The First of April

Time goes fast like a speeding race car in the Grand Prix. I guess the year has finally gone the curve, and it's summer again. The heat is burning up the asphalt and concrete, and everyone's either having fun in the icy-coldness of the shopping malls or just plain stewing in their homes. "April Fools'" how appropriate to start the month this way...maybe to remind ourselves not to take the pressues of life too seriously, or maybe just the opposite, that we are all too foolish to see that life does matter and that we do have to take stock where we are now.

Next week is the start of Cuaresma or Holy Week...time to meditate and be grateful that Jesus does care. Hey, he does. Who among us would have the guts to hang on a cross for almost three hours? No one. And that is why I value Him so much.

Edvard Munch, Ashes, Oil on Canvas

To be quite frank, I really do not know the reason why I decided to post the lyrics of Andrew Lloyd Webber's song "Tell Me on A Sunday, Please." I guess I feel a bit heartbroken, but for whom I can't say. Maybe for that unreachable girl.

Tell Me on A Sunday, Please

Don't try to let up when you want to leave
Don't call me at 3 a.m. from a friend's apartment
I'd like to choose how I hear the news
Take me to a park that's covered with trees
Tell me on a Sunday, please.

Let me down easy
No big song and dance
No long faces, no long looks
No deep conversation
I know the way we should spend that day
Take me to a zoo that's got chimpanzees
Tell me on a Sunday, please.

Don't want to know who's to blame
It won't help knowing
Don't want to fight day and night
Bad enough you're going
Don't leave in silence with no word at all
Don't get drunk and slam the door
That's no way to end this
I know how I want you to say goodbye
Find a circus ring with a flying trapeze
Tell me on a Sunday, please.

Mga Bagong Retrato:

Mga retrato sa opisina.

Enlightenment While Cutting Calamansi

on the Kitchen Table

I cut my finger today while slicing calamansi

for freshly squeezed breakfast juice.

Another piece of flesh I'ved sacrificed

due to a withdrawn state of mind...

Immediate pain ensues

coursing through capillaries beneath my nicked skin.

The incessant flow of viscous blood

marred the sterile whiteness of kitchen tiles.

A reminder, perhaps, of every loss I encounter,

Of the fragility of every fabric that constitutes life.

That everything is transient - objects, occurrences, friends

Sense and non-sense,

pain deeply felt and laughter to console ourselves
All are contained within.

Acceptance.

Odilon Redon"Sita"

NOCTURNE
by Rubén Darío

You that have heard the heartbeat of the night,
you that have heard, in the long, sleepless hours,
a closing door, the rumble of distant wheels,
a vague echo, a wandering sound from somewhere:

you, in the moments of mysterious silence,
when the forgotten ones issue from their prison--
in the hour of the dead, In the hour of repose--
will know how to read the bitterness in my verses.
I fill them, as one would fill a glass, with all
my grief for remote memories and black misfortunes,
the nostalgia of my flower-intoxicated soul
and the pain of a heart grown sorrowful with fêtes;

with the burden of not being what I might have been,
the loss of the kingdom that was awaiting me,
the thought of the instant when I might not have been born
and the dream my life has been ever since I was!

All this has come in the midst of that boundless silence
in which the night develops earthly illusions,
and I feel as if an echo of the world's heart
had penetrated and disturbed my own.

Hope by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes

Sigh (Soupir)
by Stéphane Mallarmé

My soul rises towards your brow, o calm sister,
On which dreams a bespeckled autumn,
And toward the changing sky of your angelic eye
It rises, as in a melancholy garden
A faithful white fountain spray sighs towards the blue sky
- Toward the tender blue sky of October, pale and pure,
Reflecting its infinite languor in the great pools
of the fountain, and trailing a long languid yellow sunbeam
On the still water, where leaves In their tawny death
drift before the wind and trace a cold wake.

Edvard Munch, The Scream


Wandering Mind...Again!

