#tasty tasty religious imagery

[counting-unfortunate-stars]

Oh my darling, child of autumn, dance with me in wooden shoes

Along the edge of what once was and what soon could be

See you in my prayers

In the limn of sunlight behind a gleaming statue

The voice of a silver cross told me I was no saint

But tell me, beloved, when your hands are coated in blood

What difference does it make if it is your own or someone else’s?

Oh dusk-lit child, drape yourself in the red-brown-gray of a winter twilight

Gild your hair in copper

And teach me that fire and light are one and the same

Won’t you twirl with me between what is known and what should be forgotten

And catch me when I fall to either side

Hear my hymns

From the edge of the forest where the small things scurry and the shadows walk

And sing my refrain in a silence born of snow

My darling unholy child

Won’t you teach me what it is to be sacred

#tasty tasty religious imagery #possibly my favorite thing I’ve ever written #can’t think of a title rn #poetry

[ghostchems]

la bella luna -papa emeritus ii x female!reader (part 2)

secondo gives you a tour of the abbey.

author's note: part 2 is finally here! this is for @tasty-ribz <3. 3.5k words. mndi! we got a lot of spiciness here :) as of right now, this is the final part but there potentially could be a part 3 later on :) ao3 link.

“Are you gonna let me leave?”

He ignores you. He has been ignoring your pleas and questions for the duration of your breakfast. Despite the air of grumpiness and stress, the breakfast was quite good – over easy eggs, bacon and toast, that you happily devoured. Now that your plate is empty, you continue to stare at Secondo who is lost in some papers in front of him.

You are starting to get upset, your head starting to swim with thoughts that he is holding you captive now. The awareness that you left your phone in his room spikes your anxiety. Your knee is bouncing underneath the table as Secondo takes a long, drawn out sip of his coffee. You squint to try and make out what his papers say but a nun (?) quickly comes to the table, clearing it of plates and tucking the papers under her arm. She doesn’t even spare you a glance.

Secondo is gazing at you now, his expression completely unreadable besides the always present scowl that is painted on his face. He stands from the table and you quickly do the same, fidgeting with your hands as you give him the most unsure face you can possibly muster. He reaches for you, his hand resting gently on your shoulder and you feel a small sense of relief just from the touch.

“Come. I’ll show you around, cara.” His voice is calm, yet stern. You swallow thickly and nod at him. He seems so different than the night before, much more rigid and tense, but then again, he had been drinking. Secondo still offers a small squeeze to your shoulder before turning on heel to leave the dining area. 

You follow after him like a lost puppy. This is not how you imagined this morning going. You figured you would be home by now, having your precious alone time after a shockingly successful night out. But instead, you are following a man in flowing, scary robes around what appears to be a ministry of some sort.

There is religious imagery plastered along the halls and inside what appear to be classrooms and meeting areas, as well as plenty of inverted crosses. Still, overall it seemed like a nice place? People seemed happy. There is a huge library, a garden and a greenhouse, dormitories, common areas, an auditorium, a chapel and more. The more you saw, the more you were impressed but the sneaking suspicion started to creep into the back of your mind that this is a cult and Secondo is the leader.

The tour ends in his office which is the same exact color scheme of his room - black furniture with gold and green accent pieces. You are sitting across from him, your knee bouncing again as he looks you over from his side of the desk.

“Are you afraid, cara?” He finally speaks up, brows furrowing.

“I’m… stressed. I mean, this isn’t typically how one-night stands go, ya know? I should be home by now, I think.” You’re frowning at him, trying to convey how uncomfortable you are. He doesn’t seem too phased by it.

“You want to go home, cara?”

“Yes.” You sigh deeply. “I have been asking you all morning when I can leave, Secondo. This isn’t right; you can’t just force someone to stay here if they don’t want to.” 

“I don’t think you actually want to go home.” Secondo sneers, then stands up and walks to the front of his desk, just in front of you. He leans back on the desk, his feet settling between yours. 

“Are you serious?!”  You are practically screaming now, your face twisted in anger as you jump to your feet. “You don’t even fucking know me.” You have the urge to shove him but you refrain, instead cross your arms in front of your chest with a huff.

“Oh, but I do, cara.” Secondo reaches out and snatches you by the chin. You try not to seem phased by it but you can’t help but widen your eyes at his grip. “You’re bored of your life. That is why you agreed to that date, no?” The corner of his lips curl into a barely there smile.

You say nothing and clench your jaw against his grasp. Does he want a pat on the back for pointing out something so painfully obvious? Still, you can feel your cheeks start to heat up from his gaze and his touch. 

“You are curious, as well. Curious enough to follow a mysterious old man into a dive bar.” His thumb brushes over your lips and you can’t help but part them at the touch.

“You’re not that old. Plus, you were much more charming last night.” You want to sound confident but the words come out rushed and quiet. He slips his thumb into your mouth and pressed down on your tongue. An involuntary moan spills from your lips.

“I think you like me this way, dolcezza.” Secondo leans in close and removes his thumb from your mouth. You suck in a quick breath as his hand moves to the back of  your head. “It’s what made you follow me last night.” His fingers twist into your hair and he pulls you forward, pressing his lips to yours. 

The kiss is gentle, his soft lips moving against yours. You pull away and meet his gaze, almost getting lost in his sparkling white eye. You’re still frustrated, of course, but he was right, you are drawn to him in a way that’s hard to explain. You are quick to kiss him again, this time more forceful to assert control,, your tongue invading his mouth.

Secondo makes a surprised noise, his grip on your hair tightening as he kisses you back. He slips his hand down between your legs and presses his palm firmly against your cunt through your pants. You give a soft gasp and he takes the opportunity to suck on your tongue. All illusions of you being in control slip away at that moment. You’re putty in his hands.

“Come back to my quarters and let me show you other reasons to stay.” He purrs against your lips as he slowly rubs his palm against your cunt. You whine and you’re at a loss for words. You manage to nod your head and he grins, showing off his sharp white teeth.

Secondo quickly spins you around and you huff at the loss of contact. His hands rest on your shoulders and he starts to guide you from his office. You feel like you’re on autopilot, your feet pattering along the tiled hallway. 

The moment the two of you make it inside his room, he pulls you flush against him, your back against his chest. Secondo slips down your stomach and toys with the band of your sweatpants. You slide your hand around his neck and tip your head up to him, lips brushing against his jaw.

“Mia luna.” Secondo hums and pushes his hand down your pants. He swipes his fingers across your slick folds and your body shudders at the sensation. “When I’m done with you, you’ll never want to leave.” He hisses into your ear and slips a finger inside you. 

“Fuck.” You pant and give a soft groan as he curls his finger just so. Secondo chuckles against you, then dips down to your neck, planting wet kisses down it as he slips another finger in. Your back arches and you feel his hard cock through his robes against your ass. A shuddered breath leaves your lips as he picks up his pace, thrusting his fingers in and out, curling at just the right spot. 

He slides his hand underneath your shirt and starts to massage one of your breasts. Your eyes squeeze shut and your jaw goes slack. Secondo hums against your neck, teeth grazing it and then gives it a soft bite. You moan deeply, your hand pulling him even further into you. He grunts into your neck as he pushes another finger inside you and uses his other hand to pinch at your nipple.

You’re barely hanging on by a thread, moans spilling from your lips as he continues to thrust his fingers. He seems to know exactly how to make your toes curl, your head spin, your body tremble just with his fingers. 

“Will you come for me?” Secondo whispers into your neck, then seals his lips to it and roughly sucks. Your hips jerk wildly against his fingers and you tilt your head back, resting it on his shoulder. “Will you, mia luna?” He didn’t have to ask you again, a strangled sob spilling from your lips as you reached your peak.

You don’t have much time to recover. Secondo picks you up around your waist and tosses you onto the bed, losing your pants in the process. You squeak as your ass hits the bed and he’s quickly kneeling in front of you. You manage to reach and tug at his robes, and he gladly helps you remove them. They drop to the floor in a heap, revealing a tight black t-shirt and even tighter briefs.

You’re finally able to get a good look at his face: the paint on the lower half of his face is smeared into a gray and you can see a little bit of his pink lips peeking through. Secondo’s fingers toy with the hem of your sweatshirt and you can’t help but wrap your legs around him and try to pull him in closer.

He nips at your jaw and then pushes your sweatshirt over your head, tugging it off and tossing it onto the floor. His hands are still gloved and he runs them up your back as he kisses down your chest. You rest your hand on his shoulders, then lightly drag your fingers to his neck. Secondo moans softly against you and you can feel the vibrations in your chest.

You suck in a breath as his lips close around one of your nipples, flicking his tongue against it. His fingers dig into your back and your head lolls back on your shoulders. He lets go of your nipple, lathing his tongue across it again before continuing to kiss down your stomach while his hands move down to your hips.

Secondo settles his face between your legs, looking up at you with dark eyes as his lips brush against your inner thigh. Your legs are already trembling and you move your hands to grip at the edges of the bed. He licks across your folds, moaning at the taste, and presses his face firmly against you.

His tongue dips inside you and your hips buck at the pressure. He grabs your legs and positions them over his shoulders, your heels digging into his back as he sinks his tongue even deeper inside you. You throw your head back, a loud, shameless moan spilling from your lips. Secondo digs his fingers into your hips, moving his lips up to seal around your clit.

