"All through Andalusia . . . people speak constantly of duende, and recognize it with unfailing instinct when it appears. The wonderful flamenco singer El Lebrijano said: ‘When I sing with duende, no one can equal me.’ . . . Manuel Torres, a man with more culture in his veins than anybody I have known, when listening to Falla play his own ‘Nocturno del Genaralife,’ made his splendid pronouncement: ‘All that has dark sounds has duende.’ And there is no greater truth.

"These dark sounds are the mystery, the roots thrusting into the fertile loam known to all of us, ignored by all of us, but from which we get what is real in art. . . .

"Thus duende is a power and not a behavior, it is a struggle and not a concept. I have heard an old master guitarist say: ‘Duende is not in the throat; duende surges up from the soles of the feet.’ Which means it is not a matter of ability, but of real live form; of blood; of ancient culture; of creative action."


-- Federico Garcia Lorca.

We are the echo of the future
On the door it says what to do to survive
But we were not born to survive
Only to live

-- W. S. Merwin.

There is an emptiness,

Within us,

Which brings us.



Your eyes search for mine.

In the desert,

Over the ocean,

Among the stars.

Finding them, ceaselessly;

Reflecting yours.



The wind aches,

As it blows through us.



--(words)isolde

The clock:
Ticks.
The tap:
Drips.
-- The phone --
Rings not.

The street:
Murmurs.
A radio:
Chatters.
-- The phone --
Still silent.

The cat:
Purrs.
Someone:
Sighs.
The cable:

...Lies severed.


--(words) isolde