catarina nunes de almeida

(quadro de jonathan meese, "ohne titel", 1994)


"Só de olhos fechados compreendíamos a escuridão dos olhos
o comprimento azulado dos homens que partiam
fabricantes de janelas de tecidos de ruas
com cheiro de peixes vivos.
Era um linguajar mitológico: cada fonema solar
glorificando a cegueira uma morte igual à morte -
os autos das barcas que naquela tarde. (1)

catarina nunes de almeida



(1) ALMEIDA, Catarina Nunes de - A metamorfose das plantas dos pés. Porto: Deriva, 2008. ISBN 978-972-9250-44-6. p. 13.

rainer maria rilke

(quadro de peter doig, "drifter", 1999)


"Guarda-te melhor
guarda-te caminhante
do caminho que também caminha" (1)

rainer maria rilke



(1) RILKE, Rainer Maria apud ALMEIDA, Catarina Nunes de - A metamorfose das plantas dos pés. Porto: Deriva, 2008. ISBN 978-972-9250-44-6. p. 7.

"glimpses, audio: driving late" (pete simonelli)

(quadro de cecily brown, "sweetie", 2001)


"To the immediate west, a beautiful sight,
and simple in its looming--
I have the Sutro's constellation perched above me,
its four red points blinking the the drink of fog and night
like some ethereal port of entry.
The radio says it's coming up on 4AM,

and 16th street's suddenly hotwired
with chivying cries of the highly sexed.
A barrage of them, eerily canned,
one playboy after another sounding off
burdened reports through the air:
invisible behind trees
and penumbras of streetlamps, but
voices all the same, looping down
from second and third story windows,
each one flared from the augurs
of narcotic frights to pass leeward and careless
to the women below.

You motherfuckers are goin' to jail...

And just like that-- a tacit inception or a shared
psychic reasoning-- and the night falls slapdash
into fugue,
its haunted figure askitter with needlepoints surging
willy-nilly through the body of them,
as they go veering across the darkness
like startled insects,
a scratching,
sniffing,
febrile emblem of indecisiveness,
pushing on buzzers,
imploring upward in hisses--
every one of them

dying a little more.
Like the kid asprawl on the stoop,
sick and keenly marginal
like a late model Tantalus in up to his neck,
denied fruit,
and so realizing that the stuff's bigger than him;
that it's the unrequited love and therefore
in everything he sees." (1)

The Enablers


(1) retirado do cd dos Enablers, End Note (2004)

"the auld triangle" (b. behan)

(quadro de walter pichler)


"A hungry feeling
came o'er me stealing
and the mice were squeeling
in my prison cell
And that auld triangle went jingle-jangle
all along the banks of the Royal Canal

Oh! To start the morning
the warden bawling
"get up out of bed, you! And Clean out your cell!"
And that auld triangle went jingle-jangle
all along the banks of the Royal Canal

Oh! the screw was peeping
and the lag was sleeping
as he lay weeping
for his girl Sal
And that auld triangle went jingle-jangle
all along the banks of the Royal Canal

On a fine Spring evening
the lag lay dreaming
and the sea-gulls were wheeling
high above the wall
And that auld triangle went jingle-jangle
all along the banks of the Royal Canal

Oh! the wind was sighing
and the day was dying
as the lag lay crying
in his prison cell
And that auld triangle went jingle-bloody-jangle
all along the banks of the Royal Canal

In the women's prison
there are seventy women
and I wish it was with them
that I did dwell
Then that auld triangle could go jingle-jangle
all along the banks of the Royal Canal" (1)

THE POGUES



(1) retirado do cd dos Pogues, Red Roses for Me, 1984)

"down by the water" (polly jean harvey)

(fotografia de shirin neshat, "sem título (zarin series)", 2005)

"I lost my heart
under the bridge
to that little girl
so much to me

And now I'm old
and now I holler
she'll never know
just what I found

That blue eyed girl
she said "no more"
that blue eyed girl
became blue eyed whore

Down by the water
i took her hand
just like my daughter
won't see her again

Oh help me jesus
come through this storm
i had to lose her
to do her harm

I heard her holler
i heard her moan
my lovely daughter
i took her home

Little fish. big
fish. Swimming in the
water.

Come back here, man.
gimme my daughter.

Little fish. big
fish. Swimming in the
water.

Come back here, man.
gimme my daughter." (1)

PJ HARVEY


(1) retirado do cd de pj harvey, to bring you my love, de 1995.

portugal não é um país plural

(fotografia de ângela ferreira, "casa de colonos abandonada", 2007)

hermínio martins escrevia isto em 1971. em 37 anos, muita coisa mudou:



"Portugal não é uma sociedade «plural». Um estudo comparativo das sociedades europeias mostra que Portugal se caracteriza por um grau invulgar de homogeneidade nacional. Tal descoberta é válida se tivermos em consideração a homogeneidade racial, étnica, linguística, religiosa ou cultural e é igualmente válida quando comparamos Portugal com outras sociedades, pequenas ou grandes, da Europa Mediterrânica ou do Noroeste. Esta importante particularidade societária foi obscurecida pela maior proeminência internacional do anómalo estatuto imperial de Portugal. Na realidade, historicamente, Portugal caracteriza-se por um baixo nível de diversidade etno-cultural interna, pelo menos igual, se não inferior, ao nível de diversidade dos outros impérios europeus. Mas, contrariamente às outras ex-potências imperiais, ainda não absorveu nenhuma fracção significativa dos seus súbditos coloniais ou ex-coloniais e, portanto, não diversificou a sua composição etno-cultural. Paradoxalmente, para uma sociedade «oceânica», Portugal tem tido bastante êxito na «exportação» dessa mesma diversidade etno-cultural" (1)



hermínio martins





(1) MARTINS - Hermínio - MARTINS, Hermínio - Classe, status e poder e outros ensaios sobre o portugal contemporâneo. Lisboa: Instituto de Ciências Sociais, 1998. ISBN 972-671-051-0. p. 99.



como já foi dito atrás, muita coisa mudou nos últimos 37 anos. portugal está mais diverso, deixou de ser um país apenas de emigração para ser, cada vez mais, um país de imigração. em 37 anos, recebemos muitos africanos vindos das ex-colónias, muitos brasileiros, muitos europeus de países como a ucrânia, roménia, etc. mas, será que estamos mais integrados? será que essa homogeneidade cultural de portugal se mantém?

jorge vicente

"as tears goes by" (mick jagger / keith richards / andrew loog oldham)

(fotografia de dave anderson, da série "rough beauty")


"It is the evening of the day,
i sit and watch the children play.
Smiling faces I can see, but not for me,
i sit and watch as tears go by.

My riches can't buy ev'rything,
i want to hear the children sing.
All I hear is the sound of rain
falling on the ground,
i sit and watch as tears go by.

It is the evening of the day,
i sit and watch the children play.
Doin' things I used to do they think are new.
i sit and watch as tears go by." (1)

the rolling stones


(1) retirado do cd dos rolling stones, hot rocks 1964-1971 (1972)



do you play as you used to do
do you smile as you smiled
as a kid

infancy is just a state of being
a tenderness in smile
and the constant lightning

around the eyes