#the mountain Leonard wanted to scale

[gierosajie]

I wonder if there's a whole little ceremony to get newly made wind gliders blessed (like how people over here have their newly made fishing boats/cars/motorcycles blessed for safe travel), or if whoever made them just. straight up asks the Anemo Archon for it to work like Firnas did for the Sumeru glider

[michaelbogild]

Lines by Leonard Cohen

As someone long prepared for the occasion In full command of every plan you wrecked – Do not choose a coward’s explanation that hides behind the cause and the effect

And it's stronger than drink And it's deeper than sorrow This darkness she's left in my heart.

And I'll dance with you in Vienna I'll be wearing a river's disguise The hyacinth wild on my shoulder, My mouth on the dew of your thighs

He wants to write a love song An anthem of forgiving A manual for living With defeat

The birds they sang At the break of day Start again I heard them say Don't dwell on what Has passed away Or what is yet to be.

You never liked to get The letters that I sent. But now you've got the gist Of what my letters meant. You're reading them again, The ones you didn't burn. You press them to your lips, My pages of concern.

I caught the darkness It was drinking from your cup. I said: Is this contagious? You said: Just drink it up

Everybody talking to their pockets Everybody wants a box of chocolates And a long stem rose Everybody knows

A cross on every hill A star, a minaret So many graves to fill O love, aren't you tired yet?

And everybody knows that the Plague is coming Everybody knows that it's moving fast Everybody knows that the naked man and woman Are just a shining artifact of the past

Yeah I missed you since the place got wrecked By the winds of change and the weeds of sex looks like freedom but it feels like death it's something in between, I guess

I walked into this empty church I had no place else to go When the sweetest voice I ever heard, whispered to my soul

I heard the snake was baffled by his sin He shed his scales to find the snake within But born again is born without a skin The poison enters into everything

And summoned now to deal With your invincible defeat, You live your life as if it’s real, A Thousand Kisses Deep.

I’m slowing down the tune I never liked it fast You want to get there soon I want to get there last

When they said REPENT REPENT I wonder what they meant

Her thighs they slipped away from me Like schools of startled fish Though I've forgotten half my life I still remember this

And if no leaves were on the tree And no water in the sea And the break of day had nothing to reveal That's how broken I would be What my life would seem to me If I didn't have your love to make it real

And yes she lied about it all Her children and her husband You were born to judge the world Forgive me but I wasn't

O troubled dust concealing An undivided love The Heart beneath is teaching To the broken Heart above

The pull of the moon, the thrust of the sun And thus the ocean is crossed The waters are blessed while a shadowy guest Kindles a light for the lost

How come you called me here tonight? How come you bother With my heart at all? You raise me up in grace, Then you put me in a place, Where I must fall.

And everybody knows that it's now or never Everybody knows that it's me or you And everybody knows that you live forever Ah when you've done a line or two

It's coming like the tidal flood beneath the lunar sway, imperial, mysterious, in amorous array:

The lights went out behind us The fireflies undressed The broken sidewalk ended I touched her sleeping breasts They opened to me urgently Likelilies from the dead Behind a fine embroidery Her nipples rose like bread Then I took off my necktie And she took off her dress My belt and pistol set aside We tore away the rest

The Maestro says it's Mozart but it sounds like bubble gum when you're waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come.

The sea so deep and blind The sun, the wild regret The club, the wheel, the mind, O love, aren't you tired yet?

The wounded forms appear: The loss, the full extent; And simple kindness here, The solitude of strength.

If the sun would lose its light And we lived in an endless night And there was nothing left that you could feel If the sea were sand alone And the flowers made of stone And no one that you hurt could ever heal Well that's how broken I would be What my life would seem to me If I didn't have your love to make it real

But you'll be hearing from me baby, long after I'm gone I'll be speaking to you sweetly From a window in the Tower of Song

I said I’d be your lover. You laughed at what I said. I lost my job forever. I was counted with the dead.

It failed my little fire But it's bright the dying spark Go tell the young messiah What happens to the heart

Good night, good night, my fallen star I guess you're right, you always are I know you're right about the blues You live some life you'd never choose

looks like freedom but it feels like death it's something in between, I guess

I've seen you change the water into wine I've seen you change it back to water, too I sit at your table every night I try but I just don't get high with you

The present's not that pleasant Just a lot of things to do I thought the past would last me But the darkness got that too

The splinters that you carry The cross you left behind Come healing of the body Come healing of the mind

I wish there was a treaty we could sign I do not care who takes this bloody hill I'm angry and I'm tired all the time I wish there was a treaty, I wish there was a treaty Between your love and mine

I’m lacing up my shoe But I don’t want to run I’ll get here when I do Don’t need no starting gun

Thanks For The Dance

Ah, they're dancing in the street — it's Jubilee We sold ourselves for love but now we're free I'm so sorry for that ghost I made you be Only one of us was real and that was me

And I'm still working with the wine, still dancing cheek to cheek, the band is playing Auld Lang Syne, but the heart will not retreat.

And maybe I had miles to drive, And promises to keep: You ditch it all to stay alive, A Thousand Kisses Deep.

Baby don’t ignore me We were smokers we were friends Forget that tired story Of betrayal and revenge

So you can stick your little pins in that voodoo doll I'm very sorry, baby, doesn't look like me at all I'm standing by the window where the light is strong Ah they don't let a woman kill you Not in the Tower of Song

Show me the place, help me roll away the stone Show me the place, I can't move this thing alone Show me the place where the word became a man Show me the place where the suffering began

And you're weak and you're harmless and you're sleeping in your harness and the wind going wild in the trees, and it ain't exactly prison but you'll never be forgiven for whatever you've done with the keys.

Steer your heart past the Truth that you believed in yesterday Such as Fundamental Goodness and the Wisdom of the Way Steer your heart, precious heart, past the women whom you bought Year by year, month by month, day by day Thought by thought

Word of words and measure of all measures Blessed is the name, the name be blessed Written on my heart in burning letters That’s all I know, I cannot read the rest

And O my love, I still recall The pleasures that we knew; The rivers and the waterfall, Wherein I bathed with you.

You said how could this happen You said how can this be The chains are gone from heaven The storms are wild and free

I cried for you this morning And I’ll cry for you again But I’m not in charge of sorrow So please don’t ask me when

Both of us say there are laws to obey But frankly I don’t like your tone You want to change the way I make love I want to leave it alone

Behold the gates of mercy In arbitrary space And none of us deserving The cruelty or the grace

Then I came back from where I’d been. My room, it looked the same – But there was nothing left between The Nameless and the Name.

O longing of the branches To lift the little bud O longing of the arteries To purify the blood

I to my side call the meek and the mild You to your side call the Word By virtue of suffering I claim to have won You claim to have never been heard

I know I said I’d meet you, I’d meet you at the store, But I can’t buy it, baby. I can’t buy it anymore.

I was idle with my soul, when I heard that you could use me I followed very closely, but my life remained the same But then you showed me where you had been wounded In every atom broken is the Name

I fled to the edge of the mighty sea of sorrow Pursued by the riders of a cruel and dark regime But the waters parted and my soul crossed over Out of Egypt, out of Pharaoh’s dream

They whisper still, the injured stones The blunted mountains weep As he died to make men holy Let us die to make things cheap

Sounded like the truth Seemed the better way Sounded like the truth But it's not the truth today

Hurt once and for all into silence. A long pain ending without a song to prove it. Who could stand beside you so close to Eden, When you glinted in every eye the held-high razor, shivering every ram and son?

Sleep baby sleep The day’s on the run The wind in the trees Is talking in tongues

And I loved you when our love was blessed and I love you now there's nothing left

There's silt on your ankles and sand on your feet The river too shallow, the ocean too deep You smile at your suffering, the sweetest reprieve Why did you leave us, why did you leave

I saw some people starving There was murder, there was rape Their villages were burning They were trying to escape I couldn't meet their glances I was staring at my shoes It was acid, it was tragic It was almost like the blues

If you want a partner Take my hand Or if you want to strike me down in anger Here I stand, I'm your man

Ah I don't believe you'd like it, You wouldn't like it here. There ain't no entertainment and the judgements are severe.

The opposites falter, the spirals reverse And Eve must re-enter the sleep of her birth

I don't need to be forgiven for loving you so much It's written in the scriptures It's written there in blood I even heard the angels declare it from above

Sometimes I’d head for the highway I’m old and the mirrors don’t lie But crazy has places to hide in That are deeper than any goodbye

If you want a boxer I will step into the ring for you And if you want a doctor I'll examine every inch of you

Yeah we're drinking and we're dancing but there's nothing really happening and the place is dead as Heaven on a Saturday night And my very close companion gets me fumbling gets me laughing she's a hundred but she's wearing something tight and I lift my glass to the Awful Truth which you can't reveal to the Ears of Youth except to say it isn't worth a dime And the whole damn place goes crazy twice and it's once for the devil and once for Christ but the Boss don't like these dizzy heights we're busted in the blinding lights, busted in the blinding lights of CLOSING TIME

I want him to be certain That he doesn't have a burden That he doesn't need a vision That he only has permission To do my instant bidding which is to Say what I have told him to repeat

Though I take my song From a withered limb, Both song and tree, They sing for him.

Everybody knows that the boat is leaking Everybody knows that the captain lied Everybody got this broken feeling Like their father or their dog just died

Ditched on a beach Where the sea hates to go With a child in my arms And a chill in my soul And my heart the shape Of a begging bowl

And she says, Drink deeply, pilgrim but don't forget there's still a woman beneath this resplendent chemise.

You don't need a lawyer I'm not making a claim You don't need to surrender I'm not taking aim I don't need a lover, no, no The wretched beast is tame I don't need a lover So blow out the flame

O gather up the brokenness And bring it to me now The fragrance of those promises You never dared to vow

And I don’t really know who sent me, To raise my voice and say: May the lights in The Land of Plenty Shine on the truth some day.

There's a bar where the boys have stopped talking They've been sentenced to death by the blues

I know the burden’s heavy As you wheel it through the night Some people say it’s empty But that don’t mean it’s light

Ten New Songs

I better hold my tongue I better take my place Lift this glass of blood Try to say the grace

You came to me this morning and you handled me like meat. You’d have to be a man to know how good that feels, how sweet.

A sip of wine, a cigarette, And then it’s time to go. I tidied up the kitchenette; I tuned the old banjo. I’m wanted at the traffic-jam. They’re saving me a seat. I’m what I am, and what I am, Is back on Boogie Street.

Down in the valley the famine goes on The famine up on the hill I say that you shouldn’t, you couldn’t, you can’t You say that you must and you will

So we struggle and we stagger down the snakes and up the ladder to the tower where the blessed hours chime and I swear it happened just like this: a sigh, a cry, a hungry kiss the Gates of Love they budged an inch I can't say much has happened since

And I'll bury my soul in a scrapbook, With the photographs there, and the moss And I'll yield to the flood of your beauty My cheap violin and my cross

Then she dances so graceful and your heart's hard and hateful and she's naked but that's just a tease. And you turn in disgust from your hatred and from your love and comes to you light as the breeze.

I see the Ghost of Culture With numbers on his wrist Salute some new conclusion Which all of us have missed

I tried to love you my way, But I couldn’t make it hold. So I closed the Book of Longing And I do what I am told.

And up through the system the worlds are withdrawn From every dominion the mind stood upon And now that it's over and now that it's done The name has no number, not even the one

You got me singing Like a prisoner in a jail You got me singing Like my pardon's in the mail

You can add up the parts But you won't have the sum You can strike up the march, There is no drum Every heart, every heart To love will come But like a refugee.

Everybody knows you've been discreet But there were so many people you just had to meet Without your clothes And everybody knows

It's coming from the sorrow in the street, the holy places where the races meet; from the homicidal bitchin' that goes down in every kitchen to determine who will serve and who will eat. From the wells of disappointment where the women kneel to pray for the grace of God in the desert here and the desert far away:

Even though she sleeps upon your satin Even though she wakes you with a kiss Do not say the moment was imagined Do not stoop to strategies like this

I smile when I'm angry I cheat and I lie I do what I have to do To get by But I know what is wrong And I know what is right And I'd die for the truth In My Secret Life

I loved you for your beauty but that doesn't make a fool of me: you were in it for your beauty too and I loved you for your body there's a voice that sounds like God to me declaring, declaring, declaring that your body's really you

O baby I waited so long for your kiss for something to happen, oh something like this.

O let the heavens falter And let the earth proclaim: Come healing of the Altar Come healing of the Name

If you're squeezed for information, that's when you've got to play it dumb: You just say you're out there waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come.

You put on a uniform To fight the Civil War You looked so good I didn’t care What side you’re fighting for

Did you confuse the Messiah in a mirror and rest because he had finally come? Let me cry Help beside you, Teacher.

It's coming to America first, the cradle of the best and of the worst. It's here they got the range and the machinery for change and it's here they got the spiritual thirst. It's here the family's broken and it's here the lonely say that the heart has got to open in a fundamental way:

I said to Hank Williams: how lonely does it get? Hank Williams hasn't answered yet But I hear him coughing all night long A hundred floors above me In the Tower of Song

Sail on, sail on O mighty Ship of State! To the Shores of Need Past the Reefs of Greed Through the Squalls of Hate Sail on, sail on

Ah the wars they will Be fought again The holy dove She will be caught again Bought and sold And bought again The dove is never free.

I should have seen it coming It was right behind your eyes You were young and it was summer I just had to take a dive Winning you was easy But darkness was the prize

The party’s over But I’ve landed on my feet I’ll be standing on this corner Where there used to be a street

I know you had to lie to me, I know you had to cheat, to pose all hot and high behind the veils of shear deceit, our perfect porn aristocrat so elegant and cheap, I’m old but I’m still into that, A thousand kisses deep.

It’s not a trick, your senses all deceiving A fitful dream, the morning will exhaust – Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost

If you want a lover I'll do anything you ask me to And if you want another kind of love I'll wear a mask for you

It's dark now and it's snowing O my love I must be going, The river has started to freeze. And I'm sick of pretending I'm broken from bending I've lived too long on my knees.

Well I don't know about tomorrow but I know what's coming next I've used up all my questions; I have no answers left

As for the world the job the war I ditched them all to love you more

The story's been written the letter's been sealed You gave me a lily but now it's a field

Your story was so long, The plot was so intense, It took you years to cross The lines of self-defense.

And soon there's sand in every kiss And soon the dawn is ready And soon the night surrenders To a daffodil machete

Waiting for the miracle There's nothing left to do. I haven't been this happy since the end of World War II.

The troubles came I saved what I could save A thread of light, a particle, a wave But there were chains, so I hastened to behave There were chains, so I loved you like a slave

his waltz With its very own breath of brandy and Death Dragging its tail in the sea

They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom For trying to change the system from within I'm coming now, I'm coming to reward them First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

They oughta give my heart a medal For letting go of you When I turned my back on the devil Turned my back on the angel too

Had to go crazy to love you You who were never the one Whom I chased through the souvenir heartache Her braids and her blouse all undone

Well the mouse ate the crumb Then the cat ate the crust Now they’ve fallen in love They’re talking in tongues

There’s other ways to answer That certainly is true Me, I’m blind with death and anger And that’s no place for you

I'm guided by a signal in the heavens I'm guided by this birthmark on my skin I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons

I was fighting with temptation But I didn't want to win A man like me don't like to see Temptation caving in

I know that I’m forgiven, But I don’t know how I know I don’t trust my inner feelings – Inner feelings come and go.

And sometimes when the night is slow, The wretched and the meek, We gather up our hearts and go, A Thousand Kisses Deep.

I dreamed about you, baby. It was just the other night. Most of you was naked Ah but some of you was light.

I don’t know why I come here, knowing as I do, what you really think of me, what I really think of you.

Had to go crazy to love you Had to let everything fall Had to be people I hated Had to be no one at all

I used to love the rainbow And I used to love the view I loved the early morning I'd pretend that it was new But I caught the darkness baby And I got it worse than you

Traveling light It's au revoir My once so bright, my fallen star I'm running late, they'll close the bar I used to play one mean guitar

I dreamed about you baby You were wearing half your dress I know you have to hate me But could you hate me less?

The night of Santiago And I was passing through So I took her to the river As any man would do

Let's keep it on the level When I walked away from you I turned my back on the devil Turned my back on the angel too

I’m turning tricks, I’m getting fixed, I’m back on Boogie Street. You lose your grip, and then you slip Into the Masterpiece.

So we'll go no more a-roving So late into the night, Though the heart be still as loving, And the moon be still as bright. For the sword outwears its sheath, And the soul outwears the breast, And the heart must pause to breathe, And love itself have rest.

You got me singing Even tho' it all looks grim You got me singing The Hallelujah hymn

I'm aching for you baby I can't pretend I'm not I need to see you naked In your body and your thought

If your heart is torn I don’t wonder why If the night is long Here’s my lullaby

I'm sentimental, if you know what I mean I love the country but I can't stand the scene. And I'm neither left or right I'm just staying home tonight, getting lost in that hopeless little screen.

Now in Vienna there's ten pretty women There's a shoulder where Death comes to cry There's a lobby with nine hundred windows There's a tree where the doves go to die There's a piece that was torn from the morning And it hangs in the Gallery of Frost

Oh I want you, I want you, I want you On a chair with a dead magazine In the cave at the tip of the lily In some hallways where love's never been On a bed where the moon has been sweating In a cry filled with footsteps and sand

And everybody knows that you're in trouble Everybody knows what you've been through From the bloody cross on top of Calvary To the beach of Malibu

Ah you drift into my dreams as if you had the right And you show me how you broke me doing all the little things I really like

I gave her something pretty And I waited till she laughed I wasn't born a gypsy To make a woman sad

There is no God in Heaven And there is no Hell below So says the great professor Of all there is to know But I've had the invitation That a sinner can't refuse And it's almost like salvation It's almost like the blues

The war was lost The treaty signed I was not caught I crossed the line, I had to leave My life behind I dug some graves You'll never findI was not caught Though many tried I live among you Well disguised

Now I'm living in this temple Where they tell you what to do I'm old and I've had to settle On a different point of view

Too late to fix another drink – The lights are going out – I’ll listen to the darkness sing – I know what that’s about.

I loved you when you opened like a lily to the heat, you see I’m just another snowman standing in the rain and sleet, who loved you with his frozen love, his second hand physique, with all he is, and all he was, A thousand kisses deep.

And death is old But it's always new I freeze with fear And I'm there for you

I don't smoke no cigarette I don't drink no alcohol I ain't had much loving yet But that's always been your call Hey I don't miss it baby I got no taste for anything at all

I’ll try to say a little more: Love went on and on Until it reached an open door – Then Love Itself Love Itself was gone.

I said there'd been a flood. I said there's nothing left. I hoped that you would come. I gave you my address.

So I let my heart get frozen To keep away the rot My father says I'm chosen My mother says I'm not

O Crown of Light, O Darkened One, I never thought we’d meet. You kiss my lips, and then it’s done: I’m back on Boogie Street.

Ah, the moon's too bright The chain's too tight The beast won't go to sleep

And he cut my lip And he cut my heart. So I could not drink From the river dark.

O solitude of longing Where love has been confined Come healing of the body Come healing of the mind

My mirrored twin, my next of kin, I’d know you in my sleep and who but you would take me in, a thousand kisses deep.

Suddenly the night has grown colder The god of love preparing to depart Alexandra hoisted on his shoulder They slip between the sentries of the heart

But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags that Time cannot decay, I'm junk but I'm still holding up this little wild bouquet

The autumn moved across your skin, got something in my eye, a light that doesn’t need to live, and doesn’t need to die. A riddle in the book of love, obscure and obsolete, till witnessed here in time and blood, A thousand kisses deep.

There's nobody missing There is no reward Little by little We're cutting the cord We're spending the treasure, oh, no, no That love cannot afford I know you can feel it The sweetness restored

The ponies run, the girls are young, The odds are there to beat. You win a while, and then it’s done – Your little winning streak.

