Duality
Duality (another word for aimlessness?)
Borges, you mock me when I wander alone through your city.
“He cometido el peor de los pecados
que un hombre puede cometer. No he sido
feliz.” - Jorge Luis Borges, “El remordamiento”
This resident of Santiago de Chile for the past five months has this to say in response: chuta la wea. -_-
I am sitting in a Buenos Aires hostel, taking a break from writing décimas for my final project for Lenguaje y Poética. During this break, I paused to ask myself for what feels like the thousandth time in the past month what direction I am moving in.
An excerpt from a piece I wrote just over two months ago (yes, I am exercising my right as a self-centered writer and referencing my writing within my writing):
“My life breaks pretty evenly into two halves right now.”
That feeling has only intensified in the intervening months. In the hostel around me, most of what I hear spoken is English, a preview for the monumentally monolingual culture I will be dropped back into the middle of in a few short days. I already miss speaking Spanish.
An observation about writing in my non-native language: After many years of study and practice, this past semester in Chile has finally opened me to receive the kinds of singularly vivid images that accompany my writing (especially poetry) in English. That being said, I still struggle with expressing these visions exactly the way I see them, particularly when I am limited to a particularly structure and rhyme scheme, as in the following piece (which, handily, also deals with duality of a sort):
La guitarrista y el ingeniero eléctrico
“Canto con esperanza
Todos los deseos que tengo
Bajo las estrellas de plata
Con ojos cerrados, voz preparada
Para la calle llena de hado
Que espera dentro de los dedos,
Tocando por horas encantadas.
Canto a la senda ancha
Que llega a la casa roja.
Yo, segura de la hora,
No sé nada de este hombre
que llega a la entrada
de la casa roja, alejada
con botas marcando toda la senda
con pasos pesados—hombre, qué eres?”
“Di mi vivacidad sin certidumbre
que viviría en tu dimensión.
Quisiera indicar mi intención:
invitarte a dividir una luz
construido sin límites
iluminando tu vida,
una luz que intensifica tu música.”
“Te veo como amenaza,
hombre extraño de voz baja.
No voy a dar la oreja
a estas tentaciones caramelos,
promesas para aplacar
necesidades que no tengo.”
“Traigo a ti jùbilo,
chispas de vigor.
Juramentos de cumplir
con mi vinculo imputado:
Quiero unir brìos distintos
cuyos luces te dirigen.”
—————-
Borges grew up speaking English as well as Spanish at home; I wonder if he ever had moments of doubt about what language most adequately expressed his feelings in writing.
(Further evidence for my own self-doubt: I had to rewrite the above sentence four times to get it to flow just right.)
This is the first version of the video for my cover of NIN’s “Hurt.”
The song can be bought directly from me (Unwoman) here:http://unwoman.bandcamp.com/track/hurt-2 (you can get the whole, 15-track covers album Uncovered for just $7.99 there too)
It was shot in the wilds of the East Bay by Steen
( http://www.mediapathic.net/ )
The one-take you see for the song worked so well we decided to release it as an official video before the fully edited official video.
If you appreciate this work we did together please check out the documentary project we are raising funds for (mostly via preorders, but every $1 helps)
http://kck.st/pZ42MI
We need to fund some new gear so future videos we do look even better and editing them doesn’t take a zillion years.
Review: Unwoman - Uncovered, Volume I
Unwoman – Uncovered, Volume I (songs originally released between 1980 and 1995)
I am not a child of the 80’s (and in fact I was born after all but five of these songs were released, by my count), but that does not mean that I can’t have an appreciation for the music of that period, especially if it is well interpreted. Unwoman, hereafter referred to as my cousin Erica, goes above and beyond, as usual. :)
Careless Whisper (Wham! Featuring George Michael) – I sometimes describe Erica’s interpretation of this song as a “zombie bellydancing number”, which given the song’s uber-cheesy beginnings is a vast improvement, I think. Makes me dance.
