Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of ambient drone and related genres and subgenres. It’s that time of year, I guess, what with the prolonged agony of summer’s slow death and an unusual amount of August rain saturating my consciousness. For example, I finally got around to listening to Grouper and, whoa, I could dissolve into Liz Harris’s music. Late to the game I am as usual, but at least she’s still very much around and making music unlike the old post-punk bands I discover in my restless musical wanderings through the digital wilds of YouTube. I was uncertain as to what Grouper song to post here, as she produces a wide range of sounds, all of which are different yet also strangely alike. So this is not so much representative of her work as a whole, falling more along the stripped-down formal songwriting end of her spectrum (as opposed to the looped-out drone end), but hopefully for those unfamiliar it offers a porthole from which to swim out into the depths of her catalog.
new grouper groupie
Posted by sean on August 16, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/08/16/new-grouper-groupie/
10-point plan to make america great again
- Establish a colony for alt-right white supremacists and their apologists in the Texas/Oklahoma region. Evacuate the existing liberals (mostly urban-dwelling) and erect a 20-foot wall around the entire territory. The alt-righters will then be free to establish martial law, shoot their guns, maintain their genetic purity, etc.
- Legalize marijuana in the remainder of the country. Immediately establish a network of public-private partnership clinics to transition opioid-addicted indiviuals over to marijuana use, with an eye toward eventual tapering off the marijuana. Exceptions to this tapering process will be made for those with legitimate chronic physical pain and those in need of palliative care due to chronic disease such as cancer, glaucoma, etc.
- Release all incarcerated drug offenders with only nonviolent convictions on their records from prison. Use the billions of dollars in cost savings to establish comprehensive re-entry programs for these individuals.
- Establish a review board system to examine cases of all remaining incarcerated individuals. Those approved for release will be transitioned through a network of rehabilitative programs in rural areas employing a variety of agricultural and animal therapy techniques, with the eventual goal of reintegration into society. Note: It is expected that a certain percentage of individuals will remain incarcerated. This would include those who show no remorse at all for their crimes and no potential for rehabilitation, and instead display a strong inclination to harm others again.
- Create training programs within the now-burgeoning legal marijuana industry for all individuals involved in the illicit drug trade and any interested ex-offenders. Opportunities will be available at all stages: growing, harvesting, packaging and shipping, sales and marketing, as well as in peripheral businesses such as creation and sale of edibles, paraphernalia, etc.
- Gut the vacant prisons and jails and renovate them into free housing for people without homes, complete with community gardens and on-site health clinics.
- Using tax revenues generated from the marijuana industry in combination with more of the enormous savings from closing most jails and prisons, establish free and easily accessible health care to all those who need it.
- Institute a robust nationwide program to divert edible food “waste” from landfills and instead use it to prepare meals to feed those who are hungry.
- Restore all ancestral lands to remaining Native American tribes. Form partnerships between newly resettled indigenous Americans and current residents with a long-term goal of restoring the natural balance between humans and the environment.
- Initiate planning process to dismantle capitalism in favor of a cashless barter economy, thus releasing the country’s citizens from the bonds of corporate control established and maintained via the insidious promotion and facilitation of mindless consumerism.
Posted by sean on August 14, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/08/14/10-point-plan-to-make-america-great-again/
life won’t leave us alone
When we close the windows and doors of our house and stay inside, we feel very secure, we feel safe, unmolested. But life is not like that. Life is constantly knocking at our door, trying to push open our windows that we may see more; and if out of fear we lock the doors, bolt all the windows, the knocking only grows louder. The closer we cling to security in any form, the more life comes and pushes us. The more we are afraid and enclose ourselves, the greater is our suffering, because life won’t leave us alone. We want to be secure but life says we cannot be; and so our struggle begins.
