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8838. wabbit - 2/4/2012 5:16:22 PM RIP Wislawa Szymborska
Wislawa Szymborska, a gentle and reclusive Polish poet who won the 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature, died on Wednesday in Krakow, Poland. She was 88.
Her best known poem is "Cat in an Empty Apartment"
Die—you can’t do that to a cat.
Since what can a cat do
in an empty apartment?
Climb the walls?
Rub up against the furniture?
Nothing seems different here
but nothing is the same.
Nothing’s been moved
but there’s more space.
And at nighttime no lamps are lit.
Footsteps on the staircase,
but they’re new ones.
The hand that puts fish on the saucer
has changed, too.
Something doesn’t start
at its usual time.
Something doesn’t happen
as it should.
Someone was always, always here,
then suddenly disappeared
and stubbornly stays disappeared.
Every closet’s been examined.
Every shelf has been explored.
Excavations under the carpet turned up nothing.
A commandment was even broken:
papers scattered everywhere.
What remains to be done.
Just sleep and wait.
Just wait till he turns up,
just let him show his face.
Will he ever get a lesson
on what not to do to a cat.
Sidle toward him
as if unwilling
and ever so slow
on visibly offended paws,
and no leaps or squeals at least to start.
One more - "A 'Thank You' Note"
There is much I owe
to those I do not love.
The relief in accepting
they are closer to another.
Joy that I am not
the wolf to their sheep.
My peace be with them
for with them I am free,
and this, love can neither give,
nor know how to take.
I don't wait for them
from window to door.
Almost as patient
as a sun dial,
I understand
what love does not understand.
I forgive
what love would never have forgiven.
Between rendezvous and letter
no eternity passes,
only a few days or weeks.
My trips with them always turn out well.
Concerts are heard.
Cathedrals are toured.
Landscapes are distinct.
And when seven rivers and mountains
come between us,
they are rivers and mountains
well known from any map.
It is thanks to them
that I live in three dimensions,
in a non-lyrical and non-rhetorical space,
with a shifting, thus real, horizon.
They don't even know
how much they carry in their empty hands.
"I don't owe them anything",
love would have said
on this open topic. 8839. wabbit - 2/4/2012 6:03:55 PM RIP Dorothea Tanning
Dorothea Tanning, a leading Surrealist painter of the 1930s whose path had led her from the small town of Galesburg, Ill., to a whirlwind life in the international art world, died on Tuesday at her home in Manhattan. She was 101.
RIP Mike Kelley
Mike Kelley, an influential Los Angeles artist whose physically messy and psychologically complex projects laid the groundwork for present-day installation art, has died. He was 57.
He was found dead Tuesday evening at his home in South Pasadena in what several friends described as a suicide following a serious depression. "We can't confirm a suicide pending an autopsy or coroner's report," said one of the estate's trustees, art historian John Welchman... 8840. wabbit - 2/4/2012 6:18:55 PM RIP Don Cornelius
I remember being uninterested in American Bandstand as a kid, but Soul Train was different. Cool music, cool dancing...the groundbreaking aspects never occurred to me at all. I don't think I even realized everyone on the show was black. Oh to be that young again.
I've never been so happy to have YouTube available.
8841. arkymalarky - 2/4/2012 9:18:21 PM I loved Soul Train. I'm impressed with his tenacity, but never cared for Dick Clark. 8842. vonKreedon - 2/9/2012 10:40:24 PM Niner has a movie blog: Filmvetter 8843. judithathome - 2/9/2012 10:52:30 PM Hmmmm...no foreign films? 8844. vonKreedon - 2/9/2012 11:30:54 PM He's got a few foreign films there, he just doesn't like them very much and doesn't have a foreign file catagory. 8845. arkymalarky - 2/11/2012 5:40:12 PM Our president's singing makes me swoon. Michelle Obama is one lucky lady. 8846. arkymalarky - 2/12/2012 3:34:47 AM Whitney Houston has died. 8847. wabbit - 2/12/2012 5:38:17 PM 48 years old. She looked fairly healthy in the last year, not like Michael Jackson or Amy Winehouse. We'll see if the drowning rumors are true. 8848. Ms. No - 2/12/2012 8:26:29 PM I had forgotten how truly amazing her voice was. Check out her Star Spangled Banner in this link. Effortless and joyful it's like she's channeling the sound from some holy realm.
Whitney sings the Star Spangled Banner 8849. arkymalarky - 2/13/2012 5:54:38 AM Nice Grammy tributes. I don't know how Glen Campbell is managing on his farewell tour. 8850. wabbit - 2/19/2012 4:29:00 PM Dear god, enough already. Whitney Houston was a great singer, but was she a great role model? Was she a world leader, or any kind of leader? Flags at half staff in NJ? Other than her magnificent voice, which was lost years ago, and her age, what is the deal? Michael Jackson might have been a whackjob, but he threw money at a lot of charities over the years. Did Whitney? Get a grip people. We have gone over the edge.
< /meanie > 8851. vonKreedon - 2/20/2012 8:44:42 PM Buckwheat has been shot! 8852. wabbit - 2/21/2012 1:17:58 AM hmm, I sure hope I don't have to explain that I don't mean this as a racial comment. I would be equally put off if it was Madonna, or Boy George, or George Clooney, or any celebrity. The media whips people up into a frenzy over something that happens to families every day, and to them is just as tragic, if not more so.
I'm just out of touch with popular culture, that much is clear. 8853. wabbit - 2/21/2012 2:06:32 AM I didn't get the big deal over Princess Di either. Still don't. 8854. wabbit - 2/21/2012 2:17:55 AM
'Nuff said? 8855. thoughtful - 2/21/2012 3:36:23 PM Go Granny go!
Not only did I love her spirit but I have the same perpetual calendar that she had on her wall!
8856. judithathome - 2/21/2012 4:59:37 PM I am SOOOOO with you, wabbit, on this "perpetual Whitney angst". I don't think the last 3 dead popes got this much ink. 8857. bhelpuri - 2/23/2012 10:52:56 AM what's the difficulty in understanding that whitney houston meant different things to black america + white america (to choose only one such categorization that could work for this example)? to the latter, particularly over 35, the singer was just one of the big voices of her time. to the former, she was a connection to the show-biz greats of the previous generation, a vibrant musical ambassador from the black church tradition, and rare crossover to global success. I don't understand why this is so hard to acknowledge.
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