La Princesa Verdadera

I call a lot of people "Princess." I mean it.

Darnell: To What Do I Owe The Pleasure?

Darnell gave me directions. My asking was kind of, kiiiiind of, a ploy. Regardless, people say shit to get shit they want all the time right? I've been on both sides of that type of human warfare. Anyway, he said "yes" to my taking his photo before I even finished my sentence. I considered him willing and able. Beautiful boy.

Best Seat In The House

As it ebbs and flows. Wax. Wane. Come. Go. Is the Ocean the ultimate dichotomy? Is this where we get all of our sides? The pull? The various forces in our life...maybe they come from this simple idea of back and forth...back and forth...back and forth. And we don't even know it 'til we sit on a cheap chair legs all splayed out, hat on, and stare at the ocean for a few hours...and realize everything is made of two parts. Even a realization is two things coming together.

Get comfy, Ma.

POOKA (mirror)

I went to the beach a couple of Thursdays ago. Waiting for my girl Paulina. She was a few hours late. I took a stroll around the carousels and popped into a few photo booths. I needlessly spent a couple beans on a few photos of yours truly. I tried to keep the same face. But found that different thoughts produced different faces. Not a new idea. So on that note I took one of my torso only, t-shirt design/message visible only...One came out that I thought was tolerable. I gave it to Daddy Longlegs later that day. I thought he would like an image of me where my head / face were not visible. I would never assume this mug is one he would want to look at every day.

Regarding these two women: they don't know eachother. They were on different planes that day...their entire existences, actually...but for a second they were on the same continuum.

Three Scared Mice

...good morning borjita! right. we have a small cock a roach problem and i fucking suppose we have a small mice problem as well. i don't even KEEP cheese in the cupboards. also, whose bright idea was it to slide down into the sink. musta been hot. musta thought it was a pool. as i approached the sink in the morning, they thought they were invisible...stacked on top of each other...the one on top must have been the older sibling. obviously i scooped each one (one at a time) and discarded of them outside. nice move borja. they're probably eating my cous cous in the cupboard right now.

John / D.U.M.B.O.

That is the biggest fucking lens I have ever seen. I like to get up close and personal when I shoot something. But maybe he's shooting a bridge, the city across the water from DUMBO, a group of women sunbathing 600 feet away. I consider getting close and personal like a knife fight, versus a missle launch. You wanna see what you're assaulting right? And let them see you? It's like engaging in a thumb war with a baby, this guy. Regardless: to each their own.

Mikey: Down Under The Manhattan Bridge (Endless Slumber Party)

Mikey. Smeekies. Dr. Vague, PhD. Again with the double exposed roll, ahhh Borja...Of all the photos on the double exposed May-June rolls this is probably the only one that came with its own blog entry already written for it. It takes no creativity to just explain quite simply that Mikey, Mikey Magnet, Mikey Magnifico, Mikey Magnanimous Marvelous Magical... Mikey gets married in two Saturdays to the most beautiful girl in the world. I am not exaggerating. This blog entry is free of hyperbole and charged solely with sincerity and appreciation. She is the stuff of Bob Dylan songs, Garcia Marquez flights, Brooklyn lore, Titian's Venus...She, of course, is much more than beautiful. It begins with singular and divine, and ends with lettered y fuerte...And I know a million more things in between...Mikey is, too. There are some things I don't think any of us are ever 'ready' for, per sé...babies? lay offs? broken arm? death? and maybe marriage is one of those things...especially for my generation...it seems that we are seeking to find something MORE powerful than the word 'marriage' and minus the corny, traditional or broken and false connotations...there is only one word for this kind of union ('matrimony' and 'wedlock' should be shot)...but I think here that doesn't matter...they would shine together regardless, and if no such word exists to represent their particular style of love, living, joint freedom, naked cooking, kitten conjunction, etc etc etc... then they will invent one.

the rebirth of the word will come with how we live it.

FELICIDADES JADE / MIKE

See you soon. Will try not to cry.

On a London Street Late At Night, There Lurked a Good Lookin Muhfuckah...

...wearing midnight blue wool gloves...

mom is right, as always. and that, too, passed.

...as it is a circle, you will always come back to a beginning point and can then decide in this long long long long life (hopefully), how you want the second time around to be... and the third, if the other party is that blessed to get on the merry go round with you for a fourth, fifth, or even sixth time around...not sure...i suppose there are people in my life with whom i associate only one, huge, continuum...i never doubt them, they are a backdrop and a basis and air and water and without them life is not life...there are other people who are better off with smaller tastes, smaller bites, smaller circles...because it seems they can't get on the ride with you right away and often float in and out of life like soap bubbles, bursting at the first signs of pressure...and that's fine. so maybe you complete one circle...kill time on an island... and then get back on, at which point someone has to decide the pace, the shape, the extent, the gravity and the capacity of this new wheel...rickety is for the 19th century...and i'm trying to make a Venn D with you, Ladrón! Cabrón!...Reluctant Campeón!...not float outside the color wheel, all alone, and only yellow...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArI26I9rip0

