your mouth is watering heavily, thanks God, tasting is allowed… and you’re buying something but you feel like there is always something better than what you’ve just bought; you go on thinking that next time you’ll try a different sort. There is also the fish seller and you’re like going mad because you simply don’t know what to choose… the guy would gladly help you but the only thing he knows is ‘sorry, my English is not very good’. Besides the plenty, the colors and the smells, there is the noise, the shouting out loud what the thing is about and the making you buy it. Here they don’t smile or ask you politely to try their merchandise… no, you are in a Greek market… better get used to it… this is a ‘manly’ thing like so many other things in Greece. On your way back home you feel like you’ve been ‘infused’ some life. You hear words like ‘kalimera’, ‘parakalo’, ‘ef̱charistíes’ and God knows what else, you smile and you keep going on.

This was his birthday present. He had always wanted to see Bethlehem. In Jerusalem, he arrived on Friday, when most places were closed, walls arches and doors were silent; empty roads, the Shabbat. A phantom city to an outsider’s eye. Out of Jerusalem, with bright sun, he drove down and along the wall. The grey tall concrete, cutting through people’s yards and houses, the check points with lines, passports and guns.

Bethlehem, smiling humble up on a hill, its time far back, layered and exposed. Small old churches and crosses made of stone, the roads curved, the mellow colors felt soothing. He went to the Manger Square to see the Church of Nativity, and looked under the altar, to see where Jesus was born. He bought a tunic, looked at the handmade toys, and ate Kubbi balls with Manakeesh. The outdoor market was full of flavors: Sumak, Tahina, Cardamom, Turmeric, Cumin, and … the color of pomegranate. He sat near Palestinian men, on a small stool, listened to their conversations, the sound of their words, the playing cards, the shade, smoking hooka and snaking on watermelon seeds. He drank warm sage tea, and later on arabic coffee spiced with cardamom and unsweetened- its bitterness a symbol of hospitality -, with the very sweet Kanafeh pastry. In the evening he got drunk with anise seed flavored Arak, and walked out of the city, sat on the cold ground and watched the sky full of stars. The stars seemed to move, more than the eyes could see, a secret language, far into space… the time stopped, slid back, its stories and histories… and everything made sense.

The Golden City, Jerusalem… He returned to it, fascinated and aware. A labyrinth, its walls so present, divided and permissive, it’s four quarters and three religions. So he took days. He walked and watched. Discovered the gestures, the codes, the feelings… and the ever present awareness that something can happen at any moment. He went to the Wailing Wall in the morning and listened to the sound of pages being turned, the whispered prayers facing the wall, aiming beyond. The Dome of the Rock, so precious, desired… he looked at it from a distance, its perfect shape almost surreal, golden. Bright sun shining through the dust; at times he felt almost blind.

In the Holy Sepulcher Church time seemed to stare at him from each surface. The rough and the smooth, its floors and the steps, the touch of all hands connecting in time; the cuts and marks. The Mount of Olives was quiet, a small orthodox church, and the blue sky.

The City of David, dating back to 10^th century BC, just outside Jerusalem, up on the hill, with all its layers, its silent stones washed by sun, the tunnel underground, the spring, the true old city of Jerusalem.

As a child, he had always been interested in cities; his books were covered with images of places around the world. Religious places, even more so… as he grew up… he became fascinated with… not religion in itself, but what religion does to people.

He had been living and working in London for 3 years, and had already travelled to so many places, when he arrived to Rome.

In Rome, he walked in Trastevere district, the old medieval houses, aristocratic or common, old ladies and young people, the sound of mopeds. The streets paved in unique roman cobble stones found only here, the walls draped in ivy, the deep warm colors, the coffee shops, the tables outside, the bars at night, the fragrant flowers, the Italian ice cream… he felt like a child, he fell in love with the city, and wanted to live there forever. The fountains, the squares, the polished marble warm in the sun, the beautiful statues of such beautiful bodies, graceful and strong, encoded gestures, still… playful and free, with no demand, almost alive, abundant… At night in his sleep he dreamt they were moving, he laughed in his dreams… the sound of the water falling on stone, the sun tickled his forehead in the morning, and happiness was that: Rome.

