Biscoito

21 de Março de 2010

Ta, hoje eu entendi seu medo.

E num segundo antes do outro eu vi nos olhos de uma amiga tudo o que se foi com você.

Ela me dizia de uma paixão tão presente que eu senti o que em mim estava ausente.

Rima pobre.

E Hoje decidi não ser mais poeta.

Hoje me cansei de viver em palavras.

Eu quero a poesia da percepção do que acontece.

Quero a poesia instantânea que só deixa marcas nas lembranças e nas sensações que nos assombram e dão prazer em tempos inesperados.

Hoje no caminho de casa, mais uma vez as estações foram poucas e o trem rápido demais para quem escreve e a poesia não teve um fim.

Hoje, ao sair daquele trem, me sentei em um banco qualquer, como se esperasse o próximo, e quis escrever minha ultima frase de poema.

Hoje sentada nesse banco, lembro da lagrima que escorreu quando vi nos olhos de minha amiga o que me deixa vazia e cheia de você.

Hoje salivando, cruzando as pernas, apertando os dentes, contraindo minha bochechas, remoendo perspectivas, tentava por tudo não ver beleza em minha miséria.

Queria por tudo dar uma chance a alegria, queria vê-la bela.

E num segundo apos o outro, desisto de abandonar minhas letras.

Dou as minhas palavras uma chance mais de se rabiscarem, de serem alegrias belas...

A agonia da mocinha ao me Lado me faz curiosa.

Ela reclama a falta de atenção da amiga e vejo que todos somos biscoitos na prateleira.

Me voy!

NEw York in 7 days

Today a Friend asked for tips about what to do in NY in a week.

I realized I had no idea. I never had to plan what to do here, because supposedly I have all the time I need since I live here. But now that I may leave soon, I decided that I want to have a tourist week, and do all I love to do in seven days, so I planned one.

Tips for an amazing week in NYC (from my point of view)

1 st day: arrive with an open heart and as little plans as possible.

Leave your stuff where you have to, and as soon as possible go out on

the street, take a deep breath and make sure you put the smell of the

city somewhere in your memory's archives. Turn left and find a subway,

any subway. Just take a ride, look at people around you, after a few

minutes you will understand why. At the fifth stop, randomly, get out

of the train and ask some hot dog or newspaper seller where are you.

If you are downtown, take a look at Brooklyn bridge and City Hall, and

then start walking north. If you are uptown, go to central park and

start walking south. If it's raining, common, you're not make out of

sugar, buy a umbrella and be happy (don't buy the cheaper one, they

will break in 2 seconds and after the 3rd one you buy, you will be

angrily throwing your umbrella in the garbage and looking like crazy on

your first day). If it's super raining take a yellow cab and ask the

driver to go down or up (depending where you are) 5th avenue (and yes,

just because it's famous!). If you arrived early, you may still have

time to walk some more. Just enjoy the what you see. You may stop at

union square and just look around, there's so much happening in the

city that never sleeps. If you arrive late, now it's probably time to

grab a nice dinner. You can try one of the restaurants at Astor place.

Around that area, on top of having great option to eat food from

everywhere, you can see a lot of interesting things. From alternative

clothing from India to a coffee shop where you can also get a

tattoo. Well, I think that's enough for the 1st day. Just go back to

where you're gonna sleep and pass out, preferably a little drunk. And

if you still want to party, you will find many places around Astor

Place.

Suggestions to Google and go:

Mae's Japanese restaurant (they have one dollar menu)

Yaffa Cafe

Flea Market Cafe/Restaurant

2 nd day, take your shopping list and buy everything you can. Try to

get it over with. Don't even think twice. Hopefully it will not be

Saturday and B&H will be open. Trust me, you will get tired of buying

stuff, and once you have no more obligations you can just get to know

interesting places. And even if your list is not that big, or if

you're not buyer, there's always just that little thing that you

thought you may buy. If you have no intention to buy at all, just go

to times square, and spend your day looking at people buying. Look at

all those lights and girls and boys screaming around trying to convince

you to buy something. And please, just buy one little thing, something

that costs maybe 25 cents, just to have the experience of buying

without a reason. You may like it or hate it. But at least you will be

sure of what that makes you feel. The second day is also a good day to

go to the Broadway show you (maybe) sooo wanted to watch, you will be

around times square anyway. After the show go to the lower east side

and stop at the first cool bar you see and just get the craziness of

the day out of your system. The second day is like this, just crossing

off things that you have to do that aren't that fun but that you may

regret if you don't do soon. The worst thing when traveling here, is

to have to go running to buy just that "little thing your dad sooooooo

much wants", that you can only find at Century 21 and you have only 3

hours before you have to go to the airport. You will take at least 2

hours to buy "just that little thing" and the other hour you will be

regretting not have done that before.