“Secondo!” You whine as your heels press even hard into your back. You can feel him chuckle against you but he doesn’t stop. He swipes his tongue roughly against your clit over and over again while your leg muscles start to spasm. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” You gasp, your chest heaving. Secondo growls again against you and this sends you over the edge again, tears stinging your eyes as you cum.

Secondo brings himself to his feet, lazily stroking himself through his briefs as you come down from your orgasm. He reaches for your chin with his free hand, running his thumb along your already parted lips. You’re panting heavily, your eyes watery as they drift up to his. The corners of your lips twitch into a small smile at the sight of him.

His eyes are blown wide with lust and you can see a blush peeking out from underneath his paint. You manage to lean up and run your fingers down his chest and stomach. He groans quietly, squeezing himself through his briefs. You move his hand away from his cock and tug his briefs down, his length springing free.

Your eyes flit up to his face and his mouth drops open as you grab him by the base. You lick the precum off his tip, a moan rumbling from his chest. Secondo moves his hand to grab you by the hair and forces you down his length. You hum around his length, your tongue running along the underside of it. His hips jerk into your mouth, his cock hitting the back of your throat and you can’t help but gag.

He yanks you off of him, a line of spit connecting your mouth and his cock. Your eyes are wide and you’re worried that you’ve done something wrong. That is, until he grabs you and pushes you down onto your back. He thrusts himself into you without warning and you scream, your nails scratching at his chest. Secondo’s hips are snapping ferociously into you, his thighs slapping hard against your ass.

“Fuck, Secondo!” You cry out, your voice hoarse from how much you’ve been screaming for him. He captures your lips, kissing you hungrily as he growls into your mouth. Your arms loop around his shoulders and you scratch at the base of his neck. 

“You like this, dolcezza?” He snarls between labored breaths. “You like when I fuck you into the mattress?” Secondo’s teeth tug at your bottom lip as you babble a series of “yes’s”. His hips stutter, jerking wildly as he reaches his climax. He buries himself deep inside of you and growls deep in his throat as he cums, spilling his seed. 

You’re left gasping beneath him, your chest heaving against his. Secondo picks his head up, looking at you with heavy-lidded eyes. He traces his gloved finger across your cheek with such tenderness. Your hands slide down his shoulders to his chest, running your fingers through his chest hair. He leans in and kisses you, a soft, gentle kiss that makes your heart flutter in your chest.

“Mia luna.” He mutters against your lips, then tilts his head up to press a kiss to your forehead. “I have some work to tend to, dolcezza. Would you like a shower?” Secondo’s nose brushes against yours, a soft smile playing on his lips. You try to speak but you’re unable to form words, only being able to mumble an affirmative. His lips pull into an even wider smile as he helps you to a sitting position.

***

You wrap yourself in a towel, your hair still wet as you step back into the bedroom. Secondo is gone. You take the opportunity to finally check your phone. There are several text messages waiting for you, one of which is your date from last night apologizing profusely about standing you up (some kind of emergency happened or whatever), and another from your friend you shared your location with, alerting you that you are at a satanic church.

“Good to know.” You mutter, tossing your phone onto the bed. Your gaze travels around the room before settling on the door. A quick beat goes by before you’re walking towards it, hand reaching out for the knob. You turn it. 

Unlocked.

A million thoughts start to flood your brain as you consider making a run for it. You quickly move back to the bed, changing into a new pair of sweats and crewneck that was left for you. An odd sense of anxiousness starts to fall over you as you eye up the door. Part of you is ready to go while another part is curious… curious if this was a trap and also curious as to what would happen if you just stayed… a bit longer. 

You lay down on the bed, stretching out your limbs as your brain is torn completely in half by trying to decide what to do. After a while, you end up falling asleep wrapped in Secondo’s comforter.

***

When you wake up, it’s already dark outside. You rub your eyes and sigh softly, thinking that you’ve probably missed your chance at escape. At this point, you’re not sure that’s a bad thing.

Your attention drifts to the window and you see him, not far off smoking a cigarette outside. You run your fingers through your hair and try to straighten out your sweatshirt. It’s bunched up and crumpled from taking a hard nap. You are teetering on the edge of going back to sleep or going outside to him. The pull from him ends up being too strong and you end up finding yourself walking slowly along the path to him.

You silently walk up beside him and he gives a soft grunt as a greeting. Secondo’s arm slides around your waist and pulls you to his side. “Mia luna, buona sera.” You can smell the smoke on his breath as he presses his nose to your cheek. You lean into his touch with a dreamy smile, still riding high off of the time you spent with him earlier in the day.

The moon is shining brightly like it had been the night before and the two of you stand, gazing at it in silence for a little while. “I do not offer membership here to just anyone, dolcezza.” Secondo muses, breaking the silence as he flicks his cigarette to the ground. He grinds his heel down on it, quickly putting it out. “I think you would thrive. You would be amongst other curious minds. Learn new skills and subjects.” His nose presses into your cheek again and you can feel that he’s smiling. “Plus, we would be able to have each other whenever we want.”

You feel the heat rise to your cheeks and offer a small giggle. “I still… have to think about it, you know.” You tilt your head so that your eyes meet his. The white eye is so bright in the darkness but his expression is much softer despite the scowling paint.

“Of course, dolcezza.” Secondo leans down to peck a kiss to your cheek. “You can leave whenever you like but…” He brings his hand up to stroke at your jaw. “I would like to spend another night with you in my arms, mia luna.” 

***

You left. You had to. You couldn’t just up and leave your life at the drop of a hat, even with how tempted you were to do it. But you had a job, a roommate and plants to take care of at your apartment. Plus, you didn’t want anyone to think you were sacrificed at the local satanic church either.

The weeks drag on. You end up going out on a date with the guy who stood you up (due to an emergency). He’s nice and you make plans to see each other again, and then again. Work is boring but at this point you are resigned to do the bare minimum in order to get that paycheck. You hang out with friends every so often and also spend plenty of time in your room watching your beloved reality tv shows.

Things are fully back to normal in your life despite the small detour. But, you often find yourself drifting off during your day at work or when you’re out with friends, or even when you’re on a date back to the time you spent with Secondo. Nothing has felt quite as thrilling as that night. Not even the more you get to know your new boytoy. 

You feel like you’ve been on autopilot for sometime when you start to feel that pull again. It’s been there, deep in the back of your mind since you left but it grows stronger by the day. The more bored you feel, the more you want to leave it all behind and go back. You’re almost annoyed with how Secondo has wormed his way into your brain.

Almost.

If you were actually annoyed, you wouldn’t be packing your bags right now. You wouldn’t be carefully wording a text message to your date. You wouldn’t have put in your notice at work that you were leaving. You wouldn’t be boarding an uber right now to go back to the ministry.

When you arrive, there are people in black masks ready to help you with your bags. It’s like they already knew you were coming somehow. They guide you to your new quarters. It was smaller than the room in your apartment you shared but it was quiet and it was yours. You start to unpack and organize your things when you hear a knock at your door.

It’s him. You know it’s him. He’s in his robes and mitre, face paint as scowly as ever but you can see the light smile on his face and the brightness in his eyes.

“Ah, mia luna, I knew you would come.”

#papa emeritus x reader #papa emeritus ii x reader #papa emeritus ii #secondo

[aihoshiino]

assuming the true culpit is not Hikaru, i wonder about the potential motives. It would be sound fairly 'dramaturgic' as a motive, but if Ai was killed right before the peak of her popularity to capitalize on her image as the shining star that will never get old? But uh, the truth is likely to be at least somewhat more banal and mundane.

It is possible to assume she ended up killed unintentionally (the person from whom the stalker got the address was not aware the stalker was off the deep end) too, though that would raise many questions about, well, everything.

Speaking of current Hikaru so far the hints about how he sees Hoshino make it feel a little like there's a religious flair to his perception of her as an idol (idols, right, the imagery of deities), as if him and supposedly at least some other people have a little almost a cult devoted to Ai the goddess that was embodied in the form of Ai the human.

Though it's a theory I've floated stuff, I I think I have mixed feelings about the idea of Kamiki not being the culprit... As a potential path for the story to take I think it would be really fascinating to whip the rug out from under the reader and make us question our blind faith in Aqua's perspective and deductions. But as you said, I think it would really depend both on the execution and what the "real" solution is. It would need to be at least as compelling and emotionally satisfying as what we can presume might have gone down between Ai and Hikaru.

I do think the idea that she was killed to "preserve" her was interesting. There's a sort of quasi-conspiracy theory (I'm not sure how else to class it) I have heard about certain recording labels and record executives are speculated to have been involved in killing off some of their stars at a point in their career where they were essentially worth more dead than they were alive - here's a pretty chonky video essay on the topic if you want to hear more.

The idea that something similar could have happened to Ai is a compelling one but again, it comes down to that question of who would even have been responsible and is it a satisfying alternative to Hikaru being the culprit? So I guess we'll just have to see.

Toooootally agreed on the sort of quasi-religious bent to people's fixations on her post-death, though! The weird little cult of personality Kamiki seems to be gathering around her image is very Eyes Emoji. In general I really like the ways OnK leans into the idea of idol fan culture as idolatry in its original sense and the ways that plays into how Ai's elevation into a worshipped figure hurt and dehumanised her is sooooo fucking tasty. More of that please, Akasaka!!!