I like to take my time I like to linger as it flies A weekend on your lips A lifetime in your eyes

Then he struck my heart With a deadly force, And he said, ‘This heart: It is not yours.’

Everybody knows that you love me baby Everybody knows that you really do Everybody knows that you've been faithful Ah give or take a night or two

Steer your way past the ruins of the Altar and the Mall Steer your way through the fables of Creation and The Fall Steer your way past the Palaces that rise above the rot Year by year, month by month, day by day Thought by thought

Your crazy fragrance all around Your secrets in my view My lost, my lost was saying found My don't was saying do

Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack a crack in everything That's how the light gets in.

Steer your way through the pain that is far more real than you That's smashed the Cosmic Model, that blinded every view And please don't make me go there, though there be a God or not Year by year, month by month, day by day Thought by thought

You sent me here You sent me there Breaking things I can't repair Making objects Out of thoughts Making more By thinking not

And you who were bewildered by a meaning Whose code was broken, crucifix uncrossed – Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost

I see you standing on the other side I don't know how the river got so wide I loved you baby, way back when And all the bridges are burning that we might have crossed But I feel so close to everything that we lost We'll never, we'll never have to lose it again

If you are the dealer, I'm out of the game If you are the healer, it means I'm broken and lame If thine is the glory then mine must be the shame You want it darker We kill the flame

I used to be your favorite drunk Good for one more laugh Then we both ran out of luck Luck was all we ever had

There'll be the breaking of the ancient Western code Your private life will suddenly explode There'll be phantoms There'll be fires on the road And the white man dancing You'll see your woman Hanging upside down Her features covered by her fallen gown And all the lousy little poets Coming round Tryin' to sound like Charlie Manson

Confined to sex, we pressed against The limits of the sea: I saw there were no oceans left For scavengers like me.

I was born like this, I had no choice I was born with the gift of a golden voice And twenty-seven angels from the Great Beyond They tied me to this table right here In the Tower of Song

I’m naked and I’m filthy And both of us are guilty

the fiddler fiddles something so sublime all the women tear their blouses off and the men they dance on the polka-dots and it's partner found, it's partner lost and it's hell to pay when the fiddler stops

I've seen the future, brother: It is murder

Who broke the heart and made it new? Who's moving on, who's kiddin' who?

So I knelt there at the delta, at the alpha and the omega, at the cradle of the river and the seas. And like a blessing come from heaven for something like a second I was healed and my heart was at ease.

And there's a mighty judgment coming, but I may be wrong You see, you hear these funny voices In the Tower of Song

Upheld by the simplicities of pleasure They gain the light, they formlessly entwine And radiant beyond your widest measure They fall among the voices and the wine

When you've fallen on the highway and you're lying in the rain, and they ask you how you're doing of course you'll say you can't complain

You always said we’re equal So let me march with you Just an extra in the sequel To the old red white and blue

She stands before you naked you can see it, you can taste it, and she comes to you light as the breeze. Now you can drink it or you can nurse it, it don't matter how you worship as long as you're down on your knees.

By the rivers dark I wandered on. I lived my life in Babylon. And I did forget My holy song: And I had no strength In Babylon.

All your moves are swift All your turns are tight Let me catch my breath I thought we had all night

Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. It's coming through a crack in the wall; on a visionary flood of alcohol; from the staggering account of the Sermon on the Mount which I don't pretend to understand at all. It's coming from the silence on the dock of the bay, from the brave, the bold, the battered heart of Chevrolet: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

And let the heavens hear it The penitential hymn Come healing of the spirit Come healing of the limb

There's a lover in the story But the story's still the same There's a lullaby for suffering And a paradox to blame But it's written in the scriptures And it's not some idle claim You want it darker We kill the flame

I was alone on the road, your love was so confusing And all my teachers told me that I had myself to blame But in the grip of sensual illusion A sweet unknowing unified the name

Magnified, sanctified, be thy holy name Vilified, crucified, in the human frame A million candles burning for the help that never came

They're lining up the prisoners And the guards are taking aim I struggled with some demons They were middle class and tame I didn't know I had permission to murder and to maim

So come, my friends, be not afraid. We are so lightly here. It is in love that we are made; In love we disappear.

I see my life In full review It was never me It was always you

We'll be going down so deep the river's going to weep, and the mountain's going to shout Amen!

Show me the place where my head is bendin' low Show me the place where you want your slave to go

I’m tired of choosing desire I been saved by a blessed fatigue The gates of commitment unwired And nobody trying to leave

Yeah my friends are gone and my hair is grey I ache in the places where I used to play And I'm crazy for love but I'm not coming on I'm just paying my rent every day Oh in the Tower of Song

There's an attic where children are playing Where I've got to lie down with you soon In a dream of Hungarian lanterns In the mist of some sweet afternoon And I'll see what you've chained to your sorrow All your sheep and your lilies of snow

We find ourselves on different sides Of a line nobody drew Though it all may be one in the higher eye Down here where we live it is two

I've seen the nations rise and fall I've heard their stories, heard them all But love's the only engine of survival Your servant here, he has been told To say it clear, to say it cold: It's over, it ain't going Any further And now the wheels of heaven stop You feel the devil's riding crop Get ready for the future: It is murder

I've heard the soul unfolds in the chambers of its longing And the bitter liquor sweetens in the hammered cup Ah but all the ladders of the night have fallen Just darkness now, to lift the longing up

Why don’t you come on back to the war, that’s right, get in it, why don’t you come on back to the war, it’s just beginning.

If your life is a leaf that the seasons tear off and condemn they will bind you with love that is graceful and green as a stem.

An Eskimo showed me a movie he’d recently taken of you: the poor man could hardly stop shivering, his lips and his fingers were blue. I suppose that he froze when the wind took your clothes and I guess he just never got warm. But you stand there so nice, in your blizzard of ice, oh please let me come into the storm.

I loved your master perfectly I taught him all that he knew. He was starving in some deep mystery like a man who is sure what is true.

I have begun to long for you, I who have no greed; I have begun to ask for you, I who have no need. You say you’ve gone away from me, but I can feel you when you breathe.

Hungry as an archway through which the troops have passed, I stand in ruins behind you, with your winter clothes, your broken sandal straps.

Well, you tell me that your lover has a broken limb, you say you’re kind of restless now and it’s on account of him.

Oh let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone Let me feel you moving like they do in Babylon Show me slowly what I only know the limits of Dance me to the end of love

I tried to leave you, I don’t deny I closed the book on us, at least a hundred times.

And I can’t wait to tell you to your face And I can’t wait for you to take my place You are The Naked Angel In My Heart You are The Woman With Her Legs Apart It’s written on the walls of this hotel You go to heaven once you’ve been to hell

Then let the other selves be wrong, yeah, let them manifest and come till every taste is on the tongue, till love is pierced and love is hung, and every kind of freedom done

O come with me my little one, we will find that farm and grow us grass and apples there and keep all the animals warm. And if by chance I wake at night and I ask you who I am, O take me to the slaughterhouse, I will wait there with the lamb.

Ah they’re shutting down the factory now Just when all the bills are due And the fields they’re under lock and key Tho’ the rain and the sun come through And springtime starts but then it stops In the name of something new And all the senses rise against this Coming back to you

Like a baby, stillborn, like a beast with his horn I have torn everyone who reached out for me.

We met when we were almost young deep in the green lilac park. You held on to me like I was a crucifix, as we went kneeling through the dark.

And there are no letters in the mailbox, and there are no grapes upon the vine, and there are no chocolates in the boxes anymore, and there are no diamonds in the mine.

I cried, “Oh, Lady Midnight, I fear that you grow old, the stars eat your body and the wind makes you cold

So daily I renew my idle duty I touch her here and there – I know my place I kiss her open mouth and I praise her beauty and people call me traitor to my face

But my darling says “Leonard, just let it go by That old silhouette on the great western sky” So I pick out a tune and they move right along and they’re gone like the smoke and they’re gone like this song

And why are you so quiet now standing there in the doorway? You chose your journey long before you came upon this highway.

But I swear by this song and by all that I have done wrong I will make it all up to thee.

It was deep into his fiery heart he took the dust of Joan of Arc, and then she clearly understood if he was fire, oh then she must be wood.

And Jesus was a sailor When he walked upon the water And he spent a long time watching From his lonely wooden tower And when he knew for certain Only drowning men could see him He said “All men will be sailors then Until the sea shall free them” But he himself was broken Long before the sky would open Forsaken, almost human He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone And you want to travel with him And you want to travel blind And you think maybe you’ll trust him For he’s touched your perfect body with his mind.

Your master took you travelling, well at least that’s what you said. And now do you come back to bring your prisoner wine and bread?

Your pain is no credential here, it’s just the shadow, shadow of my wound.

And here where there is no description Oh here in the moment at hand No sinner need rise up forgiven No victim need limp to the stand

I met a woman long ago her hair the black that black can go, Are you a teacher of the heart? Soft she answered no. I met a girl across the sea, her hair the gold that gold can be, Are you a teacher of the heart? Yes, but not for thee.

Oh bless thee continuous stutter Of the word being made into flesh

The cripple here that you clothe and feed is neither starved nor cold; he does not ask for your company, not at the centre, the centre of the world.

Yes, you who are broken by power, you who are absent all day, you who are kings for the sake of your children’s story, the hand of your beggar is burdened down with money, the hand of your lover is clay.

the patron Saint of envy and the grocer of despair

She used to wear her hair like you except when she was sleeping, and then she’d weave it on a loom of smoke and gold and breathing.

And may the spirit of this song, may it rise up pure and free. May it be a shield for you, a shield against the enemy.

And deep into his fiery heart he took the dust of Joan of Arc, and high above the wedding guests he hung the ashes of her wedding dress.

to wear upon my swollen appetite.“ Well, I’m glad to hear you talk this way, you know I’ve watched you riding every day and something in me yearns to win such a cold and lonesome heroine.

Come over to the window, my little darling, I’d like to try to read your palm. I used to think I was some kind of Gypsy boy before I let you take me home.

Then I took the dust of a long sleepless night and I put it in your little shoe. And then I confess that I tortured the dress that you wore for the world to look through.

And the light came from her body And the night went through her grace All summer long she touched me And I knew her, I knew her Face to face

Let’s meet tomorrow if you choose Upon the shore, beneath the bridge That they are building on some endless river

And I’ve read the Bill of Human Rights And some of it was true But there wasn’t any burden left So I’m laying it on you.”

I listened to your kisses at the door I never heard the world so clear before You ran your bath and you began to sing I felt so good I couldn’t feel a thing

Like a worm on a hook, like a knight from some old fashioned book I have saved all my ribbons for thee.

Now the flames they followed Joan of Arc as she came riding through the dark; no moon to keep her armour bright, no man to get her through this very smoky night.

And we read from pleasant Bibles that are bound in blood and skin That the wilderness is gathering All its children back again

And now this woman by your side, well, she’s asleep And there’s nothing you can give her and there’s nothing you want to keep

Just take this longing from my tongue all the lonely things my hands have done. Let me see your beauty broken down like you would do for one your love.

And she shows you where to look Among the garbage and the flowers There are heroes in the seaweed There are children in the morning They are leaning out for love And they will lean that way forever While Suzanne holds the mirror

Ah but if you cannot raise your love To a very high degree, Then you’re just the man I’ve been thinking of – So come and stand with me.

You who wish to conquer pain, you must learn, learn to serve me well.

Why don’t you try to do without him? Why don’t you try to live alone? Do you really need his hands for your passion? Do you really need his heart for your throne?

I left a wife in Tennessee And a baby in Saigon – I risked my life, but not to hear Some country-western song.

I did my best, it wasn’t much I couldn’t feel, so I tried to touch I’ve told the truth, I didn’t come to fool you And even though it all went wrong I’ll stand before the Lord of Song With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah

Oh take this longing from my tongue, all the useless things my hands have done, untie for me your hired blue gown, like you would do for one that you love.

I heard of a saint who had loved you, so I studied all night in his school. He taught that the duty of lovers is to tarnish the golden rule. And just when I was sure that his teachings were pure he drowned himself in the pool. His body is gone but back here on the lawn his spirit continues to drool.

It’s like our visit to the moon or to that other star I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.

Well I’ve been where you’re hanging, I think I can see how you’re pinned: When you’re not feeling holy, your loneliness says that you’ve sinned.

I lit a thin green candle, to make you jealous of me. But the room just filled up with mosquitos, they heard that my body was free.

Too early for the rainbow, too early for the dove These are the final days, this is the darkness, this is the flood And there is no man or woman can be touched But you who come between them will be judged

He tried to make a final stand beside the railway track She said, “The art of longing’s over and it’s never coming back.”

The judges said you missed it by a fraction rise up and brace your troops for the attack Ah the dreamers ride against the men of action Oh see the men of action falling back

Now the crickets are singing The vesper bells ringing The cat’s curled asleep in his chair I’ll go down to Bill’s Bar I can make it that far And I’ll see if my friends are still there Yes, and here’s to the few Who forgive what you do And the fewer who don’t even care And the night comes on It’s very calm I want to cross over, I want to go home But she says, Go back, go back to the World

Those who dance, begin to dance Those who weep begin Those who earnestly are lost Are lost and lost again

I asked my father, I said, “Father change my name.” The one I’m using now it’s covered up with fear and filth and cowardice and shame.

Even in your arms I know I’ll never get it right Even when you bend to give me Comfort in the night

And the last time that I saw her she was living with some boy who gives her soul an empty room and gives her body joy.

Your faith was strong but you needed proof You saw her bathing on the roof Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you She tied you to a kitchen chair She broke your throne, and she cut your hair And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Ah, there is no comfort in the covens of the witch, some very clever doctor went and sterilized the bitch, and the only man of energy, yes the revolution’s pride, he trained a hundred women just to kill an unborn child.

Oh, your chains are too dark For the seas you must swim You are smiling at the seaweed But your smile is too grim

And I thank you, I thank you for doing your duty, you keepers of truth, you guardians of beauty. Your vision is right, my vision is wrong, I’m sorry for smudging the air with my song.

But here, right here, between the birthmark and the stain, between the ocean and your open vein, between the snowman and the rain, once again, once again, love calls you by your name.

For now I need your hidden love. I’m cold as a new razor blade. You left when I told you I was curious, I never said that I was brave.

Your letters they all say that you’re beside me now. Then why do I feel alone? I’m standing on a ledge and your fine spider web is fastening my ankle to a stone.

I leave the lady meditating on the very love which I, I do not wish to claim, I journey down the hundred steps, but the street is still the very same.

And I sing this for the captain Whose ship has not been built For the mother in confusion Her cradle still unfilled

Well, I argued all night like so many have before, saying, “Whatever you give me, I seem to need so much more.” Then she pointed at me where I kneeled on her floor, she said, “Don’t try to use me or slyly refuse me, just win me or lose me, it is this that the darkness is for.”

Some girls wander by mistake into the mess that scalpels make. Are you the teachers of my heart? We teach old hearts to break.

And now the infant with his cord is hauled in like a kite, and one eye filled with blueprints, one eye filled with night.

I believe that you heard your master sing when I was sick in bed. I suppose that he told you everything that I keep locked away in my head.

Do you remember all of those pledges That we pledged in the passionate night Ah they’re soiled now, they’re torn at the edges Like moths on a still yellow light No penance serves to renew them No massive transfusions of trust Why not even revenge can undo them So twisted these vows and so crushed

I am the distance you put between all of the moments that we will be.

I choose the rooms that I live in with care, the windows are small and the walls almost bare, there’s only one bed and there’s only one prayer; I listen all night for your step on the stair.

And now I hear your master sing, you kneel for him to come. His body is a golden string that your body is hanging from.

Through windows in the dark The children come, the children go Like arrows with no targets Like shackles made of snow

Like any dealer he was watching for the card That is so high and wild He’ll never need to deal another He was just some Joseph looking for a manger

Where are you, Judy, where are you, Anne? Where are the paths your heroes came? Wondering out loud as the bandage pulls away, was I, was I only limping, was I really lame?

And it’s time for the burden it’s time for the whip Will she walk through the flame Can he shoot from the hip

Now I’ve heard there was a secret chord That David played, and it pleased the Lord But you don’t really care for music, do you? It goes like this, the fourth, the fifth The minor fall, the major lift The baffled king composing Hallelujah

But you’ve used up all your coupons except the one that seems to be written on your wrist along with several thousand dreams.

Maybe I’m still hurting I can’t turn the other cheek But you know that I still love you It’s just that I can’t speak I looked for you in everyone And they called me on that too I lived alone but I was only Coming back to you

And they’re handing down my sentence now And I know what I must do Another mile of silence while I’m Coming back to you

The door is open, you can’t close your shelter You try the handle of the road It opens, do not be afraid It’s you my love, you who are the stranger

I’m on the side that’s always lost Against the side of Heaven I’m on the side of Snake-eyes tossed Against the side of Seven.

But you lost them in your freedom And you need him now, you’re wild Blessed is the memory Of everybody’s child

Then fire, make your body cold, I’m going to give you mine to hold,“ saying this she climbed inside to be his one, to be his only bride.

Now the clasp of this union who fastens it tight? Who snaps it asunder the very next night Some say the rider Some say the mare Or that love’s like the smoke beyond all repair

With one hand on the hexagram and one hand on the girl I balance on a wishing well that all men call the world.

As a falling leaf may rest A moment on the air So your head upon my breast So my hand upon your hair

I’m not asking for mercy Not from the man You just don’t ask for mercy While you’re still on the stand

And many nights endure Without a moon or star So we will endure When one is gone and far

And then leaning on your window sill He’ll say one day you caused his will To weaken with your love and warmth and shelter

The rain falls down on last year’s man An hour has gone by And he has not moved his hand But everything will happen if he only gives the word The lovers will rise up And the mountains touch the ground But the skylight is like skin for a drum I’ll never mend And all the rain falls down amen On the works of last year’s man

You’re faithful to the better man, I’m afraid that he left. So let me judge your love affair in this very room where I have sentenced mine to death.

If I, if I have been untrue I hope you know it was never to you.

Then I saw you naked in the early dawn, oh, I hoped you would be someone new. I reached for you but you were gone, so lady I’m going too.

And there’s nothing to follow There’s nowhere to go She’s gone like the summer gone like the snow

That’s all I can say, baby That’s all I can say It wasn’t for nothing That they put me away I fell with my angel Down the chain of command There’s a Law, there’s an Arm, there’s a Hand

Lost in the rages of fragrance Lost in the rags of remorse Lost in the waves of a sickness That loosens the high silver nerves

When I am on a pedestal, you did not raise me there. Your laws do not compel me to kneel grotesque and bare. I myself am the pedestal for this ugly hump at which you stare

We are so small between the stars, so large against the sky, and lost among the subway crowds I try to catch your eye.

You met him at some temple, where they take your clothes at the door. He was just a numberless man in a chair who’d just come back from the war.

And when we fell together all our flesh was like a veil That I had to draw aside to see The serpent eat its tail

Some women wait for Jesus, and some women wait for Cain So I hang upon my altar And I hoist my axe again And I take the one who finds me back to where it all began When Jesus was the honeymoon And Cain was just the man

But I lingered on her thighs a fatal moment I kissed her lips as though I thirsted still My falsity had stung me like a hornet The poison sank and it paralysed my will

in city and in forest they smiled like me and you, but now it’s come to distances and both of us must try, your eyes are soft with sorrow, Hey, that’s no way to say goodbye.

Now my heart’s like a blister From doing what I do If the moon has a sister It’s got to be you

And where, where, where is my Gypsy wife tonight I’ve heard all the wild reports, they can’t be right But whose head is this she’s dancing with on the threshing floor Whose darkness deepens in her arms a little more

Do you want to be the ditch around a tower? Do you want to be the moonlight in his cave? Do you want to give your blessing to his power as he goes whistling past his daddy, past his daddy’s grave

If it be your will That a voice be true From this broken hill I will sing to you From this broken hill All your praises they shall ring If it be your will To let me sing

The age of lust is giving birth, and both the parents ask the nurse to tell them fairy tales on both sides of the glass.

