Storming...

I have one post in my history, Sound From the Garages, which keeps getting spammed. I just went and deleted the 19 junk comments that had accumulated, and that wasn't even the first time. Unfortunately you can't just select them all and hit delete, it's a real pain to delete multiple comments on blogger. So I'm a bit skeeved. You might even say I'm a bit irate.
Anger is interesting; there's a righteous anger that does exist, but mostly that's just God, mostly we miss the point with our anger. We like to get up in somebodies grill when they do us wrong, at least I know I do. But do you know why Jesus stormed the temple? It wasn't for himself, it was for his Father. That's made pretty clear when the disciples remember Psalm 69:9, "Zeal for your house will consume me", referencing Jesus' zeal for his Father's house, not for himself. I mean Jesus was the one man who could really get righteously angry when somebody did him wrong, but he was the one man who only got angry on other people's behalf. When he calls the Pharisees a brood of vipers, he's not saying that in defense of himself. He straight up says it two verses before; "Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come."
So that means that a lot of the time when I get angry, it's just trite and trivial stuff. What it doesn't mean is that we shouldn't get angry. No way. Not even close. There are a lot of reasons why I don't believe in pacifism, but the main one is that we're called (especially as men) to get really mad at some stuff. One of them being sin, another being injustice. Men are also called to be protectors (I love the fact that my name means "resolute protector") and when it comes to that we should not be afraid to get violent. If somebody tried to hurt one of my sisters, I would seriously mess them up, I would not even hesitate.
Anyways, now I'm getting irate again, just thinking about guys that wouldn't lift a finger to protect their family. I'm not usually one for ranting of this sort in a blog post, there's an inherent lack of accountability in this medium that can make ranting dangerous, but sometimes I get passionate about stuff and I get carried away. But really, can you blame a guy for being passionate about something? No. You really can't. Keep it pregnant.

Will

Crickophany

Listening to: Meaghan Smith - The Cricket's Orchestra
Weezer - Raditude

I've been reading Lewis Carroll lately. I started with Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and then I finished that off with Through the Looking Glass. Then I read through the more serious Sylvie and Bruno and have just started reading Sylvie and Bruno Concluded. The Alice books were similar to what I expected (although they were a lot darker than I thought), but Sylvie and Bruno is a different thing entirely. The preface to part I was probably the best preface I've ever read, with Carroll delving into issues of mass-produced literature and producing original ideas, the urgency with which we should spend our time, ideas for projects he didn't think he would have time in his life to accomplish and hopes that others can, problems with "hunting as sport", and of course a bit of an introduction to the work at hand. If you never read Sylvie and Bruno itself, I would recommend that you read the preface.

I've been listening to Meaghan Smith lately (Except for a couple of songs, I wasn't that impressed by Weezer's Raditude). I first heard one of her songs in the movie 500 Days of Summer, where she did a cover of the Pixies "Here Comes Your Man". I didn't think about it much at the time, but then I heard the song when I was in the collegium and realized that it was a darn good cover of a Pixies song, and being as the Pixies aren't the kind of band I would ever think of somebody covering, I thought I would check the artist out. Her music has a super-chill indie feel, mixing a fifties pop sound with synthetic beats and a bevy of unique instruments. It's pretty low-impact stuff, all things considered, but it is a pleasant diversion and good background study music.

Anyways, midterms are fully done, as of this morning, and I'm looking forward to final papers, final projects, and finals. I [obviously] haven't blogged much this semester, but this is partly due to the fact that I'm so close in proximity to the bulk of the people I know, enabling face-to-face conversation as the preferred method of communication. Having said that, I'm saving up some real meat-and-potatoes material for my next post. The next post will also be the first to not be imported directly to facebook. The social networking scene is just not the right environment for a blog to flourish. Til the next poetry-infused blog post, keep it pregnant people.

