View allAll Photos Tagged Parable
gigilivorno.......questi paesini arroccati!
-Bandw-...........quasi da presepe
leosagnotti......segni tangibili di tempi diversi.....
cb.almostblue.....uno scorcio evocativo!
nespyxel............il gioco dei volumi...
Lookaloopy.......una vista evocativa!
acetosa888.......Matera è assolutamente da vedere!
lillarra2006.......un momento muy especial y asi quedara en tu memoria y en la de todos nosotros.....
Gioischia..............il presepe!!
fiumeazzurro........Sospesa nel tempo!
matfer..................uno scorcio che resta nella memoria e nel cuore!
bazmoore4..............loads of detail and interest........
DPiero.............grandi geometrie.
Number 12 for 121 Pictures in 2021 : Book first published in 1921 or earlier
A present to my mother at Christmas when she was 7.
These people sitting by it were raving about the piece and beseeching me to explain it. I told them the parable. It was wonderful
This is a fractal modification of a painting by Caravaggio. It was a bit of a surprise because I thought it was a different painting, so the thing went off in a different direction.
The world is changing, that’s what we see right now. Maybe for the first time in living memory at that scale. Comparatively to that changing, it barely noticed Covid. It’s much bigger that the global financial crisis. Can you feel it? ‘Cause it could be important. It could be the biggest opportunity for all of us. The world now is like a clean sheet, it’s beginning from the beginning, in a way. What we’ll write on it at that time?
Based on Henry Van Dyke’s “The Parable of Immortality”
Along the shore I spy a ship
As she sets out to sea;
She spreads her sails and sniffs the breeze
And slips away from me.
I watch her fading image shrink,
As she moves on and on,
Until at last she’s but a speck,
Then someone says, “She’s gone.”
Gone where? Gone only from our sight
And from our farewell cries;
That ship will somewhere reappear
To other eager eyes.
Beyond the dim horizon’s rim
Resound the welcome drums,
And while we’re crying, “There she goes!”
They’re shouting, “Here she comes!”
We’re built to cruise for but a while
Upon this trackless sea
Until one day we sail away
Into infinity.
This is the third in my "rain plant" series.
Have you heard this parable?
One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between two 'wolves' inside us all.
One is Evil! . It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.
The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility,
kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather:
'"Which wolf wins?"
The old Cherokee simply replied, '"The one you feed."
EXPLORE # 381 on Wednesday, January 30, 2008
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. The whole images from these series are already on my insta, but without this texts)
The same eclipses of intelligence as with the individuals and with the families could be with the societies. They lived as the tribes for millennia and just recently become the states. You needn’t intelligence in the tribe. You need a chief which gain new territories for hunting and gathering. You just switching off the reason and follow the Chief. And he could talk every mumbo-jumbo he wants. And you could repeat it after him, no problem. It’s the tribal thing, the tribal magic which has nothing to do with the reason. On the contrary. The madder the Chief, the better. More territories for hunting and gathering. The question is how to can come to senses.
To be continued…
I want to speak about this nightmare times, to show, to see and to learn more. To do something together. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side” with rather unique opportunity to show the country when its doors are closing. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that. As well as on other social resources.
“Not every end is the goal. The end of a melody is not its goal, and yet if a melody has not reached its end, it has not reached its goal. A parable.” Friedrich Nietzsche
(Continuation. Please see the previous images and the texts of this series if you feel like that).
New-old series from now & the last summer with my favourite model and good friend Irinka. From my private letter on a completely different matter: “Now I’m shamanize with photography, and there my experience is also about the same: drinking either pu’er, wine, gaba, with music and eternity ahead, with all conceivable and unthinkable freedom and care, from different sides, nice and easy, the complex dance: one forward, two back, half to the side, half a turn, jump-pirouette-stand-still, pull here, rearrange there, and here return as it was, sometimes just put aside for a while, then look slightly squinting, with head slightly to one side, changing the angle of view – and suddenly understand that nothing more is needed, everything came together. And so to recreate the world – or touch its heart. There are many words for this, I here and now (and in a minute it may be different) like "magic realism"”.
(To be continued…)
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series).
