Showing posts with label Poetry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Poetry. Show all posts

Thursday, August 23, 2012

A new rap

i'd like to smell your finery
i'm not a fan of joinery
some hogs are mean and ornery
    my lyrical refinery
a place where dreams are made and sold
where neural networks turn to gold
where hiphop cheese is born from mould
and truth be told, you've just been rolled
 lost your bearings, pockets empty
askin 'where has H-time sent me?'
swapped your volvo for a bentley,
did it gently, can't resent me
sunk my roots into your mind
now you're dreaming, now you're cryin'
can't rewind, no use tryin
relocate to Proserpine

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Accounting for taste

With the league season over, but still two intercity train trips to make each day, my mind has turned to some of life's great topics - love, justice, the absolute, as well as a range of topics unrelated to league. One of these topics has flitted across my mind from decade to decade, without even so much as a second dwelled thereupon: could it be possible to account for taste? Taste in... hotness?

Many studies claim to show the factors which count in interpersonal attraction [citation needed]. Typically some blend of youth, symmetry and in males, relative power. If you want to know the average preferences of an average person, this might come in handy. But as the Surrealist Committee for Investigation of Claims of the Normal points out, it is exceedingly hard to find a typical, normal, average, standard person with likewise preferences. And to my mind, all the interesting things are left out of these studies anyway.

So what is hotness? Forgetting for the moment any deep philosophical discussion of the nature of hotness, let's start as any good scientist would, by producing some units. Consider the figure below, which I will dub the Hotness Scale.

On the Y axis we have Depth of Hotness. At its most shallow, we have Attention Capture. As we move further up (deeper in hotness) we enter the arena where a person's hotness has a Life of Its Own. This ranges from them making multiple involuntary appearances in your mind, through to the varying shades of crush, to the maximum: Lost Cause. There is no way, no how, that this person can ever not be hot. Surrender, all ye who enter here.

On the X axis is Duration of Hotness. This is a simple chronorithmic scale, ranging from 1 second to 1 day, 1 month, a year and all the way up to a lifetime.

On the Hotness Scale, the letter A could refer to glancing at an attractive person in a magazine. B could be some kind of crush, while C represents my hotness rating of wifey.

We are all familiar with some typical trajectories on this figure. There's love at first sight, which starts off at a very deep level of hotness and continues. There's the slow and steady burn, which starts near the origin and follows a line roughly corresponding to the equation Y=X. There's the Friend to Lover transition, in which someone coasts for some time at minimal hotness (they may not even be on the Hotness Scale) before a sudden nonlinear episode kicks them into deeper waters. And there's the U-Turn, in which someone becomes less hot, sometimes very much so. This can happen anywhere on the Hotness Scale, but is most frequent in the lower left quadrant.

To my mind, anyone on the Hotness Scale is hot. What they all share in common is the ability to pass through the beholder's Hotness Filter. The Hotness Filter consists of a series of pores, each corresponding to some quality or trait in a person. Now you and I may both have a pore corresponding to eyes, or waist to hip ratio, or amount of denim worn, but they probably won't be the same shape. My denim filter may exclude people who wear double denim or greater. Yours may let these people pass through. So in accounting for taste, I want to know what dictates the shape of the many pores in someone's Hotness Filter.

In fact, there are several Hotness Filters. I counted at least five, and you don't necessarily pass through them in any particular order. They are
  1. Attention capture hotness. It could be an image on a screen, or walking past someone on the street. For a split second at least, someone has captured your attention because they are hot.
  2. Interaction hotness. Some people who pass the first filter get blocked here because of some information gleaned when you interact with them e.g. they stink, they vote Liberal, they care about politics etc.
  3. Contact hotness. Entering into quite close proximity with someone is another kind of filter. Pheromones start coming into it here.
  4. Going out hotness. Getting serious now. They have to pass the "I'm coming back for seconds" test here, among others.
  5. Commitment hotness. To love and to hold etc.
Our filters contain lots and lots of information, with pores corresponding to the purely cosmetic, the profound and everything in between. And our filters evolve over time too.

There is another aspect to this that I think we all understand quite intuitively, which I think of as a kind of temperature. At low 'temperatures' we are less likely to find someone hot e.g. while skydiving, when feeling nausea. At high 'temperatures' we are more likely to find someone hot e.g. alcohol, after two years of abstinence, after eating half a dozen oysters. (Nb. too many oysters probably turns the temperature down). Think of temperature as making the pores in the Hotness Filter bigger or smaller. Proximity and total eye gazing time may turn the temperature up.

There's also a kind of Hotness Geometry, involving the angle from which you view someone, the distance (1 cm vs 1 m vs through binoculars) and dimension (ie on paper/screen/photo vs in real life).

Well, all of this didn't get me any closer to understanding why people's Hotness Filter pores are the shapes they are. In fact, I started to wonder whether it even makes sense to speak of the independent existence of stable filters and pores. Could it be that the Hotness Filter is actually created when someone passes through it? Could the fluid interaction of beholder and beheld be decisive in shaping what we thought was something fixed and pre-existing? How very quantum if that were the case.