I feel actually numb and dumb today. Again, I should be looking at my situation in a positive light, but it seems that pessimism is the order of the day whenever I’m in the office. I’m so heavily loaded with assignments that I really don’t know what and when to start with. I feel as if I’m in quagmire, and slowly sinking in depression. I keep on drinking coffee to keep my spirits up, but heck, it doesn't change the fact that whatever interest I have in this job is slowly ebbing away.

Do I have what it takes to continue working in this company? Maybe, I have good traits as an employee, but what of expertise? I’m more suitable for cultural work than all of this financial analysis mumbo-jumbo. Crap, I’m beginning to be like the “Born Loser”.

With utmost thanks to the Born Loser comic strip

At least, it’s the weekend. I could take a few hours off to read a book and maybe continue writing my novel.

Catfish and Gourd, Japanese painting 18th Century

Your Catfish Friend
by Richard Brautigan

If I were to live my life
in catfish forms
in scaffolds of skin and whiskers
at the bottom of a pond
and you were to come by
one evening
when the moon was shining
down into my dark home
and stand there at the edge
of my affection
and think, "It's beautiful
here by this pond.I wish
somebody loved me,"
I'd love you and be your catfish
friend and drive such lonely
thoughts from your mind
and suddenly you would be
at peace,
and ask yourself, "I wonder
if there are any catfish
in this pond?It seems like
a perfect place for them."

Arnold Böcklin, Odysseus and Calypso, Tempera, 1883

Love Poem
by Richard Brautigan

It's so nice
to wake up in the morning
all alone
and not have to tell somebody
you love them
when you don't love them
any more.

Sorrows of the Moon
by Charles Baudelaire

Tonight the moon dreams in a deeper languidness,
And, like a beauty on her cushions, lies at rest;
While drifting off to sleep, a tentative caress
Seeks, with a gentle hand, the contour of her breast;

As on a crest above her silken avalanche,
Dying, she yields herself to an unending swoon
And sees a pallid vision everywhere she'd glance,
In the azure sky where blossoms have been strewn.

When sometimes, in her weariness, upon our sphere
She might permit herself to shed a furtive tear,
A poet of great piety, a foe of sleep,

Catches in the hollow of his hand that tear,
An opal fragment, iridescent as a star;
Within his heart, far from the sun, it's buried deep.

Vowels
by Arthur Rimbaud

A black, E white, I red, U green, O blue: vowels,
I shall tell, one day, of your mysterious origins:
A, black velvety jacket of brilliant flies
which buzz around cruel smells,

Gulfs of shadow; E, whiteness of vapours and of tents,
lances of proud glaciers, white kings, shivers of cow-parsley;
I, purples, spat blood, smile of beautiful lips
in anger or in the raptures of penitence;

U, waves, divine shudderings of viridian seas,
the peace of pastures dotted with animals, the peace of the furrows
which alchemy prints on broad studious foreheads;

O, sublime Trumpet full of strange piercing sounds,
silences crossed by [Worlds and by Angels]:
– O the Omega! the violet ray of [His] Eyes!

Voyelles

A noir, E blanc, I rouge, U vert, O bleu: voyelles,
Je dirai quelque jour vos naissances latentes:
A, noir corset velu des mouches éclatantes
Qui bombinent autour des puanteurs cruelles,

Golfes d'ombre; E, candeurs des vapeurs et des tentes,
Lances des glaciers fiers, rois blancs, frissons d'ombelles;
I, pourpres, sang craché, rire des lèvres belles
Dans la colère ou les ivresses pénitentes;

U, cycles, vibrements divins des mers virides,
Paix des pâtis semés d'animaux, paix des rides
Que l'alchimie imprime aux grands fronts studieux;

O, suprême Clairon plein des strideurs étranges,
Silences traversés des [Mondes et des Anges]:
— O l'Oméga, rayon violet de [Ses] Yeux!

