People Still Care

February 9, 2014, 12:35 am

≫ Next: Hazen Robert Walker: "the rain comes down..."

≪ Previous: Other

$

0

0

.

Woman in couch, Portland: photo by Austin Granger, 23 January 2014

Life must be seen before it can be known but we are as the blind, before our lit-up screens, where then are our probing-sticks, to tap our way forward?

This imagination that life is easy to be borne, where does it come from?

The poor do not stand on ceremony over a little civility, nor does the mutilation of a compliment bring them low.

Crow (Washington Boulevard, Los Angeles): photo by michaelj1998, 27 January 2014

DC: In the last six years, you’ve tweeted just over 40,000 times —

Leah: Which is not as bad as it sounds! I think there’s an inherent discomfort in Twitter that a lot of people don’t like to address. It’s my favorite thing, watching a lot of people on Saturday night, tweeting. It’s like you’re yelling into the void. Who is here? That’s one of the reason we like bots so much. You know, a bot will talk to you whenever. People are checking in on Foursquare — “Hey, I’m here. Is anyone else here?” You know, there’s that desire to connect, and it’s sort of weirdly lonely to me. I remember one night on Twitter, I was in the bath, I’d had a little bit to drink and I tweeted “DM (direct message) me your secrets.” And I actually had to respond to so many secrets that I got put in “Twitter jail” (when Twitter prevents your account from tweeting anymore because you’ve reached a limit); I couldn’t respond to any more. I think there’s a really deep, and sometimes I feel it, too, this desire to be simultaneously connected but be very out of place. I think it’s true of a lot of people, not everyone. It makes me feel so deeply human: I can’t handle all this interiority in other people’s lives.

DC: How do you mean?

Leah: Just thinking about the conversations everyone’s having and how do you think about those people just … How do you feel, is there a place where you can feel you can just be you? For some people, Twitter does that. Not for me. For me, Twitter is turned at just enough of an angle where I can say a lot of things I want to say but not everything. I think there is that hint of melancholy that still comes through. Because there are people who say, “I want to connect with you.”

DC: They’re just getting at the surface of it, like this melancholy is just around the corner. We get glimpses of it.

Leah: Right. And I think that I’m pretty honest, and I’m pretty much just me, but I also think i’m “me” in a way that’s performative. I’m never just like, “here’s how I feel” and then let it all loose.

DC: So it’s that it makes sense and it doesn’t at the same time.

Leah: Yeah, I think that’s the beauty of being on Twitter. And that’s why you can’t explain Twitter and what you should or shouldn’t do on Twitter. Either that clicks or it doesn’t, and that’s OK. Because sometimes those elements shift out of place for me, and it gets very disjointed. And there are days that I can’t do it, and I can’t talk with this many people or engage with them. And I have to say a thing and go away. I think there are also times when it’s just off-kilter enough that’s comfortable, and times when it comes together and I think about how everyone is really great. And then it slides back out of place.

("I now work at a startup called Automatic... I do a lot of research, and because I trained as an ethnographer, I do a lot of qualitative research. I interview people, get a better understanding of their needs, of the products they use..." -- LR)

-- Seeking human connection in a virtual world: Leah Reich, social media researcher, interviewed by Noah Kulwin in The Daily Californian, 8 February 2014

Night ferry (Portland, Maine): photo by Robert Schneider, 3 November 2013

And the tech industry is taking other students as well: economics and business majors.

Sherry Jiang, a senior business major who worked as an investment banking intern at Goldman Sachs last summer, just accepted a full-time position at Amazon as a business analyst. According to Jiang, more and more business students are seeking opportunities in tech. She said the program she will be joining at Amazon is only two years old. Kayleigh Barnes, a senior majoring in economics, is in the midst of interviewing for a position at DropBox. She isn’t set on tech but said that it’s a job market that has always appealed to her as a UC Berkeley student.

“A lot of people are graduating, and they don’t really know where they can get a job,” Barnes said. “Berkeley has a close proximity to the Silicon Valley — the whole time you’re going to school, those are the companies you’re hearing about. And then the fact that the companies are so lucrative — that really seals the deal. You can make a lot of money at Google or another place and eat four-star meals while someone does your laundry.”

Interns working at Google and Facebook can make about $6,500 a month — a huge leap from the unpaid internships most undergraduates are taking on.

Victoria Lo, who is studying computer science and integrative biology and hunting for a tech gig this summer, said the money isn’t her reason for going into the field, but it can be for some.

“I met someone in one of my classes who said, ‘I just want to do this job or get a grand piano or a Lamborghini,’ ” Lo said. “And I was like, ‘Oh my god.’ This is what I want to do because it’s so much fun.”

-- Breeding the tech elite: Libby Rainey, in The Daily Californian, 8 February 2014

Free High Speed Internet (Vallejo, California): photo by efo, 21 January 2014
 

Shrine, Sauvie Island, Oregon: photo by Austin Granger, 31 January 2014
 

Noordmarkt 1 (Amsterdam): photo by Robert Schneider, 14 December 2013
 

Beverly, Massachusetts: photo by Billy (STREETIZM), 27 February 2014
 

L'il stove: photo by efo, 2 February 2014
 

Bar Supplies (Los Angeles, California): photo by michaelj1998, 17 January 2014
 

Worcester, Massachusetts: photo by Billy (STREETIZM), 27 January 2014



2741 (Temple Avenue, Los Angeles): photo by michaelj1998, 27 January 2014
 

Arlington, Massachusetts: photo by Billy (STREETIZM), 4 February 2014

caution sign(Kansas City): photo by Clayton Percy, 26 January 2014
 

 Hotel (Skid row, Los Angeles): photo by michaelj1998, 23 January 2014
 

Worcester, Massachusetts: photo by Billy (STREETIZM), 30 January 2014



Casters (Downtown Los Angeles): photo by michaelj1998, 17 January 2014
 

Noordmarkt 2 (Amsterdam): photo by Robert Schneider, 14 December 2013
 

Screaming at Marilyn (Downtown Los Angeles): photo by michaelj1998, 27 January 2014

---

Hazen Robert Walker: "the rain comes down..."

February 10, 2014, 3:35 am

≫ Next: Bridge Broke Down

≪ Previous: People Still Care

$

0

0

.

16th and Wood, West Oakland: photo by Dave Glass (Dizzy Atmosphere), 19 October 2009

the rain comes down first in color, 
then in black and white,

just as it should.

and note carefully,
how the encroaching shadows
move with you, quick and certain,
like a predator about to pounce.

and how
under the guise of departing
for some unknown destination
people stand and wait
everybody comes and goes into the light
into the bardo of what’s next 

Hazen Robert Walker:"the rain comes down...", 9 February 2014

Washington and 9th Street, Oakland, California: photo by Dave Glass (Dizzy Atmosphere), 1977; posted 21 May 2013

Bridge Broke Down

February 11, 2014, 4:33 am

≫ Next: Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Happy World

≪ Previous: Hazen Robert Walker: "the rain comes down..."