This Lovely Gust of Wind

Last Monday we went to the beach, Chloe, lil' D, her friend, and I...We went in a Benz...a huge sedan with ample leg room. I sat in the back, windows down, watching Flatbush turn from the park to Lefferts to the concrete malls of Kings Plaza and finally to the beach...along Flatbush I counted 2 establishments named S-A-H-A-R-A...obviously dealing in pita bread and tasty snacks...maybe there was a palm tree or two on the awning...etc. We arrived quietly and set up a bedouin-esque area neatly, smoothing out our blankets and anchoring down the corners with shoes. We applied sunscreen ("...You put it on like my grandmother, Sahara!"), let it dry, then walked to where the waves settled into wet sand and stood there letting it lap at our hot, hot feet...we spoke momentarily about the week's events, the job struggles, our friends and general moods / interactions, the cowardice of males, etc., the usual...but we tossed all that to the side and decided instead to be happy then and now...and now...as if happiness came from you know where...and so we cavorted with lil' D deep in the waves like content, healthy happy gals...this was perhaps the truest thing I've done all summer...we slammed into every wave that came our way...we carried chloe to safety from a school of 3 mm jellyfish...we dramatized how amazing a not-so-amazing wave was, we ducked under huge waves hoping our bottoms didn't fall off...we stood there and slapped the resting water, making that familiar, satisfying sound...we wiped salt from our eyes and got taken under by the next wave while doing so...in the end, 2 out of 3 of us were snapped at underfoot by what we THINK was a female crab named Mrs. Claws...we couldn't be sure, though, beyond sensation...as most of us was hidden as well, underneath the opaque, teal atlantic...not a merman in sight...

Holding a Sprig, This Kid...

Not too jazzed about summer vacation...He carried a weight on his shoulders that came through in his face and walk...but he held one sprig of a weed in both hands with tenderness. He should be ok...

Lucia y Mario

Peep the Pretty Boy Posture...Peep the comfort in her own skin. Dreamy.

César y Jasmine

Her look to me screams of pride...knowing this is one lucky s.o.b. holding her like that...she retains all sense of self in his grip.

Volando Voy

Beautiful Landscape

My most favorite photo ever taken in the sand was the nude of Charis Weston on her belly...There are perfect limbs on perfect sand, and then there is one detailed bend at her right side. That bend, that line her waist makes is THE thing...the little element that we look for in photos, minimalist or otherwise, that make it singular and then, last... I think about that photo often, even though he took a handful of other just as notable and beautiful photos of her. I imagine on that day he set his camera up and asked her to lay down, maybe flip over, and that the sand was on her face, so she rested her forehead on her forearms, and made herself comfortable as if she were settling into a temporary bed, leaned a bit to her left, created a comfortable equilibrium and that bend, and then let him pull the trigger...in the end, she has contributed more to the photo than maybe ol' Eddie himself.

The Venus of Willendorf...

...in balloon form...as you lay on your back, transfixed and ready, she descends upon you in all her ethereal, extinct glory...

Objection, T.S.: August is Actually the Cruelest Month

This spring was a torrent. Torrentious. Did anything grow, in response to all that rain? Well, I revived one house plant...it was all but an hoja skeleton, when I became so upset at the possibility of killing my 100th house plant (read: tired at my OWN NEGLIGENCE---read: IN EVERY OTHER SECTOR OF MY LIFE) that I sent her a strong brain-to-plant-brain message: here's water, please come back. You're too young. I have a new p.o.v. for you, see? Across the street from the big leaves, see? They have to weather the storm, you can just watch. I just bought you last Monday. I don't even know your name; common or Latin. Or where you're from. Or why I chose you. Or what you like for breakfast. Or what I'm going to do with you. But I know you can do it. So in 24 hours she came back with 4 new flowers. Her posture had shifted to proud, comfortable. I was ECSTATIC. And now I attend to her more because I know what she needs. This photo...just a mess, hectic like those months really were...both rolls are from May. And the end of June. Here, it looks like the child in the red shirt is holding the bottom of a framed photo of some arrangement of fauna...he is wearing plant pants and his shirt matches the flowers from the brooklyn patio that were from the second frame, slightly shining through from underneath...for a few months now...everything has overlapped...the plant and our little triumph is the first thing that has brought me any clarity.

the swinger in dolores park (open letter to a former self)

...baby girl is free, too!...this is her playground...all of it. the avenue, the swing set, the classroom, the kitchen, the strange new streets, the past, the present, your house, your mother's house, the president's house...whatever...every time this swinger reaches for the next ring, she risks falling, not being able to support her weight with the one arm holding her for the moment...at some point she develops calluses on her palms and she reaches forward without thinking or feeling too much, knowing there's a rhythm; a very simple and personalized way to move through air...she knows two horizons are always at her front and back, and this keeps her balanced...