Suggestions to Google and go:

Century 21

B&H

Macy's

Schillers restaurant

Essex restaurant

Arlene's Grocery bar (they have an awesome rock karaoke on Monday's

night with a live band)

3 rd day, go to all tourists places there are. Wall street, Liberty

Statue, Rockefeller Center, Empire State building, Central Park if you

haven't yet, maybe pay a city tour. Do all a tourist would do and

behave like one, ask questions, complain, laugh aloud, be impatient,

be paranoid (you're sure that guy wasn't on the line, the food arrived

first on the other table and you're sure you got there first etc.)

Take pictures, ask people to take pictures for you, take a bicycle

cab, spend more than you were suppose that day, eat hamburger with

French fries and onion rings and get a milkshake as your drink and a

brownie and cup cake as desert. At night go watch a basketball game,

drink a bunch of beers and cheer even if you don't know who's playing.

After that if you still have energy for something else, please let me

know the name of the drug you use and I'll tell mine.

Suggestions to Google and go:

Tourist things to do in NYC (:

4 th day, let this be the museum day, chose 2 and go for it. There's

nothing much I can say about it. Only that if you chose Metropolitan

you can say you are a student and just make a symbolic donation. If

it's Friday after 4 you can go to MOMA for free. But there's many

other options and they're all interesting and full of things to see

(no, really?) After such a cultural day, why not finish up the night

at a jazz/blues place. It is a great experience to go through and you

can chose between the more expensive and fancy ones and the more

traditional and simple ones. And please get drunk and write poetry on

semi wet napkins. Then go back to where you have to, walking. NYC has

a different smell at night, especially when one is drunk and all

sensitive because of the great music they heard.

Suggestion to Google and go:

Blue Note

Smalls

Birdland

55 Christopher

Museums...

5 th day, this can be the Brooklyn day. Start going all the way to the

Brooklyn museum. Than pass by the Botanic Garden. Later on, rest a bit

on Prospect Park. And on your way back to the train, why not to stop

on one of those charming restaurants and have a mojito with some

tacos. Then go all the way to Coney Island. Take a walk on the beach

and a picture of the famous Wonder Wheel. At night go to one of the

fun pubs of the alternative Williamsburg. Go to different ones, you'll

find good music, nice drinks, fun people and a different smell.

Suggestions to Google and go:

Aqua Santa Restaurant

Almacen Restaurant

Bogota Restaurant

Union Hall

Union Pool

Spike Heels pub

Surf bar

Tea lounge

Brooklyn Bowl

6 th day, choose this day to go back to places you thought you rushed

and couldn't see all you wanted. You will probably get to see a totally

different place. You may choose to walk on a different side of central

park, or go back to that cute restaurant you couldn't go because you

chose a cuter one to have your mojito (and now you are not sure which

one looked more cute), or pass by Dumbo and visit the flea market.

Maybe you just want to chill out at one big bookstore or find that

treasure book on Strand (a great bookshop at union square, they sell

used books). You can also go watch a 3D movie and have that gigantic

popcorn bowl that its even difficult to hold if you also have a big

cup of soda. You can also go to Chinatown or little Italy and after

stuffing yourself with those not much Chinese/Italian food, you can

have a massage and have a psychic reading and all on the same block.

You can may go back to Williamsburg, just to check out their cool

thrift stores and other fun alternative fairs. Take this day to be the

unplanned day and let your instinct impulses drive you. You deserve it

after being such a good tourist.

Suggestions to Google and go:

Strand Bookstore

Barnes and Noble Bookstore

Buffalo Exchange

Becans Closet

7th day, well you got to pack. Make sure you do it early that day.