In Rome he lived in a very small studio, a basement with white arches, on a narrow street right near the Vatican. Only five minutes away, he walked to work every day, and on his way back he went to the small Church of Santa Maria, and looked at Bernini’s Ecstasy of Santa Teresa, with the same fascination each time. He used to ride his bike by the river, and eat salad on Corso Victorio Manuel, or ice-cream next to Piazza de Fiori.

Tonight he went back to Tastevere, or the streets around the Pyramid, all full of life, clubs and cafes open till morning. But sometimes he would go alone to Circus Maximus, lay on the grass and watch the sky, without wanting anything else than what he had. He discovered a small round temple called San Pietro de Montorio, and he loved to spend hours doing nothing around Fontana di Trevi, but his favorite was Piaza Navona with Fontana dei Quatro Fiumi by Bernini, and that one sculpture lifting its hand in fear toward Boromini’s building… that was his favorite detail! He would sit on the edge of the fountain eating a crepe and watching people and acrobats, painters and tourists…he felt happy every day, with no exception. One place he had forgotten about, and never visited while in Rome, was Via Francigena, the pilgrim’s road to Rome, before their arrival to San Pietro and Saint Peter’s Tomb.

Javier was born in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, home of the relics of Saint James. As a child, he had seen pilgrims from all over Europe arriving on Caminho De Santiago starting in Northern France, and waiting in line in front of the imposing baroque façade of the Cathedral of Santiago. They would then enter the church and kneel, in the very shoes they had walked for days or weeks, and the first thing to do was to come close to the small statue of Santo dos Croques and gently knock your head on it.

Dip your fingers in the holy water, trace the cross three times, and only then enter the cathedral, where the golden bust of Saint James covered in precious stones awaits to be embraced.

Embraced form behind, so you must do, and enter only from left or right, it all has a meaning, directions, the number of steps, the movement of your body, the way you see and the way you touch, the others. To him a curiosity, these rituals were part of the natural rhythm of the year, just as the Carnival, the All Saints Day or the Easter Procession. He had watched the silver El Botafumeiro balanced up high in the Cathedral every Sunday, and never knew it was one of the largest censers in the world. And he had played on Monte del Cozo (the Mount of Pleasure) as a child, on warm summer days, and never knew it meant so much to other people.

The intricate façade of the Cathedral, Puerta de Obradoiro, with all its saints devils and angels lined up, he had taken for granted. He often sat bored during the mass, on the narrow wooden bench, the words fading in the background, a murmur, past the embroidered white table cloth, bright and fresh, the smell of fresh flowers, the candles… words curving along the tall grey arches, they felt like veins, alive and powerful, gold crawling up on them. He examined all details, his eyes wondered forever, his mind flew away, dragons and caves, swords, diamonds, gold and blood… He stared at the sculptures of Saint Paul with the sword, Saint Peter with the key, Saint Mathew with a Lion, Saint George Slaying the Dragon, Santa Clara with her breasts cut, and Santa Lucia offering her eyes on a plate... and wondered, but never truly longed for an answer. Beautiful and frightening, they were part of his daily life, just as the old steps, the bells ringing every day, San Antonio on the façade of the house granting a good husband, the Virgin of the Sailors in the backyard, and the Shell of Santiago sculpted in stone in the church, on the walls or the city, above taverns and shops, in silver hanging between his mother’s breasts, or stamped on a pilgrim’s hand.

This story came about by talking to Pablo Castro from Vigo, and it is based in large part on Pablos’ life.

Winter at the French Riviera is a wonderful season.
I will most probably start every article about the four seasons in France like this, but I cannot help it – I just need to. The French Riviera is a wonderful spot of the world with its climate, the culture, the lifestyle, the food – but above all, the variety of the “façade” along the coast as well as the down to earth reality in the Hinterland makes this paradise so special and unique for many people.

The bird’s eye-view shows the short distance between the seaside and the Sea Alps.

