DRUM

An intriguing, but masterly filmed black and white film from Iranian director Keywan Karimi,  reminiscent of some of Béla Tarr's work, portraying Tehran through characters that seem to move towards destruction. His use of light and contrasts to convey an increasing feeling of anguish, a strange dystopian mood, the absence of information about the characters and the content of the package given to the main character adding to some great single take scenes (like the hammam scene) make this one of the most interesting films I have watched in the last years.

Jesus Alone

From Nick Cave's new album, skeleton tree




You fell from the sky
Crash landed in a field
Near the river Adur
Flowers spring from the ground
Lambs burst from the wombs of their mothers
In a hole beneath the bridge
She convalesce, she fashioned masks of twigs and clay
You cried beneath the dripping trees
Ghost song lodged in the throat of a mermaid

With my voice
I am calling you

You're a young man waking
Covered in blood that is not yours
You're a woman in a yellow dress
Surrounded by a charm of hummingbirds
You're a young girl full of forbidden energy
Flickering in the gloom
You're a drug addict lying on your back
In a Tijuana hotel room

With my voice
I am calling you

You're an African doctor harvesting tear ducts
You believe in God, but you get no special dispensation for this belief now
You're an old man sitting by a fire, hear the mist rolling off the sea
You're a distant memory in the mind of your creator, don't you see?

With my voice
I am calling you

Let us sit together until the moment comes

Signe Ascendant

Je n'ai jamais éprouvé de plaisir intellectuel que sur le plan analogique. Pour moi la seule évidence au monde est commandée par le rapport spontané, extra-lucide, insolent qui s'établit, dans certaines conditions, entre telle chose et telle autre, que le sens commun retiendrait de confronter. Aussi vrai que le mot le plus haïssable est le mot donc, avec tout ce qu'il entraîne de vanité et de délectation morose, j'aime éperdument tout ce qui, rompant d'aventure le fil de la pensée discursive, part soudain en fusée illuminant une vie de relations autrement fécondes, dont tout indique que les hommes des premiers âges eurent le secret.

André Breton, in Signe Ascendant

FIFDH Geneva 2017

além dia

Através das águas
sempre o mesmo riso petrificado
e acesas nos convés dos navios
candeias em fogo como faróis

(entre fogueiras ainda o dia)

São poucos os que atravessam trincheiras
descalços na esperança do musgo
mesmo se os dias sabem ser frescos muito cedo
mesmo se imunes ao pavor dos pássaros
e às guerras das raízes debaixo do húmus

Para quem corre descalço
tudo é manhã:
velocidade ao quadrado
ou massa-energia que rompe a carne.

E quando a seiva derramada acorda os mortos
das suas além casas
das suas além vidas
é já tarde.

(ah, a sofrega moralidade da física)

É esta a palavra única do dia,
a palavra marinheiro
das já muito faladas manhãs,
palavra perdida num poema
sonoramente vertical
caindo, caindo
sob o efeito previsível
da sua própria gravidade.

(O Coxo, Março 2017, em ocasião dos 150 anos do nascimento de Raul Brandão)