Just recently, about a couple days ago, I’ve stopped to experience constant background horror and panic attacks. I’ve stopped to drink every single day (that was my longest period of everyday drinking, more than 100 days in a row). I didn’t drink much, that could be just a couple sips of wine, but sometimes a bottle during the day and especially the night – my sleep messed up as well (which was good for my photo-art and music). That’s a good sign, but the bad one as well. You remember “Comfortably numb”? There is no pain, you are receding… The war seems gone somewhere. But it is still right here, in my Russia, as well as in Ukraine. The state is fighting against Russian citizens as well as against Ukrainian. It’s more or less the same here like in occupied Kharkiv, for example, just without destructions. They’re gradually got hands on Russia and now trying to do the same with Ukraine. But we’re get used to the war. It became invisible. That’s the bad news. Because the war wouldn’t stop itself and even if it will, there could be the wrong ending. If we’ll stop to do even smallest things to help to stop it, it will be much stronger. A lot of smallest things have those own weight, and it could be big.
But sometimes I have doubts: does those letters have any sense? I’m more confident about my photo-art because of some feedback. But I’m not that writer and essayist. Maybe more the poet, but not English-language. Though I wouldn’t mind to tell you that I like it and feel that I found my own genre in this unity, series of images and texts, these visual stories and sometimes – fairytales. But my letters pretty often remained unanswered. I myself prefer not to comment if I could avoid it, i. e. if I don’t feel that I really have something to share in answer. But still…
Beautiful model, my good friend and sister in arts – Irinka, @kraskivrukah on Insta. We made another collab, where met different arts, “Give Peace a Chance”. Irinka painted the picture about war and peace in two characters – War and Peace and danced in both characters, I made photo and filmed. So, we had 4 arts – photography, painting, dance and movie. Now we have in mind several more collabs.
To be continued…
Window by Florence Camm 1926 on the south side of the sanctuary, depicting the parable of the Good Samaritan.
St John the Baptist's at Strensham is a Churches Conservation Trust gem and one of Worcestershire's most rewarding churches. The exterior is unusual in its lime-wash finish, the gleaming white tower being visible as a landmark for some distance. Dismissed by Pevsner for being of little architectural merit it nonetheless contains much of interest from ancient woodwork to the splendid Post Reformation monuments dominating the chancel.
Best of all is the unique medieval treasure at the west end, what now looks like a west gallery but was surely recycled from the 15th century rood screen with a continuous row of painted saints stretching the entire width of the church that must have come from the former rood loft. The paintings, a rare survival in the Midlands, have more in common with those found on West Country screens rather than more refined East Anglian ones, but are a wonderful reminder of how colourful our ancient churches once were.
My first attempt to see this church years ago ended in frustration: the church is kept locked but directions are given to a key hanging on a brick pillar outside a nearby house which was missing on my previous visit. This time happily the key was back where it belonged, and my lengthy visit at least saved another visitor the minor inconvenience of seeking it out.
www.worcesteranddudleyhistoricchurches.org.uk/index.php?p...
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. The whole images from these series are already on my insta and behance www.behance.net/gallery/140662555/Give-Peace-a-Chance-%28..., but without these texts)
I'm still processing, as said Chris Rock. He had physical damage mostly, I’m (and a lot of people all over the world) – spiritual. Something’s happened, that’s almost all what I know for now. Maybe even worse than the beginning of the war itself. Though I’m not surprised. Just shocked. You see, I was a field journalist, as I call it: I went to the places, all the chronicles of our region went through me (criminal, drug, politics which is worse and so on). When I returned from the meetings of our government, usually I just dropped sick, though apparently nothing too awful happened. Except of the feeling of it. But the main thing – people told me the truth. They wanted me to pass it, which I did. I was cheeky, and liked the feeling of the battle. But I knew an awful things, really awful, about how the power is work.
For now, but not for long, I got nothing left for this World Anti-war 1st diary. So, I’ll use this pause to ask: does anyone read those diaries? Do you see any help in them?
To be continued…
I want to speak more about these dark times, to show, to see and to learn myself. To do something together to get out of this dark. Alive and sane if possible. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side”, “from the stolen country”. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that.
(Continuation. Please see the texts of the earliest images of this series – my “letters from the other side”).
Usually, I’m uploading new works at night (as well as creating, and the deepest nights are the best). Recently I miss night after night, don’t know exactly, why. So, I decided to experiment and to enter in the broad light. I have begun morning (after a bit of playing on the electric piano and guitar, named Hiromi) with the Pu’er (by the way, how do you wright this word?) Huang Ming Sing, Tibetan collection, which is, according to the annotation, leads to the otherworld. Right what we need for our Alice.
