Tag Archives: prose

Far Reaching Effects Of Visual Culture In Our World Of Appearances

Dusty book stall archeologist and writer Jonathan Guyer oversees the far reaching effects of visual culture in our modern ‘all about appearances’ world.

Jonathan Guyer on CBC -Canada Broadcasting Corporation 

Through frequent excursions to the bookshops of downtown Cairo in Egypt,  Guyer has unearthed a wealth of forgotten political narratives and overlooked illustrative histories. Book-ending his fascination with the alternative story lines of locally appropriated Western comics, Guyer’s faith in the ethical and ideological potential of cartoons and satirical imagery extends to the underground artistic movements of contemporary self-published zine-makers. In his eloquent interview, the prolific and level-headed writer remarks on welcome shifts in the Middle Eastern visual landscape, the necessary and terrifying obligations of artists, and the autonomy of art in an authoritative society.

Bascha Mon Prince Street Rag oil on canvas

Adaptive and indomitable painter Bascha Mon has traced each frame of light between the new and full moons. Bound to spontaneity and guided by intuition, Mon’s practice feels out a logic from the sanctuary and purgatory of a blank canvas. Impelled by the psychic pains of a laboring human family, Mon retrieves the fragments of her commiserating heart from the cold grasp of reality, like pulling her distorted reflection from the surface of the water. Expressed in her stirring and poignant interview, Mon’s necessary attachment to art conceals a deep solidarity with the misplaced souls of the Earth, who struggle to make sense of an existence where whimsy and intense meaning coexist. The sage observer and painter is never dissatisfied by an individual work, as no piece is anything less than perfect if it belongs to a whole.

Shipping Container is a book on Literary Theory by Craig Martin

Reading something interesting?

Tom Allen, is ensnared by the vehement poems of mid 19th century writer Jules Laforgue, the progenitor of free verse in the French tradition and treasure to the great modernist poets. Laforgue fashioned his fervent style of observation from the fiery idealism of the symbolists and the microcosmic subjectivity of impressionism. Another one of our users, Niels Van Tomme, is pleasantly amused by the playful and engaging Shipping Container, Craig Martin’s contribution to the Object Lessons series. Martin’s colorful prose enlivens the itinerant existence of this ubiquitous transport vessel, the unsung hero of our convenient and mobile world.

Urging the flow of time and water is the promise of change made by a fork in the stream.

For the Silo, Brainard Carey.

Touching Is Our First Form Of Communication

Looks familiar? Uh huh. This image is reworked from the original LP Invisible Touch by Genesis on Virgin Records. CP

 

The moment we become parents we use our sense of touch to communicate with our brand new baby.  I will never forget that first moment in my each of my babies lives, when they started to experience and explore the world completely independently of me.  The first thing I did was reach out to my newborn and without exchanging a single sound, we were instantly familiar to each other.

The research that outlines the benefits of touch and infant massage is extensive.  Any expert will go on and on about how there is a fancy chemical reaction going on in my brain (central nervous system) that releases a feel-good hormone (serotonin) that counters stress hormones (cortisol) and that is why I feel that connection with my newborn.  What I actually experience in those first moments of my child’s new life is nothing short of magical.

This is not meant to imitate the many hundreds of articles that are already out there that outline the benefits of Pediatric Massage Therapy, but there is a little Massage Therapist inside me that cannot encourage you enough to explore it.   Children ages 0-99 can benefit from Registered Massage Therapy, but in the mean time treatment can start at home or even heart beats after birth.

 

Just a few of the types of baby massages. image: yogawiz.com
Just a few of the types of baby massages. image: yogawiz.com

 

 

After spending much time looking for a nursery rhyme that could incorporate a meaningful massage into its singsong format, I decided to write my own for you to try:

Bedtime Butterfly Kisses

Belinda the beautiful butterfly was bouncing on a breeze

Gracefully she glided to give my shoulder a squeeze

“How do you do?” Belinda sung so sweet.

“May I rest here while my heart slows a beat?”

She stopped but a moment before she began to explore

Hugging my arm she looked way down to the floor.

Three times she wandered from shoulder to finger

But I liked her so I indulged, and hoped she would linger.

Perched in my hand, she started stroking my palm

It tickled before I realized it made me feel calm.

She drew circles and hearts with her nose on my skin

Before she giggled and climbed back up to my chin.

With a fluttering kiss to my cheek she gently rubbed my head

And then softly she whispered, “Baby, time for bed.”

Though my eyelids are heavy I try to protest

To forget Belinda when I wake I’d deeply regret

Belinda’s wings push the air across my sleepy face

Like angel kisses made out of the most delicate lace

“Rest well little one,” She sings, “And think not of sorrow.

If you go to sleep now I can come back tomorrow.”

You can be creative and pretend your own hand is a butterfly.  I used an inexpensive IKEA  (Gulleplutt .99$ CP) finger puppet. Don’t let you imagination stop there.  As your child grows out of silly rhymes consider getting creative and making an imaginary pizza on your kiddo’s back, belly or palm. What about planting a garden and watching it grow?

I can give you more research that indicates why it is important to perform these treatments at the same time each day, in a calm space with a warm blanket and yadda yadda, but experience has taught me that even when my son or daughter is in middle of their wildest meltdown behavioral state; a nurturing touch with loving intent is the only cure. For the Silo, Jenny Tansley.

Jenny Tansley