sparkle

oh the infamous yearning is in town. it's come along with the soft loads of snow. every hour there's more and more of it. it reshapes the roofs and covers the tree branches. how cold can people's faces get when I watch them through the snowy walls. I can feel all of us gliding down a snow storm whirlwind. down into the fatigue, darkness and cold. and yet I'm alone in this. the other day I experienced beauty that is slipping through my fingers. so, looks like I'm back to my primeval fears and instincts. how dark a night can be.
however! the oh so anticipated kitsch party is going to bring us back to life, isn't it.

save our souls

sanity, goddess, mayday, mayday

the oceanic self

"This pain, the pain of unrequited love, occurred at such regular intervals during my childhood and adolescence that I don't care to write about it. It was a terrible and continuous pain and there was no deflecting it, only bearing it. When my parents prepared spaghetti, I always noticed the one noodle left behind in the strainer, forsaken, forgotten, while its companions lay intertwined in each others' arms, hot and steaming, in the large bowl at the centre of the table. When love was pain, I felt like that noodle. I never ate pasta without beforehand going to the strainer in the sink. I would look upon this bereft noodle, curled upon itself in search of comfort, and I would bring it love by eating it tenderly."
Yann Martel Self

the elisabeth of phrases won't let me sleep

I'm sitting in my wooden bed, hating electronic appliances. flashes make me sick, so do tiny elements, enclosed worlds, mental shortcuts so processed and transformed that I don't recognize what they're made of any more. I'm begging for wood, for paper. I want to put black soil into my mouth, I want to chew it, I want to get rid of the pop art, so overreacting in its brightness, though I like, I used to like it so terribly, I want to get back, I want to get back, I want to get back.
words like bread, the primeval bread with the low, sallow smell. so that I can sense how the structure breathes. and then the mycelium, the great motherly organism, wet corridors in constant proliferation, swelling, layer writing.
palimpsest smelling like life, and off to the soaked field with that laptop.
hundreds of hours spent in front of the screens fill my stomach, and those flashes, flashes again, like in Sankya's story, when they were beating him up, like he was, so I am waiting for the loss of consciousness, for the current to stop irritating my veins and for it all to collapse.
blood, mercury, metallic sheen.
it gushes from my body.

and it's such a pity that there's no ablative case in Polish any more.

'the charm of the written word that sets you free'

the end of the light season, now the rainy time of year, the water collects in long drops over my balcony and falls rarely, but with a load of extreme; swollen pendulum; November perpetual motion machine.
I feel helpless.
against the trance character of the theater situation, with dozens of people sitting on the one side and Herta Müller with Angelika Kuźniak on the other, the women immersed in a low and quiet conversation, over two hours long. German language with a Romanian accent, black hair and black lines under Herta's eyes, all her figure as if drawn with a piece of charcoal, so distinct, so sophisticated and dark, dark, dark.
meditation, with her sitting up there, like a black polished onyx; over our heads a theatrical muddle of fastenings and lights (yet subdued), black walls and overexposed photographs projected on the wall behind the stage. I was focused, the water surface was calm, but I broke the evening subversively together with three women and a man – though it's hard to believe, we went for a pizza and beer which we drank to Herta (may the heavens forgive us). yet I don't regret making that holy state cloudy. those people are more important, even if I can see a tinge of hypocrisy underneath their occasionally friendly utterances, even if my communication with B. is apparently getting torn and twisted, even if I'm not totally comfortable with it and I can't really be who I want myself to be, still, being with them is most important.

It is beautiful to live. No matter whether this life is beautiful or not.
H.M.

we didn't get an equal start, sister.

to carry a towel, a toothbrush and toothpaste in your bag whenever you go out.
associations?
to me, last summer, when I had a lover and I knew that sensuality could bring me to her place and I might not want to go home.
Herta Müller:
And I received summons. They wanted to humiliate me. Often. I began to carry a small towel, toothbrush and a toothpaste in my bag. The interrogator called me a piece of shit, junk, a parasite, a bitch. This was when he was furious. When his mood was better, I was a whore or an enemy. When I only took his office time, I was a slut.

***

Because writing is opposite to living. When I write, I do not exist in a sense. As a person I cannot be occupied with myself. Usually, I don't work on a book too long, because I can't stand the tension. When writing, I have to find myself where I'm most hurt inside, otherwise I wouldn't have to write at all.

It's like walking a knife blade, in between disclosure and preserving the secret.
H.M.

[translations mine]

pop.art

I'm tired
of the alcohol, cigarettes, dancing, sleep deprivation
I'm excited
new acquaintances tend to make an impression of absolute uniqueness and life-giving freshness
I'm confused
a question was asked for me to answer, but I don't seem to be able to do it
so, instead, I think how nice it is of the Western culture to create something more than just those piles of plastic coca-cola bags that lie forever on the dirty Balkan streets; it can sometimes do the cultural recycling, too, making use of its own icons: Marilyn on a bag, Audrey on a fridge, Elvis on a saucer. it seems so environment-friendly to me.
and for tomorrow
I'm not prepared, yet again.



It doesn't matter
What you create
If you have no fun

Pretty girl
Put down your pen
Come over here
I'll show you how its done

I can dance, I can drink
In the dark
It's all a trick

Across the room, across the street
I'm in the moment
Can't you see

I'm a party girl
Do a twirl
See my eyes, throw a glance
Can't you see I'm a natural

Life of a party girl, funny girl
Make you laugh, want me bad
Now I feel so much better

In the back
Of a car
I just met them tonight and I feel like such a star

What's your name
What's your art
Nobody knows
About my broken heart

Yes I'm a party girl
Crazy girl
See my lips, how they move
Can't you see I'm a natural

Life of a party girl
Sexy girl
I used to be so fragile
But now I'm so wild

What did you do last night?
Oh, I was out so late, now I'm so tired

What did you do last night?
Oh, I was out so late, now I'm so tired

I'm a party girl
Do a twirl
See my eyes, throw a glance
Can't you see I'm a natural

Life of a party girl, funny girl
Make you laugh want me bad
Now I feel so much better

I used to cry
But now I don't have the time
I used to be so fragile
But now I'm so wild

I used to cry
But now I don't have the time
I used to be so fragile but now I'm so wild
So wild

Walt Whitman

"When I heard the Learn'd Astronomer"


WHEN I heard the learn'd astronomer;
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;
Till rising and gliding out, I wander'd off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

P.s. As for Whitman, in the heat of the translation process, one of my mates translated "...saying that Walt Whitman was a racist" into "...twierdząc, że Walt Disney był rasitą". Awesome, isn't it.

yeah, do it!

the m**** project
top secret!
i can feel it coming
hope she wouldn't be terrified if she knew
hope she wouldn't sue us for stalking
after all
we just adore her for her way
just admire her style
her gentle chocolate existence
amazing, how one can master their act of being to such an extent that it thrills me.
go, girl.

P.s. M's response to my s&s, suits this home made annoying Monday perfectly: