Repining Polemics

NINE am
coffee +
wake up
call rushes
off to a 
gloom/grey
day of break
fast burrito
and picking
out new boots
and winter
coat before
a recording
session +
recovering 
still from snot
rocket city
being built
in sinuses-
I blow
more comes...
Free coffee
at the burrito
house not bad
good for
people watching
A day that's
not even lousy
with people.
My nails still
red a few chips
Blissed from
taking a quality
poo. Just laying
flat
the studio floor-
getting reacquainted
with my dirty t-shirt
and a nice long
day off.
"Should I be
her?" The
M. Monroe
question is asked
not of photographers
but of
self- out
of pose in the wet
wet city so
missing birdsong.
Drops of rain
song so many
grey excuses
crave a misty
morning summer
in a wooded glade
with lush forest
peep and call all
about
the air sweet
as unmelted
Sunday.
Instead- Ill. In
IL. Still. A few
false nights
of sleep is here
for those who 
can take the
current cold
and not pull down
sweats and chills.
I mail a postcard
and go to work.
It's probably what
got me sick OR
all this bike
riding no real
jacket I'm dull
under all the
music and writing
I need to make
For real big
epic too-
the kind I'm going
to get into
anthologies with
someday.
I've got
to pour a glass of
wine and cough
medicine-
evening shot
through with that
high.
Instead- here
among the
arch-o-texture
a black matrix
down out of the
sky up from
under cars- tiny
burnt broken
skeleton extractions
tangle
out from
hair.
Constructions
diminished
into the final
ash
aggregate.
So small.
The snowflakes
of hell.
Vampire
dandruff.
I fear this
minuscule
construction
as carcinogenic
agent
lodging in the
throat and nose
and soft parts
to recklessly
mangle my own
tender helix
deep within.
What of truth
has ever been
so visible?
Of these fragile
manacles
of discarded
dinosaur blood
I give too much
psychological
weight.
They are
matchless with
the magic babble
of birds- exotic
and not- exciting
the very green
in the branches
with thankful
balming call.
They are not
me- digging
out the gear
for basic warmth
cover-ups and 
slip sliding over
wet underfoot
leaf-smear.
Whisky as warm
wet as the
oftener-than-
sometimes
rain.
The gang of
nightime creatures
bubbling
awake, hedging
entrance.
Hard to sit
up straight and
get into
that eveningtime
waltz.
When you do
all go too the
dominoes what
ached to fall.
I don't think
I can take it much
longer. This
town tearing
a hole in my
heart.
I erase number
after number
from my phone
it feels so
good I don't know
why I'm not
throwing the
whole thing into
the lake. Could
be so close to
abandoning
identity.
Running renegade
back to anywhere.
A lump
in a throat
is a knot
in a stomach
and the hot tears
unjam only
if I admit he's not
there. What if he's
not there?
Not even yet born?
I could find him
then find myself
hating myself for
loving him all over
again.
Crazier
than you
like a fox
to try being alone.
It could take years.
But your time
and mine
wave differently.
You will remember
me mostly
because you will
get the notion
that I knew something
then
that you're not sure
you know now. You
only know that it's
now you need to
know it. You will
not go deeper to
the place where
you discover it
was only the basic
gratitude that
was required. Too
much will distracts
from a plain dumb
truth of the present.
I may
once have been
a her that
was more for
others taking. Once
I may have been
happy to be 
leaned or lead
on.
It is a fleeting
happy. I feel
the truth is
that I never really
have been. But
the risk is a 
faith-charge to
be again that
sweet post
for the right
person.
Where
are
they? Him.
With whom I 
eject myself
from the missing
out beyond not
enough cool
stuff happening
to beyond where
I boxed myself
in with work and
sighing upwardly
against the
darkness for more
energy. Made here
the same mistake
as all other friends-
fiends who aren't
punk anymore except
I didn't set out
deliberately to
do this. Aside
all else is this
beautiful
morning- frozen
and bright and
me- another USA-
born diver and
dodger. Fence-sitter
learning bitch tricks
and bad habits
from the who-cares-
less fit-giveaway
crowd.
Stand/sit and
wait in the sun. All
that's left to
do in the 
city is look around
at more city. To
be a flame burning up
barstools. Observe-
thee by thee- a
dance made on corners
way out of the
casket-
Still into the use
of your own
little world. The
best reality is inside.
Indulging all spasms
that do not soften
one so much
as enliven.
And it keeps coming
and coming
and it keeps coming
'til the day it stops.
Who's safe? For the
moment?
So what if I was
a lovely thing
and now I'm not?
That the city
turned me into a
reeking farting
funhouse of lies?
I've got bigger
bridges to burn. All
my chapter
thirteens huddle
into a pleasure forum
of airy dust on old
vinyl. A hopelessly
beautiful melody
seeps in on delayed
guitar. A record
to control time.
Leisure cast
forward or back
over closed tired
eyes imagined
memories. Sometimes.
Sometimes I shine.
I know there is a
light for the darkest
days. Sometimes.
Who?
Two-thousand-wha?
Why, which now?
This year's sloppy
slut update: the one-night
stands the
most satisfying sex
to beat
No expectations of
more, simply the
enjoyment of
another name added
to the list. 3 hot
pussy poundings
in one night- a 
blissful feeling
carried over into the
good sleep of the next,
and the enjoyable
notion that sex
is still sexy, and more
could be coming
my way and if
these dudes I keep
running into keep
having big dicks
then by all
means line them
up. There's only
been one not worth
mentioning and
he moved away,
so we won't
mention
him. I'm really
thrilled to have
ditched mr.
perpetual jealousy
for the duration
and he seems to 
have stayed away.
Life is a lot simpler
without him.