#oshi no ko #oshi no posting #onk asks #onk spoilers

[ex-furry]

after going to the all saints feast today i think going to church semi-regularly might be good for me. not from like a religious "i am a devout methodist now" perspective but because i enjoyed getting dressed for something that's kinda formal and i fucking love religious imagery, rituals, and seeing how religious communities operate. so tasty yum yum. but also madyson you could probably just join a fuckin book club

#we went to the methodist church my mom was a member of and i went to a few times as a kid #and they really emphasize history and the support of non-members and non-methodists #it was nice. it wasn't like my nana's megachurch that just tried to sell itself to us at her funeral

[pesterloglog]

Dave Strider, Rose Lalonde

Act 6, page 5398

DAVE: rose quit all the clanking around over here i cant concentrate on my raps

DAVE: what in the sweet religious name of jesus h dick are you doing with all these bottles

ROSE: Just a little alchemy.

DAVE: alchemy

DAVE: what kind of shitty thing are you alchemizing with this crap

DAVE: are you alchemizing bottles with other bottles to make like

DAVE: superbottles

#rose_ebottles

ROSE: No. Believe it or not, I'm actually focused the contents of the bottles.

DAVE: youre a pretty good hike from the alchemiters

ROSE: The alchemy I'm practicing is a little more old fashioned.

ROSE: You know, there was a time on Earth when alchemy didn't refer to a process whereby a large device used game constructs to materialize some idealized version of an object out of thin air.

ROSE: Alchemists used to experiment with various substances to transmute them into something more valuable.

ROSE: Its more pedestrian and scientifically credible cousin would be chemistry, which I guess is the technical term for mixing shit together.

ROSE: Which strictly speaking more accurately describes what I'm doing.

DAVE: so what your doing science now

DAVE: who do you think you are your mom

DAVE: wait that sounded like lame burn again

DAVE: every time i talk about your mom it sounds like a burn

DAVE: who do you think you are my mom

DAVE: wait scratch that

DAVE: every time we start talking about her as my mom things just start snowballing down our dumb conversational ski slope and suddenly sigmund freud and king oedipus start banging each others hot moms at some kind of depraved sexy momswap party

ROSE: Thanks for the imagery. It was almost as graphic as it made no sense.

DAVE: so what are you making

ROSE: Beverages.

DAVE: beverages what kind of beverages

ROSE: Tasty beverages, I hope.

DAVE: apple juice???

DAVE: please let it be aj please let it be aj please let it be aj

ROSE: I'll see what I can do.

DAVE: omg

DAVE: omg

#omg

DAVE: fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck yes

#homestuck #dave strider #rose lalonde #homestuck act 6 #page 5398 #homestuck act 6 intermission 3 #openbound

[theabyssgazesalsointoyou]

for the ask game,

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even)

4. Fav character/subject that's a bitch to draw

21. Art styles nothing like your own but you like anyways

2. the viewer's left (not the character) because i am right handed 👍

4. probably religious/divine imagery with wings and halos and soft light and stuff. honorable mention goes to fire because. well. you know. lol

21. i absolutely love highly stylized cartoony artstyles with defined silhouettes and a distinct aesthetic to each character it's just so. tasty. pretty semi-realistic art is good too but cartoony styles sighhh

#orca answers

[waspenned]

beloved user waspenned do u have any peter fic recs

BELOVED?????? ur too kind !!!!!!!! 

am gonna be honest here.... I acc dont read that much in general and I unfortunately dont have as much time to read fic as I used to I barely do the reading for class anymore and im too busy writing fic/uni stuff 😭 that being said I can recc some writers I like!!

(just talked to my bf abt it and he said to recommend my own fics... which I will not do)

I read skyline by astronomyparkers a few years ago and liked it!! I cant rlly comment more than that bc I am strongly due a reread but its managed to stay in my ao3 for 2 years so I trust ...

also adore vi @violetsandoval she NAILS the gritty sexual vibe in her fics and her imagery is just GORGEOUS and her fics are so hot and sublime. could not possibly choose a favourite but im obsessed. its giving blood and religious imagery and passion and fruit on the tongue. absolutely feral foaming at the mouth

@silkscream is also a stand out to me ... ree recently did an enemies to lovers sich and it was TASTY.......... the back and forth was so satisfying and their build up is so satisfying to me. also one of the most beautiful blogs ive ever seen and their fics reflect the same attention to detail and aesthetic. tastes like champagne.

@subspider Ashanti is so so nice and the writing is FANTASTIC. ive spoken abt wolf teeth being my bible but her other stuff like a billet-doux from the lighthouse is so interesting and unique. her writing is very palpable and sensory and thought provoking to me its so passionate and there.... high reccomemd

I recc these 3 writers specifically bc they were the three who inspired me to start my own blog ad start writing fic again after a hiatus of like... 2 yrs !!! all v exciting to me and I guess I owe a lot to them !!! if u guys see this I love u <3

I also reblogged a tasty little fic by my friend Logan @chemspxdr who only has 1 fic so far but im looking forward to seeing what she gets up to 😈 

other than that I haven't had time to read anything since before I started my blog </33 I GREATLY would appreciate any recommendations you guys may have !!!!!

#penned. #reccomended. #answered.

[a-queer-seminarian]

Amy-Jill Levine on the Parable of the Leaven, Part 1:

Unpacking antisemitism that taints interpretation

Again he said, “To what can I compare God’s kingdom? It’s like yeast, which a woman took and hid in a bushel of wheat flour until the yeast had worked its way through the whole.”

- Luke 13:20-21

The Leaven should get a rise out of its hearers, but in order to experience this, we need to clean our palates of both the bland, white-bread interpretations and the toxic ones as well. ...

We do not need a parable to tell us that the divine kingdom is “mighty,” and there are better ways of assuring us that the kingdom will come. ...If the parable says that “acknowledging God means you’ll be a better person,” again, the point may be true, but it is by no means shocking. ...

The plain and palatable are, however, better than the indigestible or poisonous. Some pastors or homilists still drag out the standard view that whatever Jesus said must somehow relate to how morbid or moribund his early Jewish context had become. Thus we still hear comments like: “The yeast is mightily permeating the dead lump of religious Judaism,” or “The Kingdom arrives as a negation of the established temple and cult and replaces them with a sacrament of its own—a new and leavened bread.”

...Interpretations that insist on constructing a pervasive, official Judaism that establishes categories of the “religiously disinherited” and that is antithetical to “the destitute, the maimed and the blind,” may seem tasty at first—but they poison the food and therefore poison the recipient.

To appreciate the parable, we must attend to the elements, such as the cultural understanding of yeast and the amount of bread that three measures of flour would yield. We need to recognize how the parable draws upon images from the scriptures of Israel as well as how it matches flavors with the numerous references to bread in the Gospels themselves. We need to correct the translations that have the woman “mixing” the yeast into the dough, because that is not what the Greek says. And we do well to see what the combined imagery of women and dough, hiding and ovens would have suggested to people living in the first century.

...

This brief foray into the culinary arts complements the view of yeast that we find in Jesus’s cultural (pun intended) world. The comparison of the kingdom to yeast might well have been surprising to a first-century Jewish audience, since yeast, especially when used metaphorically, could have a negative valence.

Metaphorically speaking, there is good yeast and there is bad yeast, and Jesus appears to have used the metaphor in its negative sense. One need not be a Bible scholar or an expert in Greek to recognize this fact; all one needs is a concordance. In addition to appearances in Matthew 13.33 and Luke 13.21, the term “yeast” or “leaven” shows up eleven times in the New Testament, and each occasion hints of something whose taste is a bit off.

...some biblical scholars further misconstrue leaven’s metaphorical register by associating it with the category “impurity”; they then extend the misconstrual by associating it with various forms of moral corruption. ...

Extending this (unnecessary) connection between leaven and corruption, another commentator proposes that “the parable opposes traditional understandings of the holiness and purity of the people of God” and “a ‘corrupting’ of the people of God through the inclusion of outcasts.” This study, published in 1988, is now available online at a website designed to promote the role of women in Roman Catholic settings. The ends (a concern for women’s inclusion) do not justify the means (an ahistorical reading of the parable by presenting Judaism as a system creating “outcasts”).

In like manner, a homiletics professor proposes in an essay on preaching the parable, “The presence of a ‘contaminating’ element fundamental to the reign of God might serves as an illustration of Jesus’s welcome of the outcast.” The parable has much to commend it, but it says nothing about “outcasts.”

...

Problems here proliferate. First, the parable says nothing about purity, outcasts, or gentiles. Leaven is not itself “impure”; if it were, Jews would not have had to remove it from their homes at Passover, because they would not have used it in the first place. ...If yeast were impure, bread would be too; that very point should demonstrate why purity is the wrong category. The Temple, the ultimate place of purity, is also the place where leavened bread serves as an offering to God. ... Yeast is not impure or “unclean”...Jesus is comparing the kingdom to leaven that a woman used in preparing bread; he is not saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a piece of bacon or road kill.” ...

Jewish Scholar Amy Jill Levine in Short Stories by Jesus: The Enigmatic Parables of a Controversial Rabbi (2014)

#amy jill levine #parables #parable of the leaven #parable of the yeast #reading and studying the bible #readings #short stories by jesus

[noratilney]

Hi, I've got you on my bingo card can you tell me more about your current muses and their aesthetic

Of course I can, thank you for asking!

