'If they give you ruled paper, write the other way'

I rarely, if ever, post poetry on my blog, unless it's my own, and i rarely if ever post that. But my wonderful friend delgaserasca put this up on her LJ, and when I read it it affected me so strongly that I felt it deserved a wider audience. Read it, see what you can take away from it; I hope it helps some of you, if you need it. :)


Austria
by Paul Guest

Easy in a college town to hang Klimt
from your many times repaired wall
or life and easy to think this better,
somehow, than violence or routine
or the kaleidoscopic degradations each waitress
in her kindness prepares
for you. Lord, a long time
I have thought of what more there is
to say. Lord, I have thought
this. Sometimes committed my flesh
to unbearable action
if only to gain speed in retreat.
If only to wake in the dark strangeness
of agreements: falsehoods
and broken words and spasms
of summer. And now a loveliness passes
and it does not matter
of what it is made or when
or living and named and nightly possessed.
Lord, it does not matter
that any of us keep on
but we do. In great numbers,
in harrowing efficiencies,
we cannot do anything but this
persistence that will not go.
I am trying, Lord, to love this world,
however it is fated
to end. Behind the wall a girl
is making love.
Two rooms distant I can hear her
and want to leave
even through the spill of rain.
But I stay because
there is nothing to leave
my mind will not carry with it
in a kind of tortured attentiveness.
I know her name
if only by her business card
given to me like I would have a use for it.
Like I had waited there
for her name. Not
all my life but a devoted time.
What else but her name and her nerves unspooling now
could I wait for? Besides
silence. Or mercy.
Or deafening rain. Her sign to now, now,
Lord, be still.

 

Anyway, book meme, snaffled fromdelgaserasca  :D

1/ Which author do you own the most books by?
*Checks bookshelf* Joanne Harris, I believe. I discovered her long after everyone else did and long after everyone had stopped raving about Chocolat, and decided to read some for myself, and I am hooked and lined and sinkered by her writing. I don't own all of them but dammit I will do soon.

2/ What book do you own the most copies of?
I only ever own one copy of a book, unless I've got it out of the library as well for some reason.

3/ What fictional character in a book are you secretly in love with?
I never seem to fall in love with characters in books, aside from in an 'oh-wow-this character-is-so-unbelieveable-madeofinsane-awesome' kind of way. So, either Granny Weatherwax in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, or Vianne Rocher in Joanne Harris' novel Chocolat. Just because both of them are such unconventional characters, particularly in their settings - Weatherwax as a non-traditional witch who tries so damn hard to be a traditional one ('HEADOLOGY'!) and Vianne being that bright, colourful, exuberant woman in that tiny dusty town where woman are still ruled over by men. i love them both for many different reasons. </Rant>

4/ What book have you read more than any other?
Oh jeez, this is difficult. As a teenager it was Chinese Cinderella, Adeline Yen Mah's autobiography of her first 14 years. Nowadays it's probably Keeping Faith, my favourite of Jodi Picoult's books.

5/ What was your favorite book when you were 10 years old?
Danny The Champion Of The World by Roald Dahl, and The Owl Who Was Afraid Of The Dark by Jill Tomlinson.

6/ What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
I'm tempted to say The Wag's Diary by Alison Kervin because the subject of the book is so far removed from my usual reading (I got the book free with a magazine and read it out of boredom), but for what it was, it was quite well written. So I guess I'll have to go with Where Blue Begins by Janice Deaner. Potentially good subject, the whole plot line is based around secrets and the nature of secrets, but it's so DULL. The author could have made so much more out of the subject matter, and instead it's just far too slow-paced.

7/ What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Quite possibly The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. Although I still can't read the bit about the feet without feeling sick.

8/ If you could tell everyone you know to read one book, what would it be?
The Waves by Virginia Woolf. It's almost a completely different genre of literature all on its own.

