East is the sun.
It is red, sacred fire, blood, life,
and success.
West is the moon.
It is black, full of old souls,
and death.
North is the cold.
It is blue and purple, trouble
and defeat lay that way.
South is the warmth.
It is white, peace, happiness
and may you find yourself there.
– Marya Ophir
My uncle, George Bleich, seems to be having a hard time recently. He’s been an inspiration for me most of my life as someone whose been able to make a living at doing what he loves, art. Recently, via a story as long as a 10 year soap opera, he’s close to having his house foreclosed.
He’s having a sale on his original paintings. Check it out here.
Also, he has high quality prints which he touches up himself and often paints on the back and adds poetry. Check that out here.
His paintings are extraordinary. Here’s but one example:
Click on the painting above to see the poem he wrote to go with it.
George’s homepage is here. You’ll find all kinds of creative stuff there, including political opinion (some which I disagree with but love reading), songs, paintings, and poetry. You’ll even find very graphic photos of what happened to his foot after a stay in the hospital after hip surgery! They’re pretty harrowing so brace yourself!
The world is a great flat island
resting precariously on the surface of the waters
suspended from the vault of the sky by four cords
attached at each point of cardinal direction.
The sky is an inverted bowl, a vault of solid rock.
It rises, it falls — twice each day.
Once at dawn, once at dusk
allowing passage of moon of sun.
There is the upper world, this world, and the underworld.
That is all.
Afterwards there are only the waters.
The upper world is structure, expectableness,
boundaries, limits, periodicity,
order, stability, time past
- and -
sun god, fire god, thunder god, rain god, moon god.
The Lower world is inversions, madness, invention,
fertility, disorder, change, time future
- and-
cannibals, ghosts, man-killers,
witches, monsters, various thunder spirits.
Our world is a precarious blend,
a balancing act between upper world and lower world,
between fire and water that shall not meet
less they both extinguish the other.
Our world is long leaf and slash pines, magnolias,
cypress, live oaks, sluggish meandering rivers,
innumerable swamps, cypress and cane, blackberries,
palmettos, gooseberries, grapes, prickly pears, sea grapes,
beavers, otters, raccoons, muskrats, opossums,
squirrels, rabbits, cougars, bobcats, foxes, wolves,
turkeys, snakes, turtles, terrapins, alligators, crawfish,
crabs, clams, mussels, oysters, sassafras, poplar,
blackberry, sycamore, sweet gum, persimmon, chestnuts,
hickory nuts, hazelnuts, walnuts, butternuts, chinquapins,
and us.
– Marya Ophir
From catharcyst:
they say that magic is unkempt
and it is the way i conduct my existence
Shame on they …
From oh sweet death come for me: what a week:
The kitchen table is covered in white cotton,
and I am drinking a cup full of ants.
Also neat, cool dream poem.