But let me ask you one more time, O children of the dusk, All these hunters who are shrieking now oh do they speak for us?

And the vow of compassion That you swore through your teeth When the war began to end And the photographs weep

Goodnight, my darling, I hope you’re satisfied, the bed is kind of narrow, but my arms are open wide. And here’s a man still working for your smile.

Yes you who must leave everything that you cannot control. It begins with your family, but soon it comes around to your soul.

I’m not looking for another as I wander in my time, walk me to the corner, our steps will always rhyme you know my love goes with you as your love stays with me, it’s just the way it changes, like the shoreline and the sea, but let’s not talk of love or chains and things we can’t untie, your eyes are soft with sorrow, Hey, that’s no way to say goodbye.

Do not dress in those rags for me, I know you are not poor; you don’t love me quite so fiercely now when you know that you are not sure, it is your turn, beloved, it is your flesh that I wear.

A war between the odd and the even.

Well I stepped into an avalanche, it covered up my soul; when I am not this hunchback that you see, I sleep beneath the golden hill.

And here, right here, between the dancer and his cane, between the sailboat and the drain, between the newsreel and your tiny pain, once again, once again, love calls you by your name.

I changed my style to silver I changed my clothes to black And where I would surrender Ah now I would attack

She said, "I’m tired of the war, I want the kind of work I had before, a wedding dress or something white to wear upon my swollen appetite.”

Then lay your rose on the fire The fire give up to the sun The sun give over to splendour In the arms of the high holy one

And draw us near And bind us tight All your children here In their rags of light In our rags of light All dressed to kill And end this night If it be your will

I met a man who lost his mind in some lost place I had to find, follow me the wise man said, but he walked behind.

I asked her to hold me, I said, “Lady, unfold me,” but she scorned me and she told me I was dead and I could never return.

Well I lived with a child of snow when I was a soldier, and I fought every man for her until the nights grew colder.

Into this furnace I ask you now to venture…

She took his tavern parliament, his cap, his cocky dance, she mocked his female fashions and his working-class moustache.

Like a bird on the wire, like a drunk in a midnight choir I have tried in my way to be free.

She took his much admired oriental frame of mind and the heart-of-darkness alibi his money hides behind She took his blonde madonna and his monastery wine – “This mental space is occupied and everything is mine.”

Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river You can hear the boats go by You can spend the night beside her And you know that she’s half crazy But that’s why you want to be there And she feeds you tea and oranges That come all the way from China And just when you mean to tell her That you have no love to give her Then she gets you on her wavelength And she lets the river answer That you’ve always been her lover And you want to travel with her And you want to travel blind And you know that she will trust you For you’ve touched her perfect body with your mind.

So, now that you’ve decided To follow the sun Like a shadow of birds Or a king on the run

Well, I’ve been waiting, I was sure We’d meet between the trains we’re waiting for I think it’s time to board another Please understand, I never had a secret chart To get me to the heart of this Or any other matter While he talks like this, you don’t know what he’s after When he speaks like this, you don’t know what he’s after

Or she’ll make a break for the high plateau where there’s nothing above and there’s nothing below

The baby’s crying, so you do not go outside, and all your work it’s right before your eyes.

I met a lady, she was playing with her soldiers in the dark Oh one by one she had to tell them That her name was Joan of Arc

And you wrap up his tired face in your hair and he hands you the apple core. Then he touches your lips now so suddenly bare of all the kisses we put on some time before.

I fought in the old revolution on the side of the ghost and the King. Of course I was very young and I thought that we were winning; I can’t pretend I still feel very much like singing as they carry the bodies away.

Oh, you are really such a pretty one. I see you’ve gone and changed your name again. And just when I climbed this whole mountainside, to wash my eyelids in the rain!

Do you need to hold a leash to be a lady?

And who are you?“ she sternly spoke to the one beneath the smoke. "Why, I’m fire,” he replied, “And I love your solitude, I love your pride.

Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove

Just open up your dainty little hand. You know this life is filled with many sweet companions, many satisfying one-night stands.

And come forth from the cloud of unknowing And kiss the cheek of the moon

But climb on your tears and be silent Like a rose on its ladder of thorns

the crumbs of love that you offer me, they’re the crumbs I’ve left behind.

Yes, and here, right here between the moonlight and the lane, between the tunnel and the train, between the victim and his stain, once again, once again, love calls you by your name.

There’s a blaze of light in every word It doesn’t matter which you heard The holy or the broken Hallelujah

There is a war between the ones who say there is a war and the ones who say there isn’t.

Oh sometimes I see her undressing for me, she’s the soft naked lady love meant her to be and she’s moving her body so brave and so free. If I’ve got to remember that’s a fine memory.

O lady with your legs so fine O stranger at your wheel, You are locked into your suffering and your pleasures are the seal.

He said, "I locked you in this body, I meant it as a kind of trial. You can use it for a weapon, or to make some woman smile.”

But the Rose I sickened with a scarlet fever and the Swan I tempted with a sense of shame She said at last I was her finest lover and if she withered I would be to blame

You will never see a man this naked I will never hold a woman this close

And you say you’ve been humbled in love Cut down in your love Forced to kneel in the mud next to me Ah but why so bitterly turn from the one Who kneels there as deeply as thee

I went down to the place Where I knew she lay waiting Under the marble and the snow I said, Mother I’m frightened The thunder and the lightning I’ll never come through this alone She said, I’ll be with you My shawl wrapped around you My hand on your head when you go And the night came on It was very calm I wanted the night to go on and on But she said, Go back, Go back to the World

May Christ have mercy on your soul For making such a joke Amid these hearts that burn like coal And the flesh that rose like smoke.

As the mist leaves no scar On the dark green hill So my body leaves no scar On you and never will

I showed my heart to the doctor: he said I just have to quit. Then he wrote himself a prescription, and your name was mentioned in it! Then he locked himself in a library shelf with the details of our honeymoon, and I hear from the nurse that he’s gotten much worse and his practice is all in a ruin.

And though I wear a uniform I was not born to fight All these wounded boys you lie beside Goodnight, my friends, goodnight

One by one, the guests arrive The guests are coming through The open-hearted many The broken-hearted few And no one knows where the night is going And no one knows why the wine is flowing Oh love I need you

I greet you from the other side Of sorrow and despair With a love so vast and shattered It will reach you everywhere

So you moved away the mountain That the sun rose behind And you said yourself a prayer And laid down with the blind

Your body like a searchlight my poverty revealed, I would like to try your charity until you cry, “Now you must try my greed.” And everything depends upon how near you sleep to me

and I lean from my window sill in this old hotel I chose, yes one hand on my suicide, one hand on the rose.

Ah the silver knives are flashing in the tired old cafe A ghost climbs on the table in a bridal negligee She says, My body is the light, my body is the way” I raise my arm against it all and I catch the bride’s bouquet

Children have takes these pledges They have ferried them out of the past Oh beyond all the graves and the hedges Where love must go hiding at last

It’s hard to hold the hand of anyone Who is reaching for the sky just to surrender

The river is swollen up with rusty cans and the trees are burning in your promised land.

Your father’s gone a-hunting Through the silver and the glass Where only greed can enter But spirit, spirit cannot pass

And all the ladies go moist, and the judge has no choice, a singer must die for the lie in his voice.

and there is no space but there’s left and right and there is no time but there’s day and night

Your father’s gone a-hunting And he’s lost his lucky charm And he’s lost the guardian heart That keeps the hunter from the harm

It’s not the news of burning towns that ruins your mind Like a spool you turn and you turn but it won’t unwind No these wars you did not start, they don’t tear your sleep apart It’s just a man taking what he needs from the store room

True love leaves no traces If you and I are one It’s lost in our embraces Like stars against the sun

And the crickets are breaking his heart with their song as the day caves in and the night is all wrong

Now the courtroom is quiet, but who will confess. Is it true you betrayed us? The answer is Yes. Then read me the list of the crimes that are mine, I will ask for the mercy that you love to decline.

I sang my songs, I told my lies, to lie between your matchless thighs.

Why do you stand by the window Abandoned to beauty and pride The thorn of the night in your bosom The spear of the age in your side

And clenching your fist for the ones like us who are oppressed by the figures of beauty, you fixed yourself, you said, “Well never mind, we are ugly but we have the music.”

Trav'ling lady stay awhile until the night is over. I’m just a station on your way, I know I’m not your lover.

Just take this longing from my tongue, all the useless things my hands have done, let me see your beauty broken down, like you would do for one you love.

Let your mercy spill On all these burning hearts in hell If it be your will To make us well

Oh the world is sweet the world is wide and she’s there where the light and the darkness divide and the steam’s coming off her she’s huge and she’s shy and she steps on the moon when she paws at the sky

And while he talks his dreams to sleep You notice there’s a highway That is curling up like smoke above his shoulder

For the heart with no companion For the soul without a king For the prima ballerina Who cannot dance to anything

You kept right on loving, I went on a fast, now I am too thin and your love is too vast.

I saw her wince, I saw her cry, I saw the glory in her eye. Myself I long for love and light, but must it come so cruel, and oh so bright?

I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm, your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm, yes many loved before us, I know that we are not new, in city and in forest they smiled like me and you

Well you know that I love to live with you, but you make me forget so very much. I forget to pray for the angels and then the angels forget to pray for us.

I know you need your sleep now, I know your life’s been hard. But many men are falling, where you promised to stand guard.

And she comes to his hand but she’s not really tame She longs to be lost he longs for the same

Now I look for her always I’m lost in this calling I’m tied to the threads of some prayer Saying, When will she summon me When will she come to me What must I do to prepare When she bends to my longing Like a willow, like a fountain She stands in the luminous air And the night comes on And it’s very calm I lie in her arms she says, When I’m gone I’ll be yours, yours for a song

Through the days of shame that are coming Through the nights of wild distress Tho’ your promise count for nothing You must keep it nonetheless

Oh the sisters of mercy, they are not departed or gone. They were waiting for me when I thought that I just can’t go on. And they brought me their comfort and later they brought me this song. Oh I hope you run into them, you who’ve been travelling so long.

Dance me to the children who are asking to be born Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn Raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn Dance me to the end of love

The walls of this hotel are paper-thin Last night I heard you making love to him The struggle mouth to mouth and limb to limb The grunt of unity when he came in I stood there with my ear against the wall I was not seized by jealousy at all In fact a burden lifted from my soul I heard that love was out of my control

Your standing days are done,“ I cried, “You’ll rally me no more. I don’t even know what side We fought on, or what for.

[giggleandtears]

Crimson Renegade, Part 3

What it feels like to match wits (With someone at your level) 

Summary: Danvers and Kirk enjoy winding McCoy up

Pairings: OC/Jim Kirk(Platonic), OC/Leonard McCoy(Eventual Romance)

A/N: If you haven't seen Star Trek Discovery season 2, Pike makes it well worth it. ;-)

Enjoy!

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Guiding me to the closest patient area, McCoy offers his hand to assist me in sliding onto the bio-bed. Jim quirks a brow at the chivalrous gesture but McCoy has already turned away to gather a few supplies for the exam. When Jim saddles up beside him, my mind runs wild with comparing the two men. Though they are roughly the same height, the air that surrounds them couldn’t be more different.  

Jim’s flaxen hair, crystal blue eyes, and perfectly chiseled jawline, screams fairy tale prince more than captain. Unless you use Captain Pike, circa 2250, as a barometer. Jim’s the type to whisk you off for an idyllic weekend getaway in a cabin, nestled between snow-capped mountains. A roaring fire would await, champagne chilled and at the ready. I think Dr. McCoy would take a slightly different approach. The fire would remain, as would a refreshing beverage. But replace the champagne with bourbon laden hot chocolate. The cabin would stand resolute against the onslaught of swirling flurries, having been built with the strength of his bare hands. Jim and McCoy are two sides of the same coin but only one is commanding my full attention.

"Ok, what you playin' at?” McCoy whispers to Jim, like salt through a grinder. It’s not standard practice for the captain to escort an uninjured crew member to the Med-bay just for a friendly hello. Jim looks on in unabashed amusement and lets McCoy continue his tirade. “We almost got shot to tarnation and you’re here to introduce a woman? Good god man! Have you no shame?” He says in a huff, gathering and regathering the same tricorder and PADD. “Are those boots even regulation?”

“They are.” I chime in sweetly, like honey flowing fresh from the comb. The boys slowly turn at McCoy’s covert mutterings being so easily overheard. “But the tights sadly are not, yet.”

Walking over to me, McCoy places the PADD beside me and can’t stop his eyes from wandering down. Under further inspection, my boots are indeed regulation, stopping just above my calves. The tights, however, are of my own design. Dark mesh blends expertly with my boots before shifting into a less opaque hue, coming to a point over my knee. Tracing McCoy’s gaze downward, I completely understand why the higher hemline of my dress uniform and the illusion of knee-high boots leaves the doctor’s mouth a bit parched.  

Clearing his voice before he continues, McCoy begins to run the tricorder around my head, then on a steady path from my forehead to abdomen and back. “So, what brings you to our favorite tin can in the sky?”

“I'm working on a new shield prototype with Scotty. Can't steal your head engineer, so here I am.”

“At least he's not on that ice planet anymore.” Jim says, with a nearly imperceptible shiver.  

“You always say that, but I had fun on Hoth.”

Shaking his head, Jim snorts wryly. “You’re about the only one.”

McCoy raises his brow at the name, no doubt never hearing of that planet in any star system. Sadly, that also means his knowledge of historical fiction is sorely lacking. How it’s not a more beloved genre is beyond me. Jim mouths ‘You don’t want to know’ to McCoy and lets it drop.  

“Keenser’s hooch always kept me warm. And what else do you really need besides that and good company?” I say. “Besides, it never seemed to be as cold as everyone whined it was.”  

A small smile highlights McCoy’s handsome features as he continues my scan. Although the warmth of his smile is unmistakable, the delicate lines around his eyes seem to narrate a tale of inner weariness. Something tells me coffee, a nap, or even a stiff drink couldn’t lessen whatever’s weighting on his shoulders.  

Returning to the conversation at hand, McCoy’s asks about my position on the Enterprise. “If you're a commander, doesn’t that make you chief engineer?”

“A commander is usually the head of a department. If Scotty needs me, I’ll be there to lend a hand but the prototype is my first priority.”

McCoy hums lowly in understanding, although his gaze has been diverted. He's concentrating deeply on the tricorder in his hands. After each tap of the device, his expressive brows grow closer and closer together.

“Something wrong?”

“Yea.” McCoy begins in a huff. “This darn thing is on the fritz again. I tried a few tricks Scotty taught me but nothin’s workin’. I assumed you were human and bypassed the initial scan but that didn’t help. You are human right?”

“To my knowledge, I am. Is trans-species a thing?”

“You’d be surprised.” McCoy says wryly. “All I got was you’re alive, but a bucktooth gopher in a melon patch is less obvious than that.”

I fail at holding back a snort.  “I have absolutely no idea what that means but it was certainly entertaining.” Offering to take a look, I extend my hand. “Let me see.” The blueprint for each circuit board and screen readout, run through my brain with ease. Fiddling with the small piece of technology is as natural as breathing.  Feeling the heavy gaze of a man no more than 2 paces away from me, is not. Widening his stance, McCoy impatiently crosses his arms after I open the back of the tricorder. I don’t think my brooding companion takes kindly to anything impeding his work, especially a pesky piece of equipment. “The circuits and connectors are in perfect condition, not charred or corroded. So, it must be a programming issue.” Replacing the back of the tricorder, I widen a few scan parameters and disable a couple more, then hand it back to McCoy. “Here, try this.”

After restarting the scan, the familiar steady beeps resume.  

“Well how ‘bout that.” McCoy says, with quiet astonishment. “How’d you know to do that?”

Swinging my legs like a schoolgirl, “Engineers are more than contraband and a good time, Dr. McCoy.”  I say, with cock my head and a cheeky grin. “Or haven’t you heard?”

“I’ve heard a lot of things but that don’t make’em true.”

Leaning the tiniest bit forward, “Is that a challenge?”  

McCoy meets my eye with a sumptuous quirk of his brow. “Only if you can deliver.”

A smile slowly spreads across my face. His steady gaze is electric, sending waves of heat to tickle my skin. Neither of us is backing down. With each passing millisecond something becomes abundantly clear; I am in trouble. Jim clears his throat, breaking us of the spell neither of us intended to cast. Honestly, I forgot Jim was even here.

Leaning back, I straighten my spine and clasp my hands in my lap. Professional as always. “So, did your scan turn up anything interesting?”

“Yea. Are you always this hot?” McCoy asks innocently, without any trace of innuendo.  

This is just too easy.  

Before I can reply, McCoy corrects himself.  “Is your temperature always this high?”

He’s learning  

“Yes. My temperature is usually above average for most humans. 99.3 to 102.4 is normal for me.”

“That’s oddly specific.”

Smiling, “I thought doctors liked specificity.”  

I expected to hear a smart quip but it never comes. McCoy’s face has grown dark.

“There’s also a fair bit of pressure at your temples and occipital lobe.”

Jim stiffens, instantly on alert. A nervous stab blooms in my stomach. I just got here. I can’t be grounded already. McCoy places a calming hand on my shoulder but addresses Jim. Silently they spar, only using their expressive eyes to communicate. I can read Jim like a well-trained empath but McCoy is a completely different beast. The altercation only lasts a few seconds but the decision is final.  

Jim sighs and stuffs his hands roughly in his pockets. “I’ll be right over there, ok?” After nodding, he saunters up to nurse and starts a friendly conversation. Jim manages to only look back once, our concerned expressions mirroring each other.  

“If only he was as protective with himself as the rest of us.” McCoy says.

Smiling weakly, I hum in agreement. With an ever-increasing nervous energy, I pick at the jagged edge of my thumb nail. I’m willing the pressure in my head to subside before McCoy takes the tricorder to me again.  

As if I'm a doe in a wooden glen that’s easily spooked, McCoy speaks much softer than before. “On a scale of 1 to 10, how bad is the pain?”

I rub my forehead. “5, maybe.” Even to my own ears, it sounds more like a question than an answer.  

McCoy stares at me disapprovingly. Maybe I don’t have as good a poker face as I thought. He asks how long I've been having headaches and if they make my duties more difficult. I have to think back but it's been over 6 months. I can handle the pain but the dizziness that sometimes accompany them is harder to shake off. I've been found in a dark supply closet more times than I care to count. McCoy bobs his head with each detail I recount, though his lips remain pursed. He picks up the tricorder once again but decides to hand it off to a passing nurse.  

“Do hypos help with the pain?” McCoy asks. Vigorously rubbing his hands together, he steps forward. Meticulously, he feels around my throat and neck.  

“Only for a few hours.” I answer honestly.  

“What did your last physician say about them?”

“Since I could still fulfill my duties, not to worry until that changed.”

McCoy’s hands still. Exhaling harshly, his nostrils flare. “What kinda bonehead, idiotic...” With a sigh, McCoy calms himself. Letting the matter drop, he continues his exam. McCoy softly eases my head to the side to rest in his large palm. His nimble fingers purposefully flutter up and down the tendons in my neck, even into my shoulder blade. When he tilts my head back, I can’t help but stare. McCoy is so, determined. It’s as if my pain and discomfort are the only thing important to him. For a moment he closes his eyes to concentrate more intently on what he feels beneath his fingers. Smiling to myself, I close my own eyes before I’m caught.  

A slight sting radiates at the base of my neck where McCoy was focusing his attention.  His deft fingers and what I suspect was a sly hypo start to alleviate the pressure that’s been building for hours. Releasing a heavenly sigh of relief, I slowly blink open my eyes. Having them closed for only a few short moments; my lids have become quite heavy.  