Open Your Heart (Madonna) - Reimagined as a “cyborg love song”, complete with vocoded male and female harmonies. Loses none of its catchiness in the rearrangement, and gains a dimension of reflection about the distance between modern-day lovers.
Crucify (Tori Amos) - Here’s the part where I admit that for my sixteenth birthday, Erica gave me a Dresden Dolls DVD and Tori Amos’s “Little Earthquakes”, which she noted was one of her favorite albums of all time. I was leery, at first, having been turned off by Tori at a young age, finding her over-dramatic, posturing, and generally abrasively strange. But I trusted Erica’s taste, and sat down to listen through the album. It knocked me over, of course, and Erica’s version of Crucify takes all of Tori’s magic and revamps it into crashing waves of desperation and distortion.
She Bop (Cyndi Lauper) - Approaching a catchy peak, here.
Send Me an Angel (Real Life) - Oh wait, no, this is the catchy peak. Walk this one down the street and sing it to the sky.
Let the Music Play (Shannon) - I’ve never heard the original version of this, and I’m not sure I want to. The lyrics sound a little artificial out of context, but Erica delivers them with such conviction that I immediately found a way that they related to my current situation. The cello-only accompaniment is once again a stellar choice.
Naughty Girls (Need Love Too) (Samantha Fox) - No wait, there’s the catchiness peak. Wikipedia cites a critique of this song that claims it sounds more like a T-shirt slogan than a proper song, but I would beg to differ. I think the song (even sans the alleged rap, which I have never heard and do not think I want to) stands well on its own, and Erica’s version of it cranks up the righteous indignation to just the right levels.
Some Kind of Stranger (Sisters of Mercy) - For this track, I would say from experience that it is best heard lying in a dark bedroom, contemplating a recent almost bad decision after having been partying until 5:30 AM.
Billie Jean (Michael Jackson) - The cello and vocals here hit just the right frenetic pitch, and nothing more complex than these two elements is necessary to get the song’s message across.
Hurt (Nine Inch Nails) - So powerful it makes me ache. See my letter to Amanda Palmer for more about what this song does to me.
Do You Love Me? (Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds) - SLinky, sexy, all around badass. Doing Nick Cave proud.
Ceremony (Joy Division) - This one makes me ache too, but in an entirely different part of my chest.
Crushed (Front 242) - This is a dirge in all the best ways, the kind of dirge that makes me want to get up and do something rather than staying trapped in a co-dependent cycle of mourning.
Exile (Alanis Morrisette) - My first impression was that it was quite strange to listen to this from the Southern Hemisphere, where December does not have cold winds (if the heat we’re having right now is any indication, and spring has only just begun here, we’re in for a hot one come December). Lyrical fripperies aside, this is a stark way to end the album, but it definitely gives me a sense of closure.
Hopefully I’ve convinced you to head on over to her bandcamp and take a listen! It’s all streamable for free, and you can download “Careless Whisper” for free too. :)
Cello goddess Unwoman covers (among many others, but these are my favorites) Madonna, Joy Division, and (jaja) Real Life, all with fabulousness and poise. Go get you some of that.
The view from my bedroom in Santiago.
Tentacles electrifying my fingertips
As we swim through the water, it gathers around us, I see it translate between two bodies through the blue
I watch as it ebbs through you, beating with your heart, travelling to your mind
Taking over your body, seeping through time
You see my hands glisten with the stuff as I move mine toward you, only to realize the bond has been broken
The tentacles lie limp in the water
The dark collects around the creature
The electricity is gone, no longer passing through its veins, but passing through the ocean
The electricity stops
We stop.
(Source: beforewegetkilledorworseexpelled)
Reblog if your Tumblr needs more Tesla!
Every Tumblr needs more Tesla.
(via serpentinesleekness)
Unwoman covering “Brand New Day” from Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog at Fanime 2011.
“I think only stupid people have good relationships.”
Pablo Neruda, “El Futuro es Espacio” (“The Future is Space”)
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