Spanish Photographers

The camera is the mechanical extension of the photographer’s eye. Through its lens-covered aperture, the photographer selects a particular subject to document and prints it on light sensitive paper. Photography’s capability to capture a veritable appearance of reality in all its detail has secured it as an indispensable scientific tool. The extensive development of photographic techniques and equipment have expanded the scope of views and subjects: high-speed photography captures the action of moving bodies; infra-red and ultra-violet photography reveal the minute elements of nature, even the mysteries of planets, stars, and space.

Photography is an extremely manipulable medium however, inviting the artist’s creativity and perception in the choice of subject, the measure of light, shadow, focus and shutter speed of the camera’s aperture, and deliberate processing in the darkroom. Since the production of the first box camera in 1888, photographers have considered photography as a significant art form. These artists developed techniques and styles that experimented with the intensities of tonal contrasts, the rhythm and distortion of forms and images, and the presentation of an intimate view into the character and atmosphere of a person, object, or event.

Pablo Genovés

Photographs are articles of memory, documenting bygone events, scenes, faces and emotions. These objects allow the remembrance of a particular experience often the saddest coupled with moments of pleasure and happiness. In contemporary art, themes that deal with the human experience center on the contemplative, the ideal and immaterial reality that the artist aspires and dreams of.

In Pablo Genovés’ photographs, the artist is fascinated with recording the fleeting memory of happiness. Happiness is an extremely inconstant and enigmatic emotion that Genovés interprets as chopped-off, deconstructed, reconstituted, and deformed images derived from modern world iconography: smiles on painted lips, dapper young men and elegant ladies, tea parties, ballet dancers. These happy images spring from a fantasy world yet are established in reality as historical documents of early black and white advertising and anthologies.

The computer manipulations and alterations of the photographs further heighten ambiguity and complexity in meaning. Superimposed over whipped cream, the images are transformed into impastoed paintings or soft-textured sculptures. Through this technique, the distinctions between art forms are blurred almost like the ephemeral quality of memories.

Alberto Garcia-Alix

Alberto Garcia-Alix’s photographs of inanimate objects, empty spaces and rooms, and portraits of eccentric characters often reveal the solitary nature of human existence. Isolated and seemingly commonplace, Garcia-Alix’s images narrate his subject’s personal history in the textures and forms, facial expressions and emotions while interpreting the mysteries of its environment.

Comparable to a 17th century Dutch still-life or memento mori, the objects and personages in the photographs are not merely decorative elements beautifully contrived but are transformed into symbols of life’s brevity, caprices, and vanities. The moments captured and immortalized by Garcia-Alix’s photographs are his selected poignant and sentimental observations of lived experiences. A true artist, Garcia-Alix uncovers the hidden meanings of his subject and shares his enlightened visions of life to the viewer.

Ricky Dávila

The photographs of Ricky Dávila may be strictly classified as traditional photo-reportage, though at closer inspection reveals an inconspicuous dimension: a poetic view into the lives of his subjects. Dávila, though conforming to a journalist’s impersonal and distant character, creates photographs in an attempt to understand the complexities of the outside world. The artist believes that the photographic image has the power to provoke an emotional response from the viewer, and to evoke introspection from the photographer. This process of self-examination encourages an artist to confront and justify his creativity, his work and its meaning.

Portraits in photo-reportage are often treated as objective documentation of reality. But the documentary photograph, like painting or sculpture, also undergoes the creative process. The photographer is the intervening force necessary to capture the essential elements of the subject. His choices, tastes, beliefs and personality fully permeate each photograph and contribute to the general point of view being expressed. Each photograph must project to the viewer the emotions of the subject. In turn, the subject becomes to the viewer a symbol of humanity and everyday life. Photographs may have different interpretations to various people, representing a higher form of language: visual poetry.

Pointless... Today I feel so horribly bushed. This is one of those days that I’d just like to lock myself up in a room, read a book in bed, and finally, take a long nap.

My mind's peregrination has again led me to that good old Greek aphorism: “Gnothi Seauton” – Know thyself. Do I actually know myself at all or am I just creating a consciousness that labels itself “myself?” Or maybe I have subverted that which has always been primal to me? Am I the kind and gentle person that people have thought of me as? Perhaps there is something more to me – darker, more outgoing, or crazy? How do you take off all the layers to uncover your true self?