McCoy tips my head back with a knuckle under my chin. When my eyes catch the light, he inhales suddenly. “Well I’ll be-.” He whispers, astonished. He slowly moves forward as if an invisible string is pulling us together. I’m enveloped by his impressive stature. His warmth seems to seep into my every pore and somehow, I already know I’ll miss it when he moves away. A sly smirk creeps onto my lips when McCoy’s eyes round in amazement. Imaging myself through his eyes is intriguing. Warm brown eyes of amber with flecks of maroon. It’s a fairly typical combination in this day and age, except they weren’t always like this. The longer the light shines in my eyes, the red specs bend and shift until it nearly overtakes the brown. I found the change to be off-putting at first but I've grown to like it.

McCoy leans in closer and cocks his head to the side. “Retinal morphic photoplasia.” Taking a pen light out his pocket and sweeps it over my eyes. “With a nearly a 47% increase in your concentering rate. That’s mighty rare.”

I shrug nonchalantly.  “Yea. It’s just one of my many tricks.”

McCoy smirks until he realizes how close he is to me. His hand has inched up from my neck and is cradling my cheek in his palm.  Clearing his throat, he gently guides my head down and releases me. Dr. McCoy returns to his PADD, tapping harshly. His faced is etched in frustration as he mumbles to himself. I sigh inwardly. I miss the teasing back and forth, the banter. I’d even settle for Mr. Grumpy Pants.  

I speak as light and airy as possible. “So, am I dying Doc?”

“No!” McCoy says, jerking upright. “Why would you go and say somethin’ like that?”

“Because you're looking at my readings like I have the plague.”

“Now that would be a magic trick, since it's been cured for over 600 years.” Sighing, McCoy places the PADD down. “I’m just not too keen on mysteries in my Medbay.”

McCoy explains my scans are in normal ranges, though a little odd. The headaches could be stress related but he’s concerned about the duration. Since I can't think of any triggers and I couldn’t have come into contact with any alien contagions, McCoy decides to take a few samples and run some more extensive test.  After getting a nurse up to speed, McCoy gives me some very pointed instruction.  “Tell me immediately if the headaches get worse. It doesn’t matter if you can still do your duties.”

“Sure thing, Dr. McCoy.” His name rolls easily off my tongue. However, McCoy’s pinched expression looks like his mama forgot to sweeten his lemonade. “Did I say something wrong?”  

He shakes his head ‘no’ but doesn’t offer any further explanation for his sour expression. I’m starting to think maybe that’s just his face.  

Shaking it off, “So, am I good to go?”

“Yes ma’am. No palpations, fever, or hives to speak of.” McCoy drawls.  

Smiling, “Great!  Thanks Doc. I'll try to keep it that way.” Hopping off the bio-bed, I look around the Medbay.  “Now where did my escort get to?”

“Jim,” McCoy says, hollering over his shoulder. “Don’t you have a ship to run?”

Jim says a few last words to an utterly bewitched nurse and walks away. He leisurely walks over, smiling to himself. “So, what I miss?”  

“I don’t know. Home trainin’?” McCoy says, dismissively. I snort softly into my hand and McCoy rewards me with a small smile. But Jim’s piercing gaze is squarely on McCoy, waiting for my results.

McCoy answers simply, all joking aside. “The commander is cleared for duty-”

“Glad to hear it!” Jim says. His jovial-self returning.

“And she knows where to find me if that changes.” McCoy gives me another pointed look for good measure.  

Inwardly I chuckle to myself but stand straight at attention. I give the doctor an emphatic though comical two-finger salute. I know we haven’t had an active military in centuries and technically McCoy and I have equal rank. But he understands me nonetheless. Or I should say we understand each other. If my condition changes and I don’t tell him, he will hunt me down and there will be hell to pay. McCoy nods curtly, satisfied with my answer. After a beat, his eyes soften and the corner of his mouth lifts just a touch. Relaxing again, I smile in return.  

Jim sees our mostly silent exchange and shakes his head. He looks like the cat that caught the canary and I’m not sure I like where this is headed. “You know I always thought you two would get along.” Jim may be right but that doesn’t mean he has to point it out. “You never let me have any fun.” Oh, how I wish that was true. “Both of you can drink me under the table.” True. Jim pauses for good measure. “And you both hate people.”

And there it is.  

Sighing, I pinch the bridge of my nose.  

“For Christ's sake-” McCoy growls.  

“I do not hate people!" We say in perfect unison.  

Slowly, McCoy and I look at each other with the same horrified expression. Brows in our hairlines, eyes bugging out and mouth agape.  We even mirrored each other’s tilted head. Neither of us know how to address what just happened, so we quickly act like it didn’t. McCoy becomes intensely interested in his PADD and I kick myself at falling for Jim’s bait so easily. His smirk is already insufferable but I do address his previous assertion.  

“After an 8-hour shift, who wants to be around people that can't hold a conversation, let alone a drink?” I ask rhetorically.  

“Couldn’t agree more darlin'.” McCoy says, clearly on my side.  

Trying to bite the inside of my cheek does little to disguise my smile. “Thank you.” I’m not sure what garners my appreciation more, his immediate understanding or being called darlin'. I haven't been called that particular term of endearment since I was a child. Oddly, I’m not averse to it. Especially coming from the doctor’s lips.  

“Wait,” Jim interjects, “are you finally admitting there are people you don’t like Commander?”

“Yes, and you are quickly becoming one of them Captain.”

This is quickly ramping up into a tit for tat situation and McCoy is having none of it. “Jim, can you let my patient get a hot meal before you start up again?”

Snickering, I mouth ‘Thank you’ and head for the door. As the doors slide open, I stop and look behind me. Jim is slowly walking with his back towards the door, whispering something to McCoy. I don’t know what he’s saying but McCoy crossed his arms in a huff. “Jim, you coming?” Jim turns smoothly on his heel, not missing a beat. The moment Jim’s back is to McCoy something peculiar happens. His arms drop and he … chuckles. His broad shoulders gently shake until he sighs to himself. For a moment he stares into space. The makings of a smile start to form-

“Danny, you coming?”

Jumping slightly, I turn towards Jim’s voice. He’s mere inches from my ear. After scowling in his general direction, I try to get one more glance at McCoy but he’s already gone. We walk in companionable silence toward my quarters but Jim is determined to spoil it. He keeps smirking like he has a secret every time he catches my eye. Its driving me nuts.  

Exhaling slowly, I mourn my sanity. “I know you have something to say. Spit it out.”

Jim shrugs nonchalantly but smiles nonetheless. “Oh, it’s nothing. Just that you owe me a bottle of whiskey.”

[robininthelabyrinth]

I've been thinking on this for ages, but I can't decide on a character, maybe Leonard Snart, Lan Wangji or Wei Wuxian. He saves, on purpose or by accident, a baby dragon. The dragon takes a shine to him and decides to hoard him. It's tiny, so the hoarding is really ineffective. It consists mainly on riding on shoulders and hissing at everyone. It's really cute.

Lan Wangji

“I like you! I’m going to keep you!” the tiny little dragon said, grinning widely. It was only large enough to fill two hands, black scales with red whiskers, and it had a mouth made for smiling.

“Get lost,” Lan Wangji said, walking faster; his uncle had explained regarding Wei Wuxian’s unusual cursed state so that he would be aware of it, but somehow his uncle had failed to mention how horribly cute Wei Wuxian’s little dragon form was.

“Lan Zhaaaaaan, you don’t meant that…!”

Wei Wuxian

“Her name is Chenqing,” Wei Wuxian said proudly, holding out his hands to show her off. “I found her wrapped around an old flute and I’m keeping her.”

The little serpentine dragon rolled around happily in his hands, lolling around and holding her little arms out in a big stretch. “Uh-uh,” she said, her voice a little kitten whisper, wrapping her tail around his wrist. “Mine!”

“Well, that’s new,” Jiang Cheng said faintly; a glance at Lan Wangji’s face revealed he also didn’t know exactly what to say. “But I suppose…congratulations are in order?”

Jiang Cheng

Zidian is his mother’s, long lithe and silver except when she’s sparking purple; she’s fiercely independent and hates anyone touching her but her master. Jiang Cheng loved to look at her as a child, the way she twisted around her mother’s hand like a bracelet, around her neck like a necklace, even around her ear, hissing a joke that only she can understand.

He’s wanted to have her in his hands since forever.

Not like this, though.

Nie Huaisang

“I found a little bird,” Nie Huaisang explained happily. “A little goldfinch! We only have eagles and vultures in Qinghe.”

“I can’t believe you brought it into the lecture,” Jiang Cheng said.

“Well, I couldn’t leave her behind! I found her right before I arrived.”

“Uh, Nie-gongzi?” Wei Wuxian, who was peeking under the cloth of the cage, said. “I don’t think this is a goldfinch.”

Wei Wuxian pulled off the cloth. The little gold-scaled dragon beamed at them from the perch, long whiskers waiving in the air.

“…yes?” Nie Huaisang says. “Is it a sparrow, then? I’m really not good with birds.”

Lan Xichen

Alone in seclusion, Lan Xichen wondered if he’d spent his entire life in service to others. To his uncle, who feared him becoming his father; to his brother, who he sought to protect; to his sworn brother, who betrayed him; to his sect, to their principles. They still meant everything to him, all of them – dead or alive – but…he was tired.

He lifted a finger to trace the head of the little dragon that had blown in through the window a few nights before – he should report it, a supernatural event like this, but…it’s not in the rules.

So he won’t.

He hasn’t yet named her, but he was going to. And then he would let her keep her the way she wanted to, nice and safe in her little hoard, for as long as she wanted him.

Nie Mingjue

Most of the time, Baxia was a saber, like all others in his sect. Like those in his ancestor’s shrine. Sometimes, though, she was something else.

“You’re mine,” she hissed in Nie Mingjue’s ear late at night, nestled deep in his soul. They’re bound together, sword and cultivator. “I won’t let you go, not in this lifetime.”

He rubbed his eyes and smiled despite himself. He didn’t smile often, his duties and dark future weighing him down, but his Baxia could do it; he sometimes thought that this was what it must be like to have a jealous wife. “Of course not. You’re my spiritual weapon; you’ll be by my side until I die, and then you’ll take your place in my tomb, with my ashes at your feet. Stop worrying so much.”

“I won’t let him take you this time,” she snarls. “Your head, your arms, your legs, your soul – they’re all mine. How dare he profane them!”

“Am I not supposed to be touching people anymore?” he chuckled, reaching back to run his fingers down her hilt; it turned into a tail and wrapped around his wrist, pinning him in place as if held down by a stronger man. “Baxia – if you just tell me who this ‘he’ is, I’ll avoid him, I promise.”

“No, he’s still necessary for now,” she said. “But when I tell you – strike true, no matter what the consequences. Do not allow your human compassion or etiquette overwhelm you. Promise me!”

“I promise,” he said, not for the first time, still as puzzled by it as he ever was. “I’ll listen to you. When the time comes, I’ll let you drink his blood to your heart’s content.”

Jin Guangyao

He’d always known there was a dragon inside Nie Mingjue, full of heat and fire and rage; he’d liked it, once upon a time, when it roared in his defense. It had been such a pity when it turned against him; he really hadn’t wanted to give him up, but he didn’t have a choice. He was backed into a corner – just like always.

He just hadn’t expected the man to turn into a literal dragon upon death.

Is this the real secret of the Nie? He wondered, backing up and reaching for his sword. Is this why they only bury their sabers, and never themselves?

The dragon curls around his neck, tight enough to choke.

“Are you going to kill me?” Jin Guangyao asked.

The dragon laughed with the sound like Nie Mingjue’s laugh, deep and sonorous and usually a little sarcastic.

“Only,” it murmured in his ear, “if you continue to misbehave, Meng Yao.”

Jin Ling

“Little Uncle got me a dog,” Jin Ling said, clutching Xiao Fairy to his chest. “So, Jiujiu, you’re getting me…a snake?”

“I’m getting you the opportunity to get a sna – to get a dragon. It’s not a snake. Stop calling it a snake.”

Jin Ling wasn’t really convinced. He squinted into the pool. “They look like snakes.”

“Of course they do, they’re flood dragons,” Jiang Cheng said irritably. “Those all look like water serpents when they’re swimming. Just…listen to me. Put the dog down – no, give it to me, yes, there’s a good puppy –”

Jin Ling coughed pointedly. “If this is all a scheme to steal pets from my dog…”

“It isn’t,” Jiang Cheng said, though his ears were suspiciously red. “Put your hand into the pool. If one of them likes you, they’ll claim you for their hoard and keep you for the rest of their lives. Give it a try. What can it hurt?”

Xiao Xingchen

Song Lan was the very first person he met when he came down off the mountain and, well, he was a bit over-excited about it – but luckily they hit it off very well, and it all worked out quite well for a few years. Song Lan was full of interesting ideas, like making their own sect based on friendship rather than blood; Xiao Xingchen liked it, but he liked Song Lan best of all.

Things went downhill, later, but as his shizun always said, it was cruel to keep a human that didn’t want to be kept any longer, so he gave him his eyes and left him alone, just as he’d asked, and hoped that one day Song Lan would come back to him. He had time, he could wait.

In the meantime, he met someone new – or rather, someone old, anew.

Xiao Xingchen decided to keep him, too.

Xue Yang

“I think I did something wrong,” Xue Yang announced to the air, though luckily nobody was around to hear him – his current employers at the Jin sect would be most unhappy if they heard, especially if they also heard that he has no idea what went wrong or how to fix it.

He looked down at what should be a repaired half piece of the Stygian Tiger Seal, but which is definitely a small black-and-grey dragon, staring right back at him.

After being locked in a staring match for a while (he loses, but he doesn’t think the dragon has eyelids so it doesn’t count), he tentatively reached out and rubbed it behind the ears.

It purred, then belched out a puff of pure yin resentful energy.

“…well, at least you still work, I guess?”

Wen Ning

“You’re mine,” the little dragon says, happily nuzzling up to him as it flops around in the dirt. “Mine, mine, mine!”

“Yes, yes, of course,” Wen Ning said, looking around all over to make sure nobody’s around. “All yours. Now, A-Yuan, please turn back before anyone sees you!”

“But…”

“A-Yuan! Please!”

Grumbling, the little dragon curled up into a ball and uncurled as a lovely bouncing little boy, and Wen Ning gave a sigh of relief. His sister hadn’t noticed the addition of an extra child to their group of refugees, assuming the way everyone else did that he’d been another Wen, someone’s child that got left behind or orphaned, and old granny had adopted him without so much as a word. He hadn’t known how to explain the truth.

But it was fine. He’d take care of A-Yuan, with the help of his sister and now Wei-gongzi, and no one would ever need to know.

Wen Qing

Wen Qing didn’t waste a lot of time worrying about things, and a dragon deciding to claim her wasn’t going to be the thing that messed up her day.

“Fine,” she said. “You can stay, but you have to earn your keep. How’s your memory? Can you take notes for me?”

The dragon nodded.

“I’ll be testing you,” she warned.

It nodded again, so she accepted it, put it in her sleeves, and went back to work.

Jiang Yanli

“I don’t need a dragon, though,” she said, quite appropriately in her mind. “I’m not much of a cultivator.”

The little dragon nuzzled her neck and picked up one of the melon seeds she’d been peeling with its jaws. “That’s okay,” it said. “I’m not much of a dragon. I mostly just like to eat and sleep.”

“Well, then,” she laughed. “In that case, I think we’ll get along.”

[love-takes-work]

The Art of Steven Universe the Movie: Outline & Review

The Art of Steven Universe The Movie was released March 3, 2020. It's a wonderful journey through the concept art, character development, and experience of fashioning these ideas into the movie we all love.

Nuts and bolts: The book is published by Dark Horse, and it was designed by Ryan Sands (a zine specialist), with commentary by Takafumi Hori, Kat Morris, and Rebecca Sugar. It includes art by Rebecca Sugar, Kat Morris, Takafumi Hori, Alonso Ramirez Ramos, Angie Wang, Ashley Fisher, Becky Dreistadt, Chromosphere, Danny Cragg, Elle Michalka, Hilary Florido, Ian Jones-Quartey, Jasmin Lai, Jeff Liu, Joe Johnston, Julian De Perio, Katie Mitroff, Leonard Hung, Miki Brewster, Patrick Bryson, and Paul Villeco.

Full review below with low-quality images.

[SU Book and Comic Reviews]

An introduction explains the same origin story that Rebecca Sugar told us in the movie DVD's commentary: that she accidentally restored her phone to factory settings and lost years of important stuff, and she ended up applying that devastating premise to her movie. That combined with the concept of "breaking" the main premise of a TV show to make a movie was how she got started developing the story. The opening of the movie styled like a storybook is blocked out with some great drawings and breakdowns of which narration would go to what storybook pages. This is combined with some partial sheet music for "The Tale of Steven." Rebecca writes about how she felt having to wrap pre-production on Season 5 only to take on this even bigger movie challenge. The biggest challenge was writing all these songs in such a short time--six weeks--and having to deal with the stress, being crushed under all that pressure while still wanting to do this story so badly, and it was humbling to still have to work so hard to sell the idea. The feeling of relief to finally be done that Steven expresses in "Happily Ever After" is very similar to what Rebecca went through feeling like she wanted to be finally done but still knowing what she had to do to climb an even bigger mountain. Some very cute Steven-at-age-16 and Connie in Space Camp clothes follow. Notes indicate that Steven and Connie are the same height now, but his poofy hair is just slightly higher than her head.

Notes from 2017 also give us the "Neckstravaganza": design notes on Steven's new form, with a neck and a jacket. It's very cool.

Some beautiful Joe Johnston boards follow, with sequences from the "Happily Ever After" song. We also get Angie Wang's final design (with Ashley Fisher's color) of the injector, including some sketchy concept art for it from Rebecca Sugar and Hilary Florido. In the rough concept notes, they call this the "Mega Injector," with notes for Takafumi Hori to use for scale. It looks beyond huge in a Leonard Hung drawing.

Spinel concepts are next. Some notes explain that aivi & surasshu (the usual composers) were involved very early since it was a musical, and Rebecca included them when pitching the story to the Crew so they could organically develop the sound. The heart shape was central to Spinel from the beginning, and early versions of her had an entire heart shape to her head.

(There's a doodle of what looks like a cartoon dog in the pile of drawings shown in this section. It's not clear what that was.)

Spinel was given the heart imagery partly because Rebecca had learned early on about the importance of symbols, and when it came time to assign one to Steven, the star was chosen because it's so positive and is read as gender-neutral. Rebecca still hadn't used hearts for anything, so it was time. They also incorporated really old, dated character design ideas to make Spinel feel like an outdated cartoon from the rubber hose era.

The aspect of her design with the running mascara versus cute eyelashes predated the rotation of her Gem. Rebecca likes to start with more realistic sketches when she's figuring out a character, and then she'll move to making it more cartoony. A quote from Miki Brewster is shared: "Spinel can do anything, as long as it's entertaining!" Her "best friend" form is described as "a doll for friendship fun & games! Of a different era--hokey, charming, weird...super gullible and trusting. Incredibly loyal, constant entertainment machine!"

When it comes to developing her "worst enemy" form, Rebecca explains a bit that she has a really complicated relationship with old cartoons because nostalgia is not compelling to her--the animation from the 1930s is so neat, but considering the social limits and the way the industry was at the time, Rebecca doesn't think she could have participated. Especially considering nowadays she even had to struggle to be allowed to tell the stories she needed to tell and it would have been impossible five years ago. The norms of the time aren't entirely extricable from the art itself.

Takafumi Hori weighs in with commentary on how fun it was to animate a scary but fun character on top of Miki Brewster's boards for the "Other Friends" fight sequence.

Next, moving on from the central new character, they also spend some time discussing Steg. Rebecca first explains "Steg Multiverse" as a character so uplifting he can make you fly, combining Greg's unending support and Steven's positive power. She makes reference to the early "stegosaurus" concepts they had for his look, but they didn't want to lose the opportunity to have his hair flow. Rebecca confirms that the pompadour idea was established in "Steven and the Stevens" so they wanted to give it to Steg, and she credits Paul Villeco for really finalizing his design and bringing him to life.

And of course the poofy hair from Steven and the double-necked guitar was essential for Steg.