Fumer Peut Vous Tuer

People treat smoking like this cool-kids in-thing lie everyone knows and passes around- a rumor bathed in subterfuge. As a rule, I don't like things like that. I don't like lies or the perpetuation of them, however necessary they sometimes need be.

Addiction is really fucking boring in my opinion, but everyone struggles with it somehow or thru another, and I respect that… but it stinks. Literally. Smoking seems to be an act, as the masses treat it, only perpetuated for the sake of itself and with no higher aim in mind. As if even the possible 'higher aims'- increased concentration and low-level camaraderie with other smokers- could be worth it in the end.

By these standards of abuse, I do not consider myself to be a 'smoker'. I'm a 'chipper'. I chip away.

It will take me months to finish a pack, and I never abandoned that phase where Clove cigarettes stopped being the most satisfying thing I could be bothered with craving. It's even better that 'my brand' isn't available in the States any more. That keeps them foreign and indulgent and at (mostly) further than arms length.

The abuse of tobacco has lead to some heinous health issues we all are aware of and therefore I won't go into here. But only to note that even light use may lead to sickness. As I write this I'm working thru just a touch of malaise for reasons listed in the last paragraph.

I have a note on my wall which I reference from time to time, which doesn't make me feel better, so much as it reminds me of the standards to which I might hold myself inside the idea that:

"If We're Going To Do This Stupid Thing, There Had Best Be Some Fucking Rules"

- Only Outside

- Have some quiet time. Stop and think and observe.
- No bumming.
- Put off the initial desire.
- Only consume the nice stuff.

- Brush your teeth and drink water afterward.

- Never more than 2 a day.

(There's more to the list that I haven't thought of right now, and maybe more will be added.)

And it is this (hopefully) 'judicious use of tobacco that can provide a real punch', to butcher a phrase coined by writer Thom Jones. 

I know how insidious this habit can be, and not only at the start. My brother still struggles with it and used to smoke nearly a pack a day. My dad was told by his doctor "Some people can smoke. You. You can't smoke."

My mom started when she was 15 in the girls bathroom at private school, presumably because most or all of her friends were doing it. All of my grandparents smoked at one point. Two died from complications from lung cancer. An aunt passed away from leukemia that was no doubt exacerbated by her heavy habit.

Right now I'm having a tough time because 2 of my close friends are 'pouch' a day smokers. They roll their own and it is harsh tobacco that has left my throat sore and gives me a cough that leads to a gnarly chest cold. I start to feel a little claustrophobic and like I can't breathe after hanging with them awhile. I don't want to stop seeing them, even as they exchange cigarettes for breakfast.

I just wish they'd smoke a little less. For their health and mine.

But what do you do when you are your own problem? 

What do you tell someone, someone close, who thinks that consuming poison is "A very 'adult' thing to do."?

Nearly 3 minutes of your life...

                 SPRING = Keep reading. Keep writing. Keep what you need. Discard the rest.

B R A Z I L - 25.01.14. Saturday.

POPhissssss go the canisters and BOOOM goes other artillery. Tear gas is just that. Immediately you start weeping. The throat and lips burn like you swallowed hot cinnamon, but it's better than breathing thru your nose. I catch the first thick whiff at the park across from the burning VW bug.

The protest- a march of anarchists, the disenfranchised, the aware, the progressive, the hyper-left, and those who support them, on the 460th anniversary of the founding of the City of Sao Paulo, and in the name of better health care and education over funding for the impending FIFA World Cup tournament, have left strewn garbage fire roadblocks and siren induced mayhem all across the neighborhood of Consolaçao.

At one time 5 helicopters swung thru a patch of the sky like lazy menacing mosquitoes. The photojournalist I'm running around with, Gus, a while back hurt his heels somehow, and I can outrun him, but he knows where to go, respecting my instinct for pause.
Surreally, just as I get back to the hotel and the helicopter swings over with its cobalt spotlight, (as it will over and over before the night is over) a bike parade comes giggling and chiming and whooping thru. It is the perfect end to the dangerous part of the evening.
Around 21:30 the helicopter hangs over what looks to be Rua Consolaçao. I listen to its pulse reverberate off of buildings, and watch the hotel parking attendants watch it too.
Renauld, the assistant concierge, appears with his blue blue eyes and metal braced smile and observes with me. When a big blonde drag queen appears for drop off, he smiles while I take a snap and smirk a thumbs up. Later we also watch a drunk and angry looking kid amble past. Maybe on his way to getting his face punched in.