Because, unfortunately, you may have to go back to Century 21 and buy

another traveling bag to put all your old things inside (of course you

already put all the new things on your bag, hoping all could fit, and

if not, you could leave some old things behind). After doing that,

take your last shower on NY and head out. Have the famous brunch of

the city, drink as many mimosas as you can. It is great that it is

traditional to have mimosas and other drinks on brunches here. It an

excuse to get drunk in the morning and enjoy the rest of the day as if

you were in an almost surrealistic movie. If it's not a weekend and

there's no brunches with mimosas available, have a regular brunch

anyway and find a bar. Go to one of these traditional cowboy's bars,

with bras hanging on the walls, and have two shots and take your last

walk before taking the plane. Take pictures of your last moments

before going back to reality and pretend NY was made for you. Take

advantage that the whole city looks like a movie set and feel like a

movie star. When it's time to go back to take the cab/train to the

airport, take another deep breath and thank yourself for the great

week you just had. If you take a cab, talk to the driver, if he/she is

nice they will tell great stories. If you take the subway, well,

you'll be entertained enough just by looking around. Arrive with some

spare time at the airport, so you you'll be able to say a proper

goodbye to what you lived in those few days and get used to the idea

of having to go back. And if you really forgot to buy that "little

thing your dad sooooooo much wanted", you can find a substitute at the

free shop. Before getting into the airplane, breath deeply again and

hope that the mimosa will still be affecting your body, and that soon

you will be passed out on the plane, resting to be full of energy to

unpack and go back to your real life...

Suggestions to Google and go:

Coyote Bar

El Faro Restaurant

Johnson's Bar

Now if you are my friend, just come to our place and you will have sooooo much fun!

The Salsicha of Monalisa

A friend once told me that beauty is sad.
Walking around today, I craved to write. The habit becomes a vice. According to Wikipedia (the new truth's master). “Vice is a practice or a habit considered immoral, depraved, and/or degrading in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refer to a fault, a defect, an infirmity or merely a bad habit. Synonyms for vice include fault, depravity, sin, iniquity, wickedness and corruption. The modern English term that best captures its original meaning is the word vicious, which means "full of vice" In this sense, the word vice comes from the Latin word vitium, meaning "failing or defect". Vice is the opposite of virtue.” After reading it, I almost got ashamed of my new vice. Considering my new position in this world full of vice, I can
guarantee my new addiction won't matter. I hate to notice that the meaning of the word vice, takes so much space in this text. It is suppose to be my words here. Not the words of some definition that someone full of vices wrote down. I am ignorant. I don't even know what this person ate tonight. Or even if this person is still around. I hope so. But I don't want to know. I just want to write about what this person ate. What passed through his or her mouth tonight. I have the image in my mind. The person walking through his or her apartment, wearing just an old shirt, opening the fridge and taking something nasty to eat. That person is lonely and imprudent. I can see this being going back to the sofa, siting there, holding an old almost rotten salsicha, chewing it with no attention at all. Just there, in an almost frozen moment. And right before swallowing it, a though crosses her or his mind: “what if I Monalisa was a man?” That thought changes something inside that person and again another bite he/she
takes. The person who wrote the wikipedia definition of vice chews fucking salsicha Tuesday's night thinking about Monalisa. This whole thing is a very old scene. A classic representation of a contemporary lonely person. Nothing intriguing if wasn't for the salsicha. Salsicha “tells a lot about a person.” Now you may be thinking, who's more miserable, the fictional character who sits alone eating salsicha thinking about Monalisa, or the writer siting alone writing about the
vice character? I just have one thing to say: Monalisa didn't eat salsicha. Nobody that ever ate salsicha could look like that. Everyone that ever ate salsicha have a different smile. And it isn't an enigmatic one. It's a more explicit and objective one. It's almost like pleasure/guilty kind of thing. Monalisa's smile it's more like: “Hum, I am hiding the salsicha, and I won't give it to you. It feels good.” The smile of someone who ate the salsicha is more like: it feels good now, but I kind of feel bad for the horses... I will pay for it in the bathroom later. I can enjoy the feeling now.” I am not a fan of salsichas, but that's not the point now. I just can't stop thinking that the absence of the salsicha brings some sadness to Monalisa's look, and it make it beautiful. But I am still not sure if my friend was right. But anyway, today, while talking to a friend, I decided to be ugly, ugly in every sense. And just let the ugliness come out from everywhere in me. It's soooo much easier like that. It doesn't require much and there's no pressure. Being ugly changes
things around and the world becomes lighter and probably even more beautiful. Funny and beauty are different similar things. I want to end this. I want the end to be locked. I want the end to be a nice thing. It doesn't have to be something with a value attached to it. It can be only a pseudo beginning, like the end of a circle. A circle always have and end, we just can't see it, because it hides it very well. This is the charm of a circle. The charm of everything closed and with no apparent end. The endlessness is a charming thing that can only be because it will end at the end.