Up to Something #1
Welcome to Up to Something, an occasional segment of my newsletter through which I let you all know what I’m reading, listening to, watching, or just thinking about.
For this first edition of Up to Something, I want to give a shoutout to Cavar’s Substack newsletter, which inspires my own.
I recently finished the audiobook How Far the Light Reaches: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures by Sabrina Imbler and thoroughly enjoyed it.
It’s a beautiful spring day where I am, and I just came back from a brief stroll around my college’s gloriously green little campus while listening to a song from the Wes Anderson movie The French Dispatch. The song is “Obituary” by the famous French film composer Alexandre Desplat.
Relatedly, this morning I came across the French Marxist artistic concept of Psychogeography, which essentially has to do with moving through a geographical location and its effects on a person’s emotions and behaviors. Here is a brief description of Psychogeography (including links to related art movements) on the British Tate museum’s website.
Last autumn, I listened to Patti Smith’s book Just Kids, and I’m looking forward to listening to M Train, Smith’s second memoir, which I just borrowed from my local library’s stash of online audiobooks through the free Libby app.
I don’t consider myself a “gamer" (aside from my obsession with Gameboy Tetris) but I recently discovered for myself the world of solo/single player role playing games (RPGs) and the vast expanse of the web store itch.io, which offers zillions of pay-what-you-want and free downloads. I decided on Telegraph: A Poetry Game, (for $3) and it prompted me to create an original poem, which I will share here, now:
BARN CAT POEM
In the June green pasture,
a wall of stacked stones
draws down rays of afternoon sun
like they shine only for him—
an old barn cat
belly full of treats
basks here in glory
knowing nothing of grief,
tail tip twitching just a little
in his warm and dreamy sleep.
See you soon!
-Devin S. Turk