I keep writing, and the street lamp just opposite me pops off as if it has burnt out, then mysteriously comes back on. It does this a couple times. The lights in the windows of residences behind it gleam forward for a moment when it does, and I am looking in... Believing the expense of living here. Believing the beauty of the quiet, unsullied places inside. The domicile and the place within the within.

The Brazilian night is wild as an animal. Blinking like a flashbulb. Wooping with the force of a massive dance music party crowd. Wondrous and colorful and scintillating like a billion galaxies in a single deep space telescope image.

I know that Gus is down there somewhere while we are up here with the cops clogging up the shit out of Rua Augusta and causing detours in an attempt to pull arrests. As the night continues they direct traffic (2 lanes almost become 4) and ride bikes and cars both directions. I see some action down the way, but I've had plenty for one night. It's killing the buzz in the hood, even tho' well dressed kids keep moving in both directions.
I'm not doing much good out on the street now. Just thinking and making notes. My feet hurt, but if I take these shoes off, they're not going back on. Soon enough, the riot gear goes back in its camouflaged land boat and kids stare gloomily from the paddy wagon as it too rolls past. I want to free them all, especially any journalists.

Gus turns up at my room about 30 minutes later. He went to the cop shop to see who was in charge and didn't get any straight answers. We head back to his flat for pizza (out of a round box with kale and corn) and my first guarana soda (pretty good!) and I catch another glimpse from his 16th floor windows of the glittering carpet of high rises. It's 'wow' to the soft jagged horizon and back.
He calls his parents to let them know he's ok before grabbing a shower and editing photos. His work ethic is intense. But it always is with someone who really loves what they do.

Later...
Do you ever have a moment where you become so aware of yourself and the magnificence of life around you, that you believe for a second that really all of your life has been leading up to this? THIS second is what you've been doing all that other living for... And if you could relive that moment?
I would want to relive the moment where, cruising in Gustavo's car with a can of Brasilian micro-brew (Do Da Bier) in my lap after playing drums at his house, we go past the magnificent bridge and the certain high rises surrounding you always see in postcards, and zoom down over viaduct and neighborhood while we listen to a famous Brasilian songwriter, and we again compare the strategic corruptions of our respective countries. The heartache over materialism and greed. Feeling that the societies around us have been encouraged to compromise what would be their real pure instincts for improvement and positive progression.
It is only about 5 minutes of conversation, before he drops me and jumps on a bicycle. Off to his night-shift work.
It is the kind of 5 minutes that make every expense to get here worth it threefold.
I did not stay long enough.

Day Job- a blue book's worth of meandering

I swear, the full moon has lasted three nights in a row.

I ride past it on my bicycle toward all conceivable destinations while it calls its silent shriek into the black cool nights of late May.
Girls in skirts and boys in conveniently inconvenient footwear are agents of the summer to come. All of them altars upon which to hang good or bad fashion.
Me? I listen to records (Beethoven, Jazz, Punk compilations never to be released on CD) and clean my room and try to think where to go for breakfast that won't be closed on a holiday. (It's a holiday.)
I keep up with bike riding and try not to misplace my helmet and wheels after a night of drinking and wandering off.

Now morning skies are gray as the damp rains they portend. Threatening to extinguish barbecues and beach-bound afternoons. But so what? If your city never stops, then you do something else. Like maybe resist the urge to break into poetry...
To fall back toward the pits of lingual pleasure... until you are no longer able… Then- it's time for a fresh sheet of paper…
You may never read it again, you'll just get it scooped up right out of your system and into the wastebasket (off of the waist) and that's alright. If it was from around the middle then it probably wasn't worth listening to or re-reading anyway.

And you know, if someone said "Pack. We leave for Paris tonight." I know exactly what I'd take. I'd be ready in just about 30 minutes. "Give me a half-hour" I'd say and I'd shower and shave and toss my goodies in one bag (I could get another bag later.) And so much then for the perfection of departure- a really meticulous thing all laid out and premeditated with a few moments to consider every decision…
Which brings me to the point of hotel rooms. Hotel rooms are a nice place to be naked. I enjoy very much being naked in the privacy and warmth of my own hotel room that I have paid for, for more than one night in a row. There are places that if I ever go back, I know where I'd like to stay. I make lists, too. All the time. And each list insists a camera. Another always good-idea for a take-along include vitamins and a notebook. But perhaps I'm being too practical here. I don't believe, anyway, that the first trip anywhere should be the time to go husband shopping. Always fall in love with a place first. Or don't. Regardless, more full moons will manifest, and boy-oh-boy will some of them get you. Yow. You can't print out all your French poems and read them badly, haltingly, stumblingly into the winged statues in forgotten gardens and think that will be of any help. Nope. Sorry. Just vanity twinging in your asshole and psyching you up to believe you'll be OK. The poetry will be fine. YOU are going to have to take all the vagina you have and wring about 40 years of blood out of it first. You're going to have to twist it up like it's a mean rat tail your mother snapped on you with biology and get screwing. Screw your way out. It's kegle time. Which is another fancy way of saying "play the game, sweetie." Go on, throw a dart at that map and move it. Comic books and barrettes and monogrammed stationery are not travel. Cincinatti is not Tangiers. Too bad for all that, but it can't be helped.

