Two life-size Victorian style dolls ride the London tube this morning. The creepy pair popped up at commuter hotspots across the capital to mark the launch of the world's first psychological theme park ride created by illusionist Derren Brown.: photo by PA via FT Photo Diary 3 December 2015
It was a human face in my oblivion
A human being and a human voice
That cried to me, Come back, come back, come back.
But I would not. I said I would not come back.
It was so sweet in my oblivion
There was a sweet mist wrapped me round about
And I trod in a sweet and milky sea, knee deep,
That was so pretty and so beautiful, growing deeper.
But still the voice cried out, Come back, come back,
Come back to me from sweet oblivion!
It was a human and related voice
That cried to me in pain. So I turned back.
Come back to me from sweet oblivion!
It was a human and related voice
That cried to me in pain. So I turned back.
I cannot help but like Oblivion better
Than being a human heart and human creature,
But I can wait for her, her gentle mist
And those sweet seas that deepen are my destiny
And must come even if not soon.
Florence Margaret (Stevie) Smith (1902-1971): Oblivion, from Scorpion and Other Poems, 1972
Migrants run as police fired tear gas into the entrance to the camp known as the ‘New Jungle’ in Calais, France: photo by Jeff J Mitchell, 2 December 2015
Cars drive past during the first snowfall of the season in Ankara on Wednesday: photo by Adem Altan/AFP, 2 December 2015
Analyzing impact of UK Syria airstrikes: image via Reuters TV @ReutersTV, 3 December 2015
San Bernardino shooting. FBI investigators inside the suspects' Redlands home on Thursday morning: photo by Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times, 2 December 2015
San Bernardino shooting. Investigators search the suspected assailants' SUV in San Bernardino on Thursday morning.: photo by Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times, 2 December 2015
San Bernardino shooting. A body lies across the street from a black SUV that is suspected to be involved in a mass shooting in San Bernardino on Wednesday.: photo by KTLA / Los Angeles Times, 2 December 2015
San Bernardino vigil. Angel Meler-Baumgartner 11, who was a member of the Inland Regional Center, where the shooting occurred, attends a vigil at San Manuel Stadium for the victims: photo by Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times, 4 December 2015
San Bernardino vigil. The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA held a press conference and prayer vigil at Baitul Hameed Mosque in Chino. The group denounced the massacre.: photo by Michael Robinson Chávez / Los Angeles Times, 4 December 2015
A boy prays at a mosque in Chino. Muslim community quick to condemn the tragedy in #sanbernardino @latimesphotose.: image via M Robinson Chávez @chavismophoto, 4 December 2015
Night seems too beautiful for the sadness that's about to overcome this stadium. #SanBernardinoShooting: image via Blake McCoy @BlakeNBC, 3 December 2015 San Bernardino, CA
A view of the kitchen inside the Redlands townhome where Syed Rizwan Farook and Tafsheen Malik, suspects in the deadly the recent mass shootings in San Bernardino, lived: photo by Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times, 4 December 2015
This is above the toilet in the upstairs bathroom: image via Kate Mather @katemather, 4 December 2015
#migrants protest behind a fence at the Greek-Macedonian border, near Gevgelija. #AFP Photo by @armend_nimani: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY 1 December 2015
#migrants protest behind a fence at the Greek-Macedonian border, near Gevgelija. #AFP Photo by @armend_nimani: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 1 December 2015
Migrants protest behind a fence against restrictions limiting passage at the Greek-Macedonian border, near Gevgelija, on Tuesday.Since last week, Macedonia has restricted passage to northern Europe to only Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans who are considered war refugees: photo by Armend Nimani/AFP, 1 December 2015
#migrants protest behind a fence at the Greek-Macedonian border, near Gevgelija. #AFP Photo by @armend_nimani: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 1 December 2015
A man carrying a baby cries after crossing the Greek-Macedonian border with other migrants and refugees, near the town of Gevgelija. Macedonia has restricted passage to northern Europe to only Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans who are considered war refugees. All other nationalities are deemed economic migrants and told to turn back. Over 1,500 people are stuck on the border: photo by Armend Nimani/AFP, 4 December 2015
A man carrying a baby cries after crossing the Greek-Macedonian border with other migrants and refugees, near the town of Gevgelija. Macedonia has restricted passage to northern Europe to only Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans who are considered war refugees. All other nationalities are deemed economic migrants and told to turn back. Over 1,500 people are stuck on the border: photo by Armend Nimani/AFP, 4 December 2015
A lenticular cloud forms as white streaks from airplanes mark the blue sky, in a rare atmospheric phenomena above the town of Gevgelija, Macedonia. Lenticular clouds have been regularly confused for UFOs throughout history due to the their smooth, round or oval lens-shaped structure: photo by Armend Nimani/AFP, 4 December 2015
3 comments:
A heartbreaking and mysterious post. Beautiful poem. Like I always say: repeal the 2nd Amendment. Thanks, Tom.
Thanks Tom for this sad and prayerful post. We all wait for that which "must come even if not soon."
-David
Terry and David, Many thanks.
2nd Amendment: isn't that the one that says gun manufacturers and vendors, along with bankers and insurance executives and hedge fund traders and the ordinary joe next door who's got an awesome arsenal in his garage, have a perfect right to continuously derive profit, not to mention, even more interestingly, other forms of satisfaction, from their preferred modus operandi, even if it's detrimental to the living as such?
I did notice the sub-trivial story detail to the effect that the weapons were legally purchased at Annie's Get Your Gun in Corona.
Have you ever noticed how it's always the sticky bite-size bits of routine horror amid the wider calamity that cling maddeningly to the cranial noodleroni (or is that just the dementia knocking at the bulkhead again??)
I guess the putative relevance would be that whatever else was or wasn't involved in, with or around the events in San Berdoo, it's safe to say that American culture, and American lifestyle, and American business, evidently played a part.
On that constitutional point raised by tpw, here's a brief bit on exactly how this latest bloodbath affected business:
Gun-makers' stocks surge after San Bernardino shootings: Smith & Wesson and Sturm, Ruger & Co jump early Thursday, part of a trend that has seen gun-makers’ stocks quadruple S&P 500 returns in past five years: Jana Kaspervic, The Guardian, 3 December 2015
Stocks of two major gun-makers surged on Thursday morning, the day after a shooting in San Bernardino, California, left 14 people dead.
More than an hour after the stock markets opened, Smith & Wesson stocks were up by 2.62%. Stocks of Sturm, Ruger & Co were up 1.67%.
Gunmakers saw their stock rise even as the overall stock market fell on concerns that the Federal Reserve would raise interests later this month.
Smith & Wesson and Sturm, Ruger & Co saw their stocks surge in October as well after a shooting at Umpqua community college in Oregon left 10 people dead, including the gunman. Investors are betting that the shootings will lead to more gun sales: a CNN Money analysis found that over the past five years these stocks have had four times the returns of the S&P 500 stock market.
Sturm, Ruger & Co stock also went up the morning after San Bernardino shooting.
On Tuesday, the FBI revealed that last week on Black Friday the National Instant Criminal Background Check System performed a record number of gun background checks. About 185,345 background checks were processed, a 5% increase from last year – and equivalent to about two a second.
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