Next, the book gives us a whole page of handwritten notes about "Drift Away." Kat Morris explains the intentional duality of the scene--how Spinel should be shown seeing her own past with new perspective, being embarrassed, blending together who she was with who she is. The partial lyrics to the song and some sketchy boards are offered.

Rebecca shares her personal connection with the subject matter--how she once left a stuffed animal in her garden and the side facing the sun faded. It really made a mark on her as a child that things changed without her, because of her actions, and that she'd left this treasured toy alone without thinking about it all that time, letting it be affected by the elements without her interference. She wrote "Everything Stays" for Adventure Time based on that plushie, and realized that she was writing about it again for the Steven Universe movie.

Many beautiful miniature boards are shown in this section.

Partial sheet music for "Drift Away" is also offered here. It's credited to Rebecca Sugar and Aimee Mann. The music sheet is followed by some lovely images of the garden by Julian De Perio, Patrick Bryson, and Leonard Hung.

Takafumi Hori returns for a discussion of the final fight sequence during "Change," which he animated from Jeff Liu's boards. He discusses trying to keep the fight feeling dramatic and serious even though Spinel's fighting style is funny. He wanted to keep her tension. Hori-san throws in a word of thanks for being allowed to work on his favorite show again, praises Jeff and Miki, and compliments Rebecca Sugar's demos. He hoped we'd get a soundtrack album. (Of course, we did.)

Some final boards by Rebecca Sugar and Becky Dreistadt of the characters in their show gear descending the steps close out the book. There are also some cute little doodles at the end on the credits page, like a head of lettuce with caption "lettuce adore you" and Spinel in a drifting go-kart laughing, captioned "drift away."

The back cover pictures Steven with his arm around a heartbroken Spinel, comforting her.

Overall, the book is wonderful--the accompanying information is generally not new to anyone who watched the DVD's documentary and commentary, and many of the sketches have been released one way or another directly by the artists through Instagram, Twitter, or Tumblr blogs. There was still plenty of wonderful new concept art that wasn't already out there, and looking at some of the iterations Spinel and Steg went through was particularly captivating. There was no new insight into the development of the plot beyond the premise and the Spinel-related conflict, though; nothing about how they decided to focus the Garnet storyline, the Pearl storyline, and the Amethyst storyline for how they would each get their memories back, and there was no spotlight on their movie versions--modern Cotton Candy Garnet, copycat baby Amethyst, and factory settings uncustomized Pearl. I was hoping especially for some Amethyst stuff because the movie was the first place we got to see her with the simple default outfit and segmented limbs. It was primarily an art book with commentary on some of the most definitive movie aspects--it didn't reach the depth that Art and Origins gave us. It has a start-to-finish feeling in a sense, but it's mostly just splashes of information that are fun to know. It's a great companion and definitely should not be missed by any fan of the movie. I recommend it heartily!

[SU Book and Comic Reviews]

[flowers-for-fischl-a]

Liyue was a long way from home - from the familiar hills and city of Mondstadt, from the Adventurer’s Guild that she knew, and the comforting breeze that was always there.

Maybe it was hearing about Pilos Peak and Leonard, or maybe it was that deep set feeling that she just wasn’t strong enough to protect everyone she wanted to - but the Prinzessin found herself deep in the land of the Adepti. She’d heard warning of entering without permission, but paid little heed to to the warnings or the protests of her corvid companion, as she made her way up the mountain. 

Soon the path came to an end, but still there was somewhere higher to reach - and so she began her ascent by climbing, taking any purchase in the stone surface she could find as she scaled the mountain, resting whenever she reached a small area she could take a break from climbing on.

At last, she found herself at the peak of the mountain, the small floating structure hanging above it’s peak, beyond her reach. Though from here, she didn’t feel the need to climb further, and instead chose to seat herself with her legs hanging off the side of the peak - one hand coming to her face to lift the eyepatch from over her left eye, the amethyst eye beneath the patch blinking away the suddenly oppressive sunlight as it adjusted to the new light.

“...What is it like... Having such a drive..?”

One hand was moved behind her back, removing her Edelstein der Dunkelheit - her Vision - and holding it up to the sky, the mixed amethyst and emerald gaze of the Prinzessin’s eyes scanning across the surface of the Vision, before she set it on the ground beside her, and turned her gaze down on the vast landscape of Liyue before her. 

“I wonder, Barbatos... If you had seen his drive... Would you have given him such a blessing too?”

A quiet sigh escaped her, and she let herself fall back - laying on the cool stone as she watched the small island hanging in the hair above her head, before her eyes drifted closed.

“...I think... I’ll stay here for a bit...”

[lucyintheskywithtemplars]

AC: Ragnarok--no, that’s a Thor movie--Valhalla!

Okay! So. I was in a teleconference today (because the one thing that hasn’t shut down during this pandemic is Construction, Especially of Hospitals) when Ubisoft did their Thing. So I missed it. But now: time to watch the trailer.

(I did get to passively, distractedly watch the art thing yesterday they did on twitter, but all I got from it was pretty landscapes and silhouette of a Big Guy, so aside from the Ubisoft AC Special (TM), and VIKINGS, I don’t know what I’m about to see. Huzzah!)

Disclaimer: I tried to keep my language clean, but that failed at some point

Bullet points, go!

1. So.... that’s looking to be a fairly burly guy. Or at least very well armoured.

2. If there is no option to play as a lady this time I will S C R E A M and then promptly wage internet war (no I won’t). Kass spoiled me, you can’t take that away from me, Ubisoft!

3. A priestess woman... is she our female playable character?

4. It’s taken me until now to figure out that the voice over narration is an actual character speaking and not just... a random voice over narrator.

5. LOL the narration is all about how they kill indiscriminately and of course Ubisoft pairs that with a “oh look at this woman and her child(ren?), let’s allow them to run away from the fighting and violence and not kill them” and I mean. This is AC of course they’re going to make their protag / protag’s people look good, so I’m not surprised, and knowing that this is a character narration means it’s propaganda to some degree (Templaaaaars!). I’m just. You’re really going out of your way to show where the lines are drawn, but in the most subtle manner you can manage, eh?

6. I gotta say: that switch from actual battle to play fighting and training with the fam? That’s a nice transition. Almost as good as the ones for the Origins Theatrical Trailer (all caps, because that? Is the shit. Still my favourite. Leonard Cohen! Bayek! Aya/Amunet! Egypt! Cleo and Caesar and did I say Bayek! And SENU, MY LOVE <3 <3 <3 <3 <3).

7. I didn’t bother to look up what year (decade) this is set in exactly, but I’m going to assume it’s pre-Christianization of the Scandiwegian countries/lands, so that means A) this is probably not going to have a happy ending, and B) my immediate reaction of KING JOHN! WHERE IS ROBIN HOOD? Is way off base

8. Guy in the background is reminding me of what’s his face from ACII. Damn it. I remember Savonarola, but not him. The Gonfallioniere (sp?). I’m recording all of my thoughts trying to remember this fool’s name because it’s bugging me so much I SHOULD KNOW IT. Um. What’s his face. The Betrayer. That guy. Getting those same vibes from Mister Background For The King. (An eminence grise?)

9. AAAAAAND... BATTLE! This is feeling like that one mission in AC3, where they tricked us into thinking we could do the same thing in actual play as Connor did in the trailer. THAT’S WHAT I’M FEELING, I am Worried. Not super stealthy to be front and centre in a giant free for all!

10. (I say like the entire premise of this game isn’t VIKINGS. What do I know)

11. WHAT IS THAT FLORENTINE LAWYER GUY’S NAME?????

12. So the... leader? Chief? Head honcho? The dude gets taken out and the guy-who-is-I-guess-our-boy just lobs that... axe? Very nice.

13. A hooded person! So maybe we actually ARE being stealthy? Is that our boy/girl?

14. No, my bad, that was just fucking god. (KASS? IS THAT YOU?)

15. “Odin is with us!” Well, that was definitely our standard bird of prey that just took off (I’m including Corvids in this--I just 100% typo’ed that as “Covid”, I’ve Pavlov’d my fingers apparently). So random hooded person who is Not Odin what is wrong with you is... maybe probably our boy/girl? Nice. And dude who is speaking is not?

(15.2. I have to admit, I’m on my second watch, and I’m still having trouble keeping track of who is who between each scene. Is the guy who meets the priestess and gets blood markings the same one we see talking? Is it the leader who gets shanked in the battle? Is it someone else entirely? I don’t know! I’m just going to assume that we’re focusing on the guy who speaks during the battle because of Reasons From Further Points.)

16. No, seriously, what is that fool’s name from Florence? Damnit.

17. Dude-on-a-horse! ...I’m assuming you’re the guy from the scene with the King. And now you’re on a horse! With a... giant of a man beside you. (Ser Gregor Clegane, is that you?)

18. Holy shit it might be, I want a normal person to stand beside both Mister Mountain and our boy, how big are you guys????? Height, muscle, mass, weight, armour, all of the above? The scales for these people look. So weird.

19. Mario Kart 64 had the battle rounds for two or more players? And when you selected it there was that (Luigi?) voice clip that said, “Battol!” Yeah, I definitely heard that when our boy faced off with Mister Mountain.

20. NOT LOOKING TOO HOT THERE, P.O.V. CHARACTER, MAYBE YOU NEED A LITTLE HELP FROM YOUR HOODED FRIEND?

21. HA! HELP GRANTED AND--

22. YOU ARE FUCKING KIDDING ME. Now I need to go back and rewatch and see if I can pick up on that bracer from earlier scenes. (And over the back of the hand? Definitely a follow through Origins then.)

23. THE SHIT. IS THIS.

24. !!!!!!!! ALBERTO UMBERTI! YOU FUCKER I FORGOT YOUR NAME!!!! Anyway.

25. But yeah, I was really hoping for some kind of surprise stealth kill like the arrow storms from Brotherhood, but... this works? I guess? I DON’T KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT THIS.

26. I lied--I know exactly how I feel about this. Very... RPG-ish, more God of War than AC. I’m probably going to enjoy it anyway because I do enjoy God of War, but since this is supposed to fit in the timeline between Origins and ACI (Altair! It’s been too long, I’ve missed you, your arrogant prick), I was kind of hoping for something that leaned more towards the stealth of Altair (except for when I’m playing the game) and less the knock-em-down, drag-em-out brawling of Odyssey.

On the other hand, our boy (and hopefully lady!) goes a-viking, so. I don’t know why I thought it might be anything different?

27. I didn’t comment on the music but! This sounds familiar! It has a very Woodkid-vibe to it, but without being Woodkid (I think?????). And lots of sound effects, of course, so I’m going to have to look this up to get a proper feel for it. It just sort of... faded into the background except in one or two spots, and I know that’s what you want for good sound mixing, but this is a trailer, not a feature length film, I want to hear the song. I’m assuming it was chosen for a reason, I’d like to be able to tell what that reason is.

(27.2 They actually used a song from Jonsi for the Black Flag trailer, and since Sigur Ros is from Iceland this might have been the better time to use it... oh! Wait I can just go look up if they have a track similar to this. Exciting!) (I apologize for the lack of proper spelling there, I’m fighting with my keyboard to make it type English characters properly, let alone ones that my computer considers “special” characters :\ )

Thoughts: Okay, well, one trailer and me otherwise ignoring all the rumours for AC means I have nothing solid to really form an opinion about. Aside from A+++++ animation quality, Ubisoft, you never fail in that department. (Game quality and glitches, on the other hand... I still remember Arno’s L’Oreal commercial, Ubisoft,)

I’m excited to see northern Europe and the British Isles in game form! It might be the only form of travelling I get to do in the next few months. ...even though this is supposed to be out just before New Years?

I said just above that I had Thoughts on how the story would be bridged between Origins and ACI, and I still do, but I’m intrigued to see where and how Ubisoft is going to take this and play with it. I also need to check and see if they’ve confirmed a timeline/decade/year that this takes place in, so I can go pour over all the history from that time period. ...and maaaaaaybe we’ll get to go see Constantinople when it was Constantinople and before it became Istanbul during Ezio’s lifetime (ish)?

AC: Revelations: fighting with Jannisaries. AC: Valhalla (DLC?): fighting as a Varangian Guard (the sort-of precursor to the Jannisaries)

A girl can dream, right?

[doomedandstoned]

Meet Corey G. Lewis, The Dude Who’s Bringing Grunge Back

~By Jamie LaRose~

Art by Ben House

With the new album sinking into our consciousness, 'Deathspiration' (2018) by The Misery Men invokes the necessity to dig a bit deeper into the creative processes behind its craft. I had the chance to follow-up with Corey G. Lewis, mastermind of the music, and take a glimpse at the band's evolution as portrayed by sound. Deathspiration was recorded and mixed by Steve Jones of Ancient Warlocks at Big Sound Productions in Seattle, and features Jones as drummer.

Deathspiration by The Misery Men

Deathspiration by The Misery Men

The intro track is reminiscent of reflections, leading into a blasting presence of a second track. This album seems to tell a diverse story, can you explain some of the inspiration behind Deathspiration?

Well the intro track is sort of an homage to Neil Young’s Dead Man soundtrack. I’m also really into Dylan Carlson and EARTH. Before I discovered Earth, I’d always described The Misery Men as, Western Doom Noir. That’s evolved into me describing it as Stone Drone. Nevertheless it’s reminiscent of the space between the notes, and the chaos that occurs. The song Sughrue is about C.W. Sughrue, a character from the book Last Good Kiss by the late great James Crumley, also an old friend. Sughrue is a Private Dick that goes off looking for missing woman. “Like a train” barreling down the highway, from Montana to Mexico.

Oh, most importantly, the inspiration behind Deathspiration is the evolution of me as a human. The cathartic shedding of skin. "Harnessing the Darkness" and riding the waves. Sometimes I feel we might be desperate to reach death, to know the truths, while we attempt to be inspired to live life, as we pass through all the adversity, and perspiring blood, sweat, and tears in these moments of our existence.

Deathspiration by The Misery Men

Do you have any secrets of sound to share? What types of techniques present The Misery Men persona?

My secret sound really is simplicity, and the ghost of Leo Fender haunting my amp. I run a 70’s Music Man 112 RP 65-watt amp with an EV bass speaker, through a 2x12 THD Cab, with a phaser pedal, and a Little Big Muff. A wall of fuzz, that is grizzly, meaty, and punchy. I don’t really try to be the tone guy, but I get more compliments about my tone than anything else.

Deathspiration by The Misery Men

"Night Creeps In" presents itself to me as the vertex of the Deathspiration story, it feels ritualistic and defining. Are there any rituals you perform while in the writing process?

This song in particular was written after a girl I was dating for only a week, told me she was going to kill herself. It was pretty heavy, and at the time she texted me, I was walking past Lone Fir Cemetery and wrote her, “sometimes the night creeps in, looking wretched weak and thin. Smiling with its meathook grin.” It was a very heavy experience. When I wrote this song about seven years ago, I was just really getting deep into Dax Riggs of Acid Bath. He’s definitely had a big impact on my music writing since moving to Portland.

Deathspiration by The Misery Men

Aside from the release of Deathspiration, are there any other exciting current happenings with The Misery Men?

We played at Dante’s not long ago with Chris Newman Deluxe Combo. Chris is quintessential to the Portland rock scene and to the whole Pacific Northwest in general. He is famous for his band Napalm Beach, who released their first album in 1981. Without Napalm Beach, The Wipers, and Dead Moon, well Seattle “Grunge” just wouldn’t sound the same. We might all still be playing Hair Metal!

Officially, Deathspiration has been out since last December, but this week it will launch on all digital platforms worldwide. This fall around September or October, expect a new two-part album to drop digitally, recorded by Witch Mountain and The Skull’s own Rob Wrong! It’ll feature 3-4 different local bass players and a couple local drummers, all guitars and vocals have been recorded, and bass/drums will be done by July/August. So far, we've got interest from bass players Billy Anderson (yes, the famous Sleep producer), Matt Howl (Mammoth Salmon), Wayne Boucher (Troll), and Jaden Mcginiss (Legendary Peavy owner, Doorman, Boudicca). All of this will be recorded in Rob’s basement, the same basement Elliott Smith practiced in.

I decided that my second album needed to be done sooner than later, after the 1st was seven years in the making. Deathspiration was recorded in Seattle with Ancient Warlocks drummer Steve Jones, I’m very happy with the way it turned out, it was analog with no filters, no frills, just my raw intensity. The second though I feel needs to be done here in Portland, it is after all according to Greg Sage, DoomTown. Unlike the first one, it’ll be all digital, but still raw and real, capturing my live performance sound. I’m also likely going to have a variety of drummers on the album playing different songs, perhaps even some legendary Portland drummers!

This week I begin practicing with a new drummer for two upcoming gigs. On Saturday, July 6th, we'll be playing with Chronoclops and Stereo Creeps from Seattle at Misdemeanor Meadows in Portland. It's a free show. Then on Friday, July 26th, The Misery Men will be rocking Gil's Speakeasy for a $5 show that includes The Sleer and Breath. I'm Working on gigs for August on through the Fall.

Do you have any memories of childhood that are notably similar to your current state of mind? What type of things about your childhood self were spot-on about who you become? What was your favorite toy?

I knew I’d always wanted to be a Rock n’ Roller or an actor in films. Like pretty much as long as I could remember. I dressed up almost every Halloween as a Punk Rocker in the '80s. My first concert of grand scale was Poison and Warrant 1989, in Bozeman, Montana -- I was in 5th grade. That show changed my life. I also dug rocks in my grandparent’s backyard, but not for pleasure -- my grandfather took advantage of child labor! I’m a rocker through and through. I think I’ve followed my dreams pretty spot on.

Favorite toys were probably GI Joe’s, Star Wars, or my SEGA Genesis. I also built wood swords from fence posts and painted them with finger nail polish as a kid. Think I may have accidentally got high!

What was the moment when you could feel music has become a part of your life? How has writing music helped you, and those around you?

Well, ever since I could remember music was a part of my life. Listening to my mom’s old tapes and records as a kid really impacted me. I was always surrounded by music, my grandparents owned a Rock n’ Roll bar I’m the ‘60s, '70s, and '80s, called The Wrangler Bar in Livingston, MT. It’s featured in the film Rancho Deluxe about some wild young cattle rustlers, starring Jeff Bridges, and Sam Waterson. There’s a scene with Jimmy Buffett playing "Livingston Saturday Night" while Jeff and Sam play Pong. I’ve played that same machine as a kid! There was always a jukebox, I loved playing Jefferson Starship's "We Built This City," Joan Jett's "I Love Rock n’ Roll," Ozzy's "Bark at the Moon," Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" and "Hell Is For Children," and Billy Squire's "The Stroke"!

In 7th and 8th grades, I really was into The Doors, The Beatles, Hendrix, and I was in a English class for kids who couldn’t really focus on reading Lord Of The Rings. In this class our teacher would have us listen to our favorite music at home, then with the feelings we got, write our own poetry. I often listened to Hendrix, especially Axis: Bold As Love and Electric LadyLand, so there were plenty of references to fantasy in my early lyrics. This really helped me learn to become a lyricist, and take an interest in poetry. Most importantly, it gave me an outlet. Around the same time, I got heavy into Henry Rollins. When I saw the video for "Liar" with Hank all painted red, I thought, “I wanna be that guy!” I bought Get in The Van and it became my Bible. All the while I was into Nirvana, Alice In Chains, and Soundgarden.

Is there a way to describe when you feel most productive or most relaxed? How is your state of mind best explained while writing music?

I’m most productive when I feel inspired. Or when the Sun is out and I’m well rested. I like the Sun, except in extreme heat, then I wanna murder the Sun. I was born at night, so I’m a Moon child. I definitely get more inspired and productive writing at night. A few years ago when I was reworking an old song that turned out to be Harness The Darkness, I took a wee bit of LSD or mushrooms -- I’m more of a microdose kind of guy -- found myself going down some deep wormholes to connect a lot of dots that would go on to make up the six verses of the song, that I eventually dropped into four, because it was the most exhausting song to play! I’m a Beatnik kid. I got into the Beat style of writing early on. So, letting the stream of consciousness come flowing out seems to work well for me. I can keep a pretty decent rhyme or off rhyme too.

