To _________,
long ago
I went to the museum
to see Van Gogh's self
portrait,
the one without
bandages
and remembered--
how small a drop
of paint lasts
to be itself
remembered
and removed
from withholding
too much
--unwinding
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Sunday, April 16, 2006
Paradise Now
There's a feeling of helplessness as the camera pans and tightens on Said's (Kais Nashef) eyes in the last frames of the film. You want so very much to prevent the inevitable but his eyes, his very fierce eyes might as well lull you into complacency as you're split into the part of you that agrees and accepts and the other part that is balanced with horror and is preparing to mourn.
Is Paradise now a call for peace? Perhaps, there's the voice of Suha who advocates other forms of resistance, she's the rational one. There's Said who has a hidden past that seems to foment his actions and there's Khaled (Ali Suliman), the hot-head, the one you're sure will be dependable right until the end. But Khaled's dependability is ultimately at question in this film as he's the character hat has the greatest change of heart or turn around. Its this turn of heart makes me question the believability of this film. Can it really happen like that? Someone who has pledged to be a human weapon, resolving to carry out an operation of martyrdom, sees that there are other options?
I really want to believe this is possible, but the conversion is too fast and too easy. I don't see where there's a real problem with what he has chosen to do and a kind of realization of what one isn't supposed to do. There's a heated conversation with Suha, the daughter of a respected resistance fighter, who is for the cause, but not the actions of her countrymen. She believes in a war of morals, one where the Palestinians have to stop the violence, so that there's never a justification for Israeli violence and then let the battle be an ideological one where the world will see the Palestinian cause as grounded in a peaceful effort toward coexistance. Her strongest argument, the one that if I suspend my doubt as to her effectiveness in changing Khaled's mind, is the question of "what about us, the ones you leave behind? what are we to do?" This question about the martyr's families, the survivors, the women who have historically born the brunt on the homefront of any armed conflit, resistance or offensive, is poignant. It is asking Khaled to step outside himself, to see a picture that is larger than his narrow view of the world and ultimately, his narcissism about paradise.
"What will happen after?" asks Khaled as he rides in a car toward the launch point of his mission "two angels come down and bring you up to paradise" answeres Jamal. "Really?" asks Khaled with a certain tinge of uncertainty. That uncertainty is ultimately his undoing, but it seems that its minor as Jamal explains it away as 'of course' in his very certain and religiously dogmatic attitude.
Both Khaled & Said's features and acting are excellent, but its the women that steal this show. Said's mother played by Hiam Abass and Suha, Lubna Azabal, are marvelous in their ability to let silence speak volumes. Hiam has a small part, something, fleeting, but in those moments she eats up the screen with the simple and quotidian act of preparing a dinner, and later, talking to her son. There's a part of you that very much wants to sit at this woman's table as she chops fresh vegetables for mezedes and hands it to Said to be carried out for the family to eat.
You can eat this piece alive as you watch the struggle, as you cry out in silence hoping to change what you know has a trajectory and life of its own, or you can sit back and wonder if this kind of moral drama does play out, or if the decision to kill yourself and other people along with you is an easy one to make and that the ritual around the martyr is nothing more than window-dressing for a factory operation called suicide bombing.
Is Paradise now a call for peace? Perhaps, there's the voice of Suha who advocates other forms of resistance, she's the rational one. There's Said who has a hidden past that seems to foment his actions and there's Khaled (Ali Suliman), the hot-head, the one you're sure will be dependable right until the end. But Khaled's dependability is ultimately at question in this film as he's the character hat has the greatest change of heart or turn around. Its this turn of heart makes me question the believability of this film. Can it really happen like that? Someone who has pledged to be a human weapon, resolving to carry out an operation of martyrdom, sees that there are other options?
I really want to believe this is possible, but the conversion is too fast and too easy. I don't see where there's a real problem with what he has chosen to do and a kind of realization of what one isn't supposed to do. There's a heated conversation with Suha, the daughter of a respected resistance fighter, who is for the cause, but not the actions of her countrymen. She believes in a war of morals, one where the Palestinians have to stop the violence, so that there's never a justification for Israeli violence and then let the battle be an ideological one where the world will see the Palestinian cause as grounded in a peaceful effort toward coexistance. Her strongest argument, the one that if I suspend my doubt as to her effectiveness in changing Khaled's mind, is the question of "what about us, the ones you leave behind? what are we to do?" This question about the martyr's families, the survivors, the women who have historically born the brunt on the homefront of any armed conflit, resistance or offensive, is poignant. It is asking Khaled to step outside himself, to see a picture that is larger than his narrow view of the world and ultimately, his narcissism about paradise.
"What will happen after?" asks Khaled as he rides in a car toward the launch point of his mission "two angels come down and bring you up to paradise" answeres Jamal. "Really?" asks Khaled with a certain tinge of uncertainty. That uncertainty is ultimately his undoing, but it seems that its minor as Jamal explains it away as 'of course' in his very certain and religiously dogmatic attitude.
