"Pipe Dreams" by Peter G. Epps

Proof that poets should not be recorded performing their own works.

Curriculum Vitae for Peter G. Epps

Curriculum Vitae for Peter G. Epps

Curriculum Vitae for Peter G. Epps - Upload a Document to Scribd

Read this document on Scribd: Curriculum Vitae for Peter G. Epps

Grab and go for video (DimP demo on TechCrunch)

DimP - A Direct Manipulation Video Player

OK, so this I downloaded right away. Too fun to pass up. :-)

DimP, a direct manipulation video player, lets users drag items on the video screen to move forward and back instead of just via a scroll bar on the bottom of the video. This is not only more fun, but it also allows users to scroll through video to where they want to be “at least two times faster,”

Take a look at the demo video (more on TechCrunch).

Technorati Tags: DimP, techcrunch, video, manipulation, tech, avi

YouTube - Johnny Cash Hurt

YouTube - Johnny Cash Hurt: Odd though it may seem when you just listen to the words, Johnny Cash has really done something with both the articulation and the video production of "Hurt".

Compare it (but don't play the video for your kids) to the Nine Inch Nails original "Hurt."

I can't believe I'm doing this, and you should note carefully that this is not a cover of the same song, but you should consider the possibility that Christina Aguilera's "Hurt" is actually on point with the same themes, only in a more simplified, obvious, and prosy way (like so much contemporary pop, it trades on a dressed-up artificial artlessness). But there's really something in this, albet not so much as in Cash's version of the Nine Inch Nails song.


If that's all wearing you out, I'm here for you! Check out this classic performance of "Ring of Fire" from 1968. A lot of what is already in this song, for Cash, is going to be in "Hurt" eventually....

OK, time for some poetry blogging

Well, when I launched this blog back in 2004, aside from the need to vent on things happenning in the US while I was in Japan, its major purpose was to serve as a vehicle for my poetry.

Well, then, off we go.

I'm prompted to this by a great discussion with Jon Trainer over at personal trainer EX villis CATHEDRA, who has brushed off his quill and, following no less illustrious example than Edward Taylor (though directly inspired by D. A. Carson), has been writing sonnets as reflections on his sermon subjects since Passion week:

a holy week sonnet
dark road
deep, deep

Champ Thornton, Jon's fellow at New Hope Church and coblogger, posted several of Carson's sonnets on Passion week: catch them here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

women in art -- a morphing video

Someone has done a pretty good job of pointing up the abstraction of face shape in visual art by morphing together fitting examples from roughly 500 years of painting since the Renaissance. The interest the abstract painters near the end show in the lines, shapes, color patches, and spacings that say "a beautiful woman" to a viewer from a certain place and time in history--or perhaps, in some measure, from any place and time?--is easier to understand after seeing how these many different faces seem, so often, to share the "same" features. Still, as jon trainer notes (hat tip, and he doesn't express it thus), the ones you'd rather wink at date back a few years. . . .

for what it's worth

Over at my other, newer blog (dedicated to shorter clips, quotes, gnomic utterances, and poetry) I have a series of brief statements of what I believe modeled on the creeds I've been posting, here:

credo iii
Tuesday, February 5th, 2008

I believe Jesus Christ is God being a man, and was already God when the Father sent the Son, and the Spirit fertilized an egg of Mary’s, so that the Son has an actual human body both created in the image of God (as are we all) and genetically linked to his mother; to David; to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; to Noah; and to Adam.

credo ii
Friday, February 1st, 2008

I believe Jesus Christ, the Lord of all believers (we entrust ourselves to Him, agree to cooperate with Him, and know He will transform us), is the same Creator God as the Father and Spirit; yet He is the Son to the Father, Who sends Him to be the Lord of all Creation.

credo i
Thursday, January 31st, 2008

I believe in God the Father, Almighty Creator of all things visible and invisible, near and far, close to Him and close to me.

I believe the Son and the Spirit are this same Creator God.

another helpful summary -- Chalcedon

Symbol of Chalcedon
Following, then, the holy fathers, we unite in teaching all men to confess the one and only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. This selfsame one is perfect both in deity and in humanness; this selfsame one is also actually God and actually man, with a rational soul and a body. He is of the same reality as God as far as his deity is concerned and of the same reality as we ourselves as far as his humanness is concerned; thus like us in all respects, sin only excepted. Before time began he was begotten of the Father, in respect of his deity, and now in these "last days," for us and behalf of our salvation, this selfsame one was born of Mary the virgin, who is God-bearer in respect of his humanness.

We also teach that we apprehend this one and only Christ-Son, Lord, only-begotten - in two natures; and we do this without confusing the two natures, without transmuting one nature into the other, without dividing them into two separate categories, without contrasting them according to area or function. The distinctiveness of each nature is not nullified by the union. Instead, the "properties" of each nature are conserved and both natures concur in one "person" and in one reality. They are not divided or cut into two persons, but are together the one and only and only-begotten Word of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. Thus have the prophets of old testified; thus the Lord Jesus Christ himself taught us; thus the Creed of the Fathers* has handed down to us.

