... four letters. Only L O V E.

What a klutz I am. I should have added, by way of a footnote, about the tyranny of viewing arts, letters, drama, culture, politics, progress, etc., primarily, even strictly, through a Western perspective. At the same time, I really do not know nothing, I mean nothing, about the theater traditions in Asia or Africa, or America. I mean, I know dey got their pageantries, like kabuki, puppets, mask shows, songs, dance, backflips, but. But I'm saying, well, those ain't narrative drama/tragedy/etc. They's opera, pantomime, musicals, dance, whatever, something else what ever else.

I guess from those cultures that have an extended rich written traditions + poetry + literature + whatever else - that'd be mainly Asians and Arabic - why no parallel track to what the Greeks were doing, and the rest of the Western culture/Europeans would strive to develop. Something that was realistic/naturalistic. Or, strictly secular. Instead the Indians, Arabs, Chinese, Japs, Koreans, etc., stuck with exaggerated spectacles.

Was it democracy? Burgeoning humanism? A beneficial byproduct of competing/conflicting nation states sharing a more or less linguistic source? Or the riches gained through trade and exploitation nullified the stifling oppression of the religious state?1 Or just the way the beach ball bounces?

By the way, I know nothing about the cacophonous cross national/cultural achievements or ambitions, I should state outright, if it was not obvious enough. And I'm not talking about influence, because Western/European culture have been influence big time, always have. I'd imagine the renaissance got its big injection from what the Arabs preserved and spread to Western thought, or Bartelby's aggressively passive "I'd prefer not to" seems some kind of Buddhist mantra, Picasso got his African masks, modern art got its re-conceived perspective via Asian art, Hitler filched his party logo from the East, Pound's Chinese/Japanese induced imagism, Pollock's Mexican muralists, the Beats and Beatles and their Swamis, it goes on, and on and on.2 But what I am getting at is the reverse. How these other national/ethnic got transformed, influenced, and so forth by the West, or perhaps how non Western societies tackled the issue of modernity. Did linear perspective blow up the Japanese art scene? Did Shakespeare, Goethe, Moliere, Ibsen, Brecht, etc., transform and expand Korea's theater?

I know in other mediums Western influence was well incorporated and reciprocated. The most glorious, for example, movies and movie tradition sprang up in Japan, Sengal, India, etc. And literature. In both cases, the Western modernist traditions were absorbed then redirected in a way that still retained cultural vitality/identity. Yet, for the life of me, I don't know one play originating from Korea, China, Lebanon, etc. not just historically, but also in today's time frame.3 However, it'd take an especially powerful naivety to be blind that it is a small n' easy step to go from screenplays and teleplays to the stage. So if I were to discuss Thorton Wilder, and the innovations and development of the dramatic tragic theater, and I totally skipped any consideration on what was going on in Korea, Iran, etc., while I kinda can't really blame myself, I kinda don't mind being hard on me self, and say I fucked up.

Or flatly, I feel horrible, a sickening type of horrible in perpetuating the cultural imperialism that I find rotten and repugnant. I should have qualify my hackneyed theater discourse by stating that it was framed around a predominantly Western/English language perspective, and or also acknowledge the high probability that similar developments were going on in other cultures. Heck, those various cultures likely even done in faster and mo' better. And other apologies.

Not that I need any positive reinforcement or kind words; or, I do need them. Someone wrote: "I love [that'd be me here]. I'll never tell him to his face but i am very fond of that lad." Thank you.

The uhd'r thing I shud a' ad'd was that I'm so fucking well read and deep and know who Andrew Marvell is and my shit is so fucking brilliant, and works on so many multi-planes. Or not. But I lapsed in not footnoting "criminal coyness," which jokingly references: "Had we but world enough, and time, / This coyness, lady, were no crime."4 See, deep, brilliant, and fucking well read. Or not.

A couple more things regarding this. Way back in the daze, I pretty much, over long distance, old-fashion copper wires, relayed to my cousin a line by line reading of Marvell's poem for her English/writing class essay. I feel dirty about that, aiding and abetting her transgression, but I guess, whatevs.

