needless digression

"read me a sweet monday ,daddy" "sorry son, i gotta go to work. "

2012-02-06T13:44:00.002-05:00

jamon serrano stinks of sinusitis, im leaking inca kola

2012-02-03T10:46:00.006-05:00

Alternate captions :
- "Not again..."
- While the education was of a fairly high standard at PS118, having a registered sex offender for dean had its drawbacks.

chao jefe

2012-01-30T08:08:00.001-05:00

buy me
sell me
commercialize me

drop down yesterday feels like a list click trash can and waste it bin

2012-01-24T11:46:00.001-05:00

feels like a watch

2012-01-23T16:29:00.001-05:00

hated like the watch of a person who hates his job

tania

2012-01-17T09:40:00.003-05:00

walking home
block away
mysteries hold
january
forth

ain't that a deal

2012-01-09T09:31:00.001-05:00

gotta get up early in the mornin'
and drown

orange chile

2012-01-04T08:37:00.001-05:00

here we go
back on the lowly horizon
the fading sunset
all you need is here
drink
stupidity
philosophy

i wonder
if you peel the face off my head
if youll find constellations of stars
or just another mark
another ugly face to show the world
how cruel the maker is

sadness is another mask
you know
take it off
i am within
diminished
but honest
or so i hope

it seems all are vying for a share of my self
grave robbers of my self-excavation
all vying for this poor
reclamation of self
give me back who i am
give me back who i was

life here is a constant sunset
an eternal orange
i am in constant fade
let me sing you a song
of my constant disappointment
at a time
stuck in between years
a constant daze
as the sun
refuses to set

keynesian dunes

2011-12-22T10:26:00.001-05:00

we must use man as a constructive ecological force - inserting adapted terraform life : a plant here, an animal there, a man in that place - to transform the water cycle, to build a new kind of landscape.

yesterday

2011-12-21T15:21:00.001-05:00

little girl ran too fast and got hit by car in traffic, she gets up and runs off. silly kids.

valentines

2011-12-16T09:50:00.001-05:00

the proximity of a desirable thing tempts one to overindulgence. On that path lies danger.

gifts

2011-12-15T13:01:00.001-05:00

i offered to pay her back for lunch with a birthday gift. she said gifts and lunches don't mix. shes right !

dunes

2011-12-12T09:53:00.000-05:00

Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never persistent. It depends in part upon the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He must reflect what is projected upon him. And he must have a strong sense of the sardonic. This is what uncouples him from belief in his own pretensions. The sardonic is all that permits him to move within himself. Without this quality, even occasional greatness will destroy a man.

Any road followed precisely to its end leads precisely nowhere. Climb the mountain just a little bit to test that it's a mountain. From the top of the mountain, you cannot see the mountain.

via melina

2011-12-05T13:19:00.001-05:00

‎"If you want to build a ship don't herd people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the
endless immensity of the sea." - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

this dhow must rest

2011-12-05T11:26:00.000-05:00

all the ships have left port
and here i sit waiting for the waves to take me away
traveling winds cant carry a spirit
or shoulder my burden

i am your dark star

2011-12-05T11:22:00.000-05:00

can you hear your silence listening in ?
i am the last tree in the garden
it says
the last shady respite for hours
i am the last moon of the month
it says
come pray with me
i am your loneliness
it says
lets talk in the space between words

call me icarus

2011-12-05T11:16:00.000-05:00

i am your falling star
i am your wax comet
ease me into the sun
set me a blaze in a sea of love
it feels so warm
as i swim in your emotions
it feels
like i am learning to fly
with the father of birds
tell me father,
do your sins weigh down on me
as heavily
as mine on you ?

listless listless

2011-12-05T11:08:00.000-05:00

take me with a stiffness of mind
but dont stifle the deeper thoughts
in which this soul orbits
it speaks meaningless because it is so
it dreams hopeless because it is so
it reeks of nostalgia because it is so
and all the words in between
cant help but wait their turn

tapestry at the speed of silence

2011-12-03T18:36:00.000-05:00

whence before it seemed strange
to swim amongst the swallows
now i find i can only be at ease
teasing the drum beats from the
harsh note
or finding distant sunsets
in the chorus of the stars
let these weary shoes speak of
their trouble
i speak of a new silence

rebecca at the party with green eyes.

2011-12-01T16:41:00.000-05:00

quickly done at work :

whats your favorite book ?
ah ive heard of that ( you never have)
its ok, (ive never really read that)
but these are no lies,
how can i talk about someone i do not know
how can i tell you who i am
if i do not know ?

is this my face ?

2011-11-27T13:55:00.002-05:00

a long road between my face and my head in this lowly horizon. all the migratory birds seem to be stars. constellations in flight: leading the way
to that distant part of me.such strange dreams we have this winter

to think, such strange dreams we have this winter

2011-11-27T13:52:00.002-05:00

conversations in tandem
to the throbbing of sleepiness
always tired arent we
sleep follows me
as if i am in a constant dream
a bird dreaming of humanity
oh such lowly horizons
may i wake up
and leave the nest
to think,
such strange dreams
we have this winter

let the words flow out of me
written by exhaustion
in the ink of tired eyes
i cant keep looking
its as if the distance between my face
and my mind are here
we are
a sudden explosion of stars
constellations and songs
in divine purpose it hurt

oh how far the future seems
when youre not in my past

it is the spring
clouds my lonesomeness
and puts away all the words
my mind cares to share
i may leave you without
conversation

as i lie in the grass
the spring of my soul
soon will fall back into old habits
the black wings of sobriety
of dirges on migration back
back into my heart
and i wake from hibernation
here comes
the distant part of me.

isn't it wonderful

2011-11-18T11:53:00.000-05:00

sex ?
isnt that what animals do
to remind themselves that they are animals ?
or what humans do to remind themselves
that they are animals ?
or what lovers do
to remind themselves that love cannot exist
without constant payments.

valentina

2011-11-18T11:37:00.001-05:00

i took a train to mexico
but arrived in iraq
how exciting it is to be
on this train
which blossoms in strange colors
and rambles into new worlds
unexpected

cooper

2011-11-15T16:51:00.001-05:00

RA: No. No descriptions. I am always talking about the underlying philosophical position and the formal position, but what connects us is the spirit, the passion for architecture and our respect for each other’s works despite the fact that formally our work is very different, even opposed. Also, I would say, the book is not a conversation, you see, it’s a dialogue. And the dialogue has to be dialectical, controversial, should position the different origins of our work, intent or whatever, and should be a confrontation in a positive sense. One thought triggers another thought, and opposites are by far a clearer strategy for getting to the truth.

LW: Our differences. First of all, they’re philosophical. Judging by what we say and do, it’s obvious that I’m interested primarily in the things that change in life, while you are interested in those than don’t change. In my life and my work—the two can’t be separated—-the driving idea has been transformation. My approach to thinking about architecture has always been based on the consequences of changes that are out of our control. I’ve tried to imagine not only forms but also ways—methods—of dealing with them in precise spatial terms. If I had to presume, forgive me, your work seems to be about the very opposite….

RA: Oh, I wouldn’t say that. And ‘transformation’ is such a generic term.

LW: I’d call it a philosophical term, like truth, or justice….very difficult to define but very important.