What is the most peculiar thing that anyone has ever said to you?

Hmmmm. Can you keep a secret? From experience, always tell them no, because sometimes people will lay some heavy shit on you, and maybe you didn’t want to be that person to carry their burden. I’m not a Priest, or a therapist, sometimes it’s fine to listen to friends, but there’s some things you can’t unhear or unsee!

Do you have a message for the universe?

I call it the "Megaverse," as coined by quantum physicist Leonard Susskind -- but my message is to be real, be compassionate, be loving, be forgiving, be understanding, be courageous, be ever evolving, and in the words of E.T.: “Beeeeee Gooooooddd.”

The Great Misery Men Giveaway!

Don't miss your chance to add the gritty album Deathspiration to your library! Grab one of the Bandcamp codes below (first come, first served) and redeem it right here.

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[bloodkingdomrp]

♚EMMETT.ROOK

“War is hell “

✚ AGE & DOB: Thirty-Two & July 5th , 1988 ✚ OCCUPATION: Construction Foreman ✚ AFFILIATION: Kovali & Capo

♛THE HISTORY♛

Emmett Rook was born in the Crazy Mountains, a remote, rugged, beautiful piece of Montana where he could ride for days without seeing another person, only the cattle his family raised.  As a kid, he felt like he lived at the top of the world—and even as he grew older, the feeling was hard to shake.

He’d never dreamed of anything except following in his father’s boot tracks.  Ranching was in his blood, in his bones—for six generations, following the Homestead Act that gave them their first 160 acres, the Rook family had been carving a living from a hostile environment, but the reward was plain.  There was pride in staying put where others had failed; love in the family that filled the ranch house; wonder in seeing each spring’s calves and colts discover the world.

And to show their gratitude for being given a chance like that, the Rook men all volunteered for the military.  And Emmett was no different.  He’d had no thought of college after high school graduation—he’d learned all he needed to know right there on the ranch.  But first, while his father was still in good health and his brother and sisters were young enough to stay home but old enough to help out, Emmett would put in his due service.  It was an exchange he wholeheartedly believed in.

Emmett’s father and grandfather hadn’t seen active combat, stationed in relatively safe areas and between major conflicts; his great-grandfather, a WWII veteran, hadn’t talked about his time in the Army.  So when Emmett enlisted as a MOS 12B Combat Engineer, he knew there was a chance of danger—but that was only a chance, right?  Nobody in his family had been killed in the service since his great-great-uncle in WWI.  He knew how to wrestle a living for his family and their livestock from the Montana wilderness; he was sure he could learn to tame foreign territory.

So, he and his best friend, Jimmy O’Carroll, set out for Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.  It was the first time these two Montana boys had been on a plane (Jimmy loved it; Emmett not so much), their first time out of the West, and their first time away from their families.  But they had each other, and they had all the grit developed by life in the wilderness, and over the next fourteen weeks of training, they went from cowboys to combat engineers.  They already had construction experience from maintaining and improving their ranches, but now they learned to build bridges and clear roads on a much larger scale, place and clear explosives, build defenses and obstacles, and use all the equipment needed to accomplish these missions.  They learned how to march and take orders, got used to being in crowds of strangers—that was maybe the weirdest thing, having gone to a high school where hardly anyone actually lived in town but had known each other’s families for decades—and prepared for a deployment they knew was inevitable.

But when it came, they still weren’t worried, too naïve to guess what could happen.  And, honestly, things went pretty well.

War wasn’t all glory, they learned that awfully fast, but they made it through.  They did their jobs, everything worked out okay, and although the enemy came too close for comfort, nothing was brutal enough to make them reconsider.  And so, at the end of four years, with cattle prices low and enough help that their families could spare them, they reenlisted.

This time they signed up for the Sapper Leader Course, a month of intensive training that built leadership and tactical skills.  Sapper Tabs in place, they shipped out for their second deployment to Iraq, confident that now, more than ever, they could conquer the desert.

Thinking back on it now, Emmett can’t believe they were ever so stupid.

From the beginning, their second deployment was worse: more frequent fights with the enemy, most of it hit-and-run but leaving more men dead than before; more difficult terrain to secure; lower morale among their comrades.  But then they were assigned what was supposed to be an easy project, a breather from high-stakes, high risk assignments.

It was just a connecting road between an airfield and a small, friendly village, and they’d checked for explosives and started to widen the path, things they’d done multiple times before—but they’d either missed a mine, or someone had snuck in an IED overnight.  Jimmy was in the truck just ahead of Emmett’s, heading through the village to the place they’d start the day’s construction—and then all of a sudden, the truck was gone, everything was in flames, they were getting shot at and shooting back and the villagers were caught in the crossfire.

When the shooting finally stopped, they couldn’t find Jimmy’s body—there was hardly anything left of the cab of the truck, it was so destroyed.  But there were plenty of other bodies—children, women, old men, Emmett’s friends.  He can’t forget it.  He’ll never forget it.  And although six years have passed, he still sees their faces in his dreams.

After his discharge, he returned to Montana, but the Crazies were named for a woman who lost her mind after seeing her family killed.  For the first time, Emmett thought he could understand.  And for the first time, he was worried the mountains might gain yet another namesake.  Before, he’d embraced the isolation; now it was too big, too empty, too lonely.  He missed the crowded barracks and being surrounded by buddies who understood—in the mountains there was nothing to stop the nightmares and intrusive thoughts from catching up with him, and sleeplessness and stress made him turn on the people he loved.  The ranch had made them tough, but they were too innocent, too good, and he couldn’t explain why he was so jumpy and angry all the time.  He couldn’t tell them what he’d seen and done.  And so, for the first time, he told them he wasn’t sure he wanted to take over the ranch.

He drifted south for a while, taking a job with an outfit in Wyoming and hoping the change of scenery and life with some wilder hands might be enough to snap him out of it.  But it wasn’t.  And he’d started drinking in an effort to block out the memories, but it didn’t work.  All it did was cloud his judgement, and when a brawl with the foreman cost him his job, Emmett got in his pickup, got on I-80, and just started driving—until he started seeing signs for Chicago, and curiosity made him turn north.

It was the biggest city he’d ever seen, full of traffic and trash and concrete, and he hated it.  And yet, it was the first place he could truly get lost.  He had to think constantly, figuring out streets and transportation and slang he’d never heard…and thinking about things like that made it a lot harder to think about Iraq.

So he stayed.  He got a tiny apartment and a job with a construction company, frequented hole-in-the-wall bars, went to Lake Michigan when he missed the open space of Montana, and for the first time in a long time, started feeling a little at peace.

Then the construction company won a bid for a guest house at what the guys called the “Kovali Compound,” and Emmett got to know a few members of what he thought was just a wealthy family.  (Maybe he had a little Western naiveite left in him after all.)  By the time he started picking up on rumors of what they were actually involved in, it was too late—they’d offered him camaraderie, and he’d seen enough death that he felt numb to it.  He told himself he didn’t care.

It didn’t take long for him to realize that wasn’t quite true, but he’s a Capo now, specializing in raids and in securing, defending, and building Kovali properties.  His family has no idea he’s involved in anything illegal—as far as they know, he’ll probably spend a few years seeing the world before returning to Montana.  But with his sisters at the helm, he knows the ranch is in good hands, and his brother’s graduation from high school this spring only confirmed the need to keep them out of everything.  He’s trying to convince his brother to go to college; to delay if not stop his desire to enlist.  He doesn’t want his brother to end up like he did, and besides, at some point the Rook boys need to quit following in each other’s footsteps.

But now Emmett has to decide: is he going to follow his father’s path?  The gang’s?  Or is it possible to blaze his own trail?

♜ THE DETAILS♜

(+): Resourceful + Protective + Social

(-): Restless - Stubborn - Uneasy

Face claim: Scott Eastwood

written by K | CST

[beyondmistland]

“May your heart be your guiding key” (Full thoughts on Kingdom Hearts III below!)

Graphics:

Ø  The game is bloody gorgeous, which helps mitigate the long and frequent cutscenes

Ø  The lip-syncing rarely fails

Music:

Ø  The new remixes are awesome and the brand-new tracks don't disappoint either

Ø  What does though is the actual audio mixing:

More often than not I struggled to hear the music over the sound effects during gameplay and the voiceovers during cutscenes

Ranking the Worlds:

Ø  #1: Corona: The world is huge, with varied terrain and a kick-ass final boss

Ø  #2 Olympus: The sheer scale and scope of the world took my breath away, plus we (finally!) get to fight all four titans

Ø  #3 The Caribbean: Assassin's Creed IV meets Kingdom Hearts, what's not to like

Ø  #4 Monstropolis: While not as eye-catching as some of the other worlds the way it intersects with the broader KH lore is really neat and the final cutscene was a delight in that it averts the Disney characters being useless when dealing with the original KH villains, on top of which its straightforward design is a nice change of pace, my only complaint is that there are only four types of Unversed

Ø  #5 San Fransokyo: The story is surprisingly short, which means you don't really get the chance to explore the environment, which sucks because the verticality and day/night cycle are awesome, plus there are a number of memorable boss fights

Ø  #6 Twilight Town: If it had been fully recreated based off the KH2 version the world would be much higher on my list but despite how small it is I love the liveliness, not to mention how peaceful it is in comparison to the other worlds, the same can be said for Hundred Acre Wood

Ø  #7 Keyblade Graveyard + Final World + Scala Ad Caelum: Though jaw-dropping in terms of visuals and audio they're not fully realized worlds, the same can be said for Dark World

Ø  #8 Toy Box: I loved the final boss as well as how the story tied into the larger plot of the game and I would be lying if I said I didn't enjoy exploring Andy's room while "You have a friend in me" played in the background

Why then is Toy Box so far down on my list, world design

Even with endgame stats (LV40-45) the Gigas are tough to take down and as a result they come off as gimmicky in the worst sense of the word, beyond that the fact that the majority of the world is set in Galaxy Toys made me feel constrained and claustrophobic, which could have been partially alleviated if we'd been allowed to make our way through the parking lot outside, finally, the story kind of got repetitive with the backtracking whenever the characters were about to leave because "someone went missing yet again"

Ø  #9 Arrendelle: Though it has one of the best final bosses in the game along with Corona there is so much wrong with this world that I wonder if it's less Square Enix's fault and more Disney placing an insane amount of red tape on their favorite cash-cow:

1) Elsa does not become a party member even after you beat the world

2) You do not get to explore the city or the ice palace despite the latter being fully rendered on the map

3) Larxene, a lightning-based character, randomly traps you in an ice labyrinth when that would have made a lot more sense both logically and thematically if it had been Elsa

4) Speaking of Larxene, she does practically nothing the whole time you're there unlike Marluxia and Luxord, who are at least semi-active

5) You climb a mountain and get knocked off of it so many times that even Sora gets fed up

6) The bloody minigame where you have to find Olaf's body parts

7) Forcing us to watch the entire "Let it go" sequence and then having "Do you want to build a snowman" play over Anna's voice as she's explaining herself to Sora

8) So much of the story is excised that you have little clue as to what's going on to the point Hans appears for all of five minutes, doesn't say any lines, and isn't even named when it would have been cool, not to mention, just plain better, if he had started off as a guest member of your party

9) As a result of #8 Sora, Donald, and Goofy's presence feels like even more of an afterthought than usual in the sense that them not being there wouldn't have changed anything at all apart from Hans' Heartless then having no one to defeat it which can be seen by the fact that when they leave no one tells them goodbye unlike in every other world

10) The visual design was bland and tiresome after a while

11) The world's gimmick was uninspired to say the least

12) Fighting alongside a giant snowman (AKA Marshmallow) was awesome and in terms of pure gameplay the labyrinth was actually quite fun

Story Pros:

Ø  Master Xehanort's new voice actor is good but after hearing Leonard Nimoy's voice for the past couple of games the change is a bit jarring

Ø  The way previous games are referenced and tied together is a nice way of bringing new players into the fold while also setting up the finale's resolutions

Ø  The game has a better sense of humor than previous installments

Ø  Sora is more like his KH2 self than the bland caricature we saw in 3D and quite a few characters display some degree of genre-savviness

Ø  Master Yen Sid gets out of his chair to lend a hand for once

Ø  Donald Duck is the most powerful mage in Square Enix canon (and I am not making that up)

Gameplay Pros:

Ø  Being able to switch between different save points in the same world is a welcome addition

Ø  The secondary ability of all shotlocks to airstep is ingenious

Ø  You can have more than two party members finally!

Ø  The secret ending isn't too hard to unlock

Ø  You can upgrade your Keyblades, which means older ones aren't automatically relegated to redundancy

Ø  Donald and Goofy are useful again after being nerfed into uselessness in KH2

Ø  Towns and cities are actually populated by fully-voiced NPCs!

Ø  Cutscenes in Theater Mode are unlocked after completing each world rather than after beating the game

Ø  I never tried the Classic Kingdom minigames but the cooking one with Remy was a nice break from the normal gameplay (I suck at the egg-cracking one though)

Ø  The camera doesn't get in the way like it infamously did in KH1

Ø  I like the new main menu design (Feel free to disagree though)

Ø  The Gummi Ship is entirely optional outside of a few mandatory boss battles

Ø  Moogle Tickets are a nice way of giving players a second chance during difficult encounters (I do wish they didn’t activate so quickly though) 

Gameplay Cons:

Ø  The game never once tells you that you can switch between Situation Commands using L2

Ø  The game never once tells you that you keep all your lower-tier magic (Fire, Fira for example) and that your shortcuts don't automatically update to include the higher-tier version of whatever magic you have equipped

Ø  There's no real incentive to switch between Keyblades (That being said, my favorites are Wheel of Fate, Nano Arms, and Happy Gear/Ever After)

Ø  Attractions lose their charm quickly and completely ruin the flow of combat

Ø  Summons aren't too big of a deal since I only ever ended up using them once and even then it was by accident

Ø  Donald still heals you at the wrong time more often than not

Ø  Even on Proud Mode the game is way too easy for the most part (Apparently Critical Mode addresses this but I can't confirm that)

Ø  There is a lack of sidequests and post-game content that contributes to the feeling Square & Disney gave us half a game (For example, there is only one secret boss, said secret boss has a generic design, no ties to the story, and can be defeated at LV40 on your first attempt)

Ø  Hollow Bastion, Mysterious Tower, and Destiny Islands are not playable

Ø  The parkour from 3D has been nerfed too much in terms of distance to actually be useful

Story Cons:

Ø  Nomura fridged Kairi and he worfed almost everyone the first time you arrive at the Keyblade Graveyard!

Ø  The wrapping up of plot points and character arcs from prior entries was a little too nice and neat for me

Ø  The out-of-nowhere introduction of Subject X

Ø  Pete and Maleficent do literally nothing the whole damn game

Ø  The pacing is awful:

Almost all of the game's resolution is held back until after you've beaten the last Disney world

Ø  There are two important cutscenes in the Final World that you can accidentally miss because for some reason they are optional

Ø  We don't get to see what happened to Lingering Will, which also means we don't get any more insight into the third aspect of being (AKA the soul)

Ø  There are no Final Fantasy characters in the game, not even Sephiroth!

Ø  What happened to Demyx?

Ø  Master Eraqus has absolutely nothing to do with Terra’s restoration

Changes I’d make:

Ø  Require us to go through the Disney worlds a second time like in KH2

Ø  Have Aqua and Ven be saved halfway through the game instead of at the end, they could then spend the second half of the game resting or join you on one of the Disney worlds to refresh themselves

Ø  Have Lea and Kairi join you on one of the Disney worlds to get practical experience

Ø  Make the Keyblade Graveyard sequence be a series of one/two/three-on one battles so that members of Organization XIII can use their full arsenal of attacks from previous games

Ø  Let us play the second battle between Lingering Will and Terra-Xehanort

Ø  Speaking of Terra-Xehanort, we should have fought him alongside the Guardian Heartless

Ø  Have us explore Scala Ad Caelum while hunting down the individual replicas before then making us fight all of them in a boss battle

DLC

Ø  The presence of it says a lot about the game and not in a good way

Final Score

Ø  7/10-8/10

[aviophobic]

tagged by: nobody, i stole it! tagging: anyone who wants to!

Muse :: Leonard McCoy

ZODIAC SIGN: Aries | Taurus | Gemini | Cancer | Leo | Virgo | Libra | Scorpio | Sagittarius | Capricorn | Aquarius | Pisces

MYERS-BRIGGS: ESFP | ISFP | ESTP | ISTP | ESTJ | ISTJ | ESFJ | ISFJ | ENFJ | INFJ | ENFP | INFP | ENTP | INTP | ENTJ | INTJ

FOUR TEMPERAMENTS: Sanguine | Melancholic | Choleric | Phlegmatic

CELTIC ZODIAC: Birch (The Achiever) | Rowan (The Thinker) | Ash (The Enchanter) | Alder (The Trailblazer) | Willow (The Observer) | Hawthorne (The Illusionist) | Oak (The Stabilizer) | Holly (The Ruler) | Hazel (The Knower) | Vine (The Equalizer) | Ivy (The Survivor) | Reed (The Inquisitor) | Elder (The Seeker)

SOUL TYPE: Hunter | Caregiver | Creator  | Thinker | Helper | Educator | Performer | Leader | Spiritualist

HOGWARTS HOUSE: Gryffindor | Hufflepuff | Ravenclaw | Slytherin

ALIGNMENT: Lawful Good | Neutral Good | Chaotic Good | Lawful Neutral | True Neutral |Chaotic Neutral | Lawful Evil | Neutral Evil | Chaotic Evil

DARK TRIAD: Psychopathy | Machiavellianism | Narcissism

THE ANIMAL IN YOU: Lion | Tiger | Dolphin | Bear | Wild Cat | Fox | Weasel | Badger | Dog | Otter | Wolf | Sea Lion | Wild Dog | Walrus | Gorilla | Deer | Rhinoceros | Hippo | Sable | Horse | Sheep | Mountain Goat | Warthog | Zebra | Baboon | Elephant | Bison | Giraffe | Cottontail | Mole | Bat | Porcupine | Beaver | Prairie Dog | Shrew | Mouse | Eagle | Rooster | Owl | Swan | Peacock | Vulture | Penguin | Crocodile | Snake | Rabbit

ROSENBERG SELF ESTEEM SCALE: 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30

BRAIN LATERALIZATION TEST:  Right Brain 33.2% | Left Brain 66.8%

[architectnews]

Luma Arles building by Frank Gehry

Luma Arles building by Frank Gehry, Creative Campus, New French Iconic Architecture Images

Luma Arles building by architect Frank Gehry

Iconic Architectural Development in Southern France design by Frank Gehry architect, L.A., USA

25 June 2021

Luma Arles building by Frank Gehry

Design: Architect Frank Gehry, Gehry & Partners, Santa Monica, CA, USA

Location: Parc des Ateliers, 33 avenue Victor Hugo, Arles, southern France

photograph © Adrian Deweerdt

Spectacular Frank Gehry Building Opens As Luma Arles Unveils 27-acre Creative Campus

LUMA Arles, a 27-acre creative campus at the Parc des Ateliers in the city of Arles, opens to the public tomorrow, Saturday 26 June 2021. Work by over 45 artists and designers will feature in the opening programme, with special new commissions for LUMA by major international artists, including Etel Adnan, Ólafur Elíasson, Koo Jeong A, Kapwani Kiwanga, Helen Marten, Pierre Huyghe, Carsten Höller, Philippe Parreno and Rirkrit Tiravanija amongst others.

photo © Adrian Deweerdt

Major new outdoor artworks include a previously unseen 13-metre-high pink sculpture by Franz West and a full-scale glow in the dark skatepark by Koo Jeong A, which is illuminated at night with fluorescent paint. Carsten Höller’s Seven Sliding Doors Corridor, a mirrored and seemingly endless passage which visitors can explore, has been reimagined and installed across the site’s pond, whilst Kerstin Brätsch has created a site-specific mosaic floor for the Café du Parc.

