Bombogenesis Blog

Encouragement: Musings and a Poem: Learning to Swim Upstream

2011-03-20T18:18:00.000-07:00

It's early Spring, and that's a good time for me.

This is a Facebook post, also a blog post, and a message to the leadership of Genesis Community Church.

Tonight's message from Craig Tackett was one of encouragement . . . involving a challenge to the church body as a whole to make encouraging people a priority, to see if we could actually change the emotional state of the Valley as a whole. Now, this may sound like high hopes, but i think Craig believes it's possible . . . and, because i respect him, i share his belief. It may be a seasonal thing with me . . . Spring always feels like being reborn. I've been very busy lately, seasonal work (also another reason why Spring has been particularly good for me this year), and my poetry postings have gotten pretty sparse. This isn't to say i haven't been writing . . . but i seem to have come to a "cycle change" where more of my hopeful poetry begins. Tonight, after church, i was given a poem . . . that's what it feels like, anyway. It is a message of hope, of encouragement. I want to share it with everyone, and hope that you'll receive it as a "gift."

Learning to Swim Upstream

***

and to you who might sell God short,

let me deliver this report

from the front lines

of a conflict that's gone on longer

than any fight, battle, or war

fought for oppression, for gold, or oil.

now, times are lean,

and those most desperate

are in need of aid,

and less are inclined to give, but

let me tell you this:

God is teaching

His people to swim upstream.

you were born for this,

to return to the Source

of your Creation!

every force, every obstacle,

every impediment

should only encourage you

to greater efforts, to inspire you

to creative survival.

think of the strength you'll gain!

if you bear up

during the hard times,

you'll truly appreciate the good.

this planet

is your neighborhood,

only a temporary residence

before you go home,

but quite a bit wider,

and wilder, than expected.

it's okay, God gets that,

He said it's best to start out small.

you know, in your

corner of the whole.

you'll learn to appreciate

the unobtrusive miracles

unfolding in obscurity,

the blossoming that only

the fewest have

the pleasure or the opportunity

to view. you will be shown where--and how--

to tear back the wreckage

and expose the Truth--and

because of that, the Beauty--

inherent in every

disastrous situation.

know your weakness, understand your flaws;

mark them with signposts

as rugged terrain

where you'll need all His strength

to lean on.

learn to swim

upstream, stroke by stroke.

be expectant

of the strength you need,

the courage for the deed;

they're guaranteed.

i've survived some pretty intense

battles; taking

the higher ground is tough.

but i gotta tell you,

the view from up here

ain't always pretty, but

you can see your target

very clear.

Supernatural Solution

2010-09-08T20:44:00.000-07:00

Supernatural Solution

"But I tell you, : Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be the
sons of your Father in heaven. He causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain
on the righteous and the unrighteous." -- Matthew 5:44-45 (NIV)

Christ's command, spoken to His disciples, was intended for all of us as well. It is difficult enough
for us to love--the word used in the above passage is from the Greek "agape," which indicates an
unconditional love--even those who are our neighbors . . . how much more so our enemies! It is
unnatural for us to love our enemies; it is, in fact, supernatural. Only God can provide the
strength necessary for us to accomplish this.

In the world's current state of affairs, this necessary love seems absent, even in those of us who
call Christ our Lord. It would appear, in fact, that certain types of hatred--and the hateful acts
that stem from this--are tolerated, or even actively condoned. When I read of or hear about people who profess to love Jesus who are directing hatred against political rivals or individuals who follow a different faith, I have to wonder exactly how we are expressing Christ's love (the immense love that led Him to die on the cross for ALL people, no matter how sinful). Rather than rely on the power of the Holy Spirit to allow us to love even those who persecute us, who oppose us (in theory or in reality), or even those we disagree with, it would seem that we rely instead on political practices, grandstanding, or complicated "excuses" for our hatred. In short, we are being more of the world than we are of God's Kingdom. The kind of "extreme love" that Christ taught and demonstrated confronts us with our hypocrisy. And, I say "we" and "ours," because I'm just as likely to fall into those traps as anyone. No, it isn't rational or logical to "love your enemies." It flies in the face of conventional wisdom. But there is no way to "spin" Christ's command to fit into our political, racial, economic, or national "agendas;" IF WE ARE TO FOLLOW JESUS, WE MUST LOVE OUR ENEMIES. Period. And that love must be visible, demonstrative, and unconditional.

Loving your enemies isn't easy. JESUS isn't easy. But if you make up your mind now to follow Him, and constantly pray for Him to love THROUGH you, it can be done. A lot of the mud being slung at various groups of "THEM" could just as easily be flung at us. The first understanding a person has to have in coming to Jesus is that we are broken, and only by accepting Him--and this means following His commandments--can we ever achieve wholeness. Are you really that taken with the big-shots and the talking heads, the "experts" of this world? How does their integrity stand up compared to the Word, made flesh for our sake in Christ? I truly believe that if more people followed Christ's lead, and truly made that effort to let His love overflow from their lives on everyone--neighbors and enemies--that the world would change for the better. It's easy for our enemies to hate us as long as we continue to direct hatred at them; imagine how difficult it would be, though, if their "enemies" started showing them LOVE? It would stand their philosophies on their heads! If you're a Christian, a follower of Jesus, then take this time, NOW, to pray for the strength to love your enemies--personal, political, or national--the way Christ loved us. If this is too hard for you to swallow, though, perhaps it's time to take a personal inventory and decide what's more important to you: your personal, political, or national welfare, or the self-sacrificial servant life that Jesus taught AND walked out, even to the worst imaginable death of His time. The only solution to the hatred that permeates our world like a cancer is the supernatural one. Angels and demons wait with bated breath to see what choice we will make.

"Those Really Bad Sins," or "The Sin Rating Game."

2010-04-07T11:43:00.000-07:00

In the popular arena, some sins are raised to a "higher status" than others. When it comes to branding somebody a "sinner," there's usually one or two favorites that are considered "really bad sins" (as opposed to . . . what? sins that aren't that bad, even though they're still wrong?) Usually, the sin or wrong being focused on is one that's either a political hot-button, or one that's out in the open and easily accessible to public knowledge.

How would any of us handle scrutiny of our lives, our thoughts, and how we behave when nobody is looking? The Bible makes it clear that if we violate ANY of God's commandments, we're guilty of violating the whole law. There's not a truly righteous person on the face of the Earth . . . it was because of this that Christ took the burden of the law on Himself, being truly righteous, as a sacrifice for all of us, putting us all on equal standing before God. Everything now comes down to a personal choice: to either accept the gift that Christ gave us, and to live according to the guidelines He laid down in His own life and words, or to reject it.

We all stand under the scrutiny of God, and there's nothing that escapes His attention. It sounds callous and unfeeling to equate something like murder with, say, being envious of your neighbor's new Lexus, but from God's standpoint, they're all violations of His law. It's easy to pinpoint a murderer, a rapist, a homosexual, a member of a hate-group or a cult . . . but less easy to scrutinize on a level that would reveal envy, greed, usury (that's charging ANY interest, not merely charging undue interest--and our entire economy is based on something that the Bible calls sin), or other sins deemed "less evil." Sorry, you don't get a pass on those, either. Just because you haven't murdered somebody, but have spent your whole life coming up with ways to profit on other people's misery, doesn't mean you can strut around as a "righteous" man.

The Bible also makes it clear how we are to deal with sin when we discover it within the body of Christ--the church--and how we are to counter it. Christ made it clear, telling us that we're to go to the person, one-on-one, in an attitude of loving reproof. If that doesn't suffice, take a couple of witnesses (by this, He meant not two of your cronies, but two impartial witnesses), and if THAT still doesn't suffice, bring it before the body of Christ as a whole . . . and if the individual's sin continues, and he refuses to accept the determination of the church--of which he is a part--then "let him be to you as a heathen or a tax collector," basically treating the person as an "outsider." Still, even in that extreme case, there's Christ's command that you are to forgive someone who commits a sin "seventy times seven" if they come to you and repent. That means that the Church must also stand ready to receive back an individual who repents of their sin. Paul continues to expound upon this doctrine of "loving reproof," an attitude that is sorely lacking in today's Church. Just because person X is a Baptist and person Y is a Methodist, you're still part of the conceptual whole of the body of Christ. Here's another: just because one member of your church is a Democrat and another is a Republican, they must put aside political differences when coming together as part of the body. But this kind of infighting between denominations or factions has become so commonplace that it's tolerated! "Loving reproof" just went out the window!

Scandal after scandal, within and without, daunts us all as Christians. The empty-headed masses are greedy for scandal, maybe because when it attaches to a person of "status," it pulls them down to the same level as the rest of us (nevermind the stupidity of elevating a person to a higher status just because they're actors or have a lot of money to throw around or have some standing in the political arena). Guess what? They're human, and the fact that they're in the public eye more often doesn't make their scandals any more sinful than those of anybody else. I'm not saying just to give them a free pass; when it comes to leaders, Paul makes it quite clear that those who lead are, in accepting leadership, putting on themselves a heavier burden, and are in effect setting a higher standard for their own behavior. What we need to do is quit keeping track of other people's "sin scorecards" and start focusing on our own! It's really easy to throw your weight around when you're a member of the body of Christ and the people you're dealing with are not . . . but that's an abuse of the name of Christ, in effect "taking the name of the Lord in vain." Do you expect the World to accept your pronouncements simply because you're of the body of Christ? Why would you? The world is set against us. We have to be in the world, but not of it . . . we have to live with these limitations, but not give up. There were a lot of people i hung out with in Union Square Park who did things that i wouldn't do, but they knew what i believed and what i represented, and i never felt like an "outcast" because of it (maybe because the world as a whole has also rejected so many of them . . . which is one reason why many of them are closer to Christ than the ones who look down on them; all it would take, in some cases, is a little nudge for those "park rats" to embrace Christ).

We live in a culture--a world--that makes having "things" something to aspire to. Making more money, having more possessions, being able to "consume" more; these are the values that the economy, politics, and wordly power make pre-eminent. There is public outcry against kids who engage in immoral sex, but the culture as a whole glorifies it, practically screams sexually charged messages from every billboard, mall, newspaper, and television show. Marijuana, of which there has never been a single recorded overdose or fatality attributed to, is still rated a Schedule 1 Drug, right up there with heroin; yet drugs with life-damaging and potentially lethal side-effects are freely marketed by pharmaceutical companies whose "cost-benefits analyses" make a few deaths acceptable losses when stacked up against making a profit. Homosexuals are subjected to hate, vilification, and rejection; yet bankers whose crimes often escape scrutiny cause more harm and misery with the stroke of a pen. Those of you who look to politics and political leaders to "make things better" are just whistling in the dark. When Christ was tempted by Satan, He was led to a high mountaintop, and shown all the nations of the world, their riches, and their glory. Satan said, in Luke 4:5-7, "I will give you their authority and splendor, for it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. So if you worship me, it will all be yours." Now, you know if Satan had been saying something that was untrue, Christ would have called him out on it. But He didn't. Instead, He refused to worship Satan, to give glory and worship to anyone but God. Kind of makes you think, doesn't it? No, i don't think all world leaders are worshipping the Devil, but they are making some pretty shady deals with Mammon, and Christ said, "You can't serve God and Mammon." Mammon is an idiom representing material wealth and its attendant power. So one has to wonder, really, what our culture is coming from, what it's teaching, and who it most stands to benefit.

Sin is sin. There's no getting around it, and all of us are apt to stumble. If you're looking for a religion that allows you to put yourself on a high-horse and throw a parade for yourself while flinging mud at people who practice your personal hit-list of sins, then Christ isn't for you. We all have need of loving reproof. We all have need of a fellowship of believers who can understand our failings and build us up when we're fallen. And, most of all, we have the need of Christ's representation in Heaven, His salvation and perfect love, that are the only things that can stand us on our feet and make us ready to resist the temptations that the World constantly flings at us. You've got your own bed to make, your own house to clean. Until they're spotless--and they never will be on this side of Paradise--you can't go around grumbling about how bad other people's houses look.

Re-Creating the Language: A Poet's Responsibility

2010-04-06T21:09:00.000-07:00

I have maintained, for some time now, that it is the responsibility of poets in particular to re-invent, re-invigorate, and re-charge language. Over the years, we watch television and "news" where not only the language, but the information in dumbed-down; reporting the news has become rife with suppression by news corporations whose CEO's don't want to criticize the government that they've bought and paid for, so instead we're offered trendy stories of whatever movie star or sports figure has screwed up--along with an endless string of talking heads and media whores babbling about it--mixed lightly with news of the world presented with the proper "spin." Information about corporate, police, military, or government blunders (or out-right crimes) is culled relentlessly. One might argue that this is not necessarily affecting language as a whole, but i beg to differ. Language is, first and foremost, a way of communicating. It's a way of presenting information, a way of speaking a message, a way of sharing concerns and showing love and concern. When language is relentlessly "spun" by various political factions to support their viewpoint, or agencies within the government who don't want the masses to have TOO MUCH information, you have a gradual dumbing-down process that eventually affects everyone. This is one of the "trickle-down" theories that actually works in practice . . . Orwell would have called it "doublespeak," and decried it as a death-knell of liberty. Often, when we think, we "hear" ourselves thinking in language . . . Orwell's view was that the "doublespeak" would eventually result in people incapable of thinking anything that was out of synch with the official, established norm. In America, in particular, we assume that we have Freedom of Speech. After all, it is written in the law of the land, and it means that people whose viewpoints may not be popular can say, and print, what they want to. There are reasonable limits to this . . . language that commands or urges violent and destructive actions can (and does) fall under legal scrutiny. However, i'd like to go back to that word "assume." Rights and liberties, like muscles, are only strong when regularly exercised. Without that regular exercise, that vigorous stimulation, they become weak and atrophied, and will (like muscles) fail when they are depended on.

This is where poets come in. Recently, on formspring.com, i was derided for my use of the word "proclivity." My insistence that i was simply availing myself of a wider vocabulary in order to communicate more clearly provoked verbal retaliation, the responder apparently feeling that i was being arrogant, or trying to "prove something" by using that word. Realizing that my responses were the equivalent of beating my head against a brick wall, i stopped trying to defend myself and simply ignored any further communication on the subject. As a poet, i realize that i have to embrace the vernacular--that is, communicate in the common language, the "language of the streets,"--i also realize my responsibility not to have an incestuous relationship with it! I use both street-language and (for lack of a better word) intellectualized-language in my poetry. I've never heard anyone complain about my use of the latter, although i have received some complaints about my use of the former . . . my response in those cases was that people are more apt to understand and respond to something that speaks in a way they are familiar with. When i use the larger or more complex words, or using the language of the streets, in my poetry, i'm not consciously aware of one or the other so much as i am the context of the poem as a whole. I occasionally drop "invented" words like "enphoenixed" (my own) and "frankenpoem" (coined by Ian Cohen), which are generally understandable in the context of the poem in which they're presented. I don't assume that my listeners or readers are English majors pursuing their Masters or Doctorate; by the same token, i don't assume that my listeners or readers are stupid (the way television does). I frequently use odd juxtapositions, either for metaphorical purposes, or to get people's minds in the mode of non-linear thinking. I want to surprise them, or shock them, a little . . . but i don't shock simply for it's own sake; i use it to call attention to something.

All of these things are tactics that i've seen other poets, and better poets than i am or will ever be, use. It makes me feel good when i see other poets challenging themselves or their readers/auditors with interesting metaphors, complex language, street-talk, witty turns of phrase, or shocking juxtapositions . . . all combined with the poet's eye to impart a message. Poets, i think, above all, desire desperately to communicate, to expose themselves and the culture around them to a critical and, sometimes, uncomfortable examination. The fact that some people regard poetry as "uncomfortable" is proof that it's working. In the Old Testament, the prophets often spoke their messages in a poetic form . . . that much hasn't changed. There are warnings implicit in many poets' work, as well as an unflappable determination to improve things.

Don't ask me to dumb down my language. Don't ask me not to discuss things that make you uncomfortable. Don't come to me expecting a poem that completely and neatly falls into your preconcieved notions of what poetry, literature, or language should be. I write, ultimately, because i don't know any other way of dealing with both my own emotions and the complexities of the Universe. I'm not asking for you not to critique me . . . i'll always listen to constructive criticism, even if i don't necessarily immediately agree with it. I'm asking you to understand how important it is to me that i keep working with the language, keep it moving forward, and keep breaking it up and reassembling it in order to prevent the arid locks of "doublespeak" and political or social norms from killing it. There's not much left of me but poetry, and for some reason, God's made it such a part of my life that it seems inextricable from breathing itself, and from whatever it is i'm supposed to be doing on this planet. I don't have it all figured out yet. I'm not a know-it-all, and if you perceive me as "arrogant," that may be as much your own fault as it is mine. Don't insult my intelligence by insisting that i need to "dumb it down," and i won't insult yours by assuming that you're already dumb.

The Upcoming Genesis Covenant:: Core Beliefs & Personal Convictions

2010-04-01T21:43:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since i've done any serious entries in my blog. A number of my poems i've posted directly to Facebook (most of them already having been copyrighted via PostPoems).

In order to clarify a few things, i've decided to express a number of personal beliefs and opinions in this entry. First and foremost, i'm a Christian. This means that i am a follower of Christ. I do not conform to any particular "denomination," even though i was raised in a Southern Baptist church. I think a lot of denominations are divisions over points of dogma, sometimes insignificant. Jesus said of the Pharisees, "You strain at a gnat and swallow a camel!" I suppose a more familiar metaphor would be "You can't see the forest for the trees." What does being a follower of Christ entail? This was outlined in the Covenant that i have signed to join Genesis Community Church. Christ is the Son of God, who died for our sins, and rose from the dead, ascended to Heaven, and sits at the right hand of God. I belive that the Bible is a necessary and sufficient guide to the Christian life . . . all the Scriptures we've been given as Christians have value that can be applied to daily living. I also believe that the Holy Spirit, which is likewise God, walks with us and guides us, and gives us insight into the Scriptures, and in effect provides a "direct hotline" to God through prayer. Of course, God doesn't always answer prayers in the way we expect, and certainly not on our schedule . . . which is why a lot of people seem to dismiss prayer. Prayer isn't handing God a wish-list; it's communication with God, actually CONVERSING with the Creator--that's pretty phenomenal in and of itself! As far as attempting to defend my Faith, i am not versed in apologetics, and not of a rational bent . . . i can only offer my own experiences, subjective though they might be, as personal testimony to my belief. I don't "beat people over the head" with the Bible, don't try to force God down people's throats, because--quite honestly--that's not how Jesus did it.

This is not to say i don't struggle with issues. Many of my close friends know the nature of my struggles, and i don't feel it necessary to detail that here--i've been warned before about "casting pearls before swine," and have learned that lesson the hard way--but suffice it to say that i understand that only God's grace and mercy could save me from disaster and, ultimately, doom. Part of the Convenant for Genesis involves, to quote from it, "righteous and loving discipline." This is both in giving and receiving. The Bible urges us to "lovingly correct" a fellow believer when they're out of line, and to accept such correction when it is given. This makes us interdependent, functioning as the body of Christ, much as a human body functions . . . if one part of the body hurts, the rest of the body is hurt by it. I certainly don't want any of my personal beliefs to become a stumbling block to fellow believers. There may be things that we do not agree on . . . but as a Christian i have to be willing to avoid becoming a hindrance to those who might be new in the Faith. I need to be held accountable, and to hold my fellow believers accountable. This is the only way a community can function effectively or healthily, Christian or otherwise.

My beliefs about poetry, spoken word, and such, are probably as self-evident as my Faith. They are deeply connected, because i feel that poetry is somehow my gift AND my calling. It is, along with the arts in general, one of the ways in which i feel the phrase "made in God's image" becomes evident. We have, within us, the desire and capability to create. When we do this to God's glory, God affirms our creations, and honors our using of the gifts He gave us. In addition, i feel that poetry and spoken word are particularly necessary, both as coping mechanisms and as communication. Paul told us to be "good citizens." In America, that's a particularly troublesome task, because if we hold to "the law of the land," those laws are represented in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. This means that, in effect, we ARE the government, we ARE supposed to "watch the watchmen," and if we don't, we're falling down on the job. Freedom of Speech entails within it the possibility that some people might not like what's being said . . . but, we all need to remember that linked with that freedom is the Freedom of Religion, which as Christians we enjoy here in America to the extent that we often forget other nations or other times where this was not a guaranteed freedom. It is often through the spoken word, through poetry, that the alarm is sounded. I have a number of Christian performance poet comrades in New Jersey and NYC, and they are as adamant about this as i am, if not more so. The ability to work with words, to craft poetry, is also a heavy responsibility. When we are careless with our words, we can cause harm or confusion (not to mention looking pretty slipshod in the process). The status quo disregards poetry as a whole, dismisses it or downplays its significance, forgetting--perhaps--that when the Old Testament prophets spoke, they often phrased their prophecies in poetic form. (From what Pastor John Ault has told me, it's more evident--and more beautiful--if read in Hebrew). Psalms and Song of Solomon are, in addition to Scripture, timeless poetic works that have influenced hundreds of generations, religious and secular alike. The oldest evidence of written work we have is a Babylonian epic called Gilgamesh; there are examples throughout history of the impact of poetry on society, and this isn't even taking into account the fact that song lyrics are poetry, as well. It is important that we be aware of the erosion of the rights and liberties we enjoy, and decry the injustices in this country and abroad that are often falsely perpetuated "in God's name." Oppression, regardless of the target, benefits no-one. Racism, though not the only modality of oppression, is surely one of the most egregious and historically prominent examples. I'm going to take a flying leap here: Christianity and racism are mutually exclusive. Period. There's no way you can use the word of God to justify hatred and oppression. That is, in fact, taking the Lord's name in vain (i'll refrain from going into a rant about the fact that the words "In God We Trust" printed on our money is almost blasphemous, considering Christ's warning that "you cannot serve God and Mammon"). The spoken word, and the arts at large, are a powerful way of expressing these things, of airing grievances, of proclaiming truth, of openly communicating . . . and also of expressing joy, comraderie, love, and the whole span of emotions.

In my relationship with Genesis and this group of believers, i desire to be a useful and active part of the body of Christ. This means taking the talent i've been given and bearing fruit, of investing it wisely and to the glory of God. I realize that there will be those who will "politicize" some of my statements . . . i am willing to listen to them, and to explain my statements and the convictions that gave birth to them. Becoming a fucntioning and beneficial part of Genesis is something i have longed for ever since i split away from Grace Covenant before i moved to New Jersey; it was something i looked for in NJ and NYC, but never truly found. The sense of "coming home" to Genesis is powerful, and i sense the affirmation of the Holy Spirit that, yes, this is where i'm supposed to be now.

I've talked quite a bit about my feelings and beliefs about the Christian life, my thoughts about my part in Genesis, and about poetry and the spoken word as something that was God-given, and about the responsibilities all these entail. There are quite a few other things that i believe in or feel strongly about, but the ones i've discussed are in the forefront of my mind. It is Christ and the Cross that form the central point of everything; everything gets its meaning and is put in its proper perspective by focusing on Christ. I expect quite a few blog posts in the upcoming weeks to deal with some of my other tenets, and how they relate to the central point. I am fully aware of my limitations--my "thorn in the flesh," which may simply be a confluence of out-of-balance brain chemistry, keeps me intimately aware of them--and the periodic rages, depressions, flights of fancy, or racing thoughts, are things that i'm going to have to wade through and pray through, and having the support of a strong body of fellow believers as i do this will be a major blessing.

Grendel's Glossary Phase 1: A random groupings of words that will crop up in my poetry.