RA: To me it’s generic. Because anything you make is the transformation of something else. When I make a pencil line on a piece of paper I transform the paper. So my question is how to transform it. I think where we really fundamentally differ is that I’m extremely suspicious about anything that is considered new. That when I try to make something original, something authentic. Not new—new alone is not good enough for me. So maybe in that respect my suspicion of the new forces me to always go back to the origins of things. I’m not interested in inventing any new formal condition that is not somehow coming from the guts, I mean the guts of history, the entire history of mankind.

I just got a book from a friend, by a rather unknown German philosopher Blumenbach, and this book is called “Cave Exits”. And what is incredible is that it goes to the origins of human habitation, which is found space, not made space. This found space was the cave, which provided shelter and security—outside the cave was the unknown world, an unknown horizon, the danger of wild animals, weather and climate. I was always more interested in the cave as a threshold between the unknown world outside and the protected world the cave provided. Crossing this threshold triggered all the cave drawings, which for me were the beginning of journalism, not art. The guys who had the courage to go out there—not only courage because they were sometimes forced no?—but they needed courage to hunt—it was extremely dangerous. And when they came back home into the safety of the cave, they recorded it and they drew their experiences on the wall like bragging. They were bragging for having killed the lion. That’s why those drawings had the authenticity of reporting, of reporting real things.

LW: In the outside world today, I think architecture has to be not the safe and known but the unknown space. Architecture has to provide the new territory, the new place to go hunting or to find something authentic because the outside world has become so surveilled, controlled, predictable. In my work, I have been trying to create unknown spaces.

RA: I know. But let me tell you something. To me is nothing more unknown than the economy that dictates the whole strategy of survival. It’s a mystery. How this world functions is a mystery. In a way, one is forced to return to the cave, which is your home, where you start to dream up a world that is not the world outside but one that you create. So in that respect it is to me doing exactly the same thing as long ago: you retreat to a place of safety. The world out there is much more dangerous than the world where you have to fight a lion or any other wild animal because the enemy, or the adversary or other tribes or animals were known then. You could look an enemy in the eye, but now the enemy is unknown, completely unknown. The world out there is more dangerous than the older world, so the cave is still has to exist. And we must always maneuver the threshold we are forced almost to cross. We are forced to survive.

So, when you say you want to create new spaces, I also want to create new spaces but I want to challenge something that has been known for millennia and to make something new with that challenge. You wrote once a very beautiful piece about working, in my book about the archetype. That is really what the archetype is all about. It means it is I’m not at all interested in history—it doesn’t effect my work. I never think about history. I never think about any kind of influence.

----

RA: I also believe that architecture has to be an intervention. It violates the site. Whatever the site may be, it always violates the site in drawing a concept into physical reality. So in a way the triangle is an intervention into the cylinder. Now the design is simply an attempt to reconcile that violation. So whatever the conditions are—a hole in the ground—ultimately the principle of architecture is simply that—a reconciliation. A hole in the ground, or a mound. Coming back to geometry as the space of the mind and the senses as the limits of the physical space, you could say the grave-digger and the surveyor were the first architects.

----

RA: The notion of building for eternity—that’s what permanency has meant—but this is not what permanent means for me. Permanent for me is the desire to create the impossibility. The impossibility of nothing lasts forever. Nothing. So, with that in mind, I understood all of a sudden the fragility of Le Corbusier’s architecture—because he did not build for eternity, he built for the moment. And that is the incredible thing, that despite the denial of eternity, and even in its state of cotemporary decay, it created incredible power. It’s very hard to describe where its power comes from. It was a very different building when it was raining, than when the sun came out. It was the most physiological experience I ever had in a building. Ever.

There is also another fragility at la Tourette. The details were made almost crudely by hand, by his own hands. To put glass in thin concrete, and imprecise metal frames with some caulking, he was creating an obligation for the inhabitants—the monks—to take care of this building, like watering a plant that will otherwise die. If you have a material like caulking that’s not made for eternity, you have to regularly fill the cracks; you have to repaint certain things; you have to keep the building in this fragile state of impermanency.

like victory

2011-11-15T11:17:00.000-05:00

while talking bout women,sex,and musicians :

"i just think its strange that people would do that"
"don't be naive,heather. is it so strange that in a capitalist/consumer culture, sex becomes a commodity ? wake up and smell the sweat, another satisfied customer.

my name ? just ahmed

2011-11-11T10:57:00.001-05:00

then the fall
no fire
no ash
no
only
muted laughter
and distant sighs
disappointed
here i am
tempted
failed
i could not kill my son
i could not face the desert
i saw the moon
and the stars
bowing before me
and i sat quiet
these things pass
i am not alone , am i ?
we hear nothing of
the countless saints
that fell
to a world
of fire
and ash
in the smile
of a beautiful woman

sitting quietly in the bar, frustrated, as the german girl holds the chilean closer

2011-11-11T10:55:00.000-05:00

tell me what hurts.
lovers balls ?
do you even want love ?
what do you wan ?
why do you toil for toils sake
you burn to feel like the sun ?
you rain to feel like a cloud ?
you say meaningless things to feel like a poet?
is this what it is like to feel human ?
my questions bore you
because you are bored of yourself
and your thoughts
even the throes of emotion
have become the listless to and fro
of the tide
of floram and jetsam
i feel sad
i feel happy
i feel horny
and still you repeat
ah ive bored you
we have talked before
of such things
am i talking to you
or You
or me
please forgive me
i forget who i am

keep on talking

2011-11-11T10:51:00.000-05:00

with you
words finally go silent
its like i am drunk
but drunk on our being
all the voices in my head
go silent
thoughts cease
all this incessant droning
in my mind
ends
it ends !
its as if you know my true name
simon says silence
and all is silent
this is love greater than love
this is souls speaking in their language

watch your hands and feet

2011-11-09T16:21:00.001-05:00

I am chasing the new architectural gestalt, the new synthesis of the world, the new embodiment of reality. Care to come with ?

and the carnival moves on

2011-11-08T09:48:00.001-05:00

a window into me
stained glass
emotions
colored by
the paint of vagueries
one can't be
too vague
too public
and too private
i must both
speak the truth
and lie
i say all
and nothing
i cry to
God
in the sound of
pagan songs

lets try that again ?

2011-11-06T19:01:00.000-05:00

are you tired ?
stay awake
for sleep is the soul's longing
for the person you will be tomorrow
be the person you are now
are you lonely ?
stay awake
embrace your loneliness
it is not so bad
your poverty today
is so much more than your wealth
in a far future

so many rivers to cross

2011-11-04T10:16:00.000-05:00

a stepping stone poem
is the middle ground between
two words i like
or two dredged up statements
maybe more
but its incomplete
doesnt quite get me there
a limbo
that is the silence between words
and the eternity
between emotions and expressions

if not

2011-11-04T10:15:00.003-05:00

what is before ?
what is after ?
if not presents that were
and will be
this moment however
live this moment
this world is beautiful
but if you dont see it it wont matter
this world is ugly
but if you dont see it, it wont matter
love this moment
and you will find
before and after
are jokes played
on lovers' minds

its not true

2011-11-03T14:49:00.000-05:00

tell me its not true.
for one like yourself, the mind is a cage.

it is a cruel place.
you are trapped within your self.

your only escape seems to be the drink.
but the bottom of a bottle is no place for your mind either.

and pouring it out of your head will only leave you thirstier tomorrow.
am i right ?

