{"id":7291,"date":"2010-04-16T06:54:48","date_gmt":"2010-04-16T10:54:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=7291"},"modified":"2010-04-16T10:30:47","modified_gmt":"2010-04-16T14:30:47","slug":"look-up-look-up-or-is-it-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2010\/04\/look-up-look-up-or-is-it-down\/","title":{"rendered":"Look Up! Look Up! (Or Is It Down?)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

[Image: “Looking Up the Yosemite Valley,” by Alfred Bierstadt.
\nFor more information, see the Haggin Museum site<\/a>.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Note:<\/strong> Here for Poetry Friday (hosted today at the impossibly appealing Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast<\/em><\/a>)? Never before been here on a Friday? Just plain confused by what’s going on in this post? You might want to read about my “whiskey river<\/em> Fridays” series, at its own “About” page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n

Thursday<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have had my dream — like others —
\nand it has come to nothing, so that
\nI remain now carelessly
\nwith feet planted on the ground
\nand look up at the sky —
\nfeeling my clothes about me,
\nthe weight of my body in my shoes,
\nthe rim of my hat, air passing in and out
\nat my nose — and decide to dream no more.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(William Carlos Williams [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and, likewise<\/a> (although whiskey river<\/em> omits the first stanza):<\/p>\n

A Blessing of Angels<\/strong><\/p>\n

May the Angels in their beauty bless you.
\nMay they turn toward you streams of blessing.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Awakening stir your heart
\nto come alive to the eternal within you,
\nto all the invitations that quietly surround you.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Healing turn your wounds
\ninto sources of refreshment.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Imagination enable you
\nto stand on the true thresholds,
\nat ease with your ambivalence
\nand drawn in new directions
\nthrough the glow of your contradictions.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Compassion open your eyes
\nto the unseen suffering around you.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Wildness disturb the places
\nwhere your life is domesticated and safe,
\ntake you to the territories of true otherness
\nwhere all that is awkward in you
\ncan fall into its own rhythm.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Eros introduce you
\nto the beauty of your senses
\nto celebrate your inheritance
\nas a temple of the holy spirit.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Justice disturb you
\nto take the side of the poor and the wronged.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Encouragement confirm you
\nin worth and self-respect,
\nthat you may live with the dignity
\nthat presides in your soul.<\/p>\n

May the Angel of Death arrive only
\nwhen your life is complete
\nand you have brought every given gift
\nto the threshold where its infinity can shine.<\/p>\n

May all the Angels be your sheltering
\nand joyful guardians.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(John O’Donohue [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

PRIME TIME OVER TARGET<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Petronella Page<\/span>:…and welcome to our new Friday slot where we break our regular habit and cover the entire planet! Later we shall be going to Honduras for interviews right on the firing line, and by satellite to London for in-person opinions concerning the food riots among Britain’s five million unemployed, and finally to Stockholm where we’ll speak directly to the newly appointed secretary of the “Save the Baltic” Fund and find out how this latest atempt to rescue an endangered sea is getting on. But right now we have a very sad episode in focus, the kidnapping of fifteen-year-old Hector Bamberley. Over in our San Francisco studios — ah, I see the picture on the monitor now. Mr. Roland Bamberley! Hello!<\/p>\n

Bamberley<\/span>: Hello.<\/p>\n

Page<\/span>: Now everyone who follows the news is aware that your son vanished more than a week ago. We also know that a ransom demand of a very strange kind has been received. Are there any clues yet to the identity of the criminals?<\/p>\n

Bamberley<\/span>: Some things have been obvious from the start. To begin with, this is clearly a politically motivated crime. During the kidnapping a sleep-gas grenade was employed, and those aren’t found on bushes, so it’s plain that we have to deal with a well-equipped subversive group. And no ordinary kidnappers would have fixed on such a ridiculous ransom.<\/p>\n

Page<\/span>: Some people would argue that on the contrary such a grenade could have been obtained very easily, and that anybody annoyed with the notoriously poor quality of California water might have—<\/p>\n

Bamberley<\/span>: Bunkum.<\/p>\n

Page<\/span>: Is that your only comment?<\/p>\n

Bamberley<\/span>: Yes.<\/p>\n

Page<\/span>: It’s been reported that a first delivery of forty thousand Mitsuyama water filters destined for your company arrived yesterday. Are you intending to—?<\/p>\n

Bamberley<\/span>: No, I am not reserving any of them for this disgraceful so-called ransom! I am neither going to yield to blackmail, nor am I going to connive at the plans of traitors. […] I decline to collaborate with them in any way.<\/p>\n

[Page continues to question the real reason Bamberley has acquired the purifiers, while he claims it was just a business decision.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Page<\/span>: But when it’s your only son who— Hello! Mr. Bamberley! Hello, San Francisco!… Sorry, world, we seem temporarily to have lost— Just one moment, let’s pause for — station identification.<\/p>\n

(Breach in transcript lasting appx. 38 sec.)<\/p>\n

Ian Farley<\/span>: Pet, you’ll have to switch to the next subject. Someone’s put out our Frisco transmitters. They think it might have been a mortar bomb.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

(John Brunner, from The Sheep Look Up<\/em><\/a>)<\/p>\n

While doing my usual free-association thing for this post, I came across a… well, it’s not exactly a performance-art piece. The artist, Sharona (Shin) Katan, calls her medium “photographic sculpture.” She’s a member of the Mannish Trousers art collective in Oxford; for a 2009 Mannish Trousers show, she contributed the piece Looking Up the Sky<\/em>, documented in this video:<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

(For more information on Katan, see here<\/a>. For more information on the Mannish Trousers collective, see their site, here<\/a>, and their blog, here<\/a>. “More information” in both cases includes still photos as well as text, and even another video or two.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “Looking Up the Yosemite Valley,” by Alfred Bierstadt. For more information, see the Haggin Museum site.] Note: Here for Poetry Friday (hosted today at the impossibly appealing Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast)? Never before been here on a Friday? Just plain confused by what’s going on in this post? You might want to read […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[247,1393,250,5,36,251],"tags":[178,1532,1741,1742,1743,1744,1745],"class_list":{"0":"post-7291","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ruminations","7":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","8":"category-art","9":"category-06_writing","10":"category-reading","11":"category-poetry-writing_cat","12":"tag-whiskey-river","13":"tag-john-odonohue","14":"tag-alfred-bierstadt","15":"tag-william-carlos-williams","16":"tag-john-brunner","17":"tag-sharona-katan","18":"tag-mannish-trousers","19":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-1TB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7291"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7291\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7320,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7291\/revisions\/7320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}