Emma - dropped into what to her was a tv show and so initially has a very what the hell is going on sense, extremely determined to change the world and the future, practical and has learned to take surprises/set backs/curveballs in stride, she is very warm and loving but also fiercely protective, definitely vibes people as a little quirky/odd due to her out of time/out of place origins, curious about the world; aesthetics wise: her favorite color is yellow but I also see her wearing greens and purples, definitely bird imagery - she loves pigeons best but I think in terms of animal association she has more in common with starlings, due to her origin in the contemporary world and longevity any era of dress from medieval/vikings to present day can suit, I see her and Elijah as being a very well-dressed couple although they’re not the type to actively match their clothing to one another (thinking about a meta I happened to scroll past about the Gossip Girl costumers subtly matching Chuck’s pocket square to the same color spectrum as Blair’s dress, so like that kind of thing)

Abby - very stubborn, spoilers!: she remains human for the entirety of her fic and represents/remains a reminder of the human side of things, snarky, sarcastic, and cynical, she loves her family very much but is very cautious about opening herself up to anyone else, can be quite impulsive and not think things through, she used to do gymnastics but had to give it up with all the moving around and the cost but she still follows the sport on a professional level religiously, as well as soccer (both women’s and men’s), and can talk about both for hours if you let her, despite her stubbornness she is generally pretty easygoing unless you try to get her to do something she really does not want to do, a bit jealous/resentful of her older sister Alicia for being the perfect sister/dutiful daughter, etc. although they generally get on, really misses her dad who she hasn’t seen since she was ten; aesthetics wise: academia/dark academia is her preferred dress sense but living in Virginia limits the cozy sweaters/heavy jackets aspect of things, loves to read, she’s a pretty good cook and is used to scrounging things into a tasty meal, athletic vibes because of the gymnastics/soccer/cheerleading, very competitive, she has so much love in her heart, playful

Victoria - very unknowable and mysterious - keeps a lot close to the chest but often deflects this by initiating the spontaneous sharing of information, lowkey a revolutionary, very much encapsulates ‘choose your battles’ and ‘hiding in plain sight’ and ‘exposing something in order to hide something else’, used to being underestimated, clever naturally, well-read, polite, lonely and used to being wanted/used for her money, family name, etc. and not who she is as a person; aesthetics wise: greens and purples, typical high class fancy dress and jewelry sense, chess, she collects old letters from estate sales and the like, especially love letters, she has a dragonfly tattoo on the back of her neck and a jeweled dagger on her thigh, definitely a revenge is best served cold type, she has a number of properties including an eighteenth century manor house and house elves, has an acute sense of noblesse oblige, owns her sexuality, a vault of secrets, enemies to lovers with Neville

Anneliese - a huge reader, which is one big bond that she shares with her best friend Petrova, a hopeless romantic and tries to see the best in everyone, wants to be an artist professionally and carries a sketchbook around with her when she isn’t carrying around a book (sometimes both), she really likes craftwork and doing things with her hands, her grandmother taught her to knit, crochet, embroider and sew but knitting is her favorite, a good big sister; aesthetics wise: very girly, very feminine, loves animals, her mom has a Norwegian forest cat that’s older than Anneliese and she has a special bond with her crow Billie, loves winter and snow and everything associated with them, color wise I associate yellow (because Hufflepuff) and pink and the general psychedelic colors of the ‘70s, potions is her best and favorite subject

Rilla - all Rilla really wants to do is be on vacation constantly and have fun, I definitely think of her encapsulating the song ‘Who’d Have Known’, non-judgmental, she and Leia had a short fling, queen of Opinions about super minor stuff like best place to find x food and the most authentic version of y folk ballad, adventurous, not an ambitious bone in her body, only child, hater of shoes, open minded; aesthetics wise: all the glitz and glamour and prettiness associated with Naboo, she’s lazy so like decadence and lounging around, delicious and intricate food and ripe fruits, beaches, sunbathing, elaborate hairstyles, gorgeous clothing, music and dance, hiding in trees and the like to avoid doing her job lol

and some more for variety:

Ellie - very much a free spirit, she trained as a nurse but is also independently wealthy and so doesn’t really worry about being employed all of the time, she gets horrible debilitating migraines where she can’t do anything but try and sleep and get through the pain, she has funny personal rituals and customs like dressing head to toe in pink whenever she’s traveling, she decides to take up violin on a whim which is how she meets Vanya, she also provides translation assistance to the police as she speaks fluent Spanish, Marathi, and Hindi as well as having passing fluency in French, Russian, Italian, and Persian, and volunteers at a local soup kitchen which is where she meets Klaus; aesthetics wise: very messy, she never really learned how to clean up after herself outside of a strictly medical capacity, she picks up hobbies and things on a whim because she can, she’s a bit like a magpie she loves colorful and/or shiny things so pretty clothes and jewelry and shoes and things

Annika - one of my youngest ocs, she’s six and does think violence is the answer, at least if she is the one doing the violence, she loves soccer and ballet and devours eighties/nineties paperback kid fiction like the babysitter’s club, pony pals, and the ramona books, etc., she is ten years younger than her older sister Rory so their dynamic is not so much based on shared experience and her relationship with Lorelai is much more paternal than friendship based; aesthetics wise: I associate her with the colors blue and white for some reason? she’s a little gremlin, weak for chocolate especially but all sorts of sweets and junk food like her mom and older sister

Lindy - she definitely enters a new world starting at Constance Billard as a sophomore when everyone else has known each other pretty much since birth and also come from extreme wealth and high society, Lindy’s family isn’t poor by any means since they can afford to send her to Constance but she very much feels out of her depth, she likes murder mysteries and headbands, loves Halloween, her favorite subject is science, she loves experimenting and finding things out about the world, she collects currency from around the world, she especially likes defunct currency like the Italian lira, she has dyscalculia and is allergic to nuts; aesthetics wise: definitely hipster dress, anything that conveys her internally going ahhhh what’s happening 90% of the time, the color red, murder mystery parties, fancy schmancy goings on, private school vibe, scavenger hunts, gorgeous bookmarks

#asked and answered #fragilestorm #hope this helps! #emma ragnarrsdottir #abby cardenas #victoria carrow #anneliese friedlich #rilla larlaal #ellie joshi #annika gilmore #lindy thomas #feel free to ask more questions if you want!

[pettyprocrastination]

I saw some dope ass fabrics so i want to post them and the vibes they have lets go 

1. 

elegant, beautiful. My fave out of the trio just because you know i love some religious type imagery. The person who wears this is some horny ass cleric who dreams about getting railed every night before crying during prayer because of their sins, no matter who wears this the outfit DOES show off some tasty and prominent titty God bless amen 10/10 imagining a gown out of this in my head rn 

2.

Bold. Bitching. Lannister energy out the ASS this is the shit you wear when you send your enemy to an execution as you watch on with a raised chin while they scream at you but you dont show a single emotion even as they get their head chopped off. 9/10 only because we hate the lanisters in this house babe long live dorne 

3.

sexy sneaky sNAKEY what more can you ask for? this is something i see as being a lace overlay in a wide slit of an otherwise covering dress or a coverupt for a revealing neckline. And i know theyre all about the oranges and golds but cmon this has some dorne energy right there and im mentally designing a gown based off this just because of the vibes 10/10 would wear this while playing chess with somebody that serves as a metaphor for either sex or the ongoing tensions between two characters of enemy noble families. 

#tj talks #craft tag #theyre just SO #that top one...in my brain rn

[soymimikyu]

Twin Peaks: Episode 3 and 4

Double episode day! More importantly coffee was drunk during the first episode. It was just the right time in the day for a dark cup of coffee.

Although very weird, I am enjoying the log lady intros. They are fun and set the atmosphere really well. They were apparently done in 1993 after the show aired for the rebroadcast on Bravo (wow I forgot about this channel).

Episode 3 Notes:

EEEE -- more cooper and audrey in a very very red dress. I for some reason wrote down how shiny cooper's hair is.

Mmm the maple syrup and ham scene. Excellent. His dream analysis is fantastic if a bit weird.

I wonder if Invitation to Love can be watched stand alone (like how Rabbits is in Inland Empire but also on its own). Apparently all 16 min are on youtube. It seems painful to watch, but might be amusing.

It is super weird, yet excellent, that Maddie is played by the same actress as Laura. Everyone is aware that it is weird.

There is a scene where Bobby is standing in front of a cross with Christ crucified and has his arms drawn back. Interestingly, Albert does the same thing to describe how Ronette and Laura might have been tied up. It is a complex series of scenes that seems too carefully planed to just have occurred. I did wonder if Lynch was raised religious (he was raised Presbyterian) and if this was some imagery he chose. Unsure.

I am happy Coop wants to move to twin peaks.

Johnny is an interesting character but not really developed.

At the funeral, Audrey has such an intense hair style. It is excellent.

The scenes with stoplights make me happy. I wonder what they mean. They add red though.

Oooo the secret society of Bookhouse boys. Where did that name come from.

Harry examines the ledger of an entire saw mill stupidly fast and comes up with "nothing suspicious". This is amazing. I firmly believe Harry was a CPA before becoming a sheriff. The best CPA in twin peaks.

