Tea With The Mad Hatters

Carnal apple, Woman filled, burning moon

2012-01-24T09:09:00.000-08:00

Carnal apple, Woman filled, burning moon,
dark smell of seaweed, crush of mud and light,
what secret knowledge is clasped between your pillars?

-Pablo Nerduda, Carnal Apple, Woman Filled, Burning Moon

Headstrong

2011-12-29T12:29:00.000-08:00

A long time ago, Zeus had a headache. While Hephaestus attempted to craft the latest state-of-the-art remedy, Hermes made a quick trip to the 24-hour Walmart for some Advil. Nothing seemed to work. Zeus’s headache began to worry the heavens; all of the gods and goddesses were constantly checking their twitter updates and some even had no school. As the gods stood around Zeus to figure out what was wrong, suddenly, Ares ran towards Zeus with a Minoan axe and cleaved Zeus’s head. Before Hera can tell Ares to go to his room, a fully grown goddess leaped out of Zeus’s head; fully armored. This goddess was none but Athena, goddess of wisdom, strength and warfare. Athena went on to be the most powerful, outspoken and formidable of the goddesses; and all of this came from a headache.

Let’s not lie to ourselves; the Greeks were misogynists. They called women a “necessary evil”; they viewed women as keeping them from work, but necessary for procreation. And I don't think I would be upsetting the story if I were to take the myth even further and say that the story of Athena’s birth, whether intended or not takes on an aspect of the female image quite ingrained into the societal subconscious; the idea that opinionated, headstrong women are "annoying" in formerly male-dominated settings.

Does it take only a headstrong woman to achieve the idea of feminism that pulls away from the submissive image? Different women have individual experiences which separates the idea of the image that needs to be adjusted. Feminism, therefore is a collective effort for individuals to change the image of women in the public realm, although the actual idea of this image differs depending on the individual in their private realm; so here is the tug-of-war between the woman and the individual we see in feminism.

The only headstrong characteristic that is necessary, therefore in a female feminist is the willingness to give up the habits that make her part of the former, negative image (whether it be submissiveness or one-dimensional objectification). It is not the actions of the woman that are remembered, but the silence when she could have done something.

News Off the Press

2011-11-23T11:59:00.000-08:00

2011-07-31T18:39:00.000-07:00

I'll Be Your Mirror

2011-07-29T07:51:00.001-07:00

I'll Be your Mirror - The Velvet Underground

"I don't mind making jokes, but I don't want to look like one."
-Marilyn Monroe

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever I see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful-
The eye of the little god, four cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

Mirror by Sylvia Plath

I love how this song juxtaposes Plath's poem of an objective mirror. While The Velvet Underground shows us we need the subjective to help define ourselves, Plath shows us we are constantly bombarded by the shallow and shattering outside world of magazines, cruelty, and desire that we let become our mirror.

Craigslist Ads

2011-07-05T09:23:00.001-07:00

Here are some ads I made up for Craigslist because I have nothing else to do with my free time that could possibly benefit society.

Skiing Partner

I have two pairs of skis that I bought before my girlfriend left me for the ski instructor. They haven't been used since.
Just the other day, I thought to myself, "Hey, just because she's gone doesn't mean I can't ski, anymore!" So, I am looking for someone to go skiing with me when winter nips into the air. Preferably someone who is under 5'10 and weighs less than 130 pounds- just so it's easier for me to teach you. And I'm really not that guy who's huge on religion and Jesus and everything, but, hey, if you are spiritual, that helps. Also, must like Chuckwalla Iguanas.

If interested, please call Dave at 555-2384

Desperately Seeking Anita

I met you at the Berkshire Mall. I winked at you, you didn't look the other way, and so I took that opportunity to give you my phone number. A couple weeks after, I texted you saying, "How bout you leave your friends at that bar and come give me a handjob at this 24 hour Wendy's?" You changed your phone number. Now, I'm looking for you. I know you're out there. Don't hide. Please, Anita Coricheck.

The Abstract World of Devendra Banhart

2011-06-16T14:32:00.000-07:00

Devendra Banhart-Insect Eyes

All art by Devendra Banhart

I saw this in a Devendra Banhart interview:

Name three animals you like the most and the reason why before you continue reading on.

