Al Capone playing Banjo in Prison (1930s)

How difficult it is for human beings to move from the recognition of the ultimate value of their own particular culture and way of life to the acceptance of the value of other cultures and ways of living. This movement implies a weakening in our own certitudes and identity, a shifting of consciousness and a lowering of protective walls. The discovery of our common humanity, beneath our differences, seems for many to be dangerous. It not only means that we have to lose some of our power, privilege, and self-image, but also that we have to look at the shadow side in ourselves, the brokenness, and even the evil in our own hearts and culture; it implies moving into a certain insecurity.

Becoming Human
Jean Vanier

Tara

copper sculpture, Tibet

Small golden Avalokiteshvara on turquoise, Nepal or Tibet, photo by Anandajoti Bhikkhu

As activists we want to do something to help the world to suffer less. But we know that when we’re not peaceful, when we don’t have enough compassion in us, we can’t do much to help the world. We ourselves are at the center. We have to make peace and reduce the suffering in ourselves first, because we represent the world. Peace, love, and happiness must always begin here, with ourselves. There is suffering, fear, and anger inside of us, and when we take care of it, we are taking care of the world.

Thich Nhat Hanh

ze fucking Graal!

Our life span is only a hundred years at most. How are we living those years? Are we making the most of our days? What are we here to realize or to accomplish?

Thich Nhat Hanh

CRIS D’AVEUGLE

                                              par Tristan Corbière

L’œil tué n’est pas mort

Un coin le fend encor

Encloué je suis sans cercueil

On m’a planté le clou dans l’œil

L’œil cloué n’est pas mort

Et le coin entre encor

Deus misericors

Deus misericors

Le marteau bat ma tête en bois

Le marteau qui ferra la croix

Deus misericors

Deus misericors

Les oiseaux croque-morts

Ont donc peur à mon corps

Mon Golgotha n’est pas fini

Lamma lamma sabacthani

Colombes de la Mort

Soiffez après mon corps

Rouge comme un sabord

La plaie est sur le bord

Comme la gencive bavant

D’une vieille qui rit sans dent

La plaie est sur le bord

Rouge comme un sabord

Je vois des cercles d’or

Le soleil blanc me mord

J’ai deux trous percés par un fer

Rougi dans la forge d’enfer

Je vois un cercle d’or

Le feu d’en haut me mord

Dans la moelle se tord

Une larme qui sort

Je vois dedans le paradis

Miserere, De profundis

Dans mon crâne se tord

Du soufre en pleur qui sort

Bienheureux le bon mort

Le mort sauvé qui dort

Heureux les martyrs, les élus

Avec la Vierge et son Jésus

Ô bienheureux le mort

Le mort jugé qui dort

Un Chevalier dehors

Repose sans remords

Dans le cimetière bénit

Dans sa sieste de granit

L’homme en pierre dehors

A deux yeux sans remords

Ho je vous sens encor

Landes jaunes d’Armor

Je sens mon rosaire à mes doigts

Et le Christ en os sur le bois

À toi je baye encor

Ô ciel défunt d’Armor

Pardon de prier fort

Seigneur si c’est le sort

Mes yeux, deux bénitiers ardents

Le diable a mis ses doigts dedans

Pardon de crier fort

Seigneur contre le sort

J’entends le vent du nord

Qui bugle comme un cor

C’est l’hallali des trépassés

J’aboie après mon tour assez

J’entends le vent du nord

J’entends le glas du cor

Avalokiteshvara mandala

Om mani padme hum

Sa récitation se fait en concurrence avec une visualisation très détaillée du mandala d'Avalokiteshvara, c'est-à-dire de l'assemblée des déités qui l'accompagne. Chacun des éléments de cette représentation, ornement, objet rituel, est lui-même symbolique. Ainsi chacun de ses quatre bras représente un des quatre incommensurables.

Quant au lotus il surgit de la boue, traverse l'eau pour fleurir au soleil sans être lui-même entaché, symbolisant par là la pureté et la beauté. Encore ici la nature essentielle ne subit pas les distorsions adventices du samsara, tout comme l'être qui a assimilé les sagesses de la vacuité et de la non-dualité. Les citations ci-dessous donnent encore d'autres dimensions de ces symboles.

De plus, chacune de ses syllabes est le bīja, l'essence-semence de libération de chacun des domaines ou règnes d'existence, des paradis des devas jusqu'aux enfers. C'est donc envers l'univers entier que le pratiquant envoie sa compassion. On peut aussi faire du mantra l'invocation du muni (sage) ou bouddha de chacun de ces domaines. Et encore, chacune des syllabes représente une des six vertus transcendantes, ou pāramitās de la pensée du mahāyāna, que le pratiquant cherche à actualiser en lui-même. 

