Try to Praise the Mutilated World

• The toe I fucked up two months ago tomorrow? finally dropped its nail last night.
• An End to Empire. I confess, that link and this sentence and the link directly below this bullet which I read last night is the totality of thought I've spent on today's Scotland independence vote. 
• England, Scotland, and hegemonic states. 
• Since the cease fire between Israel and Hamas on August 26 Israel has:

1. Annexed another 1500 acres of West Bank land

2. Seized $56 million of PA tax revenue
3. Not lifted the illegal blockade (as required by the ceasefire)

4. Broken the ceasefire by firing at fishermen on four separate occasions
5. Detained six fishermen
6. Killed a 22-year-old, Issa al Qatari, a week before his wedding

7. Killed 16-year-old Mohammed Sinokrot with a rubber bullet to the head

8. Tortured a prisoner to the point of hospitalisation

9. Refused 13 members of the European Parliament entry into Gaza
10. Detained at least 127 people across the West Bank, including a seven-year-old boy in Hebron and two children, aged seven and eight, taken from the courtyard of their house in Silwad – and tear-gassed their mother

11. Continued to hold 33 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council in prison

12. Continued to hold 500 prisoners in administrative detention without charge or trial

13. Destroyed Bedouin homes in Khan al Ahmar, near Jerusalem, leaving 14 people homeless, and unveiled a plan to forcibly move thousands of Bedouin away from Jerusalem into two purpose-built townships

14. Destroyed a dairy factory in Hebron whose profits supported an orphanage

15. Destroyed a family home in Silwan, making five children homeless

16. Destroyed a house in Jerusalem where aid supplies en route to Gaza were being stored
17. Destroyed a well near Hebron

18. Set fire to an olive grove near Hebron

19. Raided a health centre and a nursery school in Nablus, causing extensive damage

20. Destroyed a swathe of farmland in Rafah by driving tanks over it

21. Ordered the dismantling of a small monument in Jerusalem to Mohamed Abu Khdeir, murdered in July by an Israeli lynch mob
22. Continued building a vast tunnel network under Jerusalem

23. Stormed the al Aqsa mosque compound with a group of far right settlers
24. Assisted hundreds of settlers in storming Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus

25. Prevented students from entering al Quds University, firing stun grenades and rubber bullets at those who tried to go in

26. Earned unknown millions on reconstruction materials for Gaza, where 100,000 people need their destroyed homes rebuilt. The total bill is estimated at $7.8 billion

• As far as I know the residents of Augusta have yet to set a vote on leaving Maryland.
• Yes, I tweeted that I could build a post around removing Demuth's #5 as background not mostly because William Carlos Williams' birthday was yesterday but because I am #6 and few would get the allusion and if they did they wouldn't find it as funny as me. I didn't add in tweet that fine metaphors abound.
• We go to the gallery (h/t) via (h/t).
• no, i do not accept your frigging u2 album...

• Yes, K, everyone has made the "I'm 26th again, fuck you McArthur Foundation" joke. 
• L says I should keep going but faster, dammit.
• Thank you, L, thank you K. There may, there's an email flurry, there's the slightest almost infinitesimal chance, a Whatever Fucking Night It Can Be Arranged Pints in November. Please please please please please.
• Those were my favorite posts to write, these bullets will be the last one since I love you both.
• Please please please please please, may it happen, I can't imagine ever writing about it again after this post. L, K, see?
• If we get together again twice a year for the next ten years, this is it here.
• But yes. I'm trying. Thank you. Fuck it. Got it.
• Have I ever mentioned how much I love Fucked Up?

TRY TO PRAISE THE MUTILATED WORLD

Adam Zagajewski

Try to praise the mutilated world.

Remember June's long days,

and wild strawberries, drops of rosé wine.

The nettles that methodically overgrow

the abandoned homesteads of exiles.

You must praise the mutilated world.

You watched the stylish yachts and ships;

one of them had a long trip ahead of it,

while salty oblivion awaited others.

You've seen the refugees going nowhere,

you've heard the executioners sing joyfully.

You should praise the mutilated world.

Remember the moments when we were together

in a white room and the curtain fluttered.

Return in thought to the concert where music flared.

You gathered acorns in the park in autumn

and leaves eddied over the earth's scars.

Praise the mutilated world

and the gray feather a thrush lost,

and the gentle light that strays and vanishes

and returns.