the beginning is the end is the beginning.

I am very close to being done with grad school, and just starting to really process it. I anticipate being happy with my final projects. Still kind of terrified, but what are you gonna do? The ideal thing to do would be to, like Batman, find someway to transmorgrify fears into strengths.

At this very moment, I am listening to Radiohead ("The Bends") and reading this poem pasted below. I think I will hang the last line over my door, so it will be the first thing I see when I go out.

======
"Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front"
by Wendell Berry

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion - put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

"Samurai Song" by Robert Pinsky

I saw Pinsky read this poem a few weeks ago, in one of the dining halls at Harvard. He was accompanied by a jazz trio. It was one of the more visceral experiences I've ever had- from simply sitting and listening to a human voice.

***

When I had no roof I made
Audacity my roof. When I had
No supper my eyes dined.

When I had no eyes I listened.
When I had no ears I thought.
When I had no thought I waited.

When I had no father I made
Care my father. When I had
No mother I embraced order.

When I had no friend I made
Quiet my friend. When I had no
Enemy I opposed my body.

When I had no temple I made
My voice my temple. I have
No priest, my tongue is my choir.

When I have no means fortune
Is my means. When I have
Nothing, death will be my fortune.

Need is my tactic, detachment
Is my strategy. When I had
No lover I courted my sleep.

******

I put my glasses back on for the first time in what feels like forever (they were hiding in a box which I had embarrassingly not brought up from the basement of my new apartment for several months). The edges of things are much sharper than before.

Cheer Up Bird and Friends

Sketchytimes!

The most gleefully homicidal face?

The Cheer Up Bird wants you to be happy!

Cats can be scary little mothers.


MYSTERIOUS GIRL!

keep calm, carry on.

(What follows is not very linear)

One month is all that stands between me and being out of school, with no school in the near future, for the first time ever. On the one hand- terrifying- but on the other, creepily larger hand- VERY EXCITING!

Here is an owl I drew for a friend of a friend. The puns were by request, but were executed with great enthusiasm.
Next month, I expect to have another round of cartoons to submit to a certain magazine headquartered in Manhattan.

Other than that, things are busy, but sort of falling into place. I love my radio class. There may be some exciting news on that front in the next few weeks. Fingers crossed!

We've been discussing various ways of bringing out detail in narrative journalism, and I've realized that my knowledge of men's fashion is rather lacking. To correct this, I've been reading The Sartorialist extensively and asking fancy-pants guys on the T what brand of shoes they're wearing. (Thus far, the ones I've liked best have all been Florsheims). Next hurdle-- watches!

To close, I hope my friends know how much I love you and what fantastic people you are. You really are!

Looooove comix!

[NOW IN COLORIFIC QUADROVISION]

Artist's statement: I wanted to try a quick story without dialogue, just to get back in the swing of things.

As for the content, the best I can explain is: once, when I was in a very puppy-dog state of infatuation, I gushed to a friend, "I'm so happy I could throw up!" C'est l'amour!

(Or maybe I just read too much 'Calvin and Hobbes')

silly pictures/sad news

More to come soon, but enjoy this one (an article illustration for my classmate Marian) for now!

I think this accurately captures my (also, obviously, the author's) distaste for charismatic megafauna. Ugly animals need love too! Non-traditional cuteness abounds in nature.

On a different, sadder note: my cat, Romeo, is fading fast and will probably be dead before I can get home in the winter. Diagnosis is "major organ failure": heart, lungs, liver, you name it, they're all fucked. Vet doesn't know how it started- it's Just One Of Those Things.

Romeo's a friendly cat, a good mix of rambunctious and affectionate. He used to catch birds outside and bring them in without killing them. There'd be this demented chirping underneath the dining room table as I ate breakfast, and I'd find look down to find a very ruffled-looking sparrow or little mourning dove. Romeo would bat at it, gently, or just stare at it quizzically. I'd reach down and grab the bird- they'd shriek even more- and toss it out the window.

I guess it's too late to ask, but if I have any credits to spend with the Man Upstairs, I'd ask him to let the little beast hold on til Christmas. It would be nice to say goodbye.

"The Portent" by Herman Melville

This week is the 150th anniversary of John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry- not exactly something to celebrate, but an important event nonetheless. Melville's piece on his execution is below. It is my favorite of all his poems.

(Melville, as he did in nearly all his Civil War poems, grounded his metaphor in actual events; the night that John Brown was hung, a bright comet passed overhead and could be seen from the Eastern seaboard- North and South alike.)

****

Hanging from the beam,
Slowly swaying (such the law),
Gaunt the shadow on your green,
Shenandoah!
The cut is on the crown,
(Lo, John Brown),
And the stabs shall heal no more.

Hidden in the cap
Is the anguish none can draw;
So your future veils its face,
Shenandoah!
But the streaming beard is shown
(Weird John Brown),
The meteor of the war.

"Specimen"

For A., as strange to me now as he ever was.

I sat down to write
A poem for you
Because I found it
Hard to do
I pressed my heart
between
Two parchment-leaves
Instead

I suppose
I could have
Pumped it full
Of plasticine--
Retain the shape
And add a sheen
More brilliantine
Than blood and meat
Could e'er achieve--

The color isn't
What it was
When first I
Plucked it out
Because
Paper leaches out
Some vitality.

But if you should
In this
Poor fossiled frame
Unearth some tinge
Of impressed flame
Forgive me
These rough approximations--

Come and take
A most eloquent kiss
Before you leave.