"There is much evidence that the female is constitutionally stronger than the male; she lives longer, and in every age group more males than females die although the number of males conceived may be between ten and thirty per cent more. There is no explanation for the more frequent conception of males, for female producing spermatozoa are produced in the same number as male producing ones. It is tempting to speculate whether this might not be a natural compensation for the greater vulnerability of males"

Germaine Greer, The Female Eunuch

Pic by Jan Saudek

I could be bounded in a nut shell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.

William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Doll in Isla de las Muñecas, México

The rain drums down like red ants,

each bouncing off my window.

The ants are in great pain

and they cry out as they hit

as if their little legs were only

stitche don and their heads pasted.

And oh they bring to mind the grave,

so humble, so willing to be beat upon

with its awful lettering and

the body lying underneath

without an umbrella.

Depression is boring, I think,

and I would do better

to make some soup and light up the cave.

Anne Sexton, The Fury of Rainstorms

Art by Natalie Shau

Men!

Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink

Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;

Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink

And rise and sink and rise and sink again;

Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,

Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;

Yet many a man is making friends with death

Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.

It well may be that in a difficult hour,

Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,

Or nagged by want past resolution's power,

I might be driven to sell your love for peace,

Or trade the memory of this night for food.

It well may be. I do not think I would.

Edna St Vincent Millay, Love Is Not All

Art by Antony Micallef

by Paul McCarthy

Grinderman - Honey Bee (Let's Fly To Mars) - Live On Later

DIRTY THREE LIVE IN ROME

64 today

Imagine the exhilaration of knowing that you are part of something that is completely and utterly new and different. Imagine that all your life you have felt cut off from the rest of humanity at the most elementary level --you do not communicate well with others. Imagine feeling so lonely and twisted that at times you have really, really tried to kill yourself , even though you were just a kid. Imagine that the people that were supposed to love you, your family, have continually and deliberately brutalized and betrayed you in ways other people couldn't even begin to imagine. Imagine that you are at the end of your rope. Then walk into a room where for the first time in your miserable, horrifying life, you feel a part of things. These people understand you because these things have also happened to them. There's no need to explain your silence, your shyness, your need to get totally obliterated every night of the week and to maybe fuck some really cute boy against a wall in a dark corner of the club without ever asking his name and then go dive into the sea of bodies pogoing. There's no need to explain the way this music, this noise, makes you feel. There's no need to explain why, when you get dressed every day, you do everything you can to make yourself look as ugly on the outside as you feel on the inside. There's no need to explain your hurt or your anger or the damage you feel because it is perfectly self-explanatory in this place, in this music.

Nicole Panter, Fuck You Punk Rock/1977

Yesterday upon the stair
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today
Oh how I wish he'd go away.

William Hughes Mearns

I started out younger at most everything/ All the riches and pleasures, what else could life bring?/ But it makes me feel better each time it begins/ Callin' me home, hickory wind

Gram Parsons, Hickory Wind

Keith Richards - Hickory Wind

A Gram song

Despair and Deception, Love's ugly little twins/Came a-knocking on my door, I let them in

Nick Cave, I Let Love In

Pic by Jan Saudek

"Durante cierto tiempo las cosas se acumulan, ¿no es así? DE pronto, tienes que escupir, pero no recuerdas que se te juntó saliva. Tienes las manos sucias, pero no sabes cómo te las ensuciaste. El polvo te cae encima todos los días y no lo sientes. Pero cuando juntaste bastante polvo, ahí está, lo ves y lo nombras. Eso es intuición, o así lo entiendo yo al menos. Bueno, ¿qué clase de polvo ha estado cayendo sobre mí? ¿Unos pocos meteoros en el cielo nocturno? ¿Un rocío raro poco antes del alba? No sé. ¿Ciertos colores, olores, el modo como cruje la casa a las tres de la mañana? ¿Carne de gallina en los brazos? Todo lo que sé es que ese polvo maldito ha estado juntándose. Lo sé de pronto".