I picked the bunny first because...well it's cuddly, cute and quiet.

Then, I chose the cat because I often think of it as sitting on a throne, but easily surrenders when given gentle love.

Then I chose the chameleon because I remembered an assignment we had done after reading Kafka to mold an animal we identify with most and I liked the idea of a chameleon changing colors for many reasons.

So, Banhart says that the first animal you had chosen is what people view you as. The second is how you view yourself. The third is who you really are.

Is Hugh Hefner My Enemy?

2011-05-28T09:46:00.000-07:00

Is Hugh Hefner my enemy?

Feminism is all about giving women choices. And Hefner just so happens to facilitate one choice. This choice, however, brings women a step back into the pit men have dug for them.

Isn't that also the definition of the devil? To facilitate a choice that tempts us away from all we can be? Perhaps we should create an outfit for Hefner to walk around in, custom made, complete with those adorable little devil horns.

Just a thought...I made a model of his new outfit on paint, check it out.

Update: Anonymous blogger who commented; I commented back. Please read and others, feel free to pitch in!! All comments that at least somewhat employ understanding and passion are welcome.

Here is my response to yours:

I knew by saying that men dug the hole for women..that would be a controversial statement because of its tone. Which is exactly why I chose those words. I understand that women were granted free will, but in the beginning it was always men who had discouraged this free will and we are now taking the steps to claim it as our own. I believe that feminism is the belief that women should reclaim this free will...and that is all. But there are many obstacles, which doesn't include men per say, but also the mindset garnered with it.

Going on to Playboy, I disagree with you, still in many respects. While I do enjoy artis gratia artis, art for the sake of art which may include nudity,I don't enjoy art for the sake of masturbation. But it's not the magazine that I feel is a woman's enemy, but it is the IDEA that Playboy offers. Women SERVING men in bunny outfits, suggesting women as subservient sex toys? Not very liberating. And who is the mastermind behind this? Men. And most women who work as playboy bunnies only do it because they are desperate for cash or fat out of luck-so much for artis gratia artis for free will.

I certainly do not want to create a pseudo-SCUM Manifesto using this blog post, but I do want to create a new way of thinking perhaps about an issue.

And you also commented on my "going around" the internet. I actually just sit here and write this blog, why? How do you "go around" the internet? Perhaps I need a permit? You should give me a lift sometime.

These are my opinions and you have yours. I respect yours gravely, however as you seem educated enough to make a decision you employ with understanding. And, I'm sorry...but...no...that still means I disagree with you.

The Obligatory Anderson Post....

2011-05-10T19:05:00.000-07:00

"Well... we actually had a class together in school. A small class, like nine students and everyone sat around this table except I sat in one corner of the room and Owen sat in another corner of the room. So, there were two people in the class who did not bother...did not want to sit at the table and I remember thinking, "Well, who does he think he is not sitting at the table?", even though I was doing the same thing. "Is he copying me?", and we never spoke the whole time.

But when we went back for the next semester, the first day he walked up to me in the corridor and asked me which creative writing class we should take and I said,
"Oh you're...you're from the-," and he said,
"Yeah."
He acted like we were already friends-because we had silently sat there in the room together for a semester. And then we were."

Wes Anderson on how he met Owen Wilson in 88' when they were both students at the University of Texas.

Spelling Reform

2011-05-07T09:03:00.000-07:00

For example, in Year 1 that useless letter c would be dropped to be replased either by k or s, and likewise x would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which c would be retained would be the ch formation, which will be dealt with later.

Year 2 might reform w spelling, so that which and one would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish y replasing it with i and Iear 4 might fiks the g/j anomali wonse and for all.

Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants.

Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez c, y and x — bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez — tu riplais ch, sh, and th rispektivli.

Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

-Mark Twain

Allegory of the Cave

2011-04-09T16:40:00.000-07:00

"And now, I said, let me show in a figure how far our nature is enlightened or unenlightened: --Behold! human beings living in a underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the den; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a distance, and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which marionette players have in front of them, over which they show the puppets. "

Plato-The Republic

[Thanks to artists Kumi Yamashita, Tim Noble, Sue Webster, Shigeo Fukuda and Larry Kagen.]

