Vincent and Theo

Just another troubled pair of roommates

One responsible, calm, drama-repelled

The other passionate, misunderstood,

also maddeningly brilliant if you could put up with his antics long enough to enjoy the gifts that came wrapped in leg cramps-level pain,

Difficult and before his time.

I don’t think I’m either of these tortured folk,

but boy do I feel that conflict in my bones.

I bet this story repeats on an infinite loop somewhere out there where time and experience are stuck,

in fact I bet it’s among the universe’s most overplayed and anxiety-inducing cassette tapes

The way we pretend to not get on each other’s nerves while the tension…

I don’t know you, but I’m already in love.

Pre-plants, pre-us

Altruism in nature

Fungi, is it you that’s some god’s pure and mysterious love?

The Word made fleshy mushroom

What’s an individual for, after all

Interconnectedness is the name of the game

and it’s no coincidence (I think) that your psychedelic properties

make us feel precisely that,

A piece of a piece of a piece of a dust particle that’s part of a whole.

Where do we end and everything else begin?

Rumi says we’re not a drop in the ocean,

we’re the ocean in a single drop

Rumi, man, I’m…

I saw Midsommar a month ago when it finally came to my city’s theaters. It is — among other things — a brilliant and terrifying collage of an array of psychological profiles dropped into what might as well be an alien environment — some deeply disturbed, some just deeply sad, all nakedly troubled and dealing with very human feelings like selfishness, guilt, ambition, loneliness, insecurity.

The only people in the film who seem to totally have their shit together are the hosts, which are the very ones the audience would deem unstable. Say what you will about the horror within that bizarre community. They know what they’re doing and why they’re doing it. Not an ounce of existential confusion here! …

Is it sand or sawdust

on the cobblestone streets?

San Jerónimo, patron saint of this agnostic translator and

way too concerned with women’s purity if you ask me

and plus, did you really tame that lion

because I find that hard to believe.

Laid out so beautifully, fleeting murals on the ground

of this still-small town in Mexico

ready for the cleansing by trampling

of the devout.

Dancing clowns

a make-shift monster of pine branches and burlap

boys showing off their strength

as they carry a 2-ton altar to the church

complete with their refrescos on top (offering or just a convenient carrying spot? …

Your tiny body

Is so strong and carefree and perfect

that it aches to behold it,

the ever-present mix in me of pride and fear

What awaits you?

Keep it, it’s all and always yours, defend it to the last

Love it but for real, even though you’re a woman and women aren’t supposed to

Dive right in to all the pleasure and ecstasy

conceivable for us humans,

you wouldn’t even guess what’s possible

but it’s your birthright, for real

and I want for you an endless stream of feeling so fulfilled

you could just cry from the sweet wholeness

And please…

Yes, ok, things are good now I suppose,

the past is the past but I can’t get out of the feeling of it

like being in a tub of dirty water when you just want to get out

rinse off

be clean

But I’m still fixated on that dirty water that I can’t escape

No matter how much perfume

expensive bath salts

bubbles

fun bath toys are dumped in

the water is still muddy, maybe not toxic, fine,

but is “not toxic” really the best I can do for myself?

Is that what I’m obliged to accept because I’m a grown-up…