The Tower features several artist commissions throughout its 12 levels. Philippe Parreno has created Danny, a new permanent immersive artwork using algorithmic technology, a unique ceramic wall mural by Etel Adnan covers the entire back wall of the auditorium, and a new site-specific iteration of Ólafur Elíasson’sTake your Time, a circular rotating mirror affixed to the ceiling, is installed above the monumental, double-helix staircase.

photo © Adrian Deweerdt

Carsten Höller has installed a new iteration of his renowned experimental artwork Isometric Slides in The Tower, which act as one of the building’s means of transporting visitors, and Christian Marclay’s The Clock, a 24-hour video montage exploring the perception of time, will be shown throughout the summer.

photo © Adrian Deweerdt

Previously on e-architect:

19 Mar 2021

Luma Arles building by Frank Gehry architect

Design: Gehry & Partners, Santa Monica, CA, USA

Location: Parc des Ateliers, 33 avenue Victor Hugo, Arles, France

Luma Arles To Open On 26 June 2021

Spectacular new building by US architect Frank Gehry forms centrepiece of 27-acre creative campus

Luma Tower imagined by Frank Gehry, January 2021: image © Adrian Deweerdt

The LUMA Foundation announces the opening of LUMA Arles on 26 June 2021*, a 27-acre creative campus at the Parc des Ateliers in the city of Arles bringing together artists and innovators of the future.

At its heart is Frank Gehry’s spectacular 15,000 square meters tower, a twisting geometric structure finished with 11,000 stainless steel panels. It will house exhibition galleries, project spaces and the LUMA’s research and archive facilities, alongside workshop and seminar rooms. The campus is also home to seven former railway factories, four of which have been renovated by Selldorf Architects as exhibition and performance spaces. The surrounding gardens and public park are designed by landscape architect, Bas Smets.

Luma Tower imagined by Frank Gehry, January 2021: image © Adrian Deweerdt

The Arles project is the brainchild of Maja Hoffmann, who established the LUMA Foundation in 2004, as a leading international philanthropic organisation. The Foundation focuses on the direct relationships between art, culture, environmental issues, human rights, education and research. It is dedicated to providing artists with opportunities to experiment in the production of new work, in close collaboration with other artists from a variety of disciplines, with curators, and diverse audiences.

From 2008 to 2020, the development of this creative campus in Arles has been led by Maja Hoffmann working with a small dedicated team, and the collective input from a Core Group of advisers (Tom Eccles, Liam Gillick, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Philippe Parreno, and Beatrix Ruf). LUMA has already commissioned and presented the work of more than 100 artists and innovators at sites in Arles, including the ancient Roman amphitheatre, and the LUMA Arles campus.

Aerial view of the site, September 2020: image © Herve-Hote

In July 2010, Maja Hoffmann, Founder and President of the LUMA Foundation, said: “There is one driving-metaphor for LUMA at the Parc des Ateliers: that of a living organism. As such the balance between form and function determines its viability. It is about composing a polyphonic score where everything is ordered, yet where everything is possible. Là où, toujours, quelque part quelque chose se passe.”

Alongside the construction and renovation works, the ongoing exhibitions and living archive programme, The Library is on Fire, Offprint, Atelier LUMA and LUMA Days, the residencies and the first steps to define the LUMA Winterschool, have been, over the past 10 years the continuation of this vision more relevant than ever in these times of planetary transition.

Describing his building, which will house seminar rooms, exhibition spaces, research facilities, an auditorium and a café, Frank Gehry said: “We wanted to evoke the local, from Van Gogh’s ‘Starry Night’ to the soaring rock clusters you find in the region. Its central drum echoes the plan of the Roman amphitheatre.”

Aerial view of the site, June 2019, Parc des Ateliers: image © Dronimages

The city of Arles is located in the French region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur in the Mediterranean South of France, between two nature reserves, the Camargue wetlands and the mountain range of Les Alpilles. Arles became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1981, incorporating its Roman and Romanesque lega- cy which includes the monumental Arles Amphitheatre, the Alyscamps and the antique theatre.

*The opening date is subject to the latest government guidelines in connection with Covid 19.

Luma Arles, Parc des Ateliers, 33 avenue Victor Hugo, 13200 Arles

www.luma-arles.org

Frank Gehry Architect

Musée de la Romanité in Nîmes images / information received from developer’s agency

Location: Arles, south of France

New Nîmes Buildings

Musée de la Romanité Architect: Elizabeth de Portzamparc photograph © Serge Urvoy Musée de la Romanité

New Montpellier Buildings

Leonard De Vinci High School in Montpellier photograph © Hellin-Sebbag, photo Benoît Wehrlé Leonard De Vinci High School in Montpellier

Campus of University Saint-Charles, Montpellier photograph © Hellin-Sebbag, photo Benoît Wehrlé Campus of University Saint-Charles

Logements Lez in Art dans la ZAC Rive Gauche à Montpellier Design: NBJ Architectes photograph © photoarchitecture.com Logements Lez in Art dans la ZAC Rive Gauche à Montpellier

Sailing Cube – Pavilion du FAV 2014 à Montpellier Design: Atelier Jérôme Lafond photography © Paul KOZLOWSKI Sailing Cube in La Grande Motte, Montpellier

New Buildings in France

French Architectural Projects

French Architecture Design – chronological list

French Architecture News

French Architect Offices – design firm listings

French Architecture

Zenith Saint-Etienne Building Foster + Partners

New General Building of Council of Europe Strasbourg Art & Build Architect

French Architect

French Buildings

Comments / photos for the Luma Arles building by Frank Gehry page welcome

Website : Elizabeth de Portzamparc

The post Luma Arles building by Frank Gehry appeared first on e-architect.

[pdfreadfree]

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Synopsis : !^READ N0W# A Place to Call Home: Tradition, Style, and Memory in the New American House DOWNLOAD E.P.U.B.

For award-winning architect Gil Schafer, the most successful houses are the ones that celebrate the small moments of life--houses with timeless charm that are imbued with memory and anchored in a distinct sense of place. Essentially, Schafer believes a house is truly successful when the people who live there consider it home. It's this belief--and Schafer's rare ability to translate his clients' deeply personal visions of how they want to live into a physical home that reflects those dreams--that has established him as one of the most sought-after, highly-regarded architects of our time. In his new book, A Place to Call Home Schafer follows up his bestselling The Great American House, by pulling the curtain back on his distinctive approach, sharing his process (complete with unexpected, accessible ideas readers can work into their own projects) and taking readers on a detailed tour of seven beautifully realized houses in a range of styles located around the country--each in a unique place, and each with a character all its own. 250 lush, full color photographs of these seven houses and other never-before-seen projects, including exterior, interior, and landscape details, invite readers into Schafer's world of comfortable classicism. Opening with memories of the childhood homes and experiences that have shaped Schafer's own history, A Place to Call Home gives the reader the sense that for Schafer, architecture is not just a career but a way of life, a calling. He describes how the many varied houses of his youth were informed as much by their style as by their sense of place, and how these experiences of home informed his idea of classicism as a set of values that he applies to many different kinds of architecture in places as varied as the ones he grew up in. Because while Schafer is absolutely a classical architect, he is in fact a modern traditionalist, and A Place to Call Home showcases how he effortlessly interprets traditional principles for a multiplicity of architectural styles within contemporary ways of living.Sections in Part I include the delicate balance of modern and traditional aesthetics, the juxtaposition of fancy and simple, and the details that make each project special and livable. Schafer also delves into what he refers to as 'the spaces in between,' those often overlooked spaces like closets, mudrooms, and laundry rooms, explaining their underappreciated value in the broader context of a home. Part of Schafer's skill lies in the way he gives the minutiae of a project as much attention as the grand aesthetic gestures, and ultimately, it's this combination that brings his homes to life. Part II of the book is the story of seven houses and the places they inhabit--each with a completely different character and soul: a charming cottage completely rebuilt into a casual but gracious house for a young family in bucolic Mill Valley, California; a reconstructed historic 1930s Colonial house and gardens set in lush woodlands in Connecticut; a new, Adirondack camp-inspired house for an active family perched on the edge of Lake Placid with stunning views of nearby Whiteface Mountain; an elegant but family-friendly Fifth Avenue apartment with a panoramic view of Central Park; a new timber frame and stone barn situated to take advantage of the summer sun on a lovely, rambling property in New England; a new residence and outbuildings on a 6,000 acre hunting preserve in Georgia, inspired by the historic 1920s and 1930s hunting plantation houses in the region; and Schafer's own, deeply personal, newly-renovated and surprisingly modern house located just a few feet from the Atlantic Ocean in coastal Maine. In Schafer's hands, the stories of these houses are irresistibly readable. He guides the reader through each of the design decisions, sharing anecdotes about the process and fascinating historical background and contextual influences of the settings. Ultimately, the houses featured in A Place to Call Home are more than just beautiful buildings in beautiful places. In each of them, Schafer has created a dialogue between past and present, a personalized world that people can inhabit gracefully, in sync with their own notions of home. Because, as Schafer writes in the book, he designs houses 'not for an architect's ego, but [for] the beauty of life, the joys of family, and, not least, a heartfelt celebration of place.'

[livinginlandmarketing]

This story is part of a series

In the four years since David O’Sullivan went missing in the San Jacinto Mountains, several other missing-persons cases have intertwined with his and one another’s.

The same group of volunteers who have been searching for O’Sulivan’s remains have gotten involved in at least three other local cases.

A woman who helped search for a missing man later disappeared herself.

And relatives of some of the missing people share a frustration with the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department for how they handled the cases. Some say they’ve been treated poorly or don’t think authorities put enough effort into the searches. In two of the cases, relatives said the first time they tried to report their loved one missing, the person they spoke to wouldn’t take the report.

Sheriff’s officials have declined multiple times to answer most questions about the cases or to respond to families’ criticism of their actions.

“You never realize what a gift a funeral is until you cannot find your loved one.”

Theresa Sturkie says her strong Catholic faith, which she shared with her husband, John, helped sustain her after her husband went missing and was found dead in 2019. At her home in Oceanside on Wednesday, May 19, 2021, she holds a cellphone with a photo of John after he summited Grey’s Peak in Colorado. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Theresa Sturkie, at her home in Oceanside on Wednesday, May 19, 2021, displays photos of her and her husband John from their 1998 wedding album. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Theresa Sturkie says praying the rosary has helped her cope with the disappearance and death of her husband, John Sturkie, whose body was discovered in a ravine in the San Jacinto Mountains six months after he disappeared on Jan. 4, 2019. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

A rosary and cellphone photo of John Sturkie are placed on the 1998 wedding album of Theresa and John Sturkie in Oceanside on Wednesday, May 19, 2021. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Show Caption

of

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John Sturkie

John Sturkie, a 55-year-old electrician from Oceanside, loved the outdoors and would occasionally head out for a solo adventure without telling anyone where he planned to go. He was last seen by his family — wife Theresa and four teenage and adult children — on Friday, Jan. 4, 2019.

A month later, after Oceanside police got a warrant for cellphone tower records, they learned that Sturkie had driven up to the San Jacinto Mountains, about 90 miles northeast of his home. That led them to the record of a 911 call that proved both illuminating and devastating.

Read the series

Part 1: The mysterious disappearance of Pacific Crest Trail hiker David O’Sullivan

Map: David O’Sullivan’s 180-mile Pacific Crest Trail journey

Part 2: Who’s looking for David O’Sullivan? At first, almost no one

More: Missing in the mountains: 4 families ache for those lost

Part 3: 4 years later, searchers seek an answer: What was David O’Sullivan’s fate?

Sturkie’s truck had gotten stuck on a rough road above the Fuller Ridge trailhead. Three men who were up there to do some off-roading that Saturday found him and helped him get unstuck, according to Cathy Tarr, who has been leading the efforts to find O’Sullivan and helped Theresa Sturkie search for her husband. Tarr talked to the men several months later.

At the end of the day, with darkness setting in, snow falling, Sturkie’s truck low on gas and stuck again, the men begged him to come with him, Tarr said. Despite not having camping gear or winter clothes, he declined — and told them not to send help.

Once they got back to an area with cellphone reception, they called 911 anyway. However, “because the men told the 911 operator that Sturkie didn’t ask for assistance, it was classified as a disabled vehicle, not a rescue emergency,” the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

By the next day, 9 inches of snow had fallen.

Once Sturkie’s cellphone pings were discovered, the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department got involved. However, multiple helicopter searches failed to find his truck, and Theresa Sturkie said investigators kept telling her he probably wasn’t up there.

But local resident Jon King, who operates the San Jacinto Trail Report website and has search-and-rescue experience, thought it was obvious the truck was out there. So he strapped on some snowshoes and found it March 15, wedged against a rock above the Black Mountain campground.

In April — with Sturkie’s body still not located — the Sheriff’s Department suspended the case, Theresa Sturkie said. But she wasn’t giving up.

King put her in touch with Tarr, and the pair went up to the mountains every week or two to look for clues. They also organized three larger searches involving dozens of volunteers.

Theresa Sturkie admits that she “kind of antagonized” the Sheriff’s Department, telling them, “Me and my mom friends are gonna go up. I just want to let you know, you might have to rescue us.”

“They kept trying to scare me from going to search, telling me it was too dangerous,” she said. “What else am I gonna do? You guys aren’t going to look for him, I’ve got to do it.”

She thinks press coverage of those efforts is what pushed the Sheriff’s Department to organize a large-scale search on June 29 that included search dogs, a helicopter and the drone team.

His remains were found in a steep ravine on the north side of the mountains; they had to be lifted out by helicopter. Theresa believes he was trying to follow the Pacific Crest Trail down to safety but missed a switchback. He had taken off his fleece jacket, his knit cap and some socks that they believe he was wearing as gloves — signs that he was suffering from hypothermia. As people freeze to death, they may actually start feeling hot and remove clothes.

Finding him “meant so much,” Theresa said. “Even though logically you know that they are deceased, there’s a part of you, being a human being, that just hopes they’re alive.”

But getting closure was a relief, especially to her children.

“The kids were so anxious — it was like the foundation of their life was dropped out from underneath them. The relief when I told them he had been found, you could just see it in their bodies,” she said. “You never realize what a gift a funeral is until you cannot find your loved one.”

Even so, her troubles didn’t end when her husband’s body was found. The coroner’s office, a division of the Sheriff’s Department, listed his date of death as June, not January, even though what was found in June was nothing much more than a skeleton. Theresa said her family almost lost out on months worth of life insurance benefits because of that.

Death-registration guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say: “When a body has been found after a long period of time, the medical examiner or coroner should estimate the date and time of death as accurately as possible” and put that estimate on the death certificate.

She said sheriff’s officials also repeatedly refused to give her copies of their reports, which she requested initially because she wanted to see what areas had already been searched, and then later to file life insurance and benefit claims. She ended up on the phone with a sergeant who she said yelled at her.

“We’ve been through so much,” she said she told him. “If you can’t now, when can you give it to me, under what circumstances? Can you send it directly to the insurance company?” She said he finally told her no, they would never send anything to her, or anybody.

Some people at the Sheriff’s Department were helpful, she said, and she repeatedly stressed that she’s grateful to the people who found her husband and sympathetic about how hard a job the police have.

Overall, however, in that agency, “it feels like there’s this culture of not helping.”

“Hey, it’s been a long time, we need to have answers.”

Maggie Garcia Zavala, 50, at her home in in Hemet on Tuesday, May 11, 2021, holds a photo taken 10 years ago of herself and her mother, Rosario “Chata” Garcia. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Maggie Garcia Zavala, left, keeps this photo of herself and her mother, Rosario “Chata” Garcia, on her dresser. The elder Garcia went missing in July 2020 after driving onto a trail near Pinyon Pines, and her remains were found nearby in January 2021. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Maggie Garcia Zavala keeps a photo collage of her mother, Rosario “Chata” Garcia, at her Hemet home. The collage was displayed at Garcia’s funeral. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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Rosario “Chata” Garcia

Maggie Garcia Zavala’s list of grievances is long when it comes to how her mother’s disappearance was handled.

Rosario “Chata” Garcia, who was 73 and showing signs of dementia, left her East Hemet home on July 7, 2020, and never returned. Her Nissan Altima was found two days later, stuck on a rock on a trail 40 miles away near Pinyon Pines, southeast of Idyllwild.

Garcia Zavala said a search-and-rescue team with bloodhounds and a helicopter spent only a day and a half searching for her mother out by where the car was found.

That was it until a month later, Garcia Zavala said, when they brought cadaver dogs back out to the trail.

“That was because I was pushing and pushing, telling them, ‘Hey, it’s been a long time, we need to have answers,’” she said.

In an August interview, she said that if the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department’s investigation was still active, they weren’t keeping her in the loop. When she would contact them to make suggestions, “they just kind of blow me off,” she said.

She organized her own searches on weekends and hired a private investigator to try to find answers that she wasn’t getting from the authorities.

“It kind of feels like they’re just waiting for things just to fall in their laps,” she said. “It’s not going to happen like that.”

She did eventually learn that DNA tests showed no one other than her mom had been in the car, so foul play was unlikely.

In January, Tarr — the same woman who helped Sturkie and who’s still looking for O’Sullivan — asked a group of drone operators she’s worked with to fly over the area where Garcia’s car was found.

Tarr’s team of image searchers got the drone photos on Jan. 23, and on Jan. 24 they found Garcia, Tarr said — less than 500 feet away from her car, up against some of the many large rocks covering the ground.

Tarr said she contacted authorities right away and they all tried to go out to the site the next day, but it was too snowy to get there. When she called back a few days later after the snow had melted, she was frustrated to learn they hadn’t gone back yet or even notified the family.

It wasn’t until Feb. 5, according to a sheriff’s press release, that officials retrieved Garcia’s remains. That’s also when they finally contacted her family.

“Why did they wait so long,” Garcia Zavala wonders.

Authorities told her that they think after her mom’s car got stuck, she got out and started walking. She might have slipped or sat down and fallen asleep in a rocky area.

Like in the Sturkie case, Garcia Zavala said her mother’s death certificate doesn’t list her date of death anywhere close to when she went missing, but says Feb. 5.

She said it makes her angry to think that her family could have been spared all those months of anxiety if the initial search had been thorough enough.

She’s grateful to Tarr and the nonprofit organization Tarr recently founded, the Fowler O’Sullivan Foundation.

“They did in three days what the actual Sheriff’s Department couldn’t do in seven months,” Garcia Zavala said.

“The man on the phone said, ‘Am I supposed to look for him?’”

Roy Prifogle, pictured with his daughter, Kendra Johnson, has been missing since March 2020. The then-52-year-old Pine Cove resident went on a night hike on Webster Trail and never returned. (Photo courtesy of Kendra Johnson)

Kendra Johnson, 21, and Lisa Cole, 57, the daughter and sister of Pine Cove resident Roy Prifogle, visited Webster Trail in May 2021 with some members of the Fowler-O’Sullivan Foundation. Prifogle went missing while on a hike of that trail in March 2020. (Photo courtesy of Cathy Tarr)

Tags left behind by a search-and-rescue team mark the location in the brush off Webster Trail in the San Jacinto Mountains where a backpack belonging to Roy Prifogle was found shortly after he went missing in March 2020. (Photo courtesy of Cathy Tarr)

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Roy Prifogle

Roy Prifogle, 52, of Pine Cove, enjoyed hiking at night. The evening of Wednesday, March 4, 2020, he set out for Webster Trail, a path that isn’t well-used but that he’d been familiar with since childhood.

In the middle of the night, he texted his roommate that he’d be home soon but was heading to the river to get water. That’s the last anyone ever heard from him.

His sister, Lisa Cole of Anza, said she called authorities the next day. She was concerned that he hadn’t come home yet, especially because he’d had a mini-stroke about six months earlier.

