I don’t want to lie,
but to face, I feel I have to.
You are cratered
with vulnerable gracelessness
between our impeccably symmetrical commas,
like a rabbit pinned down beneath the barrel of a shotgun.
I could so easily
so masterfully
pick your teeth to threads,
it hasnt ben teribly dificut—
they are half unraveled
and always were
when you looked me in the eye,
called me Killer,
and said I was hard to read
There are reasons
I could pick you apart
masterfully
to the melody of a
Frank Sinatra.
It could be beautiful
in the way
surgeons singe cataracts
or tear open heart surgery.
I do not fuck around
I do not lie.
Know that you are painting buffalo targets
on the bedspread
when you ask.
This past weekend I went museum hopping in New York City for a class trip. The class itself focused on Impressionism, and so we visited all the major galleries—the Guggenheim, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the MOMA. Even for a Friday the noise level was essentially offensive to general museum etiquette. I suppose the MOMA is modern enough to attract a crowd willing to overlook that.
But Professor Teddy, a martinet for class and sophistication (he didn’t appreciate our playing of “Empire State of Mind” as we emerged on the NYC side of the Lincoln Tunnel), continued to lecture. As he did, I couldn’t help noticing the swarms of Asian tourists, well-dressed New Yorkers, and the high schoolers screeching with laughter while pointing to a Picasso, shouting, “Bitch be all like, ‘Look at me!’”
And the hipsters. Everywhere. Every nook and cranny. Wildly good looking, I grant you, but ubiquitous. Constant. Hilarious.
It may be the height of hypocrisy for me to condescend, as I am known to cross that sliver of a line myself on occasion, but I couldn’t resist. The perfectly tousled hair, the beanies, the Clarks. The eyeliner. The men’s peacoats. The iPhones. The setting.
I have intimate knowledge of how the hipster brain functions—like mice in a labyrinthine lab experiment. I know their habits. Their vices. Their uniform music taste(s). The jazz clubs they frequent, the Klimt and Monet paintings they plaster across their desktop backgrounds.
So as Professor Teddy continued to explain the relationship between Gauguin and Van Gogh hacking off his left ear, I entertained myself composing the inner monologue of the hipster cradling a camera and glaring at us for blocking his shot of Starry Night.
Entrance, noon - “The architecture of the building is so modern.”
12:16 - “That Picasso must’ve fucked a lot of groupies.”
12:30 - “Wonder where that kid bought his beanie?”
12:35 – “That’s not The Scream, it looks like fucking colored pencil.”
12:50 – “Modigliani felt the paint, you can tell, you can see how he used Impressionism. He really got it and did his own thing, he did him. Look how strong the brushstrokes are. [12:55] Man, that naked chick must’ve been a babe.”
1:11 – “Why didn’t Warhol show Marilyn Monroe’s tits? Come on.”
1:18 – “It’s just a fuckin’ can of soup. [1:19] I will not say that out loud.”
1:34 – “That Pollock dude had it all figured out.”
1:35 – “I wonder what kind of Nikon that chick has…”
2:00 – “StarryNightStarryNightStarryNight—There it is! GUYS, I FOUND IT.”
2:20 – “That’s Monet, too? That’s like, twenty feet of water lilies. Man, I could totally plank that.”
2:29 – “That was definitely not there when I came here in tenth grade.”
3:00 – “That is the last time I buy shoes from Urban Outfitters.”
Prints & Illustrations Collection, 3:27 – “I need a cigarette.”
Marina Abramovic and Ulay started an intense love story in the 70s, performing art out of the van they lived in. When they felt the relationship had run its course, they decided to walk the Great Wall of China, each from one end, meeting for one last big hug in the middle and never seeing each other again. At her 2010 MoMa retrospective Marina performed ‘The Artist Is Present’ as part of the show, a minute of silence with each stranger who sat in front of her. Ulay arrived without her knowing it and this is what happened.
(Source: mydearregulus)