2010-03-26T14:30:00.000-07:00

HARANO: “Something like a shadow has fallen between present and past, an abyss wide as war that cannot be bridged by any tangible connection, so that memory is undermined and the image of our beginnings is betrayed, dissolved, rendered not mythical but illusory. We have connived in the murder of our own origins.” - Edward Abbey

The Pain of Loss

In the quote above, Edward Abbey, famed wilderness advocate, curmudgeon and spiritual father of direct-action ecological protest, complains of the loss of primal beginnings: his childhood, when he roamed backwoods and fields, carefree and intensely in love with the landscape around him. Beyond being a cry against the loss of wilderness itself, it seems a cry against adulthood and the discerning mind that accompanies it - the mature mind, somehow separate and discreet from its upbringing in Eden. It is a cry of anger and of the loss of something that can never be regained.

ULLAGONE: An ullagone is a funeral lament or a cry of lamentation.

POLITICHRISTIAN: A catch-all word for individuals who profess to be Christians in order to further a political agenda, or people who automatically associate a political agenda or party with Christianity. The former rely on the gullibility of the latter to secure their positions of power, at which point the guise of Christianity is maintained while they further their worship of Mammon . . . at the taxpayer's expense, of course.

F'WAH: Fwah, also spelled "F'wah," is a cosmic sound made by the Universe. Sort of like, "Om," but less dignified. It can also be used as a sort of enthusiastic greeting, usually immediately following the person's name. Also known as an emotion of impending disaster.

"Galactus! F'wah!"
"This cosmic notion fills me with a great sense of fwah."
"F'wah! I just dropped a live grenade into a bathtub full of scorpions!"

MUH: Similar in ways to F'wah (q.v.), but more versatile. Originally, "muh" was a contraction of "muwahahaha," a sort of quick way of adding diabolical laughter to a phrase. It now has a number of meanings, and is often used as a random interjection, or just dispersed throughout a sentence. At the end of a sentence, it adds an emphatic note to the whole. Standing alone as an adjective, it means something so bizarre or intrisically unique that it can't be described any other way. In front of an adjective or adverb, it acts as an intensifier. Muh is also associated with a pink paranoid chihuahua, although experts haven't yet determined just how this applies. Muh can also be used as a greeting, a challenge, a threat, or just something fun to scream at the top of your lungs (an act referred to as a "screamuh").

"Now, I will destroy the space station with my positronic ray! MUH!"
"That woman has muh hair."
"This was the most muh delicious dessert I've ever eaten."
"MUH!"

ENPHOENIXED: A metaphorical rebirth, rekindling of passions and emotions that were thought to be lost. A counterpoint to Harano (q.v.)

WARRIOR MOMENT: Similar in many ways to an epiphany, or an incident of satori. These moments are difficult to describe, and in many ways can only be alluded to through metaphor. Instances occur, but are not limited to, incidents of artistic or creative breakthrough, and may be parallel to "Eureka!" as often expressed in the sciences. It is an event wherein the person suddenly realizes that he or she sees, or understands, things on a much higher level than before, almost a mental/emotional orgasm without the sexual component. (See my earlier blog entry on my first "Warrior Moment.")

This is part 1 of a series. I'll add more entries as necessary.

After the Waterfall--The First "Warrior Moment."

2010-02-27T20:08:00.000-08:00

Okay, here goes.

Over the years since this event, i've tried in numerous ways to explain it, quantify it, somehow interpret it in a way that people who WEREN'T there would be able to at least gain some understanding of how important it was, of its significance. Most of these attempts were poetic in nature, because it seems that metaphor is the only tool that comes close.

In April, of my 14th year . . . shortly before i would turn 15, in fact . . . i had an experience at a waterfall that defies any normal description. It was misty, foggy, but not-quite-raining, and the hills and trees were clad in that almost spiritual light green. It had rained for several days, quite hard, and i was taking advantage of the break in the rain to walk to a spot i had been before, once when i was 13 with my father, and in the previous summer (after a long walk that took me to it in a roundabout way). The waterfall is hidden in a cleft of the mountains along the Blue Ridge Parkway, on a piece of land owned by a friend of my father's . . . it was known that i wandered all around that property (in later years), but since i was not hunting and not intending any harm to the property, i was allowed to come and go pretty much at will.

The waterfall often dries up during hot, dry weather, but the recent rains had given it a considerable flow. I walked until i stood at the base of the fall, near the small pool formed there. On the walk up, i passed numerous bloodroots, whose delicate white blossoms would wilt shortly after being picked, and whose nacarat hue stained the hand that plucked them. Responding to some impulse, i stripped my shirt off and leaned into the fall to drink. The water is very clean and cold. As i did this, my heart-rate seemed to triple, and the only other way i can describe the "event horizon" is that all my senses seemed to suddenly "jack up," and i even got the impression that i was using senses that had laid dormant; i was PERCEIVING something that was, by any of the usual parameters i'd used to measure such things, beyond my power to describe. I stood up, looked around, my heart beating a savage tempo in my chest; nothing had changed . . . but EVERYTHING had changed! Half-formed dreams and images seemed to suddenly demand my attention. I walked away from the waterfall that day in a daze, seeing the woods and trees and blossoms in a completely different way, as if there were something BEHIND them . . . the concept of a "veil" was doubly appropriate, given the misty and foggy conditions along the Parkway.

I was never considered "normal" by any of my peers, but this marked the beginning of a time during which i no longer CARED. "Fitting in" was impossible to me now. I had experienced something that catapulted me into a state that might have been called "satori," or "epiphany," or--as a poet friend of mine, Marty Evans, called them--a "warrior moment." (Marty was with me years later, in Georgia, when i experienced a similar moment, and though i didn't know how to describe it, he seemed to understand, and that was the first time i'd heard the term "warrior moment" described to me). I felt as if i'd been yanked halfway in to another world, a dream-world, a parallel dimension, or what-have-you. THE NEXT FEW YEARS OF MY LIFE, I WAS IN THAT STATE. My dreams became more vivid, my fantasies more intricate, and my beliefs marked with something that some people called "mysticism" (and my mother, God bless her, used the term "unrealistic," but in all fairness, it did seem kind of "unreal"). I could lay down, close my eyes, and see clear images of places i'd never been, and wrote many of them down in my notebooks of the time . . . over several years, i'd described worlds and places and creatures, drawing partly on my knowledge of mythology, that to me seemed all-too-likely.

I once discussed my mother's resistance to these things to our youth counsellor at the church, who told me that my mother might be afraid FOR me, because i believed these things. Years later, Pastor John Ault, a mentor and good friend, told me that--because i was an artist--i had the ability to experience on a creative level what Paul experienced in 2 Corinthians 12: Paul describes being "hijacked into paradise . . . whether in or out of the body, I don't know, God knows." He said there he heard "the unspeakable spoken, but was forbidden to tell what he heard." It's no coincidence that immediately thereafter, Paul describes his "thorn in the flesh," "a gift of a handicap, to keep me in constant touch with my limitations." He says it was BECAUSE of the "extravagance of these revelations" that he was limited by this (and he does not describe it specifically). I began to understand a lot about the creative gift i was given, and that the very extremes that i experienced through it were the "flip side" of the limitations i experienced. In latter years, it would be described (or, rather, categorized) as "anxiety-depressive disorder," "bipolar disorder," and so forth. I think those are just words that people use so they can gain some kind of "handle" on it. I don't really pay that much attention to the terms or diagnoses anymore. That moment . . . and some of the other moments that have come, rare but undeniable, almost frightening in intensity . . . were worth anything i suffered because of my inordinate imagination and fucked-up brain chemistry.

When people who are rigid or narrowminded in their outlook encounter things like these, their minds reject them. They run to a psychiatrist who prescribes some chemical concotion that allows them to "numb" the feelings. They focus on their jobs, on TV, on mundane things, and try to deny that they've been afforded a glimpse of wonder. It is what Michael Yaconelli would describe as "dangerous wonder." Wonder, and awe, are often uncomfortable feelings, partially because modern society lacks these qualities. They, along with imagination, are generally neglected by people whose focus on "rationalism" and "practicality" have actually stunted their growth. Sadly, too many of these people are Christians. I consider myself blessed, extravagantly blessed, by these few glimpses of an almost terrifying wonder, an eclipsing awe, that--despite my inability to fully describe them--have remained fixed in my head, indelibly written on my soul. My vain efforts through poetry to communicate the experience at the waterfall . . . or any of the other "warrior moments" in my life . . . are, at least in my mind, only reaffirmation of what happened. I was "let in" on a secret, was temporarily caught up in the Mystery that i pursued for so long, without knowing that perhaps that Mystery was pursuing me as well. I think Heaven will be much like those experiences, only heightened and endless . . . to live such a way, in the presence of the Almighty Creator who allowed such a flawed and fragile creature to glimpse them, is--in a way--almost terrifying. If it were not for God's love and mercy, the things i experienced would have undoubtedly broken my mind. Perhaps they have. I would consider nothing more honorable than to be broken for God. It may be that that first "warrior moment" was NOT the most powerful i will experience, though none that have happened since have neared that supernal level. I can only thank God that, somehow, those very things that limit me, cause me grief, and trouble my sleep, are also the essential flaw that He works through, His strength coming into its own through my weakness, and--in an outpouring of undeserved grace--allows me to experience moments like these.

New Poem: What if They Created an Economy, and Nobody Showed Up?

2010-02-27T19:45:00.000-08:00

What if They Created an Economy, and Nobody Showed Up?
***
do you dream in chocolate
while your Toyota's gas pedal
gets stuck to the floor
while you're talking on your cellphone
discussing last night's American Idol?
or,
is your American Idol
already entered into evidence?
what if they created an economy,
and nobody showed up?
does your economy
lose its flavor
on the bedpost overnight?
all your experts have been
bought and paid for
by whatever political party is in favor--
the flavor of the week, one might say--
and you have to take advantage
of the opportunity, especially
if what all the Mayan Calender theories say
are true (what? haven't you seen
the movie
paid for by corporate sponsors
and endorsed by all the appropriate
Scientologists?)
everbody's saying the same thing,
which sounds like
NOTHING
played at a very high volume
turning CNN up loud
so it drowns out doubts and conscious thoughts
alike, and the commercials have that sense of
URGENCY,
because you have less than 2 years
to repair the economy,
and if you're not responding to this emergency
by dreaming in chocolate (which is mostly artificially-flavored CRAP)
driving in your Toyota (or other overpriced death machine)
and talking on cellphones (which are monitored by
elected officials, telemarketers, and the DoD)
about reality shows
(that don't give a damn about anything REAL
that doesn't drive up ratings
by dumbing down the content) . . .
if you're not
choosing Pepsi or Coke
if you're not
believing the political lies
that compel us to vote
if you're not
spending, pretending
that we're not already broke . . .
well,
you're not supporting the Economy,
the Almighty Mammon whose
floppy teats supply
the rancid milk of overindulgence
that, like heroin,
ultimately consumes the consumers.
And,
if that's not already a crime,
they'll make sure that it is
before the 2012 election
(participation in which will be mandatory
and saying the whole game is rigged
will be considered treason,
the only non-violent crime
which is punishable by death) . . .
but, if you're shot, at least
you won't have to live through
the disaster
that will be brought to you
by EconomyUberAlles.com.

New Poem: The Wrong Side of the Rainbow

2010-02-21T20:49:00.000-08:00

The Wrong Side of the Rainbow
***
crash landed, stranded, here on
the wrong side of the rainbow
where i live,
and this twister
ain't your magic bus
to the Emerald City
wallpapered in your favorite shade of green;
those greenbacks you're backing
have backed you against the wall,
and won't even stand you the price of a ticket,
so keep punching that clock
and i'll punch your ticket
and kick you around the block.
you don't want to go
over any rainbow
where you can't buy indigo
and put a down payment on purple;
this one'll sure pull you down
to the underground, the wrong side of town,
show you around the Slum of Oz
where the munchkins have fangs
of chromium steel, and still
look more human than you do;
they'll punch a hole in your soul
and see if you can bleed for real
when you've bartered your last swindle
for a half-decent meal
and there's nothing left for you to steel
because everyone's a broke as you . . .
you know, everyone goes through hell,
some people just have to stay,
and that ticket you bought is just one-way,
and you'll punch a clock THERE too, sucker,
but don't hold your breath for a payday,
because everything adds up to paybacks,
and you know what THEY are.
that tribe that lived on the backside of your rainbow--
the ones you refused to lend, give, or rent to--
won't be building tracks
for your runaway train now more.
hock your ruby slippers and blue suede shoes,
no matter who wins at the game you played, you lose.
they'll fold the monopoly board up around you;
no Emerald City, here . . . maybe,
if you're lucky,
they'll leave a tenement on Baltic for you . . .
all the graffiti artists who bombed and tagged
back on the block
have gone away, and
there won't be anyone to paint a rainbow
on your walls of leaden gray.

New Poem: Mystery Reporter

2010-02-21T20:36:00.000-08:00

Mystery Reporter
***
here's a news-flash for you:
either nothing is amazing, or everything is.
either the unbelievable never happens, or it's going on all the time.

poets, you see, don't quit being poets, alive or dead.
prophets don't get to retire.
troubadours aren't ever gone when their verses are still being read.
coals and ashes, when stirred, remember the fire.

one crocus doesn't make it spring, but it's one thing spring
won't get started without,
and for want of one snowflake, and avalanche would never slide.
an interstate will go from point A to point B, missing everything
on the old country route,
and a chrysalis whispers no secrets of the butterfly burgeoning inside.

thngs you can see in daylight change their forms and natures
in the dark,
and shadows only grow when light from some source flows.
the most brilliant flowers are never seen, and pass away
without a mark,
and birds flock as one, but how they choreograph their wingdance,
nobody knows.

the sun burns across rippling waters,
heliographing hieroglyphics that can't be translated,
only red in the moment before they change,
explaining things that in language can't be communicated.

every leaf on every tree is a verse in an unending song;
even in their falling, they sing; and, on the ground,
still they sigh, brittle papyri, underneath your feet.

in a universe that rings like a bell,
what further evidence of a Divine Hand
would you demand
when you can't even understand
the wonders that cascade around you--
a world at your fingertips, and
yet so much slips
through your mind like water
sluicing through a sieve,
because it takes an uncomfortable risk
to believe . . . .

don't wish for myths or miracles,
your brains are too tight to contain them
because every bit of knowledge you gain
gets rejected if you can't explain them
or turn a profit on them.

either nothing is amazing, and the unbelievable never occurs . . . .
oh, but it IS--it's going on all the time.
i'm just a reporter, i didn't make the news,
i'm just rying
in feeble meter and fumbling rhyme
to focus your attention
on what you're missing
all the time.

GENESIS!!!!

2010-02-21T20:05:00.000-08:00

Before i post a couple of poems (1 that i was able to finish after Genesis and a second one i wrote on the heels of that one), i need to say a couple of words about Genesis.

What is Genesis? It's a church plant here in the Roanoke Valley. If you want to find out some of the basics, check out their link: http://genesisroanoke.com. Their core beliefs, information, and staff are posted there. My friend and comrade from the old Slam days, Lewis Kleiner, is a staff member, and was instrumental in getting me to Genesis.

I've only been to 2 services, which have been held every 2 weeks, in the evening. At both of those services, i was struck by several things almost immediately:

I did not feel like an Outsider. This is an unusual experience for me, because as a person who--in the words of Pastor John Ault--"walks the edge," i usually find myself on the periphery of any group i come into contact with. To walk into a church where this was NOT the case was a powerful draw. The dynamic is utterly different from so many churches i've been privileged to attend. Even the word "attend" doesn't fit . . . any more than you would "attend" your home. Even more strongly tonight i was struck by the feeling of COMING HOME.

The Spirit was at work at Genesis . . . in a strong, powerful, forward-moving way. I've attended several churches who had the Spirit at work, in a powerful, convincing, CONVICTING way, but this is by far the strongest i've felt this. I can only report on my own reactions to this "phenomenon," but as someone who is aware of the Holy Spirit, i assure you, this is no fluke. There was a palpable sense--in the people, the music, the pastor (more about him in a moment)--that God was right there in the trenches with us. (WITH US! I actually said "US!" I'm used to talking in terms of "them," but man, i was a PART of this!)

There was no judgementalism here. This goes back to the first thing i mentioned . . . i could feel people looking at me, but it wasn't a cold or suspicious "looking-at" that i sometimes get. It was more of a "Hey, he's new here." Instead, i felt almost immediately embraced. I "clicked." And, brother, when somebody like me is able to sense that "click," it's an experience. I know i'm a bit of a freak (yes, i'll say it, and i'm not ashamed of it), and can be somewhat intimidating on short notice (i am Grendel, after all) . . . so imagine how powerful that felt. How simultaneously welcoming and, in a way, almost scary . . . when you know you're in a place or among a group of people who've cast their whole lot on Christ, and are willing to go the distance for Him REGARDLESS OF THE COST, it can be a very awe-inspiring experience.

The pastor--Craig Tackett--is HANDS DOWN one of the most powerful, energetic, and gifted speakers i've heard. I DO NOT EXAGGERATE. It's amazing to watch him take a single, simple, and maybe even oft-repeated passage of Scripture, and drive it home with what is undoubtedly the sheer force of the Holy Spirit working through him. He means what he says, too . . . there's no pretense, no "better-than-thou" attitude, none of the "party line" rhetoric. God has obviously called this man to do exactly what he's doing, and when he spoke, i could hear something inside me practically screaming "YES! YES! YES!" It was all i could do to restrain myself from doing just that . . . jumping up and screaming "YEAH, MAN, YOU TELL IT LIKE IT IS!" And, as intimidating as something like that can be, he's approachable, and that sense of welcoming, that he's really glad to see you there, flows as much from him as from the congregation as a whole.

I could sit here and rhapsodize about the experience for pages, but in all honesty, i couldn't do it justice. I've been talking and wishing and all-around WHINING about wanting to go back to NYC or NJ, and a part of me really wants that, but now i'm not so sure that God wants that . . . or if He intends for it to happen as quickly as i want it to happen. THIS CHURCH FEELS LIKE HOME. If God wants me here, to hang my wanderer's hat here and become a part of what Genesis is doing here in Roanoke, then i'll do it. I'll throw everything i've hoped and planned and dreamed on the altar for God, even if it's in Roanoke. God is everywhere, and He's everything good in my life, and if He wants me here, then "here am i, send me." This powerful conviction isn't something i take lightly . . . it's something i've felt in the past when i came to a place i was supposed to be. I felt it at the Poetry Slam. I felt it at Grace Covenant. I felt it in NYC. And i feel it now. This "waiting stage" of my life might have been nothing more than God preparing me for something else . . . something i couldn't have imagined. And, when you're talking about an imagination like the one that ravages me every day of my life, that's saying something.

I could think of nothing better than getting down here in the trenches with this group of committed people, LOVING people, and putting what shoulder i have to the wheel.

New Poem: You Are Not Here

2010-02-14T12:42:00.000-08:00

You Are Not Here
***
town dump gulls, foraging
like Rio kids in a mound of garbage
looking for edible discards, and
"everybody's lookin' for a
free ride," shallow mockery cries
echo "get a job" = "work for free"
echo "protect & serve" = "neglect & sever,"
and even the gulls are crying,
dying for a seashore
without a high-rise.
still, hear
"quit givin' people handouts, and those
______s will have to
W.O.R.K." = Worry Overpay Rich Killers,
but
would you pay your tithes
if they weren't tax write-offs, or
would you crawl on the floor,
squall, bawl, and bemoan
that lousy 10%
that you didn't get to spend
on Lotto & Beer?
chickadee, chickadee in the trees,
backhoe-fart, no more trees,
so no more chickadees,
no more cock-a-doodle-doo
until the backhoe man goes home,
jacks off over internet porn
until his cock crows,
silently disdainful of the dreadlocks
and cornrows
of kids busted for spray-painting
a new Picasso
on a gray underpass, "Hi,
i'm a cop, and
i can kick your ass and
get a free pass
when i flash my badge."
and it's no need explainin'
that the ones who get paid for complainin'
on talk radio or teevee
look like the fattest gulls in the dump,
knee-jerk reflex action-figures
that aim kicks at anybody
bent over to scrounge nickels from the gutters
or half a sandwich from a garbage can
in the park
where "rummaging through rubbage"
is punishable by law,
you may have to pay a FINE, tee-hee,
from nonexistent funds
stolen from your wallet
by tax-cuts for the rich,
the wealthy Bible-thumpers
who've forgotten how to read
about the widow's great gift of 2 pennies
or the warning about serving Mammon.
for every white suburbian girl
who gets into a stranger's pick-up truck,
a thousand non-white non-suburbian kids
get written off as acceptable losses
in wars that are more about profit-margins
than about the boys * girls who die on foreign soil
to pave the way for those
to arrogant to fight & too rich to care . . .
and you are not here
and you are not seeing this
and you aren't to blame
and you aren't doing anything wrong,
and you aren't doing ANYTHING
and you are WRONG
and you ARE to blame
and you ARE seeing this
and you are HERE
right where the arrow points down
and nails your insignificant mortal speck
to the spot.

Love Hurts, Especially When it's Your Family

2010-02-12T09:40:00.000-08:00

Okay.

Let me state first and foremost, for the record, that i am extremely grateful to my parents for providing for me after the "economic downturn" (which the economists refuse to call a Depression despite the fact that it is), and for everything they've done since then.

NONETHELESS . . . .

I am repeatedly chided by my Mom . . . to wit, i'm "too extreme," i'm "paranoid," i don't take enough initiative (which is her excuse to nag me about anything that springs to mind), and various other comments in reference to my clothes, my attitude (she often says i get a "tone in my voice," and when i FINALLY responded the other day that she gets a tone in HER voice, her response was "maybe you should think about WHY i get a tone in my voice), and anything else that springs to mind. She doesn't start the day off with "good morning . . . ." Instead, 4 out of 5 mornings, she begins with a complaint. Something i did, something i didn't do, something i did wrong (and, believe me, she can always find something WRONG about what i did, no matter how much initiative i took or whether or not it was done well). Just now, i received information from the Labor Department in NYC. It's just the same information i get every week . . . this propelled her into a mini lecture about how i should be calling every third day (regardless of what the instructions say), to go over the internet to find out if i'm "approved" rather than use the phone (she never uses the internet for anything that she can get Dad, me, or Jordan to do for her), and on and on and on and . . . .

Basically, i'm almost to the point of chucking it all, shoving a few belongings in a backpack, and living on the road. I'd probably starve to death or die from exposure, but at least i'd die in relative peace. I think the basic problem is, while i was away in NJ and NYC, i GREW UP. A LOT. I managed to survive on less than anyone in my family does (with the possible exception of Mom before she was married), and had my own mind about things, and was a LOT closer to God during those hard times than i am here . . . how strange it is to think that, while anyone else would have thought that i was in dire straits, my relationship with Christ was much stronger, and i spent a lot more time in prayer. And perhaps, to anyone who's firmly entrenched in the status quo (and, God help her, Mom is), a lot of what i perceive and believe is "extreme," although i have a hard time believing that it's "paranoid," because a paranoid person believes that __________ is out to get HIM, because he's somehow special . . . i know better. I'm only a threat to the status quo in my poetry and Life-Path, and as long as that's generally ignored (and it is), no "great conspiracy" or whatever is going to regard me as a threat!) It's been on the tip of my tongue to tell Mom that all the Prophets, and Christ Himself, were regarded as "too extreme" by the status quo of their times. And a lot of modern figures who were regarded as revolutionary, even pacifists like Gandhi and MLK, were also considered extreme (extreme enough for someone or a group of someones to kill them). This, however, would just ignite a veritable powderkeg. My mother is, after all, getting on in years, and she's entitled to her beliefs and feelings, and she's probably too old to change. But by the same token, i should be entitled to my beliefs and feelings, and not immediately "given in" to her way of thinking just because i'm living here. I don't want to start a fight . . . but i can't speak about Faith, religion, politics, philosphy, or most of the stuff i write poetry about, around her, because that simply turns into another thing on the "List," which is apparently a page in my Mom's mind she turns to for her nagging. I'm sure that in some regards, she's right . . . i've not been the most exemplary human being, and i've fallen short of my own goals (let alone hers, which are apparently on a completely different track than mine), and as long as this situation maintains, it's only going to generate more antipathy. I avoid her . . . and i hate feeling that way. My Dad remains, for the most part, neutral and uninvolved . . . although he's been chiding me about a few things now and then. I CANNOT LIVE HERE MUCH LONGER AND RETAIN MY SANITY.