There is good news, however, and that's breakfast. After you've struggled your lot under that electric-grass fed moonshine, tomorrow will arrive just the same and you will find yourself actually craving the standard culinary surprises of dawn, past pre-noon, past the hotel room windows, where you have not stood showing off your hot-crossed buns or other yum-yums down into the streets. Those mild corridors that sing with sweet scents or savory relished happiness- you go thru them.

So put the moon back in its can, and get back on your bike.

Cold Hands, Warm Heart: A Holiday Letter from J.J.

Hey,

   I liked your message about my life, and at the same time it has me experiencing a kind of rude awakening, similar to one I had twenty years ago.

The beginning of summer in 1990, I attended a friend's wedding in Iowa, and I was one of the few guests that wasn't married, and the only one who attended alone. Another married couple invited me to their room, but I declined.

Single people often say that all the good ones are taken, but I was forced to consider that maybe I was the problem. Since that event, my relationship goal shifted from "quantity" to "quality"; I wanted to be monogamous and in love with a woman who felt the same about me.

Jenna and I got together a year later, and I never thought about "diligence" again. After Jenna died, I know why I rushed into the relationship with the psycho I was dating last year.
I guess this raises the question of whether or not a faithful relationship with a woman that has multiple personalities is technically a monogamous one.

My point is that I wanted that special feeling of intimacy again, but now I know it will never feel the same.
I responded to your text about diligence with the reference to the Lucinda Williams song Essence, because it's one of the most sensuous and emotionally charged songs of romantic desire I've ever heard, though it also sounds a lot like textbook sexual addiction and obsessive relationship with strong analogies to heroin usage.
Whatever... it's hot.


Remember at the beach when we were talking about the emotional growth you achieve by listening to the lyrics of the song and make that connection between your own feelings and the feelings of the person who wrote the song?

For me, the first song where that happened was the Don Henley and Bruce Hornsby song Heart Of The Matter. It really hit home during a breakup, and I had a couple of bad ones around when the song came out.
Since then, the song Keep Me In Your Heart by Warren Zevon did a lot to help me deal with Jenna's death. The song We Belong written by Eric Lowen and Dan Navarro for Pat Benatar helped me deal with my pain during the weeks that Jenna was dying.
The Fire Inside by Bob Seger has lyrics that put life into perspective when you're alone, walking through every day as you suddenly find yourself older than you'd ever imagine you'd survive to be.

I just wanted to pass this along, I think I have a compulsion for making lists.


The combination of watching Persepolis on Saturday and talking with you about it on Sunday have just stirred up all kinds of feelings that I want to share.
I am not bashing Islam, or intending to cause any offense, but hearing the speech in Persepolis questioning why women must appear to take all responsibility for the feelings of men made me think.

So here it is: I think Mohammed was the Oprah Winfrey of his day, depending on how radical any given branch of Islam may be.

I know I am making an over-simplification of something that I know very little about, but that never stopped Sarah Palin.

From what I've been told, Mohammed preached that the greatest suffering anyone can endure is the rejection that a man can receive from a woman, and one of the reasons that Muslim women wear the veil is so that no man will be tempted to fall for her and be so vulnerable as to experience the unbearable torture of heartbreak.

Compare this to Oprah, who has on occasion put men in the metaphorical television version of the stocks in the town square for being unfaithful to their wives. Held up for public ridicule and punishment.

It seems to me to be a grand display, for both Oprah and Mohammed, of "he said, she said." Each trying to put the feelings and natural behaviors of men and women in a position of dominance over the other.

I'll admit, the last time I saw an episode of Oprah was when I had no choice in a hospital waiting room in September 2003, so maybe I'm not being fair to Oprah.
Whatever, I remember what I saw very vividly.

So here's where I'm going with this:
I wonder if recent regimes have banned rock music because there are two songs that really need to be heard: The Rolling Stones' You Can't Always Get What You Want, and Elvis Costello's Peace Love And Understanding.

Of course I'm biased because I've lived in this world and not that one, and maybe being prisoner of the veil is no worse than being a slave to fashion and public images of ideal beauty. But isn't it better to have the freedom of expression and choice?


Last Sunday you asked if I was looking for a new girlfriend, and I remember almost chuckling.
Yes, there's everything I said about completing the grieving process, which I know is still ongoing, but after the psycho I don't know if I can ever trust again.

I feel like a trust you. I'm grateful our artistic collaboration is evolving into a friendship, and I hope we stay close through the ebbs and tides of our individual futures. I am so amazed at how there's rarely a lull in the conversation between us, and when there is, it's OK, and your tolerance for my non-sequiturs, and the history of bizarre cinema that we share.
Now I feel that I am definitely at a turning point, living a new life of diligence, in both latex and emotions.

If you don't mind, I want to ask you about something personal and share something personal of my own, more personal than body hair grooming, more personal than going to the queer-positive sex shop, and more personal than setting ground rules, limits, and expectations for group activities...

