[Literature] Jorge Luis Borges – The Endless Rose

Jorge Luis Borges in prime form:

In the fifth century of the Prophet’s age,
Persia gazed down from her minarets
on the invasion of the desert lances,
and Attar of Nishapur glimpsed a rose,
addressing it in voiceless words
such as one thinks but does not pray:
Your shadowy sphere is in my hands.
Time is bending and forgetting us both,
this afternoon, this abandoned garden.
Your gentle weight lies moist on the air.
The relentless tide of your fragrance
rises to my old, declining face,
but I know you longer than that child
who saw you through the sheets of a dream,
or here in this garden, some certain morning.
The whiteness of the sun may belong to you
or the gold of the moon, or the crimson
certainty of a sword in victory.
I am blind and know nothing, yet I still see
there are more roads to travel. And every thing
is really an infinity of things. You are music
and rivers, palaces, angels, and skies,
an endless rose, infinite and intimate,
which the Lord will reveal to my lifeless eyes.

[Music] Rick’s Reissue Roundup: Attack of the Spring Box Sets!

Shed a tear for the hardcore prog collector — actually, don’t. This week has been absolutely crammed with articulate announcements looking to part fans from their hard-earned cash or pull them deeper into debt. And no, I’m not talking about the upcoming Derek Smalls solo album. Check out what’s coming our way as winter (hopefully) […]

via Rick’s Reissue Roundup: Attack of the Spring Box Sets! — Progarchy

Thanks to Rick for posting this. What a good year this is going to be for prog-heads!

[Music] ZGA – The Flight of Infection

ZGA were an experimental music band who were based out of Riga, Latvia, and were seen form years as one of the leading lights of the then post-Soviet experimental and improvisational music scene.

Bandleader Nick Sudnick is still making music, and has been reissuing the ZGA back catalog on Bandcamp recently. This particular title brings fond memories as I had the pleasure of working with the venerable David Katznelson in bringing this album onto CD for the first time.

[Literature/Social Commentary] We live in Philip K. Dick’s future, not George Orwell’s or Aldous Huxley’s

“Philip K. Dick and the Fake Humans” is a compelling essay by Henry Farrell published today in The Boston Review. From the essay: This is not the dystopia we were promised. We are not learning to love Big Brother, who lives, if he lives at all, on a cluster of server farms, cooled by environmentally friendly technologies. […]

via We live in Philip K. Dick’s future, not George Orwell’s or Aldous Huxley’s — Biblioklept

Our friends at Biblioklept never cease to surprise.  The political junkies followed the wrong person into a future oblivion.  It was the cyberpunk Philip K. Dick who may have had the right vision all along.