I'm now praying for patience, and for an open door that clearly marks a direction. I can't believe, at this point in time, that thinking about a "career" (in the terms the status-quo uses to describe that hell of ladder-climbing and struggling to make ends meet while you're stabbing your friends in the back to gain access to the next rung--my parents were never back-stabbers, but they didn't "love" their jobs, and the way they--Mom in particular--talked about their co-workers, bosses, etc., didn't exactly encourage me) is going to be in any way viable. The ways of this world are foolishness, and even people who should know better seem to think that acquiring more material things is what success is made of. Success at what? The things you own end up owning you. I'm getting too used to having all this space, TV, computer access, snacks, and all the "benefits" that go along with it. My writing has suffered. The funny thing is, if i'd remained in NYC, i'd have more access to "help" (as loath as i am to lean on the government for support) and to things like food-stamps and job programs than i have in Roanoke, and i would have more access to the Spoken Word scene that still calls to me every living day. I know i'm supposed to do more there than i did. I pray God will forgive me for not pursuing that more aggressively even when i had the opportunity. My dependence on Christ and my poetic endeavors both were stronger and more whole-hearted when i had it "rough" than now. I've come to understand the concept of "suffering" better . . . God doesn't "inflict" suffering or hardships on His people as PUNISHMENT, but rather as TRAINING, character-building . . . as the Message translation puts Christ's words, "using every adversity to stimulate you to creative survival, so you'll live, really live, and not just get complacently by on good behavior." That last part stings, because in this day and age, it's too easy to just be a middle-of-the-road, "law-abiding," church-attending person, and to think you're doing pretty good when all you're really doing is going through the motions, creating a microcosm in which you can exist without thinking, where everything can be a reflex rather than the result of an actual active thought-process, and where you can be "comfortable" and "succesful" without stirring up waves or making anybody else "uncomfortable" in the process. But doing the right thing, if other people can see it, is bound to make some of them uncomfortable . . . either because they just don't like it, or because it makes them feel guilty on some level, or just because doing the right thing is DIFFICULT, and requires EFFORT, and a lot of people get confused when someone would struggle to do the right thing when it's so much easier to "go with the flow." Despite the fact that you're just as likely to get ignored for doing the right thing, or snubbed, or out-and-out hated, i want that. I want whatever God is pointing me towards, no matter what kind of crap i have to wade through to get there. I'm not giving up just because i'm surrounded by people who already have, and i'm not going to let my love and thankfulness for my parents mislead me into thinking that i have to BELIEVE and THINK the way they do. No free-thinking, independently intelligent individual should ever try to force or compel another person to do that. And that goes double for Christians . . . if--by the way you're living, the courageous and bold speaking of God's truth, and the compassion and giving that you show towards others--people aren't going to be convinced, then they're not going to be any more responsive to browbeating, nagging, pushing, or bullying.

God, please keep me together until something better comes through . . . .

New Poem: If Gemstones Had Voices

2010-02-08T06:44:00.000-08:00

If Gemstones Had Voices
***
if gemstones had voices,
how many of them would scream
when the jeweler's hand
sliced off a piece of them
to better display their beauty?
part of the craftsman's duty
is to decide which parts are unnecessary
and remove them,
and what once looked
like an ugly rock
becomes a token of burning joy.
yeah, i'm sure if rocks felt pain
they'd surely complain
when a chunk of themselves
got sliced off, like an amputation . . .
"hey, that might be ugly, man,
but it was CONNECTED to me!"
if they had some idea
of the end result, i still believe
that the faceting would be uncomfortable--
or worse--
but they might be less inclined to curse
the hand that did the carving . . .
or would you tell the doctor and nurse,
"oh, just leave that old tumor there,
it's been there so long,
it's kind of grown on me."
we're not rocks. when you cut us,
we bleed, and even if it's surgery we need,
pain is usually part of the price we pay
when a deformity
is sliced away . . .
but we've been given a glimpse of glory,
we already know
that at the end of the story, we'll be
crown jewels,
our price beyond the riches
of any earthly king.
yes, this is going to hurt.
the operation isn't exploratory,
and some of us worry so much
about the pain, we'd rather
remain lying in the dirt . . .
but the craftsman isn't careless,
his skill is divine, and
when the cutting is done
we will outshine any jewel
mankind has ever dug
from the earth.

Bashers, Whiners, Subscription-Cancel-Threateners: An Overview of the Editorial Section

2010-01-31T11:19:00.000-08:00

Reading the editorial section of our newspaper, "The Roanoke Times," and on Sundays the larger "Horizon" section, is an action fraught with peril and despair. It isn't so much the difference of opinions, or the supposed "liberal" bent of the paper's editors (which, to someone who's experienced life and literature in NYC, isn't all that "liberal"), but the bizarre way mountains are made out of molehills (and, the reverse, molehills are made out of mountains). There are several modes that these things follow, and i will attempt, in the following, a discussion of a few of these modes (and why they i find them irritating).

1) The "I'm Gonna Cancel My Subscription" Mode: This is typically expressed by an individual who has been "offended" by something in the newspaper. It could be anything . . . i've seen this expressed over general content, suspected or real bias. specific editorial columns, lack of focus on local issues, and even comic strips (one was over the comic strip "Boondocks," which the newspaper eventually struck . . . apparently, more than one reader was "offended" by a couple of Black kids in a comic strip dealing with socially relevant issues). First of all, if the readers "cancel their subscriptions," they've pretty much cut themselves off from the only large newspaper that covers Southwestern Virginia. Perhaps they're better served by the numerous smaller newspapers in the area which tend to cover mostly local events, and whose attitude could best be described as "HOORAY FOR OUR_______ (insert town, county, neighborhood)." Naturally, the strictly local focus and attitude certainly limits the number of potentially "offensive" subjects. The next thing to consider is whether or not the Roanoke Times is going to be really concerned over one individual threatening to cancel their subscriptions (apparently, there was a great enough volume of "offended" people to warrant pulling "Boondocks"). I mean, COME ON. Get a grip. If you want to protest something in the paper, don't resort to such childish tactics, acting like a kid who owns the Monopoly board threatening to take the game home if everybody refuses to play by his rules. All you're really doing is revealing your own childishness and taking up space that could be relegated to people actually attempting to DEAL with the issues at hand (i suppose the paper feels some obligation to reprint SOME of these letters). Grow up, people.

2) The ______-Bashing Mode: There's an overabundance of individuals who write in this mode (you could say that i'm writing in this mode now, which is why i'm not going to send it to the editors of the newspapers), and you all know the drill. The targets are numerous: conservatives, liberals (or "lib'rals"), Muslims, Christians, secular people, or other large groups that are easily lumped into one category that can be vilified by focusing on the negative aspects of a few representatives of the group. Uh-huh, that's what it is. Actually, i'm not "bashing," because in singling out a few modes, i'm actually indicating that there are other letters to the editor and editorials who use other modes, such as reasoning, statistics, appealing to common decency or compassion, etc. At any rate, i've read enough of these to know that most of them are written out of vengeance, or out of ignorance. Sometimes both. Now, to be fair, there are certainly members of all these groups, and others, who have traits that are unattractive, criminal, "offensive," repulsive, or frustrating. No sub-category of humanity is entirely free of these elements . . . they are part and parcel of the human condition. It is a mistake, however, to take a few examples from a group (particularly those "examples" which justify a person's pre-existing bias) and use their negative qualities to condemn the whole. One might just as well, on the basis of encountering a few apples with bad spots, declare that all apples were bad. (Even an apple with bad spots can be improved by cutting the bad spots out, but that's a topic for another rant). When you write a letter for the purpose of "bashing" one group or the other, you not only paint yourself as a prejudiced individual, you paint a target on yourself for somebody else's "bashing." If the intent of your letter is to point out a flaw (and a way it can be corrected), well and good. If your only focus is "those _______s are BAD, BAD people," you deserve to have a target painted on yourself, and have no right to complain when you become the focal point of somebody else's "bashing" letter.

3) The "Department of Whining" Mode: These letters may resemble either (or both) of the previously named modes, but their identifying quality is tonal. The complaints (and they are always complaints) have an unmistakable effect in that, if one imagines them read aloud, they would sound much like a spoiled child whining when something they feel they deserve is denied them. A lot of these letters are complaints about the lack of focus on some local event, or the conclusions made in such a report. Granted, the larger the newspaper, the less coverage is given to specific local events. I was once appalled when i lived in the Bronx by the fact that a young man was gunned down at the end of the block where i lived (the fact that i heard this go down may have added to my emotional response), and nothing was said in the paper in the following days (i referred to several newspapers, but saw no mention of it, not even in the "Police Blotter" section). I would argue that the death of a teenager should certainly take precedence over the latest Hollywood scandal . . . but i didn't express my distress in a letter to any of the newspapers, especially after some of my more streetwise friends pointed out that kids being shot was just another fact of life in the city). This event resulted in several poems, and i could advise those who write the "whining" letters to take up poetry as a way to express their frustrations . . . but such an exhortation would undoubtedly fall on deaf ears, since society at large tends to ignore poetry, and those who write these letters undoubtedly would quail at the thought of being ignored. Their issues are IMPORTANT, they would tell me. Why isn't more attention being paid to their pet subjects? A more enlightened approach might be to simply write a letter to the editor ABOUT the subject, without any of the "i-don't-know-why-you-didn't-report-more-on-this" blather that just takes up extra space. Or start your own newspaper.

These are 3 of the modes that seem to irritate me the most, perhaps because it takes the least amount of focused thought or imagination to write them. When i write, i like to focus all my intellect and imagination in what i'm writing . . . to invest less than that is to insult my readers. One could say i'm investing TOO much time an energy in a blog that's only read by a few, but a few is enough. ONE is enough. If something i wrote was going to be read by the readership of the Roanoke Times at large, i would certainly invest the whole of my thought and imagination in writing it . . . and not worry one bit about the whiners, bashers, or people who cancelled their subscriptions over what i wrote.

New Poem: Path to Freedom

2010-01-25T09:25:00.000-08:00

if there's a path to freedom, put me on it.
not the kind of self-serving egocentric striving
that only confines,
defined by the status quo and possessions
that end up possessing,
where greed and appetites bind me
and blind me to what i need
and what's required of me.

if there's a direction towards truth, set me free to follow it.
like a tiger burning bright whose stripes
match the patterns of my scars,
forward through the darkness towards
that galactic centrifuge where stars
begin and end,
and no bars or barriers designed
by mankind can limit it.

if the truth leads me into mystery, let it be my destiny.
let it grab me by the scruff of my neck
and with a strength that defies
the tides of the times
carry me,
eyes wide open in fearful joy and expectation
to wonders unfolding before me,
microscopic to cosmic,
a dangerous uncharted land
where only the visionary can stand.

if that doesn't sound like freedom to you,
don't stand in front of me . . .
because the force of what drives me on
might realign your gravity,
tug you into an alternate reality
that mocks the tawdry baubles you've used
to decorate your soul,
and that fog that clouds your vision
might be torn to tatters, and freedom
shatters the walls of the prison
you took for granted.

freedom
is never selfish,
for it knows no mortal master,
and the pursuit of freedom is a head-on, headlong dash
into a Mystery
whose arms are open wide
to receive those who perceive it.

if the truth will set us free,
it is always fraught with the unexpected,
the inexplicable coloring-outside-the-lines
of the tunnel-vision that freedom's call has rejected,
a process, a yearning
that's burning all bridges behind us,
and all forces that would divert us
are deflected.
we'll ring like bells, and peal like thunder,
scattering seeds of wonder,
and those who've yet to come will reap it.

so if your definition of freedom
keeps you locked inside yourself,
you can KEEP it!

Necessary Poetry

2010-01-21T10:34:00.000-08:00

I've just spoken via FB Chat to Elysee Thomas, who is back home! Fellow poetic associates in the NJ/NYC area are posting like mad, pictures and comments, about this. For those of you who don't know, Elysee Thomas is an incredible young poet, a friend of mine whom i met during my time as MC/host of the People's Open Mic, "back in the day." Although i don't know all the details of his arrest and imprisonment, a great many people that i personally know and respect vouched for his innocence, and a massive campaign of the spoken word was undertaken by the poetic family to demand his release. I extracted a promise from him to "tell us all about it," which he will no doubt be doing in his poetry.

Right now, my life is pretty much on "hold," but even in times like these, i can rejoice for my brother, and can practically feel the waves of relief and happiness, as if it was a channel that the radio in my skull was tuned to. It reaffirms my commitment to poetry . . . because if Thomas can weather these troubles and come out stronger, then my meager problems are certainly no threat. I keep remembering what Paul said, in Romans, "The One who died for us is standing at the right hand of God, sticking up for us!" and "If God is for us, who can be against us?" Paul, by the way, was in PRISON when he wrote that. God was certainly with Thomas during this time, and He is the author of perfect and true Justice . . . God hears the prayers of the oppressed, and is responsive to their needs.

But this is no time for idleness, no time to rest on our laurels. I'm speaking both to my Christian family and my poetic family. We are weathering great storms here in our own nation, and at the same time reaching forth to those in Haiti who are in such pain . . . and it is my firm belief that if God is going to bless this nation, it is our actions and attitude towards those in Haiti, to ALL who are oppressed or burdened, that is going to create the necessary channel for those blessings. Even in an economic catastrophe, we are one of the wealthiest countries in the world, one that has been so gifted with freedoms, and it is an abomination that we've become complacent, haughty, and selfish. So many in America seem to assume that we are somehow "morally superior" to those who are oppressed, that "it's their own fault" for not embracing the WASP middle-class (a rapidly dwindling middle class at that) "virtues" that are--at their root--Mammon worship. And the freedoms we claim to love? Their being etched away, by an acid compounded of ignorance, greed, bigotry, and political sleight-of-hand.

And why is poetry so important? I've expounded on this plenty of times, but at the risk of being redundant, here it is: poetry, in particular the spoken word, is the native tongue of the human soul. It is the freest of free speech, often the only way the poor, oppressed, outcasts, and outsiders have of expressing their emotions that are probably more real, raw, and honest than anything any of us have come up against. But just because you're "safe" right now, don't think that you're invulnerable to the horrific types of misery and injustice that thousands, millions of individuals you regard as "those OTHER people." The oldest example of the written word we have is a Babylonian epic poem about the hero Gilgamesh. That alone should stand to represent the importance of poetry in history . . . and even if it didn't, pick up your Bible and check out the Old Testament prophets, as well as Psalms and Song of Solomon . . . poetry. Every epoch in history has had plenty of poetic voices to speak for it, and the great shame is that the contemporaries of those voices didn't listen very well (and didn't like what they heard). Poetry IS the voice of the oppressed, the cry of the outsiders, the howl of the prophets, and the echo of the Universe. It's not a plaything . . . it's a weapon of war, a way of cutting our way clear through the wilderness of the banal, the boring, and the mass of red-tape and doublespeak that pervert our language, as well as the supidity of most television and movies and radio talk-show hosts who dumb it down. Speech, and the ability to use it, holds us accountable for the ways in which we do--or don't--use it. Freedom of Speech, like a muscle, must be exercised regularly, and in the right way, in order to remain strong.

And that is another reason for my gladness at Thomas' release: we need all the good, strong voices we can get.

A Dose of Reality for Reality TV

2010-01-16T16:53:00.000-08:00

With all the new "reality" television shows today, the ideas must be running a bit thin. I'd like to propose an alternate concept that would inject some hard reality into these shows, which would also coincidentally make them more gripping, and thereby more entertaining. Here are a few suggestions:

Ubiquitous Disclaimer: To those of my readers who might not be aware of such obscure concepts as "parody," "satire," and "irony," this is not meant to make light of the subjects involved. Consider it, instead, as a contrast of what REALITY means as opposed to "reality television," as well as an opportunity to flex one's mental muscles by assuming uncomfortable positions not generally accepted or promoted by the status quo, which generally involves the least amount of effort combined with the greatest amount of ignorance. You have been warned.

SURVIVOR: BEDFORD-STUY

Take 10 average middle-class white American citizens, drop them in an area like the Bedford-Stuy, or perhaps Flatbush, clad in nothing but their underwear, and tell them that there are subway passes and McDonald's food coupons hidden in locations within a 10-block radius from their drop-off point. The drop-off time will be at midnight. They will, of course, have to "survive" the night (during this time, an arrangement could be made with the local police precincts to avoid any intervention . . . a sufficient cash donation, or perhaps an arms deal, would facilitate this). Part of the contract for the show's participants would include a codicil that indemnifies any of the local citizens from any actions that might result in bodily harm to the participants--after all, the point is SURVIVAL, which always entails a risk of physical harm. As far as advertising and sponsorship, which is always vital to a show's continuation, i have already mentioned McDonald's, and even the NYC Police could use commercial time to run recruitment ads (because, even in this massive recession, it seems like the police force is always hiring). In addition, having the participants clad only in underwear would be a prime opportunity for manufacturers of those apparel to prove how tough and resistant to damage their garments are . . . "And as this Survivor shows, a night on Flatbush Avenue and several assaults by the locals haven't managed to damage Fruit-of-the-Loom's super-tensile waistband!" The prize for the winners (if there are any who truly survive) would be . . . drum-roll, please . . . TO CONTINUE TO LIVE! Yes, the true meaning of survival would hit home to these middle-class Americans who are so bored with their hum-drum existence of shopping malls, cheerful kitchens, tranquil bathrooms, and 500+ HD channels of bullshit.

IRON CHEF: SOMALIA

A true "iron chef" must make the most from his or her supplies, no matter what they are, and serve them with flair. What better place to put those skills to the test than a third-world country where starvation is rampant? Of course, these chefs would have the most advanced cooking equipment (although finding power sources for this equipment would be part of their challenge), and they would have any food-like substances that the local inhabitants had access to. On a positive note, the judges would be the inhabitants, who could possibly benefit from having a few top-notch chefs to prepare their food and make the most out of their meager rations. Again, contracts would have to be drawn up to indemnify the locals, because the presence of so much American "culture" could easily cause riots, thefts, and other events (which viewing audiences in America appear to appreciate so long as they themselves are not involved).
The prize, of course, is to be able to return to their lives and jobs in America, where they'd have a greater appreciation for ANY food they are able to get.

REAL WHITE TRASH HOUSEWIVES

How can one truly appreciate the drama of cat-fights and estrogen overload in a location of relative wealth and comfort? Such conflicts could be shown to greater effect if the attractive denizens of some upscale neighborhood were transplanted in some out-of-the-way, poor, and less "enlightened" location. Each houswife would be assigned a trailer or shack, and their families would be portrayed by casting a group of the locals in those roles. Shopping trips would be occasions of great drama, considering that the housewives in question would be given a stipend roughly equivalent to the average wage in that region . . . a trip to the local "____ mart" would be quite grueling, especially with half a dozen kids and an alcoholic husband in tow. The housewives themselves, of course, would receive no prizes at the end of the show, but the families that they lived with would receive stipends based upon what the "housewives" had before the show . . . including real estate and personal property. And all of America would have a chance to view a show that involved REAL people who aren't coached or refereed by directors and actors and makeup artists.

It's easy to see how these shows could become part of a real improvement in the "reality" part of "reality tv," contrasting the "values" of WASP middle-class America with what it truly takes to survive . . . things that seem to matter so much would take on an entirely different light when survival, sustenance, and relationships are not mere buzzwords, but are the very things that one's life hinges upon.

Deals With the Devil: The Church in Bed With Politics

2010-01-15T13:46:00.000-08:00

Recently, Pat Robertson, who is one among many individuals who are more interested in acquiring capital and entrenching themselves in politics (what i call "politichristians"), had the utter lack of sensitivity and compassion to say that the recent tragedy in Haiti was caused by their "pact with the devil," referring to a historical event centuries ago. Regardless of whether or not the event occurred in the way it was construed, the statement itself reveals the actual extent of Robertson's "compassion," which is about as deep as a mud-puddle. When an opportunity arises to come alongside another individual or nation, out of compassion and love (true expressions of Christ's presence in a person's life), this little bit of caustic fare is nothing more than a political statement wrapped in sanctimonious garb.

The Christian church, by and large, seems to believe that political power and standpoint are more important than spiritual power . . . it's a deadly poison that's spread through all denominations. Once an event or issue becomes politicized within the church, it creates dissention and division, which is exactly what it's intended to do. Any person in a position of leadership realizes the power that comes from associating himself or herself with God, or gods . . . regardless of whether the person in question shows the qualities that one of Faith would consider valuable. The "leader" in question can easily demonize any opposition by saying that their opponents are "against God" or "heretics," and in a time when people within the congregation or range of influence are troubled or afraid, they are less likely to cast aspersion on a person who makes strong verbal claims to being a servant of God (or gods). This is true for any religion . . . when mankind gets its hands on religion, the first thing that occurs to many is that it's a great tool for "putting people in their place." Christianity has been used, over the centuries, as an excuse for war, racism, and hatreds of every type. For a man of Robertson's influence to make a careless statement should, in a fair world, immediately destroy any credibility the man has gained by quoting gospel and claiming to be a servant of Christ. Unfortunately, there are many people who will believe that because a good Christian like Pat Robertson said something like this, then it must be true.

Haiti has had a long history of troubles, both political and natural. Its inhabitants suffer from frequent hurricanes because of its location. It has had a long and bloody history. The United States, its neighbor, regards it--for the most part--as insignificant, partly because it doesn't have a wealth of exploitable resources. "Haiti was the first independent nation in Latin America, the first post-colonial independent black-led nation in the world, and the only nation whose independence was gained as part of a successful slave rebellion." (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitian_Revolution for more information on this). This alone seems to chafe the predominantly Anglo-Saxon "politichristians," many of whom carry the smoldering embers of racism and colonialism in their hearts. Most of Haiti's people are poor and uneducated--but poverty and lack of education are not, or should not be, a reason for hatred, exclusion, or oppression (although they often are). I am reminded of the words of the Ghost of Christmas Present to Scrooge, in reference to Tiny Tim--"It may be that in the sight of Heaven, you are no more fit to live than millions like this poor man's child." In fact, i'd argue that the wealthy are closer to being the "surplus population" than the poor. To vilify or demonize a people in a time of great hardship, especially when one carries the name of Christ, is odious at best, and verges on blasphemy, flying in the face of Christ and all the Prophets. When Christ walked the earth, He associated with people who--in that time--were considered the lowest of the low, people that the status quo regarded as untouchable. If a person is to affirm Christ as their Lord and Savior (and, if asked, Pat Robertson would undoubtedly claim this), then they are to exhibit Christlike qualities. Any reasonable individual, Christian or otherwise, would have difficulty equating Robertson's statement with Christ's example.