The hard-boiled people from all around the world, mostly retired grandmothers and grandfathers, residing in their winter domicile, are still swimming in the Mediterranean Sea. At present the water temperature is at relatively “mild” 9° Celsius.

At the same time you can ski in Les Gréolières les Neiges, a 50 minute drive from the coastline.

One of the best experiences and a “must do” is buying a Christmas tree at the Promenade des Anglais in Nice. Hundreds of Christmas trees are facing the Med, after they have travelled all the way from Denmark, Norway or Germany. The cost of the trees is lower than for example in Germany, even though one would expect it differently. After storing the tree in the car, you can have a sunbath and picnic at the beach. This somehow provides the feeling of a pre-Christmas season in the Southern Hemisphere.

The French are getting into the “German tradition” of a real Christmas market with vin chaud (mulled wine) and even in the tiniest village, they are creating their own interpretation of a Christmas market. Often the temperatures are not as they “should be” for drinking mulled wine, nevertheless the many expatriates are coming together in troops to get the Christmas and winter feeling they experienced at home”. The French seem to be less contemplative about Christmas, it is more vivid and they feature funny music bands like for example Fanfare Miss Trash on their Christmas markets.

The crowds of tourists visiting this very popular region from Easter until late September are more or less absent in the winter time, which makes life more real and down to earth. Even though the villages are relatively “empty” the back-country is a real insider tip for all country-loving people. Villages like Valbonne or Gourdon are coming across as authentic villages. During the high season, there are busloads of people arriving, and there is nothing authentic left at all. In case you want to be exposed to real culture, when you are fed-up with the countryside, than book your tickets early enough for a Pina Bausch performance in Monaco

And last but not least, there is always our cross-cultural take-away for you beside the travel-tips. This time, I would like to share some experience with the word “no”. We are exposed again and again, to a strong initial “no” – no matter if it is at the car mechanics, at the post office, at the bank or at the bakery - in many situations there comes first a “No, this isn’t possible”. I as a native German have learned, that a no is a no, and it is a sign of respect to not questioning other peoples position. I have learnt in France, that the “no, ce n’est pas possible” is neither intended personally nor a lack of respect, when I am questioning it. Because, as soon as you start negotiating, even though you are not taking their no as an answer but you are ready to debate in order to convince them, the initial no most likely turns into a “yes”. This is part of their culture and in a way it is a great way of personal involvement. If you want to learn more about cross-cultural communication with the French, have a look at our SUCCESS ACROSS news-story “living to work or working to live”:

This object took shape little by little in the late summer of 1932; it revealed itself to me slowly, the various parts taking their exact form and their precise place within the whole. By autumn it had attained such reality that its actual execution in space took no more than one day. It is related without any doubt to a period in my life that had come to an end a year before, when for six whole months hour after hour was passed in company of a woman who, concentrating all life in herself, magically transformed my every moment. We used to construct a fantastic palace at night – days and nights had the same color, as if everything happened just before day-break; throughout the whole time I never saw the sun – a very fragile palace with matchsticks. At the slightest false move a whole section of this tiny construction would collapse. We would always begin it over again. I don’t know why I came to be inhabited by a spinal column in a cage – the spinal column this woman sold me one of the very first nights I met her on the street – and by one of the skeleton birds that saw the very night before the morning in which our life together collapsed – the skeleton birds that flutter with cries of joy at four o’clock in the morning very high above the pool of clear, green water where the extremely fine skeletons of fish float in the great unroofed hall. In the middle there rises the scaffolding of a tower, perhaps unfinished or, since its top has collapsed, perhaps also broken. On the other side there appeared the statue of a woman, in which I recognize my mother, just as she appears in my earliest memories. The mystery of her long black dress touching the floor troubled me; it seemed to me like a part of her body, and aroused in me a feeling of fear and confusion …”

Van Gogh's own title for this composition was simply The Bedroom (French: La Chambre à coucher). There are three authentic versions described in his letters, easily discernible from one another by the pictures on the wall to the right.

