#458 The Sensational News

Decomposition takes time — depends
upon the size of the object. Retribution,
too, not always immediate, but it is
deliberate. Why else that phrase: revenge
is a dish best served cold? Sufficient of
the bird remaining to let it manipulate
the surrounds. Getting its own back
for its owners' neglect. Singing as it does
so, Stairway to Heaven, that Led Zeppelin


song. Using it as a template / timekeeper,
to progress the couple's decay.  First the
smile wiped off their faces, so ferociously
their features have come away as well.
Then smoothed down, as if turned on a
lathe. The final indignation still to come.
Head & neck removed, to be featured as
newel caps, put in place at the top of
the staircase as the song comes to an end.
  

#457 Tous les Jours

Up here in the mountains
it is an everyday thing
to come across vestiges of
earlier climbers &/or the oc-
casional earlier painting.
They may present as tracks
in the earth or discarded
equipment. Sometimes as
ghosts or holograms. Stare 
at the latter for long enough 
& they sometimes become 
embarrassed, begin to speak. 
In a thin voice that still  
sparks echoes, this one says: 
"I was once the star of The 
Age of Enlightenment. Now 
the world has forgotten
me. Am I not still beautiful?" 

#456 La Marchande de Sable

 

Legerdemain & sympathetic
magic are not confined only
to my paintings. Sometimes
I moonlight as the sandman, 
tell stories that throw sand 
into the listeners' eyes to 
foster dreams that render the 
invisible visible. Georgette is 
happy just to watch me work; 
but on occasion, when I wish 
to explain more fully what is 
beneath, behind, the current 
painting, I sprinkle sand into
her eyes to make her sleep. She 
smiles at my explanations; & 
at the pipe I leave beside her to
remind her where we've been.

#455 L'esprit et la forme (1928)

 

There is much to
sing about here.

The glass of water. 
The fish out of it 

but still swimming
happily around. The

pawn, token of a
game she has just 

learnt but is much
taken by. Which she

has natural advant-
ages in since she can

float above it & read
the play as easily as

she can read the myst-
eries of the sea floor.

#454 Décalcomanie

 

Which side has been taken
& pressed upon the other
one? Maybe with another
artist it might be easy to
determine — clean lines,
symmetry, a space echoing
what has been taken away
from it — but Magritte
rarely adheres to the strict
guidelines for anything, &
decalcomania is no except-
ion. The curtain behind, in 
front of; the horizons evenly
aligned but not the beach;
one shoulder sloping more.
En plein air the man blocks
out the sea. The curtains ex-
pose it as if he wasn't there.

#453 Les Bijoux Indiscrets

Hand on
my heart

I have 
a face 

on my 
wrist.

#452 Le Grand Air

A drunk man's words are often the disturbing thoughts of a sober one.

The dialectical law of negation of the negation calls us to re-visit the historical context within which the Western myth of human rights is conceived.

Agendas enter the local context. Hollywood celebrities enter into prenuptial agreements. The ideal version of democracy is a fluid entity which we constantly construct, deconstruct, reconstruct.

A touch of the modern & it would not be at all acceptable.

Who is going to cook dinner tonight, wash plates, change the baby's nappies?

#451 Representation II

The orchestra under the cypress
tree kicks into life. A few bars;
& then the scene we're watching
on the small screen is replicated
on a larger canvas that still permits
the original viewing platform to
be included in the corner, picture-
within-picture style, framed by 

the only thing that might be a 
goal were it not for the pawn on
top. Or maybe it was the other 
way around & downsizing has
occurred. No spectators to see
the "world game" shrunk to three 
a-side. The château now a simple
manor house. A lone pianola.

#450 Le Sang du Monde

I have always found imaginary landscapes more real than the real. The paintings of Magritte & de Chirico, the novels of LeGuin & Delany & Ballard — I am comfortable in these even though I may occasionally find them disturbing. Perhaps it's because I live my life vicariously, or perhaps it's because I have never found, though I've lived in quite a few of them, a city that felt like home.

Three poems from Series Magritte at Youtube

via The Continental Review





Read by Miia Toivio & with graphics by Marko Niemi

#449 L'Atlantide

The concealing shroud has
shifted from the bedside 
of a sleeping Georgette & 
now resembles a bunch of 
damp towels as it rests on 
the tiles beside a bath that 
has no taps, no obvious out-
let pipes. Rotate the painting, 
& stairs appear. & though the 
chapel at the top of them is set
into solid rock, it means only 
that an exit is behind you. A-
void the abyss which is al-
ways here- or thereabouts. &
beware the imminent arrival 
of a cascade of water falling
from the upturned bath.