This is a symptom of a larger problem that i have already mentioned. Too many people within the Christian church are too willing--almost eager--to immediately gravitate to an individual in politics who claims to be a "Christian," especially when that person touches all the right political "hot-buttons" that are almost guaranteed to generate the appropriate knee-jerks: abortion, the "war on drugs," the "dangers" of Islam, homosexuality, and so on. I'm going to take this a step further: a political "knee-jerk" is NOT a sign of a person's Christianity. The Enemy knows exactly how this process works, and uses it to both cause discord within the Church (the body of believers as a whole), and to distract the Church from its true mission: the spreading of the Message, and the alleviation of human suffering. Christians must, as a whole and as individuals, rush to the aid of those who are oppressed or suffering. The early Christian church made the Message of Christ their first priority; directly behind that, and intimately connected to it, was to render assistance to the poor. If we are to be "on our job," these things need to be pre-eminent features of our lives. Everything else must fall behind--possessions, politics, power, prestige, family ties. I'd call on Pat Robertson to make a public apology for his insensitive, inflammatory remarks--regardless of whether or not they were historically accurate--unless, of course, he wants the same kind of judgement to "boomerang" on him, and hold him accountable for the atrocities perpetrated falsely in "God's name" throughout the ages, from the Inquisition up to the present.

New Poem: 12/22/09 (Untilted)

2009-12-22T12:42:00.000-08:00

Here stands
a 14-year-old boy
first souljacked into wonder
at the waterfall's pool
and spent 30 years
trying to translate the unspeakable
unlikely fusion of joy and terror
that kept his soul spinning
after everyone else around him
put their souls in Park,
in hock to a system
that revved their engines to the breaking
point, pointed
to a horizon they'd never reach,
and convinced them they were going
somewhere. here,
there is no quest to create a following,
the folly of a flock of sycophants
who really only want a slice
to fit into their pie-shaped
pinwheel grafts,
that would make the Mystery
a piecemeal thing, exchangeable
for something extra in the bank.
here stands
a culture, one foot in the cradle,
one foot in the grave,
pissing on everything in between,
libertyandjustice4all who
fall safely between its brackets,
pigeons so comfortable
in their pigeon holes
that falling outside the lines of the design
becomes a crime.
i want to be dangerous.
i want to be Grendel to the status quo.
i want what that 14-year-old edition of me
saw and heard so clearly,
an outsider invited to the inside
of a feast surpassing
anything the elite can create as a distraction.
tell me of this "real world"
tethered tightly to the mentronomes
and claustromethodical chronometers
where i can happily exist as "eccentric"
as long as i am "harmless,"
as long as i play by its rules;
telll me
that only fools believe there's
anything else,
that i'm jeopardizing my livelihood
by refusing to play the game . . .
i'll tell you of a wonder beyond myth
that mocks the feeble mathemanics
of monetary rule,
that "harmless eccentrics"
are like museum exhibits, animatronic wannabes
that only amuse,
that only fools would sacrifice
their liveliness
for something that cannot live at all . . .
yes, it makes one dangerous
to those who think they have it all
when they've never knelt
at t he waterfall
and found more joy
than their cupped hands could hold,
more Mystery than words
have ever told.

New Poem: Breaking Day

2009-12-19T14:31:00.000-08:00

Breaking Day
***
poised, walking the ragged edges of the world
like a man standing in the bow of a ship
riding into a stormbrewed night.
calamity's hand strokes my forehead damply, feverishly;
dangers amply apply their pressure.
ever-present, the desire--like Simon Peter--
to boldly stride across the waters;
like him, my steps falter
when i look at the storm
and lose sight of my Father.

i could cry myself to sleep at night,
curled in my curdled blankets,
huddled against the haunted dawnlight
afraid to walk the streets in the face
of what's hunting me, terrified
of hurling feeble words in the face
of what's haunting me, unable
to describe in plain language the face
of what's hurting me . . . .

what use am i to God, to humanity,
scared to death in my tattered jeans,
clutching with desperation to ragged dreams,
ribbed as sails to tug my boat
from the grip of the undertow?

around me, jackals bow to a sacred cow,
a bull they both worship and hope to feast on,
the ancient golden calf given a different cast . . .
though scores of them have been torn
on the horns of their Master Dilemma,
the sight of blood only excites them,
delights them, whets their appetites, and
ushers in the next atrocity.

the towers i wander among are already doomed,
ever civilization ultimately ends up in ruins--
but that's a poor excuse for speeding up the process
and it may look like they're building an empire
but it will only amount to a funeral pyre . . .
aspirations and transitory glories lined up for their graves
followed shortly by fools who were their slaves . . .
we've plundered the Heavens, sundered the Earth,
measuring down to the molecules for material worth.

and, confronted by this,
i'm expected to speak the oracular in the vernacular,
to engrave the turbid air with measured beauty,
to blow away the smong, even briefly,
long enough to provide a glimpse of the Divine
that works often behind the scenes,
beyond the screens of tawdry mortal schemes--
put this into words? better words?
these thoughts, translated, would
tear the air itself to shreds,
and though i maintain it's a necessary art,
a survival skill,
i can make a map of my scars and show you
where words kill!
pray to God every drop of blood i spill
will be to deface the iconic mortal dreads
that the Master Manipulators maneuver like chesspieces
to keep their pawns in line.

swords of Spoken Word, warriors of the Last Frontier,
ragged kings in rugged garb
carrying white fire in Numenorean hearts,
we bear the brunt
of contemptuous tongues
who would silence us while we breathe,
and only speak well of us when we're gone,
safely in our graves, our words enslaved
in backwards-masking to sell blue jeans
and tennis shoes.

the gifts we carry are perilous fire,
tools to dismantle the status quo:
neglect them, and they become lead weights,
deadwood, hindering our steps,
dragging us down to the depths.
arm yourselves.
don't let your minds lie fallow.
don't quench the white flame.
RESIST,
not with fists thrust into the air,
not with guns, bullets, that are ignorant
of causes or purpose . . .
linked arm in arm, forge an unbreakable bond,
unshakeable faith, and march . . .
march . . .
march . . .
towards the dawn.
the breaking day will show clearly
which side we're standing on.

New Poem & Dedication: Stolen Property

2009-12-14T22:11:00.000-08:00

This poem was written partially in response to the arrest (under false charges) for "receiving stolen property" of Elysee Thomas, a good friend and respected poet in NJ. For more information on this, please go to www.slamglobal.com and click on the "Free Elysee Thomas" link. This poem is dedicated to him.

Stolen Property
***
it's 2009, and New Jersey's finest strikes again,
in an empire embattled by evils, but
one wonders why the master perpretrators
aren't being pursued or prosecuted, so
to prove that "THE SYSTEM WORKS,"
they've got to persecute somebody, and
surely society at large
will condone the removal
of a young, black poet . . .
"receiving stolen property," as long as it's
worded properly
will suffice as a charge . . .

but society at large
is guilty
of receiving stolen property . . .
most of this great nation
having sprung from the loins
of illegal immigrants,
geographic dunderheads who
mostly died of syphillis,
never once asking the natives
if they were particularly troubled
by our taking over of their land
writing treaties we planned
to break, and when wholesale slaughter
and firewater
didn't break their will,
smallpox blankets smothered it,
a "kinder, gentler" biowarfare genocide . . .
the very land under our feet
is stolen property
that our great-great-great-ancestors
took unlawful possession of.

we wear clothes and fashions
with fabrics sweatshopped into designs
stolen from street-kid innovators
and set at a price that the laborers
could never afford . . .
and this country would never even exist
if we hadn't stolen living men and women
from their homelands,
tried to beat them into shapes
we could use,
but to admit that much of our nation
was built on the backs of the blacks
would be tantamount to an admission of guilt,
so we cover the track-marks of our greed
with politically correct foundation,
pretending that segregation doesn't still exist
and that racism is a thing of the past; but, like
buried used reactor core rods
our radioactive past can't be ignored.

hip-hop was stolen from the streets
and imprisoned behind the bars of a UPC;
delicacies and recipes from a thousand lands
wind up at celebrity dinners, a thousand a plate,
"for the benefit of the poor;"
every fifth of April, Uncle Sam picks our pockets,
uses the money to by guns, bombs, limos, and blow,
and complains about the "heathen nations"
and their godless ways;
and even God's name is pimped by politicians,
a holy name stolen so it could be
stamped on our money,
and the very dollars in your pocket
could very likely have passed, unknown,
from bloody men who used it to do
things that God would never condone!

and now they've stolen a voice from the streets
just to prove the justice system is still viable,
but whether through oversight or just plain lying
there's a Higher Justice that will hold us accountable . . .
and poets continually provide an uncomfortable reminder
that everything we have is stolen property,
and even the breath we use to speak
is just the stolen breath from somebody else's last gasp . . .
those "things" you clutch will slide out of your grasp,
and stolen voices will be strong enough
to cause your walls to break.

Pseudo-Rant: Paper Talks

2009-12-09T07:56:00.000-08:00

Paper Talks
***
how many trees died
so you could send Valentines
to people you're romancing
this year, while
last year's garbage contains
the remains
of the cards you've discarded?
hemp
makes better paper, and
grows back faster
than a clear-cut forest
shipped to a paper mill--
but, back in the McCarthy Daze,
playing on "Reefer Madness," hemp
was made illegal,
and now the War on Drugs continues
the chant that cannabis is bad,
so we can't allow hemp to be grown.
if a tree falls in a forest
with lumberjacks, chainsaws, chippers,
and paper mills all around,
who knows if it makes a sound?
if walls could talk, imagine what paper
would say? the very pages
of my notebooks, crammed full, margin-to-margin,
so another tree doesn't have to fall
for my sake . . .
p.s.--human skin
makes good parchment (and lampshades),
and what remains
makes Soylent Green,
a rather extreme way of "going green."

New Poem: A Measure of Insignificance

2009-12-09T07:44:00.000-08:00

A Measure of Insignificance
***
time pauses, perhaps no longer
than it takes for a dust speck
to trek the space between
your forefinger and thumb held apart
to signify
a measure of insignificance.
there's a chance you might miss this
if your blind spot widens enough
to block your third eye, or
your tunnel vision narrows your focus
on the mirage you call success
will visionaries call your attention
to the Green Flash, the halo of the eclipse,
and meteors that fell like the Lion's tears
while you were busy with your mundane missions;
these missionaries are visiting you, offering a revision
you won't find on television,
an undiscovered country not shown
on the Discovery channel . . .
panels of experts will argue
so they don't have to agree,
and all their degrees are forgeries
doctored by people who believe that
the alphabet begins with PhD.
don't you know the Mystery exists to twist
your feeble rationality into question marks?
don't you know that beyond the fall of dark
are terrors that beggar description?
don't you know there are places where
time pauses, causing your watches to lie?
don't you know that angels and demons wait
with bated breath
to see what you will make of this,
while men with narrow minds
gather around wide tables
and count deaths like deutschmarks
and print labels for "acceptable losses?"
what you call "history" is barely
an ellipsis in the sentence, the
infinite second that God can measure
with the space between
His forefinger and thumb,
before He points at you, calls your bluff,
and says, "Time's up."
then, infinity
will open its books
and bid you to look within
and read the backwards story
of the fallen history
of these awkward creatures
called men.

Putting the X in Xmas: The Blasphemy of Mammon-Worship

2009-12-06T18:24:00.000-08:00

Well, it's that time of year again. Time for us to be once again bombarded by advertisements tricked out in tinsel, offering layaway programs, special "deals" if you come into the store at the ass-crack of dawn, and various Christmas carols cunningly recalibrated into musical mantras for what Christmas is REALLY about in America . . . money. Mammon. You know, that thing that Jesus said you couldn't serve if you served God? I know some of you remember this. Maybe it's a good time of year to take a step back and see just how much we pay lip-service to this creed while many of us are sitting in the amen pew of Mammon's unholy cathedral.

First of all, i don't think there's any problem in giving gifts on Christmas. Especially since, the rest of the year, we're a bunch of penny-pinching cheapskates. Do you really need an excuse to give? Has generosity become so archaic that we're only going to honor it once a year, because it might be embarrassing if people did it all year long? And, of course, TRUE generosity doesn't earn dividends or turn a profit, so it's pretty much useless to your generic WASP suburbian family (it's one of the family values that gets skipped over by the pundits when they're pounding the pulpits to push their particular propaganda). Now, if you're reading this, and your hackles are raising, or you're squirming around a little in your seat, GOOD. I'm about to tell you exactly what is putting the "X" in "Xmas." And it's us.

Christmas, at least in theory, comes from the words "Christ's Mass." We can be relatively sure that Christ wasn't actually born in December . . . the time of year was chosen to coincide with certain pagan rituals (the Winter Solstice, Saturnalia, etc.); theoretically, this was to make it easier for pagans to "transition" into Christian practices (what it produced instead, in many cases, was a synchretism that blended a lot of traditions). Nonetheless, if you're going to celebrate Christ's Mass, celebrate it to Christ's glory! That means, of course, to be more concerned about others, so when you're giving gifts, don't just run out and buy something that the person is apt to exchange as soon as you're out of the house . . . put some thought into the gift! Remember, Christ taught us to figure out what we would want someone else to do for us, and then take the initiative by doing it for them! And don't be overly concerned with the "dollar value" of the gift, whether you're giving it or receiving it. Nothing is uglier than a person receiving a gift who later complains about how "cheap" the giver was.

Putting this back in a contemporary perspective, and having worked in retail sails for the previous 6 Christmas seasons, i'm well aware of the over-eager nature of the sellers to "push" Christmas merchandise. Some of the merchandise will even brandish the appropriate religious references (anything that will convince more people to buy it). This attitude, and everything that participates in it and supports it, is almost a ritual honoring Mammon. I'm reminded of the terrible "accident" not so long ago when a man was trampled to death by a horde of shoppers in Wal-Mart. It was an ugly, hideous thing . . . did not one person in the mass know that they were stepping on a living human? Or was getting inside to get those early-riser deals more important than stopping to help, or at least trying to stem the lemming-like tidal wave? I can hear some of you saying, "Yeah, but if they stopped, they'd have been trampled, too." SO WHAT? Listen, if we're saying that we're Christians (those of you who aren't Christians are excused from this part of the rant, if you haven't already tuned me out), then a Christ-like action in that scenario would be . . .WHAT? Christ, who sacrificed His life for ALL of us, would surely have risked His life to help that man. Surely, there must have been SOME Christians in that herd!

This could be broadened into an indictment of our culture's approach to money in general. Sorry, W. Bush, a bailout for banks and automakers at the taxpayers' expense isn't the answer. Neither is a "stimulus program" loaded down with pork projects, Mr. Obama. MORE MONEY IS NOT PART OF THE SOLUTION . . . and you know what THAT means. On Wall St., there is a bronze image of a rampaging bull, supposedly to represent the "Bull Market" that everyone craves. But, i look at it, and i see the golden calf that the Hebrews made while Moses was up on the mountaintop. THAT is what is being worshipped. Everybody likes money, right? More money means more THINGS, more access, more votes, more bulwarks and barriers to keep the "wrong kind of people" outside. I am currently unemployed . . . not for lack of trying, but right now, the job market is tumbling . . . the "stimulus program" doesn't seem to be helping much in that response. Obama's meeting with a number of industry leaders to "create new jobs" was a joke considering how many of them had been cutting jobs before. You create a horrifying chasm doing this . . . making a bigger lower class, while somehow expecting these people to support an economy that sucks them dry and then demands more. When you look at the disparity of this circumstance, it's a wonder you don't fall down on your knees and pray for mercy, because generating a larger group of "outsiders," of people who are oppressed (and, yes, economic oppression counts) is certainly not going to please God. I'm sure a lot of you tithe 10% . . . and keep a careful record of it so you can get the tax write-off. Is this the future you want to hand to your kids? An enormous tax burden to pay for the mistakes of super-wealthy people who, for the most part, STILL ENJOY THE BENEFITS OF THEIR WEALTH? We teach our kids by example . . . and everything seems to be telling them "More MONEY is the answer to your woes. More MONEY is better STATUS, and therefore you're less likely to get convincted of crimes . . . if you have MONEY, you can get away with ANYTHING. You don't want a job that makes you happy, you want a job that gets you more MONEY, and if you have to swindle, backstab, or mistreat your co-workers and employees to do it, SO BE IT." I don't see any politicians on EITHER side of the whole Coke-vs-Pepsi political stratum volunteering to take pay cuts, to not use limousine services, to brown-bag lunch instead of having a 3-martini-lunch with their cronies . . . perish the thought!

If you're a Christian, don't expect a financial payoff because of it. Don't expect the World to be your friend . . . Mammon has no friends, just people it can use, and people it can't . . . and if you're of the latter, you're going to run into all kinds of trouble. Someday in the not-too-distant future, you may be found guilty of "not supporting the economy"--they'll make that a crime about the time they start implanting those microchips in the backs of your hands or under the skin of your foreheads. You're going to have to sacrifice some things, make do with less, and if you follow Christ's teaching in the Parable of the Unjust Steward, use the adversity to stimulate you to creative survival. When you step out of the rat race long enough to take a deep breath and a good look, you'll be thankful for the grace that allows that transition. You won't be a "respectable citizen," you won't be spending your days in "conspicuous consumption," and you're probably going to have a lot of people scratching their heads, wondering why you don't play the game . . . but you'll be LIVING, REALLY LIVING . . . not just complacently getting along because (at least for now) it's easy to claim you're a Christian in America, going to church in what's basically a stained-glass social club, insisting on God's name in the pledge, and going along with whatever political agenda has replaced Faith in your life. If you think that there's a political solution, then THAT'S the problem! When your Faith is in Christ, and you apply your God-given critical intelligence to the situation, you'll see how out-of-joint the whole mess is.

My family has a great many "traditions" that go along with the Christmas season. Christmas cookies, mulled cider, decorating the house, and having other family members who would otherwise be alone join us. My parents were always consistent with regards to remembering Whose birth we were celebrating, and teaching us accordingly. Most of my memories of Christmas are warm and pleasant, and i remember being as young as 11 when i realized i anticipated the joy or happiness that resulted from the gifts i gave rather than what i received.
It made me realize that giving was a blessing in and of itself . . . having something to give, to give FROM, and experiencing the happiness in somebody else's eyes. And, yeah, that might sound sappy and sentimental, but if a cynical curmudgeon like me can feel that, maybe you should try it on for size this Christmas. Maybe a whole bunch of Grinches will be getting bigger hearts this year when they realize the TRUE meaning of Christmas . . . hey, i can dream, can't i?

New Poem: Weltanschauung

2009-12-03T00:22:00.000-08:00

Weltanschauung
***
this ministry takes place
in a life under giants,
a playground of tyrants
where the usurers insure
the poor will always be with us;
what good is wealth
without someone beneath you?
this is mending the tatters
on the frayed garment of liberty;
if she was naked, these beasts
who wear men's faces
would not only abuse her, but
rape her as well.
this is holding up a map of hell
and showing how well
the outlines connect
those who have the most power
and have the most to fear
from a massive cry of"Unmask!"
this is asking the questions
that make people squirm in their seats,
and hurling a meteor storm of words
that's as like to bring me down
as collateral damage
if i'm even left alive long enough
to sound the attack.
throw it all on the line.
step up your game, or step out.
this is a razor edge
that might cut me off from
jobs,
friends,
family,
and leave me in unfamiliar country . . .
but the One who asks this of me
will apply the Cross-hairs to my vision
and make of me the necessary fusion
of wolf and whirlwind, gunslinger and preacher,
private eye and loudspeaker
that's required by the job.
yes, this dead serious, and yes,
it could be deadly, too.
yes, i am afraid . . . .
but this consumes me.

New Poem: Stoner Notepad

2009-12-01T01:19:00.000-08:00

Stoner Notepad
***
it's another stoner notepad,
another way of attempting to corral the chaos
in a complex combination of correlated sounds
called "words."
it's another dystopian warning,
another cry of "it's not too late . . .yet,"
it's another attempt at tearing out
the rage that attempts to strangle me,
so that my tongue clings to the bottom of my mouth
or hides behind the lumpin my throat.
it might just
kill me.
it's another manifesto,
another unnecessary proclamation of exactly
why i'm doing this or
why i go on or
why i haven't given up
as if i haven't been wearing my heart on my sleevef
rom the time you stepped into the room, so,
beware when this thing strapped to my wrist
grows thorns.
it's another attempt to cage the quantum tiger
but i'm always missing a substantial portions
of his particles in the attempt, and most of these afford
only a glimpse
of the possibilies.
it's another futile attempt to, through self-disclosure
and an honest understanding of my limitations,try to communicate something so
fundamental in the equation,
because it confounds me that you can't see
the pattern holding things together.
it's another explanation that,
what you see before you is just a loose conglomeration
of molecules and past participles,
a shadow of the possibilities,
each jagged gasp of air a stolen moment in infinity,
as much a slave to my appetites
as any common reptile . . .that God would allow such an unlikely specimen
to breathe poetry,
is beyond my understanding, but a gift
so unrestrained that
resistance is futile
and
i can do nothing but release.

2 New Poems, New Themes, New Styles: "Childhood Calling" & "Bitter Rivers"

2009-11-26T18:06:00.000-08:00

Childhood Calling
***
your childhood is calling
collect, because
you left it stranded on the
inflammation super-
highway to hell.
no pocket change, and no
pockets in footie pajamas for that
matter. you
amputated it like an appendix when
they told you
GROW UP
like it was anything to aspire to,
when things like belief and wonder and
imagination
were too immature for a
comp'ny man.
your childhood is calling
long distance, because
wolfchild howling epiphanies don't reach your
ears, years
down the line when the bottom
dropped out of your bottom
line, like roadkill behnd the limo
double-parked when you had to
drive yourself or just
walk from point A to point B,
discovering a secret alphabet of
outcast letters between the two that
resonated with the ones carved in your
bones, the things that should be
engraved on your tombstone, just another
dead kid dressed in old man's
clothes.
your childhood is calling
you names, playground
vernacular, street urchin gospel,
words you thought you outgrew by
degrees: BS or BA, MSW, PhD, MD,
A through Z when
A is for Another Aspirin and
Z is for Zoloft, anything pharma-
copious and
alphapolitically correct to
disconnect your train of thought and
leave your childhood behind, a
useless caboose, and when,
and when you need,
and when you NEED it
most, no
ghost of a map shows you the
tracks of your tears to reconnect,
recollect, because
your childhood has hung up the
phone, and now, something
worse is calling your name . . . .

------------------------------------------------

Bitter Rivers
***
bitter rivers
shiver your reflection
into shards of imperfection, seven
centuries of bad luck every time
you cry, and whales and coyotes are
symphonies for
"goodbye." croon, tune,
misfortune, all to soon, and other things that
rhyme with rune, scrawled
on the wall
above your
hollow ckull
mouldering like a jack-o-lantern
mourning its candle of thought in
November;
nine hundred ninety nine points of
light, outposts blown out
in a countdown,
empty integers all adding up to
zero. ignorance
is bliss because it's
blind to all you've left behind,
and only lasts until, at last,
history
catches up with you.

15 Things that Make Me Angry

2009-11-22T22:51:00.000-08:00

Essentially, what I'm trying to do here is write out my frustrations. I seem to have lots of them. I seriously have to watch my oil pressure. I'm surprised there aren't jets of steam coming out of my ears sometimes.
One thing that often helps to soothe the savage mind is making lists. So, here's a list of things that piss me off:

1) Lame-ass remarks on the web that are supposed to be cute and clever ways of getting sex, but they're only cute and/or clever in the minds of those who compose them. Which leads us to,
2) Mental midgets whose brainpower would be increased by having one of those hamster-wheels hooked up to their heads. Even a SLOW hamster would be an improvement. Shit, even a DEAD hamster could at least swing back and forth a little and produce SOME current.

