36 Views of San Francisco takes its name from Katsushika Hokusai’s 1830s series of woodblock prints, 36 Views of Mt. Fuji. Instead of the relative geologic stability of the iconic Mt. Fuji, however, Ravi Chandra places San Francisco and his own selfhood and identity at the center of his concerns as an artist and citizen. The ground is shifting under our feet, seismically and metaphorically: in the city, the nation and even the world. What moods and messages rise from the streets and from his soul? The series comprises 36 images of San Francisco people and locations, each accompanied by a poem impressionistically capturing the spirits and narratives of San Francisco and the artist as place, people and mind, in the summer of 2018. Hokusai first added 10 images to his original 36, and then expanded to a total of 100 views; Chandra adds 18 views to his series. Perhaps future summers will allow him to expand his embrace of all the city’s neighborhoods and stories.
The goal is to bring viewers and readers to reflections, both meditative and visceral, on a city in transition and consciousness in formation. The soul of San Francisco, known for vibrant and diverse cultural communities, the arts (including poetry and photography), spiritual seekers and workaday eccentricity and individuality, is threatened by changing economics, demographics and gentrification. Many of us fight and bemoan the change; others are resigned. Perhaps San Francisco, City of Hearts, city of St. Francis, is a Mt. Fuji after all, and will rise to meet the challenge of newcomers, new intentions and new ideas arriving in the 21st Century Tech Boom Gold Rush. Maybe the self has to be a Mt. Fuji, stable under the changing weather, supporting the goals of climbers. These missions still seem in startup mode, though. Chandra is not an economist or politician, but rather a psychiatrist and artist trying to measure the city’s varying pulse, and also trying to bring his own soul to coherence through creative inquiry. Change is traumatic; ideologies clash; people suffer. We heal when we come to a deeper sense of self. We could understand the city’s difficulties as an identity crisis. We have not sorted out yet who we are and who we are in relation to each other. Identity is always a work in progress, not something fixed, stable and solid. Our shifting environment is calling us to a deeper sense of our narratives as individuals and as a collective. There is something dying, and something coming to life, as is true of all transformations. What emerged reflects the artist’s own sensibilities and spirit as he places his ear to the ground, from Mission to Market, from the Sunset to the Haight, from the Richmond to Bayview, from J-town to the Marina, and all points in the 7×7. Chandra went looking for San Francisco’s soul, and his own. This is what he found.
Chandra notes:
“As it turned out, six of the 54 total poems (Views 36+5 through 36+10) were written in New York City, so this project is a little bit of a tale of two great coastal cities as well, both of them in flux. Perhaps because I was on vacation, perhaps because New York is a Global Queen of a City with over ten times the population of San Francisco, I found myself cocooned by people on the streets, enlightened by conversations with strangers, music and culture, and warmed by the company of friends eager to see me after months apart. Perhaps some insights are that we are/I am far too invested in work vs. relationships in San Francisco, and being a smaller city, small changes in demographics and economics make a much bigger impact on the overall feel and soul of the city. My goal as a psychiatrist and artist in San Francisco is to commit myself even more to cultivating relationship and community in the remaining years of my life, partly through my compassion organization in formation, SF Love Dojo.”
Here are wistful poems, angry poems, hopeful poems, humorous poems, flippant poems, poems about aging, poems about the city, poems about our American predicament, poems inspired by Buddhism, punny poems, and doggerel verses, all paired with images related or unrelated to the poems’ themes. They will hopefully entertain you and make you think, and perhaps even inspire you to write your own poems and responses. Feel free to add your comments, and share with your communities. Each entry is paired with one of Ravi Chandra’s blog posts from Psychology Today (The Pacific Heart), the Center for Asian American Media (Memoirs of a Superfan), videos or books.
This poetry is a free offering and endeavor. If you’re really inspired, please pick up a copy of Facebuddha: Transcendence in the Age of Social Networks, or ask your library to purchase a copy. Only 3 bucks for the e-book and a big bite of ideas. Podcast interviews and more up at facebuddha.co.
Thanks for your indulgence – please enjoy and share! May 2018 be bright for you and for us all.
All photographs were taken with an iPhone 7 plus. Each photo and poem is accompanied by the spoken track on SoundCloud.
Just click the links below each poem/view to navigate to the next view. Or come back to this page
and scroll below for a Table of Contents.
Dedicated to
The Muses and Mercury
Eros and Psyche
Saraswati and Manjushri
All Creative Acts Emanating from Heart/Mind and World
Peter Kenichi Yamamoto, June 25, 1954 – May 27, 2018
Frederic Hull Roth, July 27, 1941 – July 2, 2018
(Pete’s last poem is here; as I neared completion of this 36 Views, I discovered
that my friend Shizue Siegel had been writing beautiful Buddhism-themed poems for Peter, available on his Facebook page.
Something about his spirit passing,
his special connection to the muses and heavens, has touched so many of us.
Rest in Power, Pete.
We love you and miss you.
Dr. Roth, Fred, you gave me gifts of meaning, curiosity and warmth which I am still paying forward. Thank you.)