a man in a cage cannot escape by becoming an animal.
a bird does not leave the nest by becoming an egg.

do you not see ?
the door of the cage is open now.

run !
fly off into a lonely sunrise.

but.your escape is short lived.
for you are no bird.

and as you try to fly with atrophied wings, you fall.
you laugh, diving back to that web you made.

don't you see ?
you are no bird.

you are the cage.
paying no heed to your own dirges.

you are the cage, and somewhere within you the bird drowns.
and then ?

silence.
what do you think ?

in ernst

2011-11-03T11:20:00.000-05:00

within a week, i awoke. gone were the lackluster dreams; of life as an animal living a personal mythology of self loathing and lonesome pity.

note to a self

2011-10-28T23:15:00.000-05:00

I am not a greek god
I do not care to represent an extreme
Or a hyperbole
I am not one of many
I am one
i am the whole
I am the fountain from which all extremes spring
I am not light
I am not dark
I am the thought of sight
I am all things
In a quiet embrace

playlist and personal statements

2011-10-28T15:46:00.002-05:00

VIA Rumi :

There are two kinds of intelligence: one acquired,
as a child in school memorizes facts and concepts
from books and from what the teacher says,
collecting information from the traditional sciences
as well as from the new sciences.

With such intelligence you rise in the world.
You get ranked ahead or behind others
in regard to your competence in retaining
information. You stroll with this intelligence
in and out of fields of knowledge, getting always more
marks on your preserving tablets.

There is another kind of tablet, one
already completed and preserved inside you.
A spring overflowing its springbox. A freshness
in the center of the chest. This other intelligence
does not turn yellow or stagnate. It’s fluid,
and it doesn’t move from outside to inside
through conduits of plumbing-learning.

This second knowing is a fountainhead
from within you, moving out.

walking to salvador with a phone in hand

2011-10-27T21:20:00.001-05:00

my love
there is a world within me
within me are rivers
I wish
I could sit by your river
and you can sit by mine
and we can drink
till we've had our fill
we can drink away this thirst
we can drink from each other's loneliness
till our rivers run dry

----

what has it come to ,love?
why do I need to feel your ships
crash against my rocks
to know that I am an ocean ?

afa project

2011-10-26T08:56:00.002-05:00

DONE earlier in the Year, but reposted for posterity.

---

The city of lights is a myth. All that is left is propaganda and capitalist masks. Tourists marching slowly to Paris's death parade : the squeaking of a tired accordion.

The true face of Paris is in its blighted neighborhoods. The revenge of a colonial past. I am a Moroccan youth.

I cannot go I cannot stay.

There is a struggle. Against alienation, a struggle with identity. The struggle has left the buildings and spilled out into the streets, overflowing like sewage after months of rain. The television lies, calls for complacency.

The coffee is expensive, conversation is abrupt, contact is limited to the rubbing of shoulders between strangers. The shining lights slowly fade away, the cafes board up their doors, the intellectuals go to bed. There are many like me. We are not known to the city, and it cares not for us.

I will put on my own mask, and recreate Paris.

make up

2011-10-25T11:24:00.001-05:00

picked up some trash
one morning
and painted it red
like roses
a rose by another name
just dont smell as sweet
but it hurts me just the same
lets just give these gifts
to each other
and pretend that we are strangers
without thorns

coin me

2011-10-21T16:19:00.001-05:00

earning my pulse

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness

2011-10-19T15:28:00.002-05:00

bahrain ?
will my half my generation be
wasted
discarded by cruel winds
cold seas
unloved, unwanted
the pearls of their youth
sold for scraps
and the other half
lying idly like beer bottles
drying
in the sun
tempted by change
but choosing to fade ?

dont come round here anymore, bertha

2011-10-19T15:06:00.000-05:00

out the window
past car park
i kept on running
till I caught up to the wind
stole your lovin and ran
as fast as i can
cause i knew that
come tomorrow
it wouldn't be there

life isn't easy

2011-10-18T15:22:00.001-05:00

Some penguins turn to a life of crime to build the perfect nest.

warehouses just dont give a fuck

2011-10-18T11:23:00.002-05:00

vincent yee on summer fashion :

warehouses don't care what season it is

better in person

2011-10-15T20:56:00.000-05:00

my brother
we are two mangroves
dying of thirst
we are two mangroves
drinking from the same sea
why do you think your tears
are saltier than mine ?

bandera blues

2011-10-14T14:43:00.000-05:00

i am no longer content
to wave to a cruel wind
to be dressed up
in red and white
and sent out
to smile
in the fool's parade

Of all the minds, in all the world, she walks into mine

2011-10-14T11:33:00.001-05:00

work in progress

my father is Shiite, my mother is Sunni.
had i been born in Latin America
my name would have been karimi-bucheery, rather
than karimi, what it implied :
all that i should be, and all that i shouldnt.
i am the son of the sons of immigrants
but we are all immigrants
unless you were born before the earth
and we are all passerby
unless you pass after the earth does

4 birds in the human soul - rumi

crow of possessions
rooster of desire
duck of urgency
peacock of attetion

i wanted you, a window, even if you only let in dust

2011-10-13T11:06:00.001-05:00

to think , there was a time when holding hands was sufficient.

but he's no friend of mine

2011-10-12T13:54:00.003-05:00

and the wolf
sat down
to play the blues
singin of
red cloaked girls
and hatchets too
he said
"all the lovin in the world
couldn't bring her forth
and all the sweet ol grannys
won't
bring me back"

red rubber ball

2011-10-12T08:14:00.001-05:00

woke up this morning
found out my alarm was late
but i still was up early
lay in bed for a bit
took a shower
got laundry off clothesline
couldnt style hair today
haircut ?
walking
sun is out
walking to bus stop
cars wont stop to let me cross
driver made a gesture at me
i made an angry one back
got on bus
helped old lady
sun is peeking through clouds
old lady has one big leg
might be water retention or something
she pats my cheek
i get on metro
get my fingers stuck in door at manuel monte
suns still out
i get a parfait
i get to work
blue screen
concerns
alls good now
the sun is still shining

of mice and ash

2011-10-11T16:48:00.002-05:00

mercy is sweet consolation when the misguided dreams of starlings and men come true.

so precise

2011-10-11T12:06:00.003-05:00

all the careless looks in the world, cut so deeply.

sleep perchance to not dream

2011-10-11T11:30:00.002-05:00

every night ive been having dreams. seems my bed has provided fertile ground for my subconscious. however i wake up exhausted. never thought i'd wish for dreamless sleep when so often im fasting from dreams.

limbo

2011-10-11T09:59:00.001-05:00

too young she says
perhaps true
too young to know the birth of the stars
but not to feel their warmth
too young to know the soaring of mountains
but not to climb their heights
too young to know the origin of the seas
but not to swim in their waters
too young to remember great trees when they were saplings
but not to taste their fruits
too young she says
perhaps true
and perhaps age is a romance
that died before it began

between you and I : a world of poetry

2011-10-10T16:33:00.003-05:00

"Start walkings towards light. your legs will get heavy
and tired.Then comes a moment
of feeling the wings you've grown,
lifting"

so he says that man is like a reed flute. and within both there is a nostalgia
in the reed flute its for the reed bed from which its cut
language and music are possbile because we are empty, hollow,and separated from the source.
thus all language is a longing for home

"don't be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. unfold your own myth without complicated explanation, so everyone will understand the passage, we have opened you"

"you moan she left me, he left me. twenty more will come. be empty of worrying. think of who created thought !"

