Mais perfume.

- Parvo
a cada passo e eu, humilde, a escutar-te, pensando se soubesse dizer-te o que sinto, se pudesse abrir o peito para tu veres lá dentro, e os postais ilustrados, os pombinhos, os bambis, os naperons, as rolas, a tralha toda com que te afoguei ao princípio da crónica, tu, aproveitando uma pausa, a comunicares-me
- Não esperes por mim para jantar
pondo, à pressa, mais perfume, visto que a buzina de um automóvel te chama da rua, e o Jorge é suficientemente impulsivo para nos entrar casa dentro.

António Lobo Antunes, "Os caminhos do Senhor".

Lucky you.

Getting people right is not what living is all about anyway. It's getting them wrong that is living, getting them wrong and wrong and wrong and then, on careful reconsideration, getting them wrong again. That's how we know we're alive: we're wrong. Maybe the best thing would be to forget being right or wrong about people and just go along for the ride. But if you can do that - well, lucky you.

Philip Roth

I have lived my life on these moments.

A few times in my life I've had moments of absolute clarity, when for a few brief seconds the silence drowns out the noise and I can feel rather than think, and things seem so sharp and the world seems so fresh. I can never make these moments last. I cling to them, but like everything, they fade. I have lived my life on these moments. They pull me back to the present, and I realize that everything is exactly the way it was meant to be.

A Single Man, Tom Ford/David Scearce/Christopher Isherwood, 2009.

Steve Messer

Untitled, originally uploaded by Steeeve Messer.

"Untitled", as seen in j skilla's new project, Modern Geometry.

via Not Content.

I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

1

I celebrate myself;  
And what I assume you shall assume;  
For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you.  
  
I loafe and invite my Soul;  
I lean and loafe at my ease, observing a spear of summer grass.
  
Houses and rooms are full of perfumes—the shelves are crowded with perfumes;  
I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it;  
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.  
  
The atmosphere is not a perfume—it has no taste of the distillation—it is odorless;  
It is for my mouth forever—I am in love with it;
I will go to the bank by the wood, and become undisguised and naked;  
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.  


Walt Whitman.  Leaves of Grass.

Há tantas coisas por fazer.

it may not always be so;and i say
that if your lips,which i have loved,should touch
another's,and your dear strong fingers clutch
his heart,as mine in time not fara away;
if on another's face your sweet hair lay
in such a silence as i know,or such
great writhing words as,uttering overmuch,
stand helplessly before the spirit at bay;

if this should be,i say if this should be
you of my heart,send me a little word;
that i may go unto him,and take his hands,
saying,Accept all happiness from me.
Then shall i turn my face,and hear one bird
sing terribly afar in the lost lands.


e.e. cummings

Pequeno léxico de palavras mal entendidas (primeira parte)

"Amara-a desde a infância até ao dia em que a acompanhara ao cemitério, e ainda continuava a amá-lá em recordações. Por isso pensava que a fidelidade é a virtude mais importante, que é a fidelidade que dá unidade à nossa vida, que, sem ela, se dispersaria em mil e uma impressões fugidias."

Milan Kundera, A Insustentável Leveza Do Ser.

No Second Troy

Why should I blame her that she filled my days
With misery, or that she would of late
Have taught to ignorant men most violent ways,
Or hurled the little streets upon the great,
Had they but courage equal to desire?
What could have made her peaceful with a mind
That nobleness made simple as a fire,
With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind
That is not natural in an age like this,
Being high and solitary and most stern?
Why, what could she have done being what she is?
Was there another Troy for her to burn?

Yeats, Responsibilities and Other Poems.

Ternura de calafrio.

Devia morrer-se de outra maneira.
Transformarmo-nos em fumo, por exemplo.
Ou em nuvens.
Quando nos sentíssemos cansados, fartos do mesmo sol
a fingir de novo todas as manhãs, convocaríamos
os amigos mais íntimos com um cartão de convite
para o ritual do Grande Desfazer: "Fulano de tal comunica
a V. Exa. que vai transformar-se em nuvem hoje
às 9 horas. Traje de passeio".
E então, solenemente, com passos de reter tempo, fatos
escuros, olhos de lua de cerimônia, viríamos todos assistir
a despedida.
Apertos de mãos quentes. Ternura de calafrio.
"Adeus! Adeus!"
E, pouco a pouco, devagarinho, sem sofrimento,
numa lassidão de arrancar raízes...
(primeiro, os olhos... em seguida, os lábios... depois os cabelos... )
a carne, em vez de apodrecer, começaria a transfigurar-se
em fumo... tão leve... tão sutil... tão pòlen...
como aquela nuvem além (vêem?) — nesta tarde de outono
ainda tocada por um vento de lábios azuis...

José Gomes Ferreira

In the morning, in the winter shade

"Casimir Pulaski Day". Sufjan Stevens, Illinois (Asthmatic Kitty, 2005).

All the glory that the Lord has made
And the complications you could do without
When I kissed you on the mouth

Unmasking lust and loss

If I hadn’t documented her death, both the description of my state of mind and my declaration of love would have been incomplete. I found consolation in unmasking lust and loss, by staging a bitter confrontation between symbols. After Yoko’s death, I didn’t want to photograph anything but life – honestly. Yet every time I pressed the button, I ended up close to death, because to photograph is to stop time.

Nobuyoshi Araki, a propósito de Winter Journey, livro que reúne a documentação fotográfica dos últimos meses da sua mulher, Yoko, que morreu em 1990.

É assim.