If you still have oneIf you still have one
“One of the greatest gifts you can give anybody is the gift of your honest self.” — Fred “Mister” Rogers (quoted by Rob Owen in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
Author: Tetman Callis
PeoplePeople
David, Dan & Jeff, from The Compton-Kids, Series #1 (copyright by Tetman Callis)
Damning the torpedoesDamning the torpedoes
“When you do not take fortune at her offer you must take her as you can find her.” — Admiral David Farragut, 1864 (quoted in The Civil War: A Narrative, by Shelby Foote)
To get there from hereTo get there from here
“Oh, for more faith and clearer sight! How stable is the City of God! How disordered the City of Man!” — Salmon P. Chase, 1864 (quoted in The Civil War: A Narrative, by Shelby Foote)
A usual cruel punishmentA usual cruel punishment
“Every day, at least fifty thousand men—a full house at Yankee Stadium—wake in solitary confinement, often in ‘supermax’ prisons or prison wings, in which men are locked in small cells, where they see no one, cannot freely read and write, and are allowed out just once a day for an hour’s solo ‘exercise.’ (Lock yourself in your bathroom and then imagine you have to stay there for the next ten years, and you will have some sense of the experience.)” – Adam Gopnik, “The Caging of America”
Welcome to LockuptownWelcome to Lockuptown
“For most privileged, professional people, the experience of confinement is a mere brush, encountered after a kid’s arrest, say. For a great many poor people in America, particularly poor black men, prison is a destination that braids through an ordinary life, much as high school and college do for rich white ones. More than half of all black men without a high-school diploma go to prison at some time in their lives. Mass incarceration on a scale almost unexampled in human history is a fundamental fact of our country today—perhaps the fundamental fact, as slavery was the fundamental fact of 1850. In truth, there are more black men in the grip of the criminal-justice system—in prison, on probation, or on parole—than were in slavery then. Over all, there are now more people under ‘correctional supervision’ in America—more than six million—than were in the Gulag Archipelago under Stalin at its height. That city of the confined and the controlled, Lockuptown, is now the second largest in the United States.” – Adam Gopnik, “The Caging of America” (emphasis in original)
And a dismal placeAnd a dismal place
“A prison is a trap for catching time.” – Adam Gopnik, “The Caging of America”
Suck on it, prosersSuck on it, prosers
“If you look at the history of literature, poetry is the one enduring genre from Homer to Ashbery—no other literary form has lasted as long. The novel is only two or three hundred years old…” – Jonathan Galassi (from Nathalie Handal interview in Guernica)
First, last, and alwaysFirst, last, and always
“Not every writer is going to be immortal, even writers who are very popular in their lifetime often sink out of relevance later on. You have to write for yourself finally.” – Jonathan Galassi (from Nathalie Handal interview in Guernica)
If you’re ever wondering what it takesIf you’re ever wondering what it takes
“Really being a writer is being at home and writing your book and reading.” – Jonathan Galassi (from Nathalie Handal interview in Guernica)
There it isThere it is
“My day is not yet done: the finest hour is over the low wall.” – Eugenio Montale, “Glory of Expanded Noon” (trans. Galassi)
“Road Rave” published by Fox Chase Review“Road Rave” published by Fox Chase Review
Fox Chase Review has published my story, “Road Rave,” as part of their Autumn/Winter 2012 issue. I could post a link here that would take you straight to the story, but instead I’ll post the link that takes you to the front page. It’s a nice-looking page. From there you can find your way to my story if you like.
http://www.foxchasereview.org/
In about three months, if I remember, and I probably will, and if I’m still alive and healthy, as I hope to be, I’ll add the story to my “Previously Published Stories” widget hereabouts.