Tina, Esmie, and I have been wishing for a long vacation, probably two weeks. Oh God, if all of us were gone for more than that, we’d get a tongue lashing from the officers or maybe get sacked. And probably, a ton of paperwork piled Everest-high on our desks to comment on.

Actually, what we really want are new jobs that would make us feel good about ourselves. Jobs that we really like, that would compel us to time-in earlier than the usual and would keep us grinning all the time. Oh, heck that would make us act like robots – ala “Stepford Wives and Children.” Shit. All three of us are about to celebrate our 3rd anniversary at this job, and still we (most of the time “I”) don’t feel anything for it.

I have just been reduced to a vegetative state…time in, do paperwork, lunch…yada, yada, yada…timeout, go home, sleep…and then back to the office.

What’s the point of this existence? Beats me. Crap.

Fathoming Borges’ Fantastic Fictions

I was first introduced to the prose of Jorge Luis Borges four years ago. At that time, I longed for the world of the fantastic and macabre, enticed by the strangeness and uncontrollable fear of what may lie beyond the ordinary. Through a godsend suggestion, a friend encouraged me to read the Argentine writer’s short stories, but jokingly warned to take care since Borges’ literary corpus teeters on the bizarre and disturbing.

I actually found the comments amusing, yet at a certain degree I was filled with apprehension but then my curiosity was perked up and I was ready to try anything new. After searching among the shelves of several bookstores, I finally obtained an anthology of Borges’ short stories entitled Collected Fictions, translated from the Spanish by Andrew Hurley and published by Penguin Books.

My friend was not exaggerating at all with her remarks. At the onset, I was the amazed by the way Borges immediately infuses peculiarity in the plot of his stories—starting with a simple observation or narration of events, he leads the reader into conundrums, improbabilities, and surreal visions that challenge reality and logic. It seemed to me, at one point, that I was reading plots from “The Twilight Zone,” except that Borges wrote these stories twenty years before Rod Serling came up with the television show in the early 1960’s.

I have a confession to make…my fondness for fantasy literature has somewhat declined when I grew up. Naturally, when I was young, my reading fare consisted of the proverbial fairy tales, myths and legends, and fantasy stories, which provided an escape from the tediousness of schoolwork and helped me to spend my idle periods engaged in the wonderful joys of my imagination. How I relish the hours when I shared in the adventures of Peter, Edmund, Lucy, and Susan while reading C. S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia; witnessing the confrontation of good and evil forces in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings; or battling the nefarious monsters faced by the Greek heroes Bellerophon, Perseus, Theseus, and Hercules.

But then like any other babe, I must face the terrors of adolescence. Adding to the consternation of leaving childhood comforts, I was constantly admonished by my parents and teachers to read mature forms of literature instead of the so-called “puerile” subject matter dealt with in fantasy and adventure stories.

Being an obedient child, I followed suit, though slyly maintaining my interest in the fantastic by reading the acclaimed works of Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, Edgar Allan Poe, Alexandre Dumas, and Franz Kafka, and clandestinely revisiting my old fantasy books. However, I painfully discovered that in rereading these stories, I seemed to have drawn too much on its magic that the wonderment I previously enjoyed as a child appears to have diminished, leaving me to be sentimental of the past.

But my encounter with Borges’ anthology of stories was different. It was a real defining moment in my life for it had rekindled that passion for fantasy literature that I felt I had lost in growing-up. At some point, I felt that like me, Borges wanted to reclaim his childhood by fabricating these fantastic stories, radically departing from the maudlin fiction of 19th century Western literature rigorously adhered to in Latin America. Borges acknowledges Franz Kafka’s influence in his fictions, but unlike the Czech author, he does not conceive his stories as full length novels but as concise narratives rich in imagination and detailed in its descriptions.

