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This is the Anthem.
This is the Anthem.
This is the Anthem.

I found a used copy of Maintaigne's Essays in Paris, the full volume, but the price was too high. I can get it easily on Amazon. Things I'm missing right now: Celine, Genet, Homer, Nietszche. I aw the grave of Proust at Pierre Lachaise, and a memorial for "all the Poles who died for France." My friend laguhed. He said, "Do you think Poland has a memorial for the French who died for Poland?" Of course not. We talked about Petain and the Vichy government. As we walked the streets I said to my daughter, "See all this beauty? Imagine if it was bombed, like Warsaw." Of course, all the finery and food of Paris, Germans can't cook for shit. A crude assessment, but, I am not sure if they would have so wantonly wrecked Paris - they wanted it as is. Hitler has some kind of fixation on Poland. A place to build camps. A place to extend territory that was already mixed - liek the city of Gdansk - it was ruled under a German Polish cooperation - so it's not like you has German speaking areas in France. There is a strange push back, lined with a bit of terror at the mention of Poland. Some mix of - fear and something else. Are they still afraid of the Russians who seized it - from whom they had to run? I know a handful of Germans who say: "oh yes, my Grandmother/Grandfather was from an area there (now Polish) I shoud visit." But they don't. It's like - this forbidden zone. Well the camps are there. How many Germans are visiting them? None that I know. That would be an intersting mandatory field trip. Survivors sometimes visit camps. They come full circle. But interestingly, I never met a German who willfully has done this, and openly discusses it. It's as if the border contains the pain, and it's Polands issue. Poland does actively work on it. The Jewish comunity is involved with rememberance and digs that continue, where they find mass graves. They have them in Germany too. But they are not digging them up. Intersting how the Russian destruction of that great dam in Ukraine revealed the skeletons of German soldiers, mouths open, they looked so expressive, like they were screaming, with their helmets strapped tight, to their heads.
My friend just described a fun wedding. I go to no weddings. I have a ways to go.
Claude Picacsso died. I am good friends with his ex wife of ages ago - a marriage that last not long - a New Yorker - from the hip scene of the 60's - she is my mother's age - I thought I him when I learned the horrible story of Camille Claudel how such a talented bright force was institutionalized for 35 years by her own family - just to control her art. Disgusting. What families do. Jealous family members. It's like you should be born and the first thing you should do is walk away from your family, to preserve your life. Jesus, in the 19th century such talent and just - exploited - because she was female. I don'y see anyone putting Rodin in an institution. It's not even explained what excuse they used to do that. And I think of how cruel Picasso was to his son. Another blind narcissist - I can relate. Hateful towards youth, hateful to was he perceived only as a threat to his virility - to his life span - asshole. Sara described how Clause, when they were married wanted to introduce her to his father, naturally, he was in love and proud. So they drove to that property Picasso bought, with a view to Cezannes mountain, the one Cezanne was so obssessed with, some kind of Hotel Particulier or chateau. I know that mountain well because I suffered through an entire semester of Cezanne and always fell asleep during class, staring at eternal views of trees from that location. They went to his property and there was a concerieg guarging the gate. He explained that he was claude, the owner's son, and after a little while the conceirge returned and told him his father was busy and could not see him. They had driven all the way from Paris to this bloody location and his father would not let him in. Then came a gaggle of contractors to work on the hoom laughing and joking and the concierge opened the gate immediately and they sauntered past...Picasso's own son, and new wife. So there stood Claude, helpless, and they drove back to Paris. Similar to my father, Picasso never gave him anything. Once, I was told. Picasso randomly sent him a poster, signed, "to Claude" or some such thing. ANd that's it. He yearned for inclusion, yearned for his love, his whole life. You know, the crueler parents are, the harder the heart seeks attention, seeks, redemption, because children are essentially good, and need love. But he never got it. There was some kind of relief I was told when the management of Picasso's estate went to Claude, but there he was, defined by his father, again, but in a different way. This story stuck to me. I was treated similarly, with abject cruelty, a horrible kind of jealousy, just for being alive. ANd being female. And being talented. Three strikes, my father wanted totally to eliminate me. I was the most threatening creature on earth. Not a daughter, an object, into which he poured his hatred, and he had a lot of help - from wife #4. It made her look like a loyal fiend, willing to go to any lengths, to prove her loyalty, to seem like an ally to his hatred, to his paranoia, to his distorted lens.
Glas that's over. But it fucked me up in many ways. I can't to weddings.
Blind Daughter of Tuonela that I am
Blind Daughter of Louhi that she is
The Beauty that you feel is not what you see
That I see
You are so blind, more blind, than me.




