Flag

“If I fall, pick up the flag, kiss it, and keep on going.”

 

“I’m in love with red. I think it’s such a passionate color. Every flag of every country pretty much has red it it. It’s power, there’s no fence sitting with red. Either you love it or you don’t. I think its blood and strength and life. I do love red.”

 

“Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.”

 

“I used to look like an American flag.”

 

“Without a musket to raise, a barricade to storm, a flag to wave, the question hit me in the face like the cold air: ‘Who am I?'”

 

“Let’s face it: There are people who are extremists in every corner of society, and whatever flag they’re waving is something Bad Religion has stood against.”

 

“For you are the makers of the flag and it is well that you glory in the making.”

 

“Within him, as he hurled himself forward, was born a love, a despairing fondness for this flag which was near him. It was a creation of beauty and invulnerability. It was a goddess, radiant, that bended its form with an imperious gesture to him. It was a woman, hating and loving, that called him with the voice of his hopes. Because no harm could come to it he endowed it with power. He kept near, as if it could be a saver of lives, and an imploring cry went from his mind.”

 

“There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum.”

 

“Breakfast was an hour later than usual, and after breakfast there was a ceremony which was observed every week without fail. First came the hoisting of the flag.”

 

“It is not the fear of madness which will oblige us to leave the flag of imagination furled.”

 

“Upon the cornice of the tower a tall staff was fixed. Their eyes were riveted on it. A few minutes after the hour had struck something moved slowly up the staff, and extended itself upon the breeze. It was a black flag. It was with this blot, and not with the beauty, that the two gazers were concerned.”

 

“It is the Soldier who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag.”

 

“The sun has fallen down, and the billboards are all leering, and the flags are all dead at the top of their poles.”

 

“What can I say to you Old Flag, you are so great in every fold. So linked to mighty deeds of old, so calm, so firm, so still, so true, my heart swells at the very sight of you, Old Flag.”

 

“Two monks were arguing about the flag waving in the wind. One said, “The flag moves.” The other said, “The wind moves.” They argued back and forth but could not agree. Hui-neng, the sixth Patriarch, said: “Gentlemen! It is not the flag that moves. It is not the wind that moves. It is your mind that moves.” The two monks were struck with awe.”

 

“I cannot look down to this floor, but her features are shaped on the flags!”

 

“It resembles the communist Russian flag, except the background is green.”

 

“If you want a symbolic gesture, don’t burn the flag wash it.”

 

“You’re a white flag, throw that towel boy. I’m a jump right in that crowd boy. I don’t give a Shhh…keep it down boy and I’m a fuck you blow that loud boy.”

 

“And we knew the flag was a friend / forgotten ceremony, nailed to the floor, / climbing tooth by tooth.”

 

“Dry fields of lightning rise to receive the observer, the mincing flag. An unendurable age.”

 

“Ever since I was little I’ve had a secret attraction to the flag of Finland, secret only because there never seemed to be right moment to go up to someone and say, “Excuse me, I’ve always loved the flag of Finland. I loved it the first time I saw it, in a dictionary with a colorplate showing Flags of All Nations. Finland’s was special. It was free of the symbolism that makes some flags so fussy and editorial. The flag of Finland looked like cool, clean air in a blue sky, the essence of a zero that had just disappeared.”

 

“How much more easily the leave-taker is loved! For the flame burns more purely for those vanishing in the distance, fueled by the fleeting scrap of material waving from the ship or railway window. Separation penetrates the disappearing person like a pigment and steeps him in gentle radiance.”

 

 

“i have to make a school flag and i need help with a quote. my flag is gonna have a rainbow. and i wanna put a quote on the flag. what are some great quotes that have the word rainbow in it? reply ASAP!!!!!”

 

“The flag is symbol of the nation where a sensible object is posited as an incarnation of an object of thought.”

 

“He raised his hand the way someone might raise a tattered flag. He moved his fingers, each finger, as if his fingers were a flag in flames.”

 

“Everybody has flags out. Homes, businesses. It’s odd: You never see anybody putting out a flag, but by Wednesday morning there they all are. Big flags, small flags, regular flag-size flags. A lot of home-owners here have those special angled flag-holders by their front door, the kind whose brace takes four Phillips screws. And thousands of those little hand-held flags-on-a-stick you normally see at parades – some yards have dozens all over as if they’d somehow sprouted overnight. Rural-road people attach the little flags to their mailboxes out by the street. Some cars have them wedged in their grille or duct-taped to the antenna. Some upscale people have actual poles; their flags are at half-mast. More than a few large homes around Franklin Park or out on the east side even have enormous multistory flags hanging gonfalon-style down over their facades. It’s a total mystery where people get flags this big or how they got them up there.”

 

“He would think of the Middle East, of strife and mortar, then suddenly of Australia, and then New Zealand, giant squid, tunafish, and then of Japan, all the millions of people in Japan; and he’d get stuck there, on Japan—trying to imagine the life of one Japanese person, unable to, conjuring only an image of wasabi, minty and mounded, against a flag-white background.”

 

“From a point 10m from the base of a flag pole, its top has an angle of elevation of 50º. From the foot of a tower 20m high, the top of a flagpole has an angle of elevation of 30º. From the top of the tower, it has an angle of depression of 25º. From a certain spot, the top of a flagpole has an angle of elevation of 30º. Move 10m in a straight line towards the flagpole. Now the top has an angle of elevation of 50º.”

 

“These red flags are the warning signs that a person may be planning suicide.”