Rising and fallingRising and falling
“We sometimes think that the historical imagination is the gift of seeing past — seeing past the surface squalors of an era to the larger truths. Really, history is all about seeing in, looking hard at things to bring them back to life as they were, while still making them part of life as it is.” — Adam Gopnik, “Inquiring Minds”
No more than sixty poundsNo more than sixty pounds
“We can see our souls in the contents of our baggage. Pack too much and we risk being weighed down by the place we’re trying to leave. Pack too little and we risk losing ourselves.” — Stefany Anne Goldberg, “You Can Take It with You”
Because…Because…
Because why the hell not…
The imp of the originalThe imp of the original
“Originality (unless in minds of very unusual force) is by no means a matter, as some suppose, of impulse or intuition. In general, to be found, it must be elaborately sought, and although a positive merit of the highest class, demands in its attainment less of invention than negation.” — Edgar Allan Poe, “The Philosophy of Composition”
Hello, darkness, my old friendHello, darkness, my old friend
“Silence is not nothing, it’s something.” – Michel Hazanavicius (quoted by Tad Friend in “Sound of Silence”)
Challenger deepChallenger deep
“The dream of being a writer and the crazy price one has to pay for excellence are impossible to demonstrate or, really, even to fathom.” – John Lahr, “A Talent to Abuse”
And none of them involve snark attacksAnd none of them involve snark attacks
“Don’t ever forget that you’re a citizen of this world, and there are things you can do to lift the human spirit, things that are easy, things that are free, things that you can do every day.” – Aaron Sorkin, Syracuse University commencement speech, 2012.
Don’t look nowDon’t look now
“Show me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser.” – Peter Thiel (quoted by George Packer in “No Death, No Taxes”)
If you know what to look forIf you know what to look for
“Whereas instruction doesn’t always delight, delight always instructs.” — Martin Amis, “Laureate of Terror”
Don’t go walkin’ slowDon’t go walkin’ slow
It’s three hundred million guns loaded now…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mvexn-UWqq8
And other servants besidesAnd other servants besides
“When you cut the heads off your rich folks, you end up with a lot of unemployed chefs.” – Marc Meltonville (quoted by Lauren Collins in “The King’s Meal”)
Or her or it or all three, plusOr her or it or all three, plus
“The history of mankind is the history of our misunderstandings with god, for he doesn’t understand us, and we don’t understand him.” – José Saramago, Cain (trans. Costa)
Is it the same note?Is it the same note?
“A wrong note that is played out of élan, you hear it differently than one that is played out of fear.” – Hélène Grimaud (quoted by D. T. Max in “Her Way”)
Not to mention the rest of human cultureNot to mention the rest of human culture
“Without stories, memory falters; and without memory imagination fails.” – Peter Schjeldahl, “Faces in Time”
We’re all girls nowWe’re all girls now
“That spirit of performativity you have about your citizenship now? That sense that someone’s peering over your shoulder, watching everything you do and say and think and choose? That feeling of being observed? It’s not a new facet of life in the 21st century. It’s what it feels like for a girl.” — Rahel Aima, “Desiring Machines”
Pretty people earn morePretty people earn more
“In the world of women’s work, how one looks is as important, if not more important, than what one does: The existential anxiety of identity creation is also economic and social anxiety, because the penalties for nonconformity are so high. Feminine mystique becomes identity itself. The woman who does not possess it, the ugly woman, the overweight woman, the older woman, the woman of color who will not straighten her hair or bleach her skin, is assumed, in a very real sense, to be invisible. She is overlooked on the street, at parties, on dating websites, at job interviews. She is dogged by a feeling of unreality; she does not exist, and if she dares to ‘be herself,’ she is stunned to find that, since her social legitimacy is contingent on artifice, that self is not a legitimate social construct.” — Laurie Penny, “Model Behavior”
Penalties assessed for failure to complyPenalties assessed for failure to comply
“When beauty becomes mandatory, it ceases to be about fun, about play. Dressing up, playing with gender roles, doing your braids badly in the mirror, and eating half your mother’s lipstick in an attempt to get it on your face: Do you remember when that used to be fun? And do you remember when it stopped? Like any game, the woman game stops being fun when you start playing to win, especially if you’ve got no choice: Win or be ridiculed, win or become invisible, dismissed — disturbed.” — Laurie Penny, “Model Behavior”
From the entertaining to the extraordinary to the astoundingFrom the entertaining to the extraordinary to the astounding
There’s this: