poems from the new yorker (right, yes, the new yorker)

this book was like roald dahl for grown ups

Life and Loves of a She Devil by Fay Weldon



"Mrs. Black, washing up glasses, resolved never to give another party, never, and to divorce her husband and next time marry someone without hypocrisy, possibly from the army, who understood how much more satisfactory it is to kill and die for a cause, in the shadow of some great loyalty, than to try to live forever in the framework of the personal and the trivial.

Presently Dr. Black drove Miss Hunter back to the clinic, but not before accusing Mrs. Black of unforgivable rudeness to his guest."

Pages 227-8

"Mr. Ghengis enjoyed his work. It seemed to him that it was one of the few occupations in the world that could not be faulted. Social work could be seen as a system-bolstering; ordinary doctoring as fostering the interest of the pharmaceutical companies; teaching as the enslavement of the young mind; the arts as idle elitism; business of any kind as grinding the world's poor beneath the capitalist heel; and so forth: but cosmetic surgery was pure. It made the ugly beautiful."

Page 215

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It's really a wonder...

"It's really a wonder that I haven't dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart." Anne Frank

NO ONE is faultless. Does this mean that no one is at fault?
When we speak hatefully, should we apologize, or at least explain?

I sent the following email today...and have not received a reply. According to his twitter page, he's getting his hair done.


DEAR MARIO "PEREZ HILTON" LAVANDEIRA:

You implore people who speak ignorance and hate to stand behind their words. You harass them relentlessly and demand they justify their actions. I think it is wonderful to hold people accountable--especially when those people are perpetuating derogatory speech.

Please respond to the comments from your readers. Why won't you address or acknowledge what you wrote? Why would you send a link to a twitter page full of tasteless humor regarding the forced evacuation of people from their homes, towns, land, into such various locations as: tunnels, basements, sewers, concentration camps, and ATTICS.

Please see two recent comments to your post pasted below; these readers are asking you to justify your actions. If you don't care to read them, then please read the very short comment below.

"who is anne frank and why r all u ppl tlking about her…pretty sure this videos bout a baby gettin run over by a train…i see no mention of any anne frank…"

We are waiting. We are trying to "get a fucking clue."

Thank you,

Abbi Dion

COMMENTS
"

88Mario, I know how desperatley you try to be funny, but I'd never thought you'd make fun of a child who died the most horrible death possible, in an concertration camp. You're pathetic to use a child hero as a unsucessful attempt to be funny. After you bitch and moan about homophabia, I thought you'd be compassionate to other victims of racism.You're a pathetic, hypocritical, failure as a person.


alicialicious says – reply to this

89It's funny how when other people say or do something inappropriate you nag them, degrade them, HARASS THEM to apologize yet you wrote something completely uncalled for and offensive and all you do is delete it and act like it didn't happen. GET OVER THE "BALLOON BOY"–He is just a child, he may have some disabilities, but it seems like he was just afraid, or he wanted the attention, something that YOU YOURSELF want as well and glamourize so what exactly is the problem?!




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: mariolavandeira@gmail.com on behalf of Perez Hilton
Sent: Fri 10/16/2009 4:58 PM
To: Abbi M Dion
Cc: Frey, Brandl; joshuasrosenzweig@gmail.com; Sheryl D Kantrowitz; emilie dion
Subject: Re: Anne Frank Post


You think I'm not a jackass???
I'm PEREZ HILTON!
You should have some context - or just get a fucking clue - before emailing me.
xoxo
Jackass Perez

"Get back in the attic"

Scepticism

It is important to remember, when considering these things, that the Sceptic makes no general claims of any kind; that his aim is to cure the soul and free it from the burden of needless and unresolvable worries, not to convince it of the truth of some doctrine.

And this leads us to the second question. Sextus himself admits, though he does not elaborate on this point, that man is an animal which by nature loves truth. This seems right; it is probably true that we want to know what is and is not real, or true, not just because we need this knowledge for practical purposes but also for the sake of the truth itself.

But is it possible for a lover of truth to be, as Sextus would have him be, indifferent to the truth?

Is it possible to achieve a mental state of indifference with regard to God, time, the soul, causality and thousands of other matters? To be sure, if I want to eat an apple, I do not need any knowledge about the nature of apples in themselves—as distinct from those properties of apples that I can know through sight or taste. If I want to build a stone house, I do not need to know about the nature of stone as such; the experience of cutting stone is enough for my purposes.

But would such imperturbability, if it were attainable, really be the best, the most perfect kind of life?

We might say: well, since we know nothing, what is the point of constructing theories that have no foundation? (Although here, again, a puzzle lurks: the Sceptic cannot say that we know nothing, he can only suggest it.)

But if philosophers and scholars had seriously attempted to achieve such self-satisfied serenity, would they have been able to build our civilization? Would modern physics have been invented, with all its technical applications of which we avail ourselves every day, had it not been preceded by the speculative physics which Sextus accused of sterility and of making unfounded claims to truth? This is the second question.

Leszek Kolakowski

My Question:

What would happen if you attempted to annihilate something that hadn't been invented yet, something that takes centuries to build, grow and cultivate (like art or music). What would a deconstructed ___ look/sound/feel like?

General Thought...

The 20th Century desire to take it all apart. Not to see how it works, but to see how it doesn't work. No wonder every other commercial is advertising a pill that takes you away from this wretched wasteland. I personally would like to put out the call that there shall be no more deliberate mimicry. In my platonic universe of totalitarian enslavement, ye shall write no 'un-writings' nor allude in clever voices nor punish my ears with grayness.

Cameron Diaz

I sent the following email out to some girlfriends of mine:

Cameron Diaz said the following and I really appreciate it…

Diaz also opened up about her love life, which has seen her date Jared Leto, Justin Timberlake and British model Paul Sculfor.

“I think that I’ve what I’ve found, in my experience, is that you always find the person who you’re meant to be with at that time in your life,” she said of relationships, generally. “And what I’ve also found is that you have to move on from those people at certain times, because that’s the way it happens. For me personally, there’s nothing wrong with that. A lot of people find themselves trapped in something that they’ve outgrown and are unhappy. And they don’t know how to get out of it because they think that they’re supposed to make it happen.”

My dear friend Kath, responded with

Right on, cam!
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

My BFF Bran resplied with the following

Love this, love you!

My Philadelphia soul sister Michelle then said

Yes! Right on! I mean, no! I mean, what the flying fuck is she talking about? I don't think I could speak that vaguely if I tried.

Whatever they're smoking in Hollywood, it's way better than what comes around here.

Here's another Diaz Zinger:
“If a woman who’s a successful actress weighs 300 pounds and has warts, nobody ever asks her, ‘Do you think you made it because you’re ugly?’ So why should there be prejudice against someone who’s had some success in films and looks a little better than average. It’s all in my genes, so don’t hold it against me.”

Philly ladies - hope we can hang out tonight!

And my lifelong twin Anika said

sounds depressing to me, what about when you're 68 and no one starts coming into your life anymore? maybe i'm just an optimist, run this by me again in 5 years and we'll see where it's at

And, the latest is this (from me):

Yes, yes, yes, Cam is not going to win any awards in the dept of rhetoric, but she’s shooting from the hip!! If someone transcribed the bilge that comes out of my mouth in convo, it would read like, “oh, totally, I mean, like, I know, I know, like, what the fuck is that about?”

She is vague and her quote about the 300 lb woman with warts is slightly off the mark/totally uncalled for, but all in all she seems like she’s trying to make sense of things, which is all in any of us can ever do!


Well, that's all I got at the moment.

George Lake, 1984

There is only one way to say this. It goes like this: you cannot have it back.

There was a lake in Wisconsin, a dock that was covered in blue

And guess what, you are running down it, diving into the water, paddling your arms

Then a dog barks, and twenty years go by

You are standing in a line, you are being shot by a firing squad

You wear the flag of every country, you are every person in this line

And you feel it each time, your life extinguishing like a match burning down

Where is the wick you’re trying to jump to, you feel your body tossed into the pile

Then wrapped in Turkey’s flag, you realize, I’m still here, the bullets missed, you don’t know why

And so you go back to the party on the lawn, the hill above the lake where the cabin sits

Where the dead are not yet dead, and the old are not yet old, and the children who will inherit this world have not yet been born

Dicktionary

DICKTIONARY

A
A-Hole: A man who lives in your apartment (rent free), eats your groceries, sleeps in your bed, uses your shampoo/razors/soap/towels, drives your car and tells you he loves you. In his spare time he cheats on you, lies to you, buys drinks for girls, sends secret texts and emails and tells you that you have mental problems.

B
Barf: What you say when you see your 35 year old boyfriend fawning over one of his 19 year old female students.

C
Crap Story: This is a story a man tells you about himself that is total bullshit (e.g., "I am incredibly shrewd" or "I have been waiting my whole life to meet you"). It can also be a story about why he didn't answer when you called.