9/ What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Testament Of Youth by Vera Britten. So difficult to read in lots of ways. Firstly, it's 661 pages long. Secondly, it's an autobiography, which I always have some difficulty reading because it's someone's actual personal memoirs and as a simple reader I can never feel, or in some cases even begin to imagine, what the author feels. Thirdly, it was a recommended text for my War Literature synoptic module in A-Level Literature, and I never like reading those because I know that having to analyse them will make me hate the book.

10/ Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
I don't think I've ever read anything by a Russian author. So I guess by default it would be French.

11/ Shakespeare, Milton or Chaucer?
I've never read any Milton, although I want to what I have the time. For actual reading I would say Chaucer, because although I like Shakespeare, I would much prefer te see it on stage than to just read the text of the plays.

12/ Austen or Eliot?
Eliot.

13/ What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I haven't read any Dickens and I've only ever read one novel by Austen. I'm not particularly embarrassed by this; I've never been a huge fan of the 'classic' style, and it's my personal belief that like music, or art, literature has to move forward and authors must try out new styles. Creativity is all about pushing the boundaries.

14/ What is your favorite novel?
I have so many. An Equal Music by Vikram Seth. The Chronicles of Narnia (yes, all of them) by C.S. Lewis. Keeping Faith by Jodi Picoult. The Tenth Circle, also by Jodi Picoult. Gentlemen & Players by Joanne Harris. Sleep, Pale Sister, another Joanne Harris. I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. And, still, The Owl Who Was Afraid Of The Dark by Jill Tomlinson :D.

15/ Play?
I think it has to be Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.

16/ Poem?
Oh God, I can't do this one. I Carry Your Heart by E. E. Cummings is one of my favourites. And The Journey by Mary Oliver. But there are SO many.

17/ Essay?
I've hardly read any, although i do like Susan McClary's essay on male hegemony in Romantic music.

18/ Short story?
King Frog in Exile, from the short story collection The Tent by Margaret Atwood. And all of Andrea Lee's collection Interesting Women, particularly Full Moon Over Milan.

19/ Non-fiction?
Sunbathing In The Rain: A Cheerful Book About Depression by Gwyneth Lewis, although that might come under memoirs as well because it's a little bit of both. And - being a complete and total geek here - Music Therapy In Context by Mary Priestley (ed. Johannes Th. Eschen).

20/ Graphic novel?
I haven't read any, but high up on my list of things to read is the Sandman series by Neil Gaiman.

21/ Memoir?
An Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison - such a powerful book, and I think it should be a prescribed text for anyone wanting to go into psychiatry or psychology as a career. Not Without My Sister by Kristina Jones/Celeste Jones/Juliana Buhring, which is the memoir of three sisters trapped in the cult religion 'The Children Of God' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_God_%28cult%29 if you want to find out more). It's truly unsettling in places but well worth reading. Lucky by Alice Sebold, because it's so full of dry, dark humour, and irony and sarcasm from the author, and you get the distinct feeling that there's a hell of a lot going on behind it all. And finally, Moab is My Washpot by Stephen Fry, because...well, it's Stephen Fry, what more of a reason do you need?!

22/ History?
In terms of historical fiction, the only ones I've read are all by Philippa Gregory, of which my favourite has to be The Constant Princess, which is about the life of Katherine of Aragon. That said, I really liked Empress Orchid by Anchee Min as well.

23/ Mystery or noir?
Never been a huge fan of either. Mystery's not really my thing.

24/ Science fiction?
Hitchhiker's Guide, although I need to read them again, and some of the Red Dwarf novels weren't half bad either. But I've never been a huge reader of science fiction. For me it's a genre that lends itself better to film andTtV than to literature.

25/ Who is your favorite writer?
Oh, i have so many. Joanne Harris is definitely in the top three.

26/ Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
J.K. Rowling. I liked the Harry Potter books, and i have all seven of them, but she's not a great writer. She's a storyteller, and thre's nothing wrong with that, but people are making out that she's the best thing since sliced bread and she just isn't.

27/ What are you reading right now?
I've just finished Poppy Shakespeare by Clare Allan, and I'm now reading The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory. It's supposed to be her best book so far. I'm not finding it as good as some of her others, myself, but we'll see.

