Tag: Aesthetics
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Watching Television Evil With Mom
When my mother first moved in with us, she discovered the wonders of Apple TV. It took her a couple of months to figure out how the four-button remote works, what apps are, and the glories of Hulu, where she discovered FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper, played by Kyle McLaughlin. Once she saw him, she…
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Madness, Poetry, and Choosing Not to Die
Robert Lowell wrote those two lines in his poem “Night Sweats.” It’s one of my faves (the full poem is below). It’s a love poem, about a man who suffers mental illness, and his wife, who keeps him alive. It’s a brutal poem. Lowell suffered from manic depression. These days, people say “manic depression,” and…
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Our Demons and Our Words
1. Poetry born out of horror has a rough go of it. Some of the things we do to one another are so damaging, it’s near-impossible to wrap words around them. Yet, poets try, and sometimes they even succeed. But behind one poem that works, there might be a couple dozen that failed. Sometimes I…
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The Ache for Narrative
I’ve spent a lot of life looking back. This wasn’t always the case; Michelle reminds me that, in our twenties, I was the guy who said “Fuck the past, I’m all about the now!” We were living exciting lives. It was the 80’s. Central America and Ronald Reagan were in the news every night. Michelle…
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Wandering Thoughts on Aesthetics
1. Here’s the Oxford English Dictionary definition of “aesthetics:” “Concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty; Giving or designed to give pleasure through beauty. Basically, it’s the study of art–its creation (by the artist), and its appreciation (by the one who loves art). One thing about art: it’s not real. It’s artificial. A mountain range…