Sound Off (ROUND 1)
scent of the day: Dukkan (Semi-Bespoke: 1gr Turkish Rose), by Elkhaldi
Another rose oud but this has a jasmine undercurrent and a lovely menthol quality. The earthiness it emphasizes, after its bubblegum-connection to L’Huere Exquise fades, is not the chocolateyness of Malik al-Taif but a rootiness that I also feel in Violette Iriani. It is way up there in ranks but I hesitate to say that even with this extra rose in here it can compete with Amphora’s Attainment. As for my first wear it is great but overhyped.
*Let’s workshop this poem about militarized rhythm, ritualized humiliation, and the conversion of private degradation into public spectacle within the architecture of boot-camp discipline.
Sound Off
The drill instructor tells Yankee you to “moan like a gook” as he thumps his office desk
double-time (“Eskimo pussy is mighty cold”) and, after a good five full of lugs squealing
for purchase, parades that bare ass (“good boy”) into the valley of squad-bay attention.
“We need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us.”—Kafka (against the safe-space cancel culture pushed by anti-art bullies, left and right)