What do you do for the holidays?

What are your fond holiday memories, your preferences or traditions, and what do you most look forward to?

I ask because you and I seem to connect in so many ways, and that time of year will be here soon, and for another reason that I'll get to after some specific questions.
Do you go back to Indiana, PA on Thanksgiving and Christmas?
If so, do you make an exception to the vegetarian thing for turkey?
Are you with divorced mom and dad separately, or together?
You and I have already discussed religion (Oprah), but is your family religious and do they get together for church things?
I've told you so much about my nutty brother that I don't remember if you have siblings, and how close you are...

OK, here is why I am asking.
As I am sure you're aware, the time between Thanksgiving through the Superbowl is the time of year when suicides spike. When people have the highest expectations and the greatest disappointments, usually because they are depressed or alone.

Holiday depression is intense for me because Jenna was really into Christmas. She was diagnosed just before Christmas 2006, and died on Thanksgiving 2008. I lost Jenna and her family, which meant I lost half the holiday events that I was used to for nearly twenty years, and on top of that all the loss was during the holidays.

Last Thanksgiving and Christmas I was so preoccupied with being unemployed and breaking up with psycho-ex, it just blew past and I didn't think about it much. I made dinner both holidays for my mother and brother, and just immersed myself in job interviews.
This coming Christmas, assuming something else devastating doesn't happen, I am going to be alone and vulnerable to dwelling on all that I had, all that I've lost, and all that will never be for me.
I want to try and channel all my feelings into art of some sort; writing, drawing, photos, etc.

I know I'm not alone in this sense of loss and isolation, so I'd like to try to create something to help others like me deal with it all in some way that isn't destructive. Whatever medium that I choose for my artistic expression, I have a feeling that the best start would be with poetry, and I suck at poetry.
You're a better and more experienced writer than I am, and I've got all the angst and issues of loss and madness, so I am hoping that we can collaborate.

That being said, I don’t want my gloom and ambitions to ruin the holiday for you and your family; these times are too precious.
In a way, I guess I am setting ground rules, limits, and expectations for a different type of group activity; a creative and artistic one. If this is going to be too much, and you’d rather not, I understand.  If you’re interested, then let’s start with my questions, do some brainstorming, and maybe get the ball rolling by going to a poetry slam...

What do you think?

Nowherevember

I.
In the night of my own city, where the lights and the trees curve their curls into vision wide and, to me, flawless- I aim a cosmopolitan gaze thru my high window and the thinning leaves, toward downtown.
At the highest point of the tallest tower- beacon blinks a bright lonely blue.
A searchlight, a warning.
A companionless, tireless signal. The single letter it speaks it never stutters.
It is the jewel in the top of the crown and its job is to rotate a glisten. To remind living things to try and wager the realities of themselves as best they are able.
So, light, man-made- you are never unseen once you have moved your lamp to address a human being.


II.
Or,
what about the paradise of nothing to do?
Moving amongst the grey masses all on their caged tracks and you with nothing only with time to pass in a new circle. Friends to make beyond range of the usual activities. Fresh excitements are a matter of one deep breath after the next.
Unscheduled. Free. Shaken loose from your penciled-in bonds for a short while. Long enough to feel ready for the pull of it again. When it gets close. But that's a while from now.
Now. The beginning of gone. And not where you thought you were going. Not sorry, or disappointed, really. You work thru feelings like that pretty fast. Faster, you think, than others you know. You think.
Here you are with time and money.
All the things you could wish for graspable.
All possibilities where they could possibly find you. Found.

BLAST(FOUR)TUNE - 4 YEARS, A SINGLE CONFESSION

College. Third year. Winter.

After homework around 9pm, I decided to go catch the end of free swim at the pool.

Opting for a straight shot I rode my trick bike too fast off the sidewalk onto the wide lawn. Hi-siding right onto my back.

I lay there- relieved and aching but unhurt really, and exhausted and exhaling frozen air, motionless except for deep breaths.

For the next 40 minutes instead, I watched the stars.

The Irreducible is the fastest walk on the finest line of your netted awareness to beauty.

No Such Fiction - Reading Practice

Eavesdropping The Fall

"Please, would you please tell me what this says?"

-Ah, hello reader. Voracious student of literature.

Woman sending photographs of the future of words to herself across past minds.

Underliner. A turner of pages, pausing, laughing, pointing then laughing again.

A reflector, introspeculator, internalizer. Child of learned expressions. Observer, going on to penetrate the subservient image.

Sly dancer attracted, welcomed by the sexuale optique. Opiated oracles maneuvered to channel dead poets alive. Suffering again to remember. A re-collector- sporadic as space as hungry for the exotic.

A revelle. Cautioned and encouraged by words. Titillated by the unfamiliar and the occult.

--

"Daddy, how hot is the sun?"

-Son, you are a daughter and mothers count you lucky. Wishes on you go up and down. Rings of smoke, rays of light. You are.
Imagine yourself bigger than me. Imagine yourself completely gone. Both of you are. But you never ask if the moon is cold and how cold. You never ask if you will have another father, or how much father you have in you.
The sun is not hot. It is not a pebble in space or crust on the dust shed by the pebble you are. You are right to ask the wrong question. I am the son, now you are the sun, now you are. As hot as you want to be is how hot you are is how hot the sun is.

--

"Hey, Hey! That pawn shop open?"

-For what reason does your heart demand it? You do not know that he who stands stillest goes furthest. Your stainless modern figurines. Your small and ever smaller machines and all that soft dry gold. They are not introductions to a philosophy beyond a viseral and disgusting now. A mismanaged today and the giant and intricate rubble of time... Not instructions for a future bondage-free.
The answer is yes. The pawn shop is always open- like a pit. Like the gates to hell. But you are across the street, not yet looking in.

H O M E F O N E.

b r e a k f a s t.

m o d e l.

s o n g s p o t.

a n t i q u e s.

g l a s s e s  w i g  b r a c e l e t  g u i t a r.

k e e p s e e i n g t h i s.

g r a f  i n  c o n t e x t.

n a m e  a s  e y e.

g r a f  o u t  o f  c o n t e x t.

b i k e r a c k.

l o v e r s.

o l d  l i f e.

s t r i p e s.

d i v e r s e y   a v e n u e.

Little Red Writing Nerd - A Short Notebook

- It's so simple: the world gets easier to live in in proportion to how effectively you wash your hands.


- I give up on the notion that I will ever find a book that will lead me to the conclusion I must write a novel. Things, pieces, become novels, I think.


-You wouldn't think it, but you can meet some real people when you go running in the rain.


- When we talk about politics now, we are talking about our corporate masters, plain and simple...
I have every intention to decriminalize my life.


- Recently I found some hi-tops in decent condition. When I wear them, they make me want to go skateboarding.



These Shoes Have to Last One Summer-

These shoes have
to last me one summer.
Every warm hours walk
until they grey and wear.

These shoes must endure the sweet
stunt of August. July, June.
The wet of the pool,
The fireworks flame.

They must slip on quick
when my friends arrive
and slip off quick
when the beach calls my skin

Practical certainly,
Durable, maybe
At least not for long
but please into September.

These shoes shall endure
a marked season
melted and crisped
to cicada sounds.

Not chosen for mileage,
but miles come anyhow.
Miles and miles on
city and trail.

All I need from these shoes-
a single summer.
When school starts
Ill permit them a tear.

Another pair
in another summer.
I cannot demand more
than what's only fair.

Dj DMJ

Started using SoundCloud under DjDMJ. A few of my tunes and samples are up there. More to come!

Happy June, ya'll!

Nik'd

To the song a grey cat makes

I reopen a memory

I have a long edge that cannot be spread further

I make it go

we make it do

your push is not love

Please-to shrink me with hot kiss

is to make me on backwards

maybe you are being pusillanimous

about this maybe you are looking for colorless music

too bad your island has a boundary

which cannot help but live with mine

I try staring

standing

back

from staring back

into your ice blue eyes

unforgiving waves

will I give up saying

I love you

Will I stay away

Out of the place

turn the chair to the wall

for privacy with my gaze

too bad

for our islands could be

balanced close enough

too bad

you crave too close

what kind of punishment

is this love I seem to have asked

for myself for you too?

Too bad this

island of love

requires a new boundary.

Truce, Boston (Long Weekend)--

Oct. 2011

Friday night-

If it starts with a plane it's usually at the airport.

No.

Today we're on the jet as we begin another city misadventure.

Complete with dry contact lens, crying baby up front. Snoring and coughing to my immediate left, and somehow thru a nervous post-smoke stomachache i find it a good idea to order a vodka and coke. My first ever drink on a plane!

And this too after at least 15 minutes on the ground taxiing about as if on a joyride tour of the runway system.

The funk on the walkman kicks in. My shoes are off. It's that time... whatever time I feel like.

The tele glitches before I get in the bird. Reading just after one am tomorrow. Not quite there just yet.

Ketel One is some strong stuff. It mellows out, but not at first like Skyy, which is a favorite.

I talked about it tonight with the boy as we stood by terminal 2 so he could smoke and I could stretch, and we could joke in the indian summer air one last time before I disappear into O'Hare for some recycled air and he back into the CTA for home. His blue eyes and smile flash in the pink sunset post 5pm.

On the way to the bird depot he lets me play with his electronic device. I try the games and make a hilarious to-do list for him to view after i kiss him again near the sidewalk and make tracks.

I'll miss him, but three days away will be perfect.

Immediate right is reading total celebrity trash as I pour in the second vodka over the remaining ice and start my contributions to the burpy gaseous emissions party this airship cabin has so far become to the rock soundtrack out of a music player chalked up with tunes I hope to share with miss Steph, in hopes also of loading on in exchange some of her fave tracks.

Spirit Air does not have an airline magazine or any complementary drinks. The seats and interior furnishings appear torn and old. Repurposed 737? Shit. I've got to get another vodka on the trip home.

I remember again visualising the Dalai Lama's face on take off. It always inspires a pleasantly duped smile.