One of the artifices that Borges cunningly employs are the use of aphorisms and concepts derived from long forgotten tomes of philosophers, historians, and ancient mystics, establishing them as starting points to his plot and ingeniously interweaving suppositions to further highlight the enigmatic nature of the story. For example, Borges’ interpretation of French philosopher Blaise Pascal’s statement that “Nature is an infinite sphere whose center is everywhere, whose circumference is nowhere,” allows time, space, and the universe to become boundless, unrestricted by the laws of science and malleable to physical anomalies and the conniving of men.

Among the stories that expounded this theme, “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius” is unique for its inventiveness. The story, though comically fanciful, can be considered as an allegory for the modern world. It begins with the discovery of an apocryphal publication on the history and civilization of an utopian land written by a secret society of intellectuals who aimed to transform the whole world by overthrowing established reality and propagating the language, sciences, philosophies, and artifacts of a phantasmal society. Written during World War II, “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius” reveals Borges’ dissatisfaction for the world governed by supernatural laws which can hardly be discerned and presupposes that it would be better for the world to negate its connections with the divine order and adopt human arrangements and rule since these are inventions that are concrete and intelligible.

More than products of his erudition and imagination, Borges’ stories tries to deconstruct and challenge the heroic and persevering image of man—for man can be the victim of circumstances which he has no control of. Man is constantly at the center of many contradictions that affects the world, existence, relationships, surroundings, and emotions that he has to resolutely confront to survive. These stories emphasize that man in no mere accidental creation but one imbued with will and the spirit, independent and able to adapt to times and situations. Although divine encounters do occur in Borges’ stories, these are relegated as coincidences and more often, these preternatural interventions are sometimes perplexing because they either provide the conflict or denouement in the plot, making the reader wonder if the protagonist is the victim of a cosmic prank of fate or an Omnipotent being such as delineated in the story “The Secret Miracle.”

I finished reading Borges’ anthology of stories after a week. When I turned the last page of the book, I came to realize these stories convey profound universal truths: human existence is basically chaotic, but conflicts and challenges make man’s life colorful and extraordinary. Borges’ stories indirectly points out that living is more than engaging in a humdrum lifestyle—it is how we mold ourselves and how we respond to situations that we are able to experience life fully. Another facet of truth that I discovered is that everyday experiences such as taking the time to smile, sharing in the joys of family life, or expressing your tenderness to a loved one are enigmas that we should not dare question nor comprehend, but something we should accept and enjoy.

My friend Tina provided me with a copy of the lyrics for this Baz Luhrman song. The nuggets of wisdom will knock at your head and heart.

Everybody is Free (to wear Sunscreen)

Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of ’97... wear Sunscreen.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.

The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists; whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.

I will dispense this advice.

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Never mind. You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they have faded. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.

You are NOT as fat as you imagine.

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Sing.
Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts, don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss.
Don’t waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind. The race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive, forget the insults (if you succeed in doing this, tell me how.)

Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch.
Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives, some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don’t.

Get plenty of calcium.
Be kind to your knees, you’ll miss them when they’re gone.

Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll have children, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary.

Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself, either. Your choices are half chance, so are everybody else’s.

Enjoy your body, use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it, it’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.

Dance.
Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.

Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your parents, you never know when they’ll be gone for good.

Be nice to your siblings; they are your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few, you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle because the older you get, the more you need the people you knew when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard;

Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel.
Accept certain inalienable truths, prices will rise, politicians will philander, you too will get old, and when you do you’ll fantasize that when you were young prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their elders.

Respect your elders.
Don’t expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund, maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse; but you never know when either one might run out.

Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time you're 40, it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me on the Sunscreen.

Remembering Jasper Fforde

I remembered reading Jasper Fforde's first novel three years back. It was one of the best reads I had because it took away the boredom I felt whenever I was stuck in the office of Mr. Fat Rich Negerense Congressman I worked for in the House of Representatives. The book was very imaginative for me...a Literary Department for the Police? Even the protagonist has a peculiar name - Detective Thursday Next.