This morning I recalled the verse from our “Aquarium” group, “The time is already haven’t the power over us, we’re moving as if in a movie” (Время уже не властно над нами, мы движемся, словно в кино). I noticed this special effect in myself. Not exactly haven’t power, but it doesn’t manifest itself in the usual ways. See, to become an average dude of my passport age, 52, I had to become an average adult, what we’re call “дяденька”, but skipped it. People usually are very surprised when they find out about my age (“We thought you’re 36!” – “My wife is 36!”). Rephrasing my favourite bluesman Buddy Guy, I’m 52 years young. Not even completely adult. But with all the adult goodies such as married life, sex, drugs (as an alcohol, exchanged on the really good tea, see above), rock’n’roll. Love, travelling (preferably hitchhiking and mountains), arts. Especially music. Very psychedelic thing, music. Freedom. Very mystery thing, freedom…
By the way, isn’t the name of this series, “She could move herself all the way (Она может двигать собой в полный рост)”, is too long? Maybe I’ll better cut it to “She could move herself (Она может двигать собой)”? Or is it ok?
To be continued…
Import Export - permant lightinstallation with 8 slide-projectors by genelabo - this time: white spripes ending in a parable
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. The whole images from these series are already on my insta and behance www.behance.net/gallery/140662555/Give-Peace-a-Chance-%28..., but without these texts)
I have an interesting position for the dude with such mixed scientific and poetic mindset that I have. I live in Russia. I I’m outside the war but I live in the war epicenter: where it’s come from. Though I feel that I live mostly in Ukraine, and there’s just my ghost. I’m beginning every morning from the reading about Ukraine and doing that all day long. I’ve followed as much Ukrainian and war correspondents accounts on insta as throughout all my life before. Maybe more.
And I’m at the other side of the world, on the other side of the mirror. Crooked mirror.
To be continued…
I want to speak more about these dark times, to show, to see and to learn myself. To do something together to get out of this dark. Alive and sane if possible. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side”, “from the stolen country”. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that.
Nobody wants to know the full Truth. But there is hope and love about deepest abbys and prison and slaughterhouse. Awake, covering eyes, hiding head in the sand like Ostrich makes no hope for You. Only hope is in seeing. Be brave to awake and know and this will set You free.. MD
Results of Ostrich behavior
Snake bites deadly
B .
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series).
I’ve just returned home from the village, where we celebrated the birthday of one of my best friends Nastya about 3 days. We just didn’t want to return from the country that soon. She’s a poet, a songwriter, a singer. Nastya, her husband Sasha (they have a band for two, “Mesozoic”) and I (sort of a poet and musician as well) walked a lot, drunk beer, whiskey, cognac and vodka in the most peaceful place and talked a lot about war. I hitchhiked there and back and saw a lot of people. It looked as if there isn’t any war. People just lived those lives as they could. Surreal.
Also, I saw on insta my friend in front of the graffiti “Death to the Russians!”. I recalled that even in WWII people wrote “Death to fascist occupants”, but not “Death to the Germans”. And I’m afraid that that’s the trend today. I wrote to that friend of mine, who posted her image with this graffiti (she’s Russian too, by the way) than I’d like if people write “Russians are like any other people – Arbs, Chinese, Negroes, Germans, Jews and so forth”. That evil is this old man in his bunker and those who work for him, who are making this war, making money on it or just don’t give a shit about the war, but not the whole people. And even those people aren’t absolutely evil. Evil just prevailed in them for now. She agreed.
Beautiful model, my good friend and sister in arts – Irinka, @kraskivrukah on Insta. We made another collab, where met different arts, “Give Peace a Chance”. Irinka painted the picture about war and peace in two characters – War and Peace and danced in both characters, I made photo and filmed. So, we had 4 arts – photography, painting, dance and movie. Now we have in mind several more collabs.
To be continued…
(Continuation. Please see the previous images and the texts of this series if you feel like that).
