Brain, n. An apparatus with which we think that we think.

– Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary

***

***

dark petals

winter withered

receive

mudluscious

raindrop

***

 

***

cold cobblestones

oozing

softly

shiny black

 

below the lights

***

***

 

lightbulb in a doorway

 

that bulb god gives

 

our feelings

to discover

***

***

winter rain

caressing

intractable fools

 

their heads bent

 

careful to dodge

 

reflections of light

 

like love’s satanic glitter

***

 

 

***

winter

enters

 

the dollar bill’s fortunate soul

 

lovingly going past

 

my live wire’s leaping spirit

your driving search

for love

 

***

***

***

 

***

Still, I just can’t get enough of this eerie krautrock stuff:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2WA8E6XBW8

***

***

 

And here’s a cute li’l retro Russian Christmas carol - The Christmas tree song:

“V lyesu rodilas yolochko”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s081dTOC3yY&feature=related

 

If you’d like to sing along - here, zum Mitsingen:

 

 

V lyesu rodilas yolochka,

 

V lyesu ona rosla,

 

Zimoy I letom stroynaya,

 

Zelyonaya byla.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Metel’ ey pela pesenku

 

«Spi, yolochka, bai-bai!»

 

Moroz snezhkom ukutyval:

 

 

 

«Smotri, ne zamerzay!»

 

 

 

 

 

 

Trusishka zayka seren’kiy

 

Pod yolochkoy skakal

 

Poroyu volk, serdityi volk

 

Rys-tso-yu probegal

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chu! Sneg po lesu chastomu

 

Pod polozom skripit

 

Loshadka mokhno-nogaya

 

Toropitsa, bezhit

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vezet loshadka drovenki

 

A v drovnyah muzhichok

 

Srubil on nashu yolochku

 

Pod samyi koreshok

 

 

 

 

I vot ona naryadnaya

 

Na prazdnik k nam prishla

 

***

***

S’ Roshdyestvom! Cheers!

***

Peter Bies © 2009

***

 

Many of the phenomena of Winter are suggestive of an inexpressible tenderness and fragile delicacy. We are accustomed to hear this king described as a rude and boisterous tyrant; but with the gentleness of a lover he adorns the tresses of Summer.

– Henry David Thoreau

***

The world is a mountain of shit, if it’s going to be removed, it has to be removed by handfuls.

– Allen Ginsberg

***

 

 

 

 

winter

in a star

 

grimly flying past

 

with plentiful abandon

 

 

 

 

winter

strikes out

 

these countenances

 

clouds swiftly passing over

 

 

 

 

 

winter

in his skull

kind heart in a TV dinner

listless memories in a styrofoam cup

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

winter

 

germinating

imperceptibly

thoughtful angels of languid desire

 

 

 

 

winter

in the sun

 

your loved ones hiding

 

while the crowd watched

 

 

 

 

winter

 

vengeful female

 

some boy’s dog

leaves

 

***

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

***

http://www.allenginsberg.org/

***

“I admire Ginsberg as a poet, despite the fact that he seems not to know when he is being good and when he is bad. But he will last, or at least those poems will last.”

 

– Leslie Fiedler

 

***

Peter Bies © 2009

***

 

 

 

 

I want to know God’s thoughts… all the rest are details.
– Albert Einstein

 

 

 

 

All dream among the flowers,

 

I grow misty thoughts

 

Beside the pond.

 

 

I feel blue spells

 

Under a steelish sky.

 

I divine glowing diamonds within the flowers.

 

 

The lust is coming,

 

Shadowed, tired.

 

I be watchful.

 

 

The clouds have come.

 

Dark, ripe,

 

Shifting.

 

 

 

I take comfort

 

Trying to remember

 

Those electric faces.

 

 

Unsure, defiant,

 

Trying to remember

 

The next life waiting.

 

 

 

Where in the end

 

The lovers seek

 

The road back, lost

 

 

 

And wander

 

Aimlessly

 

While the rain fell,

 

 

 

Not knowing why

 

The dire remorse

 

Should hurt them so.

***

 

 

 

 

 

 

***

When I wrote this, I was listening to The Soft Machine:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9Io9leGqIg&feature=fvw

And to some early Tangerine Dream:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4hn21-yqqM&feature=related

(Warning: This is exemplary early 70s prog stuff… practically endless! So take your time - and indulge…)

***

 

 

 

 

 

***

Peter Bies © 2009

***

Hold somebody’s hand and feel its warmth. Gram per gram, it converts 10 000 times more energy per second than the sun. You find this hard to believe? Here are the numbers: an average human weighs 70 kilograms and consumes about 12 600 kilojoules/day; that makes about 2 millijoules/gram.second, or 2 milliwatts/gram. For the sun it’s miserable 0.2 microjoules/gram.second. Some bacteria, such as the soil bacterium “Azotobacter” convert as much as 10 joules/gram.second, outperforming the sun by a factor 50 million. I am warm because inside each of my body cells there are dozens, hundreds or even thousands of mitochondria that burn the food I eat.

 

Gottfried Schatz, Jeff’s View on Science and Scientists (2006), p. 43

***

 

 

Under

an

overcast

sky

 

 

I

was

on my way

 

 

 

to

my

favourite spot:

 

 

 

lush

verdant

botanical garden

 

 

 

this

late summer

late afternoon

warm and humid

a sky of grey steel full of menace

 

 

 

live things

bright fragrant

fragile and threatening

 

 

and

every

now

and then

 

a

sudden

glimpse

 

 

of

sunlight

sunlight ablaze

 

 

cast

through

the leaves

 

 

and

it’s

gone

…

 

…

 

***

Peter Bies © 2009

***