Author Archives: ashok

Jane Hirshfield, “An hour is not a house”

With thanks to Temperance Dewar. For Anthony Zaragosa. An hour is not a house (from Poetry April 2013) Jane Hirshfield An hour is not a house, a life is not a house, you do not go through them as if they were doors to another. Yet an hour can have shape and proportion, four walls, …

May 25, 2013 – 5:37 am | By ashok | Posted in poetry | Tagged | Comments (0)

On Bioshock Infinite

Spoilers ahead 1. It would be an understatement to say Elizabeth and Booker are well-crafted and believable characters. Sure, at first glance they seem to be cliches, bits and pieces of stories we’re heard far too often. Booker seems a laconic, thoughtless thug who can only be moral if tasked appropriately; Elizabeth a waif with …

May 23, 2013 – 7:08 am | By ashok | Posted in media | Tagged , , | Comments (1)

Links, 5/21/13

Some amazing, powerful reads lately that I cannot do justice to. And some necessary reads: “My Husband’s Other Wife” – I can’t believe I’m only seeing this now. I don’t understand why it isn’t required reading. Donald Hall, “One Road” – from the essay: Divorce was miserable, as it always is, and we divorce for …

May 21, 2013 – 4:44 am | By ashok | Posted in links | Comments (0)

Reduction

Bonus points if you can figure out the video game that inspired this. You didn’t say “I love you.” Instead, happy to be outside, thoughts about ideals and banners, responsibility and guilt. A bird flew by, not a symbol but a puzzle and we wondered about omens. Then I was hurt. Your reaction was swift, …

May 19, 2013 – 3:17 am | By ashok | Posted in writing | Comments (1)

Emily Dickinson, “The Spirit is the Conscious Ear” (733)

“The Spirit is the Conscious Ear” (733) Emily Dickinson The Spirit is the Conscious Ear. We actually Hear When We inspect — that’s audible — That is admitted — Here — For other Services — as Sound — There hangs a smaller Ear Outside the Castle — that Contain — The other — only — …

May 18, 2013 – 7:41 am | By ashok | Posted in dickinson, poetry | Comments (1)

Kay Ryan, “Album”

Album (from Poetry) Kay Ryan Death has a life of its own. See how its album has grown in a year and how the sharp blot of it has softened till those could almost be shadows behind the cherry blossoms in this shot. In fact you couldn’t prove they’re not. Comment: How does death have …

May 15, 2013 – 12:31 pm | By ashok | Posted in poetry | Tagged | Comments (0)

“Untitled,” Anselm Hollo

Untitled (from the April 2013 Poetry, inside the front cover) Anselm Hollo the way the blue room (remembered) lights up as you turn to be held and to hold me your beholder Comment: Loving the artistry of this little poem. We go through our blue period, as if our mental image is that of a …

May 10, 2013 – 2:50 am | By ashok | Posted in poetry | Comments (0)

Experience and Knowledge – Encounters and Reflections: Conversations with Seth Benardete, p. 197

The passage below, from Encounters and Reflections: Conversations with Seth Benardete p. 197, is something I’ve been thinking about the last week or so. It needs quite a bit of context. Benardete talks about how he met a mathematician at a party who thought mathematics was his professional life, but wasn’t feeling particularly fulfilled by …

May 9, 2013 – 6:04 am | By ashok | Posted in philosophy | Tagged | Comments (2)

André Kertész, “On Reading”

for Barbara Gazin, Mark Alonzo & Raj Luthra Perhaps the strangest thing about the human condition is how one has to distance oneself from humanity in order to understand and appreciate it. The activity of reading can be emblematic of this distancing when it does not serve as its catalyst. Kertész’s photographic essay seems to …

May 7, 2013 – 10:35 pm | By ashok | Posted in media | Tagged , , , | Comments (1)

birth day

Today I groggily awoke, fed the dog, went to work, napped at home. It is your birthday. I want to bark at the moon. I want the excitement of innocence, the dawning awareness your presence beckons.

May 6, 2013 – 6:42 pm | By ashok | Posted in writing | Comments (0)