Several days ago, I’ve caught myself on this two-thousand-yard stare, which the super-models took over the solder-boys. Maybe it’s the same shit more or less. But I decided not to say a word about the war until after the Eastern holy days, which are 50, from the Easter till the feast of the Trinity (not that I’m so pious, but still could feel the holy days, when I see them). Meantime, I’m just wonder: where’s all the strength and spirit? Sometimes it’s as if everything is just slipping through my fingers and the Time is just sits still or going somewhere, anywhere but forward, as we used to. Couldn’t even answer to the comments (I’m so sorry, my friends, I'm really grateful for them and need them, just not always know what to answer except thank you from my heart…). But I’m still believe in art and freedom, which is the same for me. So, take another image with my good friend, model and sister in arts Irinka!
(To be continued…)
The thing in Orina’s left arm is still an ancient mike, from the sixties (see the previous image of this series, but is this clarification really necessary?). She’s a singer, as I explained in the previous post. In this series she’s totally unplugged, which didn’t spoil our art. Because the real musician is an artist in the first point. Which Orina brilliantly proved in this photo-op – our first and the only yet, but I hope that is far from the last.
The Parable of The Fork, The Floating Robot Ribbon Worm & Where The Fuck Was Larry David?
If you ain't a member or you ain't signed in with your "Safe Search" OFF , then you ain't seein what you oughtta. Take the appropriate measures or don't.
or you could just use this Guest Pass
(Continuation. Please see the texts of the earliest images of this series – my “letters from the other side”).
How to tell the visual story right? How to shuffle the images to make it alive? I’m learning to change the keys inside musical phrases. To mix reality with dream to that extent where I couldn’t tell for sure which is which. Nor you could. I’m learning to be free as much as I can take it. And fuck the war!
To be continued…
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.
The truest conversations I have are generally always centered on hope, and if we have any.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder (Breda, circa 1525/1530 - Brussels, 5 September 1569) - The Parable of the Blind (in Dutch: De parabel der blinden) Date (1568) - tempera on canvas Size 86 × 154 cm
- National Museum of Capodimonte, Naples
L'opera di Bruegel traduce in immagini la parabola evangelica del cieco che guida un altro cieco, riportata da Matteo 15:14, in cui Cristo si rivolge ai Farisei. «Sono ciechi e guide di ciechi. E quando un cieco guida un altro cieco, tutti e due cadranno in un fosso!»
L'opera, una delle quattro tempere sopravvissute di Bruegel, è un tüchlein, ovvero un dipinto realizzato con un colore preparato mescolando pigmenti con una colla solubile in acqua; questo metodo, tra l'altro, era già consolidato nel campo dei manoscritti miniati prima dell'introduzione del colore ad olio. Il tono austero dell'opera viene enfatizzato dall'uso di colori spenti e freddi: la tavolozza di Bruegel comprende infatti il grigio, il verde, il nero, il marrone e il rosso.
La linea obliqua creata dai corpi, un po' sfasata rispetto al primo piano, taglia diagonalmente la composizione e accentua la loro fragilità e il loro drammatico isolamento. Il paesaggio sullo sfondo è tipicamente fiammingo.
Bruegel's work translates into images the evangelical parable of the blind man who leads another blind man, reported by Matthew 15:14, in which Christ addresses the Pharisees. "They are blind and blind guides. And when a blind man leads another blind man, both will fall into a ditch! "
The work, one of the four surviving tempers of Bruegel, is a tüchlein, or a painting made with a color prepared by mixing pigments with a water-soluble glue; this method, among other things, was already consolidated in the field of illuminated manuscripts before the introduction of the oil color. The austere tone of the work is emphasized by the use of dull and cold colors: in fact, Bruegel's palette includes gray, green, black, brown and red.
The oblique line created by the bodies, a bit out of phase with the first floor, cuts the composition diagonally and accentuates their fragility and their dramatic isolation. The landscape in the background is typically Flemish.
(Wikipedia)
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. I've uploaded the whole series on insta, but without this texts)
We were at the keyword “empire”. In the previous years we lived in these very secure feelings that Russia is the peaceful country. Which of course was out of touch with reality. But “Peace” was the key word in our world. The national ideology was that we could and must sacrifice a lot in the name of Peace. That was a lie as well. Now they could arrest you if you’ll dare to go to the street with the word “Peace” on your bag. And brand you a traitor just for that. And that’s the truth. Our state declared “Peace” which was lie. And it didn’t declared “Empire” though it was in the very core of its functioning and its real ideology.