I had to end my cursory excursion into Hotness Theory there, as my stop came up.

Thursday, June 04, 2009

Beak Reader

Falling fancifully in my tree
A thought was intercepted
Steal my berries will you, c^^t
For I’m a beakreader

Tis a gift I’ve had since birth
and honed with hours of practice
Some birds fear me - with good reason
They’re not used to being eavesdropped

Many stories I have heard
But one sticks in my craw
A tale of lust and mystery
concerning a macaw

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

I am still

unable to judge your present feelings, as to past events. I am a widow. I just feel so goddanged inspired. That's why I'm letting it all hang out - so to speak - for the very first time. I love. I sing. I dance, often while wearing clothes inside out. Have you ever ironed your clothes inside out? It hurts! Now that that's been said and done, we can all breathe easily. Pomegranate, Mr Neville? Do you love? Can you smell my whole life? I have been tricked, hoodwinked and I cannot believe it! A cautionary tale indeed.
~~~
There once was a man named Begbagda
he always poke his mind
and wished that he'd be wined
that's why they called him DeChauncey Begbagda
~~~
day in day out
i smile not pout
cause you're inside my brain
a vision splendy
you are trendy
quite unlike john wayne
what a hottie
yummy body
the most lovely face
how is it
that this here twit
is even in the race?
tell me that you like me
and i'll sigh a deeply smile
tell me that you love me
and i'll name our first son Gile-
s

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

I drop rhymes like nobody's dirty business

My lyrics are unstoppable
My images are croppable
i’m totally sustainable
I never touch a fossil fuel

My veins are ice and I’m known to fly
There’s a lotta imitators but I don’t know why they try
Some have likened me to the archaeopteryx
Part bird part reptile a truly stunning mix

But I’m fully equipped with the cortical lobes
that these other motherfuckers lack
and plus I’ve got robes
long, red and flowing and they’re never restrictive
if you impair my circulation I get super vindictive

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Alternative Lyrics - PJ Harvey's The Devil

As soon as I
turn left on a road
The Devil wanders
into my zone
And I pretend to myself...

Come, come, come here at one.
Come, come! On a day at 1pm
Because all of my being is now in Wyoming.

~~~

Welcome to lovesong dedications. This next song goes out to Jarryd in Bexley, and it's from his long time girlfriend Francene. Jarryd, Francene just wants to thank you for all the little things you do that make her life so special. This is for you Jarryd.
[ABBA's Money, Money, Money]

Tuesday, November 06, 2007

On the road

A week after arriving in 'complex' Istanbul, I met Hidayet. He was a friend of a friend of a friend, first one Sydney, second Sultanahmet via Hotel Empress Zoe, the last in Unkapani. I met him in a tea house in Tophane, which is where all the good tea houses are. Apple tea tastes like absolute sickly sweet shit, but if you pipe it through a nargileh, it's a light sweet smooth and not at all intoxicating.

My wife had gone to do some shopping, and judging by the length of her list she wouldn't be back for a few days. I figured that a bit of tea and nargileh couldn't hurt my throat too much, and might even help. Hidayet agreed. "Turkish apple tobacco, very good for sore throat. Cigarettes, not so much, but I don't have sore throat." You only realise how succesfully Sydney has marginalised smokers when you see them in full flight elsewhere. People blow smoke in your face here and expect you to say tessekurler.

I ordered us both an Efe, 70cl, and we knocked it back in between puffs. I ordered another round and Hedo told me about his life. He'd had a tough life, or it seemed so to me, but it wasn't any tougher than most other Istanbullu. He started working for his dad at 9, taking customers drinks and clearing up. Sometimes the customers would swear at him when he dropped things, but his dad never came to his defence. He dropped out of school at 15, unlike most of his friends, and he travelled around central Anatolya for a few years, working odd jobs for food and board. Right now he was doing some work as a travel agent, helping in the office at his friend's mannequin shop, and doing a little fishing from the Galata bridge for fun.

He knew a better place we could go, somewhere with a more diverse crowd, the drinks a bit more expensive, but i didn't mind. i hadn't bought any presents for anyone yet, so i was flush.

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Bivouac

I am reading Jack Kerouac's Mexico City Blues aloud (ich lese vor), and it is really agreeing with me. I am up to the 80th chorus (there's 242). It's a quick read, but I can see myself going back over it and reading it again. I don't have strong record of returning to books. I can see myself reading it aloud to others, with their mutual consent. I can see myself mutualise.

There's something very familiar about the writing. I recognise something of myself in there. There's parts that leave me stone motherless cold.

"I have no plans
No dates
No appointments with anybody

So I leisurely explore
Souls and Cities"
...

"F#ck is a dirty word
But it comes out clean."

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

On Vinegar

Vinegar, I’ve loved you since
I was a carefree lad
I’m older and now understand
this was no boyhood fad

I know not how it started and
I’ll guess not how it ends
But on this fine libation
my joie de vivre depends

Oh vinegar, I’ll count the ways
You satisfy my palate
If only come election time
‘twere you upon the ballot

On potatoes
Baked or fried, steamed or broiled or crucified
Don’t forget potato chips
That sweetly sting the tongue and lips
(For burn & taste the best is Ruffles
In crisps world, they’re the truffles)

Be it from rock, a lab or the sea
Salt goes with vinegar like it goes with me
Mix it with chilli, apply it to Jiaozi
Or repeat step one and add it to Baozi

Use it to rug up naked salads
Or use it as fodder for catchy ballads

I hear the sour siren call,
but ‘fore I exit these four walls
It would be remiss of me
Not to add one think
Vinegar is unappreciated as a drink

Take this shining potable
And cram it down your gullet
Drink it, quaff it, swig it, sip it
Failing that just scull it

If you love vinegar
Then you’ll know this
like you know your name
Yet many haven’t done it yet
‘Tis such a weeping shame

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Ode to Clem

I saw a bird Oh pointy pointy
Sitting on a sign
The sign said “Clem’s” Oh pointy pointy
Chicken sans red wine

I took three steps and saw before me
Poultry products pure and true
Vegies, salads, chicken fried
And some was BBQ

So began a love affair
Between Clem’s food and me
Unfaithful though I’ve been – it’s true
For I’ve known KFC

But KFC to me is worse
than the worst of sloppy seconds
You’re my number one guy, Clem
Forget what Sanders reckons

Clem’s has heart, an old school feel,
Attractive staff who keep it real
Portions that are well proportioned
Perfect? Yes, but heed this caution

A Clementine visit can only proceed
With these conditions attached to the feed:
You mustn’t have been in 180 days
The moon must be in its 13th phase
Your cravings so bad you can hardly breathe
Your wallet ready for you to unsheathe
Accompany none who deride greasy fare
Or accompany none if you don’t want to share
Last but not least an optional feat
I also recommend taking a seat
Watching the phone booth and 7-11,
The King St shufflers and backfiring mufflers
While you sit in Clementine heaven

Follow these rules ‘fore your next Lunch Pack
And these words you’ll speak “Clem, I love you. I’ll be back”

Sunday, March 04, 2007

Words

And when the sun goes down into the sky
together we shall sit and we shall sup
and we shall eat and drink the heady wine.
Let us share the overflowing cup.

We'll ramble on the coast, each side by side.
We'll feel the sting of bracing, salty air.
We'll feel the moon pull at the ocean tide
and wonder that we are together there.

One day these things shall have to come to pass.
And then the end will come, as so it must.
No longer shall we smell the summer grass.
No longer shall we know each other's trust.

So let us walk and feel the cooling breeze
before they're just forgotten memories.