Episode 4 Notes:

Ahhh I am so happy that this is the start of the Lucy and Andy argument. She throws so much sass -- it is fantastic!

Gordon Cole makes an audio appearance. David Lynch's voice always throws me. I always feel his voice should be rougher -- but it is very smooth.

The Ladies room in the high school is also super red. So much red.

More Audrey and Coop -- even though Coop is not there. It is always good content.

YESSSSS THE VET!!!!! THE LLAMA!!! YES!!!!! (I await the otter).

WTF is the christmas stuff on the way to the pitstol range in the sheriff's office? Intentional or a why not? Almost adds realism (small town sheriff's office lacks space so throws stuff around), but still so weird.

Hawk's girlfriend needs more backstory. Like a whole episode. I can't recall if this happens or if I just want it to happen badly.

I wrote "Norma is everyone's mom". It is true.

I feel that I have made things close to diet lasagna. It isn't bad. Just have to use low fat ingredients and lean meats. Still pretty tasty (I mean its cheese, sauce, and carbs [I wish I knew topology and could make some b.s. joke about how a pizza and lasagna are topologically the same] -- not a whole lot to go wrong).

Any conversation with Maddy is strange, because she looks like Laura.

Audrey is such a good actor and always good at getting what she wants.

The myna bird. It is a good choice. Fancier than a parrot.

There is a random tennis game before going to Jacque Rennault's house. I like it. Breaks up the tension with a "huh" -- sure why not. Who is playing would be a detail.

FIRST OWL IN THIS EPISODE!!!

AHHHHH!!! In Josie's house there is a stuffed mountain goat mounted on the wall. Its feet are then mounted below to hold the gun. This is the best scene.

Licking a domino is weird.

#show notes #twin peaks #mountain goats

[bihet-hozier]

Romanticism in Hozier’s Take Me to Church

So awhile ago when we were studying Romanticism in my English Class I asked my teacher if I could do a song analysis for extra credit, and surprisingly she said yes. So if anyone is interested in skimming over a lengthy dissection of Romantic themes in Take Me To Church, here you go (it was kind of difficult to do because I had to skirt around the fact that half the song is about sex). Any ways, since it’s St. Patricks Day/Hozier’s Birthday, I thought I might as well finally post it.

Take Me to Church by the Irish singer Hozier, an alternative rock and soul song, has many aspects of Romanticism. It has the characteristics of dark Romanticism, with a dark tone and dark imagery, as well as emotional intensity. It is Romantic in its reaction against ideals of Classicism, such as that of upholding tradition. In a sense the speaker of the song fits the archetype of the ‘Romantic Hero’ having rejected societal traditions and conventions, in this case those regarding religion, and is rejected by society— or at least by religious society. The song follows the speaker’s increasing disillusionment with and rebellion against his religion, saying that the love he has for someone is truer to himself, more human and therefore more pure than religion as it is practiced now, despite what religious leaders may say. The song argues that human emotion and intuition are more truthful and important than traditional doctrine.

Take Me to Church has a lot of imagery that connects to aspects of Romanticism. It has a dark tone, made musically by the somber minor key the song is set in, and with some of its imagery, such as the opening lines in which the speaker says his lover is “the giggle at a funeral”, as well as the lines that say “Every Sunday’s getting more bleak/ Fresh poison each week” which paints a melancholy picture. In Romanticism there is an appreciation for Norse and Celtic mythology, which is befitting of the line “if I'm a pagan of the good times”, which also fits the common Romantic belief in the supernatural. This line could also be seen as a reaction against Classicism, a reaction against tradition, which could be interpreted as a reaction against the church in favor of paganism, which is often associated with the supernatural. Dark romanticism often has darkly imaginative and macabre imagery in it. While meant as metaphors for the strict and judgemental nature of the church and other religions, and for hypocrisy and the reaction against it, when taken literally Take Me to Church has a lot of imagery relating to death, which is dark if not quite macabre. For example there is the line in the first verse about a “fresh poison each week” and in the second verse there are the lines “Something meaty for the main course/ That’s a fine looking high horse/ What you got in the stable/ We’ve a lot of starving faithful/ That looks tasty/ That looks plenty/ This is hungry work”. This implies that the “starving faithful” are going to kill and eat the “high horse” of religious leaders, and perhaps whatever else they have “in the stable”. It creates a darkly foreboding image of anger. A large part of Romantic literature is about nature, and in Take Me to Church there is some nature imagery, such as the line in the bridge of the song: “in the madness and the soil of that sad earthly scene” but most of the nature in the song is human nature, as Hozier goes on to sing “only then I am human/ only then I am clean”. These ideas of human nature connect to the Romanticism ones of how spiritual force is inherent in oneself, since the speaker of the song of the song believes that the more “human” they are the more “clean” they are or the more pure they are, which can mean that the more human and true to themselves they are, the more they look inwards to reflect on spirituality, the closer they are to any kind of divinity. These lines can also connect to the Romantic idea that madness can lead to truth.

Aside from imagery, the structure and focus of Take Me to Church also makes it fit into the qualities of Romanticism. There is a focus on the individual in the song, which is one of the main points of Romanticism. The song follows the speaker’s ideas on religion and he realizes that the conventional, learned beliefs of others are not as important as that of his own intuition and emotions. Here, as in most Romantic literature, the individual is emphasized more than society. Romanticism often emphasizes an importance of universal truths over learned ones. In the song Hozier writes an example of a ‘learned truth’ that the speaker learns from church, which is that “we were born sick”, or the Christian belief that everyone is born as a sinner, to which the speaker responds “I was born sick, but I love it” declaring that he does not believe he is actually “born sick” and thinks that a universal truth, one that one can understand intuitively, is that when one is the most “human” they are the most “clean”. This also reflects the Romantic belief of the perfectibility of man. The speaker starts to realize his own perfection by reflecting on his own emotions, realizing that his imperfections are his perfections, not something that is wrong with him, and that he is not “born sick” as some would have him believe. The speaker of the song fits into the Romantic archetype of the hero as a common man, as seen in how his church believes he was “born sick” or born a sinner, just like everyone else. The Romanticism theme of focusing on the physical world is seen in how the speaker of the song looks for happiness on Earth, rather than trying to ensure he will find it in the afterlife.

In regards to society and government, Romanticism often called for radical, violent change. Take Me to Church’s views on societal change fit those of the Romanticism movement. The lines “Something meaty for the main course/ That’s a fine looking high horse/ What you got in the stable/ We’ve a lot of starving faithful/ That looks tasty/ That looks plenty/ This is hungry work” in the second verse seems to be about the change the speaker believes there should be in his church. Killing the “high horse” to feed the “starving faithful” is a metaphor for revealing the  hypocrisy of judgemental religious leaders so that the faithful who are starved for happiness or any real connection to spirituality can feast on the knowledge that their traditional outlook on faith was wrong, that they should not follow bureaucratic religious leaders, but rather their own intuition to find what religion really is. By doing this they can find happiness and no longer be “starving”. There are multiple common characteristics of Romanticism in these lines. First off, there is the call for significant and violent change made by killing the “high horse” of religious leaders so that they lose their power. This also ties into the Romantic belief that government should not be controlled only by the educated and aristocratic elite, but rather that everyone should have a say. While not about a literal government, Take Me to Church criticizes the government like structure of organized religion, and the power that it wields by saying that its leaders are on a “high horse” and expect him to “worship like a dog”. It builds off of Romantic ideas that intuition is emphasized over reason, and that the human experience is subjective by saying that individual intuition is more true than reasoning presented by religious leaders and that the human experience is subjective therefore so is religion.

Take Me to Church can be seen as a Romantic piece of work because of its use of Romantic imagery, tone, subjects, and opinions. At the very least, it is heavily influenced by Romantic texts. The song uses its subject matter to create the emotional intensity characteristic of Romantic literature. It is probably has the most Romanticism in its overall themes of human emotion having more emphasis and authority than unfeeling tradition. Rather than trying to argue against religion by taking the well-trodden path of using reason, it leans on the ideals of Romanticism to make its point. It manages to make Romanticism applicable to modern conflicts and questions.

Works Cited

Hozier. “Take Me to Church”. Columbia Records, 2013.

