this & that

Long time no write. Some of the things which are currently holding my interest:

Black Swan
The Clue Train Manifesto
Ted.com

words & rice

http://freerice.com/index.php

I think what I love best is the simplicity of the idea, its elegance. For some reason, it feels a tad better than simply 'giving away'.

P.S. Don't forget to check out the 'totals' section.

feeding in

It used to be that you could tell about a person by the kind of friends he had or by the kind of books he read... to that I shall add, you can also tell about a person by the kind of RSS feeds he has!

Winter's Song

When nights fall early
In the middle of day
Nothing stirs & silence speaks -
That time of the year is now here.
Everything shivers - air crisp, clear
Ripples of Awarenes spread throughout

market fundamentalism

"Based on the premise that the market is the solution to all the problems of the human race, it is, too, a very religious fundamentalism. It has its own Gospel: The Gospel of St. Growth, of St. Choice..."

- P. Sainath, http://www.india-seminar.com/2001/497/497%20p.%20sainath.htm

Never thought of it this way. makes you think

jobbing an education

http://www.indiatogether.org/2007/nov/edu-jojoe.htm#already

very interesting premise on first being employed & then getting the required education.

"Generally, everyone first studies in anticipation of a job and then searches for a job. What would be better, he says, is if employers first pick up candidates for jobs based on aptitude, direct them to educational courses to develop their particular skills, and upon completion of the courses at the candidate's cost, employ every one of them. This novel approach to employability of rural youth is now over a year old, and has helped some 4000 people get jobs."

Would this work in a non-rural set up as well? Not sure. My only agrument against that would be education helps one in exploring fields and options and by the process of exploration arrive at an area of interest..

this too is me

fucked up i feel at times
the shoulds curving my space

i dissolve into the would-have-beens
or would have

if not for this curve of my body
holding me in

"but this, in which there is no I or you"

"If I was pressed to say why I loved him, I feel my reply could be: "Because it was he, because it was I." (Michel de Montaigne, Book 1, On Affectionate Relationships)

the space between by elena georgiou

stuck in an unnamed place
half way between love and in love,
you call me late at night and ask
if i'm sleeping. i tell you, i'm writing.
you ask about what? love, i say.

when i write about us, i stop myself
from saying we make love or we have sex.
i search for a euphemism that won't bind me,
won't define us. i arrive at the phrase
move together. and only now, in writing
this poem, do i see how fitting it is.

the way we moved together vertically
is what made me want to move with you
horizontally. music joined us,
but even in the joining, i didn't know
how to behave, how much or how little
to say, how to choose to be me.

an old friend told me if i feel
smaller than myself with a lover
this is the wrong lover for me.

yes, i make myself smaller; i shrink
my politics, my conversation. i shrink
in mind, but i grow in body.

and don't think i don't know
when the movements are fluid
we look for ways to draw each other
nearer, name each other soulmates.

i have been a two-time witness
to how easily the soul-thread can be
cut, leaving the so-called soulmate
dangling in an empty world of one.

the same old friend comes back
to say a lover should love
in me what i love in myself.

trouble is, we don't know what we love
in each other. we exchange tapes of songs
to hint at the possibility of a feeling,
admitting nothing, partially exposed
in lyrics so, if pushed, we can deny
we meant the words that way.

we skirt around edges hoping
the space between will stop closeness
because close is where we are
fighting ourselves not to be.

i preach distance to you. i inflict it
on myself. i invent barriers like age-gaps
and bad-timing. but only now, in writing
this poem, do i learn how the word
distance can magnetize lovers.

you obey my demands. you don't
call. we don't speak, but you find
a strand of my hair in your freezer
and i still write with the taste of
you in my mouth.