~~~
Those rather sombre words are from a crash test dummies song. Haunting yet upbeat. It hurts my soul, but I feel it's rather fluffy and lacks substance.

Sunday, November 26, 2006

Two stuff

These withered hands
have dug for a dream
sifted through sand
and
left over nightmares

ooover the hill
a desolate wind
turns shit to gold and blows my soul crazy

the end
oh the end
we live again

oh I grew weary of the end

That day I found Beck again. Somewhere along the line I'd lost him. Been to the Museums of the mars volta, the Westmeads of ween and the Petershams of crash test dummies. Back the soul mass transit system's just pulled in to Platform 1 at Becksville, and it's good to be back.

Dude can write lyrics.

But the real reason I wrote is to inform you of what is undeniably a return to form of ...The [zoom out clouds] Siiiimpsons...

They got a movie trailer. You MUST WATCH IT NOW

Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Water + Bubbles = Freedom

Hurt + Bandaid = Toxic Shock Syndrome
Love + Guitar = Splinter
Hunger + Flames = Burger

Alternative Lyrics to Someplace Only We Know by Keane

I came upon
a foreign land
I knew the pathway
like my own home land

Is this the place
we used to go?
is this the place
they know as Gulp'n'Blow?

Oh sympathy!
Where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need someone to move on

So tell me when
you gonna let me in
I'm getting tired of
drinking juice from my bin

and IF you have a minute why don't we go
TALK about it someplace with an eagle
THIS could be the end of everything
so why don't we go, baby to montego

Sunday, September 03, 2006

Poetry

There are sydney uni prizes. Cash prizes. There's a poetry one, named after Henry Lawson. It's called the Pete Babcock poetry prize. I decided I'd enter, and then realised I cannot write poetry.

Attempt #1

For the fourth time
flitting by
a rat with wings
began to smile
We exhale, seal lips.
Deep inside its cooing chest
A baby pidg’ resides in breast.
Its mother dies and so does it.
You know what? I don’t give a sheet.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Red Computer Bucket

Arthur a grammar. What is a question.
How'm I s'posed to get outta here, somehow?
I am king of plasma.
That's the only thing i want so much.
Kim's got her watermelon gun.
You sold me fifty dollars.
A tear drops my eye.

Nonsense or fact? You be the judge.