Monday, November 30, 2009

The end of Sunflower Sutra by Allen Ginsberg

We're not our skin of grime, we're not our dread
bleak dusty imageless locomotive, we're all
beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we're blessed 
by our own seed & golden hairy naked
accomplishment-bodies growing into mad black
formal sunflowers in the sunset, spied on by our
eyes under the shadow of the mad locomotice
riverbank sunset Frisco hilly tincan evening
sitdown vision.


Allen Ginsberg 
Berkeley, 1955

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Masculinity

"Why my dear, he is not good looking at all, but extremely masculine." (The Fountainhead)

Masculinity is the most attractive characteristic that a man can have. This is extremely obvious yet society does not actually understand what true masculinity is.

Masculinity is not something I can outline for you. It is not external, it is not purely chivalry and importantly it is not disposable, thus it can not be material even just material expression of chivalry. It is not pretty language, it is not rough language, more than anything I believe masculinity is sincerity. Sincerity does not come from an acceptance of "who you are" by what you conform to. It is not an identity that just "goes with the flow", it is something that is cherished and searched out and chiseled and formed by an identity that knows not who he is but knows to discover who he is. Life is not in the being, it is in the becoming - in the projecting of who you are in every moment.

One of the most masculine men I know is a paraplegic over his healthy BMI yet someone who demanded respect with the atmosphere which his identity brought to every situation - an atmosphere of searching. He has humbly embraced his identity as a thinker, because living in the realm of the mind requires nothing more or less than humility. He did not appear to me for an instant as his body, his freedom was absolute because he was sincere in all that he said, and honest to all of his thoughts demanding them to be the highest quality. This man is, honestly, one of the most attractive men I have met.

"Why my dear, he is not good looking at all, but extremely masculine."

Saturday, November 28, 2009


Thursday, November 19, 2009

Letters to my classmates #4

Dear Blond Blond Girl,
You are very pretty and have fantastic style.  I loved your brown Dior purse in the fall and now, with the new cold winter season, the arrival of your new designer black leather bag fills me with envy.  I peer at it every day in class trying to figure out who makes it but alas, the angle is never quite right... So I sit in anticipation for the moment when you reveal the beautiful designer who sculpted your gorgeous purse.  I love the gold hardware and the soft muted leather finish.  I imagine if I am ever close enough to it then I would smell the cool musk of expertly worked leather that identifies it as a truly worthy bag.
Okay, now I hate to turn to more negative things after admiring such a beautiful bag, but yet I just have to ask... What possessed you to mutilate your hair like that!??
Darling, judging by your eyebrows either you are a natural blond, or you go all the way with your dye job and got your eyebrows done to complete the golden facade. So please, explain to me-- WHY have you bleached a platinum cap onto the top half of your beautiful banana blond head??  The yellowy waves which fall over your shoulders are expertly ironed, so clearly you have some skills in the grooming department.  So again, why is your skull area practically white?  Did your hairdresser go crazy when touching up your roots?  Or was this an intentional diversion from consistency?  I think I would understand better if you had various blond highlights, but this is almost a straight line dividing your two shades of blond.
Perhaps this is a new high class fashion that my lowly brunette head hasn't been privy too. Or maybe it is a blonds only style... I cant imagine a ginger dumping a cup of bleach on her skull, why would you?
well, until next time BBG-
-Plain Jane Brunette who stole your purse

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

small thought ... may not be right (still needs editing)

Right now I am working on a paper on the topic of sexual ethics and particularly the different periods of history (in the West) and how cultural/religious opinions have altered man's feelings towards this serious relation.

While doing this, and talking with others about this, I had an epiphany or something like that. On the topic of birth control the world seems to be divided into two camps, one sees birth control as woman's liberation from men, as finally equalizing the sexes and permitting sex to be a show of equality. The other camp sees birth control as a great evil that has loosened the responsibility of sex and made it an activity, something to be done destroying the seriousness of this relation.

I do not believe that either is fully right or fully wrong. On birth control permitting equality I would like to respond that sexual activity - with or without birth control - should always be done within the realm of equality, of seeking the "human being" (as Rilke demanded) within the person of the opposite gender. On the raw physicality of it though women who use birth control will not have as high a rate of pregnancy and that does irrefutable equalize the results of sex. As to the opinion that birth control as loosened the responsibility of sex I agree, it has, and in many ways it has done more to divide men and women than before. Now, pregnancy (especially for teens) does not result in marriage to the extent that it did in the past putting a greater responsibility upon the mother than the father. This I believe can be linked to birth control, especially the pill, which is predominantly seen as the woman's responsibility. Marriage was the most sure means of ensuring that the male take responsibility for the child, and now while we have the court system it does not have a 100% success rate for controlling the phenomenon of "dead beat dads".

Yet thinking about the spiritual side of man while birth control can have the effect of misusing and exploiting others in the search for sexual pleasure - ultimately squandering this spiritual connection between men and women, it also can have a positive effect on man.

Birth control now allows man to move his sexual relations and desires outside of realm of the purely physical. Now the decision to engage in sex, or not to engage in sex, is a topic purely and solely for man's inner struggle, pushing him to do more to relate himself to himself. To discover what it is that motivates him, and where it is exactly that his moral decisions dwell. It now allows him to seriously challenge his conclusions and to what extent he is influenced by custom, religion, culture, or fear of other's opinions about him.

This is not to say that within the masses this is the result. In fact, statistically, it is not, but now because of birth control mans decisions can be a purely moral one. If man is constantly in a state of self searching, a natural state without distractions, he would be using the spiritual debate behind sex to learn his value*. In doing this the decisions may vary, no two people are the same, yet without the concern of pregnancy his decisions would be him projecting who he is onto the external world, and not letting the external world project who he is into him. Birth control would be supporting the higher spiritual in man, forcing him to search himself. Birth control then would build man's internal spiritual strength and not the animal.

(please note that by man or he or himself I mean both men and women)

*this is not a comment making a claim that there are no objective values, in deed there may be, but for a person to know this they can not take it as an assumption or else the word value would more accurately be convention. To know even if there are objective values one must find them aligning with his inner spiritual self because if they are objective then this would be natural anyway and grant them a more fundamental strength.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Poem shmoem

I saw you awkwardly today,
didn't have anything to say,
so simply gave a little shrug,
kept sipping from my travel mug.

Fruit-roll-up boy stalking continued

Wow! Fruit Roll-up boy speaks! (and has a little chin beard going on) So- his voice is REALLY deep!  That was unexpected.  I think you just went a notch in my book. well... in my blog.  I'm not sure your voice matches your body... that happens sometimes.
OH! side note/update on my philosophy professor: today his deep purple sweater fit properly and he had a pink oxford sticking out of the collar.  Spiffy! He was looking pretty stylish, if I do say so. His classic dark jeans were not too faded or long
Oh... Fruit Roll-up boy (I think I'll call you FRUB)-- you just spoke again, but sorry this time I'm not that impressed.  Throwing in the awkward curse word during class discussion is not classy.  It just sounds out of place and uncomfortable.  This is Philosophy class! we are talking about deep, serious, meaning of life issues. Dropping the F-bomb is just weird.  There is no reasonable cause for anger, and we aren't on MTV.