PipeSmokingProfessor

Writer is not politically correct

Untitled

She ascends in all her glory
her robe is virgin white and trimmed with gold
hands move like still-life albatross
cool with dew, beautiful

He came to bring fire on the earth

The master of the house had saved
His last, His finest, His funeral wine
her lips and chin are stained and drip
she's drunk her fill of wine
with dirt and blood her feet and knees are scathed

and zeal for His Father's house consumes Him

The bride is a used prostitute
a crippled whore who's been abused
She anoints Him for burial
the whore has saved her best perfume

and He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty


Listening to Jacaranda by Josh Garrels and Electroshock Blues by the Eels
I've never been one to explain my poetry, I feel that the poetry should be allowed to speak for itself and the reader should be allowed to understand the poem on a different level than the writer understands it. This is important. There are poems, however, that require a certain amount of explanation. A lot of the time poets who read their works aloud will give it a brief (or lengthy) introduction to ground the audience in what they are about to say, give them some sort of emotional stake or purchase in the poem to increase its impact. I appreciate how that might be necessary in vocal readings, but when someone is reading it for themselves, they should be allowed to encounter the poem on its own level. If a written poem needs some explanation, it should come after the poem.
Having said that, I think that this one could do with a little bit of explanation. The poem is essentially a love song about the church. It is paradoxical intentionally because the church in itself is such a paradox. On one hand we have Hosea, where God tells Hosea to marry a prostitute and then, when she leaves him and goes back to her old lifestyle, to take her back. Hosea is a powerful example of how God loves his people, Israel, but also the church. The church is the prostitute who keeps on going back to her sin, and we have plenty of problems, plenty of dark things in our past, but on the other hand the church is the bride of Christ. Though she is dirty and sinful, she is washed clean by the blood of Christ. This is essential for Christians in our post-modern world, especially younger Christians. Even though we see all these things that we don't like about the church and we see all these problems that the church has, it is absolutely and fundamentally important that we are part of the bride of Christ. So unless in the case of clear heresies, we need to do everything we can to stay in the church, to change it from the inside out yes, but not leave it because we disagree with little things the pastor says or little issues we have with authority (because issues with authority is a pretty big killer these days). We need to stop shopping around for a church that we like, we need to become committed to a community of believers. I know the metaphor sounds repetitive and cheesy, but we really do need to "plug in" to the body of Christ. God has been getting at me for the last few weeks about the importance of His church and I've been trying to write that poem for almost as long. So I'm excited to be finished it. I haven't got a title, but I hope it speaks for itself. Keep it pregnant people.

Park Ranger

Moving Past That

My last attempt at making a schedule for my blogging (the best of the decade lists) ended in me losing all motivation to blog. That's the way it's been for weeks so I think it's about time I moved on. I had this revelation the other week that I didn't end up blogging about because I wanted to blog about some stupid top ten lists. This cannot be allowed to happen.
We all have our own understandings about what heaven will be like and we all interpret different passages of scripture to mean different things about it, but a lot of this is simply empty speculation that could be entirely misleading. This can lead us away from what we really need to focus on. The most important thing about heaven, and one of the clearest things about it that we can draw from scripture, is that we will be with God. Whether or not we will have electric guitars in heaven is completely irrelevant and so are a multitude of our other concerns. We will be with Jesus!!! and fundamentally that is enough.
The reason why I'm blogging this at three-thirty in the morning is that I went out to Denny's with some of the guys in the dorm and had some man chats and lots of coffee. I feel incredibly untired right now. It's been a good two weeks back at school so far, but I've got a monumental amount of coursework this semester. I finally got into my pols 312 class (I fought pretty hard for that one) so that cements my number of courses at five. It seems like a pretty normal number, but some of the classes, like math 101 and hist 135, have a colossal amount of weekly homework, which, in the case of the math, can be pretty challenging. So there we have it, I'm overworked, tired (not momentarily), full of joy for the ways God has been challenging me this week, and looking forward to the possibilities this semester holds. Also I miss my family and the people in town just a little bit. Unfortunately not enough to pull me away from Trinity this weekend as I have a bunch of things I need to do for next week, but enough to make me blog.
Although I'm not going to post a list of the top ten discoveries of the decade anymore, I still think that one of them deserves mention. I'm referring to GJ 1214b of course. What's that you ask? It's only the most earth like planet ever discovered. It's star is not too many light years away from us (within striking distance you might say), it's only about twice the size of earth, it's within the inhabitable distance from it's star, and it's covered in water. Kamino anybody? It was only discovered in the last days of the decade, but I'd say it still counts pretty good.
Now that I've gotten that out of my way, I feel like I can move on, so the next blog isn't constricted by what I was thinking I might want to write about when I was writing the last blog. That's just a dumb system. Keep it pregnant people.