3) Politicians. Any and all.

4) Muscleheaded jocks who don't have the ability to engage in verbal repartee or even peaceable discussion, so they beat the shit out of anyone who looks, thinks, acts, talks, or smells a little differently from what passes in their minds for "the Norm;" these selfsame jocks are the entities that spawn Columbine-like reactions, and have the AUDACITY to look SURPRISED when somebody wants to shoot that smug look off their faces.

5) Stupid neo-nazi-wannabe kids with no coping mechanisms who think a bunch of guns and plastique is gonna solve anything, or that Hitler was anything but a maniac who should have been shot up with thorazine and locked in one of his own concentration camps, but like the gutless phony he was he took the coward's way out.

6) Muscleheaded jocks and stupid neo-nazi-wannabe kids who grow up and either become soldiers or cops so they can continue their barbarism and total ethical meltdown on even larger scales.

7) Oblivious fat people in supermarkets who look at YOU like it's YOUR fault they're walking around creating impact tremors like Jurassic Park as you try to squeeze past one of their elephantine buttocks just to get some fucking BREAD while they're moseying around buying diet soda to eat with their 500-pound lardburgers, or deciding which fat-free dressing to top off their salad with (said salad loaded with more cheese, ham, pepperoni, and anything else greasy and fattening that can be put into a salad and still be considered a salad).

8) Anorexic yuppie chicks who think that Barbie is overweight, and so they compensate by making themselves so damn thin a strong wind would snap them into, but they don't have to worry because they'll be DEAD from NOT EATING long before a strong enough wind comes along, unless Rush Limbaugh starts talking to them.

9) Rush Limbaugh. The very IDEA.

10) When my mother calls me "paranoid," as if that's an excuse to avoid admitting that there are some things out there, PARTICULARLY with regards to the government and big business, that one should be suspicious about. They're not out to get "me," they're just out to get EVERYONE.

11) People with a knee-jerk first response tendency to MEDICATE in order to solve whatever perceived mental/emotional problems they may have. Big surprise: when people do shitty things, they're SUPPOSED to feel like shit. And just because your kid's mind is moving faster than yours is no excuse to dope them up with ritalin. And when you act so HORRIFIED that somebody is smoking pot, you'd have a fit of the screaming heebie-jeebies if you couldn't get a refill on your valium prescription (which is an ADDICTION).

12) People who favor one "brand" of politician over another (see above under "politicians.") If you have to choose between the "lesser of two evils," THEY'RE STILL BOTH EVILS.

13) Racists. Any and all.

14) "Officers of the peace" and/or "peace-keeping operations," which are Orwellian neologisms for "forces of oppression" and "Hi, i'm a cop, i'm going to kick your ass and get away with it!" And, finally,

15) Making a list of things that make me angry in order to calm me down, only to find out that i'm more angry than i was when i started it!

Now THAT was a total waste of time.

New Poem: I Identify "I" (maybe retitled at a later date)

2009-11-22T22:11:00.001-08:00

the only thing that links these things
is time, and the times in which
i identify "i"
this whole concept of "i"
like why i write, what my eye
sees, and the trainwreck of mixed metaphors
and past participles that form the collective whole
of "i."

walk around Bonsack.
i can tell you where the sweetest water
flows into a cattail swamp,
where a naiad lives in a waterfall
with bloodroots around her feet,
where Solomon's-seal, black nightshade,
water hemlock, St. Jonhswart, and jimsonweed grow,
where the red barn once stood in a suburb,
one road named "Red Barn Road" after they tore it down.
this is where myth and reality walked hand-in-hand
as i walked, learning the lay of the land,
finding places that seemed like dreaming legends
and the made-up names i gave them in my heart.

walk around Union Square, NYC.
i can take you to the circle where the park-rats sit,
where street intellectuals and sidewalk philosophers talk.
i can introduce you to people with legendary names:
Smoke, Spider, Conscience, Old School, Papo, Shadow, King Twice.
i know where to find: street artisans that would make Salvador
weep with joy, nag champa incense, chess games, sparring, and cannabis.
there's a map in my soul that i could follow blindfolded
to restaurants, poetry dives, coffeehouses, and bookstores.
this is where i wed myth to reality, becoming mythical myself,
an outsider looking in and an insider looking out,
finding a hunger, and learning what hunger was all about,
and growing a few streetwise hairs in my ragged, thinning pelt.

walk around Hinton, WV.
i can point to the land that my great-great-grandfather owned,
and sold when they came to build the dam.
i can take you to the place where the water sounds like thunder,
and where a single misstep can pull you under.
i can show you the Cave Ridge, the Old Rail-Yards, the point
where Greenbrier and New River's join in their flow.
i can show you the building that held the store
where my great-grandfather worked when i was a boy.
this is where i merged bitter with sweet,
just like the Greenbrier and New River meet,
and flow together like nostalgia and nightmares join
and from troubled waters dive for darker pearls.

the only common element is this insignificant particle
that i identify "i," and the thread that binds
them all together
is time.
at any point along that line, i could have turned
another way, made
another choice, or breathed
my last breath. this mortal thread
is finite. i keep the cords
wrapped tightly as i can,
binding them with words, binding
words into poetry, and trying to make sense
of senseless things,
and when people tell me these things aren't connected,
i tell them, "yes, they are.
you're looking at the common element,
the rare earth that has tied the knot."

New Poem: Untitled

2009-11-18T09:22:00.000-08:00

there was a deer stepping with unconscious precision
through the scrubby brushthat borders the field
where, i'm told, a strip-mall
was once pondered
but, real-estate being what it was,
and the economy being where it is,
was a discarded concept.

what was the pretext of adding yet another
bland carbon-copy
of a thousand other strip-malls
to our already blighted landscape?

there's nothing missing from this picture.
gray, flat sky, evanescing on the mountain;
tawny field, shrubs, people passing in cars
staring at somebody
who isn't indoors letting the simple plans of wonder
occur beyond their sight-lines,sacrificing something insignificant
on the altar that would make life
so much more convenient.
what kind of a man
would do that?

can't you see that we're dying here,
not for want of another Starbucks
or Burger King
or nail salon,
but from an overdose?

i hope that deer survives hunting season
when hordes of idiots with guns
will descend upon the unspoiled
in faux appreciation of nature
to mount a stuffed head on their wall
and let the meat get freezer-burn
because Whoppers have ruined our palates
for venison.

watch out for that tree . . . it's only growing there
so that a winter storm
can send it crashing down
on your crackerbox
and spill your human crumbs
out into the street
that's due to be repaved next week.

Giving Thanks: Grace, Mercy, and American History

2009-11-17T17:30:00.001-08:00

After a long hiatus of poetry and various rantings, it's time to take the cap off the old blogger's pen and actually write about some things in a more organized fashion.

This time of year, most folks--including my own family--are preparing to celebrate Thanksgiving. When i was younger, the basis of Thanksgiving as a holiday was given to us by our history teachers, obviously boiled down and sanitized, that it was a "time when the settlers and the Indians (which is what they called Native Americans at the time) gathered together and shared a feast." This was, one presumes, before the settlers decided that they'd rather just intoxicate the natives with firewater, slaughter them wholesale, and kill them with kindness by giving them blankets--smallpox blankets. A lot of the food that we now enjoy in America--corn and pumpkins being two of many--was given to us by long years of historical use by the Native Americans. The early settlers of Jamestown, not knowing what they were doing, at one point tried to eat datura stramonium, now known as "Jimsonweed," a contraction of "Jamestown Weed," in memory of their stupidity. A large number of them, of course, died from the lethal poisons--including atropine and scopolamine--in the plant. I'm certain the Native Americans could have told them--had they been asked--that this was a stupid idea.

The early settlers had moved into a world (not a "new world," as it was often referred to) that was in many ways different from the one they left behind. "Manifest Destiny," in its amoebic march to engulf and digest other cultures for its own benefit, had expanded into a new era of exploitation. The natives had lived in this land for millennia, quite independent of European culture. Even Amerigo Vespucci (after whom the Americas were named) and Christopher Columbus (a geographic dunderhead who died of syphillis) weren't the first Europeans to land on the soil of this land . . . archaeological evidence shows that the Vikings landed on American soil much earlier. Europeans, for the most part fleeing religious and social oppression, eventually began a new type of oppression, seeing the "savage and hostile natives" as ignorant creatures who needed to be "educated" and/or eliminated. Some people don't regard anything done by white Europeans as "wrong." The Native Americans attacked them, made war on them (nevermind the fact that they WERE here first, and had every right to defend their homeland from what eventually became aggressive and destructive expansion), and so it was obvious that the only "logical" course was to kill the natives to make "homesteads" where the white settlers could (over the course of time): plow under, clear-cut, and hunt species like the buffalo into near-extinction. Perhaps one of the earliest forms of biowarfare practiced on American soil was the "smallpox blankets," exposing the Native Americans to a disease that their immune systems had no defense against.

But i started talking about Thanksgiving, didn't i?

Jesus told a parable, once, about a Pharisee and a Publican (a tax collector) coming to the temple. The Pharisee "bragged" to God about what a good person he was, how he tithed from his largesse, and how glad he was that he wasn't a "heathen" like "that Publican over there." The Publican, not even daring to raise his eyes, begged instead for forgiveness for his wrongs. He was considered the lowest of the low in ancient Israel, a man who had literally "made a deal with the devil" by working for the invading Romans. Jesus told his listeners that the Publican went away right with God. At a time when we, in America, enjoy more wealth and freedom than many other nations, and have in recent times--with the exception of 9/11--been free from attacks from outside nations, we have it good. We were told after 9/11 that the terrorists "hate our freedom;" if that's the case, then the draconian wipeout of the Constitution done by the "Patriot Act" must have pleased them mightily. Even after that, we still have a great deal of freedom that a lot of other nations don't enjoy. And yet, rather than being grateful of this, we lord it over the "heathen nations," acting like simply being born on American soil makes us somehow "better" or "more moral." We act like the "planet police" as we invade other countries to "make them safe for democracy"--as long as it's our kind of democracy. God bless America? How about "God FORGIVE America?" I still believe that the USA is one of the best places on the planet to live. Even though there are forces within our own government who are hell-bent on removing any individual autonomy--the freedoms we send our children to war in foreign countries to protect--and eroding the Bill of Rights to the point where it's only a vain posturing, a fragile skeleton of the once robust concept it represented. We are hardly AWARE of the profound nature of these things we enjoy. The odious self-righteousness of our politicians and "world leaders"--here and abroad--is not only a smear to the reputation of America as it has been presented to the world, a land flowing with milk and honey . . . it is blasphemy. This year, at Thanksgiving, i want all of us . . . Christians in particular . . . to think HARD about everything that we DO have. When we sit down to tables laden with food, watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and the football games on television, and relish good times with our family, friends, and loved ones, we should be astounded by what we have. And a part of that astonishment should be shame, both for the apathetic way we take these good things for granted, and for the evils falsely perpretrated in the name of God and of liberty. There should be no attempt to whitewash the history of the nation that proudly proclaims "in God we trust" when that hardly applies. Gratitude--true appreciation for the quality of God we call "Grace" (which is defined as the good things we receive that we don't deserve)--can never be blind, lest we forget to be grateful as well for "Mercy" (defined as the punishment we deserve that we don't get). People who are raised in comfort and relative wealth may develop a false sense of entitlement, that the world somehow owes them something . . . the World doesn't owe us anything but suffering and death.

I'm not saying you should spend Thanksgiving day in mourning, appalled at the gravity of our history. In fact, Thaksgiving should be just that . . . giving thanks to God for his mercy and grace, which surely staggers the imagination. When you're eating, sitting with your loved ones, enjoying creature comforts great and small, remember to be thankful for them. Be grateful to the men and women of the armed forces who are honoring their commitment, and who for the most part--in my opinion--are honestly going to war because they want to protect the freedoms we enjoy. And be constantly aware just how fragile those rights and freedoms are. They are, in fact, like muscles . . . they have to be fed and exercised in order to be kept strong. If they are neglected, they will grow weak and will atrophy, and when we most need to depend on them, they will fail us. It is that part of defending freedom that falls to each of us, as citizens of America. It is, really, a profound gift for those of us who have been born and raised in America, and such a gift should NEVER be taken lightly. NOTHING should be taken for granted; circumstances can change, and those good things you enjoy could be snatched away while you're not looking. Thank God also that each and every one of us has the capacity for a critical intelligence, if we only have the willingness to use it. Do not be wasteful ingrates . . . because much will be expected from those who are given much.

New Poem: No Accidents (work in progress)

2009-11-16T17:11:00.001-08:00

No Accidents
***
i have seen the smile in the alligator's eye
on the Suwanee River,
and worked with one teenager
who had the same look in his.

i have waded the waters of the Gulf Shore,
a school of rays parting around me,
making me for one moment
a part of their dance,
and from there to New Orleans
in a car filled with laughter
and the redolent reek of marijuana
for a Ghost Tour in the Vieux Carre.

i have looked through a telescope, breathless,
at the Orion Nebula;
my friend, an astronomer, beside me,
telling me, "You're watching a star
being born." That crucible of Creation
is a spark reflected in God's eye,
in Whose eye i also dance.

i am not the protagonist of this story,
but these are no accidents of Fate . . .
tracing these lines back to their Source,
i feel as ever the incredible force
of the first poem spoken
into the audient void:
"Let there be light."

And there was.

Rescued from Myspace: Untitled Poem

2009-11-15T11:42:00.000-08:00

am i at the right station to catch the train i'm chasin'?
you tell me . . . is it just one of my phases, traces, ornate
races from place to place, cannonball-crazed through
this maze of worm-tunnels of the womb-belly beneath
this bawdy beldame, the city that i can't claim as home
where i'm still takin' chances? i fell in love with her like
one of those doomed romances.
she rode a wrecking ball through my poetry in one of our first dances,
raped my sleep-schedule like a lioness in heat,
laughed an icy gasp down my throat
with a January kiss to a reggaeton beat,
clenched me in her sweaty, dusky thighs in the August streets
right there where the juices run hot and the flesh tastes sweet
. . . by turns fiery and frigid, fitting firmly into the grooves and
ridges of my bipolar soul--and that's no small feat.
what makes me believe i belong here? i long to believe i can
be strong here, although i know i could go wrong here, become
just another outcast that the throngs fear, but i'm trying so hard
just to be here, to stay here . . . stay. please, just listen to what i say.
i want my poetry to be
what warfare is to a piano, like shooting a man
with a guitar solo, like ripping your balls off
and making you sing soprano
i want my poetry to be
the margarita-colored eyes of the 13-year-old street-rat
who sells me pot in the park,
to be tough enough to walk the Bedford-Stuy
after dark, to cry like an angel with
the body of a wolf, howlin'
like Ginsberg to Giovanni to Gilgamesh,
thrash like a skateboard-huckster kicking
apart a Wal-Mart, giving all the old ladies
a heart attack. am i on the right track?
you tell me,'cuz i'm still dazzled by the mystery,
still hassled by my misery,
still fallin through the shadows of my history,
stallin' for time still hustlin' twilight through a pen
that's runnin' dry.
hey, i only laugh when it hurts, but that's all the time--and you don't wanna see me cry.
i'm on a mission, receiving a transmission
that could drive like fission into the big dictators,
the master baiters who regard me with
derision til i'm screaming a revision
that's turning the tables, drive this corkscrew
into their souls, yank 'em out, tell 'em just for whom the hell's bell tolls.
write the runes of their doom on the walls
of this city, this bitch, this angel, this whore,this queen of mine--am i on the right line?
you tell me, 'cuz i'm running out of time.

Rearranging the Landscape (Yeah, another long-winded rant, just deal with it)

2009-11-13T09:39:00.000-08:00

We've dug a hole, collectively, and we're pulling the dirt in over our heads. And anytime anybody shows us a way to climb out, we take our shovels and kill him or bury him under the dirt to shut him up. You know, I wonder why God always gets our "sloppy seconds." We wheel and deal, and when that doesn't work, we manipulate behind the scenes, and when that fails, we put on the "poor me" show . . . and when everyone stops falling for that, we increase the self-victimization until we alienate even the most stalwart of friends . . . and then we come crying to God. I mean, when He got to me, there wasn't much left to work with . . . so, if what you see before you looks like a wreck of a man held together with spit and baling twine, that's just me. If I seem at all to speak well or eloquently, THAT'S the miracle, that Poetry breathes through the likes of me. The world needs poets who, like outlaws, rearrange the landscape. Like terrorists . . .and although one could argue that plastique and bullets are immediately more impactful and thus more effective, words have shifted spiritual and emotional landscapes like rapid-moving glaciers since the dawn of time, before bigots and tinpot tyrants ever earned the name "dinosaur." The emotional energies that power this machine are furious in the extreme, insatiable, and usually ungrateful of what they receive. It's never enough, is it? Vicarious living at your fingertips, television and world-wide-web, landscapes and terrain erased to create space for a mini-mall that's a clone of every other mini-mall . . . access to goods and knowledge is practically unlimited . . . so why the fuck are you so mentally bankrupt? These are the clinics where they operate on your brain, and with all the assholes out there who throw bombs in response to abortions, how come nobody's bombing THOSE clinics? You catch and cage every thought you have, strangling them with the umbilical cords of your broad-band intentions and short-spanned attentions . . . because if one of them survives, you might develop something like perspective, and if that happened, you'd have to be HONEST and face the fact that you're DAMNED by the very engines you built to pave your way to a pseudo-paradise that was never worth living OR dying for! How many of you are already walking around, bought and sold, not even missing the soul they're sucking out of you from every television set, every political media whore, every Mega-Macro-Store, the whole damn lot of them vampires, and you not only invited 'em in, you let them have a house party! Slap a brand on me, a scarlet P for poetry, make me wear it on my forehead in the streets--right next to the L that's apparently already there . . . not that you'd ever have any trouble figuring it out, when I'm ranting loud enough on the subway to make people back away from me, when I compose poetry while I'm chasing two parakeets around in the pet store I work in trying to convince myself that I'm not just a manager trainee, I'm a POET, dammit, a POET, and someday, if you stupid fuckers don't finish the job of ruining the world, maybe I'll be able to reshape a piece of the landscape . . . not for a monument to myself, there's too many people in that business already, and unlike a lot of others who claim to be Christians, I have some concept of "humility," which is basically "A man's got to know his limitations," and brother, I know mine--most of 'em I learned the HARD way. I've seen the way people bristle, the way they're picking up their shovels and pickaxes where they've been working on that mass grave for humanity, ready to commit murder in the name of the System, the icon of their Idolatry, as related by the Industry Standards and Ratings and Product Tie-Ins, combining to create a revolution-proof culture-condom. I know what it means, and I'll bet YOU know what that means, and if you mean what you say when you say "by any means necessary," then now's the time to start arming yourself with what you know, because the next war that will be fought will be for the space between your ears. Just because resistance is futile doesn't mean that it's not an obligation--it IS an obligation, and even if everything I fight for is a "lost cause". . . at least I know where I am.

Out of the Ashes: Excerpts from my previous blog

2009-11-09T07:11:00.000-08:00

What follows is a series of excerpts from my Myspace blog that i considered worthy of salvage. They're in no particular order, and i'll probably end up doing at least one more entry like this, but for those of you willing to wade through my rambling, here goes:

*******

With God, ALL things are possible.
Now, THERE'S a scary thought! No? But consider--once something enters into the realm of Possibility, it becomes something that needs to be considered, to be dealt with. Jesus taught us that nobody who gave up anything for His name's sake would lose out--in fact, they'd gain more than they ever believed possible, and while that included incredible blessings, it also included troubles! Now, some people would whine that a loving God shouldn't "provide" troubles. It's probably one of the most telling points of debate in the whole of Christianity that what C. S. Lewis called "the problem of Pain" is such a roadblock. Our entire society, at its present, is concerned with the providing of and obtaining of comfort, convenience, and conspicuous consumption. To a culture like that, Pain is something to be avoided, detoured around, or subdued . . . our culture invalidates Pain, and equates suffering with Lacking. Poor people suffer because "they lack money," not because those who have money are lacking in compassion. Comfort, convenience, and conspucious consumption: those are the idols whose lies make us think that "if we're uncomfortable, something's wrong." I challenge that thought! If we're COMFORTABLE, something's wrong! People who have become empty shells for that triad of idols may lack suffering, but they also lack many other things. God brings us a fulness of experience that, while it has some hard nights and rough accomodations, also provides us with a deep and complex personality, not a shallow mirror for the corporations to preen in. It's a hard thing to understand when we're undergoing those "learning experiences," but when you look back on them, they often point to a refining process. God pares you down to the bare essentials, and then says, "Okay, now let's start over at the Beginning. Back to square one." People who look at my life at various points over the past 5 -10 years or so would think I'd had it really hard at times (as I did while those times were going on!) But, it is those rough spots, sort of the equivalent of scouring a pot, that helped me shine where I do. Getting back to basics helps you understand what you really need, and it further helps you recognize the abundance of your blessings. That is both an uplifting and humbling experience (as are most things in the Christian lifepath). With God, all things are possible. Things both wonderful and terrible loom over us with their Possibility. God, who spoke both things into existence, provides the perspective and understanding to deal with them. Revel in the richness of your experience. Rejoice that you can still feel and understand Pain, because without it you would never fully appreciate Joy. The bitter underscores the sweet. People who fall before the idols of comfort, convenience, and conspicuous consumption don't know what they're missing out on.

*******

Slam poetry is, and as long as it endures probably will be, a rather chaotic thing. It will inevitably seek to break any bonds of conventionality that attempt to restrain it. People who come to the Slam are often seeking something, whether they're members of the audience or wordslingers themselves. Granted, its inclusivity is bound to invite a variety of elements that are, taken out of context, divisive, but given the common bond of appreciation of, and seeking expression and affirmation in, poetry. That perhaps is a rather idealistic and simplistic "definition" of Slam poetry and its denizens. As a working template, though, it might also serve as a potential model that the Christian church might consider!
It sounds ridiculous . . . on the surface. And yet, I've known many poetic communities wherein: the attitude towards the newcomer was warm welcome; there was a sense of, "you can let down you're guard here," a sense of safety and security that would seem contradictory to the rather intimidating concept; newcomers weren't expected to know the ropes, and early mistakes and missteps were to be expected; the generally flaky and quirky nature of poets was well-known, and having been through quite a few self-induced catastrophes, the poets tended to be forgiving of such things in others, and were there when one of their poetic siblings needed them; guidance was provided, and although sometimes poets tend to have a kind of abrasive "tough love," the love was clearly evident--that did not, however, mean that excessive indulgence or liberties taken by any one poet would be treated lightly. These attributes, placed within the framework of a Christian perspective, would certainly be considered admirable in any Body of Believers. As a "vagabond poet," I've surfed many sofas, and have found that Slam communities tend to "take in" any wandering poet and treat 'em well. Sure, household duties and some expenses were often shared, but it was a light thing compared to laying out funds for a hotel room and a solitary meal in a restaurant. Imagine a travel-weary man and his pregnant wife, probably a little rough around the edges, coming into your community, in need of a place to stay for a few days. I know plenty of Slam communities where they'd be taken in at the drop of a hat, given at the very least half-decent crash space in somebody else's home and a meal; how many churches could that same couple expect that kind of treatment from--would we even let them sleep in our toolshed?
Sure, I'm exaggerating a bit to make a point. But not by much. And as to those who would point out the scandal, the lust or drunkenness or plain-out stupidity that often dogs the Slam . . . are these so different than the same things that dog the Christian church? Simply stated, no. The difference is possibly that the Slam doesn't attempt to cover up its scandals, and the Church often does . . . so which is the more honest approach there? Did the Adulteress pretend NOT to have committed adultery in front of Jesus? Did Matthew hide the fact that he was a Roman sympathizer, or Simon the Zealot pretend NOT to be a freedom fighter committed to overthrowing the Romans BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY? No, of course not. We all have quirks and flaws. To utterly succumb to any of these quirks and flaws is wrong; but it is equally wrong to deny or attempt to cover up these wrongs. I suffer from these limitations, myself . . . there are things I've stood up and admitted in a poetry slam that I would be hard-pressed to stand up and admit in a Church, when someday I am going to have to stand before God and admit them, one way or the other . . . but, wouldn't it be a wonderful thing if there was a Church in which confession did what it can often do in a poetry slam . . . simultaneously make you aware of your own vulnerability while feeling utterly free? That awareness of vulnerability and sense of freedom and possiblity is a precious thing. Most of us experience it as children, less and less as we grow old . . . but Jesus said that unless we received the Kingdom of Heaven as a little child, we'd never find the way in . . . and in that condition that both acknowledges our own weakness and yet at the same time makes us free, a sort of free-fall, we understand the Principles of Grace and Mercy. Grace is the state that is, while it lasts, so much like flying; Mercy is the chute that we can absolutely depend on to open us. Perhaps Fear, turned upside-down, is Joy and Awe. If I've seen elements of all this in such a humble place as a poetry Slam, shouldn't I also be able to see them in the Christian church, and in myself?

