A List of Good Things-Pt III
People, places, and things enjoyed in the last month
I may not have travelled much this summer, but I did read, see, and eat some pretty wonderful things. Here are some of my favorites:
My friend Sophie Pinkham’s short, thoughtful, complex analysis of the borderlands of Russia/Ukraine, “A Once Familiar Place” at The Drift Mag. I love these lines in particular:
A border is a figment of human imagination — at least until war breaks out. A wall is something you can touch and feel, or at least view from a distance. Never mind that it is destructive and expensive, the physical manifestation of a failure of imagination.
I recently rewatched the somewhat-problematic-but-nonetheless-delightful Party Girl (1995) and have a renewed appreciation for my perennial love, Parker Posey, and especially her outfits. In case anyone doesn’t already know this film: Parker Posey plays the Lower East Side-based eponymous party girl, who is forced by her godmother to get a job as a library clerk. Perhaps because I identify very strongly as both party girl and bookish dweeb, I found her retro-chic party-librarian looks especially appealing. Case(s) in point:
My house in Philadelphia sits directly between two neighborhoods: Washington Square West and the Gayborhood— a real, official name (check Google maps if you don’t believe me!)— so I am used to seeing fun LGBTQ+ swag around. I’m just a half-block away from Giovanni’s Room, the oldest LGBTQ+ bookstore in the country. In the past few weeks I’ve noticed something called the Philadelphia Lesbian Mapping Project crop up, with wheatpasted monuments of likely-fictionalized everyday life. I absolutely love it, and want my students next term to do something like this. The connection between city life, romance, the quotidian, and the monumental immediately reminded me of old readings of Georg Simmel’s “The Ruin” and especially Robert Smithson’s “The Monuments of Passaic.”
Here are more that were posted on instagram:
My friends are so dang talented. Case in point: Catherine Carberry, whose short story “Dog Days” from The Masters Review is such a fantastic read, and perfect for late summer. And it even won an award! Check it out here!
I read a looot of poetry this summer, especially Audre Lorde and Paul Celan. I had wanted to read both for years; a few years back, I named an Eastern Swallowtail butterfly after Paul Celan because it just felt right. After reading an excellent auto-theoretical biography of Celan by Chase Berggrun in Poetry magazine, I went into a deep dive reading every translated poem by the tortured Jewish germanophone poet that I could find. The latter’s poem Corona was one of my favorites; Celan was so obviously ahead of his time:
Autumn eats its leaf out of my hand: we are friends.
We shell time from the nuts and teach it to walk:
time returns to the shell.In the mirror is Sunday,
in the dream we sleep,
the mouth speaks true.My eye goes down to my lover’s sex:
we gaze at each other,
we speak of dark things,we love each other like poppy and memory,
we sleep like wine in the seashells,
like the sea in the moon’s blood-beam.We stand and embrace at the window, they watch us from the street:
it is time, for this to be known!
It is time that the stone took the trouble to bloom,
that unrest’s heart started to beat.
It’s time for it to be time.It is time.
As for Audre Lorde, there are far too many fantastic poems that I can hardly choose just one. Before this month I was more familiar with her essays in Sister Outsider than her poetry, but then saw a documentary on Lorde that heavily featured her performing poetry. I will likely include more next month, but for now the poem Coal, from her first (!) collection in 1968, was especially chilling:
I
Is the total black, being spoken
From the earth's inside.
There are many kinds of open.
How a diamond comes into a knot of flame
How a sound comes into a word, coloured
By who pays what for speaking.
Some words are open
Like a diamond on glass windows
Singing out within the crash of passing sun
Then there are words like stapled wagers
In a perforated book—buy and sign and tear apart—
And come whatever wills all chances
The stub remains
An ill-pulled tooth with a ragged edge.
Some words live in my throat
Breeding like adders. Others know sun
Seeking like gypsies over my tongue
To explode through my lips
Like young sparrows bursting from shell.
Some words
Bedevil me.
Love is a word another kind of open—
As a diamond comes into a knot of flame
I am black because I come from the earth's inside
Take my word for jewel in your open light.
This summer I joined the Philadelphia Community Orchestra, despite not really playing any instrument that could be easily used “in” an orchestra (all I know is piano, vaguely, from childhood, plus recently-acquired [very amateur] drum skills; sadly my expert ability to match BPMs in Virtual DJ doesn’t map easily onto the orchestra setting). I’ve never done anything quite like PCO— it has “orchestra” in the title but all the songs chosen are very improvisational. The majority of pieces are either ultra-modern/contemporary or quite ancient (especially medieval/renaissance). We have a show next month and attendance is free! Monday Sept 16 at 7:30. Here is a Facebook Event Link. Anyone can join next season! Very chill, truly the least uptight orchestra I could imagine.
Is it just me or is Reductress at its absolute peak, rivalling the best of the Onion from several decades ago? This post especially hit all the right film bro notes:
Although it sadly closed earlier this month, I was thrilled to see the Community of Images exhibit, created through Collaborative Cataloguing Japan. The exhibit featured some of the most interesting avant-garde moving image art from the 1960s to the present day, with a special focus on the way Japanese and American artists overlapped with one another. I already wrote about Donald Richie’s piece in this exhibit in an earlier post, and Oe Masanori’s Great Society (1967). Here is more information about the exhibit, as well as a few additional photos:
BLTs. Just that: BLTs. Perhaps the perfect sandwich? The ideal, filling midday meal for tomato season, and there’s just something so pure, so ideal, in the lettuce-tomato-bacon combo, preferably on some fresh sourdough and olive oil mayo (on both sides of the bread). I was pregnant most of this summer (not anymore, long story) and for some reason BLTs were my craving of choice. There was a two week stretch when I had at least one a day. While my local media-favorite sandwich shop, Middle Child, had a line for their seasonal BLTs that was several hours (!) long at one point, I actually loved the ultra-simple version made in my local cafe, Good Karma. Here is a photo of my favorite homemade treat on my favorite decidedly-not-homemade West Elm plate:
Until next time, and happy (ugh) first day of fall semester to all who celebrate!