To be continued…
I want to speak about this nightmare times, to show, to see and to learn more. To do something together. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side” with rather unique opportunity to show the country when its doors are closing. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that. As well as on other social resources.
Today is the New Year – of the war. Of the unhappiness. Of the helplessness. Of the unprecedented unity of the world in the, as I put it, World Anti-war I. The war broke out a year ago near that very time. Somehow, I couldn’t sleep. I made this photo, I’m mixing wild cola (35% Sibbitter, pretty decent local brand, stands for Bitter Siberia, which is true for now, bitter Siberia in bitter Russia) with regular domestic cola and write this letter to you. Year ago, I slept this time. I didn’t believe that it would possible, though all the media was full of the news and speculations about its possibility. Like before the WWII (I re-read Remarque recently, first time in the original). Then I got the news, and it was shock, horror and descent into the abyss. I still feel more or less the same feelings. I can't get used to the war. Hope that neither are you, my friends. Somehow this lack of habituation seems important to me. And I wish all of us happy new year, I wish us the year of the end of the war. As they say in Ukraine, Слава Украине, героям слава! (Glory to Ukraine, Glory to Heroes!) and русский военный корабль, иди на хуй! (Russian warship, go fuck yourself!) (Pardon my French). Cheers, my friends!
From the parable of the lost cane:
And foresooth, the elderly, slightly plump guy was leaning against the gate and absently hung his stick upon the gate, commenting to his comrades that he liked the hook in the cane because he could hang it on his belt and not forget it.
Whereupon, when the time was at hand, the group left. Only later, did the elderly, slightly plump, and really stoopid guy realize that he had lost his cane. Happily, his comrades indulged his dopiness and returned to find his stick still heroically hanging where he had left it.
And yea, what was lost has now been found.
-
St. Charles, Illinois 41.948849, -88.306355
October 11, 2022
COPYRIGHT 2022 by JimFrazier All Rights Reserved. This may NOT be used for ANY reason without written consent from Jim Frazier.
20221011_120825(1)1366x768
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. The whole images from these series are already on my insta and behance www.behance.net/gallery/140662555/Give-Peace-a-Chance-%28..., but without these texts)
I suppose that’s how the war is affecting us – as the dead man in the room. The war takes lives, whole or in pieces, not just from its direct victims – murdered, crippled, psychically traumatized, banished. I’m in another country, in thousands of kilometers from the immediate war zone. But I feel that it takes my life as well. How do you feel in these days, the 2nd month, my friends? I'd really appreciate it if you’ll share your sensations. As I mentioned earlier in this series, I have mixed, artistic and scientific, set of mind and now trying to use this explosive mix in my participation in this World Anti-War I.
To be continued…
I want to speak more about these dark times, to show, to see and to learn myself. To do something together to get out of this dark. Alive and sane if possible. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side”, “from the stolen country”. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that.
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. The whole images from these series are already on my insta and behance www.behance.net/gallery/140662555/Give-Peace-a-Chance-%28..., but without these texts)
Maybe now we need the new definition – Ruzzia (Ruzia?) which one shouldn’t mix with Russia, because they aren’t mixing, though geographically coexist. I have some trouble writing this word (those letters, which looks obscene and filthy now), as could be if I’ll try to draw swastika or do the Nazi salute: my hand don’t want to.
To be continued…
(Continuation. Please see the previous images and the story of Dunja In Timelessness series if you feel like that).
Dunja, my closest friend, sister in arts, favorite model and hero of so many of my photo-tales, several times was about to come to me, 100 km away from her town, to make photos. Never made it yet till this last photo-op. Once she wrote me something like “What for? There are still no more photos from the last time”. I made a conclusion, that Dunja was discouraged because of this. I promised to make up for it. Of course, Dunja understand, that I couldn’t make art any time, art hfve its own mysterious ways. And we made art many times, and every time it was an immense joy (see the album Dunja). Nevertheless. So, today, at World Photography Day, which seems symbolic for me, I made this photo and up to make a couple more. For the beginning. What do you say, my friends? And happy World Photography Day to all of you! May the Photography Force be with you!
(to be continued…)
Confinement to a room for long periods of time could lead to madness if one isn't willing to try anything new within the limited boundaries.
"One aphoristic definition of madness is repeating a behavior that has previously led to disappointing results over and over again, expecting a different outcome each time. Freud coined the concept of “repetition compulsion” around this notion."