D
Douche Shuffle: The dance done when a man who believes he is not in your presence, realizes you are there. For example, say you have entered the coffee store he frequents, and you see a girl sitting at a table—a girl you believe he is having an affair with—and so you approach and being chatting with her. You notice his book and cell phone sitting on the table. She is uncomfortable. A door opens and he swaggers in. He has a spring to his step, a sparkle in his eye, chin up and hands in pockets. He notices you and changes his gait, his nonchalance, his cheater's stride. He continues forward with simultaneous horror and delight in his heart. This is the douche shuffle.

E
Email Persona: This is the absurd grandiose fun-loving personality adopted by your lover when he is speaking to other women on the web. This persona is full of promise and freedom and excitement; he is smart and passionate and interested; eternally attentive. He will use a phrase such as "I am not a religious person, but you were singing ad jingles to me on the street and it was the closest thing I've ever felt to religion. I wish I could have gone away with you then." You recognize this as a persona, because it is how he wooed you.

F
Fucking Fucker: This is a man who cheats on you and lies about it. For example, say you go to New York for the weekend and call him to talk. Say he doesn't answer but calls the next morning to tell you how much he loves you. Say you talk and then ask what he did last night. Say he yells at you for being psychotic and demanding. Now let's say you believe this and begin to detest yourself. Say that one night, after breaking up, he is drinking a martini. Say he decides to confess that in fact he slept with a girl that night.

G
Greece Vacation: The trip you take after your relationship has crashed and burned. You go with the purpose of remembering yourself before all these terrible things happened.

H
Happy: The thing he tried to extinguish within you, but you will find it and make it bright.

I
Introspection: When you wander around the city of Philadelphia, lie awake at night, write in journal after journal, lose your focus at work, drive in circles and circles and circles, trying to figure out why he stopped loving you.

J
Jello Shots: His beverage of choice. Popular at the undergrad parties.

K
Kristmas with Kransuzisch: Title of the movie that will made about your life. It will make no fucking sense but will be comic, and tragic, and comic again.

L
Love: The thing you can be in…with someone else. Someone who isn't a coward and a liar and an insecure fucked up a-hole from hell.

M
Martini Marathon: The race you run to the finish line of complete forgetting.

N
Naked Photos: What you find on his camera. She will be twenty-two, but will look almost twelve. She will have blond highlighted pigtails. Wide doll eyes and a rosy lip-glossed mouth that she will mold into a pout with every flash. She will have small breasts and her body will be virtually hairless. He will have photographed her in the shower, twirling in the living room, kissing his adult male mouth.

O
Out of Proportion: The accusation he will level against you every time you try to bring an issue out of your inner world of fear and anxiety and into the real world where it can be discussed (in theory). He will tell you that you're blowing (insert example) totally out of proportion. For example, you will say: "I found a receipt from August 11th. It says you got four beers and two burgers at one in the afternoon on Wednesday. You told me you were at Barnes and Noble all day." And he will respond: "We just went out for drinks [in the middle of the day, secretly, and with an age difference of 15 years—and a history of inappropriate mutual flirtation]. I didn't tell you because I knew you'd do this! You're blowing it way out of proportion!"

P
Parenthetical Naming/Shaming: This is when your lover sends you a note or text that clearly establishes dominance such as: "It takes two to be miserable, Abbi" or "We're just different people, Abbi."

Q
Quick: An unfortunate trait of several men. You can handle it several ways, but sometimes it's easiest to just say "Oh, NO! I thought it was great. Really!" When he breaks up with you suddenly and without explanation, you will wish you had told him: that sucked.

R
Relief: What you look for, pray for, long for.

S
Signature Move: The shit he tries to foist on people as genuine and inspired behavior/reactions. Like: feeding the birds in Rittenhouse park. Or: sending an email attachment that is wry and inscrutable. Or: making you feel sorry for him while telling you that you are refreshing, bright and redemptive.

T
Therapy: A place where you go to bitch about your life. You will need to cut it off when your therapist starts calling you.

U
Understanding: What you try to provide over and over to the person who does not give a shit about you and/or your feelings. You will say things like: "I don't get it, actually. I don't get why you have pictures of your students on your parents' computer. Please help me understand." Or you will think things like: he's had difficult experiences in life—I just need to be more understanding of his behavior, in that light."

V
Vomiting Blood Across the Computer Screen: This is what happens when you realize you have been dropped from the Facebook FRIENDS of a man who you have recently begun seeing again. You call him, text him and send an email to inquire whether you've gone mad. He sends an email explaining that it's nothing you did, in particular. He's just had a realization that "you are who you are and I am who I am." Your stomach will feel like its been hit with a truck.

