Richard Brautigan - random poetry

All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace

...
I like to think
  (it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.


Love Poem

   It's so nice
to wake up in the morning
   all alone
and not have to tell somebody
   you love them
when you don't love them
   any more.


A CandleLion Poem

           For Michael

Turn a candle inside out
and you've got the smallest 
portion of a lion standing
there at the edge of the 
   shadows.



I Live in the Twentieth Century

            For Marcia

I live in the Twentieth Century
and you lie here beside me.  You
were unhappy when you fell asleep.
There was nothing I could do about
it.  I felt helpless.  Your face
is so beautiful that I cannot stop
to describe it, and there's nothing
I can do to make you happy while
   you sleep.



The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster

When you take your pill
it's like a mine disaster.
I think of all the people
   lost inside of you.



The Nature Poem

The moon 
is Hamlet
on a motorcycle
coming down
a dark road.
He is wearing
a black leather
jacket and
boots.
I have 
nowhere 
to go.
I will ride
all night.



It's Raining in Love

I don't know what it is,
but I distrust myself
when I start to like a girl
   a lot.

It makes me nervous.
I don't say the right things
or perhaps I start
   to examine,
             evaluate,
                      compute
   what I am saying.

If I say, "Do you think it's going to rain?"
and she says, "I don't know,"
I start thinking:    Does she really like me?

In other words
I get a little creepy.

A friend of mine once said,
"It's twenty times better to be friends
   with someone
than it is to be in love with them."

I think he's right and besides,
it's raining somewhere, programming flowers
and keeping snails happy.
   That's all taken care of.

         BUT
if a girl likes me a lot
and starts getting real nervous
and suddenly begins asking me funny questions
and looks sad if I give the wrong answers
and she says things like,
"Do you think it's going to rain?"
and I say, "It beats me,"
and she says, "Oh,"
and looks a little sad
at the clear blue California sky,
I think:   Thank God, it's you, baby, this time
   instead of me.

Moderat - "Seamonkey"

It starts as nothing special, but around minute three the synths start and things get amazing.

Quite different, but a great track as well: "Sick With It"

"A New Error" ...mesmerizing, both in sound and video (two hands, black and white)

The Kyteman Orchestra - "The Jam Sessions"

• "Jonas" : a lone (alt?) violin, only after minutes joined by piano
• "Overpriced": though the rap does not drive me crazy, a great jamming slow down and build up
• "The Page - Part II": parlando, classic piano

Richard Brautigan - "In Watermelon Sugar"

'In watermelon sugar the deeds were done and done again as my life is done is watermelon sugar. I'll tell you about it because I am here and you are distant.'

'We walked back to iDEATH, holding hands. Hands are very nice things, especially after they have travelled back from making love.'

'One of the crew turned off the switch and Fred had me come over very close and get down on my hands and knees and crawl under the press until we came to a very dark place and then he lit a match and showe me a bat hanging upside down from a housing.
   "What do you think of that?" Fred said.
   "Yeah," I said, staring at the bat.
   "I found him there a couple of days ago. Doesn't that beat everything?" he said.
   "It's got a head start," I said.'

'Of course we used a lot less tombs when the tigers where in bloom.
    But now we bury them all in glass coffins at the bottoms of rivers and put foxfire in the tombs, so they glow at night and we can appreciate what comes next.'

'The bridge was made from stones gathered at a distance and placed in their proper order.'

'I saw Margaret climbing an apple tree beside her shack. She was crying and had a scarf knotted around her neck. She took the loose end of the scarf and tied it to a branch covered with young apples. She stepped off the branch and then she was standing by herself on the air.'


Liked it a lot. I did not trouble myself finding the underlying images, the thoughts behind the words. He has a nice way of repeating a sentence, usually something that is said, a few lines later, which really works.

8tracks - triphop list

http://8tracks.com/10-korriku/to-a-simple-time

• Doctor Flake - "Only You"

there was more good stuff that I did not log

http://8tracks.com/ziggie-t/electronic-soul-u-need

• Boztown - "God Father"
  hints of the theme

http://8tracks.com/lparufier/welcome-to-the-street

• Boztown - "Candy's Gun"
  intriguing vocals

"Page Eight" and "Turks & Caicos"

First two films from a trilogy (last one: "Salting the Battlefield") about Bill Nighly as Johnny Worricker as an (ex) MI5 agent, doing the right thing.

First one was nice. Second one (with Christopher Walken) was ok.