Macro Mondays 19/03/18 theme Once Upon A Time
For this theme I choose a Tibetan story from a book of Tibetan Folk Tales, by A.L. Shelton, [1925]
www.sacred-texts.com/asia/tft/tft04.htm
If you are a parable unto yourself--there exists no evil.
Tibetan Proverb.
The Wise Bat
A LONG time ago, a very long time ago, when men and animals spoke to each other and understood the languages of one another, there lived a very powerful king. He lived far off in a corner of the world and alone ruled all the animals and men in his jurisdiction. Around his grounds and palace were great forests and in these forests many birds and animals lived. Every one seemed happy, except the king's wife, and she said that so many birds singing at the same time made such frightful discord that it worried her. One day she asked the king to call them all in and cut off their bills so they couldn't sing any more.
"All right," the king said. "We will do that in a few days."
Now, hanging under the eaves of the palace, close to the queen's room, was a little bat, and though he seemed to be asleep, he heard and understood everything the queen had said. He said to himself, "This is very bad indeed. I wonder what I can do to help all the birds."
The next day the king sent letters by runners into every corner of the kingdom, telling all the birds that by the third day at noon--and it mustn't be forgotten, so put this word down in the center of their hearts--that all of them were to assemble at the palace.
The bat heard the order, but because he was very wise and understood everything he sat very still thinking and thinking about what the queen had said and didn't go to the king's audience on the third day, but waited until the fourth. When he entered, the king said angrily:
"What do you mean by coming on the fourth day when I ordered every one to be here on the third day!" Oh, he was very angry indeed.
The bat replied, "All these birds have no business and can come whenever the king calls, but I have many affairs to look after. My father worked and I too must work. My duty is to keep the death rate from ever exceeding what it should be, in order to govern the sex question, by keeping the men and women of equal numbers."
The king, much surprised, said, "I never heard of all this business before. How does it come that you can do this?"
The bat answered, "I have to keep the day and night equal as well."
The king, more surprised, asked, "How do you do that? You must be a very busy and powerful subject to attend to all these matters. Please explain how you do it."
"Well," the bat replied, "when the nights are short I take a little off the morning, and when the nights are long I take a little off the evening and so keep the day and night equal. Besides, the people don't die fast enough. I have to make the lame and the blind to die at the proper time in order to keep the birth and death rate in proportion. Then sometimes there are more men than women, and some of these men say, 'Yes, yes,' to everything a woman asks them to do and think they must do everything a woman says. These men I just turn into women and so keep the sexes even."
The king understood very well what the bat meant, but didn't allow him to know it. He was very angry with himself because he had agreed to do so quickly what the queen had asked, and thought perhaps the bat might change him into a woman.
"I am not a good king," he thought, "when I listen to a woman's words and yield so easily, and I am terribly ashamed to have given this order. I'll just not do what my wife asks, but send these birds all back home and not cut off their bills."
So he called the birds all to him and said, "Heretofore, men haven't known how to mete out punishment and laws for you, but now I am going to make the Cuckoo your king, and what I called you up to-day for is this: I wanted to ask your King and the prime minister, the Hoopoe, to rule wisely, judge justly, and not oppress the people. If big or little come to you in a law-suit you must judge rightly between them and not favor either rich or poor. Now, you may all return to your homes."
But the king in his heart was still angry at the bat because he hadn't obeyed him and came the fourth day instead of the third, and to show him he was the ruler and to be instantly obeyed he gave him a light spanking for his disobedience and then turned him loose.
At 19, The Film Student Has A Near-Death Experience
A true-to-life parable by B.S. Wise
This night, more than two decades ago, RRR*rrrr*rriding my little scooter on the rain-slicked streets of Eagle Rock, California, heading to the college library to watch mad bloodied Viet Nam war documentaries and work more on the my surreal Tarkofskian-Jodorowskyish-Lynchian sci-fi war screenplay/poem/book/reve, it had begun to rain harder, and, huddled in my scarf and jeans jacket, full and downhill speed ahead, I plunged helmetless through a dark intersection lit only by a swaying green light and a streetlamp sputtering like spark-wood
.......SSSSCCCRRReeecCHCHHC**!!*** *CRRAJVDWSKKFFFFKKKFKFK..........
hah....hahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa....ha*BKCHHRSSSHH**KSSSSHH!!!