I often wished that I could be part of the story. If there was a chance for anyone to enter a book or story of his/ her choice, what would it be? If I could trap anyone of my "enemies" (though I don't think I have one, I have always been good to everyone I know) in a poem, what would it be? Maybe, I'll take Fforde's cue and trap them in Edgar Allan Poe's poem "The Raven," so that they'll always have to say the refrain "Nevermore."

By the River Bank, Watercolor on paper

Seascape, Watercolor on paper

Lady with Flower Pot (copied from Juan Luna painting), Pastel on paper

Young Woman, Pencil on paper

Naked Australian man, pencil on paper

Again, my paintings and drawings on a variety of subjects.

Bar Scene in Baclaran, Oil & encaustic on Canvas paper

Bar Scene 2, Oil & encaustic on Canvas paper

Dressing Room, Oil & encaustic on Canvas paper

American Miner, Pencil on paper

Indian woman, Pencil on paper

These are some of my works that I'm posting in this blog. I really should start drawing and painting again.

I have decided to write stories for the time being. I am posting a story which I wrote a few months back. It's actually written for children and takes the form of a myth.

The First Trees on Earth

In the early days, the earth was still young and newly formed by the sky goddess Inang Mayari from the soil of her heavenly home, Maluwalhati. The earth was greatly parched and rock-strewn, rippling in hillocks as far as the eye can see. The sky, which was but an arm’s breadth distance from the earth, was constantly tinged orange and yellow since the sun blazed brightly among the clouds. All that abundantly grew in this arid land were vines, prickly cogon grass, and hard shoots of rattan cane.

Inang Mayari had not yet created the first human beings. She formed the earth solely as a home for her pets. These beloved pets were a carabao named Nuang, a monkey named Kiririk, a rooster named Sari, a snake named Uleg, and a frog named Patang. They were very special to Inang Mayari because of their unusual beauty, having ivory skin and silvery hair that gleamed brightly under the sun. In order that her pets would not become lonely, Inang Mayari created other animals out of clay and breathed on them to give life.

One day, the sun scorched the earth with its blistering rays. Hot fumes rose up from the earth and spread out the sweltering heat. All of the animals, even Inang Mayari’s pets were fretting anxiously at the oppressive weather. The uproar reached Inang Mayari’s ears, and she promptly descended to the earth.

Nuang the carabao cried out piteously to Inang Mayari, “Mistress, we are suffering terribly because of the sun’s rays. There is no shade to give us relief from the heat.”

“The rattan does not give us enough cover,” Uleg the snake moaned.

“The cogon grass is prickly on the skin,” croaked Patang the frog.

Inang Mayari was saddened at the animals’ discomfort. “My dear pets, how can I help you?” she whispered.

“Farther up from the highest peaks of Maluwalhati, the gigantic Tree of Life grows. We could gather its seed pods and sow them on earth,” exclaimed Kiririk the monkey.

“We can shower these seeds with Maluwalhati’s sweet waters to help them grow into strong trees,” observed Sari the rooster.

Inang Mayari liked the idea very much, but was uneasy. “How do we get up to the highest heaven? I can only fly up to Maluwalhati and no further,” she mused.

“We can build large wings!” suggested Sari the rooster.

“I can bring down two long rattan poles with the help of the other carabaos!” offered Nuang the carabao.

“I and the other monkeys can weave the cogon grass into mats to cover the rattan frame,” said Kiririk the monkey.

“The snakes can gather the vines to twist into ropes,” said Uleg the snake.

“We frogs can knot the vines to tie up the poles and mats together,” trilled Patang the frog.

“I can ask Habagat, the North Wind to give us a lift,” crowed Sari the rooster.

Inang Mayari bid the animals to work together to finish the wings.

The animals all worked hard. Nuang and the carabaos uprooted two long rattan poles with their horns and tugged them to the animals’ work place. Kiririk and his monkey friends wove the cogon grass into huge mats, and created straps to help Inang Mayari wear the wings. The snakes dragged and twisted vines into ropes, while the frogs began to nimbly tie up the poles and mats together. Sari and other birds of the air entreated Habagat the North Wind to buoy Inang Mayari up when she flew.

