Thursday, February 3, 2011

the thing perhaps is to eat flowers and not to be afraid


Since I can remember, a beautiful silkscreen print hung at the top of the third story staircase at my grandparents home in Jacksonville, FL. When they passed away, I asked to take the print, and it now hangs in my bedroom, right next to my bed so it is the first thing I see every morning. I recently googled the artist name at the bottom of the print, and only found a site of a production company that worked on a documentary about her work on the MARTA in Atlanta, GA. I left a message on the "contact us" part and was delighted when the artist herself emailed me back! I'm still hoping to see more work of this amazing artist, Barbara Brozik.
The quote comes from a beautiful poem by e.e. cummings, copied & pasted from here: 

voices to voices, lip to lip
i swear(to noone everyone) constitutes
undying; or whatever this and that petal confutes...
to exist being a peculiar form of sleep

what's beyond logic happens beneath will;
nor can these moments be translated: i say
that even after April
by God there is no excuse for May

-bring forth your flowers and machinery: sculpture and prose
flowers guess and miss
machinery is the more accurate, yes
it delivers the goods,Heaven knows

(yet are we mindful, though not as yet awake,
of ourselves which shout and cling, being
for a little while and which easily break
in spite of the best overseeing)

i mean that the blond abscence of any program
except last and always and first to live
makes unimportant what i and you believe;
not for philosophy does this rose give a damn...

bring on your fireworks,which are a mixed
splendor of piston and of pistil; very well
provided an instant may be fixed
so that it will not rub, like any other pastel.

(While you and i have lips and voices which
are for kissing and to sing with
who cares if some oneyed son for a bitch
invents an instrument to measure Spring with?

each dream nascitur, is not made...)
why then to Hell with that: the other; this,
since the thing perhaps is
to eat flower and not to be afraid.

3 comments:

  1. What a beautiful post! I love that print soo much! It is amazing! xo Samantha

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  2. thank you! i know, i really treasure it! xo

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  3. I have some of her prints i snagged from my mom. Love them

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