Ray Bradbury, ¡Muchachos! ¡Cultiven hongos gigantes en el sótano!

Street Art bt Banksy

Teddy Thompson - Change of Heart - July 18, 2007

Shiori Matsumuto

"El crimen es la convocación de las sombras, el placer de diluirse en las tinieblas. El victimario es el hijo ignorado del viejo Harpócrates, el dios homicida que se alimenta de oscuridad y silencio"

Juan Jacobo Bajarlía, El placer de matar

I went down to old Joe's bar room, on the corner by the square
Well, the drinks were bein' served as usual, and this motley crowd was there
Well, on my left stood Joe McKennedy, and his eyes were bloodshot red
When he told me that sad story, these were the words he said:
I went down to the St. James infirmary, I saw my baby there
She was stretched out on a long white table, so cold, and fine, and fair.
Let her go, let her go, God bless her, wherever she may be
She can search this world over, never find another man like me
When I die Oh lord please bury me In my high top stetson hat
Put gold coins over my eyelids So the boys will know I died standing pat
Get six crapshooting pallbearers Six chorus girls to sing me a song
Put a jazz band behind my hearse wagon To raise hell as we roll along
Get sixteen coal black horses, to pull that rubber tired hack
There's thirteen men going to the graveyard Only twelve men are coming back
Well, now you've heard my story, well, have another round of booze
And if anyone should ever, ever ask you, I've got the St. James infirmary blues!

St. James Infirmary, folk song (rec: Triffids version)

Sculpture by Christian Lemmerz

Clausurado. Será la próxima vez.

So now I hang out down by the train's depot/ No, I don’t ride, I just sit and watch the people there/ They remind me of wind-up cars in motion/ They way they spin and turn and jockey for positions/ And I wanna scream out that it all is nonsense/ Their life’s one track and can’t they see it’s pointless?/ But just then my knees give under me/ My head feels weak and suddenly It’s clear to see, it’s not them, but me/ Who’s lost my self-identity/ And I hide behind these books I read/ While scribbling my poetry/ Like art could save a wretch like me/ With some ideal ideology/ That no one could hope to achieve/ And I'm never real, it's just a sketch of me And everything I’ve made is trite and cheap and a waste/ Of paint/ Of tape/ Of time.

Bright Eyes, Waste of Paint

"El mundo se creó para los muertos. Piensa en todos los muertos que hay --dijo y luego, como si hubiera concebido la respuesta a todas las insolencias, añadió--: ¡Los muertos son un millón de veces más que los vivos y el tiempo que los muertos se pasan muertos es un millón de veces más que el tiempo que los vivos se pasan vivos!"

Flannery O'Connor, Más pobre que un muerto, imposible

Sometimes it's like someone took a knife baby/ Edgy and dull and cut a six-inch valley/ Through the middle of my soul./ At night I wake up with the sheets soaking wet/ And a freight train running through the middle of my head/ Only you can cool my desire/ Oh oh oh, I'm on fire.

Bruce Springsteen, I'm On Fire (Bat For Lashes' version)

Pic by Jan Saudek

All the soldiers/They're all gonna die/ All the little babies/ They're all gonna die/ All the poets/ And all the liars/ And all you pretty people/ You're all gonna die.

Low, All You Pretty People

Art Daniel Martin Díaz

The World According To Sawyer

So Young

Mona tried to tell me/ To stay away from the train line./ She said that all the railroad men/ Just drink up your blood like wine./ An' I said, "Oh, I didn't know that,/ But then again, there's only one I've met/ An' he just smoked my eyelids/ An' punched my cigarette."

Bob Dylan, Stuck inside of Mobile With the Memphis blues again.
art by Camille Rose García

"Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.

You forget some things, don't you?

Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget"

Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Pic by Paul D'Amato

Me acerco al agua /Bebiendo tu beso/ La luz de tu cara/ La luz de tu cuerpo/ Es ruego el quererte/ Es canto de mudo/ Mirada de ciego/ Secreto desnudo/ Me entrego a tus brazos/ Con miedo y con calma/ Y un ruego en la boca/ Y un ruego en el alma

Lhasa, Con toda palabra

Art by Jenny Bird Alcantara

Nostalgia

I have crossed oceans of time to find you.