The painting depicts Van Gogh's bedroom at 2, Place Lamartine in Arles, Bouches-du-Rhône, France, known as his Yellow House. The door to the right was opening to the upper floor and the staircase, the door to the left served the guest room he held prepared for Gauguin. The window in the front wall was looking to Place Lamartine and its public gardens. This room was not rectangular, but trapezoid, with an obtuse angle in the left hand corner of the front wall and an acute angle at the right. Van Gogh evidently did not spend much time on this problem, he simply indicated that there was a corner, somehow.

By painting “La Blouse Roumaine” in 1940 Henri Matisse gave it artistic perenity and International recognition. The painting, which is now in the Musee d’Art Moderne in Paris, had become an epitome for Romania and for Romanian feminity.

Pieter Brueghel the Younger was the oldest son of the famous sixteenth-century Netherlandish painter Pieter Brueghel the Elder (known as "Peasant Brueghel") and Mayken Coecke van Aelst. His father died in 1569, when Pieter the younger was only five years old. Then, following the death of his mother in 1578, Pieter, along with his brother Jan Brueghel the Elder ("Velvet Brueghel") and sister Marie, went to live with their grandmother Mayken Verhulst (widow of Pieter Coecke van Aelst). She was an artist in her own right, and according to Carel van Mander, possibly the first teacher of the two sons. The family moved to Antwerp sometime after 1578 and Pieter possibly entered the studio of the landscape painter Gillis van Coninxloo (1544-1607). In the 1584/1585 registers of Guild of Saint Luke, "Peeter Brugel" is listed as an independent master. On November 5, 1588 he married Elisabeth Goddelet, and the couple had seven children.

He painted landscapes, religious subjects and fantasy paintings. For this last category he often made use of fire and grotesque figures, leading to his nickname "Hell Brueghel".

Apart from these paintings of his own invention, Pieter Brueghel the Younger also copied the works his father had created by using a technique called pouncing. His genre paintings of peasants lack Pieter the Elder's subtlety and humanism, and emphasize the picturesque.

Henri Matisse (31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid, brilliant and original draughtsmanship. He was a master draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but excelled primarily as a painter. Matisse is regarded, with Picasso, as the greatest artist of the 20th century. Although he was initially labeled as a Fauve (wild beast), by the 1920s, he was increasingly hailed as an upholder of the classical tradition in French painting.^[1] His mastery of the expressive language of colour and drawing, displayed in a body of work spanning over a half-century, won him recognition as a leading figure in modern art.

Madras Rouge (The Red Madras Headress) is a painting by Henri Matisse from 1907. The woman depicted is the painter's wife, Amélie Noellie Parayre Matisse.

It was an angel al the beginning and while his wings were brushing my soul I wanted to share the moment. The colours took me to a Northern country of winds and magic, and then he became a saint in a white room letting his blessings descend on the weary lids of oblivion.

The painting, now in a private collection in Germany, belongs to a large size series (2X2m) that has been exhibited by in 2000 in the Helios Gallery of Timisoara by Calin Beloescu, an internationally acknowledged Romanian artist.

The painting is known as the "Christ of Saint John of the Cross," because its design is based on a drawing by the 16th century Spanish friar Saint John of the Cross. The composition of Christ is based on a triangle (Christ's arms); and a circle (Christ's head) that can also be seen as a reference to the Trinity.Dalí explained its inspiration on the bottom of his painting studies: "In the first place, in 1950, I had a 'cosmic dream' in which I saw this image in color and which in my dream represented the 'nucleus of the atom.' This nucleus later took on a metaphysical sense; I considered it 'the very unity of the universe,' the Christ!"

Chagall grew up in the Russian Jewish shtetl town of Vitebsk and went on to challenge many traditions of Jewish and Western art, becoming one of the major artists of the 20th century. His art reflects the influence of Cubism, and Fauvism, as well as a novel style expressed in oil, watercolor, and gouache painting, stained-glass, theatre and costume design, book illustration, ceramics and mosaics.

The painting “Birthday,” which celebrates the young Chagall’s marriage to his wife Bella Rosenfeld can be admired in MoMA, New York.

The city of Darmstadt had the tower built in memory of the marriage of the Grand Duke Ernst Ludwig to Princess Eleonore zu Solms-Hohensolms-Lich on the 2nd of February, 1905.

