A Supermarket in California – Allen Ginsberg
WHAT THOUGHTS I HAVE OF YOU TONIGHT, WALT WHITMAN, FOR I WALKED DOWN THE
STREETS UNDER THE TREES WITH A HEADACHE SELF-CONSCIOUS LOOKING AT THE FULL MOON.
IN MY HUNGRY FATIGUE, AND SHOPPING FOR IMAGES, I WENT INTO THE NEON FRUIT
SUPERMARKET, DREAMING OF YOUR ENUMERATIONS!
WHAT PEACHES AND WHAT PENUMBRAS! WHOLE FAMILIES SHOPPING AT NIGHT! AISLES
FULL OF HUSBANDS! WIVES IN THE AVOCADOS, BABIES IN THE TOMATOES! —- AND YOU,
GARCIA LORCA, WHAT WERE YOU DOING DOWN BY THE WATERMELONS?
I SAW YOU, WALT WHITMAN, CHILDLESS, LONELY OLD GRUBBER, POKING AMONG THE
MEATS IN THE REFRIGERATOR AND EYEING THE GROCERY BOYS.
I HEARD YOU ASKING QUESTIONS OF EACH: WHO KILLED THE PORK CHOPS? WHAT PRICE
BANANAS? ARE YOU MY ANGEL?
I WANDERED IN AND OUT OF THE BRILLIANT STACKS OF CANS FOLLOWING YOU, AND
FOLLOWED IN MY IMAGINATION BY THE STORE DETECTIVE.
WE STRODE DOWN THE OPEN CORRIDORS TOGETHER IN OUR SOLITARY FANCY TASTING
ARTICHOKES, POSSESSING EVERY FROZEN DELICACY, AND NEVER PASSING THE CASHIER.
WHERE ARE WE GOING, WALT WHITMAN? THE DOORS CLOSE IN AN HOUR. WHICH WAY DOES
YOUR BEARD POINT TONIGHT?
(I TOUCH YOUR BOOK AND DREAM OF OUR ODYSSEY IN THE SUPERMARKET AND FEEL
ABSURD.)
WILL WE WALK ALL NIGHT THROUGH SOLITARY STREETS? THE TREES ADD SHADE TO
SHADE, LIGHTS OUT IN THE HOUSES, WE’LL BOTH BE LONELY.
WILL WE STROLL DREAMING OF THE LOST AMERICA OF LOVE PAST BLUE AUTOMOBILES IN
DRIVEWAYS, HOME TO OUR SILENT COTTAGE?
AH, DEAR FATHER, GRAYBEARD, LONELY OLD COURAGE-TEACHER, WHAT AMERICA DID YOU
HAVE WHEN CHARON QUIT POLING HIS FERRY AND YOU GOT OUT ON A SMOKING BANK AND
STOOD WATCHING THE BOAT DISAPPEAR ON THE BLACK WATERS OF LETHE?——————
DEFINITELY ONE OF MY FAVORITE POEMS EVER
Seconded.
“where are we going walt whitman?”
Source: fatamorganavision
Source: fuckyeah1920s
Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (M, 20s, red hoodie, white canvas shoes, tweed golf cap, F train) http://bit.ly/9FVv6S
I read this book to impress a boy I had a crush on and it turned out that I loved kurt vonnegut beyond the telling and it kind of maybe had a huge impact on my life. nothing else ever came of that crush and the last time I saw the kid, his formerly amazing hair that I practically wrote sonnets to had become awkward and puffy in his middle-age. however, when people say never ever do things just to impress a boy (or girl, though I don’t feel like people bother telling guys that), they’re not always right. because sometimes trying something you wouldn’t have for any reason is worthwhile.
Source: coverspy
The Outlaws of Sherwood, Robin McKinley (F, 20s, fair complexion, tank w summery striped skirt, D train) http://bit.ly/ahKjZz
I think I read this book 4 or 5 times the summer I was 10.
Source: coverspy
Today is Towel Day!
Don’t forget your Towel!
“A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.
More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have “lost”. What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with.”RIP Douglas Adams (1952-2001)
Being in a relationship, that’s something you choose. Being friends, that’s just something you are.
John Green, Will Grayson, Will Grayson
oh, tiny cooper, you broke my little heart. because it’s really true, even though sometimes it would be easier if it weren’t.
(also yes, I’m just quoting john green every week now.)
