belgian gothic

[Nightingale, Milwaukee Avenue below Thomas Street]

music swims back to me

Imagine it. A radio playing and everyone here was crazy.
I liked it and danced in a circle.
Music pours over the sense and in a funny way
music sees more than I.
I mean it remembers better; remembers the first night here.

"Music swims back to me," Anne Sexton

[Between Damen Avenue and Winchester Street, above Chicago Avenue]

it came to me the other day

It came to me the other day:
Were I to die, no one would say,
“Oh, what a shame! So young, so full
Of promise — depths unplumbable!”

Instead, a shrug and tearless eyes
Will greet my overdue demise;
The wide response will be, I know,
“I thought he died a while ago.”

For life’s a shabby subterfuge,
And death is real, and dark, and huge.
The shock of it will register
Nowhere but where it will occur.

- John Updike

[Chicago Avenue east of Damen Avenue]

i want a back porch with a swing and a view

[Chicago Avenue east of Damen Avenue]

lost dog!!!!!

[Damen Avenue below Haddon Street]

jim got kicked in the head by a horse last year

Jim got kicked in the head by a horse last year. He went around killing horses for a while, until he ate the insides of a clock and he died.

"Playboy of the Western World," John Millington Synge; ALSO: Twister (1989), Michael Almereyda

[Damen Avenue above Thomas Street]

there aren't any times but new times

Eighteen years have passed, but have they? By gosh, old times certainly are starting all over again.
Old times. Not a bit. There aren't any old times. When times are gone, they're not old, they're dead. There aren't any times but new times.

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), Orson Welles.

[Damen Avenue below Iowa Street]

rain in snow

[Damen Avenue below Division Street]

jessie lee

[Blue Line, Halsted Street at UIC]

searsed

[United 8855, approaching ORD]

headless

[Milwaukee Avenue below North Avenue]

frayed knot

[666 bus headed west]

dawnzerleelight

[Chicago Avenue east of Bosworth Street]

skylines

[Dana Hotel, State Street at Huron Street]

πόλη θεωρείται

[Fullerton Avenue platform, Red Line]

the most common form of despair

The most common form of despair is not being who you are.

~ Kierkegaard

[Chicago Avenue west of Damen Avenue]

♫ let's dance

Let’s dance, for fear tonight is all.

- David Bowie

[Chicago Avenue west of California Avenue.]

with the story of the way it should be

It’s got to be fate that’s doing it
A spooky witch in a sexy dress has been bugging me
With the story of the way it should be
With the story of sebastian and belle the singer

"My Wandering Days Are Over," Belle & Sebastian

[Damen Avenue below Division Street]

an intensified feeling of nonchalance

Jazz is an intensified feeling of nonchalance.

~ Françoise Sagan

[Milwaukee Avenue at Chicago Avenue]

alph

[Chicago Avenue at California Avenue]

"what great theater should be"

[Dearborn Street below Lake Street]

rush

[Chicago Avenue west of California Avenue]

i carry your heart

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

"i carry your heart," ee cummings

[Blue Line platform, at Damen Avenue below North Avenue]

the talent of the room

People who are young at writing—and this does not necessarily mean they’re young in years—ask me, now and again, if I can tell them something useful about the task. Task is my word, not theirs, and it may seem a harsh and formal word, but before writing is anything else it’s a task. Only gradually do you learn enough for it to become a craft. (As for whether writing becomes your art—that isn’t really up to you. The art can be there in the beginning, before you know a thing, or it may never be there no matter what you learn.)

“The only thing you really need,” I tell these people, “is the talent of the room. Unless you have that, your other talents are worthless.” Writing is something you do alone in a room. Copy that sentence and put it on your wall because there’s no way to exaggerate or overemphasize this fact. It’s the most important thing to remember if you want to be a writer. Writing is something you do alone in a room.

"The Talent of the Room," Michael Ventura

[Chicago Avenue east of Damen Avenue]

neither sin nor virtue

In that place there is no happiness or unhappiness,
no truth or untruth
neither sin nor virtue.
there is no day or night, no moon or sun,
there is radiance without light.

Kabir Das

anything

Anything
to keep the Barbarians away
will do.

"The Script," Mónica de la Torre

[Above Chicago Avenue, east of Damen Avenue]

oh you've got green eyes

Up, down, turn around
Please don't let me hit the ground
Tonight I think I'll walk alone
I'll find my soul as I go home.

Oh, you've got green eyes
Oh, you've got blue eyes
Oh, you've got gray eyes
Oh, you've got green eyes
Oh, you've got blue eyes
Oh, you've got gray eyes
And I've never seen anyone quite like you before
No, I've never met anyone quite like you before

"Temptation," New Order

[Above Chicago Avenue, east of Damen Avenue]

i like it here can i stay

---

in the days when you were hopelessly poor
i just liked you more...

i like it here can i stay
I like it here can i stay

"Half a Person," The Smiths

[Above Chicago Avenue, east of Damen Avenue]

morning

[Thomas Street east of Damen Avenue]