The architect Josef Maria Olbrich, who joined the artists' colony at the Grand Duke's invitation in 1899, designed the 48-metre tower, which was completed in 1908.

The brick tower building comprises a symmetrical, multiple-level footing with an entrance portal, an upright main tower body with eccentric window bands extending around the corners and a unique five-spired top based on a concept from the Grand Duke himself and reminiscent of the outstretched fingers of a hand.

The tower interior has seven storeys, including an entrance hall, a book magazine, rooms for the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess, the latter decorated with frescos by Philipp Otto Schäfer. The uppermost storey is the viewing platform.

René François Ghislain Magritte (21 November 1898 – 15 August 1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images. His intended goal for his work was to challenge the observer's preconditioned perceptions of reality and force the viewer to become hypersensitive to their surroundings.

Magritte's work frequently displays a juxtaposition of ordinary objects in an unusual context, giving new meanings to familiar things. The representational use of objects as other than what they seem is typified in his painting, The Treachery of Images (La trahison des images), which shows a pipe that looks as though it is a model for a tobacco store advertisement. Magritte painted above the pipe "This is not a pipe" (Ceci n'est pas une pipe), which seems a contradiction, but is actually true: the painting is not a pipe, it is an image of a pipe. It does not "satisfy emotionally" — when Magritte once was asked about this image, he replied that of course it was not a pipe, just try to fill it with tobacco.

A French singer, dancer and entertainer made famous in paintings by Toulouse-Lautrec Anne-Marie Marcelle Bastien, began dancing at the age of sixteen and within a few years made a name for herself performing at the Théâtre des Variétés in Montmartre.

Lautrec's portrait of her in full costume, her flame-red hair accentuated by two red poppies worn like plumes, boosted Lender's popularity considerably after it appeared in a Paris magazine. The painting was eventually sold to a collector from the United States and on her passing in 1998 the painting's then owner, American Betsey Cushing Whitney, donated it to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

Doru Covrig is a widely acclaimed contemporary artist living in Paris. His sculptures, some of them of huge dimensions, are covering a large thematic area from imposing statues of dictators made of glued pieces of timber, cardboard of paper to homage to Guttenberg cast in bronze prints.

Princess Lulu is part of the artist’s larger project consisting of papier maché sculptures, all replicas to Brancusi`s series of Mademoiselle Pogany.

The Scottish artist Calum Colvin reinterprets Titian’s motive by making use of the photographic technique to which he juxtaposes a symbolic graphic surface with two points of reflection, a dressing table and a camera set upon a tripod in the pupil of the eye.

In his own words: “This work has a reflection at its centre, in fact it has two. There is the dressing-table mirror’s reflection of Venus painted on the left-hand wall, then there is a camera set upon a tripod in the pupil of her eye … What I wanted to do was look at the narrative behind it, at the idea of Venus, and make my own version of this image which would refer to photography and the notion of creativity … To look at these paintings afresh, in a sense to represent the image and let the people just think.”

The work has been painted at Picasso’s home in Vallauris on the French Côte d’Azur and is dated 7 October 1952. It that time Picasso’s relationship with his companion Françoise Gilot was deteriorating; a year later she ended the relationship taking her children, Claude and Paloma, with her back to Paris.

Picasso statuesque figure has the quality of a sculputure which can be viewed “in the round”; the figure is seen from both front and the back. It is likely that Picasso was directly inspired by Titian’s painting of Venus (see Art Gallery). Direct comparison can be drawn by the use of color and the scale and composition of the figure.

Titian lived in Venice for most of his life, but was also known throughout Europe. He may have made this work to rival a famous ancient Greek painter called Apelles*. Apelles was greatly admired in the 1500s. He had painted a 'Venus Rising from the Sea' (1520) , which had since been lost and was known only through a written description. Titian's Venus is a big, beautiful woman who dominates the picture. She looks unaware of being seen, like a celebrity snapped by a paparazzo while wading ashore after a swim. The only reference to her mythical status is the small scallop shell in the bottom left-hand corner.