Habagat the North Wind was also tired of the oppressive sun that he agreed to help the animals. He even lent to Inang Mayari, his weathered magical parasol, which could make them light as a feather.

As soon as the wings were finished, Inang Mayari hopped on Nuang’s back, strapped on the wings while the other pets clambered up. Inang Mayari held on her left hand Habagat’s magic parasol and began to flap the wings upward and downward. The parasol tinkled sweetly, and shortly they were lifted far from the ground. Swiftly, Habagat blew them further up with a windy puff.

Inang Mayari and her pets flew past the highest heavens of Maluwalhati and saw the glistening branches of the Tree of Life. When they reached it, Kiririk the monkey climbed up and began to harvest the Tree’s golden seed pods.

While Inang Mayari and her pets were descending to earth, they scattered the seeds on the ground, which immediately took root. Inang Mayari commanded Maluwalhati’s streams to rain down on the earth to water the seeds.

Soon enough, large trees sprouted and covered the earth with emerald foliage, giving all the animals shelter from the fiery sun. These are the first trees to grow on earth.

Tod

The Panzers have all rushed in to take us down--
Blitzkrieg is the perfect way to suprise, both friend and foe
without any cry not even a whimper--we won't have any recourse
everything leads to that which the old ones, our ancestors say we should fear
Dying isn't it a dance routine from one fleeting existence to the next--
maybe a rhumba or frenzied waltz that those Chicanos cavort to celebrating Dia de la Muerte?

Mishima had it right expiration should be an elegant act
for poets and artists to partake of--
A white flowing yukata marred by crimson droplets,
a swift chop to complete the artistry
of such a delicate procedure.

To Cut

To cut
does not necessarily
mean that I
with finality of intention
sever that which
we both longed for—
An affinity perhaps
for poetry that
mattered to
the everyday
The sundry facets
are revealed as
innocuous, inordinate, enigmatic
like worlds within
tufts of grassy earth
or the lines
and whorls of time-worn hands.
My comrade,
we may not bloom
like a field of amaranths
Likely our friendship
Suffers from
withering rot
Yet its tendrils
pulsate of
Lives lived and sometimes
lost in joys or of sadness
This cutting
may not be severe or
a distancing but heralds
beginnings
never the shutting of our doors

Hannah Höch (1889-1978): Collages

Change occurs as a reactionary challenge and opposition to established beliefs and norms. Change is rooted in the development of free thought. It confronts elements of tradition as it provides a chance to expand personal views. Change often allows unique art ideas to emerge, providing an alternative insight and interpretation of contemporary themes.

Industrial growth and new scientific and technological discoveries brought about an evolution of lifestyles, preferences, and rapid urbanization during the early 20th century. Industrialization transformed Western society and made life comfortable: machines replaced human labor; factories replaced domestic production of goods; education and public health standards improved; new means of transportation and communication were invented. These developments also caused sweeping social, economic, and political reforms that gave people more opportunities to establish and invest in various businesses; laws that protect worker's rights; suffrage and active participation in government.

These events encouraged artists to address the need to portray the changes that affected nature and the environment, individual and social relationships, and national character. New materials and techniques allowed artistic experimentation to fulfill this objective. Interpretations of social issues elicited two opposing responses from artists: the unconditional acceptance and acclamation of human advancements because of economic progress, and a concern for the dehumanization and degradation of the common person.

Economic rivalry, nationalist extremism, and militarism in Europe heralded the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, shattering the social, cultural, and political order of modern Western civilization. Artists who fled to Zurich, Switzerland from the battlefronts, were appalled by the mindless slaughter, as well as, the blind rationale and materialism that started the conflict.

Cynical of the Old World order, a group of European literary and visual artists was united by disgust for the intellectual and aesthetic postures of both traditional and new art movements. They attacked cultural conventions and standards of good taste. They called the organization “dada,” a term that meant “hobby horse” in French, and was also the reiteration of the first vocal enunciation of a child.