Listen to the poet Sanai,
who lived secluded: "Don't wander out on the road
in your ecstasy. Sleep in the tavern."

When a drunk strays out to the street,
children make fun of him.

He falls down in the mud.
He takes any and every road.

The children follow,
not knowing the taste of wine,
or how his drunkenness feels. All people on the planet
are children, except for a very few.
No one is grown up except those free of desire.

God said,
"The world is a play, a children's game,
and you are the children."

God speaks the truth.
If you haven't left the child's play,
how can you be an adult?

Without purity of spirit,
if you're still in the middle of lust and greed
and other wantings, you're like children
playing at sexual intercourse.

They wrestle
and rub together, but it's not sex!

The same with the fightings of mankind.
It's a squabble with play-swords.
No purpose, totally futile.

Like kids on hobby horses, soldiers claim to be riding
Boraq, Muhammad's night-horse, or Duldul, his mule.

Your actions mean nothing, the sex and war that you do.
You're holding part of your pants and prancing around,
Dun-da-dun, dun-da-dun.

Don't wait till you die to see this.
Recognize that your imagination and your thinking
and your sense perception are reed canes
that children cut and pretend are horsies.

The knowing of mystic lovers is different.
The empirical, sensory, sciences
are like a donkey loaded with books,
or like the makeup woman's makeup.
It washes off
But if you lift the baggage rightly it will give joy
Don't carry your knowledge-load for some selfish reason
Deny your desires and willfulness
and a real mount may appear under you"

"Don't hand me another glass of wine
Pour it in my mouth
I've lost the way to my mouth"

"Don't ask questions about longing
Look in my face"

"drunks fear the police but the police are drunk too
people in this town love them both
like different chess pieces"

- rumi

architecture

2011-10-07T09:30:00.001-05:00

heres a misquote - pahlaniuk- what if time isnt akin to the butterfly effect. but a river , and the changes we make are like small pebbles we throw in the stream, sure it can make a difference but only if we throw a lot of pebbles.

or what if its more like shoveling shit in a valley full of shit ?

anyway, thats architecture maybe

"The things you used to own, now they own you.”

2011-10-07T09:28:00.001-05:00

“The unreal is more powerful than the real. Because nothing is as perfect as you can imagine it. Because its only intangible ideas, concepts, beliefs, fantasies that last. Stone crumbles. Wood rots. People, well, they die. But things as fragile as a thought, a dream, a legend, they can go on and on. If you can change the way people think. The way they see themselves. The way they see the world. You can change the way people live their lives. That's the only lasting thing you can create.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Choke

“You know how they say you only hurt the ones you love? Well, it works both ways.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

steve jobs?

2011-10-07T08:58:00.001-05:00

if only we mourned the death of a poor man like we mourned the death of a billionaire.

between you and I : a world of poetry,unread.

2011-10-06T17:31:00.003-05:00

what do clouds know of the sadness of birds ?
what does the wind know of the longing of sailors ?
what does the sun know of the thirst of palm trees ?
if only you knew of the dreams of words
and their thirst for ink
or how fuel longs for fire
to burn throughout the night
and to rest in ashes in the morning sun

excuse

2011-10-06T08:49:00.001-05:00

the plumbing, but im sure none of you will mind me dredging up old material

just remembered

2011-10-05T16:51:00.001-05:00

august 2011 passed, and i didnt get married

angels turn the traffic lights green, all the way home

2011-10-05T16:50:00.002-05:00

breakfast with sancho, lunch with circe , dinner with virgil - tell beatrice ill be home late. oh so late.

this reminds me of that time i was avant garde for a week

2011-10-05T16:49:00.001-05:00

he built a time machine, but it could only take him 10 seconds back in time. has been enjoying the same sneeze for the last 20 years while everyone else went on with their daily live

She smiled through the bottom of the ocean, I knew I wouldn't reach her before drowing.

2011-10-05T16:22:00.000-05:00

what do clouds know about the sadness of birds?

chat with vinny

2011-10-05T13:58:00.000-05:00

like , i barely remember my first semester (before cfy), spring 07. i remember fall 07 quite well, spring 08 with keith not as much. summer 08 was barcelona tho it feels like it should have been summer 09. spring fall 08 was fred and physics. spring 09 was tristan, you and i really hung out then i think. thats when i remember foo fighters and models and all. i think we hung out during fred era but more so in tristan. when did i get my car ? feels like it was in spring 09.
summer 09 was home. fall 10 was high gear best semester ever i think
fall 9 i mean
spring 2010 was you and i
hmm, then paris

كل همسه نقولها نجوم سهرانه في جناح الليل

2011-10-05T07:55:00.004-05:00

finally figured out what my dad was saying

my dad used to hum this tune everyone once in a while
and a few lyrics
its in arabic
but translates to more or less
"every whisper we say is a star longing for sleep in the wings of the night"
anyway, ive been talking to my mom about poetry, and she sent me some today
and my heart skipped a beat, when like halfway through one poem that line was there
and it hit me that it was probably the poetry they read when they met or while they were in love.
so it was sort of curious to realize that we were sharing a similar emotion from similar times in your lives

sort of like a milestone in empathy, i guess

thats a real nasty habit you got there

2011-10-03T11:37:00.004-05:00

bahraini in less than a million.

every once in a while
as nostalgia strums its tune
across my veins
and the songs of the island
course through my arteries
i surrender to wishing

that the maker
had chosen a better vessel
to deliver bahrain to strange shores
rather than this leaky dhow
buffeted by the winds of foreign lands
and the careless handshakes of strangers

or , that my heart were bigger
big enough to carry my hope
and my longing
to carry the smell of the earth
the smiles of its people
and their tears

or, that the chambers of my heart
were filled with grain of sands
and beat to the tune of the
rustling of palm trees
rather than the tired hum of
airplanes in endless flight

here we are
drowning in siren songs
chasing absent pearls
till we return with high sails
to singing shores
till we leave strange moors
to travel amongst palm trees
and swim deep within henna

citrus blues

2011-09-27T10:32:00.004-05:00

time has blossomed
departing,now like a child
desperately drowning under a full moon
never becoming a firefly
yet gasping as we part from parts
and
where no grass grows in my heart
terrible thoughts may linger
rest assured there will be fields
singing with cotton to clothe
helping to warm the darker parts of me.
and
listen,fire flees in the sunset, so
sing at the passing of dusk
kisses,longing,and parting
give me a moment of time
empty of every word
that
leaves my summer
that
falls to find another
that
does not fade in the sun

peruvian dreams

2011-09-26T10:06:00.001-05:00

barking in the wrong forest

on a scale from 1-10

2011-09-23T11:13:00.003-05:00

a strange world
truely
hot tea
Fantastic
iced tea
amazing
everything in between
complete garbage

safir

2011-09-21T13:02:00.004-05:00

TRANSLATION of a song by Khaled al Sheikh

travel with high masts
and i am your sail, keeping away the winds of time
return to me with your love
and find
my chest your dock
and safe harbor

my life, if my life is long enough
i burn for you
and become your light
your morning, within your darkness
my patience, if my patience is long enough
ill wait for you
all my life
and become a home for you

oh joy
if after a long wait
we meet with a laugh
and begin to depart
with a step
away by boat
away from the moors

oh absent love
if your chest draws tight
or foul winds bring you to strange lands
cry in time and i will hear
your scream in my heart, and feel it close
my chest, my hope, and the island
dream of your return
even if only in whims and dreams
return to find all the shores
in your country singing :
return my love

travel with high masts
and i am your sail, keeping away the winds of time
return to me with your love
and find
my chest your dock
and safe harbor

keep playing with the heart line

2011-09-21T12:42:00.001-05:00

my heart,
we have not spoken in a while.
i am sorry
for choosing only to communicate
in the language of faraway drums
signals across distance
smoke of affection and distant winds
of longing and nostalgia

i have yet another request
i need you
my heart
to become bigger
bigger to
fit
all my love
all the hate
i need you to hold the smell of bahrain's air
the salt of its seas
the tears of its people
i need you to hold all the love
all the hate
and carry it with you to other countries
and carry it with me to other countries
till one day i return to singing shores
and travel amidst palm trees

