father of many seeds

Unlike the Little Prince who considered them an existential threat to his tiny planet, we’ve been cultivators of baobabs for quite some time and have many clones around the house grown from errant leaves and branches and it was quite distressing and depressing to learn that after millennia of existence, we’re living through a time (with our much more modest lifespans) when many of Africa’s monumental trees have succumbed to the ill affects of manmade climate change. The title is the etymological root for the plant, borrowing from the Arabic name abū ḥibāb (أبو حباب). Hopefully it’s not too late for those majestic and sheltering landmarks that remain.

benedictine beatnik

A self-described “monknik,” Hyperallergic introduces us to the concrete poetry and cut-up style of Dom Sylvester Houédard, a Benedictine priest and theologian who regularly slipped away from his abbey in the Cotswolds to spend weekends in London, helping to inform the particular genre and scene.
Artfully presented and visually stunning, Houédard’s works are replete with religious references but reflect a view broader than his own tradition, having an affinity for Eastern philosophy as well. Like the poems of his friends and correspondents William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg (who objected to the label beatnik, coined by journalist Herb Caen after the launch of Sputnik), Houédard was interested in acquainting writer and reader “in maximum communication with minimum words,” composing terse and polished little stumbling blocks to cause one to question semantic trappings.

small blows

It’s vital to remember that in the face of dispiriting, soul-crushing contemporary civics and politics that we have allies against the forces of regression—and indeed allies worth celebrating, including the witty and insightful contributors to McSweeney’s. Since 2016, the publishing house has been offering a regular feature that helps cope with the paralysing apoplexy that uncivil discourse can bring about in an anthology of thoughtful, modest and inspiring essays on the theme of One Small Blow Against Encroaching Totalitarianism. Be sure to visit and indulge in their expansive archive fighting for social justice, for yourself and for the greater good.

it takes one to know one

We’ll see how much history is determined by the historic meeting between the leadership of the US and North Korea but it does already strike me as a little hollow and quite asymmetrical with the regime of Kim Jung-un being accorded the legitimatising recognition that it’s sought for some time and preternaturally under the same terms and conditions that Trump bewailed his predecessor as concessions to Iran, making America look weak and dopey.
Much in the same way that the Manchurian Candidate’s revolting behaviour has markedly improved the image of loveable, old war-criminal Bush II, not only does his eagerness to meet with Kim deflect attention from the hermit kingdom’s atrocious human rights standards (zero freedom of movement, zero freedom of speech and mandatory, universal adoration—not to give Dear Leader any more ideas) with the optics, this plum bargain asks little in concrete terms from North Korea while having US military presence on the peninsula characterised as “provocative” (after so much mutual sabre-rattling) and pledges to suspend large-scale training exercises with the South and Japan.