ॐ मणि पद्मे हूँ

Le Bouddha expose qu'une grande figure se dresse pour aider toute personne en difficulté. Il entend toute personne qui prononce son nom. Il est donc « Celui qui considère les appels ». 

En chinois, guān signifie « qui considère, qui tourne son regard vers » et yīn est le son ou plutôt l'incantation. 

Avalokiteshvara peut prendre trente-trois formes: celles d'un bouddha, d'un bodhisattva, d'un brahmane, d'un Roi Céleste ou d'une femme.

What is born will die, what has been gathered will be dispersed, what has been accumulated will be exhausted, what has been built up will collapse and what has been high will be brought low.

The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying
Sogyal Rinpoche

Enlightenment is: 
absolute cooperation with the inevitable.

Anthony de Mello

We are living in a culture entirely hypnotised by the illusion of time, in which the so-called present moment is felt as nothing but an infinitesimal hairline between an all-powerfully causative past and an absorbingly important future. We have no present. Our consciousness is almost completely preoccupied with memory and expectation. We do not realise that there never was, is, nor will be any other experience than present experience. We are therefore out of touch with reality. We confuse the world as talked about, described, and measured with the world which actually is. We are sick with a fascination for the useful tools of names and numbers, of symbols, signs, conceptions and ideas.

Alan Watts

The feeling of awe and sense of wonder arises from the recognition of the deep mystery that surrounds us everywhere, and this feeling deepens as our knowledge grows

Anagarika Govinda

The book that I shall make people read is the book of the heart, 

which holds the key to the mystery of life.

Meher Baba

this or that

1965

1975

1978

1973

fucking baguettes: take two

Ali Baba 

The Rolling Stones American Tour 1972 was a much-publicized and much-written-about concert tour of the United States and Canada in June and July 1972 by The Rolling Stones. Constituting the band's first performances in the United States following the Altamont Free Concert in December 1969, critic Dave Marsh would later write that the tour was "part of rock and roll legend" and one of the "benchmarks of an era."

The tour and difficulties:

 Mick Jagger and Keith Richards share a microphone during the June 1972 Winterland shows

The tour in part supported the group's Exile on Main St. album, which was released a few weeks earlier on 12 May. It was also part of a tour-America-every-three-years rotation that the group established in 1969 and maintained through 1981.

On the first show of the tour, 3 June in Vancouver, British Columbia, 31 policemen were treated for injuries when more than 2,000 fans attempted to crash the Pacific Coliseum.

In San Diego on 13 June, there were 60 arrests and 15 injured during disturbances. In Tucson, Arizona on 14 June, an attempt by 300 youths to storm the gates led to police using tear gas.[ While in Chicago for three appearances on 19 and 20 June, the group stayed at Hugh Hefner's original Playboy Mansion in the Gold Coast district.[4] Eighty-one people were arrested at the two sellout Houston shows on 25 June, mostly for marijuana possession and other minor drug offences.[5] There were 61 arrests in the large crowd at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C. on the Fourth of July.

On 13 July police had to block 2,000 ticket-less fans from trying to gain access to the show in Detroit. On 17 July at the Montreal Forum a bomb blew up in the Stones' equipment van, and replacement gear had to be flown in; then it was discovered that 3,000 forged tickets had been sold, causing a fan riot and a late start to the concert. The next day, 18 July, the Stones' entourage got into a fight with photographer Andy Dickerman in Rhode Island, and Jagger and Richards landed in jail, imperilling that night's show at the Boston Garden. Boston Mayor Kevin White, fearful of a riot if the show were cancelled, intervened to bail them out; the show went on, albeit with another late start. Dickerman would later file a £22,230 lawsuit against the band.

The tour ended with four shows over three consecutive nights at New York City's Madison Square Garden, the first night of which saw 10 arrests and two policemen injured and the last leading to confrontations between the crowd outside Madison Square Garden and the police. The last show on 26 July, Jagger's birthday, had balloons and confetti falling from Madison Square Garden's ceiling and Jagger blowing the candles off a huge cake. Pies were also wheeled in, leading to a pie fight between the Rolling Stones and the audience.

Following the final performance, a party was held in Jagger's honor by Ahmet Ertegun. Guests included Bob Dylan, Woody Allen, Andy Warhol, the Capote entourage, and Zsa Zsa Gabor, while the Count Basie Orchestra provided musical entertainment. At the event, Dylan characterized the tour as "encompassing" and "the beginning of cosmic consciousness.

Rock critic Robert Christgau reported that the mood of the shows was friendly, with Jagger "undercut[ting] his fabled demonism by playing the clown, the village idiot, the marionette.