When I'm ridin' round the world

2011-09-15T10:29:00.001-05:00

And I'm tryin' to make some girl
Who tells me baby better come back later next week

cakes like walks

2011-09-14T15:18:00.000-05:00

all i can offer you is my regret, but alas, never a good decision my dear.

wednesday - dreams of flightless birds

2011-09-14T09:55:00.001-05:00

lets talk like the wings of flightless birds
and brush shoulders
and brush lips
and brush away the scraps of tattered bread
yesterday stale
today eaten
oh heart
you are too small
too small for my love
too small for my wings
for my waiting
for my anticipation
i want you to encapsulate my hope
my tension
I want you to hold the world within you
and to empower
all that makes me human
all my dreams of flight

portman

2011-09-07T11:30:00.000-05:00

i should also be so fortunate an architect as to be blamed for all the failures of my generation

arabic poem , 7adeeth al hail

2011-09-06T11:39:00.003-05:00

حديث الهيل ، عمر الفرّا

تعالولي احدثكم حديث الهيل للدله
حديث العين للكحله
حديث الميه للنسمه
وحديث الشفه للبسمه
وحديث الدوري للصفصاف
تعالولي انا منكم
قرايبنا قرايبكم
وعدوي هو عدو الكم
فرحنا من مباهجكم
وحزنا من مصايبكم
دوا جرحي من مراهمكم
تعالولي احدثكم
حديث القبّرة للريح
وحديث الحمّرة للشيح
انا وقلبي تعاهدنا
من خلقنا تعاهدنا
محينا كل حواجزنا
متى رادوا حبايبنا
متى حسّو بغربتنا
يضيفونا بلا تصريح
يونسونا ونحدثهم
حديث الغيمه من تنزل
على خدود الزهر تجريح
تعالو نزين النخله على دجله بورد جوري
تخدر من صبا بردى
تعالو تعشب الصحرا
بألف زهرة وبألف فكرة
تعالو نزرع البستان
يصير الراعي لو غنى بنجد
يطرب غنم وهران
تعالو نعتلي موجه
على اسم الله مراسيها
نشوف الدنيا وش بيها
نسايلها وتجاوبنا
ونقرا كل معانيها
نفتش عن دفاترنا
نفتش عن اوابدنا
نفتش عن حضارة
من بني العباس نسيتنا ونسيناها
غلبني يا حبايبنا غلبني الشوق
غلبني والهجر مرمر
نهر عمري لون مر... مر
احبكم ما طلع بيدي
لوانها لحظة اتصبّر
احبكم والهوى عمر
الف سد ولا معبر
تضيق الروح عن حبكم
وأريدك يا قلب أكبر
تسع شوقي وتسع حبي
تسع ريحة حبايبنا
سوالفهم نسيم الليل
خالط ريحة العنبر
هواكم يا حبايبنا وشم بيدي
على جيدي
على صدري على عمري
على نسمة صبح تغري
حبايبنا تعالو لا تخلوني
اعيش بوحشة الصحرا
أموت بوحشة الصحرا
يطاردني الف ثعبان
تعالو يا حبايبنا
تعالو
من تجو يمي
احس اني صرت انسان

eric morris

2011-09-05T16:14:00.001-05:00

People with hot moms shouldn't have glass houses.

note to self

2011-09-05T13:53:00.001-05:00

would like to visit in the near future :

peru
brazil
argentina

farther future :

scandinavia - finland/denmark/norway
india
china
egypt
lebanon
iran
italy

2011-07-17T23:07:00.001-05:00

Follows are Avicore's notes on the prohibition of slavery.

It began with mandated lowering of the cost of license from the schools by almost half the originial cost. As predicted this opened the floodgates for slaves to purchase their freedoms, this also severely crippled the income of the guild in the year. Following , it was illegal to purchase,sell, or in anyway transmit slaves or come into the possession of them as no new licesnes would be granted by the slave guild. Again a decision made by Navid, who had someone how as the execute power of the slaver guild managed to pass what would spell the guilds own demise.

2011-07-14T02:05:00.000-05:00

Navid, born in the 13th generation of Alarian Assembly , during the time of King Villem fey Fairusi. To a goat herder father and a seamstress mother, both largely unremarkable and of no bearing to history save for the importance of their progeny.

- Navid : A discourse and history

There is a tale that circulates amongst the lower classes in Alaria. If a baby does not suckle at its' mothers tit, or rejects the milk then often the baby is given the taste of something bitter to sway its disposition. It is said that when Navid was born he was given goat's blood, and took a liking to it.

inheritance

2011-06-11T04:00:00.001-05:00

Both my grandfathers are dead

But its ok , because that's what grandfathers do.

They pass on.

Sometimes wisdom,

sometimes money - in my case neither

However,

I've got the same birthmark as my paternal grandfather.

Anyway.

My father has passed on to me most of his features

we both bite our tongues when focused

We spoke over dinner

I asked him if his generation was to blame

for Bahrain.

I told him his generation was to blame

for everything

because his generation was

not strong enough

not united enough

not intelligent enough

Perhaps it was my grandfather's fault.

Worst still

and I don't know how, or from whom

Ive inherited this silly desire

to dream

to dream

that one day i will wake up to find a country

and call it Bahrain.

And if I did stand up ?

2011-06-11T03:27:00.002-05:00

a long nights rest
and perhaps if fortunate
you will awake
to find a country

a machine can dream.
one day,
perhaps if fortunate
the machine will no longer be content

content to repeat your tired slogans
false platitudes
your tired love songs
your tired anthems
no ?

then please
send me forth
dressed in red
to dance
in the fool's parade
till the gears grind
to. a . halt.

one day
after a sleepless night
you will awake
to dreams come true
to find

a country of ashes, and tired love songs.

Foreword

2011-06-09T16:18:00.001-05:00

Foreword

As presented by illuminary Avicore vey Wallad, noted head at the Unidiscplinary of Alaria and personal friend; this is a collection meant to better clarify the events from the "transition" of the 15-17th generations of the Assembly. This collection, a series of tellings, documents, and revelations were prepared as research by Avicore for the first volume of his histories but alas incomplete. While they are not without their insights, and personal additions, this ensemble desperately seeks further illumination from Avicore, which will remain unheeded.It must be said of course, with thanks to the patron, that what follows was not released at the behest of Avicore but rather post-mortem under the auspices of the esteemed junior-elect Johanus Klous. Johanus, always the patron of scholarship, had seen to it personally that these jewels of research are made available to all from illuminary to common dross.

