Arthur Durkee

I genuinely struggle this year with gratitudes. I’m thankful for having a place to live provided by the man who loves me. But I have SO MUCH RAGE about things this year. Gratitude is a bit drowned out. And now the White House says queer people don’t have a right to exist. They can just fuck off.

But I’ve been an LGBTQA activist since the AIDS years, so I know how to turn anger into fuel for change. I can’t march in the streets anymore but I do other activism. Still, it’s stupid that we have to fight for our rights ALL OVER AGAIN now, 40 years later.

I’m poor, homeless, queer, and disabled. I was kicked out of where I was living, had to move across four states this summer. I’m settling in, but it’s hard to fulfill my purpose, which is music and art. Nobody is thinking about art and soul. I’m anxious and angry and isolated all the time.

When I frst came to live here, I thought my time would be brief, but already five years have passed. This passing shelter of mine has slowly become a home; the eaves are deep in rotting leaves, moss covers the foundations. When news of the capital happens to come my way, I learn of many people in high places who have met their end since I retired to this mountain, and other lesser folk besides, too many to be told. And how many houses, too, have been lost in all those fires? In all this, my mere passing shelter has remained tranquil and safe from fears. Small it may be, but there is a bed to sleep on at night, and a place to sit in the daytime. As a simple place to house myself, it lacks nothing. The hermit crab prefers a little shell for his home. He knows what the world holds. The osprey chooses the wild shoreline, and this is because he fears mankind. And I too am the same. Knowing what the world holds and its ways, I desire nothing from it, nor chase after its prizes. My one crav- ing is to be at peace, my one pleasure to live free of troubles.

this passing shelter of mine has slowly become a home; the eaves are deep in rotting leaves, moss covers the foundations

Kamo no Chōmei, Hōjōki, c.1212 CE

Distinct brain alterations and neurodegenerative processes in cognitive impairment associated with post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 @natcomms.nature.com
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Love that so many people here talk about what they’re drawing, and sometimes share it.

Weirded out that it’s universally mangaka.

It’s like an entire population has forgotten that there are other styles to draw in?

I draw in the Rodin figure drawing lineage. I seem to be alone in that?

Snow was falling all over Ireland . . . on all the living, and the dead.

People are best on records and books because you can turn them off or put them back on the shelf - Henry Rollins

Destiny? That implies inevitability, which isn’t real. The thing that’s real is that the choices we make affect outcomes. If things go on as they are X will happen. That feels like “fate.” But we can always make different choices, and change directions at any time. Its not inevitability.

Five years ago, we all applauded nurses, public health, and health care workers every evening for saving lives.

Today, the federal government does not consider these workers professional.

This says everything about the state of US health care.

I cannot imagine what could possibly go wrong in trying to court-martial an astronaut and pilot decorated multiple times for valor and exceptional service, who is also a sitting senator, for correctly making the point that service members are obliged not to follow unlawful orders

This is great.

Pre-digital, my favorite camera and film.

Mark Kelly being targeted by the vindictive and incompetent current administration is hilariously going to fail, but still waste plenty of taxpayer dollars.

And part of being a light evangelist for me would be solar power promotion. People forget that everything we are and do on this planet is ultimately powered by the Sun, from chloroplast bacteria on up to us. Light is literally life. Even fossil fuels are fossil sunlight-eating plants.

The same WSJ editorial board that doubted masks and social distancing during the first COVID lockdown pre-vaccines . . .

Robert Reich The DOGE Damage Elon is Leaving Behind

The "Department of Government Efficiency" has disbanded eight months early.

DOGE sowed chaos throughout the government and disrupted services relied upon by millions, while finding hardly any savings.

Here's what you should know about damage that DOGE leaves behind.

The absence of young people in protests against Mr. Trump’s authoritarianism matters, and not just for crowd counts. The No Kings protesters look like, and in many cases are, the same people who protested during Mr. Trump’s first term in office. But older people with signs are old news in the attention economy. As a result, the No Kings protests have had less effect on our politics than, say, the smaller Tea Party protests during Barack Obama’s first months as president, which helped spark a backlash before the 2010 midterm elections. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/24/opinion/boomers-protest-trump-gen-z.html?unlocked_article_code=1.3k8.ui6r.Ag1dMthOacrp&smid=url-share

If there's one thing the mainstream news media love to overlook, it's the impact of the mainstream news media. The petite Tea Party in all its elite-backed astroturfiness was hailed like a sacred comet; the historically huge No Kings was played down by the NY Times, among other publications.

“If that car hadn’t run you over, you would never have gotten that sweet disability income!”

We can do away with it without a new Supreme Court. Nor do we need a constitutional amendment. There’s a far simpler way to get rid of Citizens United. Let me explain. https://robertreich.substack.com/p/how-to-get-rid-of-citizens-united

WSJ

moon crescent setting
beyond the lake of night in
the city of light

#haiku #poetry #nightphoto #moon #mythos #spiritlights

I think it's easier to understand the Trump Era when you realize nobody actually likes Trump, they just like the anarchy and chaos of being free from social norms and basic civility.

Even his supporters hate him, but he normalized being a monster.

He just wants to catch ghosts to take them on dates.

“Extremity is the root ground of prophecy.” —Alice Ostriker

When things get extreme, that’s when prophets appear.

“A prophet is one who interferes with injustice.” —Abraham Heschel

A lot of disinformation is circulating about what Senators/Representatives Slotkin, Kelly, Crow, Deluzio, Goodlander, and Houlahan actually said. Here is the transcript. It contains no accusation that the President issued unlawful orders, no call to disobey lawful orders, and no advocacy of mutiny.

If you think social culture has no impact on climate, boy are you missing the boat. It has everything to do with it.

Sports gambling is not just corrupting our trust in sports, but America.

Thank you to @amanpourcopbs.bsky.social, @michelmartinnpr.bsky.social and @camanpour.bsky.social for the platform.

Our full conversation: youtu.be/uiomTi50pS8?...

I have a series of choral compositions that are all interrelated. For me, they are an ecumenical statement of personal faith. The general caption will read:

From the series “Light,” which are evocations in music of the experience of the Mystical Light found across many spiritual traditions.

Little post to say that disabled people aren't lazy. We try our best, but our disability does what it says on the tin. It disables us.

We try to just live in a society that wasn't built for us or with us in mind a good majority of the time. Oftentimes, it even works against us.

Disabled ≠ Lazy

The modern composers who’ve had the most impact on my musical style and concerns?

Britten
Cage
Copland
Messiaen
Reich
Carlos
Oliveros
Bartok
Eno

Several of them gay like me.