#happy birthday hozier #st patricks day #take me to church #romanticism #hozier #classicism #wasteland baby! #romantic hero #song analysis #hozier review #rock #soul #gospel #alternative rock #international hozier day #hozier album #blues #rappaccini's daughter #nathaniel hawthorne #english essay #song essay #hozier essay #woodsy jesus #george washington irving #edgar allan poe #songwriting #catholic church #happy st. patrick's day #religion #mine

[benvantasopinions-blog]

I Have An Opinion On - Prequelle by Ghost (2018) Prequelle is the fourth full-length studio album by Swedish heavy metal band Ghost. Originally formed in 2006, Ghost released their first studio album Opus Eponymous in 2010, and since then have risen to metal mainstream fame, especially after the release of their third studio album Meliora in 2015, which included the Grammy-winning single “Cirice”. In the time since Meliora’s release, the band has released some small batches of material, including the Popestar EP (which would then be bundled with Meliora as Meliora Redux) and the He Is digital EP / vinyl single, and the band’s first live album, titled Ceremony and Devotion. Alongside all of these releases have come some major changes in Ghost’s canon with the arrival of new vocalist Cardinal Copia, the reveal of Papa Nihil, and the deaths of all previous vocalists, Papa Emeritus I, II, and III. However, by far the biggest change to the band is the reveal of Tobias Forge’s identity, being revealed as all of Ghost’s vocalists due to a lawsuit filed by former members of the band. Due to this, Prequelle is the first Ghost album to be recorded with the knowledge of Tobias Forge’s identity. Prequelle is a loose concept album (although it may be generous to call it as such) about death, destruction, and doom, with nods to historical periods such as medieval times and the Black Death / Great Plague, the latter especially being shown in the album’s first two tracks, the opener, “Ashes”, a short minute and a half piece beginning with an eerie organ and the recital of a version of the old nursery rhyme “Ring a Ring o’ Roses”, performed by Forge’s daughter, which then opens into some slow, heavy guitars and drums, which become accompanied by some melodic synths that lead into the second track, the album’s lead single, “Rats”, a song with lyrics about a disease spreading like wildfire, wiping out entire cities and leaving them destroyed. I absolutely love the drum intro on here, and the rest of the song’s instrumentation and overall sound is great too. I love the “Them rats” refrain after every verse, as it gives the song a darker feelings, and the dual melodic guitar solo from the Nameless Ghouls that starts slow and picks up in pace is fucking gorgeous. It all wraps up in a nice bow with a nice little heavy instrumental outro segment. The next track, “Faith”, starts with a few quick and melodic guitar riffs, but then drops the melody and goes for straight up heavy and slow, with the exception of the melodic, midtempo solo. The low growl of the chorus after the solo, as well as the “Because faith is mine” line after every chorus adds to the song’s written perspective of the Devil and how he watches people suffer and pass during the Plague, with the chorus reading “I am all eyes, I am all ears, I am the wall, and I’m watching you fall”, however, there are also some subtle jabs at Ghosts’ previous members and Forge’s feelings towards them, with lyrics such as “Although it stinks, feels, and looks identical, a pack of fools can take the stand” being nods towards the band Priest, started by former Ghost members that looks extremely identical to Ghost, with religious imagery and masks to hide identities. Overall, it’s a very sinister track, and it helps solidify the album’s overall darker themes and sound, but this changes with the piano-lead outro that ties directly into the following track, “See The Light”, a piano and synth lead ballad that serves as a huge contrast to the previous songs on the album. The choruses always bring in the rest of the instrumentation, which has a very melancholic feel to it, especially in the slow-paced guitar solo, with the song being about the Devil’s strength growing with hate, with some nods towards transubstantiation (the belief that communion water turns directly into the body of Christ), and as with the previous song, there are some jabs towards Ghost’s former members, especially with the line “Many a rat I’ve befriended”. It’s a nice little ballad. The next track, “Miasma”, is the first of two instrumentals on the album, and has some really nice synth layering, with the main synths on the track being layered directly over the guitar work, giving it an almost 8-bit-style that I really enjoy. However, the structuring of the song bothers me a bit, and is the first actual problem I have regarding any song on the album. While it is an instrumental, it follows the same Verse-Chorus-Verse-Chorus-Solo-Chorus structure that rock/metal songs usually follow, making it feel like it should have vocals on it, but they were forgotten or just left off at the last second. With that being said, however, the tasty saxophone on the last section of the track kinda makes up for the weird missing vocals feel the song has. “Dance Macabre” comes afterwards, as is also the album’s second single. It feels much like an arena-rock style anthem, but it also blends in some 80′s disco, giving it a slight glam metal style. The main drum rhythm is very simple, but the rest of instrumentation adds to it and helps make it a song that really makes you want to move, and the slow but high note guitar solo definitely adds to it’s upbeat sound. The lyrics keep with the theme of the Plague, as it goes over the feeling of people dancing and enjoying themselves as death creeps up on them. There’s actually some really nice wordplay in here, with parts of the chorus reading as “wanna bewitch you in the moonlight” and “I wanna bewitch you all night” sounding like “wanna be with you in the moonlight” and “I wanna be with you all night”. It’s something small, but I like it as it goes with the themes of the band themselves. The following track, “Pro Memoria”, has a gospel and orchestral sound to it, and it feels very much like the song “He Is” off of the band’s previous album Meliora. With lyrics about not fearing death, as it is inevitable, it’s very much a saddening and melancholic track, but it still has an easy-going confidence to it that I enjoy. I love the chorus of “Don’t you forget about dying, don’t you forget about your friend Death, don’t you forget that you will die”, and the haunting choir and organ combo that closes the track is a nice touch. The next track, “Witch Image”, is written directly from the perspective of the Reaper, the personification of Death itself, and references the Four Horsemen, with the line “I am riding in the shadows behind you on a pale white horse” directly referencing Pestilence, keeping in theme with the Plague. As far as it’s sound goes, it’s another anthem-style song, but is noticeably more upbeat than the others. “Helvetesfönster” is the second instrumental track on the album, and definitely my favorite of the two, as this one feels more like an instrumental than it’s counterpart. The first half of the track is powerful, with slow, low guitars riffs alongside pounding drums and a nice blend of piano and synths, but the second half is a lot more subdued, with a really mellow acoustic guitar and flute combo that really add towards the album’s medieval times feeling. The subdued feeling that this song closes off on leads into the album’s closing track, “Life Eternal”, which asks the listener, would be better to die as a mortal or to live forever with immortality? The piano, organ, and choir gives it that feeling of finality, and while the final section of the song kinda hurts it a little in my eyes, as I feel the repetition of the word “Forever” drags on a bit too long, there’s definitely more good than bad, and it’s a nice track to close off on. Prequelle is overall a very enjoyable album, and while it may or may not top albums like Meliora and Opus Eponymous (depending on the type of person you are), it definitely shows why Ghost is as popular as they are. I get that they’re very much an “entry-level” metal band, but that doesn’t make them any less enjoyable within the genre. This is a great album, and a great way to follow up an extremely successful album like Meliora. Joke about Ghost being “Scooby Doo chase music” all you want, this is a great album, and the fact that it’s accessible to non-metal fans while still being very much a metal album is pretty cool. Definitely check it out if you’re interested. FINAL SCORE - 9/10 BEST TRACKS - Rats, Faith, See The Light, Dance Macabre, Pro Memoria, Witch Image, and Helvetesfönster. WORST TRACKS - Miasma, just for the weird ‘missing vocal’ feeling it has. If it wasn’t for that, this would probably be a perfect 10 for me.

#ghost #ghost bc #cardinal copia #tobias forge #prequelle #opus eponymous #meliora #nameless ghouls #heavy metal #doom metal #hard rock #rats #dance macabre #review #music #opinion

[thesethingsofours]

Black is King: Africa Beyoncéfied

I really enjoy watching old music videos on YouTube. It reminds me of simpler times: before CGI, insanely big budgets and, well, YouTube.

​Lately, I’ve been tripping on Kate Bush. Wuthering Heights sees her as a cosmic, cherubic teenager wafting alone in a field. In Army Dreamers she’s running through a forest with a  blonde kid, stopping only to mesmerise with her phantasmal, milky eyes. In Breathing she’s stuck in a Zorb until freed to join some green-faced virologists in a lagoon.

Those are all delightful, but my favourite has to be Babooshka. Shrouded in a black veil, she cavorts, improvised and imperfect, with a double-bass; like a mime artist bride's first dance at an enchanted wedding reception. Then, the chorus kicks in. Wailing, she transforms into a steampunk warrior temptress, back-lit by a heavenly white glow; her hips uttering truths even Shakira’s could never profess to know. There is one camera, one room, one performer, two outfits, and one special effect – zoom. It’s lo-def, simple, cheap, and in its way, purely spectacular.

Fast-forward almost exactly forty years and, NOW STREAMING ON DISNEY+, Beyoncé releases Black is King – an ostentatious, opulent, enormous, 85-minute antithesis to the austerity of Babooska. In keeping with BEYONCÉ and Lemonade, it’s a “visual album” to accompany her (I suppose we need to call it now) “audio album” – The Lion King: The Gift. Both are inspired by last year’s CGI-update of the classic 1994 animation, following a similar storyline.

The film opens onto an “African” river. A wicker basket floats downstream, interspersed with shots of colourfully clad “Africans” in a variety of settings. James Earl Jones resonantly reiterates that “we are all connected in the great circle of life”. Under a pastel sunset, Beyoncé materialises on a beach in a flowing, white mille-feuille dress, holding a baby. There is spoken-word poetry, earnestness, shots of her daughter, a man painted blue. A group baptism ensues. Church organs sound. “You’re part of something way bigger”, she exclaims as she paints the face of a pre-pubescent boy.

The imagery steeply escalates, every colour luminescent and outfits increasingly innumerable. Beyoncé in horse-print… on a horse. Beyoncé in a painting… as Mother Mary. Beyoncé in water, dripping with red rope. It turns out we’ve been in heaven. Or space. Or somewhere beyond both - blacker and more kingly. The boy takes off, becomes a comet, hurtling towards earth. Is this in 4K? 8K? 16K?  Did they shoot it in Bey, not K? Whatever the definition, it is high. Babooshka, it is not. ​ This is irrepressible Beyoncé, lofty Beyoncé; the terrestrial goddess, progenitor of pop. To make the film, Queen Bey – who also wrote, directed and produced – drafted in a wealth First off, a word about Beyoncé’s “Africa”. It is relentlessly proud and picturesque in a way perhaps no other film about “Africa” has ever been. It is cool, hot, sensual, and sincere. It is appealingly traditional yet ambitiously modern. It’s Africa filtered first through the American kaleidoscope, then again through a diamond encrusted Beyoncéscope.