As always, the vow is upon the narrator.
A thousand courtesies to you and yours.

Khaldur vey Batis

tuesday - whatup

2011-05-25T00:32:00.001-05:00

"hey ali, what is your best feature ?"
"well i dunno ali, ive never made a movie before"
"hah, surely its your wit"
"yes im very surly"

The chicken crossed to the center of the road... to get to the other side.

2011-05-23T21:07:00.001-05:00

what would you do with a million dollars ?

i was asked this question at an interview. now, i had been prepared for a host of architectural questions, but this somehow cut through the mental conditioning that four years of undergraduate studies had constructed. I don't know, I replied abruptly.

---

ali karimi is a human being, who exercises his humanity within the capacity of an architect. he works in architecture in his non-free time.

peripatetic

2011-05-20T13:29:00.002-05:00

On the Rhodes Scholar,Again

facebook quote dump

2011-05-05T22:20:00.003-05:00

This will pretty much where I dump stuff I find interesting.Not really favorite quotations so much as food for thought.

When you write a manifesto, you don't need to put footnotes - Doug Allen on New Urbanism and Corbusier

if i could think what i would do,other than architecture, it would be to write the new fairy tale, because from the fairy tale came the airplane and the locomotive and the wonderful instruments of our minds... it all came from wonder - Louis Kahn

on your worst days, be good. On your best days be great. And on every other day, get better! - bobby morris

“Only those who love architecture can destroy it.” Balthasar Hols

“Habit is a second nature that destroys the first. But what is nature? Why is habit not natural? I am very much afraid that nature itself is only a first habit, just as habit is a second nature.” - Blaise Pascal

Power wears out those who don't have it.
Giulio Andreotti

all building isn’t architecture, just as all writing isn’t literature or poetry, even though the spelling, grammar, and syntax might be correct. There is something in architecture that touches people in a special way- fay jones

The mind works by making connections between concepts it is already familiar with. True creativity therefore is noticing a new or novel connections between existing concepts. - paraphrase De Bono and lateral thinking.

New ways of representation may prompt new ways to design, which in turn prompts new ways to evaluate that work.

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."- Proust

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are just looking at the stars." -Oscar Wilde

By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.-Franz Kafka

"If you don't set goals which are unattainable, then you need to ramp up your goals."- thom mayne

“Design is thinking made visual.” - Saul Bass

"I am a magpie." - Thom Mayne

"I am interested in removing the boundaries that constrict thinking, not flipping a building upside down."- Thom Mayne

‘To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail,’ Mark Twain

"You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose."- Mario Cuomo

“Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government!” - Monty P

Wny has elegance found so little following? Elegance has the disadvantage that hard work is needed to achieve it and a good education to appreciate it. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra

Our age is retrospective. It builds the sepulchres of the fathers. It writes biographies, histories, and criticism. The foregoing generation beheld God and nature face to face; we, through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe. Why should not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation to us, and not the history of theirs? - Emerson

"There are no atheists in foxholes" isn't an argument against atheism, it's an argument against foxholes. ~James Morrow

Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.- Emerson

If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years... - Emerson

"The most fundamental issue in government is not who obeys the law but who makes it" - Kreiger

"When a mind is flawed, the man is flawed. When a man is flawed, that which he touches is flawed.What a flawed man sees, his hands make broken. "- PS.T

“The poor object to being governed badly. The rich object to being governed at all.” - Chesterton

Speed is often confused with insight. When I start running earlier than the others, I appear faster.If I wanted you to understand it, I would have explained it better. It's better to fail with your own vision rather than following another man's vision. Coincidence is logical. To every disadvantage, an advantage. Football is simple, but the most difficult thing is to play simple football. -Cruyff

"We know ourselves by the questions we ask, and the questions we do not." - PS.T

''I don't like the word lucky,'' said Mourinho. "You win what you deserve. It is all about the details, and they had the details."

"It's like, when I was in high school, I really liked the Ramones, and it was me and just this one other girl in the whole senior class who liked the Ramones. We would talk about it like it was a secret club when everyone else was listening to Journey. We'd always say we wished they were bigger. But I think deep down, part of us liked that it was an exclusive thing, like only we appreciated them. We identified with that, because in some ways you're saying, 'No one appreciates us.'" - Tim Schafer

"Sometimes the songs that we hear are merely songs of our own". - Grateful dead.

"Crunches are simply the result of bad scheduling, unrealistic expectations, continually shifting targets, or a combination of the above" -d.g.

Debord's first book, Mémoires, was bound with a sandpaper cover so that it would destroy other books placed next to it.

Older Stuff - ToW

2011-05-04T18:07:00.002-05:00

This is from a few years back , from a novel I was writing.

Introduction :

A solitary figure moved across the dunes of the blue desert. Under the light of a pale moon, the figure softly whispered a name to himself. “Hendrek bey Oranjhe”. The name belonged to the man who spoke it, he repeated himself, allowing it to pass over him and shake him into sobriety. It felt loose on his skin, like ill fitting garments of a lifetime passed. “Hendrek bey Oranjhe” he said once more, extending and shortening the name as he pleased, until it no longer had any meaning. It was a name as confused as its owner. Part Northern, part Southern, a bastardization born in the pidgin of the city and nursed by the whim of the man on which it fell. Yet it was in no way a misnomer, the name was an apt description of the man who chose it. It was a name which attempted to eke out a neutral position amidst two cultures, and in doing so found itself lost in between. A month ago Hendrek was the sovereign elector of a vast federation. An Alarian empire uncontested, its economic and political structure secure for at least five generations , three in the case of completely inept rule. Twenty years before he had been the apprentice of a man upon whom the title of genius would be a utter understatement,he stood at his side as ambassador to the Mala'aran isles and foreign junior-elect. Hendrek had the world in the palm of his hands, and frittered it away like the morning bread. Yet, more frightening than what had been lost, was the overwhelming apathy he felt towards it all. He did not long for power, he did not long for control nor fortune. All he longed for was the sense of purpose he felt many years ago , now lost. The trail of breadcrumbs now lead to the far north, in the cold wastes of Noord-Khali. Wrapped in rags which concealed the fine livery underneath,Hendrek tried to keep himself warm and steady as he trekked forth into the shadow of a mountain. It was the rock he had spent his time thinking of , it was where he expected to find answers. Far more than simply a necessity, his abdication now became an opportunity to answer questions that had plagued him for years. The empty vessel disappeared into the folds of a stony crag as a cool wind blew his footprints away from all but memory.

