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the labcat is the online life of labrys, smith college's art/literary magazine. we collect poems, prose, flash-fiction, letters, diary entries, essays, doodles, paintings, oils, sketches, photography, animation, videos, graphics, chicken-scratches, stippling, charcoal rubbing, pastels, collages, observations, music and whatever else inspires you. send it in bulky bundles to labrys@smith.edu.

Sunday, September 30, 2012

the arrival of lucifer

initially penned in ovid's amore, the pathos of marlowe's faustus is keenly felt as he bewails his final moments: o lente, lente, currite noctis equi! --> o, run slowly, slowly, horses of the night! i can't get this out of my head.

photographs create stellar dichotomies.
margaret draft '13

Saturday, September 29, 2012

words fail me

Hi there! Posted below for your listening pleasure is the only known recording of Virginia Woolf. It comes from part of a BBC broadcast from April 19, 1937. Hope it can bring you some inspiration on this dreary Saturday!


"How can we combine the old words in new orders so that they survive, so that they create beauty, so that they tell the truth? That is the question."- Virginia Woolf

Friday, September 28, 2012

Jenny Lewis






Hey Labcat readers,
After a really rainy day here in Northampton, why not listen to some good music? I have been listening all week on my iPod to Jenny Lewis, formerly of the band Rilo Kiley.  She has a great voice and her songs are unique.  Here is one of my favorites in a live performance- aren't live performances always better? This is "Sing a Song for Them."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaxNlskBAfY&list=AL94UKMTqg-9BLUgJ4GTRz8lspTEIdQz9U&index=15&feature=plcp

Enjoy!
Esra

Thursday, September 27, 2012

inspiration

I thought that for today I would post a quote to (hopefully) inspire some of you to post your work on the labcat. Here is a quote from Smith alum Sylvia Plath: 


"And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt."

We hope to hear from you :) 

Labrys love,
Kelsey '13

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Sand Art!

After a day of reading and reading, my mind has been officially frazzled. And I imagine that, this being Wednesday, many people are in need of a respite from words and all their beloved eccentricities. So here's a video of an insanely talented sand artist from the Ukraine. Enjoy! -Jackie


Tuesday, September 25, 2012

freezing points

four months of

blankness. nothingness.

tonight was the snap.
yesterday, my thighs chafed,
sweat swaddled my upper lip.

my mouth that was so great
to you.

tonight
the raw skin between my legs
prickled with the premonition of snow.




happy anniversary to me.

--becca



Monday, September 24, 2012

prompt

i once contemplated what a poem might look like if it were almost wholly composed of song titles. a little idiosyncratic, but may it inspire:


far away is the man i love 
and his sweet tooth, mumbling 
on a blanket the beer barrel polka 
with a storm in his tired hands

i pick at the grieving breath, 
the seagull of moth wings 
and blueberry mountains

dear cliff-top, the deer will write
with angry ink, biting at red apples
it's like reaching for the moon - 
the body's dance, handjobs for the holidays. 

i would be remiss not to thank my dutiful favorites: national skyline, art tatum, gillian welch & dave rawlings, autolux, the andrews sisters, josé gonzález, k.c. accidental, benoit pioulard, first aid kit, manchester orchestra, cat power, billie holiday, broken social scene
margaret draft '13

To the Harbormaster

I wanted to be sure to reach you;
though my ship was on the way it got caught
in some moorings. I am always tying up
and then deciding to depart. In storms and
at sunset, with the metallic coils of the tide
around my fathomless arms, I am unable
to understand the forms of my vanity
or I am hard alee with my Polish rudder
in my hand and the sun sinking. To
you I offer my hull and tattered cordage
of my will. The terrible channels where
the wind drives me against the brown lips
of the reeds are not all behind me. Yet
I trust the sanity of my vessel; and
if it sinks, it may well be in answer
to the reasoning of the eternal voices,
the waves which have kept me from reaching you.
                                   
