epiphany of beauty: they still gives me shivers...

The untimely death of Christopher Bowman ('Bowman the Showman') just came up in Yahoo news. A google image search on him - his brilliant career and all too short life - led to further searching (as it always does with google, eh?), and landed where art begins and ends: heart-shaking videos of the all-time greats, Torvill & Dean. I still weep with wonder and gratitude for them.

Their perfect scores in the Olympics of 1984 ('Bolero') remains at the top even now, despite their magnetic tide pull on all wanna-be's to their altar of style and originality over the years. But today it is their 1984 paso doble that makes my soul hold its breath. It is one of several required dances in the Olympics - 'compulsory', with prescribed steps and rhythmic precision providing a platform for the pair's creativity. Torvill & Dean set the standard with this one. So: Enter Christopher as matador. And Jayne as cape...with inherent possibilities for twirling, throwing, dragging...and (for her) draping. Despite its 'age'...Breathtaking.



Some other (more recent) high points out of their myriad: Oscar Tango. And Sarabande (a collaboration with Yo-Yo Ma). YouTube has many others, including their interpretations of Dave Brubeck's Take Five, John Lennon's Revolution paired with Imagine, and even Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend.

calm & blue...

The courtyard area in Pablo Neruda's home.

For a large version of the photo, try clicking here.

So serene. And...the lovely blue paint exudes completeness...unlike the dining room in my corner of the world (The gorgeous pink paint, custom-mixed by JR, awaits application...and is bound to make the wallpaper in the adjoining kitchen look unattractive and outdated!!! A project in the wings???) Ah, blue -- makes me think of Patricia Barber's 'blue'...lift the sash to air the breeze...a mixture of both the serene and the somber.

The other connection, this night, is with Neruda's poetry, as Lauridsen uses one of his poems in his 'Nocturnes' set. However, my excessive self simply can't get past the 'ultimate', represented by the Shining Night offering in that group.

I suppose blue could carry me to other places tonight...perhaps to a cosmic veil of musical tears in one of my other current 'ultimate beauty' cravings: 'When David Heard' by Eric Whitacre. Here I must interject: does a composer who is as California surfer blond and beautiful as Whitacre understand if we at first wonder if he is too pretty to be taken seriously? Obviously, though: serious talent he is.

So, in 'When David heard...' we get 11+ minutes of wailing on a biblical text. When David heard that Absalom his son was slain he went up into his chamber and wept. Oh, my son...Absalom.... Tears. Sobbing. Wailing. Catching of breath...Starting all over again. The climactic musical ascension to the throne of God? A veil: not draping, falling, bidden earthward by gravity, but rather quite palpably, literally, building itself a bridge to heaven...touching the heart of God with its grief. (And let us not forget the context: King David's son Absalom was waging battle so as to win his father's kingdom and throne by force. Yet...the father grieves for the loss of his life.)

Profound. Somber. But indescribably beautiful.

Tonight, though much work (though never 'enough') was done here in my all too earthly un-kingdom, I'm grateful for an escape to the blue, with some rare time & energy allowing me to reply to some recent-and-beyond blog comments.

Off to dream... But first: must face the 'music' in the basement. This evening, Bixby brought in a not-very-dead GIANT pigeon, undoubtedly to impress us. It's about half his size. He only maimed it. I will lift it with tshirt-gloved hands and carry it out to lie under a fern in the front yard. Make he soon rest in peace.

Mercy.

michelangelo's seizure

I had referred to this poem in an earlier post. Here it is, in its entirety, on the National Endowment for the Arts website. I assume that, at very least, allows me to post the link to an e-altar where it lies in entirety! This sort of contact can only lead more people to purchase the volume anyway.

My favorite phrase (currently, of course): "...with the witchcraft hushed inside his veins..."

Favorite imagery (for now): "...with two dead bugs crushed into the paint..."

Note that this utterly brilliant poet briefly discusses his next project. In preparation he is..."researching O'Neill's biography, and his work, to try to find moments of psychological empathy that will let me into the poems"...

Psychological empathy. Fuel of the gods.

if i were blue

Patricia Barber not only knows how to sing but also write the blues:

if i were blue
like David Hockney's pool
dive into me and glide
under a California sky
inside your mouth and nose and eyes am i

if i were blue
like Edward Hopper's afternoon
lift the sash to air the breeze
let my summer flush your cheek
lie supine beneath the soft and gentle season

would that this were that
this is more like black
dark as darkest indigo
sickly sweet and ripe
like nothing
smothering light

bring on the pelting rain
palpable sensual pain
like Goya in his studio
in the thick of night
absence is
dull and silent

if i were blue
a pale Picasso blue
as beauty is to sorrow
let me cover you in sleep
and in your melancholy i would give you peace

if i were blue...

I'm an obsessed fan...

patricia barber

Her latest album: Mythologies

Gotcha from Fortnight in France on YouTube

A remarkable review: Verse

And if you're going to be in Chicago...

michelangelo's seizure

Supper at Emmaus Caravaggio

One of the perks of my job: opening up the interesting mail that comes for the Associate Provost for Enrollment. Yeah, a lot of it is total junk. Or from people/institutions trying to impress him. I suppose the announcement from Seton University of the imminent publishing of a professor's book of poetry, including the title poem in its entirety, might come under the category of the latter. But...oh, my...oh, my -- what a poem. A tantalizing doorway into Steve Gerhke's world of marrying painters to poetry.

Of course, I cannot in good conscience print the entire text of the poem here. But, I assure you, an excerpt will do, if you're looking to be hooked.

"...with the witchcraft hushed inside his veins,
onto the flayed skin of St. Bartholomew, crumpled, fierce,
with two dead bugs crushed into the paint, like that bit of
terror, he would think, sealed inside of everything He makes."
--From the title poem Michelangelo's Seizure

The volume includes Caravaggio as a subject. Another reason to order mine, post haste.