Sip. Sip. Think... you only brought one pen lady. Maybe they have pens in Boston if you're lucky.

Here are other things you'll do in the hours:

Stretch and get all yogic.

Finish writing in this book. Yeah, easy.

Be lavish with lotion.

Take shots on your new digital (polaroid) camera.

Note: turbulence in 16E. The fashion seatbelt sign is not on.

Saturday Night-

Freshly showered... I clean up real nice.

A gorgeous day has unfolded. And as I write this- hair wrapped in a towel, my "metal heads have more fun" bedtime shirt sported post local watering hole browndog ale to Stephanie's vodka cranberry, I dim the living room lights and sit up on the 2nd futon.

Grab a pen from Alex's (Steph's BF) desk and listen to a siren spin a loud loop somewhere up Cambridge street toward Harvard University.

Yes. I am not in Boston proper, or even Sommerville, where the Stephanoid has dwelled before.

But Cambridge. Near the train trax on Max ave where the #69 branch of the "1369" Coffee shops held me for long enough to drink water and take in more of my book before S got out of her tutoring session and back into the 86 degree day.

The neighborhood reminding me, oddly, of San Francisco in its general building structure. Only a slight slope to the land noted here, however.

Around 4pm after some comedic TV vegetation, we head around the block to a Broadway and a plaza with a hospital and a Marriott featuring a rooftop garden attached to a parking garage. Very plush. We talk as a bride and her maids get photos taken and a grey jay surveys the areas- spinning in the air and ducking with his friends into the bushes, chuckling.

We agree it's time to make the apple pie after this. It is done with pears included.

This and a veggie calzone have been the main staples of the day.

Fortunately, there always seems to be delicious food in Boston.

Sunday Night-

Quarter to nine and we are brains scorched by another day of 86 degrees and sunny and a perverse amount of exposure to the idiot box.

Over the last of the apple pie we made, we watch cooking shows and stretch like cats on the futons.

I poke the internet enabled electronic device for awhile as this goes on. Thinking I should try and listen to some music.

This morning was CBS Sunday programming over "indian toast"- the savory answer to french toast, and then another trip out the door, before noon thankfully, with no destination in particular, but did result in a fantastic visit thru Sommerville, past Steph's old place, to Fresh Pond- the public watershed. A gleaming lake with a ring of bike paths all around used avidly by pet enthusiasts.

One short red line ride from Alewife to Davis Square puts us near Tufts Univ campus and a fantastic Irish pub called the Burren.

Live music just appeared at 3pm- 2 fiddles and a piccolo and accordion, for practice.

Also materialized Steph's pals Gabe and Patrick- Pat being one I hadn't met yet, Gabe's latest beau of a little over a year.

Finally kicked a headache I'd been having on and off for a couple days with 3 aspirin.

Overall I feel good and rested. One more full lovely day in greater Bostonia ought to mellow me out but good.

Another trip to the rooftop garden perhaps- or another comparable park-like green space?

Now that I've taken a bunch of pictures and have a pretty good handle on the camera and its commands and prompts, it occurs to me to grab it up and out of my pocket and take the shot. Great zoom. Got some portraits with the timer and am still investigating the flash and lighting settings.

Monday-

A holiday (Columbus). Gorgeous and clear and begun at 9am. The day blinks away as I decide to forgo a tattoo for now. and focus on spending time with miss Stephanie in the form of walking along the river and talking and watching more of "the f word" (cooking show) as well as darning my socks, updating my blog, taking a call from my beau and my bro, and briefly again visiting the rooftop deck.

The carillon next door sounds again odd#s of chimes at the hours. And a passenger train as well as freight liners come by, surprising Stephi.

She is yawning by 630 and so I get her to take me for walkies to the grocery plaza.

Chicken, cheese, soda.

A short, shameless (hers) list.

Here's hoping that tomorrow bodes an easy trip to the airport- warm, unhurried, inexpensive.

My charlie card is good until the 14th after all.

Tuesday morning-

The first cloudy one. The sun still shimmies brightly thru skylights and window cracks.

Stephanie leaves as it is still dark- 6am.

Now, after 8, Alex is gone and soon I'll down some instant oatmeal and make myself scarce too.

A long walk and one last train ride and its back to Chi where home is.

Where I know my way around and where my love is.

A clean-up and 3 pieces of cinnamon raisin toast later, I've left a note and am out the door, walking thru and taking a final glimpse at the neighborhood before arriving at North Center and doing the orange-to-blue line jog out to Terminal B.

If I remember correctly, the T used to be a bit grittier, louder, dirtier. More like a trolley than a subway. But maybe that's just the green line.

Last stop on the blue: Wonderland.

Sounds almost fantastical. I'll be left to wonder what's there.

Ive noticed here too, more than ever, and even in Steph's apartment, discarded lotto scratch cards like cookie wrappers or crack baggies, Just everywhere! Makes me think pieces of them might do a decent collage.

Now,

I lick prompts off of my hand and listen to a kid scream his head off near my gate. One more ride and I'll try to reconcile an overpriced drink from the last one. The lo-mein at the Chinese food court bucket is actually OK. I put mustard and duck sauce on it for the first time like I know it'll be a tasty blasphemy.