The mirror on my wall
Casts an image dark and small
But I'm not sure at all it's my reflection.
I am blinded by the light
Of God and truth and right
And I wander in the night without direction.

So I'll continue to continue to pretend
My life will never end,
And flowers never bend
In the rainfall
-Flowers in the Rainfall, Simon and Garfunkel-->

Sitting here wishing on a cement floor

2011-04-09T08:10:00.001-07:00

"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita. Did she have a precursor? She did, indeed she did. In point of fact, there might have been no Lolita at all had I not loved, one summer, an initial girl-child. In a princedom by the sea. Oh when? About as many years before Lolita was born as my age was that summer. You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied. Look at this tangle of thorns."
Nobokov, Lolita

Sitting here wishing on a cement floor
Just wishing that I had just something you wore.

I miss your soup and I miss your bread
And a letter in your writing doesn't mean you're not dead.
So spill your breakfast and drip your wine
Bloody your hands on a cactus tree
Wipe it on your dress and send it to me.
-Cactus, The Pixies

This Side of Whimsy

2011-02-24T10:00:00.001-08:00

It's only interesting being interesting when other people are interested.

(Movie stills from: A Philadelphia Story, Pretty Woman, As Good As It Gets, Breakfast At Tiffany's, When Harry Met Sally, Annie Hall, Napoleon Dynamite, Harold and Maude)

New Blog

2011-02-20T08:10:00.000-08:00

New blog. It's called:

Books Were Written To Be Read

Follow.

"So, here you are wondering what all this is about. Well, here is an explanation:

I deleted my old blog that I haven't maintained in a while (the one with my columns in it that you have no clue even existed) and decided to start a new blog because the child laborer in my yearns to be exploited. This blog will be dedicated to books (mostly ones I have read).

If you would like to know why I have decided to write a blog about books when I have a school to attend, a job to do, a harp to practice, an endangered species to save, and homework to procrastinate, then read the phrase after the 2nd-to-last comma.

But, for the psychologists out there who still need answers, here are some intricacies of mine which may have spurred a sensation in me to write this blog:

I always thought I was a very precocious child. I would always keep this leather-bound journal with me everywhere I went, writing about anything and everything that gave me inspiration, and then tried desperately to make up witty little quotes about each happening. But, after nostalgia wandered around time like a ghost, it finally came into reality as I read through that journal and I realized I was really just a pretentious child.
I have always wanted to work at the Barnes and Nobles in my town, but everybody who comes in knows absolutely nothing about books, possibly due to the fact that it is too close to the Old Country Buffet.
I know a lot of quotes from books because I read a lot of books about quotes from a lot of books.
Sometimes when I read a book, I end up reading my dictionary more."

All Tomorrow's Tomorrow's

2011-01-24T04:36:00.000-08:00

McBeth:

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more.
It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

I think anyone would agree that this is probably one of Shakespeare's most depressing soliloquys. But, as Woody Allen is funny because what he says is truth, Shakespeare is depressing.

I had once written on this blog about forever, where I had concluded that "Now, in our mortal youth, forever is a naive soul". http://teawiththemadhatters.blogspot.com/2010/02/forever.html

I was disillusioned with the fathom of no sand running out of the hourglass. But, we are constantly disillusioned with the sand while it is running out. Our minds are constantly wrapped in the next grain of sand because this grain of sand, or this moment, holds emptiness for the moment, but too much possibility for the future.

So, how can we grasp a grain of sand to hold unto while time keeps running out?

Derrick Brown has the right idea:

"a sky flush with moon
opened up like a ballroom
and her kiss broke the spine of the night
paralyzing the moment
into our skulls,
forever."

-The Uncaptured Orchastra, Derick Brown

The Blackbird Who Sang the Blues

2011-01-18T14:52:00.000-08:00

Late at night,

when I was a little girl, a blackbird would sing.

Late at night,

when the colored people would pray on the North Star,

that blackbird sang the blues.

One day,

the sun came, but the pond was frozen over.