Another thing, I still feel, perhaps with some guilt, that Prufrock is amazing.5 I remember, back in the daze, on a coffee break from the trading desk, my then co-worker pal read to me and Sixth Avenue Prufrock the whole way through . That recital had a large part in my "getting" Eliot and his remarkably accessible fun and lyricalness.

Third and last, only that I have not explicitly expressed, J (for just a perfect someone) is perfect. Recently, a friend L (for lass) somehow got the impression that I wrote poems, and asked to read 'em. So, well, I e-sent one poem to L. An older poem, back, again, from the daze, when I still, like, actually wrote poems. L said it was aight, and ask for more. I obliged, sending to her my last proper poem. That poem had a part that was a mediation on J.6 I guess since I don't often re-visit my back-then writings, preferring to just leave them as is and move on, I hadn't re-consider that piece much aside from setting an implicit threshold that future poems should exceed.7 But re-reading it before gmailing to L, god, it brought back all these beautiful memories of beautiful J. In all honesty, whatever I/reason/god(dess)(e/s)/books/pop tunes hadn't already transformed in me from, it's hard to describe, but from something extremely and deeply guarded, elusive, and shrouded to a more blatant openness, she blew the covers off, and finished the job. I don't think of myself much as a confessional type poet, or really writing much about/for a particular person, because I guess, that is not the type of writing I'm interested in. But that poem, or that part of the poem, when I had to think of someone to model a "you", that was all and only J.

Fuck, this is drowning in opacity. The point is that she compelled me to love and to love her. Which I do, then, and now.

I should say that it is a bit of a shame that aside from an everlasting affection and admiration, I didn't try, or try harder, to fan the flames of that relationship beyond the platonic flicker. I don't think I could or would ever be good enough for her. Is that really low self esteem?8 It's odd in the sense that J swelled and stretched and ballooned the outer limits of my romantic/spiritual soul, but in that I cannot be by her side, it is just fucking heartbreak. And, not that I ever stop thinking of her, but in re-reading the poem, it was like she was in front of me just again, and I was re-finding all the words and images for how I felt about her. Which in a way, since she could only produce the most profound and truest loving feelings from/in me, that was terrific, but well, then again, J ain't in front of me, and I'm not with her, that's much less than terrific. "look elsewhere for answers; answers are selfish and whitewash. / only questions seduce, and incite; you: why, how, and what exactly?"

And a retraction, I take back whatever endorsement of Mike Bloomberg. Bill Thompson is just not so awful of a mayoral candidate to say Bloomberg is clear cut better. I'm still irked by Thompson's mindless response to accusations that he took campaign cash money from investment managers doing business with the city. But, if I had to really think about it - and I guess I won't have to think about it until I am behind the black curtain at the polling station - flaunting term limits is not right.

Thompson doesn't seem to be the most eloquent public speaker, but more important than that, he lines up with my view on most issues and he looks like he can handle the local petty politics. And what has Bloomberg done in eight years that really needs four more?

I suppose City Comptroller and Public Advocate are foregone conclusions. Though regarding John Liu: do we really need shoe throwing in City Hall?9

Hmm... any good movies out? Funnily, I almost hardly ever watch a movie more than once in the movie theaters, partly because movies, as NY prices go, are hella pricey. Second, I can rarely justify going for a second viewing when there are so much that I haven't even seen for the first time. Yet, I love 35 Shots of Rum and it was freaking marvelous watching it again. Second time: Mati Diop still ravishing; Gregoire Colin still riveting; Alex Descas still badasses; and Claire Denis is still Claire Denis da bomb. I actually would be tempted to see 35 Shots a-again. That is how much I love Mati Diop, and that stunning wedding dress she wore, and that absolute blisteringly masterful bar room sequence. And Gregoire Colin. And superlatives etc.

Also, City of Sadness. Hou Hsiao Hsien's early masterpiece is great and all but I was planning to skip it this past weekend. However a good pal/movie buddy said he was going, so what the hay, it's in Brooklyn and I love grey old Brooklyn too. And Tony Leung is young and earnest, and Tony Leung, above all. I guess City of Sadness is a complicated movie - or I can understand if some folks find it that way, telling a complicated piece of Taiwanese/Chinese history/terror, without watering it down, but rather enhancing its complexity with an austere, elliptical style - but I found it follow along-able and still damn good.