*****

I have a problem with winter.
The light that falls on the trees and rooftops here make it look like everything and everyone is experiencing muted emotions, like music robbed of all its vitality and heartbeat. I can remember being in offices or elevators, hearing that "muzak" that's supposed to be soothing, making my pulse pound until my head felt like a furnace, and I wanted to scramble up, yank that speaker out, and stomp it into the floor, screaming, "QUIT IT! YOU'RE KILLING ONE OF THE FEW THINGS THAT MAKES MY LIFE TOLERABLE!" But, see, in the winter I hardly even have that much energy. It sucks me dry, dries up all my sap, turns my pithy potency into something that would barely light a candle, let alone a bonfire. It's almost like my "disorder" is tied to the seasons. I feel manic pretty much for all of spring and a good part of summer. Autumn is when I usually have my flare-ups or flake-outs or breakdowns. Whatever you want to call them. And then there's winter, where I have a season where everything sort of collides with me like a big snowball. As Lou Reed says, "It makes me mad, and that makes me sad, and then I start to freeze." That pretty much follows the progression. I've leaned on a lot of people during my winter seasons. This year I'm not going to make anyone bear the brunt of my depression. If you keep on reading this, you've been forewarned: I plan on unleashing a lot of the stupid drama and angst in here. Maybe when the chrysalis breaks open again in spring I'll feel like I have been pounded into shape.
Some of the frustration I feel (and here those of you who are anti-religious are going to start squirming around in your seats, I know), is the way Christmas is turned into the Ultimate Capitalist Holiday. SPEND! GO! NOW! PEOPLE ARE DYING ALL OVER THE WORLD, YOU COULD BE NEXT, SO GO . . . RIGHT . . . NOW! RUN! RUN TO ALL THE SHOPS AND SPEND ALL YOU CAN! HELP KEEP THIS STUPID BROKE-ASS ECONOMIC SYSTEM FROM COLLAPSING! BUY MORE SHIT THAT YOU DON'T NEED, THAT YOU CAN'T POSSIBLY AFFORD . . . GIFTS THAT WILL BE EXCHANGED ON THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS!!! This is how we celebrate Christ's birth? You are bombarded on all sides by commercials that don't just perch on the edge of Blasphemy, they dive right in and take a bath in it. Every day, they continue to hammer the idea that "Captialism and Christianity go hand in hand." Notice how very few people quote that verse "You cannot serve God and Mammon (i.e., the Bank, Profit, Capitalism)"? We don't even NOTICE our own excesses anymore. That's what happenes when you're constantly beaten about the head with commercialism, you sort of go numb, and you suffer brain damage, too. So, brain-damaged consumers, pimps of the corporate whores, war-mongering capitalism-pushers . . . BACK THE FUCK OFF!!!! This year, if commercialism tries to hit me, I'm not just going to duck and run, I'm going to hit back. I've HAD it. I remember when Christ chased the moneychangers from the temple, overturning their tables and brandishing a braided whip (yes, that's what happened). There's a DIRECT APPROACH, laid out there in the Scripture, the Word itself, that FLIES DIRECTLY IN THE FACE of this whole Dragonball Z Fusion Technique of Economics and Religion.
Now, see, there's where I get mad. I want to grab hold of the things that Christmas SHOULD mean to me. Christmas, in its original context, as the focal point of History, the amazing concept of God-With-Us, God-AMONG-Us, taking on the flesh and doing for us what we could never do ourselves. It is that Gift that should drive us to give abundantly, not some farcical commercial contrivance. And it is in that Spirit that the gift should be given, not in some vanitorious "look-what-I'M-giving" sense or with some sort of hidden pretext . . . but lavishly, with joy. There are gifts you can give that don't come out of some catalogue or commercial--those are the best kind. If I make THIS important enough, can I stave off the frozen wastes of January and February as well? Or, if it were possible, to LIVE in that Spirit, CONSTANTLY, could all the Soul's Winters widen their eyes at the sight of blossoms that do not wither, warmth that does not grow cold, winds that are not bitter?
And, having said that . . . will you help, too?

Ghosts: A Question of Definition

2009-11-06T17:26:00.000-08:00

Lately, i've been watching a lot of shows on television such as "Ghost Hunters," "Destination Truth," "Ghost Adventures," "Most Haunted," and the like, and that--along with personal experience--has prompted me to write out my own take on the theme of ghosts and spirits.

Let me say first and foremost that i do not believe in ghosts in the sense that they are spirits of the deceased. My faith holds that, once people die, their souls reside in the Afterlife--Heaven or Hell, in other words--and they do not appear in this realm, in any fashion. There is, however, enough empirical evidence that there is SOMETHING going on in places that are reputedly "haunted." Even if 90% of the evidence is false, forged, or anomalous, the remaining 10% still deserves consideration. What follows are several categories that i believe that reports of ghosts could be attributed to, not including hysteria or common natural phenomena.

1) Demons: One of the fundamental truths in Christian belief is that there is an ongoing spiritual warfare that surrounds us--as Christians, we are participants in this warfare, through the agencies of prayer and the direction and authority of the Holy Spirit that resides within us. Demons are spiritual entities that are inimical to all humans. They seek, among other things, to deceive mortals, to cause fear and empty superstition, and to lead people into fallacious belief-systems. I believe that, when people see or communicate with what they suppose are the spirits of deceased loved ones or relatives, they're actually communicating with demons who are disguising themselves as "ghosts of the departed." The Biblical prohibitions against mediums or sorcery are not just there as part of a system of rules, but as protection, a way of setting boundaries. People who attempt to communicate with these spirits are in danger, not just from deceptive messages, but in literal physical and spiritual danger. Those who do not have the protection of the Holy Spirit, that seal that says "Hands Off!" to demons, could easily open themselves up to possession or spiritual poisoning, especially in cases where the person attempts to "channel" the spirit. As to Christians who might be uncertain in the faith, or unsure what to believe about ghosts, my advice is to avoid it altogether. Some "manifestations" might be attributed to the other causes i've listed below, but it would be unwise to assume that.

2) Elementals: my personal belief is similar to that of C.S. Lewis', that there are spiritual creatures who are, in intelligence and behavior, essentially animals. They would exist in the spiritual realm that coincides with our own earthly realm. Like wild animals, they would tend to avoid human contact. Also like wild animals, they are not to be trifled with, as they can be dangerous. Legend associates such creatures with certain geographic locations or natural forces (rivers, streams, caves, oceans, storms, and the like). A person who attempted to "channel" one of these would be, essentially, similar to a child who attempted to play with a wolverine, or a man trying to charge a battery by holding the battery in one hand and grabbing the third rail of a subway in the other. As to whether or not these creatures can manifest visually (the way demons do in order to deceive), i'm uncertain. I remember a near-drowning experience in the New River when i was 19, when i was underwater, a strong sense that there was something there, some intelligence, regarding me . . . it did not seem hostile, but more aloof from my struggles, the way a human might regard the struggles of a fly in a spider's web. I don't know whether or not that perception was merely my imagination being acted upon by a high-stress situation, or an actual "encounter" with an elemental . . . but i DO know that it's not something i'd be anxious to repeat. There is a regularly recurring event in a place called Brown Mountain, NC, where lights seem to rise from the mountain into the sky . . . this might be something explained by elementals of some type.

3) Psychic Remnants: I believe that events or situations that involve extremely strong emotions, especially negative emotions, can leave traces on a location, the way a human can leave fingerprints on something, or the way a person's sweat or blood has DNA in it that can identify that human. Houses or buildings where fearful or traumatic things--especially in places where these things would be repeated, like prisons or sanitariums--might retain some of these emotional traces, and some people could be more sensitive or receptive to these than others. The visual, audial, or olfactory sensations that such people experience in those places are probably attempts of the mind to "translate" the information. Because places steeped in that kind of negativity could easily have been the result of demonic activity, again, it's dangerous to attempt to "communicate." On one level, it's foolish to try to communicate with these "remnants," as they don't have any intelligence of their own . . . essentially, it would be like trying to talk to a photograph. On the other hand, "opening up" to try to gain more information is likely to draw demonic attention, and any information gained would then be tainted or false. If you see or experience something uncanny in a certain location, and later discover that the experience seems to relate to something that happened there before, it could easily be just a "remnant," a psychic "fingerprint" left on a place by an event that occurred before. And, again, it's safer not to delve too deeply into such an experience, or place too much importance to it.

4) Temporal Anomalies: Those who study quantum mechanics have postulated the existence of particles called "tachyons," which are essentially already moving faster than the speed of light (Einstein's theory would allow the existence of such things, provided that they weren't simply sub-light-speed particles that somehow accelerated). I'm no physicist, but i understand that in certain theories, a high presence of these tachyons could cause a sort of "fault" in time-space. Things like this would certainly explain "disappearances" such as the type associated with the Bermuda Triangle; a temporary "rip" or "weakening" of time-space could also explain certain ghostly manifestations or other unexplained phenomena, effectively offering a glimpse into the past. Because i believe manifestations of this type would be extremely rare (if they happen at all), they probably wouldn't be explained by any of the causal factors i listed earlier, and would be--in effect--"freaks of nature," encountering them probably wouldn't have any true spiritual context, other than the possibility that some weak-minded people who saw them might foolishly assume that this was an evidence of their "psychic ability," or something trying to communicate with them.

These are just a few of the possible explanations of such things, and i've simplified my theories in the interest of brevity. In some later post, i'll probably discuss teratology and cryptozoology (which are areas that would more explain such things as the Yeti and the Loch Ness Monster). The long and short of it is this: there is both an visible and invisible world, and God was and is as attentive to both, as He created them both, and understands the intricate ways in which they interact. There are more wonders on this planet, and in the part of the universe that we can perceive, that simply cannot be easily explained by man. I believe that some of these mysteries were created by God to inspire us with awe for Him, the Divine Creator who keeps the wheels of the Universe in motion. I believe that many of them will never be completely unravelled by the mind of man . . . and that is fortunate. Long before anybody ever thought of baseboard heating or toasters, electricity was used to put people to death in Sing Sing. Einstein's Theory of Relativity explained more about the material universe than we'd ever understood before, and Einstein himself said that there were probably only about 6 physicists in the world who completely understood it's implications . . . but mankind's first use for this knowledge was a bomb, and Einstein also said if he'd forseen the use his theory was going to be put to, he'd have become a watchmaker instead. Perhaps the mantle of mystery that many of God's creations wear are there to keep us from knowing something that, ultimately, we'd only use to bring about more destruction.

Keep in mind, as well, that everything i've written about this subject in this blog is based on my personal knowledge and experience (both limited). It is enough for me to know that i have seen things and experienced things that have only caused me to feel more awe and respect for the Creator, and to understand that the world i walk in is no less wonderful--and dangerous--than Narnia, Middle Earth, or any other "wonderland" described by those who have the gift of transcribing dreams.

Freedom of Speech in Action: The Poetry Slam

2009-11-02T19:30:00.000-08:00

It's been over 2 weeks since my last cigarette, and the craving is pretty rough. But, if anything, i've got an extra reason to hold off on the smoking coming up tomorrow night. That's right, after a long hiatus, Grendel is going to hit the Slam scene again, this time in the town that gave him his first set of Slam wings.

To newcomers to the concept of Poetry Slam, a bit of explanation is probably in order. First and foremost, someone interested in the concept should check out www.slampapi.com, and www.poetryslam.com . The first is the website of Marc Smith (SO WHAT?) (you have to be an insider to the Slam to get the "SO WHAT?" reference, but trust me, it's cool). Marc Smith is the "Slam Pappy," a man who has started the whole movement. Very few people can claim that they've inspired a movement, but Marc has. He's a Chicago poet who, in the mid-1980's, began bringing poetry back to the people. For years, poetry had been "caged" by the academia, the purview of readings where the only people in attendance were academics, other poets, and students. The decorous silence and golf-clap applause, where people were expected to HANG ON EVERY WORD, even if the speaker droned on for an intolerably long time. The Beat poets were a breath of fresh air in their time, Allen Ginsberg's live performance of "Howl" probably breaking the conceptual sound-barrier, actually being a "banned book" (a laughable concept which probably means that even people who would not normally read it would fight to get their hands on it). But as the Beats aged, finally gaining a grudging acceptance by the academia (and Allen Ginsberg turned into a really creepy guy who would take his clothes off in public and make everyone watch), poetry seemed to "slump" back into its former state. Along came Marc Smith . . . and everything changed again. At the famous Green Mill in Chicago . . . a BAR, of all things . . . the concept of having poets "compete" for prizes, with randomly chosen individuals in the crowd holding up scores in imitation of an Olympic event, became the epicenter of a movement that would sweep the nation, and even reach other nations . . . Great Britain, Germany, France, and even Israel, and by now probably many other countries around the world. Suddenly, people who normally would not even THINK about poetry, much less read it or listen to it, were attending these events, participating, and finding themselves enjoying it. Once you come into a Slam, whether you're a performer or a member of the audience, you're part of it, an integral part of something that is much greater than the sum of its parts. It's often intense, in-your-face, aggressive, perhaps a little intimidating, always entertaining . . . freedom of speech in action! I've seen poets perform all types and styles even in our hometown Slam . . . everything from hip-hop to villanelles, ages ranging from 7 to 70, subject matter that spanned the entire consciousness of this time and the times that preceded it.

Marc Smith, for somebody who started a movement, is a down-to-earth, likeable, friendly guy. He makes it a point to introduce people to one another, to "bring them in." It's an attitude that makes coming to a Slam that holds true to its roots a lot like "coming home." I've attended a number of Slams, including 2 Southeastern Regional and National competitions, and i've got to say that, like Kenny Mostern said, in his "Cheap Art Manifesto," i've been to one-horse-town Slams where i met 12 of my best friends that i've never known before. My own personal Slam experience began here in Roanoke, taken under the wing of a banty little Jew named Ian Cohen, a manic street-poet who encouraged me, and--along with poets like Mark Skelley, Patricia Johnson, Ian Mack, John Beard, and a number of others--gave me my early chops, showed me what it was all about, and ultimately convinced me that yes, i could do this. I'm not going to say that all my experiences with the Slam have been clear "wins"--it came to me at a time in my life when i was struggling with a lot of things, and there were situations where (especially once i accepted the responsibility of maintaining or running a slam) i mishandled it--it has also been the vehicle for many good things, probably most of the positive things in my life. I felt like i found something that the odd equipment God had given me could be put to use. It was at a Slam that i met Pastor John Ault and his wife Jane, two people who eventually became mentors and leaders as i re-encountered Christ on a new level. It was the Slam that put a hunger for travel and an edge to my senses, made me brave enough to tackle Jersey, and eventually NYC, for years . . . and not without some success. Some people who have become the best friends i've ever had, or ever will have, i met through the Slam. One individual i met through the Slam, Taalam Acey, has become--especially after seeing him twice in New Jersey, and purchasing his 2-CD set "The Market 4 Change"--almost like a prophet, and certainly somebody who made me more aware of what an awesome, dangerous responsibility it is to take on the title of "poet," to apply it to oneself. I can only hope that i could become one tenth of the poet that he is.

It's really no surprise to me that "Stevedogg," one of my friends from the old Wits' End days, is at the helm of the current incarnation of the Roanoke Poetry Slam. His energy and creative ability will no doubt sustain the new Slam, and i'm looking forward to seeing him, and many of my other old friends, at Studio Roanoke tomorrow night. It will be worth coming back to Roanoke just to see this new incarnation, and to be part of the wind in its sails.

Poetry Slams in general might "shock" or "offend" (oh, how i hate that word!) some people whose concept of poetry begins with Hallmark Cards and ends with Reader's Digest, and it might seem silly or wonky or perverse to people who've been freeze-dried in the academia . . . but, as Marc Smith would say, "So what?" I strongly believe that spoken word venues like this are the last bastion of true "freedom of speech," where people of different social, political, religious, racial, and national backgrounds can come together and find out just how much they have in common . . . and how much they have to learn from one another. A Slam isn't about scores, or about one or two divas who show up just to suck up the attention, or the applause or heckling or even "boos" of a bar-crowd . . . it is a thing that is greater than the sum of its parts, art happening before your eyes. Yes, you'll hear things that you may disagree with. Yes, you'll likely feel the prickly contact with more than a few artistic temperaments. Yes, you'll probably experience everything from rage to tears to hilarity. And, yes, you will probably learn something in spite of yourself. Is it for everyone? No . . . but it darn well should be. I've always maintained that freedoms, liberties, are like muscles . . . if you don't exercise them, they'll grow weak and atrophied, and when you most need to depend on them, they won't be strong enough to hold up. And, from a Christian perspective, if your Faith isn't strong enough to handle being in a place like this, a place where you might encounter in-your-face opposition, a place where people are WHO they are at the top of your lungs . . . then how can your Faith walk in the world there these things are real, but might otherwise escape your attention?

New Poem: Bitterness Enough

2009-11-01T13:00:00.000-08:00

Bitterness Enough
***
winding through the thickets, laurel hells,
mosscrowned forests . . .
like greenbrier, tangles of something wicked,
wretched, vetchlike strangling
what could be underblossoms here.

when something has clutched so long
that it's regarded as part of the mental scenery,
it isn't hard to see the disease,
here in seasondeath, winter's colder breath
breathing down your neck
in icy, fetid gusts
a yeth hound looking over your shoulder
reading it's own legend in every book.

pound the keys,
clutch the pen in a deathgrip,
spill the ink like blood,
and build a cage to trap it in . . .
and once you make the key,
throw it away.

you need only survive until the vernal equinox,
and Spring, and Rebirth . . .
forgiveness covering the jagged scars
in the earth
with gentler blossoms
and kinder foliage.

with every seed you plant in the heart's soil,
say a prayer for the crop that will come,
so you don't need to fear the harvest . . .
there is bitterness enough
in the foulness others have sown
seeking only to stuff the barns of their own appetites,
their bloated self-importance gloating
over sharecroppers
who never even received the gleanings.

there's poison in that soil.

Halloween: Who's Holiday?

2009-10-28T18:26:00.000-07:00

Time for Grendel to mount the old soapbox again. Today's topic, Halloween. In the continuing tradition of the Enemy's plan to keep us infighting about insignificant points of dogma while ignoring the larger picture (remember Jesus telling the Pharisees that they "strain at a gnat and swallow a camel?"), Halloween and it's meaning is a molehill that's been turned into a mountain.

To gain some perspective on this topic, a bit of history is useful. Halloween is actually a contraction of "All Hallow's Eve," referring to the fact that it is the night before All Saint's Day. The roots of the traditions associated with Halloween go farther back in history, to the Gaelic tradition called "Samhain." The Catholic Church sought to supplant pagan holidays by arranging "holy days" during the same time-frame as the pagan festivals they were supposed to take the place of (for example, Easter gets it's name from "Eastre," the Anglo-Saxon goddess of Spring). The festival of Samhain had several elements: it was believed that on that day, the barrier between the physical and spiritual world was thin, allowing spirits--harmless and harmful--to travel more easily into the material world; it was a time to celebrate the harvest, usually with feasts and bonfires; and it was a time to remember the dead, memorialize those who had passed. The origin of costumes is believed to originate with the practice of dressing up in disguise to confuse or thwart harmful spirits. While it's true that Samhain had some dark roots, it was also considered a tradition to mark the transition between the "light seasons" and the "dark seasons," and thus was also regarded as a sort of New Year. As with most holidays that were "morphed" by the Catholic church, it kept many of the trappings of the pagan festival, blending them with symbolism and associations with the church, a process known as synchretism. For more details about the history of Samhain and Halloween, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween is a useful starting-point.

In modern times, there has been a movement in some churches and denominations to do away with Halloween, calling it "the Devil's Holiday." This is, in my opinion, a superstition that harks back to the ancient Gaelic Samhain, as if there was a single day in the year that Satan and his minions have more access to the world. Granted, there are certain things associated with Halloween that might be considered dark or dangerous (particularly to those who are weak in the faith), making a big deal out of these things only draws more attention to them. Like Paul, i believe that nothing in and of itself is necessarily evil, but how we treat it and think of it can bring about evil. Also like Paul, i believe that there's nothing inherently wrong in regarding certain days as special, or in thinking that every day is pretty much like any other day. By regarding Halloween as "the Devil's Holiday," many Christians are infused with an unnecessary superstitious dread, and it also generates a "counter-reactionary" movement by people who are by nature rebellious or inimical to the Christian faith. Often, when Christians are too quick to condemn something they disagree with as a point of dogma, or through a misunderstanding, individuals who are inimical to the Faith adopt that very thing as a symbol. When Jerry Falwell announced that the purple Teletubbie was a symbol of homosexuality to "normalize" it to preschool-age kids (the triangle symbol on it's "antenna," the color, and the fact that it carried a "purse"), it was pure hogwash . . . but a number of people in the gay community adopted it as a symbol. If you walk around telling people that Halloween is "the Devil's Holiday" (and making a big deal out of "not practicing it"), you're drawing attention to it. It's very similar to the movement to do away with rock-n-roll, because it was "the Devil's Music." I remember one incident in the late 80's when the Christian rock band Stryper had gained some mainstream popularity: my job at the time was at a place where most of my co-workers were what i call "politichristians"(in spite of the fact that some of the jokes that were told were racist, sexist, and often decidedly raunchy), and the topic of Christian rock-bands was being discussed. One girl said that Stryper's style of dress, hairstyles, etc., were not "of Jesus." This was one of the few times i verbally countered what i thought of as ignorance, telling her, "I think Jesus looks on the inside, and if these guys are practicing what they preach and reaching young people in a way that hymns written in the Victorian Era can't, then they're doing God's work. Even Jesus said "if he's not against us, he's for us." The look of fearful perplexity on her face is one i've come to know well, an expression that pretty much says, "How dare you say such things? If you're a Christian, you should agree with ME." At any rate (pardon the digression), i see much of this in the hullaballoo about Halloween. GET OVER IT.