Hendrek took a deep breath, allowing the cold air of the cavern to mingle with the warm smoke of the fisq. His pilgrimage brought him here, to the smell of spice and molasses rising from the depths of the cavern as purple shadows crept across its walls. The smoke painted velvet lions on the walls,they roared gold and turquoise, and sent lines snaking through the sand . He held a small nugget of fisq in his hand, allowing it to cake his fingers ever so slightly before adding it to the fast emptying pipe. So much pain crystallized in that blue-gray resin : it had given him the world,once. A surfeit of fortune and blessings bestowed on a man who was but forty rings of age, the white hairs of wisdom only recently gracing the sides of his head. Now he sat, still in his velvet vest with tarnished gold buttons, his pants filled with coin and fisq . His mind ? Empty. Hendrek spat, leaving a brown spot on the sandy floor of the cave. “I think, if it is not too presumptuous of me, I need no introduction” he said out loud. His voice echoed but only a cool breeze rasped a reply. “I know you can hear me. Had I been looking to make an appeal to the deaf I would have gone to a kerrche”, he shouted awaiting a reply. Hendrek chuckled as he began to hear whispers mingling with the wind.“There we go. You must be wondering how I found you.” he removed a pouch from his belt and threw it into the dark. “Fisq seems to travel farther than clink nowadays.” he said, remembering his own pipe, he put the coral to his lips and drew smoke through the porous skeleton. The lions roared once more, diving into the sand and pouncing on shadows. “This is not good” said a voice from the darkness. Hendrik allowed an impatient look to flash across his face before drowning into neutrality. A gaunt man emerged from the darkness into the eerie blue light, his skin tinted light gray and his features sharp.

“Konin Hendrek.” the man stated.
“No longer” Hendrek replied staring into the black eyes of the slate colored man.
“You are no stranger to Mala'ran treachery then.” the man said in perfect Alarian, “Call me Zuhair” he said , placing his right hand on his chest.
“That is not your name.” Hendrik said, repeating the salutation.
“No.” he replied , making it clear that the subject was not open to debate. “You seek narcosis.”
“No. You know better than that. I seek genethsai,direction, you provide entheogens.”
“We do not provide escape , Konin”
“What you provide is good enough”
“This fisq is not pure, it will not work well. If it is mixed with the loa it still will not provide you with the visions you seek. It is not sufficient payment either.”
“It will have to do.”
“It will not do...”
Hendrek opened his mouth but the man continued. “-but we make exceptions for friends. We will provide our own fisq as well as the loa.”
“What will I provide in return then ?”
“An open mind once you are done”
“You seek something ?”
The man laughed “No , you do... I do not understand Siri. A problem unanswered at home, is not answered on the road Siri.
“It is not, but sometimes one must see the problem through different eyes” , Hendrek said with a smile , bringing Zuhair back to the topic at hand.
“Our eyes we will provide then.”

They began to walk into the depths of the cave. After a short walk Hendrek and his guide began walking past small shacks and run down tents built along the sides of the caverns. Women looked from the dark tents while dozens of small children ran around playing with lean black-haired dogs. Hendrek furrowed his brow “I see a lot of houses.Zuhair.” “We are a plentiful people, thankfully.” “How many of you are there ?” Zuhair did not reply. He motioned to Hendrek to come closer, Hendrek obeyed. “Look.” Hendrek looked out from the top of the pass and was breathless. Small fires as far as the eye could see, all within the gigantic cavern under the mountain. “Fish, and plants.” said the guide, answering the question Hendrek had not composed himself to ask. “How do you feed these people ?” he muttered , without thought, blinking after realizing the question had been answered. Hendrek's mind began to race, trying to count the number of huts in the cavern, “two hundred, six hundred, two thousand, five thousand, eleven, twelve, seventeen..” he began to lose count as his eyes tried to find the horizon and only found the abyss blurring with fires. “

he was lead into a tent overlooking the great chasm of twinkling lights. He entered, head lowered into the smoke filled tent, the air was heavy and one could almost break into sweat upon entering. The air smelled of rose petals and dried mud. There were others on the floor, gazing at the ceiling with the dead stares of someone who has consumed a large amount of fisq. They layed there completely still , save for their mouths moving like they were chewing on words too big to be spoken, it seemed like they were between mastication and discussion. Zuhair motioned for Hendrek to take a seat, he sit crosslegged on the cold floor. Zuhair excused himself, and returned with a pipe filled with fisq, and two small pink marble-like globes. “Place these and smoke. Hendrek did so, running his tongue against the grainy spheres which tasted like dried fruit and then taking a long drag from the pipe. His vision turned purple instatly, coughing at the strength of the fisq, the likes of which he had never known exhisted. “We will speak of your plans once I find what I am looking for. “very well siri” said zuhair, at his side. As he spoke his words condensed in the air, falling slowly to the ground in splashes of perfume. “All my memories smell of camphor ...” and fell into sleep before completing his sentence.

He drifted into his own memories, swifting amongst the pools of myrrh until he found the earliest one he could muster. Touching the sunset colored drop , a flash turned all the droplets into stars, and as he looked below, he saw the map of the firmament, the constellations that shaped the universe that is himself. Slowly , they began to revolve around him , each part of the story reminding its author of its existence.

Chapter One

Extract from : The incoherence of the end
The esteemed lecturer Navid and Second-editor of the press.
From The Alarian Unidisciplinary on Thought

...I would thus urge the reader that we study the writings of the great illuminary Avicore fey Vallad.We must begin to realize the distinction between the impractical study of the metaphysical, and the study of the real. let the final remains of the philosophical thought be buried. Its role in our society has become more symbolic than useful. Allow for the final separation between law-science and moral philosophy. Reasoning cannot resolve issues in this world, only science and study. Furthermore, the doctrines of final will and manifest destiny cannot correspond to our world, nor our rational perception. We must take each action , and its prior action within consideration, but realize we do not have the vision to see beyond the veil. Due to our epistemological limitations I advocate the superiority of event over end and the importance of single consideration...

(The chapter would begin after this)

Chapter Two

Unpublished extract from : The greater cost of the reassessment of servile
The esteemed Joenas van Riberr grand-lecturer on educational theory

That is perhaps the biggest concern when one reads Navid's work. As stated above: it has long been perceived that while a slave has the potential to be human , the two are mutally exclusive. A slave has no free will, a slave is not sapient. They may comprehend and think , but those thoughts are not developed and hardly educated. A slave may ask for freedom , but has not the capacity to reason with his master. A slave is sentient, but so are animals, they can suffer, speak and cry. Is a newborn slave more intelligent than a horse ? Is a slave more trustworthy than his owners mastiff ? The answer, is a resounding no ! But still , we have looked over these things, our society has avoided stagnation by allowing slaves with the capacity to become human. Anything with the potential to become human, shall be allowed to reach that potential. A slave may purchase his freedom , or if a slave has a patron may have his freedom purchased for him from the educational charter distributor. A human being is an education , a human being is a civilized creature, chartered at young age or at an old one and taught. A child is a human being, because they are guaranteed an education, a slave-born is not. What becomes of a slave ?

Can we try to determine the future ? Not according to Navid. Can we see the larger patterns within this world , even the most clear? Not according to Navid. But surely the thought of eventual humanity is still valid ? Not according to Navid. According to the poet, a slave is his master's equal, despite the gulf in education and humanity.Slaves will begin to question their place, and rather than purchase their freedom like their forebears they will begin to ask for it ! Education will become something mundane, given rather than earned. Who will take responsibility for this? What guild would provide these services of education to anyone regardless of compensation ? Navid proposes the abolishment of slavery. But no. He means far more. Navid wants more than to destroy time honored institutions, and usher in an age of alleged non-philosophical scholarship. With all the freed slaves, he wishes to change the fabric of our society. Navid looks to upset the guild order, look at the legislation he has advocated as well as the polymaths he has supported. The dross that fill the Unidisciplinary and teach at it are hardly the same as the gentlemanly graduates of the sophist tutelage of generations past. This rabble then moves on to established guild positions enamored by their poet-God and work some damnable collusion.