Everyone wishes to be loved, but, in the event, nearly no one can bear it. Everyone desires love but also finds it impossible to believe that he deserves it. However great the private disasters to which love may lead, love itself is strikingly and mysteriously impersonal; it is a reality which is not altered by anything one does. Therefore, one does many things, turns the key in the lock over and over again, hoping to be locked out. Once locked out, one will never again be forced to encounter in the eyes of a stranger who loves him the impenetrable truth concerning the stranger, oneself, who is loved. And yet — one would prefer, after all, not to be locked out. One would prefer, merely, that the key unlocked a less stunningly unusual door.
Source: youmightfindyourself
gatsbylives:childrensbooks:clairefisher:paradiseisnowhere: artismydrug / illiejane / madteaparty
One of my favorite illustrations from this book. Or ever.
Source: madteaparty
fuckyeahperioddramas | lydianea:
Little Women, 1994
These two literary characters were meant to be together. But Alcott decided that they were not, causing this reader to suffer from one of the worst heartaches ever. First watched in 1999. Watched it again between the years 2002 and 2004. Almost six years later, I unearthed my old VCDs and decided to watch it again, thinking that my age have hardened me against the onslaught of one of the worst letdowns in both book and film in history, ever. That, and the fact that Alcott had to kill one of her characters and the fluffs.
I was wrong. I cried. My mother thought that cheese and chocolate pancakes would make me feel better while I was halfway through the movie (second VCD, actually), instead, I cried harder. Cheese and chocolate pancakes had never tasted that bad.
*deletes the rest of the commentary after three reblogs and several likes later* I just feel oddly … bereft. That is all.
I will be bitter till THE DAY I DIE that Laurie and Jo didn’t end up together
and the fact that he ends up with amy (who I actually like, but COME ON) is somehow supposed to be okay is completely insulting in every way.
Source: lydianea
April 10, 2010: Frida Kahlo to Marty McConnell, Marty McConnell
Frida Kahlo to Marty McConnell
Marty McConnellleaving is not enough; you must
stay gone. train your heart
like a dog. change the locks
even on the house he’s never
visited. you lucky, lucky girl.
you have an apartment
just your size. a bathtub
full of tea. a heart the size
of Arizona, but not nearly
so arid. don’t wish away
your cracked past, your
crooked toes, your problems
are papier mache puppets
you made or bought because the vendor
at the market was so compelling you just
had to have them. you had to have him.
and you did. and now you pull down
the bridge between your houses,
you make him call before
he visits, you take a lover
for granted, you take
a lover who looks at you
like maybe you are magic. make
the first bottle you consume
in this place a relic. place it
on whatever altar you fashion
with a knife and five cranberries.
don’t lose too much weight.
stupid girls are always trying
to disappear as revenge. and you
are not stupid. you loved a man
with more hands than a parade
of beggars, and here you stand. heart
like a four-poster bed. heart like a canvas.
heart leaking something so strong
they can smell it in the street.On this day in…
2009: Bike Ride with Older Boys, Laura Kasischke
2008: Let’s Move All Things (September), Denver Butson
2007: The Day Flies Off Without Me, John Stammers
2006: A Supermarket in California, Allen Ginsberg
2005: Tortures, Wislawa Szymborska
Source: april-is
Hysteria, T. S. Eliot
As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved
in her laughter and being part of it, until her
teeth were only accidental stars with a talent
for squad-drill. I was drawn in by short gasps,
inhaled at each momentary recovery, lost finally
in the dark caverns of her throat, bruised by
the ripple of unseen muscles. An elderly waiter
with trembling hands was hurriedly spreading
a pink and white checked cloth over the rusty
green iron table, saying: “If the lady and
gentleman wish to take their tea in the garden,
if the lady and gentleman wish to take their
tea in the garden …” I decided that if the
shaking of her breasts could be stopped, some of
the fragments of the afternoon might be collected,
and I concentrated my attention with careful
subtlety to this end.
Source: poetry365
Through the Looking Glass Book Purse made from by rebounddesigns
omg, want so so badly. these are all gorgeous.
Source: etsy.com
Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures Under Ground: Introduction
omg. so very cool. the internet isn’t just for pictures of christina hendricks’s boobs and harry potter fanfiction after all! (originally via http://thedailywh.at/)
Source: bl.uk
things I see or hear or think. things I love almost as much as I love carnies and champagne.