W
Wine: What you consume when the love of your life is gone and you are lying in bed, unable to sleep, unable to think about anything except how terrifyingly sad you feel.

X
Xanadu: A literary reference. One of many that his other girls don't recognize. But intelligence, recognition and associative abilities don't mean anything to him.

Y
Years: Time that will go by and you will be grateful for every moment, every learning experience, every night you woke up breathless, moving through the house, looking for something you can't quite place; every car that drove away and you never saw again; every day you found a spot on the wall to stare at, waiting to feel safe in your skin; every moment that came out of nowhere and when you felt it, you took a deep, restoring breath: you were coming back.

Z
Zero: the amount of tolerance you will have for yourself if you find yourself in a shit relationship with a shit man who gets off on giving you shit. You will give him no excuse. You will give yourself no excuse for sticking it out. You will be on the move, out the door, hitting the box in the living room with your best girls.

what is it

Home is where somebody notices you are no longer there.

study abroad

I wrote this a long time ago…

Things happened, time passed. There were whole days that went by without you noticing. You would skip class and sit in the McDonalds at the train station. You pretended you were someone else, living somewhere else, arriving from another place, and departing to a place that would save you. You were young, you know. You were nineteen. You were writing down quotes, making your own bible, illustrating the pages with girls sitting alone at cafes, smoking on fountain ledges, lifting glasses to their mouthes at tables and boarding trains with suitcases, hats, and gloves. You ordered another coca light and found your camera missing. You bought cards from a bum, then bought him beer and drank together in a park until dawn. You rode the bus around the city and got off when it made its last stop. You wandered until midnight, lit a cigarette and recited Ungaretti. You met a dark haired boy who studied philosophy and smoked grass. You will carry an unparalleled affection for him the rest of your life.

song

Love is on the Way

I wrote you a love letter but it got lost in my files.
I wrote you a love letter but the ink ran with wine.
I wrote you a love letter that went on for miles.
I wrote you a love letter but the handwriting wasn't mine.
I wrote you a love letter of words that were true.
I wrote you a love letter without using 'you'.
I wrote you a love letter but it went out with the trash.
I wrote you a love letter but the end was all wrong.
I wrote you a love letter then realized it was rash.
I wrote you a love letter that sounded like an 80s song.
I wrote you a love letter saying just what I meant.
I wrote you a love letter with feelings you'd lent.
I wrote you a love letter and it started like this.
I wrote you a love letter and I said fuck through and through.
I wrote you a love letter and I started to miss.
I wrote you a love letter and said I want to start new.
I wrote you a love letter but it's in scraps on the street.
I wrote you a love letter that traces a heart beat.

quote from a book re psychology/psychiatry

"Regardless of the depth of his character flaw--and I had no doubt that it was a trench of considerable magnitude." (page 50)

Ending of BIRDS

One day, during spring cleaning, Adela suddenly appeared in Father's bird kingdom. Stopping in the doorway, she wrung her hands at the fetid smell that filled the room, the heaps of droppings covering the floor, the tables, and the chairs. Without hesitation, she flung open a window and, with the help of a long broom, she prodded the whole mass of birds into life. A fiendish cloud of feathers and wings arose screaming, and Adela, like a furious maenad protected by the whirlwind of her thyrsus, danced the dance of destruction. My father, waving his arms in panic, tried to lift himself into the air with his feathered flock. Slowly the winged cloud thinned until at last Adela remained on the battlefield, exhausted and out of breath, along with my father, who now, adopting a worried hangdog expression, was ready to accept complete defeat.

A moment later, my father came downstairs--a broken man, an exiled king who had lost his throne and his kingdom.

Bruno Schulz

you piece of unmitigated garbage

I still can't believe someone said that.

calling someone a jerk: $5
calling someone a biotch: $15
calling someone a devil: $25

calling someone a piece of unmitigated garbage: priceless

lalula

This was where I was about five months ago... it feels like less. I must be happy. Weird.


P.S. This is the border of Colorado and Nebraska

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Today, online, I saw the headline, "How to Eat like a Hot Chick." I looked at the image of the two women who are selling this idea (size 0 and 2, respectively). Why? I asked them. Wait, I replied. Maybe I am flying towards Judgment. Let's watch. "You two are not dieticians," the emaciated news correspondent prompts. "NOOO," they reply.