Here's my take: if you don't want to celebrate Halloween, don't. Don't give away candy, decorate your house, or participate in any Halloween festivities. A cynical part of me says that Halloween--like most other holidays--has been transformed into a day where the corporate world rakes in more cash than usual (the place that i worked--an electrical supply company--might have been anti-Halloween, but if their sales went up because of people decorating for Halloween, they wouldn't have turned down any of the cash appropriated by it). Most holidays now are more rituals to celebrate Mammon for the corporate world at large, so if you're going to protest a holiday, that's a better reason than some empty superstition. If you want to celebrate Halloween, but some of the trappings make you uncomfortable, there's nothing wrong with having a Fall Harvest festival, celebrated with feasts, bonfires, and the like. Autumn has always been a favorite time of year for me, mainly because (as i have discussed before in this blog) of the beauty shown in Nature during that time. Some types of fruit don't taste good until the first frost hits; other types don't come into full ripeness until October. If you don't have a problem with Halloween at all, seeing it as a time mostly for kids (of all ages) to play "dress-up," and go "trick-or-treating," that's pretty much okay, too--but if you have friends who are troubled by some of the elements of Halloween, make sure you're being considerate of their feelings. Just like you wouldn't invite vegetarian friends to a barbecue, or Jewish or Islamic friends to a pig roast, don't invite your more conservative friends to a Halloween party. As far as costumes go, there are plenty of costumes and masquerades that don't have anything to do with devils, ghosts, witches, or monsters--go as your favorite historical figure, Star Wars character, or animal. To me, focusing too much on the whole idea of Halloween as a "bad holiday" smacks of religiosity, an empty thing done more for appearance's sake than for any true conviction. Of course, you MUST follow your convictions as a Christian, and if you test those convictions and still find that the idea of the holiday troubles you, then don't celebrate it, and avoid it.

In reality, those of us who worship Christ should regard EVERY day as special day, another day in which to revel in the joy of knowing Christ, of seeing the hand of God in the Natural world and in the way unobtrusive miracles occur every minute, whether in October, April, or any other month. The world, the fullness thereof, and every day on every calendar page ever printed belongs to God. Stop your infantile squabbling and live each and every moment to God's glory.

Over the River and Through 2012

2009-10-25T20:21:00.000-07:00

1 full week of not smoking cigarettes, a weekend at our family's place on the Greenbrier River, the current "craze" about 2012, and watching the movie version of Stephen King's "Desperation" (and, as usual, they butchered the book, although not quite as badly as some of Hollywood's translations of SK) . . . 4 unrelated things that have resulted in some deep thought this weekend.

I started smoking cigarettes about the same time i moved to the Bronx, AFTER the housefire (there's probably some irony in that). I didn't have any particular reason, it was just something i started doing. No peer pressure (that was never very effective on me, anyway), no significant trauma (well, the housefire was a little upsetting, but my situation after the housefire was pretty good--better, in fact, job-wise and opportunity-wise) . . . and, at first, i gave away more of a pack than i smoked. As time went on, though, it became something to do when i was bored . . . and then something to do when i was stressed, and before long it was something i didn't even THINK about that much. That's the bitch about a habit . . . it's something you don't think about, and not thinking has become a habit we can't afford. A week ago, i felt like i was being urged to fast . . . and, yeah, i hear all the "you don't need to fast" bullshit, but you don't fast for dietary reasons, you fast to cleanse yourself from (among other things) the impurities that most of your food contains. So, i drank only water, fruit juice, and tea, and ate nothing. I had originally planned to make cigarettes a part of the fast, to give them up during that time. I did some intense praying and Scripture-reading during that time, and realized that i didn't need to just "abstain temporarily" from cigarettes. They were killing me . . . there's enough stuff on this planet that's doing that already. I've often said that the things i talk about in my poetry (or, potentially, in this blog) would get me shot sooner or later . . . but i'm certainly not going to help them out by killing myself more rapidly. And, as it was with alcohol, God was my strength in giving them up. Addictions are powerful, and once they sink their claws into you, you're going to need supernatural aid getting rid of them.

The benefits of having stopped smoking became apparent almost immediately. And i don't just mean breathing easier. My sense of smell and taste, which had been blunted by cigarettes, began to reassert themselves, and just in time for the trip we made to our family "compound" on the Greenbrier River. Now, Autumn has a "smell" all its own . . . it's simultaneously loamy and spicy. As we drove along 81 and then 460, then Route 12 into WV, the woods went from almost-peak here in VA to just-past-peak in WV. Watching the trees in their autumnal garb dancing in the high winds brought back the old excitment i always used to feel looking at the forest. The word "excitement" is as close as i can come to describing the powerful emotion that, in some cases, bordered on an almost frightening ecstasy . . . but now, stepping out of the truck there by the Greenbrier, i was more aware of the scent of the forest and river than i've been since i returned from NYC. Another side-effect of not smoking is an upsurge in my appetite--which has been a lot better since i came back from my self-imposed exile in Babylon, but now it's ferocious, especially since the food i'm eating tastes even better.

Now i'm going to sidestep. One of the things about Autumn that impresses me the most is the amazing diversity in the colors of the trees, and the way the whole forest seems to celebrate the "harvest," a last fling before the more austere and apollonian beauty of Winter. Think about it. If you accept the concept of Intelligent Design (i do, obviously), you have to wonder why God would go to all this trouble. It's not necessary for the leaves to change into all those variegated colors, no reason at all except for beauty. And why does it seem beautiful to our eyes? Maybe that's WHY it looks the way it does. God wants us to appreciate and enjoy His Creation . . . it is one of the inspirations of Praise. The awe and wonder it inspires should be something no Christian is without . . . it is that childlike quality of expectant wonder that is so necessary to all things we do in our walk with Christ. The Christian walk should not be some timid, shallow, plodding thing . . . it should be exuberant, adventuresome, and--with the realization that God is in CHARGE--fearless. I don't mean fearless in the sense of the sometimes foolhardy thrill-seeking that the word might call to mind . . . i mean, that fear should not be a factor when we are walking in step with God's will.

And this takes me to the next topic: 2012. According to one interpretation of the Mayan calendar, the "end of the world." Guess what? I don't give a tin shit what Nostradamus, the Mayans, or any of the doom-criers say about 2012. I know what Christ said regarding the end of times: "No man knoweth the hour." Jesus DID describe a certain event by which we would know that we should be ready to "run for the hills," so to speak . . . the Abomination of Desecration. Basically, something setting where it should not be. Apostasy. It would be a human being setting himself or herself up as "god-on-earth." Things of this type have happened throughout history (in fact, Peter said that if we were looking for the antichrist, that antichrists were all around), but this will undoubtedly be in such a way that it will be undeniable . . . at least, to followers of Christ. This individual will want to do away with all forms of religion other than the twisted version he or she represents. There is, in contemporary Christian thought, a dangerous trend, an assertion that the Rapture will happen before the Great Tribulation. I find no such assurance in Christ's message . . . in fact, if one carefully reads the Scripture, it becomes apparent that the Church will be present on Earth during the Tribulation. Worshippers of Christ will face opposition, ostracism, and execution. It will eventually come to a point where people are going to be forced to choose which is more important to them: their citizenship of the Kingdom of God, or their citizenship of the World. We already have forces in this world pushing for a "one-world-order," the WTO being primary among them . . . individuals who hold the financial fate of billions in their hands, who consider themselves above and beyond all laws that have been created on national and international level to check or bar them. A one-world economy will eventually come into being . . . and the "being" who holds the reins will be a literal representative of Hell-on-earth. Many folks in the world would consider the idea of a "National ID Card" as a good thing, to "protect us against terrorist threats." Having gone that far, how about a little microchip planted subcutaneously . . . such technology exists . . . that contains all the relevant financial and medical information about an individual? I can tell you how that one will probably be sold . . . "let's do it for the children." Everyone will think it's a good thing to have your kid electronically tagged so that, if they get lost or kidnapped, they can be located by GPS, or if found, can be identified easily. Sounds good, doesn't it? Well, if the kids get it, why not everyone? Then there'll be no danger of terrorists at all . . .because everyone will have their ID implanted in their skin. If you're aware at all, you probably know where i'm going with this . . . if you don't, God help you.

Compared to what IS going to happen, the disaster-movie-style apocalypse that most people are imagining (and depicting in typical Hollywood style from the point of the view of the handfull of survivors rather than the point of view of any of the other millions slaughtered) would be mild. And given that, why do i insist upon a "fearless" attitude? Because, if you are firmly grounded in Scripture, and filled with the Holy Spirit, you realize that GOD IS IN CHARGE. Time and time again, if you read the Scripture, you read that those of us who are in Christ have the Advocacy of Christ at the Throne of God. Jesus Himself said that the Gates of Hell would not prevail against His Church. The Church is not a building or a social organization, but the whole group of those who follow Christ. The body of Believers. Yes, things are going to get tough. Sometimes, you won't understand WHY they are so tough . . . or exactly what God is up to. That's where trust comes in. You can trust God wholeheartedly, without reservation, even when the situation seems desperate and hopeless. In the book "Desperation" (and, i recommend this novel; horror-writer though he may be, King makes some very good points in this one), a good portion of the book concerns itself with a young boy's "conversion" experience, and the nature of God as the boy comes to understand it. One thing that is repeated in the book is "God is cruel." It's harsh-sounding, but if you understand that "cruel" is a human interpretation (for a Biblical reference, read Job), you realize that often it seems that way, especially to Christians who are in dire straits or in terrible situations. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to it. Throughout the novel, it becomes clear that this group of people have been gathered there to do something because it's God's will . . . and, sometimes, the answer to the question "Why?" is simply "Because." At the end of the novel, though, the reassertion is made that "God is love." Ultimately, it's God's love for His children that will prevail. He didn't spare His Son when it came to saving humanity, doing for us what we were incapable of doing ourselves . . . it was the most powerful statement of Love ever made, any time, any place. It is good for us to be AWARE, to be AWAKE, and necessary for us to recognize those things Christ told us to be prepared for, that the Scriptures tell us will come about. It is dangerous for us to allow twisted fallacies, flimsy religious "magic-shows," the complacency that comes from being surrounded by the apperance of normality, or perversions of the truth to have any hold on our Christian brothers and sisters. If we are to be for Christ, we must fearlessly confront falsehood whenever and wherever we see it. A lot of people are going to be fooled by those assuring, comforting falsehoods that will be promoted by religious organizations, corporations, political parties, and so-called "world leaders." If you're going to be fearful, be worried for THEIR sake! Let your fears spur prayers. You cannot overcome evil with more evil . . . but you can get the best of evil by doing good. Prayer, kindness, guidance, supportiveness to those in need . . . those are things that everyone can do, and may surprise you with what they can accomplish if applied consistently and faithfully.

Fearful Symmetry v2.1

2009-10-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

Fearful Symmetry
(lines in quotes from William Blake)
***
"Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?"
*
In a time when clipper ships, sails belling windward,
plied the ocean currents in search of new lands,
mariners, sailors, explorers alike
populated the edges of their maps
with fearsome beasts, deadly bygones
like the manticore, the peryton,
the leucrotta, and the catoblepas . . .
*
and then, all lands had been sundered,
plundered, surrendered to the hunger
of these Conquistadores, these ravagers,
robber barons with maps and sextants
facile archaeologists who weighed the material worth
of each priceless find to a nicety.
and most priceless of all, native virgins fall
to the hands of those who claim Divinity
as a cover for their lusts.
*
now, the many-times great-grandsons of these
conquerors and the natives they raped
bear the marks of both their parentage
in the language they speak, in their lean and tawny
frames. they walk an urban terrain, and in it
they are the fearsome beasts.
they dance the streets to primal rhythms,
their blood runs with the rumble of drums.
*
and men such as their many-times-great-grandsires
were, now walk in terror of them, feel
themselves nearing some forbidden border
of their mental maps as that music reaches
them on some subconscious level, as those
chatoyant eyes glance in their direction.
their high-rises and briefcases are empty play,
and now the aristocracy is the prey.
*
survival of the fittest? so you say,
before you step outside when night replaces day.
lords of creation? i think not.
i see fangs of steel in the dark.
*
"Did He who made the lamb make thee?"

Wonderlost (New Poem)

2009-10-20T20:45:00.000-07:00

Wonderlost
***
incessant intellectual exercise
devoid of discourse;
breaking old habits, fearful
of what new ones will step forward
to inhabit those now-empty niches,
praying not for empty rituals
but to be taught new steps for the dance.

i remember when four walls and few meals
sustained me.
i remember writing poetry that thundered
and widened eyes.
i remember when forests had names and trees
spoke, and eyes burned in the darkness,
and every scent was a living thing,
and that was the dance,
and that was enough.

now, i live unchained, but haunted.
something dogs my steps, breathing down my neck.
something pulls me forward like a lodestar.
in between, these myths grow potent,
and these pedlars of banality weary my ears
with their pallid recipes for "reality"
that's no more real than the whispers of the breeze
and insipid as history's repeats.

i've been locked inside my own circles for so long,
and i long to share the dance with others,
but my steps falter, and my ears are attuned
to a rhythm that doesn't belong to this sphere.

i've heard:
i'm too extreme, i'm too emotional, i'm paranoid,
i'm looking for something that isn't there, i'm a
dreamer, i'm an idealist, i'm unable to forgive
my past, i'm scared of success, i'm just
fucking well
-STUCK-
and beating my head on a wall, and
i'm not going to change anything.

in one breath, somebody asks me
to be more "tuned in" to my surroundings,
then complains that i tune out sirens
because i became accustomed to hearing them,
and unable to alter their cries.

i'm asked to devolve, to adapt backwards,
to adjust to the rhythm of a railroad town
with an overblown ego based on
making a bigger rut to get stuck in.

new job, advancement, "because i deserve more,"
but deserving more obviously doesn't include
being respected for surviving against the odds
transcribing the history of an urban tribe
trying to represent an alternative
in a World dying of thirst for the Truth
that doesn't trickle down from any empty theories
that the elite deem sweet.

wanderlust aches in my bones,
and winds from other worlds blow around my head,
and sleep is only a temporary respite
from the appetites that gnaw and claw
and have left me leaner than ever . . .

all these stones, they might break my bones
oh, this fire, it might set me alight
c'mon, set me alight . . . .*

*lyrics from The Wild Flowers "Set Me Alight"

From the 2 Train Journals: Transcendant Transfer

2009-10-20T20:30:00.000-07:00

pellucid, an almost
holy gray-and-gold light
illuminates this landscape,
tawny with teasel and reed, and
backed up against that
distant, homesick gray
the trees spell their branch-sentences
in letters that,
though i would linger here for hours reading,
i could not transcribe the first word thereof.
i tell my friends, transferred from the tropics
where Spanish is spoken,
"it transcends human experience,"
feeling doubly locked by clumsy English . . .
if i can't even phrase it in my mother tongue,
how can i hope to dance in their fluid language
well enough to make it known?
for what prupose was this gift given?
why was such a treasure placed
in such a broken vessel?
perhaps it is
the flaws in me
that allow some of that transcendancy
flow through, untainted
by my tawdry identity . . .
and perhaps,
that is the definition
of poetry.

Divided & Conquered: The Sinister Solution

2009-10-20T16:02:00.001-07:00

A lot of folks who read my blog might raise their eyebrows by the information links that i have listed in the side panel. There is a stereotype of the American Christian that asserts that we all: vote Republican, resist knowledge, prefer ignorance, practice intolerance, and are in collusion with certain political or ideological groups. Sadly, there are plenty of Christians who either accept and believe that these things are part of their responsibility, or are duped into following along with the rest of the herd. Stereotypes wouldn't exist if some individuals didn't follow them.
Once again, the time has come for me to test the waters and see how many other folks i can alienate. Or maybe i'm overdoing the whole "alienation" thing. At any rate, let me clear a few things up.

I don't necessarily believe, condone, or follow everything that the sidebar links promote. Essentially, these are merely helpful locations in the larger context of the internet that i've found provide data and information that the larger, corporate-owned-and-promoted media organizations either downplay or ignore altogether. Since 2000, i've become increasingly interested in this "underside" of the news, and why we aren't being told about it. Yes, it's likely that some of the information you'll find on these links borders on "paranoia," and that some of it is disinformation, but that's no less true in the corporate-owned media; what most folks would accept as "normal" news is no less susceptible to disinformation, confusion, and out-and-out falsehood than the sources i've listed.

One thing that Evil likes to do is create divisions within the human race, and then promote enmity and hostility between those divisions. To a great degree, this is easily done between the elite and/or super-wealthy, and the common lot of us; in many ways, there are those who consider themselves "elite," who think that because of their greater wealth/power they should make decisions for the rest of the human race. Those of us who do not belong to their "class" are expected to simply accept their pronouncements and plod along with the rest of the herd, bemused by all those televised images and glossy magazine photos. Those of us who "cut against the grain" are vilified, regardless of our intentions or beliefs. We're often labelled "paranoid," "conspiracy nuts," "out of touch with reality, " "losers," "freaks," and words even i won't repeat. When you challenge the dominant paradigm, you're going to generate hostility, even if that's not your intent. Why else would pacifists be murdered? Year after year, liars are elected to government posts, and they face no greater threat than any of their comrades . . . but utter a few hard-hitting words of truth, and laser gun-sights will multiply on you like measles! I've encountered resistance and hostility on double-fronts before. As a performance "slam" poet, i've been questioned and even actively opposed because i'm a Christian, and to a degree that someone who claimed to be a Buddhist, a Wiccan, or a Pagan would never experience. Yet, because i move in those circles, and because i don't pass judgement on my fellow poets, or the other folks i associate with (such as the "Park Rats" of Union Square), a lot of my fellow Christians regard me with suspicion (bad) or a sort of condescending indulgence as if i were a wayward child (worse). I hate to beat a dead horse (i've expressed this frustration in prose and poetry for years), but i'm really getting tired of it on both ends. Even among members of my own family, i'm regarded as "paranoid" or "too extreme." I began to wonder WHY it was that Christians aren't supposed to have a critical intelligence, or a healthy skepticism regarding ANYTHING having to do with the World. I hate to break everyone's bubble, but there ARE NO POLITICAL ANSWERS TO THE HUMAN CONDITION. You might as well get it through your head. The more power you put in the hands of the Government, the less the Government is going to be "public servants." That term is almost a joke as it is. And don't hand me that old Democrat-vs.-Republican bullshit, because that's just a game they play to keep us amused. Don't you see that every time somebody gets elected to office, they: break promises they made during their campaigns, begin living high off the hog from our taxpayer dollars, and cite "executive privilege," "state secrets," or just a general "no comment" when they're confronted. Wealth and power create all sorts of walls, mazes, and distractions that keep the people who're being governed from getting too close. Any government that cannot accept the scrutiny or criticism of the people being governed cannot call itself a Democracy. What we have in this country--indeed, in most of the world--is plutocracy/aristocracy. Rule by the wealthy and elite. Those who have the most money and biggest financial backers generally win elections. This is the way of the World, and any right-thinking Christian realizes that there's only death and destruction down that road.

Evil seeks to divide us and subdivide us, especially within the Church. If the body of Christ is divided, how can we hope to effectively function as moral or ethical examples? And, to my fellow "freaks," if you resist oppression and hatred, why is it so difficult to understand that we have a common Enemy? The fact that God's name has been misused as an excuse to perpetuate evil does NOT mean that all those who are Christians condone or promote those evils . . . quite the opposite! Not all of us are puppets for the Right Wing. Some of us deny ALL political classification. I wouldn't be writing like this if i accepted the "dominant paradigm" of what i call "politichristianity:" religiousity used as a cover for political motivations, or as a tool to assure that certain portions of the population will accept what they'd normally reject. I'll be point-blank: THIS IS BLASPHEMY. Every year, Uncle Sam picks our pockets, uses the money to by guns, bombs, limos, prostitutes, and blow, and has the audacity to complain about the "heathen nations" and their "godless ways," but "God bless America" and "in God we trust" are Uncle Sam's magic incantations, a way of making all the crimes seem simultaneously righteous and patriotic. (Oh, and by the way, nowhere in the Bible is being "unpatriotic" listed as a sin).

We are rapidly coming into an era where the free exchange of information and ideas has a new horizon in the Internet (a fact that the elite are quite aware of--watch for more attempts to limit and/or privatize this new horizon). People have been shaken and shocked, first by 9/11, and then by the nigh-collapse of the economy. Reality has a way of doing that . . . and yet, rulers, leaders, and "captains of industry" have done everything in their power to re-create that "magic curtain," to keep us entertained, amazed, and amused, to feed us tiny bits of information that are a placebo to real knowledge, and of course, to make sure that the divisions of race, religion, age, sex, and political orientation stay firmly in place, and promote the stereotypes that reassure that (watch FOX; they're really good at promoting stereotypes).

There's one point i want to end with: anything that is not of God will ultimately fail; anything that IS of God will ultimately prevail. The "dominant paradigm" is all wrong, all deception.
Let me end this with an appropriate passage from the book of Habbakuk, from the Message translation. It makes the point better than i ever could.

"Note well: Money deceives.
The arrogant rich don't last.
They are more hungry for wealth
than the grave is for cadavers.
Like death, they always want more,
but the "more" they get is dead bodies.
They are cemeteries filled with dead nations,
graveyards filled with corpses.
Don't give people like this a second thought.
Soon the whole world will be taunting them:
"Who do you think you are--
getting rich by stealing and extortion?
How long do you think
you can get away with this?
Indeed, how long before your victims wake up,
stand up and make you the victim?
You've plundered nation after nation.
Now you'll get a taste of your own medicine.
All the survivors are out to plunder you,
a payback for all your murders and massacres.
Who do you think you are--
recklessly grabbing and looting,
Living it up, acting like king of the mountain,
acting above it all, above trials and troubles?
You've engineered the ruin of your own house.
In ruining others, you've ruined yourself.
You've undermined your foundations,
rotted out your own soul.
The bricks of your house will speak up and accuse you.
The woodwork sill step forward with evidence." -- Habbakuk 2:5-11

The Christian Walk in a Global Community: Part 1

2009-10-18T16:45:00.001-07:00

Writing in response to my last blog post, a respected friend and mentor, Pastor John Ault (who, along with his wife Jane, were frequent visitors/performers at the Roanoke Poetry Slam), presented me with a challenge. Although he affirmed a great many of my "points," he wanted me to go deeper, and find some gospel-based answers to the problems i posed. Rather than enumerate those problems one by one, i've decided to reaffirm exactly what being a Christian in this--and any--situation requires, at least from my personal standpoint. There are several points i want to touch on here, things that i believe would, if applied personally and individually, have a marked effect on our "global community."

1) Forgiveness: A constant and prevailing topic in Christ's teachings--and what He represented to the world--is forgiveness. Now, this is more than simply telling somebody who has wronged you, "That's okay, forget about it." It's more than just shrugging off the hurtful things that people have done to you. Forgiveness requires that the individual who has been wronged fully understands the nature of what's been done to them, how it has affected them, and how the relationship with the offender has been changed or altered by that action. I'm not merely talking about the mishaps or misunderstandings that happen on a daily basis (although they are included), i am particularly talking about the deep and fundamentally hurtful things that are done, and ESPECIALLY those that are done intentionally. It's easy to "forgive" someone when they've screwed up because of a misunderstanding or accidentally; it's far more difficult to forgive someone when they've done something knowingly, especially with the intent to harm. Jesus said, "LOVE your enemies. BLESS those who curse you." From a mere human standpoint, that's not just difficult, it's nigh impossible. This kind of attitude can only come from the direct interaction of the Holy Spirit in our lives. What i'm going to say now will probably alienate more people (but, that's okay, i'm used to it), but think of this: if, after the dreadful attacks of 9/11, every Christian in the United States offered up prayers NOT for vengeance against our enemies, but asked God to BLESS them, to show mercy on them, and to give them a change of heart . . . and REALLY meant it, what do you think would have happened? That act changed the face of our nation, threatened us both externally and --with the crack-down on civil liberties (the very things that make our nation what it is, the very things that we were told the terrorists hated about us, our freedom)--internally. Hatred and rage ran rampant. More hatred, more destruction, and more rage are NOT a God-honoring response to hatred, destruction, and rage! It sounds insane on the face of it, but i believe that if the Church as a whole had prayerfully submitted all our fears to God, and prayed for God's FORGIVENESS and MERCY, both for us AND for our enemies, things would have been changed for the better in a way that probably goes beyond our comprehension! Christ Himself, on the cross, spoke the words "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do." If we as Christians are to be Christ's representatives in this world, that is how we are to act and think. Period. And, again, this can't be done without the direct action of the Holy Spirit working through us.

