“If It’s Meant To Be,” Barbra Streisand
“Off to Sea Once More,” Macy Gray
“Sparkle Market,” Blue Hawaii
“Mississippi You’re On My Mind,” Lucinda Williams
“Lightning (Kent Rockefeller remix),” David Byrne & St. Vincent
“Say Ladeo,” Bobby McFerrin
“Memorabilia,” Donald Fagen
“How,” Regina Spektor
“In Two,” Blue Hawaii
“Se Voce Me Ama,” Melody Gardot
“Tall Tales,” Matt Alber
“Drifted Apart,” Tift Merritt
“With One More Look at You,” Barbra Streisand
“Sierra Lift,” Blue Hawaii
“Cissus,” David Byrne & St. Vincent
“All Too Soon,” Chris Connor
“Touch,” Toro y Moi
Playlist: new music of 2013, iPod shuffle, 9/7/13
September 7, 2013Quote of the day: LOSS
September 3, 2013LOSS
“The Pruned Tree”
As a torn paper might seal up its side,
Or a streak of water stitch itself to silk
And disappear, my wound has been my healing,
And I am made more beautiful by losses.
See the flat water in the distance nodding
Approval, the light that fell in love with statues,
Seeing me alive, turn its motion toward me.
Shorn, I rejoice in what was taken from me.
What can the moonlight do with my new shape
But trace and retrace its miracle of order?
I stand, waiting for the strange reaction
Of insects who knew me in my larger self,
Unkempt, in a naturalness I did not love.
Even the dog’s voice rings with a new echo,
And all the little leaves I shed are singing,
Singing to the moon of shapely newness.
Somewhere what I lost I hope is springing
To life again. The roofs, astonished by me,
Are taking new bearings in the night, the owl
Is crying for a further wisdom, the lilac
Putting forth its strongest scent to find me.
Butterflies, the sailboat’s grooves, are winging
Out of the water to wash me, wash me.
Now, I am stirring like a seed in China.
— Howard Moss
Photo diary: last week in NYC
August 30, 2013(click to enlarge)
I started a two-week crash course in Spanish
El Taller Latinoamericano is a language school but also a cultural center and an art gallery. The current show features three artists, my favorite being Holly Wood, whose work includes “Furry Bar” (above) and “Demon Beaches” (below)
speaking of art galleries, a temporary James Turrell suddenly showed up in my hallway/portrait gallery
Wednesday night gamelan rehearsal
Saturday night to celebrate Andy’s birthday I took him to Kazino to see “Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812”
afterwards, a walk on the High Line with a view of a beautiful sunset
the public art show currently on display features busts by contemporary artists — above, George Condo’s “Liquor Store Attendant”
speaking of public art, I’m alternately dazzled and startled by this Leda and the Swan that lives across the street from me in the arcade outside 40 W. 57th St.
Sunday we had brunch with Sari, Alex, and Hugh at the Astor Room in the Kaufman Astoria Studios.
across the street — Frank Sinatra High! who knew?
Quote of the day: BLANK
August 27, 2013BLANK
You must never blank people when intimate relations have arisen. You must never slam the door in their face. I’ve been the victim of it several times – and it’s the worst. It gives you no chance of dealing with it and working it through. You just stand there in the middle of the road wondering what happened, what did I do…When the other party has a change of heart but will not tell you why they have, or indeed that they have – this is the cruelest mystery of all, for the mind cannot rest but cogitates ceaselessly.
— Duncan Fallowell
Photo diary: a weekend in New York
August 18, 2013(click on photos to enlarge)
subway stealth shot (NB: these two were not “together”)
dessert at Lincoln Ristorante: torta caprese, before
torta caprese, after
the Amateur Astronomers Association of New York shows up around town with high-powered telescopes — we got to peek at the cratery crust of the moon in closeup
waiting for the ferry at Sandy Hook
product new to me, part 1
product new to me, part 2
another eye opens 