April 2011
13 posts
“Anti-drug hysteria is now worldwide, and it poses a deadly threat to personal freedoms and due-process protections of the law everywhere.”
—William S. Burroughs, 1991.
We are like roses that have never bothered to
bloom when we should have bloomed and
it is as if
the sun has become disgusted with
waiting.
Charles Bukowski (submitted by noise-n-tangerines)
“I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’”
—Kurt Vonnegut A Man Without A Country (via bul-bul)
what was your major at mcgill?
I was an Anthropology major. I started out in Psych but failed math haha so that became my minor…and I also minored in Cultural Studies in the English department, which is why I could get away with taking classes on Leonard Cohen!
“you met him at some temple
where they take your clothes at the door
he was just a numberless man in a chair
who’d just come back from the war
and you wrap up his tired face in your hair
and he hands you the apple core
then he touches your lips now so suddenly bare
of all the kisses we put on some time before” —
where they take your clothes at the door
he was just a numberless man in a chair
who’d just come back from the war
and you wrap up his tired face in your hair
and he hands you the apple core
then he touches your lips now so suddenly bare
of all the kisses we put on some time before” —
Leonard Cohen, “Master Song”, The Songs of Leonard Cohen
I used to listen to Leonard Cohen all the time when I was at McGill, which was appropriate obviously given he was from Montreal and went to McGill as well, and my time in MTL culminated with taking a Leonard Cohen class in the English department my final semester. It was pretty rough actually, taught by an amazing prof who expected you to know all the rules of English literary rules & criticism, which I really did not, so he wasn’t so crazy about my papers! One of which was on this, “Master Song”, a song I love, but apparently I sucked at analyzing from a poetic point of view, haha - oh well! So he didn’t like that one so much. But this song is still amazing.
“In New York City, the first spring trees that blossom on the streets are the callery pears. To most people their fragrant petals herald the arrival of warmer days and signal the end of winter, but for the past nine springs their sweet bouquet has reminded three friends, Bob Rosenthal, Peter Hale, and myself, of the sudden death of the man we worked with, Allen Ginsberg. We haven’t failed to remark on it once in those nine years. We note the early or late blooming of the flowers in comparison to the day in April when Allen died and left his world of triumph and suffering behind. It coincided with the moment the pear blossoms reached their peak. As we walked out onto the street after the deathbed vigil, their pleasant aroma was so invigorating and thier ivory radiance so cheerful that it made a sharp contrast to our sadness. Our grief was shared by thousands of friends and fans in the days and months that followed, but each April fifth we’ve said to one another, “Well, the pear trees are late this year,” remembering the day and date so vividly.”
—Bill Morgan, “Foreword” to I Celebrate Myself (via fuckyeahallenginsberg)