Posted by sean on August 14, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/08/14/life-wont-leave-us-alone/
seefeel – ‘through you’
days of nothing to say, nothing to write–only music to transpose feeling from within
Posted by sean on August 10, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/08/10/seefeel-through-you/
friday at black marsh and environs
Black Marsh Wildlands Area, Edgemere, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Little Blue Heron at Black Marsh Wildlands Area, Edgemere, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Eastern Box Turtle at North Point State Park, Edgemere, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Rose Pink (Sabatia angularis) at North Point State Park, Edgemere, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Spicebush Swallowtail at North Point State Park, Edgemere, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Eastern Cottontail at North Point State Park, Edgemere, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Not depicted: (1) the Eastern Ratsnake that beat a hasty retreat from the trail it was attempting to cross when it sensed my approach; (2) the White-tailed Deer fawn that bolted from its hiding spot adjacent to the trail as I came upon it; (3) the 30+ other species of birds I saw and/or heard.
Posted by sean on August 4, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/08/04/friday-at-black-marsh-and-environs/
widow skimmer
A female Widow Skimmer dragonfly at Prettyboy Reservoir, Baltimore County, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
Note: While I initially thought this was a female, widow skimmers are sexually dimorphic, meaning that even though the mature males and females look different, the immature males look similar to the females (this is also not uncommon in birds). A good way to separate the sexes is by their terminal appendages, as nicely illustrated in this post by Walter Sanford. The female has two, while the male has three. In order to determine this, one needs a clear close-up view. Unfortunately the resolution of my images is not quite high enough to determine the sex for certain. When I have the image magnified, it looks to me like there is possibly an epiproct present, but because of the angle of the shot I can’t be sure.
UPDATE: Walter Sanford stopped by and identified it as a female (see comments). Thanks, Walter!
Posted by sean on July 28, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/07/28/widow-skimmer/
when spirits decide
the planchette inscribed
ovals on the board
stay or go
we had asked
a reply of stay
led to a why
ovals came back
first spelled out
then drawn
over and over and over.
Posted by sean on July 25, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/07/25/when-spirits-decide/
gate – trees
Posted by sean on July 25, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/07/25/gate-trees/
tree deity
‘Tree Herder’ sculpture from recycled materials by Paul Rodriguez, found trailside @ Lake Roland, Balt County, Maryland, USA. © 2017 S. D. Stewart
I came upon this woodland spirit during a sweltering late morning hike/bird walk. I’m thankful that it’s there watching over the trees. I was surprised at how many fellow humans were also out sweating in the woods. Trail people are always so friendly, even when it’s in the upper 90s and the humidity feels like we’re all floating in warm bathwater. One runner stopped to talk birds for a few minutes. Others just smiled or said ‘Good morning!’ One of my admittedly unscientific axioms, solely based in anecdotal evidence, is that people are much likelier to make eye contact and greet each other in the woods than they are on the street. Why is this? It is the power of the trees, I suspect. We are all happier in the woods, whether we know it or not. Nature has a calming effect and these days that effect is needed more than ever. As always at this time of year I have been struggling with the heat and not going to the woods has made it worse. But today I took up arms in the face of summer’s brutality and I’m glad that I did. For me there is no substitute for a couple of hours amidst the greens and browns of the forest. I feel it is my true home.
Posted by sean on July 23, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/07/23/tree-deity/
spatial divide
Black sky of crows crowns mornings, bookends to nights of ferocious dream violence
[can an empty space feel occupied—be occupied—with no bodies present]
Jackal fear circles, breathing hidden threat-breath, by unknown summons
[can shadows of bodies, once (they have) / left, still linger, filling space once occupied]
Inside, a wavy line descends, evens out, climbs a steep peak—teeters—declines again
[two containers—one infinite, one finite—hold space—connecting valves open and shut to control in/voluntary flow—allowance for expansion / contraction]
Outside, surrounding space—unbroken—limbs recede at the height of uncertainty
(11-12.14 / 7.17)
Posted by sean on July 23, 2017
https://lostgander.wordpress.com/2017/07/23/spatial-divide/
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