Saturday, December 5, 2009

Canary Island Flight . . .

I had to go all the way to the Canary Island of Tenerife to take this photo in early 1994. There was construction going on all over the coast near where we stayed on the western end of Tenerife ; I suppose these toilets were stacked up waiting to go into the bathrooms of yet another tourist hotel. Does this photo say anything about my views on the world ? Better let the psychologists answer that one. There is a poem that goes with this, that I wrote on the first night in the hotel near where these toilets were waiting to start serving their destined purpose.
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Also, I'd just like to say, I recntly had the great pleasure of stumbling by serendipitous chance on a sublime blog with the magical title Dreams, Delirium, and Mind Talk, written by the enchanting Nevine Sultan, who I am starting to believe is descended from ancient Egyptian royalty, for it would be easy, extremely easy, to try to describe her spell-binding writing in poetry and prose as nothing short of divinely inspired, in an entirely mystical sense. I encourage you, click on the link to her blog, see what you think. I was hooked from the first few phrases. Today she published a piece called "freefalling", and if you give it a read, you will see why I pulled out the below piece as a counter point. (the poem I mean, not the photo...)
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....Canary Flight
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Homer Stern was sitting
At the white table
Which stretched away before him
Like an arctic waste
An empty ashtray miles away
On the wind swept horizon
Eleven floors up
In a concrete tower
No ivory nor ebony
Only iron girders cloaked
In irony
A prison playing at paradise
.
The water purification plant
In the washed out ravine
Behind the hotel
Is scrambling shit
For all it’s worth
Churning like a Santa Fe freight
Climbing the long grade
Up toward Donner pass
Homer doubts that sleep
Will be forthcoming
.
The motor driven blades
Plowing through the fecal matter
Sound like a flock of C-130’s
Bearing down on a jump zone
And Homer steps to the window
Looks down at the tennis court
Eleven floors below in the darkness
The white lines faintly gleaming
Beckoning like a helicopter pad
To a tired pilot
He imagines the descent
The jolt of landing
Bright light followed by no light
Preceeded by a few vicious seconds
Of total awareness
While falling, flailing, falling
Senses screaming
.
In the morning the entire west side
Of the hotel would be on their balconies
Looking down on the carnage
Dried ketchup spray
The local west-side story
For a day two
Homer restrains himself
Despite the shit grinding din
Of late night sewage treatment
More or less akin
To late night TV
He doesn’t want to cast a pall
On so many people’s
Vacation here in paradise
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12 comments:

Nevine Sultan said...

Owen? Tu m'as fait pleurer, encore. You are unbelievable. How did I find you? How did you find me? I can't... Now you have me speechless. And your "Canary Flight"... well, you know why you pulled it out, and now I know, too.

The image of the people standing on their balconies... yes, that's what makes us freeze. "... ketchup spray..." is so cruel, but how do you describe such a thing, otherwise?

Owen, you are an angel... I'm really at a loss for words. Do excuse me, please, if I can't quite find the proper words to tell you how much I appreciate you. Je t'embrasse très fort, Owen.

Nevine

Barlinnie said...

Great post... great photie as usual.

Owen said...

Dear Nevine, in some moments there is no need for words, thank you for being there... simply thank you. I think there are a number of angels in the blogosphere, if one can just spread one's wings to fly high enough to find them... Me, earthbound mortal that I am, I look up from below with a telescope....
:-)

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Hey there Jimmy... I thank ye for dropping in here this weekend, it would appear that this post has not caused many to want to comment for some reason... maybe it's just such a shocking array of toilets there ? What do you think ? I really appreciate your company...

Blind Fly Theater said...

Pleasure to see
you did refrain
from irony
through frozen rain
or mid-swing stride
of those attest
a windswept ride
to ever-rest
through purple sky
and sticky stars
hard to deny
their lifelong scars

Marguerite said...

Mon cher ami, Owen, You are the only one I know who can make a stack of toilets look so interesting! lol You are amazingly creative and I see how the poem relates as a counter point. Brilliant!

Owen said...

David ! I am more than honored to receive this fragment of poetry, ahh, those lifelong scars... may we dwell on stars rather than scars, even if the scars come back to haunt us at times... the stars are more beautiful... It is a pleasure, a real pleasure to see you out and about again, and producing your fabulous designs... it is good to know that one can take a break from blogging when life issues require it, and then pick up where you've left off...

A great Sunday to you...

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Marguerite !!! You are there ? Did someone post your bail ? I thought you were in jail my darling, for such terrible temptations as you committed ! I hope all is well where you are, I was happy to realize that the hurricane season is probably over by now, and that is was quiet this year for folks in your neck of the bayou country... thank goodness for small blessings...

Virginia said...

Well only you could make a stack of toilettes so wonderful dear Owen. Take a bow my friend!!
V

Jo said...

I love the edginess of your blog -- your photos and your prose.

As Virginia said, only you could make a stack of toilettes so wonderful.

Nevine Sultan said...

Owen, just wanted to let you know I never saw your post appear on the dashboard. It seems blogger is having a time with updating. I've noticed this on a number of blogs. It took my new post several hours for it to appear, and with some others it seems they just never do. Don't know what's going on...

Owen said...

Ah Virginia, you are too kind... I had never seen such a stack of toilets, though they must exist on the loading docks of any porcelain products factory. The oddities of our industrial world... can you imagine having on one's business card, the job title : "Toilet Quality Controller" ? Or "Toilet Functionality Tester"? "Toilet Evacuation Flow Design Engineer" ?

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Jo, thank you deeply, I am definitely focused on keepin these pages out on the edge with a bit of edginess... as you said some time ago, it is not for repeated garden photos that one might come here. Although, there are exceptions, even with flower photos, as there are some bloggers out there who turn flowers into the most incredibly sensual works of art imaginable, such as Clo here at :

http://clo-photosanscible.blogspot.com/

She is doing simply phenomenal things...

Greetings to you all in Vancouver...

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Hi Nevine, hmmmm, well, I guess with all the millions and millions of blogs on the Blogger servers, and the incredible connections between many of them that are linked by followers or in sidebars, it must not be easy to make all that work perfectly all the time... I wonder if that may explain the smaller than sometimes number of visits this time, not that I take any number of visits for granted, far from up... but when I got up yesterday and saw only your visit and later Jimmy's, I was thinking for sure I've driven everyone away with my toilet humor and suicidal ponderings... Important to note that the character backed away from the window and went back to bed... In any case, thanks for passing that on... hopefully I haven't scared everyone off forever... I've grown to enjoy the company that has been dropping in here from time time, getting to be like family. Two have adopted me as their brother, and one as a nephew in fact...
Happy Sunday in Texas to you...
:-)

Gwen Buchanan said...

Damn, You sure can express yourself!!!!!

Owen said...

Hey Gwen ! Whether that is a good thing or not is another question, but it helps to get it out, rather than bottle it up...

Love your raven skull...