Will

The Decade According to Will pt. 1

This is a pretty special new years eve. Ending of a decade. You know what that means. That means top 10 lists. I've been known to indulge in numeration from time to time. Seems to me this decade is probably the one that defines my generation, although the 10's are the decade that we as a generation will define, and that calls for a bit of numerical summation. Starting today and leading up to getting back to TWU in a week's time, I'm going to try to post a few top ten lists on this blog. I've got five list ideas and the first one that I've completed happens to be the top ten movies of this past decade, so here goes (also, I hate top ten lists that start with 1, it just makes no sense). Also I just had the hugest deja vu.

Top Ten Movies of the 00's

10. 28 Days Later (2002)

Directed by Danny Boyle, this film is good not because it's a vivid re-imagining of the zombie genre (which it is), but because of its brilliant character development. The breakdown of the protagonist into something savage and barely recognizable as human in order to maintain his humanity is immense.

9. Cinderella Man (2005)

There are not many sports movies I enjoy (exactly two), they almost invariably follow a set formula designed for specific emotional responses. They're a cheat. Boxing movies have a natural advantage over other sports movies in that they generally focus on a single man, rather than a team, which opens up the story to a much broader range of development. Cinderella man takes full advantage of this and features some of the best acting from some of my favorite actors, netting it a spot on this list.

8. Juno (2007)

The characters in this movie are intensely human and their responses to their situations are beautifully consistent. Too many hollywood movies fall into the trap of creating characters that can change at a moments notice, but Juno recognizes that for real people, change comes hard. It also tackles a pretty heavy issue with wit and a lack of pretension and comes out on top, props.

7. Gladiator (2000)

Like I said, Russell Crowe is one of my favorite actors and this is where he shines best, in a tale of bittersweet revenge opposite a truly despicable Joaquin Phoenix. Not only is it a fairly faithful recreation of a period of history, it's also just a darn good tale.

6. The Dark Knight (2008)

For such a rich comic book history, Batman has had some of the worst disappointments ever filmed. The Dark Knight is the long awaited realization of what a Batman movie should be. It's a beautiful crime drama that delves into the concepts of chaos and order, with a hero that's darker than he's ever been and villains that are multi-dimensional and fascinating. Add killer music and great cinematography and pacing and we have a winner.

5. Children of Men (2006)

Children of Men looks at what would happen if babies stopped being born. While this will probably not be useful information in the future, it does happen to be a fantastic science fiction film and is arguable an accurate representation of what we would become and what we would do, as humans, should that ever happen.

4. Lord of the Rings (2001-2003)

My Mom read us the books when we were kids and to go see it portrayed so faithfully on screen was a pretty sweet experience. There were so many times during the trilogy that I realized 'hey, this is exactly how I imagined in my head', this is both a testament to Tolkien's incredibly descriptive style and Peter Jackson's skill and courage as a filmmaker.

3. There Will Be Blood (2007)

This is capitalism vs. religion played out in a brutally honest story about an "oil-man" and his rise to power. Daniel Day-Lewis melts your face off with his acting, putting this on my top five of all time list as well. Favorite line: "I... drink... your... milkshake!"

2. No Country for Old Men (2007)

Only the Coen brothers could have turned out this brilliant adaption of Cormac McCarthy's already brilliant book. It's basically a frank discussion of where our society is at with relation to crime and how that compares with our fathers' generations. It's brooding and unsettling, leaving the viewer wishing for some measure of assurance, but finding none

1. Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

Guillermo del Toro's finest creation yet, Pan's Labyrinth is both a violent and moving account of life under General Franco in Spain, and an intricate world, peopled by strange and fascinating creatures, as seen through the eyes of a young girl on a personal odyssey to find out who she is. It delves into the dynamics of family and loyalty, among other issues, as well as delving into the richly populated mind of Del Toro. Over all, however, what gives this the number one spot is the fact that it is just a really good story. A darn good story.