Brakes locked, I skidded instantly into the oncoming metal of a Vintage Dodge 1972 Station Wagon, and my left leg crumpled against the sharp wing of it, shattering my femur into bone shards sent screaming through the flesh of my inner-thigh. While my scooter quickly disappeared under the car.
I had left gravity...
tumbling...
tumbling...
tumbling through the air, with a fire in the mind.
An odd sensation, for I thought I 'd reached the ground safely and was rolling, rolling somehow protecting my head, but no, catapulting in a great whiz-whirling somersault through the air...
*BAM!* I hit the light pole and crumpled to the street onto my broken leg, which, now unsupported by the femur, snapped at the tibia and fibula into two clean breaks. The leg disappeared under me, broken backwards at the thigh.
Well, I thought I'd lost it, gone was my leg.
I began screaming: "OH MY GOD!! MY LEGGGGGG!!! OH MY GOD MY LEG!! OH MY GOD MY LEG!!! YOU TORE OFF MY LEEEEEEEGG!!!"
And yelling, "YOU COME BACK HERE!!! OH MY GOD MY LEG!!!" at the driver, himself in severe duress, slowly dragging my bike under his car, which scraped and scratched at the street as he slowly drove in a wide bewildered circle.
This man, so like God in the shape and movement of this story, turned out to be an 82-year-old grandfather who rarely drove, his eye-sight failing, but had taken the old boat out just that night to fetch some medicine from the pharmacy for his poor bed-ridden wife.
(O, who knows where even our best intentions will lead us.)
In unending fire of pain, I managed to lift this non-leg out from under me, and saw it there to be all higgely-piggely and zig-zaggedy and just a completely sad and utterly f*cked-up looking leg.
Soaked in rain imagined to be blood, I had a delusion of my foot falling off and my life's water draining away into the gutter and coursing on into the boundless sea....
But then I realized that it was just my shoe that had fallen off from the end of this infernal pain machine leg, and I sunk back towards the curb, adrenalin rush waxing into shock and madness, to experience a rapid-fire series of very lucid and empirically rationalizing epiphanies:
Thinking back to my screenplay, I became excited that I was actually experiencing a small taste of what a soldier whose leg has just been blown off from a land-mine might be feeling and that this was "great stuff" for the writing and film and well because of this event and possibly having to live my life with one leg I would never be called to service should there be a draft in coming wars and any way this isn't even half as bad as that and wasn't all that a jolly good relief and living with one leg or in a wheelchair is so much better than being dead and wow despite my lack of helmet and the simple common sense to wear one I had managed to not to hit my head so thank the Earth Mother and Great Omnisexual Oneness of The Universe for that.
At that moment, I was lifted up and held there by the Living Embodiment of Good Will and angelic potential in all human beings... the local high school football coach, who had just been walking by when the accident happened.
"Lean on me son," he said with a kind, strong, deep voice tenured from years of comforting injuries on the playing field. As I did, a great golden light emanated from his strong coach's arms, illuminating, calming, and warming us like a crackling campfire...
A strange curtain of onlookers with blackened eyes had gathered around us swaying gently, mouths agape, as if submerged zombies lit by a flickering TV set.
This static zombie curtain was then parted by a Biker, who, at first, appeared to me a dark angel come clad in leather to claim my soul for Satan's domain. Revealed to be also an Agent of Good Will, hell-bent and free, he started screaming at me:
"OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! The same thing happened to ME! MAN! I was ridin' along, saw the whole thing, MAN! and *SccrrreeecCHCH* Bam! SAME THING! "
(Now, some of you may recognize these lines and this scenario as being very similar to a throwaway scene in David Lynch's "Wild At Heart." However, I submit to you that the events depicted in this tale of casual vehicular mayhem actually preceded that movie by a few years; so you tell me where the idea comes from? Some would say the collective subconscious, where people do pop up like ideas... I do. Or, maybe it's just a common thing to say to crash victims.)
But I digress, the Biker then incredulously pulled down his pants to show me his numerous scars:
"Check it out, Man! I got metal here! Here! Here! They're gonna put you back together and you're gonna be riding along in no time, Man!! Hey! I gotta go! My bike's parked on the side!"
Then, pants up, he shook my hand, "YOU TAKE CARE BRO!" and was away as Time Itself.
I then knew that...
faraway, so close... angels and zombies do live among us.
(Continuation. See the texts of the earliest images of this series. The whole images from these series are already on my insta and behance www.behance.net/gallery/140662555/Give-Peace-a-Chance-%28..., but without these texts)
Russian journalist Elena Kostyuchenko returned from Ukraine, where she was on assignment for the “Novaya Gazeta”. She told in the interview after returning from the war: “I had derealization for several days. I acted in reality, but I had the feeling of a dream. It's a pretty common feeling around here, a lot of people talk about it. The first few days you just don't believe it. It happens that some kind of nightmare is dreaming, it becomes more and more unpleasant, more terrible and more terrible, but you know that when it reaches some completely unbearable point, you will wake up. And then I arrived, the war is getting worse and worse, now there are dead children, but I still don’t wake up and, apparently, I won’t wake up”. I recognized the same feeling, which I noticed in others as well. It’s just our derealization lasts much longer than several days. Seems that it’s spreading in Russia like almost forgotten now Covid in the pre-war times.
In Russia we aren’t living in the war zone, but we’re very close and in a way at the very epicenter. From Russia are coming the orders and troops. In Russia are returning “the 200th” – the military code word for the dead bodies. So, we’re step by step becoming a little bit crazy. We’re desperately need this nightmare to be over…
To be continued…
I want to speak more about these dark times, to show, to see and to learn myself. To do something together to get out of this dark. Alive and sane if possible. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side”, “from the stolen country”. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that.
(The last of 6 images from the series; other anti-war series are waiting to be presented to your kind attention. The whole tale is on my insta, but once again without these texts).
Here where I live, in Russia, the mask time's not up yet. The war here is masked, incognito. If you don’t want to write this obscene phrase, “special military operation in Ukraine”, how they call those filthy war, in Russia you could write “***” (in Russian it would be “*****”) and even that way you could be busted and fined (as well as for the dove of peace, even children are not allowed to draw doves now). They’re trying to cover it up, like those petty thieves, who are leave heinous evidence. Sadly, there’s the biggest crime with the psychology of petty theft. (Of course, you know that mr Zed’s [these days I’m often recall “Zed is dead, baby, Zed is dead”, though I’m not a big fun of “Pulp Fiction”] soldier boys are nicking and sending home blenders, TV sets, smartphones and even nonferrous metal? One of them told about the latest thing). And they’re eliminating Kievan Rus from the history, from the new textbooks, as well as the country name “Ukraine”. That’s like when you did something utterly wrong, you’re trying to forget it ASAP, to wipe it out the memory completely. Now they’re changing Ukrainian signposts to Russian ones at the occupied territories. Maybe if they’d capture Kiev as they intended (which, happily, didn’t happen), they’d rename it.
The good news – if you’ll write “** ***” (in Russian – “*** *****”), everybody will understand. Another good news – the Resistance in Russia now is everywhere, on the walls, under the bridges, in the parks and the forests. (We’re using the green ribbons, which are perfectly intelligible and prohibited like “** ***”, you could be busted for the green ribbon). The trees and stones are screaming here. Whatever Works, just like Woody Allen said.
(Continuation. See the texts in the earliest images of this series, the uploaded photos at my photostream and the whole series on insta without texts)
I’m so glad and grateful that I could share my feelings with you and to feel your sympathy and support. It really helps to stay sane and alive. In one of the previous posts I was asked in the comment, how to help Russian Digital Resistance which we can see now. I think that to express these support and sympathy sometimes could be priceless and so inspiring. Now in Russia you must try hard for not to turn into Zombie, to stay really alive and kicking trying to stay free and safe, if possible, at the same time. So, thank you so much, my friends!
Also I’ve upload this project on Behance and I’d like to share it wide if possible. Because, as I’ve wrote there, the art could be the powerful weapon in this World Anti-War I were we are now. Here it is www.behance.net/gallery/140662555/Give-Peace-a-Chance-%28...
To be continued…
I want to speak more about these dark times, to show, to see and to learn myself. To do something together to get out of this dark. Alive and sane if possible. Now my photo art become the “photo-diary from the other side”, “from the stolen country”. I’m very welcome you to stay in touch with me on Insta, which now turned to the main site of the Digital Resistance in Russia in spite of becoming the outlaw social media or maybe partly because of that.