Showing posts with label fashion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fashion. Show all posts

Wednesday, 16 April 2014

MASKE (NIGHT OF THE BLOOD MOON)

I went to the place where the wild things are
last night, on the trail of the blood moon;
I followed stardust and scalpel stones
to the place beside the runes.



I held my palms, out,
for all the readers to see,
to make what they could of the threads that bind me
behind the smudging
     and the tearing
     and the rearranging
of my soul.




The blood moon passed over
I was bathed in blood
I paid in pain of a different sort
from a different source;

from the place where the wild things are
to the place where the unspeakables are
to the place where the silent are
remembering.

© Shaista Tayabali, 2014


Phyllis Galembo, professor of fine art at Albany University in New York, celebrates the ritual of masquerade in her portrait photography from Nigeria, Haiti, Zambia, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Burkina Faso and Benin. The carnival characters are rooted in African religion and spirituality, and among the materials plundered are lizard excrement, sugar syrup, tar, coal dust, leaves, cowry shells, sisal. 
Over at the dverse poets pub, the poets have thrown open the floor to interpretation.
I've been wanting to write something about the blood moon, and passover, so last night, I did… 

Sunday, 20 October 2013

A WARRIOR DANCES IN AUTUMN

The most important thing, when you are terribly late, is to make an entrance...
Masked warrior is my best bet tonight at the 6th Annual Willow Manor Ball, where festivities have been swinging for hours already and Tom Hanks has probably already swiped all of the caviar dressing. It helps the Warrior Style (I feel) to turn up without a date, for how can a mere man compete with this vast crinoline silhouette (no room for him in the doorway!)... 
This haute couture robe à la française is the Maria-Louisa for Christian Dior by John Galliano, and I know exactly what you are thinking... you were expecting butterflies and a riot of autumnal colour, but mes amies, that's where the shoes come in... Sophia Webster is a genius!
The hostess, Lady Tess Kincaid, is celebrating her birthday in blush pink so my gothic attire will not compete with her effect and in any case, she's been at the Guinness a while so hopefully she will simply throw her arms around me as Miloš Karadaglić heats up the floor with 'Libertango'...

The real reason I didn't bring a date is because I heard Billy Collins might be here tonight - Tess introduced me to him years ago and the thought of hearing him recite 'I Chop Some Parsley While Listening to Art Blakey's Version of Three Blind Mice' is thrillin'. He is a former Poet Laureate, and subverts the usual idea of a poet - he is witty, droll, simply magnifeek... Here he is reading for the Obamas - the video is unclear, but the words are all that matter...  
Someone is playing Autumn Leaves, moonlight fills the Scioto (I'm in Ohio, of course) and I all but forget that I can only see out of one eye (naturally I am wearing a black lace patch over my left eye). Seamus Heaney is wooing Tess beneath the trees, and I walk alone by the banks, thinking of the Native Americans who once made their home here and for the slaves who escaped the antebellum - the Scioto meant freedom. I feel no pain, only the sheer blissful relief that comes with imagination and the magic that creates virtual worlds of friendship and beauty. Happy birthday Tess! It's time to dance in the spirit of, and for, the Iroquoian warriors.

Images from: Fashion In History
Native Americans Online