It's a kind of magic

"No hay más que un problema filosófico verdaderamente serio: el suicidio. Juzgar que la vida vale o no vale la pena de ser vivida es responder a la pregunta fundamental de la filosofía (...). Es profundamente indiferente quién gira alrededor del otro, si la tierra o el sol. Para decirlo todo, es una cuestión banal. Nunca vi a nadie morir por el argumento ontológico".

Albert Camus, El mito de Sísifo.

Well sooner or later the ground's gonna be holdin' all

Of my ashes too

But I can't help but wonder if after I'm gone

Will I still have these three hundred mile perhour,

finger breaking, no answers makin',

battered dirty hands, bee stung and busted up,

emptycup torrential outpour blues

One thing's for sure: in that graveyard

I'm gonna have the shiniest pair of shoes

The White Stripes, 300 M.P.H. Torrential Outpour Blues

Please don't bring me down

Please don't let me go

My heart is a worried thing

Memories have now planted seeds of a field I now

Want to reap and sow

I'm on the same side as you

I'm just a little behind

Cat Power, Willie

"He imagined the pain of the world to be like some formless parasitic being seeking out the warmth of human souls wherein to incubate and he thought he knew what made one liable to its visitations. What he had not known was that it was mindless and so had no way to know the limits of those souls and what he feared was that there might be no limits. "

Cormac McCarthy, All The Pretty Horses

Pic Jean Philippe Charbonnier

If you were coming in the fall,

I'd brush the summer by

With half a smile and half a spurn,

As housewives do a fly.

If I could see you in a year,

I'd wind the months in balls,

And put them each in separate drawers,

Until their time befalls.

If only centuries delayed,

I'd count them on my hand,

Subtracting till my fingers dropped

Into Van Diemens land.

If certain, when this life was out,

That yours and mine should be,

I'd toss it yonder like a rind,

And taste eternity.

But now, all ignorant of the length
Of time's uncertain wing,
It goads me, like the goblin bee,
That will not state its sting.

Emily Dickinson, If you were coming in the fall

And I Never Think You'll Get It

Tonight You're Doing Something

This Fix Is More Important

Than You Are

Hooking In The Streets

Don't You Have Somewhere To Go

This Man Is More Important

Than You Are

Girl Can This Summer Turn You On

When You Walk Inside Yourself

And Feel The Moon Has Let You Down

Remember When The Heat Could

Knock You Off Your Feet

I Remember When The Streets Would

Still Be Good To Me

Girl Where Were You On That Perfect Day

When Hearts Were Handed Out

And Young Girls

Found Pretty Lover Boys

Come On

Make It Right

The Raveonettes, Remember

And the wonderful Gia Carangi

Love hurts, love scars,

love wounds and marks.

Any heart not tough or strong enough

to take a lot of pain, take a lot of pain.

Love is like a cloud,

holds a lot of rain.