$

0

0

.

Young ladies dressed for a day of sport crossing a log over a creek, Canunga, Queensland: photo by George Jackman, n.d. (State Library of Queensland)

London Bridge is broken down,
Broken down, broken down.
London Bridge is broken down,
My fair lady.

Loading timber into railway wagons, Mayne Junction, Brisbane: photo by George Jackman, n.d. (State Library of Queensland)

Build it up with wood and clay,
Wood and clay, wood and clay,
Build it up with wood and clay,
My fair lady.

Loading timber into railway wagons, Mayne Junction, Brisbane, Queensland. Timber support framework has been constructed to assist in the assemby of the steel structure of the bridge. A concrete pylon is in the centre of the view and the steel construction for the bridge has been commenced in the background. A large gantry crane is mounted on the framework and is lifting the heavy steel girders into place: photo by George Jackman, 1937 (State Library of Queensland)

Wood and clay will wash away,
Wash away, wash away,
Wood and clay will wash away,
My fair lady.

Early stages of the Story Bridge construction, Brisbane. Workers are standing precariously on a single girder whilst manoeuvring heavy material with block and tackle pulleys. Heavy wire cables run along each side of the girder and also threaded through a square pulley system attached to the side of the girder. Kangaroo Cliffs are clearly visible in the background and the Brisbane River flows below: photo by George Jackman, c. 1937 (State Library of Queensland)

Build it up with bricks and mortar,
Bricks and mortar, bricks and mortar,
Build it up with bricks and mortar,
My fair lady.

Locomotive derailment on the Gold Coast, Queensland: photo by George Jackman, n.d.. possibly 1930s (State Library of Queensland)

Bricks and mortar will not stay,
Will not stay, will not stay,
Bricks and mortar will not stay,
My fair lady.

Men working on the cargo ship Barossa while in port at Brisbane. ("SS Barossa was heavily damaged in Darwin Harbor by the Japanese during their raid on Darwin on February 19, 1942. Aircraft from the Imperial Japanese Navy and the Imperial Japanese Army Air Service took part in the bombing and strafing of the city and harbor. SS Barossa would be salvaged" -- from a comment): photo by George Jackman, n.d  (State Library of Queensland)

Build it up with iron and steel,
Iron and steel, iron and steel,
Build it up with iron and steel,
My fair lady.

Looking from the Brisbane River toward the Story Bridge under construction, Brisbane. With the small ship Coopa tied up at the dock in the foreground: photo by George Jackman, c. 1936 (State Library of Queensland)

Iron and steel will bend and bow,
Bend and bow, bend and bow,
Iron and steel will bend and bow,
My fair lady.

Painters working on repainting the bow of the Barossa while in port at Brisbane: photo by George Jackman, n.d. (State Library of Queensland)

Build it up with silver and gold,
Silver and gold, silver and gold,
Build it up with silver and gold,
My fair lady.

Firemen on their way to fight a blaze at Mt. Gravatt, Brisbane, Queensland: photo by George Jackman, c. 1940 (State Library of Queensland)

Silver and gold will be stolen away,
Stolen away, stolen away,
Silver and gold will be stolen away,
My fair lady.

Gentleman inspecting the Walter Taylor Bridge at Indooroopilly, Brisbane: photo by George Jackman, c. 1938 (State Library of Queensland)

Set a man to watch all night,
Watch all night, watch all night,
Set a man to watch all night,
My fair lady.

Motor vehicle on the brink of toppling into the water, Gold Coast, Queensland: photo by George Jackman, n.d., possibly late 1930s (State Library of Queensland)

Suppose the man should fall asleep,
Fall asleep, fall asleep,
Suppose the man should fall asleep?
My fair lady.

Grammar School boys welcome in the new year at school, Brisbane: photo by George Jackman, n.d. (State Library of Queensland)

Give him a pipe to smoke all night,
Smoke all night, smoke all night,
Give him a pipe to smoke all night,
My fair lady.

Indooroopilly Bridge at night, Brisbane: photo by George Jackman, n.d. (State Library of Queensland)

Farewell to passengers leaving on the Stratheden, Hamilton Wharf, Brisbane: photo by George Jackman, n.d. (State Library of Queensland)

London Bridge is broken down: traditional, text as given in Iona and Peter Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, 1951

Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Happy World

February 13, 2014, 5:10 am

≫ Next: Subjective City Valentine

≪ Previous: Bridge Broke Down

$

0

0

.

Untitled (Newark): photo by Joshua Perez (StrangeGoodness), 1 February 2014

14.7.16. 

Man cannot make himself happy without more ado. 

Whoever lives in the present lives without fear and hope. 

Chinatown #2 (New York City): photo by Jim Rohan, 9 February 2014

21.7.16. 

What really is the situation of the human will? I will call "will" first and foremost the bearer of good and evil. 

Let us imagine a man who could use none of his limbs and hence could, in the ordinary sense, not exercise his will. 

He could, however, think and want and communicate his thoughts to someone else. 

Could therefore do good or evil through the other man. 

Then it is clear that ethics would have validity for him, too, and that he in the ethical sense is the bearer of a will.

Untitled (Newark): photo by Joshua Perez (StrangeGoodness), 28 December 2013

Now is there any difference in principle between this will and that which sets the human body in motion? 

Or is the mistake here this: even wanting (thinking) is an activity of the will? (And in this sense, indeed, a man without will would not be alive.) 

But can we conceive a being that isn't capable of Will at all, but only of Idea (of seeing for example)? In some sense this seems impossible.

But if it were possible then there could also be a world without ethics. 

Perfumes (Chinatown, New York City): photo by Jim Rohan, 8 February 2014

24.7.16. 

The World and Life are one.

Physiological life is of course not "Life". And neither is psychological life. Life is the world. 

Ethics does not treat of the world. Ethics must be a condition of the world, like logic. 

Ethics and aesthetics are one. 

Untitled (Newark): photo by Joshua Perez (StrangeGoodness), 30 January 2014

29.7.16. 

For it is a fact of logic that wanting does not stand in any logical connexion with its own fulfilment. 

And it is also clear that the world of the happy is a different world from the world of the unhappy. 

Untitled: photo by Alyona Surikot, 9 February 2014

Is seeing an activity? 

Is it possible to will good, to will evil, and not to will? 