...this morning i woke up and everything outside was still dark...i was spread out like a disgruntled starfish on top of the blankets with a face heavy from withholding...everything felt counterintuitive...i looked outside and figured i could probably watch the grey rain fall through the grey sky through the green leaves of the treetops that lay against the green shingled houses from this pov of 17th street for the next few hours...despite my evening (sick, false, perfunctory, trite) i had an amazing dream. slightly torturous but amazing. more so than what transpired in the dream (just details, the who/what/how) was the feeling that coated the entire thing. sweet and achey...but sweet like central valley summertime nectarine sweet...like cali mango sweet. like honey cakes or slow dancing. the tone was warm, the hue: red/orange. the scene: long overdue. the timescape: now. the weight/less. the pressure: none. the parties: one open book, one interrogation survivor...i realized the feeling was torturous because unlike dreams where i'm 'feeling' something about running from the cops, running under water, paralysis...this feeling / scene had already transpired in 'real' life, and therefore familiar...dreams disappoint because they are just that (they must disappoint themselves sometimes, too, then...) and the people in them are bound to disappoint because how they are in reality is never how you designed them to be in your subconscious...

in the dream i didn't have to say anything or search for the right words, or tip toe or make concessions or be understanding or presume to assume or be fearful or project into a black, deaf, mute abyss or work over time learning telepathy...in the dream, as in life, i wasn't seeking to classify, vilify, or crucify...boxes and squares do not fit into my bag...in the dream we were a planet that moved along its own axis...i behind you and you behind me on and on and on and over and around as forward moving, powerful entities can and do...you my horizon behind me and me your horizon behind you behind me in front of me as i am behind...you, etc. continuous...concentrated...intelligent...circular...like Borges, like a seed, like a spark, like the perfect shape, like roe...like ova...

...the antonym of all these words (bud, origin, ovule, root, sprig, sprout) of course, imply: 'the end...' a counterintuitive place for this planet to be, as it had just exploded into the july 4th air, with the rest of those things that go boom, rise, sparkle, and shine...all of this is -- not that serious...que será será this is just how i feel today...i cannot guarantee that i will feel the same way tomorrow...but apparently no one takes those kinds of risks these days, anyway...do they, darling?

JUSTIN - (BEISBOL EN BILLYBOB)

...a few tuesdays ago i had that thing, that thing, this thing, this thing, go away, it's going away, it's there, go away, this thing...on my mind...i made plans to see and drink with BT Genevieve...(modesto gal, bright green eyes, beautiful frame, long untamed waves, confidence that smacks you in the fucking face and men literally fall off...the edge...of their seat...out of her life fearful for their lives / sense of masculinity / power feeling threatened...they...fall...off...the...planet...damn Gen...)...i was early so i killed a few minutes at the baseball diamond on bedford where the red team had just gotten in a fight with the blue team (big dudes, all testosterone, all sandlots and brooklyn childhoods, accent over the 'FOCHHHHHH yuuu...NO! FOCHHHHHHH YUUUUUU!' and across the street in the mcKarren park grass watching people have wine-nics on blankies and watching dog walkers, and very young mothers (russian / boriqua / brooklyn) passing me by...at the baseball diamond i saw Justin eyeing the popsicle cart and watching his Pops bat it around, warming up...I thought of the kid who played "Mikey" in the "The Sandlot" (1994), where the new nerdy, white kid finds a group of hooligans / outcasts (read: fatties, brownies, stutterers) to play ball with...of course, he gradually gets better and gains confidence and they win in the end and their biggest nemesis throughout the film is a huge hairy dog that slobbers (really?!?!) and i remember a red bathing suit and a blonde and i remember at the end the the protagonist kid goes on to be a writer (VO Narrator) and that the puerto rican looking kid goes on to play in the major leagues, as does "Mikey," the cute, tall, Cuban kid with the thick eyebrows...I remember MAKING HIM SO REAL in my head / life, and wishing that something like him existed that would see ME...in modesto, playing soccer, bushy tailed, brace faced...that it was detrimental...kind of detrimental...maybe to my development and learning how to distinguish between reality/fiction/figments/flesh/blood/fantasy/feet/clouds/ground/grow UP BORJA!!! i know he was AN ACTOR...but...the issue is that it's so easy to create (imagination / reality---easy), and I see the potential in most breathing / walking / feeling things...and when i try to get at somebody's inner workings it's not because I want to control/have/define/or call mine, but because building is so natural...breezy...like summer is supposed to BE...it's easy -- or it's not...y punto...anyway, the tall cuban kid with thick eyebrows took on many faces from 1994 til whenever...I always knew their last names before they knew my first.

JUSTIN / MIKEY / YOUNG THINGS - 2009