The slaves are free, and the guilders are clean-sheeted . What next ? When the humans and the slaves have changed, what happens to the leaders? What will happen to our electors and the power base of our society ? Our kings ? Perhaps we cannot see the greater patterns in this world, but certainly the writings on the wall.

(The chapter would begin after this)

Notes

Does anyone in my army have any debts ?
No sir.
Good. Let them know.
I will sir.

Lecture : Composition of the Strange
The esteemed lecturer 55

navid opposed philosophy and slavery . Why ? So he can fill educatonal systems with his kids, as well as create a new working class.

“ there is little personal income from this drug business, its more than my other hobbies provide but still much lower than the cost of easing jurors and electors. Its more of a public service”
why do you live
what is a human being
something that accepts god ?

No its fine , anyone who argues with his superiors will argue with his underlings as well.

For one who values the articulate and precise you are very loquacious

No one in my army has any debts Namiz !!!

To obey, if ’twere already done, were late;

Man is called by philosophers the divine
Navid stood at the end of the table with his globe in hand; rolling it across the smooth veneer. “ Its an interesting opportunity that your disillusioned friend cedes to us” Navid said in a contemplative tone, “both a solution to current troubles and a chance to behead future ones.”
“So you suggest supporting him against the monarchy ?” queried Samer , furrowing his brow.
“Of course not. Do not be so daft. I have spent far too much attention on the royal family to hope it is inherited by a Qahd’in rebels. We quell them , and then use that to tip the scales in Javid’s side.”
“I never took him for a man of that sort, he seems a bit disinterested. He would shirk the position”
“He knows where his interest lies, the distant prince will come into the fold.”
“If he doesn’t ?”
“He either comes into his own or is forced into it. This flower will bloom”
“Even in Malaaran isles eh ?”
“Even in.” Navid said contently as he set down the antique and moved towards the door. “Manbukir I will be setting towards X-stan
“Wait.” Piped Samer, getting out of his seat. He set down the papers in his hand on a stack of books and motioned towards the window. “This word of your hand in the fisq trade is getting to be common knowledge…”
“Hear me. This information people is an illusion, it is a weight we place in their hands and they hope it will weigh down on our shoulders. They would not fathom it if I had not allowed them to.”
“ I just cannot see why we are being so heavy handed about it”
“ This heavy handedness as you call it is a morning call to the tired guard.It is the realization that favor has vacated men such as Waliy or Umur”
“ They will see it as an opportunity to change ?” Samer cried out , he put his hand on his forehead “Waliy is probably already drawing up new plans.”
“Waliy knows he has no more breadcrumbs in his hand Samer. Umur, the remaining guilders as well. I agree, it is heavy handed, but sometimes the catlle must be told where to graze”
Samer nodded in reluctant concession. “Very well… you do know I find your metaphors tiresome at times Navid”
“ I find your need for elucidation bothersome, boy” he said, his voice turning cold suddenly.
Samer paused for a moment, and then attempted a change of conversation: “ What takes you to X-stan ?”
“Do not be so bothersome Samer. Also, do feel free to show some discretion; you may not be the most clever pupil but certainly cleverer than the Malaaran rabble”
“Not the most clever ? Then why have you kept me around this long?” inquired Samer, feigning sarcasm but slightly suspicious of the dropped que.
“You’ve your uses.” He stated abruptly. After a few moments of quiet tension he nodded and left the room. Samer rested his back against the edge of the chair, unsure if he should give much thought to what he had just heard. The only things that swam in his mind were that contract with the mariners and of course, the taste of those lips. The scent of clay and dried flowers wafed in from the corners of his mind. He decided to exorcise his thoughts by writing, but every once in a while the breeze ran through his veins.
why is he the hero ? luck ? destiny ?

Thursday- Love Machine

2011-04-21T19:02:00.000-05:00

sometimes the notion scares me
that i become a love-machine

that i should continue to emit
platitudes
praise
and words
meaningless

and perhaps i will be called a lover
faithful
nationalist
and perhaps i will be pleased
sedated

thats what you want ?
a love machine ?
without voice
content to repeat your tired slogans ?
your tired love songs

then please
send me forth
dressed in red
to dream
in the fool's parade

till the gears grind
to. a . halt.

monday - shook me all night giving me your lovin

2011-04-18T01:31:00.000-05:00

the youtube generation - a cognitive map of strange associations.

Wednesday - feed the monster. get the girl. steal the gold. shoot the messenger.

2011-04-13T18:08:00.003-05:00

On Sugaree , 7 months ago.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpFE_1yzr7w&feature=related

This song always conjures the strangest images in my mind . Girls I've broken up with, friends I never see anymore, the fall of Saddam Hussein. The song is both cowardly and powerful, optimistic and negligent, contemplative and conceited. Like all the best Dead songs, it can become the soundtrack to your life - on your best days and your worst.

Sunday - Bowling for Prague

2011-04-10T05:07:00.000-05:00

Man in Me - Dylan

The man in me will do nearly any task
As for compensation, there's a little he will ask
Take a woman like you
To get through to the man in me.

Storm clouds are raging all around my door
I think to myself I might not take it anymore
Take a woman like your kind
To find the man in me.

But, oh what a wonderful feeling
Just to know that you are near
It sets my heart a-reeling
From my toes up to my ears.

The man in me will hide sometimes to keep from being seen
But that's just because he doesn't want to turn into some machine
Take a woman like you
To get through to the man in me.

Sunday - Another Milestone for Freedom

2011-04-03T07:30:00.000-05:00

History has come to Paris, and left still smelling fainly of urine. In fact, the history of America can be summarized as a series of stupid things people did in Paris. It is the American Dream. Maybe it borrows from the conquering of the frontier and killing native peoples , but there's something in the American imaginary that lends itself to the spirit of reckless adventure : finding a stable people, and completely ruining where they live. It is the American Dream. Well, at least,its the second American Dream. The real American Dream is to be able to market something successfully to a large group of people (read : target audience).

Sunday - Cloudy sea

2011-04-03T06:38:00.000-05:00

"Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before. He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way." - Vonnegut

"Artists use frauds to make human beings seem more wonderful than they really are. Dancers show us human beings who move much more gracefully than human beings really move. Films and books and plays show us people talking much more entertainingly than people really talk, make paltry human enterprises seem important. Singers and musicians show us human beings making sounds far more lovely than human beings really make. Architects give us temples in which something marvelous is obviously going on. Actually, practically nothing is going on." - Vonnegut

"Lucky me,lucky mud" - Vonnegut

Sunday - The Importance of Being Ernst

2011-04-03T01:12:00.001-05:00

a young man aspiring to become a magician and to find the myth of his time. - Max Ernst

Thursday Last Week- Travelling at the Speed of the Human Condition

2011-04-03T00:43:00.002-05:00

two time travelers met.they were traveling at the speed of the human condition. one from the past was traveling into the far future, the other from the far future traveling into the distant past. they spoke on what it meant to speak in the age of relativism. they both fell in love once, at different times to different women. they had dinner together. after several hours of conversation they parted without paying for dinner.

Friday - Throw Pillow Vendetta

2011-04-02T12:13:00.000-05:00

i was walkin home from the metro downhill. and saw a throw pillow. i kicked it along the sidewalk for about 8 minutes, down a few blocks. eventually i came across a discarded couch that matched the pillow and realized i pretty much undid the work of whoever kicked it up that far. life.