I wrote up a short list of 28 movies before I narrowed it down to 10, but three of the ones that didn't make it, I felt deserved special notice. High Fidelity was our first real introduction to the comic genius of Jack Black and still somehow remains a poignant story thanks to John Cusack. If this list had an 11th place, High Fidelity would occupy it. The Passion of the Christ was an incredibly accurate and well done depiction of what the crucifixion of Jesus would have been like and you cannot watch it without being deeply moved, but let's be honest, the book was just that much better. Moulin Rouge was one of the first musicals I could actually appreciate thanks to its killer use of popular music as story driving pieces, but notwithstanding a really good story and great acting, Moulin Rouge is still more about the music than the movie so it falls short from this list. Anyhow, it's past four right now and I'm needing sleep in a big way, I just thought I might start this thing off right away. Tomorrow I'll tackle the top ten discoveries. Keep it pregnant.

PipeSmokingProfessor

Brain Jar

Just as a word of caution, the following blog post tries to chart the strange brain of Will Davies and is full of accounts of dreams, oddities of perception, and other wildness. It was also mostly composed while the writer was in the thick of final exams and his brain was at the time not fully functioning on a normal plane. Well, enough apologizing for myself, I am what I am.

The way my mind works is sometimes a mystery to me. Most of the time. I had a dream the other night (I dream more when I sleep in beds that aren't my own) where I was exploring a warehouse that had gone out of business. Both floors of the warehouse were filled with junk and treasures and all manner of things, it was really fascinating. Now the thing with my dreams is that when I want to fly, I jump while I'm walking or running and pedal my legs. I don't outright fly, but it takes me a lot longer to reach the ground. The thing with this dream is that when I realize I'm dreaming and I try to fly, I can't do it. That's unusual because I can usually control my lucid dreams.
I've now sketched 36 assorted creatures in my fictional compendium. It's a world that really fascinates me. It's populated by four types of creatures; Fauna, Sentientia, Automata, and Lusus Naturae. There are also combinations of those classifications like F.L., A.S., AL, and interestingly even F.S.. These classifications probably wont hold much meaning without the implications behind them. This is another way in which I do not understand my own mind.

I made it thirteen stanzas into my second epic poem (the first, White Trash and Beardo, is still only around five stanzas) before my inspiration ran dry. This time I was sure to lay out where the poem was going, how it was going to get there, and the major themes before I even started, but I still can go no further for the time being. Perhaps the inspiration will come back on the holidays when I have a bit of time to think. I still don't understand how this inspiration gets ahold of me in the first place and why it leaves just as suddenly.

I can listen to a soaringly beautiful aria and be unmoved, but when I hear the strangled growl of Tom Waits singing about a Prostitutes Christmas Card or the fact that Romeo is Bleeding, it sends shivers down my spine. Someone commented the other night that the music I was listening to was offsetting. It's true, Tom Waits employed a couple of tempo changes in the song that leave the listener disconcerted and confused. The thing was that he was doing it intentionally. I dislike when musicians are not good at what they do and therefore their music is jarring unintentionally. When a musician is so good at what they do that they are able to experiment, look at music from new perspectives and apply different laws to how they play, when they try to evoke certain emotions other than joy or sadness (such as contentment or uneasiness), I appreciate their music. That's a bit of an explanation for my strange musical preferences I guess, something that I've come to terms with, but other people maybe haven't.

That wraps up a peek into my strange physche, and in case you think I'm a crazy person now, just take a look at yourself, normal as you think you are. You probably won't find any of the same stuff, but I guarantee you'll find bits you don't quite understand.

Pipesmokingprofessor

Funeral Wine

Angry wine of Pharaoh's mother
stowed and sealed with dust behind a stone
lust unforgiving for that wine
want it enough to strip a mountains crust
Her tomb wasn't even hidden
they just buried her
some palace Pilate said
"damn her, damn her immortal soul"

On the day you pop the cork
you will slake your thirst
you will stop being self-referential
your mouth will learn to be couth
it will open to spew the seven hundred individual colours of the Nile
and on opening, it will tell the ancients
kneel at my feet

When you scratch a flame
you will hurl fire from your lips
to cool your burning mind
When you are found in the cold
you will spew forth new mythologies
rolling them into logs to burn

All men will not speak well of you
until you are dead
not until they have made your body a fine ash
they will put you in your bottle
pile cold dirt in July
In one hundred years they will remember your funeral wine


PipeSmokingProfessor