writing – Seb Palmer

10 April 202311 April 2023

POETRY: Classroom Crush?

I’m following Kurt Vonnegut’s advice, as per my previous post, and writing a poem. Here it is:

Classroom Crush

She’s a beauty
And no mistake 
Long brown hair
A fine filly
With a luxuriant mane
Just enough jewellery 
To suggest sophisticated decadence
Sat with her peach of a derrière 
On the edge of her desk. 

A green velvet jacket
A colourful batik silk scarf
Enchanting hazel eyes
A voice that’s refined
Commanding obedience
Oh so willingly given
Long elegant fingers
Rest on a copy
Of Sirens of Titan.

Oh, Mrs Martin
Your Mona Lisa smile
Always baffled and beguiled 
I wonder how many
Boys hearts you quickened
Or maybe broke?
Sat in the ranks
Of hideous brown plastic chairs
I secretly loved you.

10 April 202310 April 2023

CULTURE: Kurt Vonnegut on The Arts

KV. A terrific writer. With some great insights.

I have to thank a secondary school English teacher (Mrs Martin?), for introducing me to Kurt Vonnegut. Truth be told it was her sex appeal – a bright and beautiful young woman, with a fascinating looking book – as much as the literary appeal that first took me. Ah, Mrs Martin, where are you now?

Well, today, on FB, he was quoted by one of those weirdly intrusive ‘you might like this’ meme-things. I reproduce the quote below, keeping the bit about homosexuality that they omitted:

‘If you want to really hurt you parents, and you don’t have the nerve to be gay, the least you can do is go into the arts. I’m not kidding. The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.’

According to online sources this quote comes from Man Without A Country. I must get/read that!

4 April 20234 April 2023

ART: Josep Palau i Fabre & Picasso

I posted about this dude and his passion for Picasso quite a while ago (read that here if interested). And I find myself wanting to post about this pairing again.

As per my previous post, I have three of the four ‘whoppers’ i Fabre published. And I really want to get hold of any more there might be. I’m aware of just one more, as things stand. Which, alas, seems both rarer, and consequently more expensive.

This is one version of the book I don’t yet have.

I’ve learned, thanks to my search for the cheapest way to buy this book, that it can be bought brand new, for €150! From Poligrafa, the Spanish publishers responsible for all these fabulous books. And in English (or Catalan!), as well as Spanish.

Second-hand editions of this title are all more expensive. But sadly anything at all, let alone say £20-30 (roughly what I paid for the third volume in this series), is way too expensive for me right now.

I exchanged some emails with a chap called Carlos at Poligrafa today, thereby learning of the newer/cheaper buying option. But thanks to me not speaking Spanish, or quite following all his English, I’m none the wiser as to whether any more posthumous (to i Fabre’s passing, that is) volumes are in the pipeline.