11.4.10

Media Art: "Red Marks"



If you look closely at the image I call "Red Marks" there is a human figure to be found. The story is I took this photograph in a normal manner circa 2003 or 2004. I don't remember exactly. I took it with Kodak color film and when I processed the film I stored away in my memory bank. It's basically an image of a man sitting in a chair in a sitting room (you can barely make out the wooden Venetian blinds behind his head). We had been sitting and chatting after dinner one night. I am purposely not revealing who the man is in the photograph for the sake of privacy — and also because my gut says it is more interesting to think of the image without any identifying markers, except a red mark.  Fast forward to 2010 — I scanned the original photograph and then used Photoshop to make the above image. Presto. Primo. What do you think? Leave a note in the comment box below.

7.4.10

Photograph: "Lipstick Red Bloody Mary"


The reddest Bloody Mary can be consumed at Outback Steakhouse. I have no idea what they put in this drink to make it lipstick red, but I feel like I'm kissing someone's ruby lips when I drink it.

6.4.10

Poem: "Obsession"

Even though I call him my sun-tanned god;
As he laughs and skates on the waves,
I slaughter him in my mind,
A ghastly howl of the knife,
A trickle of the divine
To bring together in my mind
Some semblance of sex and death —

I do this, I think,
Because am I a neurotic? —
many would agree.

Only because they do not allow such cruel thoughts.

But it is the only way to rid him from the contours:
the image in my mind that sticks,
sublime
image credit: Jerome Park Reservoir, New York City

Prose Poem: "to leave"


to unsettle from place is fearful: fear eats the soul; they say face your fears, but isn’t place a barrier between us and our fears; a comforting worn thing set as a wall; for who really faces fears; except maybe the emigrant; moving away — but the death in facing back, like lot’s wife and her salt, or orpheus looking back — and I feel shame, like salt, and I feel evaporated … all those nice things I have come to like, to feel, I will have to give up so I can touch my belly again;

Why David Remnick is My Hero (But I Don't Want to Emulate Him)

David Remnick, the editor for the New Yorker, and latest biographer of the 44th president, gets up at 5:30 AM to write, goes to work at one of the most eloquent magazines in the country, and still has a few minutes to spend time with family, go back to work, look good, be friends with Malcolm Gladwell - and he commutes by subway. I wish I could be him - but then, I think, maybe not. I don't desire editorial glamour (I'm not a Tina Brown wannabe) but, at least God, please give me a Remnick brain! I wanna write 2,000 words effortlessly.

5.4.10

Graphic Design: Invocation to the New York Public Library Lions

One of the flanking lions that guard the entrance to the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan
I am a reader.
     As a kid, I read fantasy novels and Mad Magazines. As a college student, I read a lot of philosophy (which stimulated my brain). As an adult, I read loads of spiritual books and followed random blogs on the Internet. As a teacher, I read for work so I can teach what I have read.
     In the remaining moments, I read a voraciously the New York Times — and when the new issue of Entertainment Weekly comes in the mail I spent at least twenty-five minutes lying in bed flipping through its glossy pages.
graphic design credit: Greig Roselli © 2010