One night,

the moon came, but that bird's voice had gone away

and so I sang the blues

Down South,

that blackbird belonged with a southern brass slave band.

Down South

that blackbird band leader was still singing the blues.

Down south is where I longed to be.

In my dreams,

those slaved bird's melodies unfolded into wings.

In my dreams,

those wings would fly me to sorrow and back again

and so I would sing the blues.

There is a place,

where blackbirds play the blues wishing they wern't so blue.

There is a place,

where bluebirds hear the blues wishing they were black so

they could sing the blues.

-Iliana Hagenah

Under the Moon, Not the Stars

2010-12-23T09:52:00.000-08:00

Do we live,
under the moon, and not the stars?
Balsamic shadow in
but the shadow of day.
Let there be light,
but let darkness guide us
to where paper and peace began.
Why not,
under the stars?
Mirrors of light,
which hushes along the ash tray
with our Father's cigars.

We do not burn,
to touch a star.
To not dare strike our tuning forks against
a lullaby.
If we could touch a star,
we would surely die
of hydrogen, and hydrogen a lone.

-Iliana Hagenah

Blackbird

2010-11-26T09:39:00.000-08:00

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to
fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise

Black bird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and
learn to see
all your life
you were only waiting for this moment to be
free
You were only waiting for this moment to arise,
You were only
waiting for this moment to arise,

-Blackbird, The Beatles

If I Had The Voice of Janis Joplin

2010-11-24T14:08:00.000-08:00

If I Had the Voice of Janis Joplin

Lee Harvey Oswald was just a boy,
who never knew a gun,
and
small pox was a ploy
made up by the government.

I turn off the t.v. and looked him in the eye.

"And this all, the taxi driver from New Orleans told you?"

But he stopped a while and listened to me sing,
to regain what society had taken away from him.

-Iliana Hagenah

I am.

2010-10-30T08:34:00.000-07:00

I am Katherine Hepburn when I think I am. All other days I am her fun house mirror.

Daphne.

2010-10-15T19:25:00.000-07:00

You rise from your sleep
as from a lover gone silent and cold.
You walk in a sunken green light,
stand before your water mirror,
then cut off your hair

I find you, I lose you. You change,
stand fast in a makeshift of shadows;
you leave, and ferry my heart away.

Your voice from its inner distance
saying your poem, your myth,
born from the bark of your tree.

Parting is such sweet sorrow

2010-10-15T09:22:00.001-07:00

Juliet:
Sweet, so would I,
Yet I should kill thee with much cherishing.
Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow,
That I shall say good night till it be morrow. [Exit above]

There is another sky

2010-09-24T21:40:00.002-07:00

There is another sky,
Ever serene and fair,
And there is another sunshine,
Though it be darkness there;
Never mind faded forests, Austin,
Never mind silent fields -
Here is a little forest,
Whose leaf is ever green;
Here is a brighter garden,
Where not a frost has been;
In its unfading flowers
I hear the bright bee hum: Prithee, my brother,
Into my garden come!

-Emily Dickinson

Clearly, I took these with an average digital. Clearly, it was no average day.

It's 1962 March 28th

2010-09-06T15:55:00.000-07:00

It's 1962 March 28th
I'm sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
night is falling
I never knew I liked
night descending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain
I don't like
comparing nightfall to a tired bird

I didn't know I loved the earth
can someone who hasn't worked the earth love it
I've never worked the earth
it must be my only Platonic love

I just remembered the stars
I love them too
seeing them I could even think of death and not feel at all sad

I didn't know I liked rain
but why did I suddenly discover all these passions sitting
by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
is it because I lit my sixth cigarette
one alone could kill me
is it because I'm half dead from thinking about someone back in Moscow
her hair straw-blond eyelashes blue

I didn't know I loved so many things and I had to wait until sixty
to find it out sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
watching the world disappear as if on a journey of no return

-Nazim Hikmet



This poem reminds me of my grandfather who was a Mark Twain impersonator/writer
and a few vintage family photos.
But I suppose if a picture speaks a thousand words,
I should marry these so I could shut my mouth and enjoy the wine.

Inspiration Dimanche.

2010-08-29T06:58:00.001-07:00