Pisze po polsku. Bo zacze?o si? tam w Polsce. Gdzie ktos si? urodzi?. Nie tam, gdzie otworzyla si? wrota krwi. Moja wrota krwi. To bylo gdzie indziej. Napisa?em o tym do programu, który zrobi?em z Hansem Bellmerem i za ten tekst Gabrielle Salomon bardzo mnie pochwali?a. Jest gdzie? tutaj, poni?ej. Brama krwi, o ktorej mowie, to inna osoba, w innym miejscu, w innym narodzie. Mówi innym j?zykiem. W jakis sposób nasza krew - sie skrzy?owa?a.
Ale jak to mo?liwe. Aby cz?owiek krwawil, musi zosta? poci?ty. Musi by? rozdarty. Musi zostac zaatakowany. Z czyms, o czym nie mo?e ?ni?. Mo?e co? ze stali, w fabryce, albo w?ókna gwo?dzia, co? najbli?szego zyciu, przymocowane do dloni, ale wkrótce odci?te. Tylko w ten sposób cz?owiek mo?e krwawic. A je?li tak, to jak zmiesza?a si? nasza krew?
Nawet a ja to pisz?, a t, h, ja, s, to w?a?ciwie o nim – on – nie ja – ale on – odbudowuje siebie. Zacz?lo si? nie tutaj. Zacz?lo sie w Polsce. Zacz??o si? od mojego cia?a. Zacz??o si? od jego spojrzenia. Zaczyna sie od zamknietych oczu. Zacz??o sie od mojego lona. Zacz??o sie od ch?ci mieszania. Ale nasza krew byla ju? zmieszana.
Jak to jest.
Jak to si? mog?o miesza? – juz.
polska krew.
I my?l? o w?ciek?o?ci. I jak blisko jest do mi?o?ci. To nie jest spokrewnione, ale siedz? w komnatach blisko siebie. Ich przestrzenie mieszaj? si?, jak zmieszana krew. Mo?na powiedzie? trucizna, ale to jest krew.
THE BLACK THING IN THE ROOM




Can't hold my breath from another
You are the imperfect storm.
My feet are falling from the ground. My head up in the clouds from the core. With fainting eyes.


I hate it when our eyes meet. You know when you have peered into a person's soul. Why did they let you in. Just a crack. But they won't open. To you, they are like the air you breathe, it feels like, blood, in your veins, what you see, what you feel, when you are cut, you bleed them...they come pouring out of you. But they won't let you in. They just show that they want you. But do nothing
And you wish you had 1000 babies with them. How dare they speak of such things with you.


LOVITAR - Blind Daughter of Death

"Loviatar, vaimo vanha,
pahin Tuonen tyttäriä,
ilke'in manattaria,
alku kaikille pahoille,
tuhansille turmioille.
Sill' oli muoto mustanlainen,
iho inhon-karvallinen.
Tuopa musta Tuonen tyttö,
ulappalan umpisilmä,
teki tielle vuotehensa,
pahnansa pahalle maalle.
Selin tuulehen makasi,
kaltoin säähän karkeahan,
perin viimahan viluhun,
kohin päivänkoittehesen."

(Elias Lönnrot, Kalevala, 5th Rune, 1849)


TRANSLATION 1

"The blind daughter of Tuoni,
Old and wicked witch, Lowyatar
Worst of all the Death-land women
Ugliest of Mana's children
Source of all the host of evils
All the ills and plagues of Northland
Black in heart, and soul, and visage

Evil genius of Lappala
Made her couch along the wayside
On the fields of sin and sorrow
Turned her back upon the East-wind
To the source of stormy weather
To the chilling winds of morning."

TRANSLATION 2

"A girl there was of Tuonela
blind
Pit-daughter
an old woman
the worst of Tuoni's daughters
wickedest of death-daughter's
source of all ills
a thousand downfalls;
she had a swarthy face, a
skin of loathsome hue.
Well, that black girl of Tuoni,
the sightless one of the depths,
made her bed upon a road
her litter on evil land
lay with her back to the wind
her side to the rough weather
her rear to the chilly blast.
>
TRANSLATION 3

"The girl of death's domain was blind, Lovitar, an old woman
Death's worst daughter, the wickedest daughter of the Abode of the Dead,
source of all evils, of thousands of disasters
She had a very dark coloring, a vile colored skin
That dark girl of Death, the half-blind one of Waste-Land
Made her bed on a pathway, laid her pallet on bad ground
She lay down back to the wind, aslant to the severe wind,
Back to the blasting cold, facing the dawn."

 


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