 

“I saw our first Confederate flag at 9:35 AM, wrapped around a man’s head, as neither a hat nor a bandanna, but more just a thing that hugged his hair.”

 

“What not yet above could not be crushed, this was the fifteenth iteration and would replicate again, though this still not be any new beginning and when it ended it would not end, the houses laced with blue night risen in the toning of the crystalmind, a corridor of small flags each pyramidal and seated with a center made of cream, each hiding where inside them another instance of this lock, the speaking humming through the speakerbodies magicked and lumped with lanterns down the longest corridors.”

 

“The black flag represents the absence of a flag, and thus stands in opposition to the very notion of nation-states. In that light, the flag can be seen as a rejection of the concept of representation, or the idea that any person or institution can adequately represent a group of individuals.”

 

“And the ship / The Black Freighter / Runs a flag up its masthead / And a cheer rings the air.”

 

 

“In the pirate flag of skull and crossbones, loved by children of all ages and many nations, it is the idea that is paramount, the actual execution of the design often woefully imperfect — but who cares so long as the wind is up and the flag flutters, bringing the animating force of nature into play. There is another reason for not caring; this pirate flag is also an anti flag — not merely a sign of belonging to no nation but a refusal of all signs and hence of representation, to, belonging to no nation but a sign of refusal of all signs and hence of representations, too, as nature unfurls its own nation.”

 

 

*

p.s. Hey. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi. Very happy you liked his work, and excellent comparisons. There was a Thomas Demand retrospective here last year that was one of my favorite shows in ages. ** Misanthrope, Cool. I once saved Bernard from this guy who was aggressively hitting on him at a party, so it works both ways. You’re one hour closer to me until next Saturday. Quit invading my space, man. Maybe you should have just let the bad haircut grow out and do a mullet. I bet Alex would cream. ** Dominik, Hi!!! Very happy you liked them. ‘Physical: 100’: I’m on it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a show like that. Except when I was a kid there was a show called ‘He-Men’ where men had to chain themselves to the fronts of giant trucks and drag them and compete for who dragged them the furthest before falling in a sweaty heaps on the ground. I guess that counts? No, that was the new producer. That demand/request was one of a number of strange seeming ones, like he made us truncate the end credits so they only said our names and the producers’ and the five main actors’ but not the crew or anyone else. He explained it to Zac yesterday, and it makes more sense. Basically that the more mysterious the film seems, the better its chances with festival curators, he says. And since she’s gotten a number of films he’s produced into this festival, we have to trust him. And it’s just for this one submission. So, I guess it’s okay. Your love of yesterday would come in very handy over here too where it’s just raining and raining, and I really don’t like walking under an umbrella. Love making the current luck I’m having with some fiction I’m working on not run out, G. ** Steve, Very glad you got the prescription and that your mind is at peace again. I kind of explained the names thing to Dominik. I don’t know. I have no idea how to seduce festival curators, but our producer thinks he does, so we will see. Yeah, a lot of talk about what happened at Berlin. Can’t imagine that happening at festivals here in France, but … who knows these days, it’s true. ** Adem Berbic, Whoa, Adem! Howdy! Tricks are okay at the moment, I think. Oh, shit, I hope you’re de-flued or seriously on route today. Yeah, there’s still some work to do — VFX, probably a little fiddling with the color and sound after we watch it screened in a theater — but we’re close, and it’s definitely going to live and be born and stuff. Amazing, as you can imagine, having heard the horror stories of its making relentlessly for years. You’re coming! I think I’ll be here then, yes! We’re going to go to LA to show the film to the cast/crew, but not that soon. Great! So, yeah, hit me up with your deets and schedule whenever the time is right. It’ll be so good to see you and meet your pal too. xoxo. ** Justin, Hi. I’m glad you dug Amir’s photos. Yeah, they hit my spot too. The credits thing: I explained it better up above. It should be okay. And it’s only for this one festival submission. My name certainly has been known to drive people away from things I’m associated with, but it attracts too. Mixed bag. But, yeah, my reputation doesn’t fit with what I actually do, and that does really irritate me even as I’m powerless to do anything about it. I don’t know. I’m not very articulate today either. Less sleep than I needed. So, you sounded like you were on my very wavelength. ** Uday, Thanks, U. Monsoon-like, nice. I like that word too. It’s pretty. Me too, on the sex tourism rep, but, based on friends’ reports who’ve been there, they said it’s a little like the built in expectation that when you go to LA you’re going to see movie stars all the time as opposed to seeing maybe one and not a very famous one. What’s new? ** Cori, Hi. You did see the Waters show. I really wish I could get to LA before John’s show exits, but it’s so extremely unlikely. Todd Verow owns IFC?! That is a strange factoid right there. Huh. Gosh, I hope you can make some writers friends you trust and respect there because that’s definitely the best way to get feedback, but, yeah, give it time. Sometimes I find myself in a strange mental state where I at least feel like I can see my writing with total objectivity and find the strengths/ problems. But it seems to happen pretty randomly. There are so many good indie presses, gosh. Some of my favorites are 11:11 Press, Apocalypse Party, Semiotext(e), Dorothy, The Song Cave, Inside the Castle, Clash, Whisk(e)y Tit, Pilot, … I could go on and on. What kind of work in particular are you looking for? Or, if it’s a possible search for a publisher for your work, maybe say more about what your work is like, if you feel like it? Anyway, happy … what is it … Wednesday! ** Okay. I actually quite like the post today, and I guess I hope you will too. See you tomorrow.