Lastly, if your idea of fun is some handjob action between father and son, you can count your lucky sicko stars because Taiwanese - speaking of movies, cross-culture, and modernity - virtuoso Tsai Ming-Liang is getting a sort of mini retro treatment at Asia Society.10 Some omissions in the selection of movies, but whatevs. Tsai deserves more exposure.11 Lots of boredom there, but I get a cinematic hard-on from boredom. Which reminds me, I had a really fun flick conversation with this chick at a LES bar recently, we were comparing White Material with 35 Shots, and Resnais, and Jia Zhangke, Antonioni, Haneke, and so forth.12 Haha, we agreed that boring, static, nothing happening, extended sequences are brilliant awesomeness.13 I should have asked what she thought of Tsai.

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1. Need it be said that I don't know anything about anything, just taking wild stabs here. I wonder if it's worth reading Jacques Barzun's From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life 1500 to the Present. A friend of mine was reading it - or carrying it - and if the book's take isn't too myopic, which is kinda my point there, it might be interesting. But then again, since it's a shit load of pages, I need something stronger than "might" to motivate me to start it. Plus, I always think of Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Society when I think of history.
2 Uh, Google?
3 I blame Google or Wikipedia!

4 see Fn 2?

5 see Fn 4.
6 I titled that poem 3 components. Hmm... is it bad that I don't include the poem itself?
7 I should have stated: future, if any, poems.
8 I don't mean it quite like that, but J is just too/so beautiful, perfect and lovely. In a way, it's intimidating. In another way, I feel that there would be time or occasions despite my diligent efforts to make her happy that I wouldn't succeed. And in that she should ever be unhappy, due to me, for even a moment, I could not or would not be able to bear it. Of course, what kinda sick, miserable bastard am I that would want a relationship where I could bear to make my partner unhappy. Jeez, that's what I'm saying, ain't it? Otherwise, I'm happy that she likely is happy now with whomever she's happy with.
9 Like this example. Is that bad stereotyping?
10 More info. I should withdraw that handjob comment because Tsai Ming Liang isn't mainly/solely/at all about that. Or that shouldn't be a reason not to go watch his movies.
11 This is funny. How Wikipedia describes Tsai's The River: "a 1997 Taiwanese New Wave Film by Tsai Ming-liang. The plot focuses around the character Xiao-kang, a young man in his early 20s, who begins to suffer inexplicably from severe neck pain." Without giving it away: So. Not. Close. To. Describing. The. Movie. At. All.
12 She asked which directors/movies I like and, like, I completely blanked! Doh, as a outdated, 4 fingered, thin haired, bulbous cartoon homeboy might say. I am loathe to do this, because I love Claire Denis, and sitting at Alice Tully I was captivated with it, but White Material came up short to whatever bar I think Denis has set. Still amazing stuff, but. Well, all that "but" implies.
13 I had planned on more. On Herman/Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent, which was really, not in a good way, boring as hell, but, I guess in a good way, pretty interesting. Then more stuff about the media, and how it relates to, oh I don't know, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc. Hmm... the main gist of it could be: what the fuck is going on there, why are American soldiers still there, do you know that flesh and blood human beings - woman, children, regular folks - are getting slaughtered there, and the fucking mainstream media is such complicit and ugly dogs. Also, considering that most media folks can read, and presumably have read Manufacturing Consent, how the hell do they live with themselves. And you know who is gay, Glenn Greenwald. I kinda suspected it because sometimes from the TV, he looked just a smidge too clean cut and thin. And sometimes on the radio, boy, is he overbearing. You know, in that gay way. It kinda all falls in place now. Only kidding. But he is, apparently. And with a partner already. Good for him. But, like I said, more planned but have to cut this short and sweet, because I really feel bad if anyone, actually I'm assuming no one, you know, reads this blog, but if he/she/they did, and voted or supported Bloomberg because of me - in which case, youse an idiot.