the ugly earring

I ran into an old friend this morning. Nearly ten years had passed since we last met in the poetry section of the changing hands bookstore. At the time, she was a mother, poet, and musician in hiding; and I was a student at the university studying poetry. My inexperienced hands were no match to the living she had done and the stories she shared. I was a novice mesmerized by her large wings and long pauses, emulating her style — the disheveled clothes, the hair that covered her eyes and those tired old walking boots.  During this time, she introduced me to many of her colorful friends, and occasionally we met to recite passages by Baudelaire. 

(entire poem here)

For nearly a year, she influenced my pen to the dismay of my professors who had discredited her as a poet.

They assigned poems by traditional women poets, their scathing criticism abolished the idea that a musician can be a poet, and a class on John Milton’s Paradise Lost sent me back to the text books and away from her writings.

(patti smith) 

***

My dear old friend,

It’s a pleasure to see your black wings again.  What a curious world we live in to be separated all this time only to find our trails reunited at this river, feeling and living according to similar sentiments. 

At times it feels quite barren here. 

It’s nice seeing you in this place.

***

(if you live in LA, go here this thursday. it’s free.)

“True artists are prophets. I don’t want to be that prophetic in that sense because it’s so lonely.”

         Yoko Ono

She has said she sleeps in her makeup, because, “to put it on every day would simply take too much time.” Her nails, lacquered in a searing pink, were peeling at the edges.

“When I’m busy I find they get chipped,” she said. “But I’m learning to move my hands quickly, so you won’t see.”

(more here)

topshop unique ready to wear fall 2007.

usa (bouffants)

spain (neck scarf)

tokyo (side burns)

(more here)

rockabilly for women: Women’s fashions in the rockabilly community have never really revived the true 1950s look of poodle skirts worn with letter sweaters. However, glamorous 1950s dresses, often with crinolines, have found some favor. Many of today’s female rockabilly fans are inspired by bad girl pinup models of the 1950s, such as Bettie Page. They often wear animal prints, horn-rimmed sunglasses, fishnet stockings, tight jeans, capris, or short shorts. Tattoos are popular among both sexes.

****

blog poll: what trend do you fear will resurrect from the dead? 

 ”The moment a child is born, the mother is also born.  She never existed before.  The woman existed, but the mother, never.  A mother is something absolutely new.”  ~Rajneesh

…a seahorse song.