I'd like to add a couple of questions of my own to this meme:

28/ Favourite film adaptation of a book?
Probably I Capture The Castle. The film was made a lot darker and more intense than the book, but it fitted pretty well.

29/ What's your guilty pleasure book?
Mine would have to be The Secret Diary of a Demented Housewife by Niamh Greene. Chick lit at its finest. :D
 

• This Is Your Brain On Music (Daniel Levitin) - this is for my research project. I'm trying to find out how the brain interprets music and which parts of the brain it specifically uses, and how this works in the brains of physically disabled people when other functions have been destroyed. It's a really useful book, and one that I'm enjoying reading, not least because Levitin explains everything more or less in layman's terms so it's scientific without being too daunting for someone non-scientific like me.
• An Unquiet Mind (Kay Redfield Jamison) - the author of this is one of the leading experts in the entire field of psychotherapy and the manic-depressive illness, and is herself a sufferer of manic depression. I decided to read it after hearing Stephen Fry mention it on an episode of QI (obviously, what the Fry says goes!); it's basically a memoir of her experiences with the disease, and the way she describes her manic states is incredible - she focuses on those more than the depressive states, because less people understand what the manic episodes are like. In my opinion, this should be a prescribed text for any psychotherapist in training.
• The Light Fantastic (Terry Pratchett) - I decided to reread my Discworld collection (which currently consists of about 5 books), so this is my silly fiction book. I read something humorous whenever I'm ill, and I currently have a cold :(

Pick 10 people and give them the 'you make my day' award in no particular order. If you're picked, you are charged with picking 10 of your own (unless you've already done it).


This is going to be incredibly difficult, but in no particular order:

1)

ladyofsalzburg

  for always being there to cheer me up and for lazing about on the chairs in the foyer with me
2)

delgaserasca

  for making me laugh, stopping me cry and for all the ducks!
3)

sevenhelz

  for making exceedingly good food and even better music
4)

smokeymcjazzcat

  for putting up with my insane mood swings and long rants about life
5)

bobthepetferret

 for being generally insane and never laughing at my ideas!
6)

a7x_loveee

  for drunken texts and rants about how shit both men and women can be
7)

cydonianknight

  for all the takeaways, cider, guilty pleasures (ahem!) and sofa jokes!
8)

tiwla

  for all the advice and for filling my mind with phonetic filth
9)

anhourortwo

  for the serious conversations and the confidence boosts
10) and last but not least

mijdge

 who has been a fantastic, funny friend for more years than i would willingly put up with myself for!

Congratulations, you win the awards. come and collect your shiny trophies!
xxxx :)

edit: I have no idea why it's gone wonky, but LJ won't let me put it straight without turning all the writing blue and not turning it back again. Hrumph. xx

A question for the musicians among you: Have you ever tried playing your chosen instrument, or any other instrument, with your eyes closed?

I ask because I just tried playing the piano with my eyes closed - the piano is not my instrumental forte (pardon the awful pun there, it wasn't intended) but my second or third instrument really - and I don't think I'm overexaggerating by saying it was quite incredible an experience. For those who don't know, my research project for my third year of uni is on music and disability, and how music (particularly the ability to perform) has been made more available to the physically disabled. So, after doing some research this afternoon, I decided to go and play some music myself, and I got to thinking about what it is like for blind musicians, and I closed my eyes and tried playing. I didn't do too badly, but it was a piece I knew and had memorised. But the sound that came out of the piano and out of my fingers was different somehow to how it normally sounded; because I was being more careful about where I put my fingers and because I had no sheet music to guide me, I felt the piano differently and the sound seemed better, more clear, and most definitely 'deeper' in some way. I've played that particular piece on the piano so often I'd forgotten what it was supposed to sound like, and playing it with my eyes closed sort of brought back its musicaility to me.

The above probably sounds very strange to you all, but if you're a musician, try it - if you can try it on an instrument that isn't your primary one, even better. it really puts a whole new perspective on the music you're playing.

Next research: playing with earplugs in to muffle the sound, as it would be for someone with partial hearing.