                                   Frank O'Hara


Kristen DeLancey '15

Friday, September 21, 2012

Cindy Sherman


Why not start the weekend off right by digging into some Cindy Sherman artwork.  Sherman's artwork, including her most recent exhibition first displayed at the NYC MOMA is incredible.   I was lucky enough on my recent visit to San Francisco to see the exhibition at the SF MOMA.  Sherman photographs herself as different women from various backgrounds.  The outfits are crazy, and the makeup even crazier.  I found out about the Sherman exhibit after listening to Ira Glass' narration of visiting the Sherman exhibit when it had just opened at the NYC MOMA.  Someone posing as Cindy Sherman went around the exhibit saying she was Cindy Sherman. Of course, Ira Glass being Ira Glass, he had to make a hilarious prologue segment of This American Life on it.  Listen to it here. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/468/switcheroo

Here are some amazing photos of some of Sherman's photographs I saw in her recent exhibition.  (All Photos courtesy of www.moma.org unless otherwise noted)

Courtesy of aesthetics.com

Photo above Courtesy of  artobserved.com

Esra Karamehmet '13J

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Mountain Day

In honor of Mountain Day...here's a poem about what else? A mountain!



The Mountains -- grow unnoticed
Emily Dickinson

The Mountains—grow unnoticed—
Their Purple figures rise
Without attempt—Exhaustion—
Assistance—or Applause—

In Their Eternal Faces
The Sun—with just delight
Looks long—and last—and golden—
For fellowship—at night— 

We hope you all had a wonderful Mountain day, whether it was your first, second, third or last. There is nothing better than hearing those bells ringing at 7 AM! 

Kelsey McDermott '13

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Random Thoughts


And now, snippets of Rainer Maria Rilke (dead Austrian poet)'s advice to other younger, less-dead poets on love and, yes, poetry:

“Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.”

“Let everything happen to you
Beauty and terror
Just keep going
No feeling is final”


“It is not inertia alone that is responsible for human relationships repeating themselves from case to case, indescribably monotonous and unrenewed: it is shyness before any sort of new, unforeseeable experience with which one does not think oneself able to cope. But only someone who is ready for everything, who excludes nothing, not even the most enigmatical will live the relation to another as something alive.”


“For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure, and it amazes us so,
because it serenely disdains to destroy us.
Every angel is terrible.”


Jackie Leahy '14


wye oak, civilian

i am nothing without pretend
i know my faults
can't live with them
i am nothing without a man
i know my thoughts
but i can't hide them

i still keep my baby teeth
in the bedside table with my jewelry
you still sleep in the bed with me
my jewelry, and my baby teeth

i don't need another friend
when most of them
i can barely keep up with them
perfectly able to hold my own hand
but i still can't kiss my own neck

i wanted to give you everything
but i still stand in awe of superficial things
i wanted to love you like
my mother's mother's mother did
civilian

\
Presented to you by Becca O'Leary '13

Friday, September 14, 2012

friday sentiments

For reasons entirely due to my own procrastinatory (it is a word) tendencies, this lovely start to the weekend finds me holed up in the periodicals room working on last minute assignments. However, I did find some time in this midst of all my pointed concentration to quickly flip through this summer's Paris Review and find this lovely quote for you (rhyming unintended):

"Don't be so sensitive. Lots of things bore me. Things I love. My husband. My daughter. My Native American pottery collection. It's not an insult."
                                  - Sam Lipsyte, "This Appointment Occurs in the Past"

I thought it put my general feelings towards 200+ pages of economics reading into words perfectly. The rest of the story is just as good, so if you too find yourself "working" up here sometime soon, I'd highly recommend it. Oh and--

Welcome back,
Kristen (former secretary/budding social media chair)

Monday, September 10, 2012

cool cats, welcome back

artwork by margaret draft '13

an update from labrys: the labcat plans to galvanize the face of our magazine's counterpart. in doing this, we ask for your patience, enthusiasm and dynamic engagement. we invite your feedback; how would you like to play with the labcat? send your thoughts and work as we strategize ways to inspire continued readership and participation. in the meantime, bask in the bosomy bounty of our relentless procrastination in impassioned sketches of cow/pigs.

moo?, your editor-in-chief
margaret