To tell the truth, this one is very nit-pick-able because the language of "natures" is so imbricated in a particular metaphysics of substance, and the incoherence of "before time began" remains inadequately considered to this day. None of which detracts, finally, from the important respects in which this symbol helps to limit the possibilities for understanding Jesus. If you care to try, sorting out which of these clauses is precisely backed by Scripture, and which are less authoritative because more original to this creed, would be a valuable exercise.

apropos of nothing.....

Me, Simpsonized, I guess. :-)

Big White Hat » Autism

Big White Hat » Autism:

Quite a lot of good commentary from this blogger, whose son is autistic. After one unsettling episode, he writes;

I have never been more frightened. My boy went to extreme measures to leave the safety of our home for an enticement he spotted out of the car window. I was helpless. That is one sick feeling.

I have also learned a lot from the well intentioned and imperfect heroes that helped us that day. First, that police officer bled for us. Second, it is human nature to assume parents are negligent. Third, the thank you moments of our lives are awkward. Most folks don’t know how to act. I think the lone ranger and Tonto had the right idea by avoiding the whole situation. I owe those folks a debt of gratitude. But they will never celebrate the fact that my family was reunited.

Lord, I know you must feel sick about the 6 billion children that left your presence to chase after enticements. Bless all of Your rescue workers. Comfort us when we bleed. May we keep our joy fresh and celebrate with You when Your children are reconciled.

Amen.

HEMA - online winkelen

HEMA - online winkelen

This is . . . just brilliant (HT: evangelical outpost).

those crazy Dutch. :-) you gotta love 'em

...some Auden for y'all.

Whose world does this sound like?

The Unknown Citizen
To JS/07/M/378
This Marble Monument is Erected by the State

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the War till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.
Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Installment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A gramophone, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace; when there was war, he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his generation,
And our teachers report that he never interfered with their education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.
(W. H. Auden -- March 1939)

Power Line: Long time gone

Power Line: Long time gone

Scott at Power Line comes through with another musical gem for us:

ah, makes me long for karaoke. Cheers, Rod.

YouTube - Thelonious Monk - Lulu's Back in Town Part 1

YouTube - Thelonious Monk - Lulu's Back in Town Part 1

Just a bit more of the good stuff for ya:


continued here -- 'cuz life is like that.

a great way to summarize

The words are old, and in some cases I think we might be able to say it more clearly in our own language than in the translation of this--but these abiding and widespread agreements ("ecumenical creeds") about what "Christian" means are well worth keeping in mind.

Apostle's Creed	Nicene Creed
1. I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth,	1. We believe in one God the Father, the Almighty, creator of heaven and earth, and of all that is, seen and unseen.
2. And in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, our Lord,	2. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one being [substance] with the Father. Through him all things were made.
3. Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary,	3. For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven; by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made truly human.
4. Suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried; He descended into hell.	4. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death and was buried.
5. The third day he rose again from the dead;	5. On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures;
6. He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.	6. he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
7. From there he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.	7. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.
8. I believe in the Holy Spirit,	8. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]. With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the Prophets.
9. I believe in the holy catholic church, the communion of saints,	9. We believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.
10. The forgiveness of sins,	10. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
11. The resurrection of the body,	11. We look for the resurrection of the dead,
12. And the life everlasting. Amen.	12. and the life of the world to come. Amen.

YouTube - Jerry White's Select Songs / Ragtime Stride Piano Jazz

This is cool for a couple reasons. It's some pretty sweet stride piano, and it has a whole monologue in Thai, too. Not that I know Thai, but I have friends who might. And I like the music, and the oddness of the setting makes it grand. Apparently this was made for Thai soldiers needing orientation to US culture while training here.

YouTube - Vic Fontaine/Benjamin Sisko - The Best Is Yet To Come

YouTube - Vic Fontaine/Benjamin Sisko - The Best Is Yet To Come

Well, I was looking for Sinatra singing it, but hey. . . . look what I found!


(Trek fans: I'm sure you'll agree this was a very good moment in an anticlimactic wrap-up.)

Oh, did you want someone else? Well, here's Tony Bennett singing it.

YouTube - Kansas - Carry On Wayward Son" 1976 Video

YouTube - Kansas - Carry On Wayward Son" 1976 Video

OK, well, this breaks the piano-jazz and tech-geek music & video run, but . . . OK, really.

First of all, it is a great song. Also, get a load of the hair....or don't.



Enjoy.

Power Line: Who says Freddy's dead?

Power Line: Who says Freddy's dead?

I do profit by the perspective over at Power Line, but I much more enjoy the musical and cultural bits. The politics and the music meet in this video, but go read the post for a bit of provocation (in one of the better senses):

Cool.