My job.

pen under eyewear
Pelikan M400 Souverän, medium nib, c. 1980, says "W. Germany" in caplip metal. Noodler's permanent red

pen adjacent to eyewear
Pelikan M200, burgundy, medium nib, c. 2000. Noodler's permanent black

Maria Damon & Ira Livingston's Poetry and Cultural Studies: A Reader (U of Illinois, 2009). "It is time for this book. Poetry is studied more and more frequently with a cultural studies approach, and Damon and Livingston provide the perfect balance in this collection." Juliana Spahr

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gandhiji 1-30-1948 goodbye again

Kabira kharā bāzārameṅ,
liye kuḷhārā hātha.

Śiśa utāre, bhuīṅ dhare
cale hamāre sātha.

Kabīr says
"I am here with an axe
calling you.

Only one ready
to chop off her head
and throw it in the dust
can come with me."

mindfulness practice leads to increases in regional brain gray matter density

"[MRI] analyses in a priori regions of interest confirmed increases in gray matter concentration within the left hippocampus. Whole brain analyses identified increases in the posterior cingulate cortex, the temporo-parietal junction, and the cerebellum in the *MBSR group compared with the controls. The results suggest that participation in MBSR is associated with changes in gray matter concentration in brain regions involved in learning and memory processes, emotion regulation, self-referential processing, and perspective taking."

Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging

Volume 191, Issue 1, Pages 36-43 (30 January 2011)

*MBSR, as near as I can tell, appears to be at core a kind of vipassana.

"Over the December holidays, my husband went on a 10-day silent meditation retreat. Not my idea of fun, but he came back rejuvenated and energetic.

"He said the experience was so transformational that he has committed to meditating for two hours a day, once in the morning and once in the evening, until the end of March. He’s running an experiment to determine whether and how meditation actually improves the quality of his life.

"I’ll admit I’m a skeptic. [I'm not]

"But now, scientists say that meditators like my husband may be benefiting from changes in their brains. The researchers report that those who meditated for about 30 minutes a day for eight weeks had measurable changes in gray-matter density in parts of the brain associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress. The findings will appear in the Jan. 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging."

- New York Times, Health Section blog, Jan 21 2011

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he manga wai koia kia kore e whitikia

one of my favorite youtube videos and i'm not sure why

paul gamache, former holder of the world record for freefall waterfall descent in a kayak, 108 ft, runs smith river oregon hole gorge on california oregon border at flood stage, 80,000 cubic feet/sec, heavily aerated water too small boat

i don't really know what bruni's singing, so it's not her words necessarily. maybe the song's melodic/rhythmic structure somehow matches the river. maybe it's just: who does this? who runs a river like this?

[there is some strong speech from a clearly good humored but naturally concerned person who is standing near the camera as his friend fights for his life]

For what is it to me that rivers run whole ages and their streams are never done 

- Henry Vaughan

Do not save love

for things

Throw things

to the flood

- Lorine Niedecker, wisconsinite

thanks to paul gamache for how to ride a cause of death, allhearted, potamophile

on thurs march 5 2009 paul gamache ceased being the world's record holder for freefall descent in a kayak that record was then held by pedro olivia at salto bello falls 127' on the rio sacre in brazil a tributary of the amazon in a jackson kayak rocker using a snap dragon spray skirt in 70 degree water but the new record is held by tyler bradt who april 21 2009 paddled off palouse falls in washington state 186' but clearly there is no world record for being allhearted there is a pali word sabbecittam which means allhearted that giant eddy line and that cabin sized recirculating hole don't do that again paul gamache or use a larger boat maybe

"Participating in an 8-week mindfulness meditation program appears to make measurable changes in brain regions associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress. In a study that will appear in the January 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, a team led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers report the results of their study, the first to document meditation-produced changes over time in the brain's grey matter....

Previous studies from Lazar's group and others found structural differences between the brains of experienced mediation practitioners and individuals with no history of meditation, observing thickening of the cerebral cortex in areas associated with attention and emotional integration. But those investigations could not document that those differences were actually produced by meditation."

[The kind of meditation mentioned in the study is called MBSR (Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction), which is, from what I can gather, more or less a medicalized name for what appears to be a kind of vipassana]

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The momentum given ... by passage through sorrow is missing when peace is sought through avoidance. A flat life of calibrated retreat may appear placid and ordered to neighbors, but those who live minimally and timidly tread water, enduring a life of chronic anxiety-depression.

Cultivating Inner Peace, Paul R Fleischman, MD, psychiatrist and Vipassana Acariya

Give not thyself up, then, to fire, lest it invert thee, deaden thee; as for the time it did me. There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness. And there is a Catskill eagle in some souls that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges, and soar out of them again and become invisible in the sunny spaces. And even if he for ever flies within the gorge, that gorge is in the mountains; so that even in his lowest swoop the mountain eagle is still higher than other birds upon the plain, even though they soar.

Moby-Dick, chpt 96