Titian's Venus fills the canvas. The small shell floating on the water identifies the beautiful nude female as the goddess of love. The ancient Greek poet Hesiod described how Venus was born fully grown from the sea and blown to the shore on a scallop shell. Titian shows the goddess wringing her hair, a pose inspired by classical sculpture and by an account of a painting by Apelles, the most celebrated painter of ancient Greece. Titian's Venus proved that he could rival the art of antiquity and that he could make the ideal appear real. The painting is in exceptionally fine condition and was acquired from the Sutherland collection in 2003.

The classical goddess Venus emerges from the water on a shell, blown towards shore by the Zephyrs, symbols of spiritual passions. She is joined by one of the Horae, goddesses of the seasons, who hands her a flowered cloak.

The effect is distinctly pagan, considering it was made at a time and place when most artworks depicted Roman Catholic themes. It is somewhat surprising that this canvas escaped the flames of Savonarola's bonfires, where a number of Botticelli's other alleged pagan influenced works perished. Botticelli was very close to Lorenzo de Medici. Because of their friendship and Lorenzo's power, this work was spared from Savonarola's fires and the disapproval of the church.

The anatomy of Venus and various subsidiary details do not display the strict classical realism of Leonardo da Vinci or Raphael. Most obviously, Venus has an improbably long neck, and her left shoulder slopes at an anatomically unlikely angle. Some have suggested it prefigures mannerism.

Apelles of Kos was a renowned painter of ancient Greece. Pliny the Elder, to whom we owe much of our knowledge of this artist, claims that this very painting had been part of the collection of Julius Caesar, but was destroyed when Caesar's mansion on the Palatine Hill burned down.

While sketching one of Alexander the Great's concubines, Campaspe, Apelles fell in love with her. As a mark of appreciation for the great painter's work, Alexander presented her to him.

The image represents the birth of Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, as she emerges from the waters. According to Greek mythology Aphrodite was born fully adult from the sea, which perpetually renewed her virginity. A motif of the goddess wringing out her hair is often repeated.

Constantin Brancusi: Mademoiselle Pogany

A friend, Margit Pogany, was the inspiration for Mlle Pogany II, one of the sculptures that came to epitomise Brancusi's work.

The most radical of these works is the mysterious Princess X, from 1915. A photograph survives of the first version of this sculpture, in which a woman arches her neck to catch a glimpse of herself in a mirror. The neck is exaggerated in order to convey the self awareness of this gesture. Dissatisfied with this version, Brancusi carved back the superficial details. The head became an ovoid on an arching neck and the supporting hand is reduced to a pattern.

He showed this sculpture in New York, but when the bronze version was exhibited in Paris in 1920 it was banned - to Brancusi's apparent bewilderment - as being deliberately phallic. It was only reinstated as a result of a campaign to support his freedom of expression.

The Marc Chagall mural on the ceiling of the auditorium of l’Opera Garnier. Installed in 1964, it provoked much heated controversy because it was not in keeping with the "Napoleon III" style of the original. Furthermore the new mural was attached in such a way that the old mural (underneath the new) was permanently damaged. Nevertheless time has softened the controversy and to the first time visitor, the Chagall has a lightness and beauty that complements the 19th century decor in a charming (and lasting) way.

Echoing the colorful style dear to Charles Garnier's, Chagall has designed his painting as a living image of the festive spirit surrounding each performance: luminous, fluid figures surge forth, contrasting with the gold and red tones of the theatre.

One of Velázquez's most representative works Las Meninas (1656, The Maids of Honour), appears to have as a subject the eldest daughter of the new Queen, Margarita, However, in looking at the various viewpoints of the painting it is unclear as to who or what is the true subject. Is it the royal daughter, or perhaps the painter himself? The answer may lie in the image on the back wall, depicting the King and Queen. Is this image a mirror, in which case the King and Queen are standing where we stand? Are they the subject of Velazquez's work? Or is the work simply a court painting? Much is still in speculation about the true subject of this masterpiece, and many of the questions that we ask may never be truly answered.

Created four years before his death, it is a staple of the European baroque period of art. An apotheosis of the work has been effected since its creation; Luca Giordano, a contemporary Italian painter, referred to it as the "theology of painting," and the eighteenth century the Englishman Thomas Lawrence cited it as the "philosophy of art," so decidedly capable of producing its desired effect. That effect has been variously interpreted; Dale Brown points out an interpretation that, in inserting within the work a faded portrait of the king and queen hanging on the back wall, Velázquez has ingeniously prognosticated the fall of the Spanish empire that was to gain momentum following his death. Another interpretation is that the portrait is in fact a mirror, and that the painting itself is in the perspective of the King and Queen, hence their reflection can be seen in the mirror on the back wall.

The fresco on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was painted by Michelangelo about 500 years ago. It illustrates the Biblical story from the Book of Genesis in which God breathes life into Adam, the first man. Chronologically the fourth in the series of panels depicting episodes from Genesis on the Sistine ceiling, it was among the last to be completed. The fresco technique requires that the artist paint a freshly plastered wall which is still sufficiently humid to allow the paint to bond chemically so that when the plaster dries, the paint is completely a part of the wall. In order to paint the plaster which dries very quickly, the artist must have a very rapid and precise techniques of painting. He must clearly know how much he can paint during the course of the day ('giornata'). It is possible to identify the extent of the various daily paintings from the plaster on the borders of the frescoes. From these it is clear that Michelangelo painted at a remarkably high speed. The creation of Adam was painted in two weeks.

Edouard Manet painted The Luncheon on the Grass originally titled The Bath (Le Bain), between 1862 and 1863. It is oil on canvas and measures 208 by 264.5 centimeters. The juxtaposition of a female nude with fully dressed men sparked controversy when the work was first exhibited at the Salon des Refusés in 1863. The piece is now in the Musée d'Orsay, Paris.

“Painters, and especially Édouard Manet, who is an analytic painter, do not share the masses' obsession with the subject: to them, the subject is only a pretext to paint, whereas for the masses only the subject exists.”

Perhaps the most important of Wassily Kandinsky's paintings from the decade of the 1900s, it shows a small cloaked figure on a speeding horse rushing through a rocky meadow. The rider's cloak is a medium blue, and the shadow cast is a darker blue. In the foreground are more amorphous blue shadows, presumably the counterparts of the fall trees in the background. The Blue Rider in the painting is prominent, but not clearly defined, and the horse has an unnatural gait (which Kandinsky must have known). Indeed, some believe that a second figure, a child perhaps, is being held by the rider (though this could just as easily be another shadow from a solitary rider). This type of intentional disjunction allowing viewers to participate in the creation of the artwork would become an increasingly conscious technique used by the artist in subsequent years—culminating in his great "abstract expressionist" works of the 1911–1914. In The Blue Rider Kandinsky shows the rider more as a series of colors than of specific details. In and of itself, The Blue Rider is not exceptional in that regard when compared to contemporary painters, but it does show the direction that Kandinsky would take only a few years later.

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867). A summation of the theme of female voluptuousness, attractive to Ingres throughout his life, The Turkish Bath, was painted in 1862, in the circular format of earlier masters.

The most erotic of all his works, created at the end of his life, this harem scene combines the figure of the nude with an oriental theme. Taking as his inspiration the letters of Lady Montague, who recounts a visit to a women's bath in Istanbul in the early eighteenth century, Ingres has borrowed figures from some of his previous paintings for this composition full of arabesques.

It was Prince Napoleon who commissioned this harem scene around 1848. The painting was delivered in 1859, but returned soon afterwards because it had shocked the empress. The painter continued to rework his picture until 1863, even after he had dated it 1862. It was only finally revealed to the wider public in 1905, on the occasion of the Ingres retrospective at the Salon d'Automne, and here it excited the most avant-garde painters such as Picasso. The Turkish Bath was the masterpiece of Ingres' later years, as audacious in its subject as it was in its style. The painting can be admired in the Louvre, Paris.

