You know, it’s not exactly easy dealing with dreams. It’s weird stuff. Of course, contra Laurie Anderson, I don’t make a big fuss of it. Shit like that allows your imagination to roam a bit. Nothing wrong with that. A couple years ago, I had a dream about Ryuichi Sakamoto. It was after Bowie had a died. He paced back and forth. He wept. In the process, he was surrounded by websites, blaring at his face for even bothering to weep. He was wearing that old uniform from that movie Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, but he was as he is now. I asked him, “Why?” He simply answered, “龍一はそうしなければならないから。 デイヴィッドは隆一の友人だったから。” It was stiffness mixed with sadness.
Everyone’s immortal. Everything is too. | Бессмертны все. Бессмертно все.
You have to feel for Arseny Tarkovsky. He wrote that line above in the poem “Life, Life.” (It’s conveniently the same name as the Sakamoto song being “reworked” above by LA artist Anenon, who himself dropped a new album earlier this month.) But how could he believe that? Perhaps it was written before the war, when a shot in the leg eventually destroyed it. Maybe it was written while his son, the legendary film director Andrei, was still alive. It’s a rare sight to see you outliving your children. It’s also tragic in some ways. I wonder if my grandmother finally lost her mind to Alzheimer’s after my father passed, or if it was merely consequential. Can’t imagine how she felt.
No need for a date: I was, I am, and I will be | Не надо мне числа: я был, и есмь, и буду
Life is a wonder of wonders, and to wonder | Жизнь - чудо из чудес, и на колени чуду
I dedicate myself, on my knees, like an orphan, | Один, как сирота, я сам себя кладу,
Alone—among mirrors—fenced in by reflections: | Один, среди зеркал - в ограде отражений
Cities and seas, iridescent, intensified. | Морей и городов, лучащихся в чаду.
A mother in tears takes a child on her lap. | И мать в слезах берет ребёнка на колени.
This remix is the final part of the Async Remodels, a “reworks” series created by Sakamoto in collaboration with multiple artists, including the recently departed Jóhan Jóhannsen. In Anenon’s rework, we have an attempt to correlate the name with the actual book of poetry, for it comes with a recitation of a poem from a book of Tarkovsky Sr.’s works. A translation of a song, as it were. This is not to say, though, that this is not something new of its own. Like the verse above that has been translated to English from the original Russian text, we can see a majority of the words changed, the rhyme scheme lost, and the cadence a mess. In essence, in understanding, we have created a new work that nevertheless conveys a similar meaning. That isn’t such a bad thing.
More about: Anenon, Ryuichi Sakamoto
