Never Stop Talking To The Animals (Happy Birthday)

Fig. 1. Paul Klee - Cat and Bird, 1928

'Seven to eleven is a huge chunk of life, full of dulling and forgetting. It is fabled that we slowly lose the gift of speech with animals, that birds no longer visit our windowsills to converse. As our eyes grow accustomed to sight they armor themselves against wonder.'

Leonard Cohen

Your Ears Will Orgasm #38: Takako Minekawa - Fantastic Cat (MixPod Player)

Addendum: A wonderful contribution from "Anonymous". Thank you!

Les Chats

Les amoureux fervents et les savants austères
Aiment également, dans leur mûre saison,
Les chats puissants et doux, orgueil de la maison,
Qui comme eux sont frileux et comme eux sédentaires.

Amis de la science et de la volupté
Ils cherchent le silence et l'horreur des ténèbres;
L'Erèbe les eût pris pour ses coursiers funèbres,
S'ils pouvaient au servage incliner leur fierté.

Ils prennent en songeant les nobles attitudes
Des grands sphinx allongés au fond des solitudes,
Qui semblent s'endormir dans un rêve sans fin;

Leurs reins féconds sont pleins d'étincelles magiques,
Et des parcelles d'or, ainsi qu'un sable fin,
Etoilent vaguement leurs prunelles mystiques.

Charles Baudelaire

Ode To Those Who've Heard The Barmaids Singing*

Fig. 1. Édouard Manet - Un bar aux Folies Bergère, 1881-2

Fig. 2. John Brack - The Bar, 1954

Fig. 3. Yasumasa Morimura - Daughter of Art History: Theatre B, 1998

'An alcoholic is someone you don't like who drinks as much as you do.'

Dylan Thomas

* 'I have heard the mermaids singing each to each / I do not think that they will sing to me.' The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (1917) by T.S. Eliot

Addendum:

Leonard Cohen - Closing Time (click image to access clip on YouTube)

Obituary: Lost in Space actor Bob May dies at 69 in California (CDT, 18.01.2009)

Fig. 2. The Lost in Space (1965-68) cast: Mark Goddard, June Lockhart, Guy Williams, Billy Mumy, Angela Cartwright, Jonathan Harris, Marta Kristen and Bob May (as "The Robot").

I Am Floating Free - Like A Drunk In A Midday Choir*

Fig. 1. Henri Matisse - Le bonheur de vivre, 1905-06


'I am unable to make any distinction between the feeling I get from life and the way I translate that feeling into painting.'

Henri Matisse

* 'Like a bird on a wire, / Like a drunk in a midnight choir / I have tried in my way to be free.' (from Bird On A Wire by Leonard Cohen)

Addendum: At First Because I Had To Be - Now Because I Want To Be

Johnny Cash - Bird On A Wire (1994)