But as my Ghanaian mother relentlessly reminded people, Africa is not a country. It is the second largest continent on earth. It is not at all a singular culture. To chop up a kilo of its prettiest bits and squish them all into one tasty, palatable burger would be horribly reductive. One can fairly assume that patty-fying Africa is not Beyoncé’s intention, but if Black is King’s aim is not to represent a real-life place, what is it intended to do? In Beyoncé’s own words from a June 29 Instagram post:

I wanted to present elements of Black history and African tradition, with a modern twist and a universal message, and what it truly means to find your self-identity and build a legacy.

So it’s an idealised agglomeration of cultural concepts in service of Beyoncé’s ideas about her true heritage, and by association, those of anyone that identifies as black. ​Pastiche-ifying Africa. Fair enough.

But as I watch, innumerable questions arise, thudding inside my skull to the rhythm of jovial afrobeats: Where is the line between race and culture? Where does glorifying one’s ancestry end and appropriating a foreign culture begin? What legitimate connection does a billionaire American musician have to the African continent (where she has rarely visited and even more rarely performed)? Does being a dark-skinned American, 10-15 generations removed from your African ancestors, deliver a free pass to portray a place of 1.3 billion people you have barely been to?

What if Beyoncé was white, but born and raised in Ethiopia, and she made this same film? Is Beyoncé, in fact, the best – or only – person to show a positive version of modern “Africa” to a global audience? Is she creating a falsely romanticised version of heritage for Black Americans or a necessary interpretation of the continent they have a natural, genetic attachment to? Is animal print and people in trees cool or offensive? Is it cool or offensive to present all black people as the descendants of Kings and Queens? Is Disney+ available anywhere in Africa and will it ever be?

Is this just a pop music video, geared towards Beyoncé and Jay-Z adding to their billion-dollar empire? Or is it a deeply meaningful, glamorous exposition of what it means to be black, whether diasporic or native to Africa? Is Black, in fact, King?

I can’t answer most of these questions because I could argue both sides ‘til the Beys come home. Black is King is simultaneously superfluous and necessary; respectful and insulting; clever and vapid. It’s completely absurd, and completely logical. Part of me is appalled, but the majority, absorbed; addicted.

​I can’t look away. It’s the Beyoncé Paradox.

Many of these contentions arise because Beyoncé is so often front and centre; royally, religiously presented. In fact, the scenes without her – those dominated by West and South African rappers, singers, and nameless dancers – offer the most exhilarating, authentic, and refreshing moments. Had she chosen to purely direct rather than star, or stayed a little more in the background, her broader message may have been elevated. Instead, with her plumb in the middle, Africa is necessarily re-invented in Beyoncé’s image; moulded to fit the Beyoncé narrative - not that of the global Black diaspora, “Africans”, or nationals of its 50+ territories, hosting 2000+ languages. In this world, Beyoncé is King, albeit a benevolent one that invites her African subjects to participate in amplifying her personal glorification, ancestral identification and iconographic myth-building.

This is the artist’s prerogative, but ultimately, attributing deeper meaning to the film than it being a fundamentally superficial exercise in branding Beyoncé as Disney’s African Queen feels pretentious. Arguable, but pretentious.

That said, just as a joke is only offensive if it is insufficiently funny, when something is as beautiful, stimulating, and cool as this, does anything else matter? If people are happy to pay $7 a month and find some fantastical personal solace in it, what harm does it do? In the end, it’s a big, sexy, pop music video. Entertainment. Treated predominantly thus, it is, in its way, purely spectacular.  So watch it. While Lemonade had far deeper meaning because of her proximity to the subject matter, Black is King is still Beyoncé’s most stunning video to date. Its form and existence raise challenging questions about race, heritage, culture and society, but in the end, the sheer scale and sumptuous visual onslaught will inevitably win out. Streaming now on Disney+.* (*Not available in Africa)

Black is King Trailer

Babooshka

#beyonce #disney plus #film #film review #movie #movie review #godontgo #music #visual album #disney

[gartdavis-blog]

Berlin September 2016

Started this trip on a Friday morning… I’d booked a new option, the Norwegian air shuttle that started 787 services from JFK to a couple transatlantic destinations.  They have an economy plus class that is basically like a domestic first class - seats have plenty of pitch, and the prices are similar to a normal economy ticket.  I got to RDU with a bit of time to spare.  My flight to JFK delayed, so it was good that I’d booked a very long layover.  I spent the day and the evening in the Terminal 8 Admirals club.

This was the day that mom was in the hospital with an uncertain diagnosis.  I talked with Paul a couple times, and then with Mom.  Things were looking better so I decided to carry on with my trip.  I crossed to terminal 1, which was full of humanity; it was a little nutty, nearly in the same category as Santo Domingo.  The lines were immense, but I discovered the economy plus had its own line, still quite long.  Made it to the gate and got aboard without too much fuss.  The seat was actually comfortable for sitting, but just didn’t work well for dozing.  Not a comfortable night.

Arrived in Oslo midday.  Small airport… about the size of the main terminal at RDU, but pleasant.  Classically Scandinavian, full of wood.  I paid for access to a lunch buffet and found a quiet corner and had one of those scrambled naps where one awakens disconnected from certainties of time and space.

When I’d booked tickets I’d looked for hotels and found all the usual suspects either sold out our charging triple - 300-500 euro for rooms typically under a hundred on a slow week.  This has happened before, and I’ve always just worked it day by day.  I decided to do that on this trip.

My connector to Berlin left at 5:30.  When I woke around 330 I looked at options for Saturday and Sunday night decided to avoid the Berlin situation, so I booked a hotel in Potsdam for Saturday night to explore a bit.  Potsdam is home to Sans Souci, Frederick the great’s country place built in the 1740s.  Its referred to as the Prussian answer to the Louis the XIV palace at Versailles.  Where the French royals used a super serious baroque style with lots of religious imagery, Frederick, who is more of a free thinker, adopted a rococo style so random that they call it Frederician Rococo.  I picked a place along the lake on Zeppelinstrasse outside of downtown.

The flight arrived on time at Schoenfeld.  Berlin has two supremely ugly airports - Tegel was for the West, and Schoenfeld was for East Berlin.  In theory they’ll be replaced by Brandenberg Intl, which is on the scale of Heathrow, but for the time being the arrival is -very- anti-climactic.  I went to the s-bahn station, and for 3 Euros got an ABC one way commuter ticket - this zone includes Potsdam even though its well outside the city.  I went to the hotel, checked in, dumped my stuff, reserved a bike for the next day, and went to an Italian trattoria in the same building.  I had a lasagna that was absolutely killer, and walked it off by walking the town for a couple hours.

Potsdam is a city like Denmark is a country… fingers of land surrounded by water.  The main part of town is in the middle of the Octopus, and the liveliest part is near Brandenburger Tor near the front gates to Sans Souci park.  It has interesting layers of history.  Its home to the oldest film studio in the world, where ‘Metropolis’ was filmed in the 1920s, and Many of Marlene Dietrich’s early films as well.  To this day, that era dictates the politically acceptable version of glamour that shines darkly at you from all the banner advertising in Germany.  I didn’t get out to the studio… perhaps next time.  The town itself is clean and cheerful in the same way that Berlin is grimy and relaxed.

My room turned out to be on the corner of the hotel with windows on two walls looking out on the water.  As was true throughout this trip, the weather was cool and delightful.   I woke late, booked a room right next to Brandenburger Tor for that night, got on my bike, and headed out along the lake; there was a trail that followed the shore invitingly.  About three miles up I came to an athletic park that turns out to have been the principal training ground for olympic athletes during the heyday of the GDR olympic movement.  It was classic cold-war communist architecture, where it was easy for me to imagine the anabolic steroid-ridden athletes looking like the Stasi villains of 70s Bond films.  A little further up the lake there was a placard describing the history of the park.  Apparently it was built on the green lakeside fields where giant rigid dirigible Zeppelins came and went before WWII.  

My ride swung around and ran all through Park Sans Souci, which is just as grand as advertised.  I didn’t buy tickets and tour the buildings… I mostly wanted to get a flavor for the park and the grounds, which is where Frederick put most of his efforts.  I returned my bike with many thanks and changed to the hotel in town.  I left my stuff and found a Viennese wine cafe, and had bread and a selection of French cheeses for dinner.  Good, but a -lot- of dairy to process.

Next morning was Monday, so I grabbed a train and headed into the office at Thiemannstrasse.  For hotels, it turned out that there was an enormous conference that used up all Berlin’s convention space and hotels Tuesday through Friday.  I lucked into the Odeberger hotel on the first night, and ate really well at a little thai joint across the street.  This is a hotel in Prenzlauerberg that was a grand Victorioan Schwimmhalle built in 1898.  Berliners are serious about their indoor swimming.  After the wall came down, the pool was boarded over and the space hosted squatters and punk rock shows.  Its being restored into a tony hotel, but is still under construction.  Weird, super-thick walls.  Strange, interesting authentic steampunk. 

