Aesthetics

echo, late 20's, they/them/theirs. aesthetics: the sensory background influencing the work of an artist.

[apoemaday]

Try to Praise the Mutilated World

by Adam Zagajewski tr. Clare Cavanagh

Try to praise the mutilated world. Remember June’s long days, and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew. The nettles that methodically overgrow the abandoned homesteads of exiles. You must praise the mutilated world. You watched the stylish yachts and ships; one of them had a long trip ahead of it, while salty oblivion awaited others. You’ve seen the refugees heading nowhere, you’ve heard the executioners sing joyfully. You should praise the mutilated world. Remember the moments when we were together in a white room and the curtain fluttered. Return in thought to the concert where music flared. You gathered acorns in the park in autumn and leaves eddied over the earth’s scars. Praise the mutilated world and the grey feather a thrush lost, and the gentle light that strays and vanishes and returns.

[revilonilmah]

It would be so relaxing to have a cup of tea with your favorite Pokemon after a long day of working in the greenhouse!

[librarycard]

the ship of theseus wikipedia article in 2003. 20 years later, after 1792 total edits, 0% of its original phrasing remains. (x)

[carouselcometh]

Devastating! Art museum gift shop doesn’t sell prints of specific and unpopular painting that struck a cord with you!

[apoemaday]

Don't Go Far Off

by Pablo Neruda tr. Stephen Tapscott

Don’t go far off, not even for a day, because– because–I don’t know how to say it: a day is long and I will be waiting for you, as in an empty station when the trains are parked off somewhere else, asleep. Don’t leave me, even for an hour, because then the little drops of anguish will all run together, the smoke that roams looking for a home will drift into me, choking my lost heart. Oh, may your silhouette never dissolve on the beach; may your eyelids never flutter into the empty distance. Don’t leave me for a second, my dearest, because in that moment you’ll have gone so far I’ll wander mazily over all the earth, asking, Will you come back? Will you leave me here, dying? 

[headspace-hotel]

Y'all ever open a book on a new subject, read a little bit, and have to put it back so you can process the way in which your mind was just expanded?

[headspace-hotel]

The textile book: okay here is some of the ways that textiles are important to human life

me: Okay!

The textile book: Clothes separate the vulnerable human body from the conditions of the outside world, and in doing so absorb the sweat and debris of human existence, accumulating wear and tear according to the lives we live. In this way, various lifestyles and professions are represented by clothing, and the clothing of a loved one retains the imprint of their physical body and their life being lived, as though the clothes absorb part of the wearer's soul

Me: ...oh

The textile book: The process of weaving a garment and the process of a child being formed in its mother's womb are often referred to using the same language. Likewise, when a baby is born, a blanket or other textile material is the first material object it encounters and protects it. Textiles can create the idea of two things being inextricable, as with being "woven together," or can create the sense of separateness, as with a curtain or veil that separates two rooms or spaces, even separating the living from the dead, or separating two realities, such as a performance ending when the curtain falls

Me: ...oh God

The textile book: Odysseus's wife Penelope undid her weaving in secret every night to delay the advances of her suitors. In this way she was able to turn back the passage of time to allow her husband to come home. Likewise the Lakota tell a story of an old woman embroidering time by embroidering a robe with porcupine quills. If she finishes the embroidery, the world will come to an end, but her faithful dog pulls out the quills whenever her back is turned, turning back the clock and allowing existence to continue.

me: ...is...is...is that why we refer to the fabric of space and time?

The textile book: The technological revolution of textile making is sadly underappreciated. The textile arts are possibly the most fundamental human technology, as once people created string and rope, they could create nets for catching fish and small animals, and bags and baskets for carrying food. In the earliest prehistoric times, the first string or cord perhaps came from sinew, found in the body of an animal. Because of this perhaps the body of a living being could be understood as made of a textile material. Indeed textiles have the function of preserving life, as with a surgeon stitching back together the human body or bandages being placed on a wound. Textile technologies are being used to create life-changing implants to restore function to injured parts of the body, as though a muscle or tendon can be woven and made in this way. Cloth can be used to create a parachute that will save a human's life as they plummet out of the sky. Ultimately, the textile technologies are used to enter new parts of the universe. [Photo of an astronaut and details explaining the astronaut's suit]

Me: STOP!! MY MIND IS NOT STRONG ENOUGH FOR THIS

[headspace-hotel]

The book is "Textiles: The Whole Story" by Beverly Gordon

[datasoong47]

[alexunlawful-deactivated2024022]

See also: spoopy litwick comic

For some reason I’ve become infatuated with the idea of Calem unwittingly becoming a Phantump’s mom.

