gold cell

I finally came around to watching "Into the Wild" yesterday & was truly inspired to pack my bags, burn my cash & drive my hypothetical car with my hypothetical license by the seaside & hike into Alaska. Unfortunately, I know I could never and will never venture to such immodest ends with nature. I dislike my inherently social nature, but I really am quite captured with the routine of civilization. What I did discover was the magic of Sharon Olds & her insight on motherhood (or, at least, how she articulates it). Here is the poem they featured in the movie. I am thrilled.

I Go Back to May 1937

I see them standing at the formal gates of their colleges,
I see my father strolling out
under the ochre sandstone arch, the
red tiles glinting like bent
plates of blood behind his head, I
see my mother with a few light books at her hip
standing at the pillar make of tiny bricks with the
wrought-iron gate still open behind her, its
sword-tips back in the May air,
they are about to graduate, they are about to get married,
they are kids, they are dumb, all they know is they are
innocent, they would never hurt anybody.
I want to go up to them and say Stop,
don't do it - she's the wrong woman,
he's the wrong man, you are going to do things
you cannot imagine you would ever do,
you are going to do bad things to children,
you are going to suffer in ways you never heard of,
you are going to want to die. I want to go
up to them there in the at May sunlight and say it,
her hungry pretty blank face turning to me,
her pitiful beautiful untouched body,
his arrogant handsome blind face turning to me,
his pitiful beautiful untouched body,
but I don't do it. I want to live. I
take them up like male and female
paper dolls and bang then together
at the hips like chips of flint as if to
strike sparks from them, I say
Do what you are going to do, and I will tell about it.

The Islands concert was last night, and although disappointed that Sebastien Grainger did not show up, the performance was still o.v.e.r.w.h.e.l.m.i.n.g.. But I do have to mention - as cute as he is - does Nick Diamond mean to pick at least one fight per concert?

Islands - The Arm
Islands - Volcanoes
Islands - Waterloo Sunset (Kinks Cover)