F. & B. Bryant, Love Hurts

For Ana

I know where the bodies are

I buried them myself

I'm coming down from afterhere

To terminate your health

I am not a peaceful man

When lightning leaps up from my hand

Something in your smiling eyes

Says all you gotta do is rise

I am not a peaceful man

But sometimes when I take your hand

The natural urge it does subside

For plunder, rape and genocide

I'm not one to compromise

And the truth, the beauty, the ruined prize

Look into your smiling eyes 'cause all I wanna do is rise

I am a lizard in the sun

With hooded eyes and belly warm

I move down through the blackened fields

The ocean wide, a silver shield

Hold me darling in your arms

And stay here till the mornin' comes

Look into your smiling eyes

And all I gotta do is rise

Grinderman, Rise

Art by Mïa Mäkila

"Y el contador de chistes decía: a ver, valedores, defínanme una mujer. Silencio. Y la respuesta: pues es un conjunto de células medianamente organizadas que rodean a una vagina. Y entonces alguien se reía, un judicial, muy bueno ése, González, un conjunto de células, sí, señor. Y otro más, éste internacional: ¿por qué la estatua de la libertad es mujer? Porque necesitaban a alguien con la cabeza hueca para poner el mirador. Y otro: ¿en cuántas partes se divide el crebro de una mujer? ¡Pues depende, valedores! ¿Depende de qué, González? Depende de lo duro que le pegues. Y ya caliente: ¿por qué las mujeres no pueden contar hasta setenta? Porque al llegar al sesentaynueve ya tienen la boca llena. Y más caliente: ¿qué es más tonto que un hombre tonto? (Ése era fácil.) Pues una mujer inteligente. Y aún más caliente: ¿por qué los hombres no le prestan el coche a sus mujeres? Pues porque de la habitación a la cocina no hay carretera. Y por el mismo estilo: ¿qué hace una mujer fuera de la cocina? Pues esperar a que se seque el suelo. Y una variante: ¿qué hace una neurona en el cerebro de una mujer? Pues turismo (...) Y cuál es el día de la mujer? Pues el día menos pensado. Y: ¿cuánto tarda una mujer en morirse de un disparo en la cabeza? Pues una siete u ocho horas, depende de lo que tarde la bala en encontrar el cerebro. Cerebro, sí, señor, rumiaba el judicial. Y si alguien le reprochaba a González que contara tantos chistes machistas, González respondía que más machista era Dios, que nos hizo superiores. Y seguía: ¿cómo se llama una mujer que ha perdido el noventa y nueve por ciento de su cociente intelectual? Pues muda. Y: ¿qué hace el cerebro de una mujer en una cuchara de café? Pues flotar. Y: ¿por qué las mujeres tienen una neurona más que los perros? Pues para que cuando estén limpiando no se tomen el agua de wáter. Y: ¿qué hace un hombre tirando una mujer por la ventana? Pues contaminar el medio ambiente".

Roberto Bolaño, 2666

And Frida Kahlo

I am just living to be lying by your side

The Rolling Stones, Moonlight Mile

Art by Laurie Lipton

pic by Robert Frank

"...Pero no hables de los jardines, no hables de la luna, no hables de la rosa, no hables del mar. Habla de lo que sabes. Habla de lo que vibra en tu médula y hace luces y sombras en tu mirada, habla del dolor incesante de tus huesos, habla del vértigo, habla de tu respiración, de tu desolación, de tu traición. Es tan oscuro, tan en silencio el proceso al que le obligo. Oh habla del silencio".

Alejandra Pizarnik, Extracción de la piedra de la locura

Art by Beksinski

Dear darkness

Dear darkness

Won't you cover, cover me again

Dear darkness

Dear I've been your friend for many years

Won't you do this for me?

Dearest darkness

And cover me from the sun under the

Words typing

The words are tighening around my throat and, and

Around the throat of the one I love

The timing, the typing, the tightening

Around the throat of the one I love

The timing, the typing, the tightening

Dear Darkness

Dear Darkness

Now it's your time to look after us

Cos we've kept your clothes

We kept your business

when everyone else was having good luck

So now it's your time

Time to pay

To pay me and the one I love

With the wordly goods you've stashed away

With all the things you took from us

P.J.Harvey, Dear Darkness

Art by Gus Fink

Stay here while I get a curse

To give him a goat head

Make him watch me take his place

Night has brought him something worse

Will Oldham, A Sucker's Evening

Art bt David Stoupakis

Eastern Promises

"Sabía que mi interés era poco realista y probablemente malsano; pero permanecía tercamente, era la geografía de mi deseo. Un chico que veía a veces en el puesto de diarios de la esquina, con el pelo revuelto y aire irritado, podía hacerme estremecer al rozarme el codo con su manga. En cambio, el hombre con quien dormía me parecía impreciso y remoto".

Michael Cuningham, Una casa en el fin del mundo

missyouneedyousomuch