Tuesday night the city was completely booked; I walked into the Days Inn at Hermannplatz… they had one room left and I talked them down 50 Euros.  That place was passable.  Key trick: they usually give you two comforters - sleep under one and on top of the other.  I managed to book the Leonardo Royal hotel near Alexanderplatz for two nights in a row - the only time I was able to stay in the same place for two nights running the the entire trip.  During the week I used a combination of the hotel tonight app, kayak.com, hotels.com, and priceline to do all the booking.  On Thursday I biked into Prenzlauerburg and ate a perfectly tasty quiche at Anna Blume’s cafe on one of my favorite street corners in Berlin.  There is a dress shop right across the street that Allie found and has been cultivating.  The work with their own fabric designs and sew all their stuff in the shop.  It’s called Bonnie and Buttermilk, and the shop window is lovely.

After the week wrapped up, I was too tired to start a long journey, so I decided to spend an evening exploring Frederichschain, a rising center just across the Spree from Neukolln in old East Berlin.  I booked at ‘hotel Almodovar’ - yes, devoted to the Spanish auteur, and biked over.  The hotel is near a city block that is a park and anchors both the Friday night restaurant/cafe scene and the Saturday morning market.  I partook of both.  I’d say this part of Berlin is a bit more packed in than Prenzlauerberg… a bit younger, a bit less expensive, nice but still a bit rough.  Saturday morning market was lovely.  Most interesting: a stand that was an open charcoal grill selling nothing but mackerel - the whole fish grilled in a cage.

Energy level restored, I decided to travel to Oldenburg on Saturday.  Oldenburg is the birthplace of my Muhlmeister antecedents, who crossed to America in 1900 when my grandfather was 2 years old. 

I left my bike locked up at an S-bahn station, kind of hoping for the best…. it all worked out but I was kinda nervous.  The Berlin Deutsche Bahn station is the largest train station in Europe.  Inside, it looks like one big 3 dimensional maze of things at odd angles to each other.  It took me a bit to figure out how to buy a ticket, eventually I did - 92 Euros, 3.5 hours.  Along the section going to Hannover I sat opposite a woman who had settled in Berlin after emigrating from Israel.  Her family were early kibbutzim, before the nation of Israel was formed after WWII.  They own the largest shipping line in and out of Israel, and she is the first of all her family to not pursue this career.  She is in the jewelry business.  We talked about the oddities of German, American, and Israeli politics, the phenomena of Israeli ‘memory books’ that are all over the world and written in by Jewish trekkers that are traveling after their military service, a rite of passage for Israeli youth.  She is married to a German, and we talked about how words like ‘perfect’ and ‘correct’ are so important in German, much less so in Hebrew.

The station in Oldenburg was celebrating its 100th birthday, so they had lots of pictures of the original ‘romantic’ station built in 1867, and the one started in 1911 and completed during WWI in 1916.  I found a bike rental place right by the station, and for 3 euros, rented a bike for the rest of the day.  Connectivity had definitely been iffy, so I looked for a spot I could get wired up and find a hotel.  I ended up at ‘der schwann’, a pub right on the canal that used to go through the town.  I had a pint, booked a hotel, and lingered looking at the boats, bikes, and walkers.  Altogether lovely.  I biked over and dumped my stuff at my hotel and took off through town.  

Oldenburg had a city wall and a moat, and while they’ve filled in pieces to make a ring road, its still quite easy to imagine.  There were really nice houses right outside the old town, and a lovely park.  And a cat having a bath on the hood of a car looking like it owned the place.  I only had the bike for a few hours… the rental place closed at 8 pm and was not open on Sunday, so I made the most of it.  After circling the downtown and the parks, I headed out of town along a canal… lots of sheep, bugs, cows, and wide open flatness.  I got the bike back just before 8 and walked into the old town.

I imagined that I crossed paths with at least a dozen people who bore a sharp resemblance to my grandfather at different points in his life. There was a kid on a bike that was much too big, a dapper young gent, a middle-aged guy, And all of them skinny with that particular nose, forehead, and hair line.

Oldenburg is delightful. It was almost untouched by the wars of the 20th century, so much of the housing stock and old city survive. The old city has been converted entirely into a thriving pedestrian shopping district. They do not even allow bicycles.  I had dinner there - its only old in it's bones. McDonald's and Burger King have arrived here too… Nonetheless the narrow streets and the old buildings still carried a great deal of charm even though they housed Irish pubs, fast fashion shops, and the occasional German brasserie.  Fewer people speak English here than in Berlin... I have to haul out my bumpy German, and I require a great deal of help from Google translate… but it works.

I’m on the DB train section from Bremen to Hannover on my way back and the weather still holds sparkling clean.  This part of Germany is flat as a pancake, full of agriculture, and enormous 747 size windmills everywhere.  Oddly, lots of fields of corn… very American.

[robertxtokyo-blog]

Tour 26: Sanja Matsuri, Asakusa.

Yoyoyo everybodeyyy

So I recently went to see the Sanja Matsuri in Asakusa, but was really quite slow in getting the photos edited – therefore with significant delay, you may now receive some imagery.

Sanja Matsuri is one of the bigger Shinto festivals in Tokyo, so it was packed with people. It lasts two days, maybe even three, the main みこし, i.e. festival procession, being on Sunday. Those processions are quite massive, they begin in the morning and end only at night, making their way across rather significant chunks of Tokyo in between.

However, I went on Saturday, which I think was sensible in my case – I had seen another very famous such procession a week before, so had already checked that off my bucket list, and at the same time lacked the experience of wandering around Asakusa, so seeing Asakusa’s ‘signature’ shrine in full business was a sensible activity to undertake. 

It was really a great experience, I have to say – Asakusa is a fairly mind-blowing contrast to the stereotypical view of Tokyo as postmodern business city (ignoring for the moment that such a view is quite stupid anyway). It’s cosy, traditional, old, small, and has a great historical atmosphere. It’s like a part of Kyoto shipped to Tokyo! Because of the festival, it was, as mentioned, really busy, but in a positive and enjoyable way – the crowds added to the atmosphere, and it felt much like a cosy popular event, with families and children in school uniform and old people and some tourists. 

The event itself consisted of loads of stalls, mainly selling food, all around Senso-ji. Now and then, smaller processions made their way across the grounds and through nearby streets – our slow wandering-around was periodically interrupted by those, which made for some very lively entertainment. I think that generally, on a normal day, Asakusa’s traditional vibe is surely nice, but might seem a bit dusty, however due to those periodical outbursts of live tradition it seemed very lively and dynamic. Therefore, a really good occasion to explore the area!

Also, fun fact before we head on to some photos, there were actually quiet a number of foreigners who participated in carrying around the holy (I assume?), erm, things (whatever they’re called officially) – A, that’s really funky, how do they get to do that?!, and B, I want to do that, too, when I finally settle in Tokyo... hehe. 

Okay, now photos!

traditional means of transport on display

a Riksha, erm, driver (?) in perhaps the world’s most fancy shoes

(btw now also copied my Maison Margiela, how terribly creative)

a procession making its way past me as I was waiting for my homies

a smaller one, though

and another one – the interesting thing about Sanja Matsuri was, or is, that it consists of a lot of small processions, so that you’re bumping into yet another one again and again

note: this only applies to Saturday, I was told there’s a bigger one on Sunday

perhaps my fav photo of the day: procession moving away from me, with this super funky foreground

and yes, I was not alone

view from Senso-ji’s main gate towards the shrine’s centre

funky detail: these balloon thingies can be folded up for the processions

could be in the 60s

had some super tasty cold Matcha

a street off Senso-ji, terribly cosy

detail of a store decoration

a procession moving towards Senso-ji’s main gate from the shrine’s centre

getting closer

I’m not sure if this is an original, historic item or if it is a rather new-ish replica, but in any case it’s a fancy-looking piece

I imagine it was quite hot and sweaty, carrying those thingies (I seriously can’t figure out how they’re called, hence my resorting to squabbely, meaningless and imprecise wordings) in a crowd of dozens

so historical

one of those, well, haha, thingies, moving towards the main gate – that street running into the distance has small shops on either side, selling more or less touristy Japanese items

super close-up

view of the shrine’s main building

and some kind of pagoda tower

very nice scenery, with all the visitors and the hustle and bustle of the shrine’s main event

some old men and lots of smoke

a cleansing ritual, smoke instead of water

a solution for our water-scarce future?

outside the shrine, one of Asakusa’s many very traditional small side streets

at the front of these processions, there’s usually two women who pull along that bell-equipped stick while walking, making a very rhythmical sound

and there’s a guy swinging some paper

yet another religious ‘thingy’

a stunning number of participants in matching uniforms

in the crowd following the procession (visible in the distance)

there’s always percussion music at those processions, being played on those cart-mounted drums

clever invention

the procession moving back towards Senso-ji, along street packed with loads of bars and restaurants and drunk Japanese 

once more in colour

aforementioned bars and drunk Japanese

view of Tokyo Skytree from Senso-ji

a procession just sitting in that main gate

to round off, an evening impression of Senso-ji’s main approach route from the main gate

So, that way it – I hope you got a decent impression of Asakusa’s impressively historical vibe, which is, as mentioned initially, reminiscent of Kyoto, just in Tokyo. Funky. 

#asakusa #sanja #matsuri #mikoshi #sensoji #tokyo #shinto #procession #history #japan