Poetry Landmark: McLean Hospital in Belmont, MA

In suburban Massachusetts, on 240 acres of peaceful grounds, is a literary legend—of sorts. McLean Hospital, with its long history of treating the blue bloods of Boston, has become an unlikely poetry landmark after providing both recuperation and inspiration to Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, and Anne Sexton.

Plath was the first of the three to stay at McLean. In 1953, during a summer at home before her senior year in college, Plath swallowed a bottle of pills and crawled beneath her house. Her failed suicide attempt led to months of treatment at McLean and began her long relationship with the psychiatrist Ruth Tiffany Barnhouse. While there, Plath received insulin-shock therapy, anti-psychotic drugs, and ultimately electroshock therapy. The experience surfaced years later in her poem, "The Hanging Man," which begins, "By the roots of my hair some god got hold of me / I sizzled in his blue volts like a desert prophet."

Lowell was admitted to McLean in 1958, though his infamous manic outbursts had already resulted in numerous stays at other mental institutions. Over eight years, he stayed there four times, correspondeding frequently from his hospital address, and sending letters to Theodore Roethke, Ezra Pound even Jackie Kennedy. Written about his first stay at McLean, his poem "Waking in the Blue" mentions Bowditch Hall and was pasted on the wall of the nurse's station there for years. It ends with the lines:

"I strut in my turtle-necked French sailor's jerseybefore the metal shaving mirrors,and see the shaky future grow familiarin the pinched, indigenous facesof these thoroughbred mental cases,twice my age and half my weight.We are all old-timers,each of us holds a locked razor."

tate modern

Sometimes you almost get a punch in.
Then you may go for days without even seeing him,
or his presence may become a comfort
for a while.

He says: I saw you scrambling last night
on your knees and hands.

He says: How come you always want to be
something else, how come you never take your life
seriously?

And you say: Shut up! Isn't it enough
I say I love you, I give you everything!

He moves across the room with his hand
on his chin, and says: How great you are!

Come here, let me touch you, you say.

He comes closer. Come close, you say.
He comes closer. Then. Whack! And
you start again, moving around and around
the room, the room which grows larger
and larger, darker and darker…


James Tate, "Shadowboxing"

More Baby Drama!!!

Perez Hilton writes:

"There's something in the air!!!
This is pretty juicy stuff.
The National Enquirer is exclusively reporting that Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards is going to be a father again, and the baby is not his wife's!!!!
Yup, dumb dumb got his alleged mistress pregnant.
Edward's wife is dying of incurable cancer.
Click here to read all the scandalicious details!"

Comments:
#226 - Remember The Facts says – reply to this
The National Enquirer is owned by a Clinton backer. That means till the election they will be running major political scandals on anyone but Clinton. Last week was Obama and Oprah and this week it's Edwards.
Please read and look for other sources before making decisions on politicians.
Thanks and Please Vote For Change

#216 - You Pig says – reply to this
This is alleged. This is the Enquirer which is total trash. You have no proof. You would add to the burden of an incurable cancer patient with a story that is nothing more than an assumption at this point. Just when it seems you can't become any less human, you piece of slop, you show that you are even more soulless than anyone's worst nightmare. Karma is hell Perez. When your time comes to face God, I hope you are prepared for the price to be exacted from you and I hope it was worth it. You piece of unmitigated garbage.

#196 - abbi says – reply to this
Perez, you are hilarious and astute, but this entry shows the kind of gullibility and bourgeois salaciousness that one typically finds on 'lesser' blogs. Disappointing, especially since you have shifted the focus of your criticisms from brain-dead self-entitled goons to progressive intelligent magnanimous advocates for victims rights. And the victims are the American people.

thinking this morning about high school

http://musicbox.sonybmg.com/video-player/fiona_apple/never_is_a_promise

In the living room Elaine was surrounded by winter snowflakes. It was a night. A very small night. It was a room. A very small room. The first few friends of Philadelphia. Bottles of liquor in the kitchen, music in the main space and a window open. It was cold and they were blowing smoke. They were singing along to music from high school. Ten years later at least and they were like oooo-oooo-oo-oo-oooo. The string section was strong on that number. She remembers it well.

She feels the cold sheet of air blow into the living room and the smoke back across them. And she hears music from her best friend's Honda Civic driving to school in the morning. Minnesota winter morning on the way to Shore View High School. They would drive by a couple of times, light another one and try to figure out what the fuck they were doing. I know I'm going to fail today, they would say. Did you finish the book? They would say. Last night Elaine dreamed about a boy she knew in high school. He was medium height, thin, glasses, played the piano...