Dada is characterized by the concept of chance in art creation, using a variety of media: newspaper and photograph clippings, metal sheets, glass, and utilitarian objects to create unusual artworks such as ready-made sculptures, word-image play, and collage. Through other outrageous artistic, literary, and musical parodies and provocation, the Dada movement contrived temporal performances more than permanent artworks because it believed that art, under the whims of a society bent on self-destruction, was not worth saving or perpetuating. Its anti-art influence flourished in Zurich, Switzerland; Cologne, Berlin, Hanover in Germany; Paris, France; and New York, USA from 1915 to 1923.

One of the leading figures of the Berlin Dada Group is its sole female member, Hannah Höch (1889-1978). She studied Applied Arts and Painting at the State Museum of Applied arts in Berlin and worked as a designer at the Ullstein Publishing House. Through her intimate friendship with Austrian artist and photographer Raoul Hausmann (1886-1971), Höch joined the Berlin Dada Group in 1918. Her training in publishing and art proved invaluable in the formulation of the photomontage technique. Photomontage is a type of collage composition made up of overlapping images from photographs and printed pictures.

Hannah Höch’s photomontage works were blatantly critical and satirical of the social and political scene in Germany after World War I. She considered the photomontage as her means of defiant self-assertion, focusing mainly on issues such as racial and gender discrimination, equal work opportunities, decision making, and respect for human rights. Höch’s treatment of these themes combined the serious with the fantastic. Using a pair of scissors, she would cut out various shapes, pictures from newspapers, magazines, and photographs, allowing herself to play around with images and undergo what she termed as a “voyage of discovery.” In her creations, it was imperative for Höch to open the mind to the “delights of the coincidental” because it would act as a constant stimulus on the imagination.

These combinations produced a menagerie of strange animal-men, doll women, and hybrid plant monsters, creating a fairy tale world but communicating a disturbing ambivalence bordering on the hallucinatory. The images’ transformations show us the dual aspect of nature: enchanting and threatening, creative and destructive at the same time.

Though these cutouts may seem arbitrary and turbulent, the artist revealed an underlying value for order and composition by carefully selecting, arranging, and combining the images to form a unified artwork. Höch held the firm conviction, though contrary to Dada’s anti-art position, that the substance of artistic creation is established in the order of its visual elements.

The Nazis labeled Höch’s critical avant-garde works “degenerate” and she was forbidden to create art in 1933. Retreating to the outskirts of Berlin, the artist discreetly continued to create small photomontage works that she hid in her house. During the postwar period, with the availability of full-color magazines and brochures, Höch’s photomontages extensively used its color-saturated pages, interpreting the complex symbolism of advertising and transforming its banal images into visual poetry.

Höch’s body of works reveals an artist confident of her talent and creativity, willing to participate in art’s progress by experimenting with various materials and techniques to create new art forms, regardless of art’s male-dominated cliques and political persecutions. Undaunted by and distant from the emerging art movements of the postwar decades, Höch remained faithful to her technique. Not alienating herself from ideas that would improve her vision, she quietly observed, selected, and interpreted the world’s complex images in her own private way.

On Art
by Rainer Maria Rilke

Art is childhood, after all. Art means to be oblivious to the fact that the world already exists and to create one. Not to destroy what one encounters but simply not to find anything complete. Countless possibilities. Countless wishes. And suddenly to be fulfillment, to be summer, to have sun. Without speaking about it, unwittingly. Never to be done. Never to have the seventh day. Never to see that all is good. Dissatisfaction is youth. God was too old at the beginning, I think. Otherwise he would not have stopped on the evening of the sixth day. And not on the thousandth day. Still not today. This is all I hold against him. That he could expend himself. That he thought that his book was finished with the creation of the human and that he has now put away his quill to wait and see how many editions will be printed. That he was no artist is so very sad. That yet he was no artist. One wants to cry over this and lose all courage for everything.