we real cool

the hackney brothers of motor city hard rock band 'death'

photo: tammy hackney

"we real cool"

the pool players.

seven at the golden shovel.

we real cool. we

left school. we

lurk late. we

strike straight. we

sing sin. we

think gin. we

jazz june. we 

die soon.

i'm pretty into this poem by gwendolyn brooks. it's the poem she's most known for and i bet that gets annoying for her...but this poem just ricochets around inside me. it's urgent and true and tragic. and it just wants to fall off the tongue.

(the photo and poem are totally unrelated, except that they give me the same kind of feeling—that mix of defiance and frivolity, that i don't give a fuck attitude that is both buoyant and weighty)

secret gardens

pamplemousses botanical gardens, mauritius

peradeniya botanical gardens, sri lanka

new york botanical gardens, bronx, usa

pietermaritzburg botanical gardens, south africa

hope botanical gardens, jamaica

rio de janeiro botanical gardens, brazil

botanical gardens are one of my favorite places to visit in a city. some years ago i went to the one in rio de janeiro with one of my best friends... and i am still completely taken with that experience. i remember the heat, and the metallic blue dragonflies that darted above the pond. i remember we sat for a long time, near each other but still separate, on a stretch of grass that was half in the sun and half in the shade. we watched the sun glint, and we heard the wings of  the dragonflies beat, and we felt sweat bead on our skin... and we didn't move, we couldn't. neither of us wanted to go anywhere, there seemed like no better place than there.  i remember neither of us said a word, but somehow we both knew we wanted to stay there, in that place, in that moment. i think about that day and those hours and i think i want to go back there. i want to retrieve that moment, that time. perhaps i will go hunting for it...and i will travel to as many botanical gardens as i can, looking for that same feeling. that would be fun. i will go to any and all of them... it won't matter where really, because there is something so secret, so magical, so glorious about any vast green garden in the middle of a city... they are like stumbling upon a childhood treasure... or wandering into a storybook...or managing to pause time, even for just an instant...

super cool

giovanna battaglia: man, i love what this chick does with clothes. she can do girly and sexy...but mostly i love when she does boyish. i guess you'd learn a trick or two if you were the fashion editor of l'uomo vogue. i like that she always looks a little tough, a little rough, never too polished, but still definitely pulled together. and how cool is it to be a girl called gio? 

oh, charlotte

charlotte gainsbourg. it's impossible to not fall in love with her. big-eyed and coltish. long-limbed and shy and soft-voiced. but that quiet face seems tough too, sharp and discriminating, urbane. like she knows a thing or two. like she might always know more than you, but she likes to stay quiet and watch and wonder. she probably smokes too much. she probably likes the early mornings when no one else is awake. she's boyish and girlish. she's bright and she broods. she must read before she goes to bed. she must like the look of simplicity and brand-new white t-shirts, and the way her stomach feels in an elevator. she probably likes to walk without a particular place to get to. she must cry easily when you least expect it and not at all when you would. it would be impossible to not fall in love with her.

a hot mess

all photos by terry richardson

terry richardson does dirty dirty like nobody's business. and actually, these shots are on the much nicer side of things. let's just say the other side gets a lot closer to filthy. and it all happens pretty fast. 

what i've been dreaming about:

buenos aires at night

bunnies

southern country roads

figs off the tree

a sweep of sky & a sweep of sea & a sweep of sand

a grey horse in a green field

fine and dandy

i want to be a gentlewoman. and wear trousers. instead of jeans. perhaps not always. maybe just on sundays. just one day a week to be dapper and debonair. i will wear brogues or lace-up oxfords or jaunty little pumps. and rose colored lips and a proper watch. and a nice easy blouse, clean and girlish. and i will part my hair to the side and keep my hands in my pockets as often as possible. and i will walk the dog like that, or buy apples or ride the bus... like some kind of first-rate fop. because wouldn't that be just absolutely grand? to be a gentlewoman, on a sunday.

more than yesterday

photo from weheartit.com

i love you more than yesterday.

what a thing to say. everyone should have that said to them. 

all walled in

photo from weheartit.com

photo from worldsbestever.com

photo from weheartit.com

photo from weheartit.com

i love what wallpaper does. it turns a room into a story. it imbues empty space with whimsy and nostalgia and myth. it adds texture. it adds movement. i really really like it. 

that running-wild kind of youth

i quite like jonathan leder photographs. most of them anyways. i know they are a bit trendy. perhaps a little too cool. but i like the terrain that some of them speak to... that speedway of running-wild youth, spasming and misspent, glorious and dreamy, pouting and snarling...where it feels like anything might happen, where it feels like nothing happens. those panting moments. those bored, pacing moments. those secret, perverse moments. those sweet green moments. days of dress-up, days of dress-down. days of make-believe and make-up and make-shift and make-over. i think his photographs get these moments and manage to hold onto to something—something alive and young and throbbing. and i like the muted colors and the emptied-out landscapes and the fuzz of light.