A masterpiece by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, a painter of the baroque era, completed in 1599-1600 for the Contarelli Chapel in the church of the French congregation, San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome. The church is located in the neighborhood of Piazza Navona.

Caravaggio represented the event as a nearly silent, dramatic narrative. The sequence of actions before and after this moment can be easily and convincingly re-created. The tax-gatherer Levi (Saint Matthew's name before he became the apostle) was seated at a table with his four assistants, counting the day's proceeds, the group lighted from a source at the upper right of the painting. Christ, His eyes veiled, with His halo the only hint of divinity, enters with Saint Peter. A gesture of His right hand, all the more powerful and compelling because of its languor, summons Levi. Surprised by the intrusion and perhaps dazzled by the sudden light from the just-opened door, Levi draws back and gestures toward himself with his left hand as if to say, "Who, me?", his right hand remaining on the coin he had been counting before Christ's entrance.

Johannes Vermeer van Delft (1632- 1675) the painter of meditative portraits and of poetical domestic scenes was a master of rendering the almost material quality of light falling on rich textures, on the delicate traces of a face or on a pearl. Girl with the Pearl Earring won in the past years a well deserved fame through Tracy Chevalier’s novel and through the homonymous film; a consuming story of unconventional love and renunciation in an exquisite patrician environment.

The portrait can be admired in Royal Cabinet of Paintings Mauritshuis, The Hague, The Netherlands.

Albrecht Dürer (1471 1528), painter and graphic artist, was the central figure in the German Renaissance and one of the most outstanding personalities in the history of art. In the year 1500 Dürer painted a self portrait in a hieratical pose that up his time was only reserved for kings and for Jesus, whose features he was emulating in it. This portrait represents his own interpretation of the biblical figure and his belief in the divine inspiration as the source of the artist’s creative powers. The remarkable force of the portrait is emanating from the balanced focus of the stare.

Some time ago I made a note in my diary to write an essay about smiling. I wasn’t quite sure why this would be a good topic but somehow I wanted to explore all the meanings that lay dormant behind the most genuine form of expression known to man. I became aware of the power of a smile during my first days in Germany. In those days I could only speak a few words in German, so the first system of signalization was used a lot instead. A few months later, when I was visiting back home and I was asked how I was getting along with the Germans I heard myself answer: I don’t know yet; all I can tell you is that whenever you smile at somebody they smile right back at you.

I remember reading somewhere that you need 17 muscles to smile and 43 to frown. That alone would usually be enough for any biological system to go on the energy save mode, but the “problem” with the facial muscles is that they are directly connected to our emotions. As a rule, with a lot of good practice you can fake a smile but you cannot fake your reaction to smiling. Children are the best proof here. It is the first thing they learn to imitate.

But that’s not the main reason why I wanted to write an essay on smiling. Have you ever tried to look at people’s faces while you are walking down the street? If you haven’t, do it next time you go out. You will be surprised. Most of the people have a vacant look on their faces, as if they were alone; quite a few frown and almost nobody smiles. You will says, why smile, if there’s nobody to smile to. There is!

As a small child I have developed a sort of a habit, or maybe I got born with it, of tensing my facial muscles in a grin. My mother used to say that I would age early if I pulled my face like that and she used to whistle each time I was doing it, which was most of the time, only to remind me to stop. But I didn’t stop! I grew up, and the grin grew with me and turned into a smile.

These days when I walk on the street I see quite often faces that wreathe in smiles. Sometimes I think that it must be my grin. Sometimes I think that maybe it is the habit I have developed in my non-verbal days. But whatever the cause may be it is always a joy to see so many faces becoming suddenly beautiful with smiles.

Smiling is the only common language we share. It is the language that, just like music, goes straight to the heart without engaging the thinking and therefore remains a genuine, untainted by convention.

Yesterday, while waiting at the traffic light I saw a young man on the other side of the street. The sun was shining on him. As he sat on his bike waiting, he closed his eyes, raised his head and smiled.

The Window and the Door

Federico García Lorca, Sonnet of the Sweet Complaint

Constantin Brancusi: Mademoiselle Pogany

Federico García Lorca,
Sonnet of the Sweet Complaint