Wisps of clouds curve gentle dimensions into the periwinkle of the sky over Logan International.

A good, relaxed visit in a walking city. Happy and dirty enough to be almost anywhere in America.

A good truce.

90% Of Art Is A Prank - Portfolio and Notes

Dreams are a plague...

If they lie to you, it's because it's still none of your business...

 An equation: Art < Beauty >Truth

sparkled/glow/stand/hungry/aloud/wordless/partner/gliding/helping/electric/floating/how/street/outside/mirror/rang/ready/slicked/awaited/spirits/close/auspicious/hips/fingertips/music/lights/arrive/vivid/festival/decided/good/joy/weekend...

No War No TV No Taxes No Banks...

Never fake a seizure just because you want a kiss...

This is the end of the book.

The last chapter.

The last page.

The final word...

Blanks off into two extra pages of nothingness bound together.

xxo.

J A M A I C A

For a week at the beginning of November of 2012, I paid a visit to Montego Bay and Negril...

+

+

Last night I stood outside and listened to music with the local boys while they drank a little rum and danced and talked. It made me smile to watch them.

Locals pack the hostel court at night along with the strut of black marbled pigeons.

Grooves can be heard from local parties going on well into the night. I didn't go to Pier One, where the big friday bash is in Mo'Bay, instead I rode around with Carlos (a driver with a sound system who loves anything with a beat) up into his neighborhood called Melbourne. Quiet and dark except for pockets of local parties and people dancing. We laughed about how they thought I was a boy (my head recently shaved) at the local shop while getting "Wissla" (long rolling papers for smoking with the name "king weedie" on the side) and Red Stripe (never a hangover) and some drink that comes in a tiny bottle and tastes super sweet like cough syrup.

Old school. The way people do things is the way they do, until something comes along that makes them want to do it differently. Jamaicans understand this.

The whole place scares the hell out of me, but I'm getting used to it. Maybe even liking it a little bit: that terror that means you're beyond your comfort zone for the moment.

Thinking about where to go and how to get there and how much cash to bring along sometimes tires me out. Or I just wish my hostel had more couches...

It was explained to me by a high-all-the-time professional JUTA bus driver that "there are 3 classes of citizens in JA. Rich (who keep getting richer), Middle (majority taxi drivers and other service workers), and Ghetto- poor-as-dirt, "Real Rasta" slum-dwellers.

He talks further about clocking a drive to Kingston in 1 hour and 45 minutes. Unbelievable. It should take 3. 2 hours is how he usually does it, he says. One time it was dark and a bicyclist came out of nowhere. He hit him. Heard him hollar, but he didn't stop... and that's the protocol.

"You don't stop. If you hit someone and stop, they'll kill you or fuck up your car. You just continue on and go to the police station."

That night, he went home and went to bed.

They have a phrase: "Left is right. Right is suicide!"

Somehow, as absolutely nutty as drivers and driving is here, it is comforting to be in a car.

Taking lots of pictures here has been a goal.

Behind the little enclosed neighbor dome of the Mt. Salem housing project is a ghetto hill country with unfinished houses, beautifully shaped nonetheless. Most of my photography constitutes architecture, since I don't want to impose my giant lens on local folk.

I hang with some people from my hostel: a sky-diving German who talks it up about being a greaser in Hamberg, and a Czech accountant with a Cuban girlfriend younger than his youngest son. Both of them smoke like it's going out of style, and are drunk by sunset.

Learn my lesson with that one. We are white people. Therefore we are always about 5 seconds away from a jam when we go out and about here.

I practice never abandoning my drink.

Clothes lines flutter everywhere. A teeming slum, writhing and colorful and filthy. Potholes so big they put Chicago to shame. Jah mon.

Mighty fruits hang like ballsacks from the tree above the long picnic table where I work and spy my first Jamaican skink skurry up to a shady ledge where he can lounge out. Draping his legs over the cool painted concrete and keeping out of the purrview of cats.

The sand is very coarse and the stormclouds are fickle as the afternoons approach. All was well, very relaxed and quiet at Doctor's Cave Beach yesterday.

Boring, yes, but so worth it for the relaxation of a bouyant float and a canopy by which to stay out of the sun.

I never want to get out of the water for how much it feels like a bath.

 

50 years independent this year. The breezy day in the Caribbean glimmers with light... Irie, Irie.

Milk, Milk, Lemonade - 3 Poems

True Story-

We sit in powdered down furniture

to keep the bugs away.

The candles were lit from stolen lighters.

Dishes are clean, and away,

but the peanut butter is out.

All days

become

Saturdays.

+

Self Portrait, Evening-

One light.

Paint from earlier

dried on my arms.

Some white wine

on the night table

and a kind of

holding pattern.

Book unfinished.

Shower untaken.

This movie has great music

and

River Phoenix.

+

Eleven and Seven-

Your heartbeat is shaking the bed.

Sniff, shift,

Sleep.

Your heartbeat is shaking the bed.

I suppose you think

it's going to cry

for you.