Book pairing: Facebuddha: Transcendence in the Age of Social Networks
Begin: 36 Views of SF – View 1
Start: June 9, 2018
End: August 8, 2018
36 Views of SF: 1. Prelude – Lovesick
36 Views of SF: 2. Beginning Poems
36 Views of SF: 3. Mission Shoe Repair
36 Views of SF: 4. Typical Old Guy
36 Views of SF: 5. America strikes a pose
36 Views of SF: 6. Food Hall, Valencia and 16th
36 Views of SF: 7. Haight Street Buzz
36 Views of SF: 8. San Francisco, taken to the cleaners
36 Views of SF: 9. Specialist or Generalist?
36 Views of SF: 10. deathbed boner
36 Views of SF: 11. Who’s Writing our Movie?
36 Views of SF: 12. Remembrance of Pride’s Past
36 Views of SF: 13. Red Thread
36 Views of SF: 14. Golden Gate
36 Views of SF: 15. Significantly Fucked
36 Views of SF: 16. Minolta Mind, Kodak Kiss
36 Views of SF: 17. Borderline
36 Views of SF: 19. i’ll see you underground
36 Views of SF: 20. The Ring Cycle
36 Views of SF: 21. A Place and Time for Everything
36 Views of SF: 22. what to do, what to do
36 Views of SF: 23. go gentler on our shamisen strings
36 Views of SF: 25. The Wound Comes to Life
36 Views of SF: 26. To the Mamas and the Sistas
36 Views of SF: 27. Poem about the Moon
36 Views of SF: 28. Enough is Enough
36 Views of SF: 29. Interdependence Day Workout
36 Views of SF: 30. America in Crisis, America in Transition
36 Views of SF: 31. first memories
36 Views of SF: 32. small plates
36 Views of SF: 33. the stream
36 Views of SF: 34. The Great Vehicle
36 Views of SF: 35. the bandaged place
36 Views of SF: 36. We come from the Belly of Earth!
36 Views of SF: 36+1. Apocalips
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+2. Masterpiece Theater
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+3. Is there another option?
36 Views of SF 36+4: Three for the road
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+5. belonging
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+6. angry wounds
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+7. The Storm
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+8. Her Name is Han
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+9. Pro-lost, pro-found
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+10. Vision Field
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+11. San Francisco, Eternal City
36 Views of San Francisco: 36+12. Awake
36 Views of SF: 36+13. Summer of Verklemption, Summer of Redemption
36 Views of SF: 36+14. Tanabata Ache, Tanabata Joy
36 Views of SF: 36+15. safety soul
36 Views of SF: 36+16. Love Psalm, Love Palms
36 Views of SF: 36+17. American Son: A Chautauqua in Five Acts
36 Views of SF: 36+18. San Francisco, San Francisco
August 18, 2017
Lovesick for an America that does not exist
An America just beyond my fingertips
Wandering this nation trying to resist
The heartbreak
Of seeing their fists
Shouting their hatred
Like my death is their bliss
We have to keep fighting
Because love is not sick.
Blog pairing: After Charlottesville: Is Racism a Mental Illness?
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
June 5, 2018
Zen Death Poem, age 51
Old chrysanthemum
Petals wilt, still looks alright.
Good for making tea.
Which shoguns ruled when Basho wrote?
Kings, Queens, Rulers, Rules
Poetry outlasts them all.
Build your Basho Hut.
Heart-Wine
Heart-wine breaks the mind –
New wine breaks old wine skins still.
Call it “Heart-break-crushed-grapes will.”
Truth with Consequences
the mind is an alibi,
a cover story for
kids grown tall
we try to fake our way
out of the heart
into the world,
but the Heart’s golden lasso
is a Wonder Woman’s knot –
we cannot escape our truth.
Blog pairing: Option B and Option Buddha—Sheryl Sandberg and Kisa Gotami
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
June 13, 2018
So much depends
On new laces for my kicks
2 bucks at Mission Shoe Repair.
Lady behind the counter been there six years;
Store there for twenty-six.
Spanish accent, immigrant, smiling.
Patient with my questions.
Takes the measure of my everyday yarn.
Knows what she’s doing.
San Francisco is in that store
Rotating rack of down-to-earth laces
Simple wallets, functional and proud,
Soles repaired on the cheap.
I’ll rock these new-laced sneaks
For as long as they last,
Strung up with my lost-and-found
Sense of place,
Of belonging.
Blog Pairing: Friendship Gardens – the Modern Victory Gardens
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
Artist’s Statement + TOC Previous View Next View
(this photo, like some other photos, was taken in New York City)
]]>June 13, 2018
Typical old guy
gets mad when his newspaper doesn’t show
curses at the Recology truck
when it spills its flow.
All he knows is
nothing’s going his way
and everything goes.
That pisses him off.
That pisses him off.
Death might be a welcome rest
but he’s raging at that door.
Raging at what he’s about to lose,
What he’s lost along this path.
He thinks if he gets his paper on time
He might find it all again.
But what he’s lost or never had
Is someone who gave two fucks.
If he shouts loud enough,
Maybe someone will.
But this is America.
