Liora Sophie

The Enemy of Art

The enemy of art

Is the ever-present, big, scary

Sharp-clawed, yellow-eyed, fire-breathing

English teacher.

You know I’m right.

If not for her,

You may have had a chance

To appreciate the works 

Of William Shakespeare or George Orwell,

But instead they were shoved down your throat.

At a young age you were forced to bear witness

To the mortifying sight of these masterpieces

Being dissected, deformed, mutilated

And burned at the stake

As punishment for attempting to show us

A human experience.

We are taught to look at art and say,

“You’re trying to make me feel?

Well I’ll make YOU feel!”

And we tear them apart

And hang them by their thumbs

And return to our televisions,

Hoping they will cry themselves to sleep.

But sometimes, their screaming

Manages to penetrate our sleepy minds,

Shaking us awake and forcing us

To look them in the eye

Until we find the voice to say,

“Wow.”

Or perhaps they will be satisfied

With a sharp intake of breath,

Because art does not want to be analyzed,

Are just wants to be heard.

And I know for certain

That if you stand before a real work of art,

You stand in front of one of Picasso’s paintings

And humbly forget all the nonsense metaphors

You were told it contains,

And just listen,

Even today, so many years later

The painter’s own scream will reach your ears.

And I dare you to come back to me

And look me in the eye

And tell me it didn’t

Make your knees tremble.

itsthemusicpeople:

I basically wanted to get these messages across when selling Seuss to UWS ‘rents. Sometimes it worked. Most of the time, I was met with silence. #LifeOfAnActivistBookSeller

(Source: foxxypants)

“Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.”
God she’s good with her metaphors.

“Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.”

God she’s good with her metaphors.

(Source: letstalkabouted)

“There is an unbelievable arrogance in trying to write something, even more arrogance in expecting someone to pay money to read it.”
— David Foster Wallace (via paperlover)
“Virginia Woolf said that writers must be androgynous. I’ll go a step further. You must be bisexual.”
— Rita Mae Brown (via sapphosnymph)

(via papercranechronicles)

Jerusalem’s Most Cliche Couples

The OMGADORABLE Couple

The PDA Couple

The BFF with Laptops Couple

The Shomer Couple

The Happily Ever After Couple

“And that’s the thing about people who mean everything they say. They think everyone else does too.”
— Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner (via pleuvoire)
Alice’s Unhelpful Writing Tips of Glory and Wonder #132

alicevernon:

‘Pin the Manuscript on the Publisher’ is a lesser-known writing game.  Firstly, you need to find a street on which a publishing house is based.  Next, stand on the pavement with your manuscript (unstapled) on a particularly windy day.  Wait for a literary fellow to emerge for their lunchtime Subway, and let go of your manuscript like Anna Paquin in Fly Away Home.  If you’ve judged it correctly, several pages should stick to the person’s face, thus attracting their undivided attention to it.  

Also, in the event that they read your manuscript and have the nerve to reject it, read How to respond to a Rejection Letter. It’s funny!