notes from the internets

You can't prevent poets and writers from comparing women to flowers in the same way that you can never tell designers to stop bombarding runways with floral maxi dresses when it is time to showcase their spring/summer collections -- considering the name of the season itself implies as such. 1

There is an awful lot of debate still ongoing about the running of the F1 in Bahrain. The pretty odious Bernie Eccelstone , whos hobbies include comparing women to domestic appliances and praising hitler has said that the raging battles for democracy in the state are nothing to do with him. 2

TOO MANY ASSHOLES ON MY FACEBOOK TONIGHT ARE COMPARING WOMEN TO APPLIANCES…

I JUST WANT TO SMACK THEM IN THE FACE!!!I AM NOT LIKE A FRIDGE OR A VACUUM CLEANER, OR A VENDING MACHINE. I AM A FUCKING HUMAN BEING WHO DESERVES MORE THAN YOU WRITING A WITTY CRITICISM OF HOW YOU WANT ‘YO WOMAN’ TO ACT. ESPECIALLY WHEN ONE OF THEM IS A FAMILY MEMBER.

I SOMETIMES WANT TO SCREAM 3

Here's a Georgia Repub, comparing women to pigs, cows, and sheep: "State Rep. Terry England was speaking in favor of HB 954, which makes it illegal to obtain an abortion after 20 weeks even if the woman is known to be carrying a stillborn fetus or the baby is otherwise not expected to live to term. 4

Preibus wasn't comparing women to caterpillars. He was pointing out how rediculous it is to point to poll numbers (rather than actions) as proof this 'war' exists. 5

The authors believe in wild oats and are full of advice for sowing them: comparing women to wines, for instance, they suggest trying "the mellowness of experience" as well as the "exuberance of youth," and the pleasures of oral sex are not neglected. 6

You can't prevent poets and writers from comparing women to flowers....

... a red red rose, maybe?....

(this all written, still, heart in my throat)

earth day

Sai Baba died today.

TODAY!

the reason this fact is so notable
besides, of course, all the regular reasons,
is that i first heard about him, even saw a film about him,
40 years ago... today.

i had to double- and triple-check to believe my eyes --
that the one time i look him up is the day he dies.

•

but i get ahead of myself.

•

If you're going to San Francisco
Be sure to wear
some flowers in your hair
If you're going to San Francisco
You're gonna meet
some gentle people there





For those who come
to San Francisco
Summertime
will be a love-in there
In the streets of San Francisco
Gentle people
with flowers in their hair




All across the nation
such a strange vibration
People in motion
There's a whole generation
with a new explanation
People in motion people in motion





For those who come to San Francisco
Be sure to wear
some flowers in your hair
If you come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there



If you come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there

•

and so i went. the first commune i lived in was called "free city," wherein among many other things, a young man named David Lloyd-Jones transcribed, printed up, and circulated a speech by R. Buckminster Fuller. he, like so many others of that moment, could see further into the future than many republicans can see to this day. he could see that it was a world of abundance, and that it could be made to work for every soul on the planet.

•

skip to one day early in 1971, i began to hear commercials on the then very cool KSAN, fm radio. they were for this thing called, "World Game," a series of workshops, and classes and discussions, all about ways to make the world work, a brainchild of R. Buckminster Fuller.

and it was indeed very cool. to simplify to the extreme, Bucky had worked it out so that if all nations would cooperate (yeah, right) in allowing there to be an international grid, there would be more available energy for each person on the planet to have what americans have today.

the sources of all this power: tidal, solar, and wind. it's all there; it's just not hooked up right.

to the left is his Dymaxion Map (or Globe). Bucky believed that to view the planet from this perspective, not only was it more accurate, but it also relieved the viewer from having to try to figure out what's up. for, of course, there is no up, or down for that matter. only in and out.

very quickly we students formed a gang, and did all and sundry things. we dropped acid and had profound discussions out on the grass. we had massive thanksgiving dinners in a Russian Hill mansion someone had donated for the duration.

we went to the Institute of Ability where we attended Enlightenment Intensives. we had dinner at the Swami Satchidananda ashram which was right up the hill from where i lived.

and, forty years ago today, we went to University of California at Davis's first Whole Earth Festival, held on the very first Earth Day. it was concerts, and dancers, and craftspeople and lectures and yoga and huge "Om" circles and so much more.

there was the woman who had come down from the mountains, who walked around all day with a green parrot on her shoulder, wearing nothing but a green crocheted bra-top, and a large piece of yellow satin wrapped around her hips.

she sold earrings she had made with feathers from her parrot; i still have one green feather earring today.

•

and there was the Fairfax Street Choir (hear them here).
singing full-of-light songs and dancing, even tap dancing; how heavenly.

and, in a classroom, in a building a bit away from the rest,
we saw a movie about Sai Baba.

from The Real Poem • (the calendars)

Even now
I remember something

the way a flower
in a jar of water

remembers its life
in the perfect garden

the way a flower
in a jar of water

remembers its life
as a closed seed

the way a flower
in a jar of water

steadies itself
remembering itself

long ago
the plunging roots

the gravel the rain
the glossy stem

the wings of the leaves
the swords of the leaves

rising and clashing
for the rose of the sun

the salt of the stars
the crown of the wind

the beds of the clouds
the blue dream

the unbreakable circle.

from Mary Oliver, The Leaf and the Cloud

i wear purple too

today is the second anniversary of my first japonisme post!!

i have learned so much, and met so many fascin- ating people!

thank you all for the many treasures you've added to this blog.

it's also the 16th anniversary of beginning my 12-variety iris garden!

dead my old fine hopes
and dry my dreams
but still...
iris, blue each spring

shushiri 1

1794

.垣津旗よりあの虹は起りけん
kakitsubata yori ano niji wa okoriken

irises--
where that rainbow
starts from

Issa imagines that the rainbow has arisen from blooming irises--the intense, showy colors of the flowers continuing in bold streks upward, into the sky, forming the rainbow. It's interesting that "iris" derives from the Greek word for "rainbow." Issa could not have known this, but he intuits the same connection that exists in many Western languages. The rainbow is a flower in the sky; irises are rainbows on earth.

1814

.我庵や花のちいさいかきつばた
waga io ya hana no chiisai kakitsubata

at my hut
an iris with the tiniest
blossoms

Issa bends down low to acknolwedge and appreciate a small flower. There is a world of meaning in this simple act of paying reverent attention to things that other people ignore. The tiny-petaled iris is as precious as the big, bold chrysanthemum. Issa's approach to the living universe is democratic.

1824

.鶺鴒は神の使かかきつばた
sekirei wa kami no tsukai ka kakitsubata

running messages, wagtail
for the shrine's god?
irises

The wagtail (sekirei) is a bird with long, wagging tail feathers. Though he doesn't say so explicitly, Issa implies that the setting of the haiku is a Shinto shrine. 2