“The man on the phone said, ‘Am I supposed to look for him?’” Cole said. He told her Prifogle was an adult who was probably out doing adult things, Cole said, and if she wanted someone to look for him, she should do it.

It wasn’t until Friday, March 6, that authorities realized Prifogle was a missing hiker and began to search for him, according to Cole and Prifogle’s 21-year-old daughter, Kendra Johnson.

According to the California Attorney General’s Office: “In California, a missing person is someone whose whereabouts is unknown to the reporting party. … There is NO waiting period for reporting a person missing. All California police and sheriffs’ departments must accept any report, including a report by telephone, of a missing person, including runaways, without delay and will give priority to the handling of the report.”

Prifogle’s car was still parked near the trailhead of Webster Trail, and that weekend, a search-and-rescue team found his backpack deep off the trail.

When word of Prifogle’s disappearance got out, people in the close-knit mountain community of a few thousand residents wanted to help.

But Johnson said after the first weekend — within the time frame when Prifogle could still have been alive if he’d gotten hurt or stuck somewhere — the Sheriff’s Department threatened to suspend the search if anyone other than the authorized searchers went out to look for Prifogle. They said it would disturb the scene and compromise their efforts, Johnson said.

The day that his backpack was located, two local men had gone out to look for Prifogle, Johnson said. She learned from the men as well as sheriff’s officials that when the search-and-rescue team came across the men, authorities were so adamant that no unauthorized searchers could be out there that all four team members escorted the men back to town — leaving the trail that led away from the backpack.

“That was a bad call,” Johnson said. A storm soon hit and washed away whatever tracks may have been out there.

A couple of weeks later, sheriff’s officials became more welcoming of volunteer search efforts, according to Johnson, although they still ask people not to take risks or interfere with the official search.

Johnson said she has generally been treated well by the Sheriff’s Department. In the beginning, the deputy in charge of the case answered every question she had and made her feel better during a difficult time. Cole, however, is less satisfied, saying the sheriff’s personnel she’s tried to get updates from have treated her dismissively.

More recently, Johnson has been frustrated that authorities are “not doing the best job of communicating” and have to keep a lot of details of the case secret in case it ever turns out that foul play was involved.

“I don’t want to sound ungrateful for what sheriff’s station has done,” Johnson said. “It’s easy to say that (a particular decision) was wrong, but I know they did their best, probably. I appreciate everything they’ve done.”

She’s glad that a search-and-rescue team went back out this April to look for her dad again — but she’s also hopeful now that Tarr and the Fowler-O’Sullivan Foundation reached out to her recently and want to help search.

“It feels really good just because police have been so unsuccessful since they found the backpack,” she said. “… It’s about time we start trying different things.”

“I don’t want to count her dead.”

Melissa Lane has been missing since mid-June 2020. The then-41-year-old Pine Cove resident was last seen when a cousin dropped her off at the trailhead to Black Mountain Road in the San Jacinto Mountains. (Photo courtesy of Kathy Lamont)

Melissa Lane

Melissa Lane — who helped search for Prifogle last spring because Prifogle was good friends with her cousin — was last seen in mid-June, said her mother, Kathy Lamont of Anza. Lane lived in Pine Cove and was 41 at the time.

According to Lamont, the same cousin said that sometime between June 10 and 15, he drove Lane to Black Mountain Trail, where she got out of his truck to go for a hike. She wasn’t carrying a cellphone or backpack.

Lamont said she tried to report her daughter missing later in June, but the sheriff’s deputy she spoke to wouldn’t take her case.

“He said we have no proof” that she was actually missing, Lamont said. “He said she could have hiked off the mountain and started a new life.”

She said she called back in August and asked, ‘At what point do you consider her missing?’”

Lane was finally entered into the state’s missing-persons database on Aug. 5.

Since then, Lamont said, sheriff’s officials have treated her kindly and respectfully, although she wishes they’d do more to keep her and the community informed.

Lamont said her daughter was a frequent hiker and mountain biker who “knew the area like the back of her hand.” She also acknowledged that Lane had struggled with addiction but said she was trying to turn her life around.

The past year has been agonizing for her and for her daughter’s two children, who are 19 and 11, Lamont said.

“I don’t want any other families to have to go through this,” she said.

She’s afraid her daughter may have met with foul play somewhere in the mountains. She said she prays night and day about it, but doesn’t feel Lane’s presence or energy anymore.

“I don’t want to count her dead,” Lamont said. “I’m still hopeful — but I’m not.”

How to help

Anyone with information on the Prifogle or Lane case can contact the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department at 800-950-2444.

Next in the series: 4 years later, searchers seek an answer: What was David O’Sullivan’s fate?

-on May 26, 2021 at 01:01AM by Nikie Johnson

[kmalexander]

Gleam Upon the Soundtrack

In the past, I’ve released my book playlists before the launch of the book. These tend to be inspiration playlists, not the music I find myself writing to. (If you’re interested in a “writing playlist,” let me know in the comments! I’d be happy to assemble something. There’s very much a “type” of music I listen to when writing a Bell Forging Cycle book.) Since Gleam Upon the Waves has been out for a little over a week, I thought I’d go a step further and not only share the playlist but give a few details, why I chose particular songs, and how I felt they reflected (and inspired) aspects of the story.

First, the playlist! Jam out, roaders.

Not a Spotify fan? The playlist is also over on YouTube.

SPOILER WARNING

The following details will contain Gleam Upon the Waves spoilers. So, if you’re still reading, I’d recommend avoiding the rest of this post until after you finished the book. For the rest of you, let’s head deeper into the playlist.

Prologue

Sons and Daughters – American Spirit

Sleep now child beneath The heavy current Dragging you along

This was the song that inspired this book. Something about life dragging you through the wringer without caring about your desires or plans cemented itself inside my head (even well before 2020.)

Chapter 1 & 2

Baltimore Blues No. 1 – Deer Tick

Can you hear the sound of the crawling flesh Now can you smell the burning desire This place is too small to hide All the ghosts that’s kicking around inside

There’s something gritty to this Deer Tick song. I felt it was a nice pairing to Wal putting on airs and wearing suits—despite his intentions, he can’t hide who he is. His problems will not disappear. Lovat devours.

Chapter 3

Gates of Dawn – Heartless Bastards

I have awoken The footsteps sound of thunder

While this tune more positive than Wal’s experience, I thought opening a new reality deserved a song that had a similar impact. I’m also a sucker for Erika Wennerstrom’s vocals. (Probably why Heartless Bastards make an appearance a little later.)

Chapter 1-3

How Deep Is The Ocean – Miles Davis

Like I wouldn’t include this in an ocean-themed playlist.

Chapter 4

bury a friend – Billie Eilish

Why aren’t you scared of me? Why do you care for me? When we all fall asleep, where do we go?

I had this chapter in my head since Red Little World. I also read it for Dead Drop Live last week. I loved the idea of Ashton being this ghost that haunts Wal—an echo of his past. One he weirdly cares about despite understanding that he’s an enemy. Eilish’s pop-minimalism just felt right for a decoupled avatar whom you may or may not want dead.

Chapter 5

Wild and Wasted Waters – Kill It Kid

Wild and wasted waters Have come to carry me on

For something so deadly, humans have an odd fascination with water. Also, this song fits with Wal being entirely out of his element. It’s helped by the Alan Lomax sample that works too well as an undercurrent for the story happening to Wal.

Chapter 6 & 7

Blood on your Bootheel – Caroline Rose

Think if you act like a man, you can alter this wheel; You can make it in this world without that blood on your bootheels

“Altering the wheel” is something Wal has attempting for a while (since Old Broken Road, if we’re honest,) but he can’t change his destiny. He can kick against the goads as much as he wants, but fate will drag him along whether he wants it or not.

Chapter 8

‘Round Midnight – Thelonious Monk

No lyrics, but man what a song. (If you haven’t noticed, any of the jazz numbers I call out in the books end up in my playlists.)

Chapter 9 & 10

Glitter & Gold – Barns Courtney

Do you ponder the manner of things In the dark The dark, the dark, the dark

Wal’s damn lucky for a guy that can’t escape his reality, eh? There’s also an element of foreshowing here. With the cult’s interest Wal can’t escape his past just like he can’t escape fate.

Chapter 11

Lovecraft in Brooklyn – The Mountains Goats

Someday something’s coming From way out beyond the stars To kill us while we stand here It’ll store our brains in mason jars

If you’ve read the last three books, it should be obvious why I included this one. Also, John Darnielle is a national treasure and should be protected at all costs.

Chapter 12, 13, & 14

Sirens – Lola Marsh

In a million years It’ll all be over Within a million years It’ll all be over

Yael Shoshana Cohen’s voice is incredible. There is a vastness in this song that matched the tone of the Wasteland. It also deals with time on an epic scale, and that’s something I appreciated—it’s cosmicy without being overt.

Chapter 15

Postcards From Hell – The Wood Brothers

I got a soul that I won’t sell And I don’t read postcards from hell

I hope you caught how Gleam Upon the Waves reflects the other stories up until this point. Wal waking in a hospital and pushing himself out of bed is awfully familiar. Despite what he’s faced with, Wal tends not to stop. He’s relentless. Tell him things are bad, and he keeps going. His tenacity is admirable, if not a bit foolish.

Chapter 16 & 17

Wicked Waters – Benjamin Booker

This must be where I lose it all, darling Throw myself into wicked waters

Again, water. Maybe our pal acted a bit too rashly?

Chapter 18

Ding Ding Dong – Waipod Petchsuphan

For all its familiarity, Empress is a foreign place, and Wal is a stranger. This poppy Thai luk thung track from ’76 sparked similar emotions for me. It’s familiar, borrowing from common themes, but at the same time it’s different from other music of the era. It’s also a bop.

Chapter 19

Hello, Darling – Conway Twitty

Hello darlin’, nice to see you, it’s been a long time

Should be fairly obvious.

Chapter 20

Figure It Out – Royal Blood

Nothing better to do When I’m stuck on you And still I’m here Trying to figure it out

This is a fairly big reveal, and while the theme of the song is related to Wal’s relationship with Essie, it’s even more complicated. “Figuring it out” is kinda a thing here, see?

Chapter 21, 22, & 23

You Want it Darker – Leonard Cohen

There’s a lullaby for suffering And a paradox to blame But it’s written in the scriptures And it’s not some idle claim You want it darker We kill the flame

Cohen’s last album deals with death and loss, there’s a heaviness to it, and it felt fitting for this section of the book.

Chapter 24, 25, 26

Mean Old World – Big Bill Broonzy

This is a mean old world to live in, I’m just travelin’ through It’s a mean old world to live in, I’m just travelin’ through Yes, sometime I get so blue, that I don’t know what to do

Another one that should be obvious. Poor Wal. Who’s the jerk that subjects him to this?

Chapter 27 & 28

Madness – Ruelle

Nowhere to run from all of this havoc Nowhere to hide From all of this madness, madness, madness

Eventually, you can only experience so much before it all just begins to break down.

Chapter 29 & 30

Sway – Heartless Bastards

So, I stumble and I sway into the room and I fade I hope my darkest day are behind me I want to stay here in the sun for a while I hope my darkest days are behind me

There’s a spark of hope here, and I feel like there’s a spark of hope in these chapters as well. Yes, two Heartless Bastard songs in this playlist. You’re going to have to deal.

Chapter 31

Remains – Algiers

While the captors boast On how they lower your costs The rich men gamble At the foot of the cross

When you make a decision, you need to be ready to deal with the outcome.

Chapter 32

Revival – Soulsavers

Why am I so blind With my eyes wide open, oh? Trying to get my hands Clean in dirty water

A song about people doing something they feel is right even though reality clashes with that desire, and somehow, at their core, they know it. If that doesn’t fit the Deeperists, I don’t know what would.

Chapter 33 & 34

The Church Bell’s Moan – Bror Gunnar Jansson

Don’t you hear them?

Ring the bell and eventually they’ll come.

Chapter 35 & 36

Get Loud for Me – Gizzle

I see my goal and get cold as December when Counting our sins, I don’t have no friends I came here to win, my start is your end Now let it begin now

FIGHT. FIGHT. FIGHT. Also, this is such a great reflection of the previous song that I had to include it.

Chapter 37 & 38

The End – Kings of Leon

This could be the end This could be the end This could be the end This could be the end ‘Cause I ain’t got a home

A song about change and facing that change. Felt like a fitting end to this playlist. 

Chapter 37 & 38… again

I See A Darkness – Johnny Cash & Bonnie “Prince” Billy

And did you know how much I love you Is a hope that somehow you you Can save me from this darkness?

Wait, never mind. This is even more fitting.

Chapter 37 & 38… for real this time

The Parting Glass – Hozier

Of all the comrades that ere I had, they’re sorry for my going away, And of all the sweethearts that ere I had, they wish me one more day to stay, But since it falls unto my lot that I should rise while you should not, I will gently rise and I’ll softly call, “Goodnight and joy be with you all!”

No… this one.

So, that’s Gleam Upon the Soundtrack, a Gleam Upon the Waves playlist! I hope everyone enjoyed a glimpse into my musical inspirations. It’s really fun to assemble these things and reflect on why particular songs spoke to me over another. I totally understand why other authors do it as well. This isn’t the only playlist I’ve made for my novels, you can check out the other ones here.

Once again, thanks to everyone for picking up Gleam Upon the Waves. I’m really proud of it, and I hope you enjoyed your time back in the Territories. If you haven’t nabbed your copies yet, you can do so from any of the links below.

Buy the paperback:

Amazon – Barnes & Noble 

Buy the eBook:

Kindle – Kobo – Nook – Apple Books – GooglePlay

Finally, if you’ve finished Gleam, please leave an honest review, and if you liked it, tell your friends! Thank you for making Gleam Upon the Waves one of the books you chose to read this year. Time is finite and it’s an honor you decided to spend some of yours with my book.

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[usfwspacific]

What’s Killing Hawaii’s Forest Birds?

In the last 200 years, 17 out of 41 species of Hawaiian honeycreeper have gone extinct. Another 14 are endangered. 

 Extinct Hawaiian Honeycreepers (Left to Right): Greater Koa Finch (Rhodacanthis palmeri), Kauai 'O'o (Moho braccatus), Hawaii 'Akialoa (Hemignathus obscurus), Hawaii 'O'o (Moho nobilis)

From: Birds of the Sandwich Islands,  By Wildon Scott (1899) Courtesy of the Smithsonian Institute

In the early 1900’s, a silent killer began stalking the natural and cultural heritage of Hawaii. From the mountains to the shoreline (mauka to makai) the forests of Hawaii were falling silent. Something was killing Hawaii’s honeycreepers - a unique family of birds not found anywhere else on the planet. 

The ancestors of the honeycreepers arrived on the newly formed Hawaiian islands millions of years ago and quickly evolved to fill the empty landscape with dozens of new and unique species, a process called adaptive radiation.

An feeds i’iwi on a lobeliad flower. Photo Credit:  Jack Jeffrey 

Naturalists began to record the disappearances of many endemic Hawaiian species in the late 1800’s. Habitat loss and introduced predators like cats, rats, and pigs were taking their toll on all of the native plant and animal populations.

But as the decades passed and the species continued to disappear, it seemed as if something other than habitat loss and predation was impacting Hawaii’s birds - particularly the honeycreepers. The huge flocks of ‘I’iwi that once roamed the mountainsides foraging for food had disappeared, even from seemingly pristine lowland forest.

Endangered Hawaiian Honeycreepers (Left to Right) Akiapolaau © Jack Jeffrey Photography, Akohekohe © Jack Jeffrey Photography, Amakihi © Jack Jeffrey Photography, Hawaii Akepa © Jack Jeffrey Photography

By the 1960’s biologist Richard Warner believed he had identified the culprit. The answer lay in the pattern of disappearance. The birds were disappearing from healthy lower elevation forests but were still present in the higher elevation forests where the temperatures were cooler. Whatever was killing the birds, it was only happening at lower elevations. The culprit, he theorized, was a disease found commonly in bird species across the planet - mosquito borne avian malaria.

Apapane with a mosquito. Photo  © Jack Jeffrey Photography

Avian malaria itself probably came to Hawaii in the early 1900’s when domesticated birds were imported into the lowland cities. These introduced birds almost certainly carried avian malaria, but the disease never would have spread to the native bird population if it hadn’t been for another earlier invader - the mosquito Culex quinquefasciatus. The Culex quinquefasciatus species is the only known vector of avian malaria. Without Culex, the disease cannot spread.

In the vast majority of bird species, the parasites (members of the genus Plasmodium) have little to no impact on the health of the infected birds. Long exposure to the parasite has allowed most species around the world to evolve effective disease resistance.

 For many of Hawaiiʻs forest birds, which evolved in the isolation of the world’s most remote archipelago without exposure to malaria or mosquitoes, the impacts have been catastrophic. Wherever the forest birds range overlapped with mosquito populations, the birds have disappeared.

Mosquitos breed and thrive at lower and warmer elevations where they infect birds with avian malaria and pox. Higher and cooler elevation forests, where mosquitoes and their diseases do not thrive, have become the only refuges for Hawaii’s forest birds, but even those areas are now under threat. As temperatures rise, mosquitoes, and the avian diseases they carry, have begun to spread upwards into the mountains further constricting habitat.

“For decades, we had reached this equilibrium. The birds had moved into the upper elevation forests where they had this area of refuge from mosquitoes and avian malaria,  but now that's being threatened,” said Josh Fisher, Invasive Species Biologist ​with the ​Pacific Islands Fish and Wildlife Office .

Today, nearly every species of Hawaiian honeycreeper is facing shrinking ranges and declining populations. In the last 200 years, 17 out of 41 known species of honeycreeper have gone extinct. Another 14 are endangered. On the island of Kauai, every species of native forest bird is in decline. Ninety percent of the ‘i’iwi’ population is confined to a narrow band of forest on the windward slopes of the island of Hawaii, between 4,000 and 6,000 feet (1,300 and 1,900 meters) in elevation. “We are at this point where some of these populations are so low or so dependent on a single area, that a single catastrophic event could spell the end of a species” said Josh Fisher, Invasive Species Biologist ​with the ​Pacific Islands Fish and Wildlife Office .

“There’s an urgency now that didn’t exist before because warming temperatures are already starting to push mosquitoes into the upper elevations of places like Kauai. There really isn't anywhere else for these birds to go. They can't go down and they can't really go up much higher.”

For decades researches have watched as avian malaria reduced bird ranges and pushed population declines across all of the low elevation forests of Hawaii. “We’ve known what the problem is, but with avian malaria there isn't a tool that we can just pull out of a box to fight this. We have to develop the tool,” said Fisher.

Places like Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge are tackling habitat loss by aggressively planting native species and restoring forests. James Campbell National Wildlife Refuge and Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge are using predator proof fences to keep out invasive predators and protect birds. But introduced diseases are more difficult to address. “Fortunately over last decade there have been significant advances in how to address mosquitoes at the landscape scale,” said Fisher.

Biologists and conservationists across Hawaii are working to find ways to save the honeycreepers: from dealing with predation by introduced species to landscape scale control of mosquitoes. Now more than ever, it is important to work with our partners to protect these species for future generations.

This story is part of a series examining the issues impacting Hawaii’s forest birds. Read the other stories in the series here. 

Hawaii’s Magnificent Forest Birds

ʻŌhiʻa lehua: the Foundation of Hawaii’s Forest Ecosystem

Want to dive deeper? 

Collapsing avian community on a Hawaiian island Paxton, Eben; Camp, Richard J.; Gorresen, P. Marcos; Crampton, Lisa H.; Leonard, David L.; VanderWerf, Eric

Abundance, distribution, and population trends of the iconic Hawaiian Honeycreeper, the ʻIʻiwi (Vestiaria coccinea) throughout the Hawaiian Islands Paxton, Eben H.; Gorresen, P. Marcos; Camp, Richard J. 

Large-Scale Range Collapse of Hawaiian Forest Birds under Climate Change and the Need 21st Century Conservation Options.  Fortini LB, Vorsino AE, Amidon FA, Paxton EH, Jacobi JD

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