He’s on his own.
He’s the Mayor of his mind,
And it isn’t a happy place.
His city has never been funded right,
Maybe it was never founded right.
Maybe it’s lost, and hasn’t found a way.
Maybe it’s looking for a country to join.
But this is no country for old men.
Anyway, who feels like they really belong,
Like someone cares
In America?
Blog pairing: Social Media and IRL: Narcissistic Attachment to Opinion
Video Pairing: SF Love Dojo Ep 3: Understanding Anger, Generating Compassion
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
June 19, 2018
Our screenface Buddha’s are
little TED talks:
How to stand –
Make your bed every day –
How to dry your hands.
No one asks
why we’re slouching
why we don’t feel like
making our beds
why we’re always
washing our hands.
There’s something dirty about us –
about this place –
secrets we’ve pushed aside.
They haunt us in our dreams.
We count sheep
and lie.
We slouch unclean.
My mother says it looks
like an elephant slept in my bed.
She’s right, as always.
America’s all about answers.
But there are none.
Who makes a TED talk on
the proper way to
gnash your teeth?
Maybe that just comes
natural
in America.
That, and
lectures on
grit.
Blog Pairing: Grit: Is It Baloney?
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
June 19, 2018
Ti Couz transformed
into corner store for splendors.
Incarcerated honey almonds
catch my eye from their hamper.
Pomegranate pistachios beside them,
“classic” fruits and nuts abide.
No one asked them for their papers, though
They’re immigrants welcome to our nation.
San Francisco will always be
a sanctuary for salivary sophistications.
Four lines of wine
and more, in refrigeration;
40 bucks and up.
Modern Times beer cans
smile
while my heart is breaking cognitions.
Cucumber Sour next to Death by Coconut
with Maui Brewing Company in between.
Which one am I?
What you drink is what you are –
Is San Francisco here?
Object Permanence
eludes me, but it’s here on the shelf,
right next to
Smoke and Mirrors
an India Pale Ale.
I buy a matcha custard muffin,
three-seventy-five,
wealthtastic confection;
and talk to the young woman
in cashier position.
“We’ve been here two years,”
she says in confession.
Blind or averse,
I’d never taken note.
The muffin tastes good.
With bittersweet notes.
Blog pairing: MEMOIRS OF A SUPERFAN VOL 12.5: MAKE AMERICA
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
Artist’s Statement + TOC Previous View Next View
June 20, 2018
Is the Haight in some special know?
Or is it just Frisco’s tourist curio?
Is eccentric and strange the San Francisco flow?
Every way I turn, I get a special show.
Gods and Buddhas peer from shelf altars
Why? Why not? For Love of Ganesh.
A man chants Radhe Radheoverhead
A harmonium plays, like Allen once did.
Holy!
Deluxe trickster cynic outside Club Deluxe
sings tiptoe, through the bullshit–
Skinny old white guy, muse for our trip.
Holy!
Homeless man in blanket sits lotus-legged.
Head bent, heaven sent, Nataraj handed.
I guess he sits shiva, mourning, waiting for the dance.
Holy!
Gideon plays guitar –
Richard drums along –
I get urges to sing
and talk to pretty young things.
Holy!
There’s still a buzz in this town
even though stores close down.
There’s still a buzz about it
even through the evicts.
When the buzz ghosts us
or avocado toasts us
San Fran will be dead –
let’s go out with our cusses.
Holy fucked.
Wholly fucked.
There’s a Whole Fucks
in the Haight, too.
Just so you know
what’s really up.
Blog pairing:MEMOIRS OF A SUPERFAN VOL 12.6: PERSISTENCE OF VISION, VISION OF PERSISTENCE
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
]]>June 20, 2018
Shopping center under new management
rent doubled on the store next door.
I’m just a little piece of
nothing
in this hustling, two-timing town.
No one cares.
No one cares.
I’m on the cliff,
no escape.
Bulldozers and cranes,
developers with cash
want even this –
this last bit
of
unreal estate.
No escape.
No escape.
Blog pairing: MEMOIRS OF A SUPERFAN, VOLUME 13.6 – ASIAN AMERICAN HAN
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
]]>June 20, 2018
Are you a caring
specialist
or a care
generalist?
Do you care more and more
about less and less
til you care everything
about nothing?
or care less and less
about more and more
until you care nothing
about everything?
Most of us are in between.
We are distracted care-drivers.
We care mostly
about what’s in our lamps
and don’t give a damn
about what’s not on our road.
What would it be like
to care intensely
about the one thing that
drives us all mad?
That nav system nothing
with only one line –
You’ve heard it before:
“Me, myself, and mine.”
It keeps telling me to go
someplace that
doesn’t even exist.
When you get there you’ll weep.
You’ve been driving asleep.
Care enough to wake up, at least.
Care everything about nothing
Watch its every move.
Care everything about nothing
Until you become something new.
Blog pairing: MEMOIRS OF A SUPERFAN VOLUME 13.11: UMAMI, “JIMAMI TOFU” AND “AUNT LILY’S FLOWERBOOK”
© 2018, Ravi Chandra. All rights reserved.
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