PS, some extras I haven’t posted here on Patreon.

[pokemonheritageposts]

Pokemon Heritage Post

[apoemaday]

Poplar Street

by Chen Chen

Oh. Sorry. Hello. Are you on your way to work, too? I was just taken aback by how you also have a briefcase, also small & brown. I was taken by how you seem, secretly, to love everything. Are you my new coworker? Oh. I see. No. Still, good to meet you. I’m trying out this thing where it’s good to meet people. Maybe, beyond briefcases, we have some things in common. I like jelly beans. I’m afraid of death. I’m afraid of farting, even around people I love. Do you think your mother loves you when you fart? Does your mother love you all the time? Have you ever doubted? I like that the street we’re on is named after a tree, when there are none, poplar or otherwise. I wonder if a tree has ever been named after a street, whether that worked out. If I were a street, I hope I’d get a good name, not Main or One-Way. One night I ran out of an apartment, down North Pleasant Street — it was soft & neighborly with pines & oaks, it felt too hopeful, after what happened. After my mother’s love became doubtful. After I told her I liked a boy & she wished I had never been born. After she said she was afraid of me, terrified I might infect my brothers with my abnormality. Sometimes, parents & children become the most common strangers. Eventually, a street appears where they can meet again. Or not. I’ve doubted my own love for my mother. I doubt. Do I have to forgive in order to love? Or do I have to love for forgiveness to even be possible? What do you think? I’m trying out this thing where questions about love & forgiveness are a form of work I’d rather not do alone. I’m trying to say, Let’s put our briefcases on our heads, in the sudden rain, & continue meeting as if we’ve just been given our names.

[malojasnake]

— Sunrise, by Louise Glück

[slowdivemp3]

[ID: “And if you missed a day, there was always next, / and if you missed a year, it didn’t matter, / the hills weren’t going anywhere, / the thyme and rosemary kept coming back, / the sun kept rising, the bushes kept bearing fruit” end ID]

[bluberry-parfait]

[1990danieljohnston]

oh my god Song of the Anti-Sisyphus by Chen Chen just split my head open like a melon and now is eating out of my brain i can't believe he wrote this

[blackberryjambaby]

[smokefalls]

If we could communicate fully, there would be no need to communicate. If we could love perfectly, there would be no need to love. If we could finish grieving, there would be no need to live. If we could touch completely, there would be no need.

Chen Chen, “a small book of questions: chapter iv” from Your Emergency Contact Has Experienced an Emergency (via smokefalls)

[sirgawin]

Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth by John Singer Sargent (1889)

Florence Welch by Simon Procter (2016)

[mind-altering-bugs]

The best part about turning 30 was, legitimately, unlocking the ability to use this image

[apoemaday]

Fear

by Raymond Carver

Fear of seeing a police car pull into the drive. Fear of falling asleep at night. Fear of not falling asleep. Fear of the past rising up. Fear of the present taking flight. Fear of the telephone that rings in the dead of night. Fear of electrical storms. Fear of the cleaning woman who has a spot on her cheek! Fear of dogs I’ve been told won’t bite. Fear of anxiety! Fear of having to identify the body of a dead friend. Fear of running out of money. Fear of having too much, though people will not believe this. Fear of psychological profiles. Fear of being late and fear of arriving before anyone else. Fear of my children’s handwriting on envelopes. Fear they’ll die before I do, and I’ll feel guilty. Fear of having to live with my mother in her old age, and mine. Fear of confusion. Fear this day will end on an unhappy note. Fear of waking up to find you gone. Fear of not loving and fear of not loving enough. Fear that what I love will prove lethal to those I love. Fear of death. Fear of living too long. Fear of death. I’ve said that.

[luthienne]

Tony Hoagland, from Application for Release from the Dream; “The Complex Sentence”