Both Khaled & Said's features and acting are excellent, but its the women that steal this show. Said's mother played by Hiam Abass and Suha, Lubna Azabal, are marvelous in their ability to let silence speak volumes. Hiam has a small part, something, fleeting, but in those moments she eats up the screen with the simple and quotidian act of preparing a dinner, and later, talking to her son. There's a part of you that very much wants to sit at this woman's table as she chops fresh vegetables for mezedes and hands it to Said to be carried out for the family to eat.
You can eat this piece alive as you watch the struggle, as you cry out in silence hoping to change what you know has a trajectory and life of its own, or you can sit back and wonder if this kind of moral drama does play out, or if the decision to kill yourself and other people along with you is an easy one to make and that the ritual around the martyr is nothing more than window-dressing for a factory operation called suicide bombing.
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
[untitled]
Did you say
solipsistic
i love that
word
gently used
reeds and
willows
face me
speaking
about face
condensed
bread crumb
back toward
this way
walk this way
like the walk
of this road
will lead you
back to me.
XCVIII
3 were charged after messages striking a chord in the prime of youth – their youth wasn't in question – but 18 more than the previous year reported – in an underage way – under reporting absence clearly states – there's more – to be dragged 3 miles till the arms teeter out and depending on the road – this is where it might seem redundant – 63 incidents are collectively enshrined – 34,000 destroyed after they were already destroyed in 2 days no less – on this site there will be a monument – for the numbers were a record – and the 1 was stoned by many on the seventh day in accordance – something written ends relation – 6 million weren't all sacrificed – or by fire – to forget the 20 million trampled by steel – 6,000 lined the Via Appia in 72 – years before 3 on the hill – and later in nome de patre – or it's what you oughtn't to do but you do anyway – some dispute differences between 100,000 gone in prison and another 10,000 at the stake – but revision is modernity's sole resolve toward enlightenment – the figures say now that maybe 31,912 over 400 years – young governments came and went and took with them 1 million or so Anatolians – it was around the 1st great one the record clearly states 9 million fighting men and boys and 7 million others – and every generation is supposed to out do the one before – when everything became possible after Auschwitz – 937,000 laid to waste in 100 days – so many Cain's and even more Able – to understand the origin – 10-20% never made it sailing the ocean blue – another 15-33% couldn't be seasoned out – this season's ripe count measures success totally unaware that eye deep in hell an abacus still clicks and counts.
3 were charged after messages striking a chord in the prime of youth – their youth wasn't in question – but 18 more than the previous year reported – in an underage way – under reporting absence clearly states – there's more – to be dragged 3 miles till the arms teeter out and depending on the road – this is where it might seem redundant – 63 incidents are collectively enshrined – 34,000 destroyed after they were already destroyed in 2 days no less – on this site there will be a monument – for the numbers were a record – and the 1 was stoned by many on the seventh day in accordance – something written ends relation – 6 million weren't all sacrificed – or by fire – to forget the 20 million trampled by steel – 6,000 lined the Via Appia in 72 – years before 3 on the hill – and later in nome de patre – or it's what you oughtn't to do but you do anyway – some dispute differences between 100,000 gone in prison and another 10,000 at the stake – but revision is modernity's sole resolve toward enlightenment – the figures say now that maybe 31,912 over 400 years – young governments came and went and took with them 1 million or so Anatolians – it was around the 1st great one the record clearly states 9 million fighting men and boys and 7 million others – and every generation is supposed to out do the one before – when everything became possible after Auschwitz – 937,000 laid to waste in 100 days – so many Cain's and even more Able – to understand the origin – 10-20% never made it sailing the ocean blue – another 15-33% couldn't be seasoned out – this season's ripe count measures success totally unaware that eye deep in hell an abacus still clicks and counts.
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
Away but back...
So its been a bloody long time since I postd anything. I think I need a break from thinking out loud. Now that I've taken a break from thinking to myself, or maybe for myself, or maybe not, I don't know; it
On Broadway at Columbus
you can drink a lesson
like loitering for shadows
when the drummer vanishes
ice melts faster in liquor
first the fingers and then
the fingers
might feel a stab of cold
when you’re crazy
you don’t miss the sun
if you weren’t paying attention
let’s fake letters in lights
park the rhythm in back
inviolate clocks
the violence’s been timed
four-four swings the sound
while sips turn to pound
standards are foreign
friends have come far
On Broadway at Columbus
you can drink a lesson
like loitering for shadows
when the drummer vanishes
ice melts faster in liquor
first the fingers and then
the fingers
might feel a stab of cold
when you’re crazy
you don’t miss the sun
if you weren’t paying attention
let’s fake letters in lights
park the rhythm in back
inviolate clocks
the violence’s been timed
four-four swings the sound
while sips turn to pound
standards are foreign
friends have come far
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