Or is only he happy who does not will? 

"To love one's neighbour" means to will! 

But can one want and yet not be unhappy if the want does not attain fulfilment? (And this possibility always exists.) 

Brooklyn Bride #3: photo by Jim Rohan, 7 February 2014

Is it, according to common conceptions, good to want nothing for one's neighbour, neither good nor evil? 

And yet in a certain sense it seems that not wanting is the only good. 

Here I am still making crude mistakes! No doubt of that! 

Cities of Tomorrow #2 (New York City): photo by Jim Rohan, 6 February 2014

It is generally assumed that it is evil to want someone else to be unfortunate. 

Can this be correct? Can it be worse than to want him to be fortunate? 

Here everything seems to turn, so to speak, on how one wants. 

It seems one can't say anything more than: Live happily! 

The world of the happy is a different world from that of the unhappy. 

The world of the happy is a happy world. 

Then can there be a world that is neither happy nor unhappy? 

Elasticity #1 (Ink transfer to Arches 88 paper using Purell hand sanitizer and instant coffee): photo by Jim Rohan, 11 February 2014

30.7.16. 

When a general ethical law of the form "Thou shalt . . ." is set up, the first thought is: Suppose I do not do it? 

But it is clear that ethics has nothing to do with punishment and reward. 

So this question about the consequences of an action must be unimportant. 

At least these consequences cannot be events. 

For there must be something right about that question after all. 

There must be a kind of ethical reward and of ethical punishment but these must be involved in the action itself. 

And it is also clear that the reward must be something pleasant, the punishment something unpleasant. 

Circles and rectangles: photo by efo, 4 January 2014

I keep on coming back to this! simply the happy life is good, the unhappy bad. 

And if I now ask myself: But why should I live happily?, then this of itself seems to me to be a tautological question; the happy life 

seems to be justified, of itself, it seems that it is the only right life. 

Depth Map (El Cerrito, California): photo by efo, 8 February 2014

But this is really in some sense deeply mysterious! It is clear that ethics cannot be expressed! 

But we could say: The happy life seems to be in some sense more harmonious than the unhappy. But in what sense?? 

What is the objective mark of the happy, harmonious life? Here it is again clear that there cannot be any such mark, that can be described. 

This mark cannot be a physical one but only a metaphysical one, a transcendental one. 

Ethics is transcendental.

Reality and fiction (Stockholm): photo by Jimmy Dovholt, 25 November 2010

1.8.16. 

How things stand, is God. 

God is, how things stand. 

Only from the consciousness of the uniqueness of my life arises religion — science — and art.

Yummy Garden Chinese Restaurant, Portland: photo by Austin Granger, 12 February 2014

2.8.16. 

And this consciousness is life itself. 

Can there be any ethics if there is no living being but myself? 

If ethics is supposed to be something fundamental, there can. 

If I am right, then it is not sufficient for the ethical judgment that a world is given. 

Then the world in itself is neither good nor evil. 

Electricity (El Cerrito, California): photo by efo, 8 February 2014

For it must be all one, as far as concerns the existence of ethics, whether there is living matter in the world or not. 

And it is clear that a world in which there is only dead matter is in itself neither good nor evil, so even the world of living things can in itself be neither good nor evil. 

Good and evil only enter through the subject. And the subject is not part of the world, but a boundary of the world. 

It would be possible to say (a la Schopenhauer): It is not the world of Idea that is either good or evil; but the willing subject.

Development, Woodburn, Oregon: photo by Austin Granger, 12 February 2014

I am conscious of the complete unclarity of all these sentences. 

Going by the above, then, the willing subject would have to be happy or unhappy, and happiness and unhappiness could not be part of the world. 
 

 Trash bagman outside Shattuck Theater (Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley): photo by George Kelly (allaboutgeorge), 16 October 2011

As the subject is not a part of the world but a presupposition of its existence, so good and evil are predicates of the subject, not properties in the world. 

Here the nature of the subject is completely veiled.  

Surveillance camera and shadow, Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley: photo by Jeremy Brooks, 30 August 2010

My work has extended from the foundations of logic to the nature of the world. 

from Ludwig Wittgenstein: Notebooks 1914-1916, ed. G. H. von Wright and G. E. M. Anscombe, with an English translation by G. E. M. Anscombe, 1961 

Ticket Booth, Canby, Oregon: photo by Austin Granger, 12 February 2014

Subjective City Valentine

February 14, 2014, 5:43 am

≫ Next: Down by the River

≪ Previous: Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Happy World

$

0

0

.

Girl (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 8 December 2010

Face (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 29 April 2012



No. 302: photo by wang yuanling, 12 April 2011
 

The subjective city -- No. 15.  Man (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 5 June 2009
 

Girl (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 12 April 2011
 

The subjective city -- No. 19. Playing cards (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 26 June 2009
 

[Untitled]: photo by wang yuanling, 4 June 2010

Portrait 1 (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 18 June 2010

 

The subjective city -- No. 23. Playing in the summer evening (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 27 July 2009

 

The subjective city -- No. 17.  Loving (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 16 March 2009

 

Newlyweds (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 2 November 2010
 

Congratulations. I found a nice husband, me:): photo by wang yuanling, 15 May 2013
 

Wedding: photo by wang yuanling, 14 September 2012

Down by the River

February 15, 2014, 5:23 am

≫ Next: Under the Plum Tree

≪ Previous: Subjective City Valentine

$

0

0

.

Habitats No. 4 (Yangtze River): photo by wang yuanling, 13 June 2011

After Wang Wei

Chilling down by the water
stopped to watch clouds drift
clouds drift clouds drift
bumped into mr. green
talked laughed forgot
it was time to go

Chilling down by the water: Wang Wei (699-759), English by TC

The subjective city -- No. 1. A balloon on the banks of the Yangtze River, Chongqing: photo by wang yuanling, 15 March 2009



Fog in the river (Yangtze): photo by wang yuanling, 15 October 2009

Helmet (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 2009 [posted 25 February 2010]



Rowing (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 11 june 2010



In the fog (Chongqing Wulong): photo by wang yuanling, 4 June 2010



The subjective city -- No. 10. The gang (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 17 March 2009
 

The subjective city -- No. 25. (Flood, Yangtze River, Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 27 July 2009

Bridge (Chongqing): photo by wang yuanling, 2009 [posted 7 January 2010]

Under the Plum Tree

February 16, 2014, 4:43 am

≫ Next: Vladimir Mayakovsky: The Brooklyn Bridge at the End of the World

≪ Previous: Down by the River

$

0

0

.

Branch of Flowering White Jasmine: attributed to Zao Chang, early 12th century, album leaf painting, ink and color on silk, 24.9 × 27.1 cm (Shanghai Museum)

It’s a pity we have to suffer
The bluejay said to me with a wink
If any part of the body be cut off
No part of the soul perishes but
Is sucked into that soul that remains
In that which remains of the body
These aren’t tears anyway just eye gunk
And you’ve always taught me to be brave
As the last kindly rays of February
Sun warm bare ruined plum tree choirs
And light them up with a gaggle of buds
From which a few white blossoms are just
Starting to pop open as traffic hums
And in this moment there is nothing lost

Bird in a bamboo and plum tree thicket: Anonymous Chinese painter, 12th Century
 

Bird on a branch: Li Anzhong, late Northern / early Southern Song Dynasty, early to mid 12th century, album leaf  on silk, 25.4 x 26.9 cm (Collection of the National Palace Museum, Taibei)

Cloudy Mountains: Mi Youren, Southern Song Dynasty, c. 1130 (Cleveland Museum of Art)

Vladimir Mayakovsky: The Brooklyn Bridge at the End of the World

February 17, 2014, 2:58 am

≫ Next: Walt Whitman: Baffled at the Shore

≪ Previous: Under the Plum Tree

$

0

0

.

 

Brooklyn Bridge #1 (New York City, New York): photo by Jim Rohan, 15 February 2014

 

If ever
.......the end of the world
..............should arrive,
and chaos
.......sweep off
............. the planet's last ridge,
with the only
.......lonely
..............thing to survive
towering over debris
.......this bridge,
..............then,
as out of a needle-thin bone
.......museums
..............rebuild dinosaurs,
so future's geologist
.......from this bridge alone
..............will remodel
these days
.......of ours.


Vladimir Mayakovsky: from The Brooklyn Bridge, 1925, in Poems, translated by Dorian Rottenberg, 1972

 

Brooklyn Bridge, Water and Dock Streets, looking southwest, Brooklyn: photo by Berenice Abbott, 22 May 1936 (New York Public Library)
 

Brooklyn Bridge: Looking at New York City from Brooklyn: photo by Daniel Berry Austin, 7 July 1899 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)

Brooklyn Bridge: Looking East, from New York City side: photo by Daniel Berry Austin, 7 July 1899 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)

Bridges from Brooklyn: photo by Irving Underhill, 1913 (Library of Congress)

Brooklyn Bridge and Elevated Road to Fulton Ferry: photo by Edgar S. Thomson, c. 1896 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)

Street Scene near Brooklyn Bridge: photo by George Bradford Brainerd, before 1897 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)

Construction of Brooklyn Bridge: photo by George Bradford Brainerd, c. 1872 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)
 

Painters on the Brooklyn Bridge Suspender Cables: photo by Eugene de Selignac, 7 October 1914 (New York City Municipal Archives / Museum of Photographic Arts Collections)
 

 Bridge Street: photo by George Bradford Brainerd, c. 1872 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)

Brooklyn Bridge: photo by Edgar S. Thomson, c. 1895 (Brooklyn Museum / Brooklyn Public Library)

Under the Brooklyn Bridge, New York City. ("Is it just the normal tourists taking pics, or was there a special event that day?"  "A special event indeed! They are waiting for my new world record dive of 277 ft from atop the center bridge tower which would have shattered the existing world high dive record by some 105 ft! Little do they know I am actually behind them with a Holga."):  photo by Jim Rohan, 4 March 2011

Talman Street, between Jay and Bridge Streets, Brooklyn: photo by Berenice Abbott, 22 May 1936 (New York Public Library)
 

View of Brooklyn Bridge: photo by George P. Hall and Son, c. 1905 (George Eastman House)

Mayakovsky, Museum: photo by alex_henri, 24 April 2007
 

Brooklyn Bridge: photo by George P. Hall and Son, c. 1905 (George Eastman House)

---

Walt Whitman: Baffled at the Shore

February 18, 2014, 1:23 am

≫ Next: César Vallejo: Trilce LVIII

≪ Previous: Vladimir Mayakovsky: The Brooklyn Bridge at the End of the World

$

0

0

.

To Fall or Run (Lower Darnley, Prince Edward Island): photo by Jim Rohan, 29 September 2012

O baffled, balk’d, bent to the very earth,
Oppress’d with myself that I have dared to open my mouth,
Aware now that amid all that blab whose echoes recoil upon me I have not once had the least idea who or what I am,
But that before all my arrogant poems the real Me stands yet untouch’d, untold, altogether unreach’d,
Withdrawn far, mocking me with mock-congratulatory signs and bows,
With peals of distant ironical laughter at every word I have written,
Pointing in silence to these songs, and then to the sand beneath.
I perceive I have not really understood any thing, not a single object, and that no man ever can,
Nature here in sight of the sea taking advantage of me to dart upon me and sting me,
Because I have dared to open my mouth to sing at all.

 

Walt Whitman: from As I Ebb'd with the Ocean of Life, 1881, first published as Bardic Symbols in The Atlantic Monthly, April 1860

Toward Seaview (Lower Darnley, Prince Edward Island): photo by Jim Rohan, 22 July 2011



The Raging Sea (Darnley Beach, Lower Darnley, Prince Edward Island): photo by Jim Rohan, 13 July 2013
 

Salacia (Lower Darnley, Prince Edward Island): photo by Jim Rohan, 6 December 2013
 

Where the Ocean Began (Darnley Beach, Lower Darnley, Prince Edward Island): photo by Jim Rohan, 15 June 2013



North Wind (Darnley Beach, Lower Darnley, Prince Edward Island): photo by Jim Rohan, 10 March 2011



Big Ocean #2: photo by Jim Rohan, 31 January 2012
 

Nelson Island #11 (Rowley, Massachusetts): photo by Jim Rohan, 29 January 2014

César Vallejo: Trilce LVIII

February 19, 2014, 4:14 am

≫ Next: Richard Brautigan: Lonely at the Laundromat

≪ Previous: Walt Whitman: Baffled at the Shore

$

0

0

.

House where the poet César Vallejo was born, Santiago de Chuco, Perú: photo by Carlos Adampol Galindo, 19 January 2008

In the cell, in the solid, even the corners 
huddle up. I set to rights  

The stripped men, who crumple, 
submit, become rags.  

I climb from the horse 
panting and snorting lines 
of blows and horizons; one 
lathery foot against three hooves. 
And I help him: Come on, you creature! 

Less. One would take 
always less of what it befell me to divide
in the cell, in the liquid. 

My prison companion 
was eating wheat from the slopes 
with my own spoon, 
when, at my parents' table, a child 
I fell asleep chewing.  

I prompt him: go on 
back round the other corner: 
go quickly... go round... go soon!  

Heedlessly, I 
find him his reasons, plan: 
there's room for a bit of a bed in here
merciful, rickety. No doubt of it 
that doctor was a sound man.  

I'll laugh no more 
when my mother prays 
in childhood and on Sunday
and at four 
of an early morning 
for wayfarers, for prisoners, 
sick 
and poor. 

In the sheepfold of boys, no more I'll 
deal blows at any 
who afterwards would cry 
still bleeding: Another Saturday 
I'll give you my cold meat 
only don't beat me.
All I'll say to him now is: O.K. 

In the cell, in the gas unlimited 
till it grows round in condensation, 
who stumbles outside?


César Vallejo (1892-1938): Poema LVIII, from Trilce (1922), translated by Charles Tomlinson and Henry Gifford in Poetry, January 1967

Panoramic view of the archaeological site of Huaca del Sol (Temple of the Sun), Mochica political capital, south of Trujillo city, Perú: photo by Martin St-Amant, 27 August 2007

Charged with intellectual instigation of a partisan skirmish in his hometown, Santiago de Chuco, Vallejo was imprisoned for 112 days (8 November 1920-26 February 1921) in the northern Peruvian city of Trujillo, where he had attended university

En la celda, en lo sólido, también
se acurrucan los rincones.

Arreglo los desnudos que se ajan,
se doblan, se harapan.

Apéome del caballo jadeante, bufando
líneas de bofetadas y de horizontes;
espumoso pie contra tres cascos.
Y le ayudo: Anda, animal!

Se tomaría menos, siempre menos, de lo
que me tocase erogar,
en la celda, en lo líquido.

El compañero de prisión comía el trigo
de las lomas, con mi propia cuchara,
cuando, a la mesa de mis padres, niño,
me quedaba dormido masticando.

Le soplo al otro:
Vuelve, sal por la otra esquina;
apura ...aprisa,... apronta!

E inadvertido aduzco, planeo,
cabe camastro desvencijado, piadoso:
No creas. Aquel médico era un hombre sano.

Ya no reiré cuando mi madre rece
en infancia y en domingo, a las cuatro
de la madrugada, por los caminantes,
encarcelados,
enfermos
y pobres.

En el redil de niños, ya no le asestaré
puñetazos a ninguno de ellos, quien, después,
todavía sangrando, lloraría: El otro sábado
te daré de mi fiambre, pero
no me pegues!
Ya no le diré que bueno.

En la celda, en el gas ilimitado
hasta redondearse en la condensación,
¿quién tropieza por afuera?

Santiago de Chuco, Perú: photo by Carlos Adampol Galindo, 19 January 2008


 
Mochica god "Ai apaec" or "Degollador", tile in a wall of the Mochica sanctuary Huecas del Sol y de la Luna, near Trujillo, Perú: photo by Elmer Castillo Contreras, 30 August 2008



Banknote for 10,000 intis (a currency that existed in Perú between 1986 and 1991): image by Discjockey, 6 April 2010

The poet César Vallejo in Nice: photographer unknown, 1929; image by Stefan4, 1 May 2012

 

Grave of César Vallejo, Cimetière du Montparnasse, Paris: photo by Blueswan59, 24 October 2012

Plaza de Armas, Santiago de Chuco, Perú: photo by Carlos Adampol Galindo, 19 January 2008

Richard Brautigan: Lonely at the Laundromat

February 20, 2014, 3:54 am

≫ Next: Henry David Thoreau: Close to Earth

≪ Previous: César Vallejo: Trilce LVIII

$

0

0

.

 Laundry day. What's he looking for? (Albany, California): photo by efo, 18 October 2006

This poem was found written on a paper bag by Richard Brautigan in a laundromat in San Francisco. The author is unknown.

By accident, you put

Your money in my

Machine (#4)

By accident, I put

My money in another

Machine (#6)

On purpose, I put

Your clothes in the

Empty machine full

Of water and no   

Clothes

It was lonely.

Richard Brautigan (1935-1984): San Francisco, from All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace, 1967

Wash Dry 10 Cents Laundromat, 806 Divisadero Street, Western Addition district, San Francisco: photo by Dave Glass (Dizzy Atmosphere), 1979, posted 2 January 2008

Laundromat, 3040 18th Street, Mission District, San Francisco: photo by Dave Glass (Dizzy Atmosphere), 1988, posted 5 May 2010
 

Jesse, laundromat attendant, Fulton and Divisadero, Western Addition district, San Francisco: photo by Dave Glass (Dizzy Atmosphere), 1977, posted 17 December 2009

Little Hollywood Launderette, 1906 Market Street, San Francisco. Art Deco storefront, Market and Laguna: photo by Dave Glass (Dizzy Atmosphere), 1 January 2008



Wash 20 cents. Old laundromat sign in Oakland. (This one I took because it's closed and I'm afraid the sign will go away soon...): photo by efo, 16 July 2005



Adeline Wash House, Oakland: photo by efo, 1 September 2013
 

Abandoned laundromat -- holgarama: photo by efo, 8 February 2014
 

Laundromat (San Francisco): photo by efo, 19 February 2012

Henry David Thoreau: Close to Earth

February 21, 2014, 2:04 am

≫ Next: Stevie Smith: Dear Child of God

≪ Previous: Richard Brautigan: Lonely at the Laundromat

$

0

0

.

  Nelson Island #24 (Rowley, Massachusetts): photo by Jim Rohan, 9 February 2014

The life in us is like the water in the river. It may rise this year higher than man has ever known it, and flood the parched uplands; even this may be the eventful year, which will drown out all our muskrats. It was not always dry land where we dwell. I see far inland the banks which the stream anciently washed, before science began to record its freshets. Every one has heard the story which has gone the rounds of New England, of a strong and beautiful bug which came out of the dry leaf of an old table of apple-tree wood, which had stood in a farmer's kitchen for sixty years, first in Connecticut, and afterward in Massachusetts — from an egg deposited in the living tree many years earlier still, as appeared by counting the annual layers beyond it; which was heard gnawing out for several weeks, hatched perchance by the heat of an urn. Who does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality strengthened by hearing of this? Who knows what beautiful and winged life, whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life of society, deposited at first in the alburnum of the green and living tree, which has been gradually converted into the semblance of its well-seasoned tomb — heard perchance gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man, as they sat round the festive board — may unexpectedly come forth from amidst society's most trivial and handselled furniture, to enjoy its perfect summer life at last!

Henry David Thoreau: from Walden, 1854

Close to Earth: photo by Jim Rohan, 15 January 2011
 

I went to the woods and all I got was this lousy Henry David Thoreau t-shirt(Concord, Massachusetts). (Walden Pond is one of the most "un-wildernessed" places you could ever visit. I'm sure Thoreau is spinning in his grave. I also shot this with people in it (hard not to at Walden Pond) and given the smarmy title I came up with, probably should have posted a peopled version of this...): photo by Jim Rohan, 27 June 2012
 

Bench #2, Walden Pond, Concord, Massachusetts: photo by Jim Rohan, 6 January 2012
 

The Great Marsh #5 (Newbury, Massachusetts): photo by Jim Rohan, 14 April 2013
 

 Professor Chandler's Long Walk #3 (Rowley, Massachusetts): photo by Jim Rohan, 6 February 2014
 

Abandoned shack, Stackyard Road, Rowley, Massachusetts: photo by Jim Rohan, 18 February 2014
 

Cove, Lynn Woods, Lynn, Massachusetts: photo by Jim Rohan, 12 October 2010

Stevie Smith: Dear Child of God

February 22, 2014, 3:25 am

≫ Next: Curzio Malaparte: Into the Ukraine

≪ Previous: Henry David Thoreau: Close to Earth

$

0

0

.

 Bucket Boy (found photo).  Found in Amsterdam, December 2013: image by robert schneider (rolopix), posted 2014

Dear child of God

With the tears on your face

And your hands clasped in anger

What is the matter with your race?

In the beginning, Father,

You made the terms of our survival

That we should use our intelligence

To kill every rival.

The poison of this ferocity

Runs in our nature,

And O Lord thou knowest
How it nourishes thy creatures.

Oh what a lively poison it was

To bring to full growth.

Is then becoming loving

As much as our life is worth?

It is a price I would pay

To grow loving and kind,

The price of my life

And the life of human kind.

Father in heaven

Dear Father of peacefulness

It is not often we remember

You put this poison in us,

Generally we stand

With the tears on our face

And our hands clasped in anger,

Faithful but unfortunate.

Florence Margaret "Stevie" Smith (1902-1971): Dear Child of God from Not Waving but Drowning, 1966

Untitled: photo by Malcolm Markovich, 1975
 

Untitled: photo by Malcolm Markovich, 1975
 

Untitled: photo by Malcolm Markovich, 1975
 

Untitled ("Geordie bairns encounter London freaks taking a break on the tour bus"): photo by Malcolm Markovich, 1975
 

Untitled: photo by Malcolm Markovich, 1975

Untitled ("Is there a story behind this set? did you know these kids?""Didn't know them, no. Gryphon, the band I was playing with at the time, were touring the UK supporting YES. To the best of my recollection we were in or on the way to/from Newcastle and decided to pull over -- can't recall why. This bunch of kids, just out from school, saw a bunch of freaks in a bus, a camera, and did what kids do."): photo by Malcolm Markovich, 1975

Somewhere in the north of England: photo by Malcolm Markovich, c. 1975

Curzio Malaparte: Into the Ukraine

February 23, 2014, 6:13 am

≫ Next: Robert Desnos: I Am a Shadow

≪ Previous: Stevie Smith: Dear Child of God

$

0

0

.

Abandoned Soviet T-34 tank, Ukraine: photographer unknown, 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

Meanwhile the sun was coming up from the horizon of green, and gradually the hoarse call of birds was becoming shriller and more lively. The sun seemed to beat down hammer-like on the cast-iron plate of the lagoons. A shiver ran along the water with a kind of metallic vibration and spread to the surface of the pools, just as the sound of a violin spreads like a shiver along the arms of a musician. By the roadside, and here and there in the cornfields, were overturned cars, burned trucks, disemboweled armored cars, abandoned guns, all twisted by explosions. But nowhere a man, nothing living, not even a corpse, not even any carrion. For miles and miles there was only dead iron. Dead bodies of machines, hundreds upon hundreds of miserable steel carcasses. The stench of putrifying rose from the fields and the lagoons. The cockpit of a plane was sticking up from the mud in the middle of a pool. The German cross was clearly discernible: it was a Messerschmitt. The smell of rotting iron won over the smell of men and horses -- that smell of old wars; even the smell of grain and the penetrating, sweet scent of sunflowers vanished amid that sour stench of scorched iron, rotting steel, dead machinery. The clouds of dust lifted by the wind from the far ends of the vast plain carried no smell of organic matter with them but a smell of iron filing. And all the time, while I was pushing into the heart of the plain and approached Nemirovskoye, the smell of iron and of petrol grew stronger in the dusty air; even the grass seemed to be permeated with that undefinable, strong and exhilarating smell of gasoline, as if the smell of men and beasts, the smell of trees, of grass and mud was overcome by that odor of gasoline and scorched iron.

*
 
It had been raining for days and days and the sea of Ukrainian mud slowly spread beyond the horizon. It was the high tide of autumn in the Ukraine. The deep black mud was everywhere swelling like dough when yeast begins to work. The heavy smell of mud was borne by the wind from the end of the vast plain and mingled with the odor of uncut grain left to rot in the furrows, and with the sweetish stale odor of sunflowers. One by one the seeds dropped out of the black pupils of the sunflowers, one by one fell the long yellow eyelashes from around the large, round eyes, blank and void like the eyes of the blind.
 
The German soldiers returning from the front line, when they reached the village squares, dropped their rifles on the ground in silence. They were coated from head to foot in black mud, their beards were long, their hollow eyes looked like the eyes of the sunflowers, blank and dull. The officers gazed at the soldiers and at the rifles lying on the ground, and kept silent. By then the lightning war, the Blitzkrieg, was over, the Dreizigjährigerblitzkrieg, the thirty year lightning war, had begun. The winning war was over, the losing war had begun. I saw the white stain of fear growing in the dull eyes of German officers and soldiers. I saw it spreading little by little, gnawing at the pupils, singeing the roots of the eyelashes and making the eyelashes drop one by one, like the long yellow eyelashes of the sunflowers. When Germans become afraid, when that mysterious German fear begins to creep into their bones, they always arouse a special horror and pity. Their appearance is miserable, their cruelty sad, their courage silent and hopeless. That is when the Germans become wicked. I repented being a Christian. I felt ashamed of being a Christian.

 Curzio Malaparte (born Kurt Erich Sickert, 1898-1957): from Kaputt,1943, translated from the Italian by Cesare Foligno

Abandoned Soviet KW-1 tank, Ukraine: photographer unknown, 1942 (Deutsche Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

 
Destroyed aircraft, Ukraine, Soviet Union, beyond the Dnieper: photographer unknown, 2 September 1941 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv/German Federal Archive)


 
Burning Soviet T-34 tank, Ukraine: photographer unknown, 1941 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv/German Federal Archive)
 

Burning houses mark the struggles of the 6th army in the advance toward Stalingrad: photo by Horst Grund, 21 June 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

Wreckage of Soviet Polikarpov I-153, during the Russian retreat: photo by Horst Grund, 21 June 1942 (Deutsche Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

Abandoned Soviet KW-1 tank on the steppes near Stalingrad: photo by Horst Grund, August 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv /German Federal Archive)

Abandoned Soviet T-34 tanks: photo by Horst Grund, 21 June, 1942 (Deutschse Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

Abandoned Soviet T-34 tanks, during the Russian retreat: photo by Horst Grund, 21 June, 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv /German Federal Archive)

Junkers JU-52 in flight over Ukraine, August 1942: photo by Horst Grund, 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv /German Federal Archive)
 

German IV Panzer odvancing in Ukraine, 1941: photo by Horst Grund, 1941 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

Fieseler Fi 156 transport plane at air strip under construction on the steppes near Stalingrad, September 1942: photo by Horst Grund, 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

View of Stalingrad-South, 23 September 1942: photo by Horst Grund, 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)
 

Stalingrad-South, ruins after battle, 23 September 1942: photo by Horst Grund, 1942 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)



German IV Panzer on the way to the Eastern Front, 21 June 1941: photo by Horst Grund, 1941 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv / German Federal Archive)

Robert Desnos: I Am a Shadow

February 24, 2014, 2:00 am

≫ Next: Pierre Reverdy: Slippage

≪ Previous: Curzio Malaparte: Into the Ukraine

$

0

0

.

3323: photo by Petros Kotzabasis (pkomo), 24 December 2012

The Last Poem

I’ve dreamed so much of you
Walked so much
Talked so much made love to your shadow
So much that there’s nothing left of you
What is left
Of me is a shadow
Among shadows but 100
Times more shadowy than the rest
A shadow that will come
To rest
In your life in which the sun
Is so much.

Robert Desnos (b. Paris 4 July 1900, d.Theresienstadt concentration camp, 8 June 1945): Le Dernier Poème (The Last Poem), addressed to the poet's wife Youki, found in his effects after his death at Theresienstadt concentration camp, 8 June 1945; English version by TC

Nous sommes à jamais perdus dans le désert de l'éternèbre (We are forever lost in the desert of eternal darkness): still from Man Ray and Robert Desnos: L'etoile de mer, 1929; image by SOLARIXX, 19 January 2012

Le dernier poème

J'ai rêvé tellement fort de toi,

J'ai tellement marché, tellement parlé,

Tellement aimé ton ombre,

Qu'il ne me reste plus rien de toi,

Il me reste d'être l'ombre parmi les ombres

D'être cent fois plus ombre que l'ombre

D'être l'ombre qui viendra et reviendra

Dans ta vie ensoleillée.

2675: photo by Petros Kotzabasis (pkomo), 30 August 2012
 

5302: photo by Petros Kotzabasis (pkomo), 8 September 2010

J’aitant rêvé de toi (1926)

J’ai tant rêvé de toi que tu perds ta réalité.
Est-il encore temps d’atteindre ce corps vivant et de baiser sur cette bouche la naissance de la voix qui m’est chère?
J’ai tant rêvé de toi que mes bras habitués, en étreignant ton ombre, à se croiser sur ma poitrine ne se plieraient pas au contour de ton corps, peut-être.
Et que, devant l’apparence réelle de ce qui me hante et me gouverne depuis des jours et des années, je deviendrais une ombre sans doute.
Ô balances sentimentales.
J’ai tant rêvé de toi qu’il n’est plus temps sans doute que je m’éveille. Je dors debout, le corps exposéà toutes les apparences de la vie et de l’amour et toi, la seule qui compte aujourd’hui pour moi, je pourrais moins toucher ton front et tes lèvres que les premières lèvres et le premier front venus.
J’ai tant rêvé de toi, tant marché, parlé, couché avec ton fantôme qu’il ne me reste plus peut-être, et pourtant, qu’àêtre fantôme parmi les fantômes et plus ombre cent fois que l’ombre qui se promène et se promènera allégrement sur le cadran solaire de ta vie.

Robert Desnos and his wife Youki: photographer unknown, 1933; image by Menerbes, 29 October 2008

Last known photo of the poet Robert Desnos, in the Terezin (Theresienstadt) concentration camp: photographer unknown, c. May 1945; image by Menerbes. 20 October 2008

[The eyes of Robert Desnos]: image by Camilo_ Hoyos, 9 May 2009

---

Pierre Reverdy: Slippage

February 25, 2014, 1:16 am

≫ Next: Hidden Villa

≪ Previous: Robert Desnos: I Am a Shadow

$

0

0

.

A piece of slate: photo by Jon Zander, 2007

On each slate
..............that slipped from the roof
....................someone
..................had written
..............................a poem



The gutter's lined with diamonds
.......................the birds sip them

 

 

Pierre Reverdy (1889-1960): "Sur chaque ardoise...": from Les Ardoises du Toit (1918), trans. TC

Slate roof, Tannery, St. Fagans: photo by Zureks, 2007 (Wales National Museum, Cardiff)

Sur chaque ardoise

...................qui glissait du toit
................................on
.........................avait écrit
....................................un poème

La gouttière est bordée de diamants
.............................. les oiseaux les boivent

Windows: Egon Schiele, 1914 (Österreichische Galerie, Wien)

Hidden Villa

February 27, 2014, 3:59 am

≫ Next: Storm Light, from Ocean View

≪ Previous: Pierre Reverdy: Slippage

$

0

0

.

Untitled: photo by Adrian Tsim, 3 January 2014

fallen down hutch
dry rot
.........broken step
leaf mulch
................detritus

litter village

.....tangled

....under woods

.........let there

.................hang this

singular epithet

in the speech balloon:

..................[ -- ]*
_____

* an imprecation heard

in weedy language

Hidden Villa: photo by Adrian Tsim, 16 February 2014

Hidden Villa: photo by Adrian Tsim, 12 February 2014
 

Hidden Villa: photo by Adrian Tsim, 16 February 2014

Storm Light, from Ocean View

February 28, 2014, 1:30 am

≫ Next: Nice Surprise

≪ Previous: Hidden Villa

$

0

0

.

Storm Light, Oregon coast: photo by Austin Granger, 25 October 2012

The big storm looms off shore in black ecstatic light

Preparing us for the violence of landfall

The old weird light of the North Pacific, cold

And deep, bright and dark
The blue wind In the thin black trees
And the pavement in the city street hissing

In the rain so late yet so strong in coming

Making up for a whole season strangely missing

As if until now it had had better things to do

Rain, Oregon coast: photo by Austin Granger, 26 January 2012
 

Rain, Oregon coast: photo by Austin Granger, 26 October 2012

After the Rain, Cape Lookout, Oregon: photo by Austin Granger, 26 October 2012

Nice Surprise

March 1, 2014, 5:12 am

≫ Next: Mother, can you find me?

≪ Previous: Storm Light, from Ocean View

$

0

0

.

Untitled: photographer unknown, n.d: posted by  _elinor, 14 February 2014

There toward the end of that last millennium, with only about sixty more years to go, when things were finally beginning to become just that little bit clearer, it was thought time to provide the child a soft, loyal, companionable stuffed friend.

But by then, it was perhaps too late.

The mask had slipped just enough to reveal the inchoate fear encroaching. What was it, merely a passing shadow, there, behind the child's untrusting eyes. That which had been suspected yet not thus far seen would indeed soon enough become actual, as incipient things have a way of doing.

 
First it's stuffed bunnies they're giving you. Next it's ice cream and then the nicesurprise -- you're at the hospital, having an operation. 


 

Guetteur: photo by Anne Fleur Sire, 11 November 2012

Mother, can you find me?

March 2, 2014, 2:41 am

≫ Next: Wislawa Szymborska: Cat in an Empty Apartment

≪ Previous: Nice Surprise

$

0

0

.

The old Tatar in Bakhchisaray (Crimea), Yakub, as many of the Crimean Tatars, was deported in 1944 by the Soviet government to the Urals, where he was forced to work as a lumberjack. This work, in severe conditions, ruined his health. He returned to Crimea in the early 1990, as the Soviet Union collapsed: photo by Wojdom, 20 September 2012
 

Families identify war dead in Kerch, Crimea: photo by Dmitri Baltermants, January 1942 (The Dmitri Baltermants Collection/Corbis)

Milk seller in in Bakhchisaray (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 22 September 2012
 

Russian vacations (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 8 September 2012
 

Fun at the beach in Koktebel (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 7 September 2012
 

 In Koktebel (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 7 September 2012
 

At the Biostancya, near Koktebel (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 7 September 2012
 

On the beach, Black Sea (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 11 September 2012
 

On the bus (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 8 September 2012
 

A monastery in the mountains (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 21 September 2012
 

Women at the holy spring, near the monastery (Crimea): photo by Wojdom, 21 September 2012
 

Participants at demonstration in Sinferopl, Crimea hold a banner""There is only one Homeland, like a Mother!": photo by Leyla Emir-Asan, 18 May 2010; posted 4 July 2010 (International Committee for Crimea)
 

Participant at demonstration in Sinferopol, Crimea displays pictures of Crimean Tatars who served as officers and won medals in the Soviet Army: photo by Leyla Emir-Asan, 18 May 2010; posted 4 July 2010 (International Committee for Crimea)
 

Soviet rocket in Crimea: photo by Kirill (Twilight Tea), 15 July 2012
 

Soviet war memorial, Panorama building, Sevastopol, Crimea. The panorama of the 349-day defense of Sevastopol, 1849-1850: photo by Slavophile, 8 June 2011

Soviet era surveillance tower, Koktebel, Crimea. Shot seconds before a troupe of peasants in colorful folkloric garb marched over the hill, singing Soviet anthems... not: photo by Satanael, August 2006

 Postcard from Lucy GRV in Russia, showing a famous park in Yalta, Crimea (now the Ukraine), famous resort of the Soviet people. The card was sent in 1956 from a student to a teacher for Mother's Day: image by Jassy-50, 11 October 2013
 

Reminiscences of the Crimea: photo by Natalie Panga, 14 March  2012

Crimea is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name.The territory of Crimea was conquered and controlled many times throughout its history. The Cimmerians, Greeks, Persians, Goths, Huns, Bulgars, Khazars, the state of Kievan Rus', Byzantine Greeks, Kipchaks, Ottoman Turks, Golden Horde Tatars and the Mongols all controlled Crimea in its early history. In the 13th century, it was partly controlled by the Venetians and by the Genovese; they were followed by the Crimean Khanate and the Ottoman Empire in the 15th to 18th centuries, the Russian Empire in the 18th to 20th centuries, the Russian SFSR and later the Ukrainian SSR within the Soviet Union in the rest of the 20th century, Germany in World War II, and now Crimea is an autonomous Ukrainian administrative region.

"Reminiscences, even extensive ones, do not always amount to an autobiography. For autobiography has to do with time, with sequence and what makes up the continuous flow of life. Here, I am talking of a space, of moments and discontinuities.  For even if months and years appear here, it is in the form they have in the moment of recollection. This strange form -- it may be called fleeting or eternal -- is in neither case the stuff that life is made of.”-- Walter Benjamin
 

Camp Artek, 1991. Famous Soviet (present day Ukrainian) summer camp for children in Crimea. Can you find me?: photo by Uzi-Doesit, 25 April 2011
 

Foros sanitarium, Foros, Crimea. Soviet old-style sanatorium in Foros. Time stands still: photo by SusanneD, 25 September 2006

Balaklava nuclear submarine base, Crimea #55. The nuclear submarine base in Balaklava used to be one of the most secret military bases on the planet. Once the Soviet Union collapsed, the base was no longer needed. Now it is open to the public. Tunnelled into the cliff face, it is more like a set from a James Bond movie than a museum!: photo by Jonathan Wallace, October 2006; posted 27 February 2009

Balaklava nuclear submarine base, Crimea #47. The nuclear submarine base in Balaklava used to be one of the most secret military bases on the planet. Once the Soviet Union collapsed, the base was no longer needed. Now it is open to the public. Tunnelled into the cliff face, it is more like a set from a James Bond movie than a museum!: photo by Jonathan Wallace, October 2006; posted 27 February 2009
 

Entry into Soviet nuclear submarine base, Balaklava, Crimea.  Underground and classified nuclear submarine base operational until 1991 and said to be virtually indestructible, even by a direct atomic impact. In this period Balaklava was one of the most secret villages in Soviet Russia. Almost the entire population of Balaklava at the time worked at the base, even family members could not visit the town of Balaklava without good reason and identification. The base remained operational after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 until 1993 when the decommissioning process started and the warheads and low yield torpedoes were removed. Then in 1996 the last Russian submarine left the base, and now you can go on guided tours round the canal system, base and small museum, which is now housed in the old weapons stowage hangars deep inside the hillside: photo by Vyacheslav Argenburg, 1 September 2005