2) Prayer: I mentioned prayer in the last blog-post, primarily in regards to the arguments pro and con regarding Prayer in Schools. It's a political hot-button, but i think it's a non-issue. If children are taught to pray at home, both as a family and individually, they will carry that with them throughout their lives. Shrugging off the responsibility on a bureaucracy that is, at best, flawed, if not completely disfunctional, is not the answer. I never felt any pressure to pray in school, but i often did . . . either silently, alone, or with others who shared the Faith. Prayer is a conversation with God; it is part of an amazing thing that happened through Christ's death and resurrection. Christ's spirit, the Holy Spirit within us, allows us DIRECT ACCESS to God! In Romans, Paul talks about how Christ is standing at the right hand of God, STICKING UP FOR US! God is on OUR SIDE! He did for us what we could never do for ourselves . . . arranged things so that we could actually stand before God acknowledged as His children. That birthright that belongs to all Christians is not something to be taken lightly, and i have serious concerns that something like prayer would be left to teachers (already overburdened) and administrators (whose minds may not be seriously committed to the prayers). It is very important, and something that should not fall into rote . . . no ritualistic prayer in the morning in schools, not some form prayer that you repeat without thinking about it. Your intellect and your spirit must both be focused on your conversation with God. I am also aware that there are many nonbelievers who, rather than being encouraged by prayer in schools, would feel more oppressed, and at a time when rebellious tendencies run high, might just push them AWAY from Christ. (There are many things that i think the Church is either doing badly or not at all that form what a brother of mine in NYC--nicknamed "Conscience"--refers to as "church hurt.") Christ gave us a general outline for our prayers, and my friend Lewis refers to an acronym for prayer called ACTS: Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication. These four components can be seen clearly in Christ's teachings. Adoration: "Hallowed be Thy name." This worshipful awe should be the first step as we approach God. Confession: The Message translation's wording for this part of the prayer is "Keep us forgiven and forgiving others," and this should never be a simple rote, either. Being aware of what we need to be forgiven FOR goes back to what i said about forgiveness earlier . . . we need to be aware of how our wrongdoings have hurt our relationship with God and with those around us. It's also important to share our confessions with another Christian, someone who can provide support and love . . . trust me, i have a great need of forgiveness, and for reminders of that forgiveness. It's tough for me, sometimes, because i have a long memory which, coupled with anger issues, make it easy for me to carry a grudge. I often have to pray again and again for Christ's help in releasing those old hurts, to NOT HOLD ANYTHING AGAINST ANYONE. Confession helps us by releasing that . . . forgiveness, the letting go of grudges, lightens our burden. Thanksgiving: Realizing that God is the "giver of every good and perfect gift," that He blesses EVERYONE, not just the righteous, but EVERYONE, and that all good things have their origins in His love, gratitude should overflow in our prayers. Why does God bless those who neither acknowledge Him, nor share the blessings with others? Because that is part of God's Nature, and God cannot be made less than He is. He remains True, no matter how many falsehoods are perpetuated (either out of denial, or falsely "in His name"). Just because somebody doesn't recognize God as the source of the good things they have in no way changes the nature of God. However, much will be expected of him who is given much." Blessings and curses are both boomerangs. Being grateful to God for what He's given us makes us more aware of just how much we have, and allows us to become receptacles for blessings that will spill over on those around us. The more aware and grateful you are for what God gives you, the more open you are to receive more . . . and always with the implicit understanding that it is your responsibility to pass those blessings on! If you actually sit and try to "count your blessings," and SERIOUSLY think about everything you have to be grateful for, you might be surprised by just how much you take for granted. Supplication: "Give us this day our daily bread," and "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." Supplication, asking for God's help, is something God expects us to do. It is part of an act of humility. Humility, which means (among other things) to be aware of our limitations, puts us in a position to receive from God. He wants us to ASK for blessings, and has many things to give us . . . and some of us never receive them because we simply don't ask. Supplication can be for things that we need, for protection, for "deliverance from evil," and can be made both on our own behalf and on behalf of others. The people that it is hardest for you to pray for--your enemies--should be some of the first people you consider in supplication! Ask God to BLESS them! Maybe your "enemies" are simply enemies because of the circumstances they're in. If those things were to change for the better for THEM, they might regard you differently. Don't be afraid to ask God to help you out in times of trouble . . . but never forget to ask Him for guidance, protection, grace and mercy, when things are going GOOD. That's something that i've often fallen short on . . . it's easy for me to become complacent when things are easy, but that's dangerous . . . taking things for granted, getting too full of myself, and those times have often preceded a downfall. And there's no set time to pray . . . you should do it at different times during the day, whenever you're tempted, whenever you're grateful, whenever you're in need, whenever you see someone else in need. It's a good idea to set apart a time of day to read the Scripture and to pray, and to simply make that as much a part of your day to day life as a meal, or sleep . . . it's something you need for your spiritual health and wholeness. But that doesn't mean that you should limit your prayers to that time alone . . . far from it.

3) Love: The word Love is used so many times in the New Testament, it's unavoidable. Love, as God loves us, is expressed in the Greek as agape, meaning "unconditional love." Psychologists phrase this as "unconditional positive regard." It goes beyond the "love" that's typically expressed in Valentine's day cards, or in phrases like "i love pizza." It's deeper than the love that we have for people who are our friends, those close to us who share our interests. Paul said: "There abide these things: Faith, Hope, and Love . . . and the greatest of these is Love." It is the "more excellent way" that he expounds in 1 Corinthians 13, often called "the Love chapter." It's a great chapter to read through and think about regularly, because it describes the qualities that our Love should have. Imagine: a group of people, diverse in race, age, and any other demographic, LOVING one another, caring so much for each other that they will willingly sacrifice for the better of those around them. Hard to imagine? Sad to say, that's where the Church has OFTEN fallen short . . . failing to represent Christ's unconditional love in the community. In times of economic crisis, this love--and the expression of it--is critical. Hardship shears away our facades, revealing us as we truly are. That's, in part, what hardship is FOR. It's a necessity to "love the unloveable," to do for them the things you'd want done for you. TAKE THE INITIATIVE! Be creative in hospitality! Sometimes something as simple as a smile or a helping hand can make a world of difference in somebody's life! Christians, both singly and as a body, should be reaching out in LOVE to those around us, to those who are lost, lonely, angry, afraid, in despair, in need . . .no matter how well we speak, no matter even if we allow ourselves to be martyred for Christ, if there is no Love in our actions, our actions are empty. Dying for something means nothing if you haven't lived for it. Christ expressed His love both throughout His life, and in His sacrifice. Would you die for the sake of a murderer? a rapist? a sex pervert? a war criminal? a terrorist? a drug dealer? That's what Christ did . . . that and more. Again, this kind of love is something that we are only capable of if we allow the Holy Spirit to use us as instruments. It is more than an embellishment, it is a necessity.

4) Anger, and It's Place: Now, this is a difficult topic. Anger is an emotion that is DEADLY if mishandled. Paul affirms that anger has it's place--there's a lot to be angry about! But he also urged us not to let anger provoke us to sin, or to "let the sun go down on your anger," that is, not to let anger fester and seethe, to turn into rage or bitterness. But, as one button i wear says, "IF YOU'RE NOT PISSED OFF, YOU'RE NOT PAYING ATTENTION!" Any time we see oppression, murder, crimes of any kind on any level, we're supposed to be angry! But anger, in the context of a Christian life, should provoke us to work to change the things that we're angry about--and not in a hateful, spiteful, destructive way. And, if you're angry, be sure to TEST that anger. Take a minute and try to figure our what the source of that anger is. Some people's natural response to being confronted--either explicitly or implicitly--about hypocrisy or harm they've done, is to become angry at the person who's confronting them! Make sure that your "anger" isn't actually chagrin or humiliation. Sometimes, we get angry over things that are beyond our control . . . in times like those, that's where prayer comes in; take those angers and frustrations to God, and He'll help you sort them out, putting everything in perspective. If you're working on something and accidentally injure yourself, you're going to feel anger on top of the hurt . . . but don't let that turn into what psychologists call "misplaced aggression." A lot of people who are cross and cruel to other people aren't really angry with THEM, they're upset over something else that's going on in their lives, and just vent that anger on any convenient individual. Part of dealing with anger as a Christian is trying to understand the source of other people's anger, and in understanding that, as Paul said, "everybody has their own history." So, when you hear about oppression, or people being wronged or hurt, you SHOULD feel anger . . . then let that anger turn into energy that will drive you to work in a positive way to make things better. It can be done.

Whew! That's probably the longest blog i've written in a while, but a lot of it needed to be said. Reading through it, you'll no doubt find a lot of possible solutions to the situations i described in my last post. It's actually made ME think through things i've written about, just by sitting here and putting it into a format that i could deal with. In many ways, this is how the gift of poetry that God gave me has worked for me . . . being able to deal with my angers, fears, hopes, dreams, and exaltations, to put it in a coherent form so i could come to grips with it. I just hope that my words can help other people with their own troubles . . . either by letting them know that they're not the only ones who've felt this way about things, or by giving them a vicarious release of emotions they've kept bottled up. The act of writing, and especially poetry, has provided me with a great deal of benefit, but it would rejoice my heart even more to hear that someone else has found worth in my words.

Why I Shouldn't Run for Office

2009-10-16T17:19:00.000-07:00

Okay.

In the following blog, i will probably piss off or alienate plenty of people. It seems to be one of my basic skills, along with cooking and being able to rip pieces out of my brain and put them on paper.

In a recent discussion with my parents, one in which i was (probably accurately) described as being "too extreme" and/or "paranoid," i was ranting (as usual) about the current state of affairs in America, the world, and so on and so forth, blah blah blah, yackety smackety (i'll spare you the play-by-play), i was told that if i didn't like the way things were, i should run for office. Now, that's a really ridiculous idea: me, Todd Pack, aka Grendel, running for public office. Forget for a second that there's a lot in my past that could (and would) be dredged up and media-pumped into a huge scandal. Forget that the people with the most financial resources usually end up winning (like, say, having the manufacturer of voting machines being one of my major supporters). Let's zero in on what most of America totally ignores when voting: the issues. Oh, the candidates will TALK about issues, or take stupid things and transform them into issues, and then make promises regarding those issues that they intend to break as soon as they're in office. But, are the issues what it's really all about? Well, in case i'm ever stupid enough to try a stunt like this, and in case there are people in America stupid enough to vote for me, let me lay out a few of these issues and my opinions about them.

1) The Economy: Economists have been warning us, over the past decade--at least--that the consumer-driven economy (which is not quite the same as capitalism) is doomed to fail. Our current economy is based on consumers and commodities, and assumes that there will always be consumers capable of purchasing these commodities. Basically, the economy is top-heavy . . . those with the most pull the strings on what's popular, what's promoted, what's ignored, and all with the singleminded goal: to earn a profit. So far, so good. But, as we've seen in recent years, the accumulation of wealth seems to reveal a common flaw: GREED. Having more money doesn't satisfy . . . like any addiction, it reaches the point of diminishing returns, whereat the addict requires more of the same thing in order to reach that "high." I have nothing against capitalism in and of itself, but our economy is not BASED on capitalism, but is rather a malignant cancerous outgrowth of it. My attitude towards the economy is simply this: "You cannot serve God and Mammon." Period. The word "Mammon" represents material wealth and the things it can acquire. You might as well say "The Bank," "Profit," etc. I find it ironic (and infuriating) that so many people who self-avowed Christians seem to completely avoid this Biblical truth. It's as if the thought of Christ flies right out the window when it comes to turning a buck. Will the economy recover? Possibly. Will it take another down-turn? Probably. Will it ultimately fail altogether? ABSOLUTELY. I could get on a long side-track here by dissecting what people SAY about money and what their actions regarding money say about THEM, but that would probably turn into another rabid, foaming-at-the-mouth rant, and i do that enough as it is. So, let's turn to another subject.

2) War: What is it good for? Turning a profit (see the preceding paragraph). The United States, France, Great Britain, Russia, and China ALL turn a profit on arms sales. They sell to both sides of the fence. Don't think so? Well, those of you who are old enough (or have read history and retained any of the knowledge gained therefrom) will remember that when Russia was invading Afghanistan, the United States was supplying the Taliban with weapons, military technology, and training, in order to help keep Russia out. The same group of individuals who were involved in the 9/11 attack on American soil. This is just one recent, modern example of something that's gone on for centuries. Huge corporations stand or fall based on whether or not a war will occur, and how long it will go on, and how much profit can be gained from it while it continues. The people who supply these arms seldom--if ever--have to look on the carnage firsthand, or suffer one iota of the misery caused. Is war a necessary evil? Well, given mankind's track record, i'd have to say it probably is. But, if war is a necessary EVIL, how can ANY war be called "good?" Nowhere in the Quran do the words "holy" and "war" appear together, but the words "holy war" are bandied about by many who claim to be Islamic. Likewise, you'll find a lot of people who claim to worship the Prince of Peace, the One who commanded "LOVE YOUR ENEMIES," calling for war, citing "patriotism" as their reasoning. How exactly are we "loving our enemies" by lobbing bombs at them, by gaining huge profits from arms sales and developing new and improved ways of killing off more people, and then actually claiming that God WANTS this? Even if you're an agnostic, an atheist, or a voodoo priest, this "playing both sides of the fence" HAS to be ridiculous. The fact is, one one hand, we're (and by "we," i mean the United States) are condemning and attacking Islamic leaders and people in Iraq and Afghanistan because of human rights violations, and on the other hand are oppenly supportive of an individual like Suharto, who has kept his countried embroiled in civil war that has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths, an Islamic leader who, according to Bill Clinton, was "our kind of man." The war in the Middle East has been going on for thousands of years. Our "intervention" and "liberation" are insignificant drops of water in the comprehensive ocean of that war. But, now that we're there, and feel we have to protect our investments, we've been caught in what could be aptly described as a combination of a bear-trap and a land-mine. We're stuck in an explosive situation, and whether we stay there or leave, it's going to explode . . . but that's not a valid excuse to add more explosives.

3) Prayer in Schools, "Under God" in the Pledge, and Other Voodoo Semantics: The Christian Church has gone to bed with politics, and whenever that happens, the child of that union is a monster. I'm not going to belabor the point, just point out a few truths that should be self-evident. First of all, if you teach your kids to pray at HOME, then they'll carry that with them wherever they go. I often prayed in school . . . particularly before exams. There's nothing to prevent anyone from praying silently while they're IN school, or at work, or anywhere else. The government, by definition, cannot prohibit or forbid--this would be a violation of a Constitutional guarantee. Simply put, this "non-issue" is a way of throwing off responsibility. Christian belief is rooted in the concept of individual responsibility, and "family values" vary depending on the family in question . . . so, flush those buzzwords down the toilet. I ENCOURAGE people to pray at home, in school, at work, on the road, EVERYWHERE. And "prayer" isn't a wish-list, or a hotline to complain about the service. Prayer is intimate conversation with God. I don't want an unholy world having ANY say in how or when i pray. And, "In God We Trust" printed on our money is outright blasphemy, because when people get their hands on those bills, God's usually the last thing on their mind. "One Nation Under God"? Get with the program . . . ALL nations are under God, and just because people are repeating it by rote doesn't mean that they're actually thinking that . . . in fact, it's the other way around. Anyone can recite scripture, and they're often apt to do that if it makes them look good in public. But saying it and MEANING it are two different things. Jesus said of the Pharisees, "You strain at a gnat but swallow a camel whole!" It's the same thing here . . . you're quibbling over mere dogma and completely ignoring God's Spirit while you're doing it. YOU CANNOT LEGISLATE MORALITY. Christ's life, death, and resurrection put things back in order, making each of us responsible, making each of us "ground zero" for our own "revolution." You cannot please God by following rules, but rather by letting the Holy Spirit motivate you, changing you from the inside out. And if THAT happens, people around you will notice. Sure, you're going to encounter opposition, that's part of the deal . . . in fact, REJOICE when you encounter it, because it means you're doing what you're supposed to be doing! But others are going to follow your example, and be enriched by the way you live your life, and that's God working through you. Don't let the government, or any other earthly body, control the way you live your life before God. If you want to pray in school, pray. If you don't, don't. It's as simple as that.

4) The Sanctity of Marriage and the Right to Life: Okay, this could actually be a continuation of the preceding paragraph, but i've separated them for thematic purposes. I don't believe that homosexuals should be forbidden to have civil unions. Why not? Well, the same government that blathers about "the sanctity of marriage" has allowed legal brothels in Las Vegas. If they REALLY believed in it, they'd repeal those laws. It's hypocrisy for the government to deny homosexuals the right to be "married" in a civil ceremony . . . of course, nobody would THINK of interfering with Las Vegas' legalized brothels because--you guessed it--that's MONEY. PROFIT. Now, i don't think the Church should let itself be influenced by what the state does, one way or the other. First of all, the Separation of Church and State is healty for the Church, and for the government to try to demand that the Church allow such ceremonies infringes upon the Constitution. So, stop clamining that the "sanctity of marriage" is what you're really concerned with. It's just another holier-than-thou scheme, putting yourself on a higher level than other humans, acting like you don't or haven't sinned in ways that are just as wrong. If a man sleeps around with another man's wife, it's a small scandal; if he sleeps around with another man, that's a big scandal, but THEY ARE BOTH THE SAME SIN. Adultery is adultery. Now, as to the right to life, i DO NOT support abortion as a method of birth control. There are plenty of methods of protection, the best of wish is abstinence, to avoid creating a new life. If you ARE pregnant, carry the baby to term . . . because there are plenty of families out there who are willing, in fact EAGER, to adopt a baby. BUT: i don't believe that it's the right of the state to forbid it. In function, this works much like the Prohibition. The Prohibition did not stop drinkers from drinking . . . in fact, it just opened the door for organized crime, and resulted in more calamity. If you prohibit abortion, you open the door for free-lance abortionists, and women who want to get an abortion will do it somehow . . . there are records of women dying because they attempted to give themselves abortions using broken bottles stuck on the ends of broomsticks. If abortion is murder, it's on them . . . creating convoluted laws to make it illegal will only increase the prison poplulation, and as Charles Dickens observed, "in the courts, nobody wins but the lawyers."

There are plenty of other issues i could comment on, but my fingers are growing numb. Probably, i'll continue this in another chapter, as new ideas come to mind. Now, given the preceding paragraphs, there is no political party in the world that would have me as a member, and running as an independent is like painting a target on yourself for both Democrats and Republicans to take cheap-shots at. I'm better off remaining a poet, successful or non-successful, because poetry--thus far--has been the only vehicle that is capable of supporting my emotional storms. Everybody expects poets to be a little weird, anyway, and in that department i'm quite capable. I am as vocal a supporter of Freedom of Speech as the Right to Bear Arms, and in my case they're both the same thing. I have a hard enough time controlling myself, let alone guiding a city, state, county, or nation. I've got my hands full . . . i wouldn't want to burden others or myself with a position where i'd be attacked on all sides, both with pressures to conform and pressures to resist.

Enough said.

New Poem: Beyond the Edge of the Chessboard

2009-10-13T16:46:00.000-07:00

Beyond the Edge of the Chessboard
***
don't worry. be happy.
the politicians pharamceutical companies
bankers lawyers doctors
various NWO conspiracies
religious fakers
media whores
telephone name-takers
advertising CEO's
have got a PLAN for you.

they're not necessarily in collusion
but they're all selling variations of the same illusion
and, despite the apparently conflicting world-view solutions,
the resolution is always about
GREED.

gimme dat, gimme dat, gimme gimme gimme dat
MONEY.
whole lotsa
MONEY.

their quest for money seems funny
because in order to get it, they need to be phoney
because the reality of their ghoulish greed
even frightens them.
they have the best
drugs
cars
wars
bars
and various other ways of disguising themselves
and like all liars, are skilled at lying to themselves
to avoid the truth of six feet of dirt
all the land they'll ever really need
to hide their remains
until rot and decay
reveal humanity's true face
unmasked.

and, unlikely as it is,
they've sold these masks to us
telling us
don't worry, be happy
because happy faces sell products
happy faces make the malls more inviting
happy faces on the drug commercials
make you wonder what you're missing
if you don't take that blue pill
that gives you a 3-hour erection
blood rushing to a place
where (at least in the male body) it tends to remain
at the deficit of the brain.

What? You're not HAPPY?
You didn't buy the latest product?
You didn't read the Wall Street Journal?
You didn't give envy run of the house
so that you can get one-up on your neighbor
and own a bigger plasma TV, bigger SUV,
bigger ass from eating bigger burgers?
what are you, some kind of
intelligent, self-aware, thinking creature?
how EMBARRASSING.

And, here's a guy in the White House
who's been promising change,
but it's not likely to add any change to your pockets
while he's riding around in jets and limousines
and spending thousands on an inaugural ball
just like his predecessor, only more media-friendly
and a lot more articulate.
and look at all these glossy flyers
submitted to each post office box
by the latest political candidates
who seem to enjoy flinging poop at each other
like monkeys in the zoo
only, there's no bars around these animals,
so some of the shit's likely to land on you.

don't worry, be happy,
even when 2012 looms on the Mayan Calendar,
and even if it isn't the end of the world
all those wealthy men
will find a way to make the doomsday trend
line their pockets once again
(remember Y2K?)

don't be happy. worry.
we've let these idiots play the tune too long
it's the same old song they've played
since they nailed God's Son to a tree,
and they've even taken that piece of history
and used it for their own purposes
and if you buy into the lie, sucker,
YOU'VE been played.
you're just a pawn on the chessboard
allowed to move in tightly restricted lines
and if they need to sacrifice you
to protect their king and queen,
they won't hesitate . . .
step outside the lines
demand their attention
remind them that we outnumber them
and let them know what it's like
to WORRY.

New Poem: Know the Refrain

2009-10-10T18:44:00.000-07:00

Know the Refrain
***
it's like howling at the moon, and hearing it howl back
it's like watching the trees move in the breeze,
and feeling your veins do the same thing
it's like being tested by fire a hundred times
until only a core of diamonds remains
it's like listening to the same song a hundred times
just to hear the refrain

you wonder if you missed the train
reaching for a grip that slips out of your grasp
nothing but a gasp between you and forever
a well you're falling into
and something in the night calls your name
a phone ringing at midnight
with bad news breathing down your neck
a wreck of something you might have been
and you'll never build anything from the ruins
that won't fall down again
ashes, ashes, we all
fall down.

you can make your home look like a picture in a magazine
you can stake all your hopes on the American dream
you can break a thousand hearts looking for the right one
you can take from everybody you meet and not gain a thing.

something's missing.
meter, rhythm, rhyme
cadence and design
pages full of words that--
distilled into their purest form--
only repeat
LISTEN.
PLEASE LISTEN.
ARE YOU LISTENING?

Jesus saw us as sheep
and they nailed Him to a cross.
Paul called us idiots
and they locked him in a prison.
Socrates drank a poison cup
because he woke too many dreamers up.
Martin and Malcolm took a bullet
that was fired by 200 years of hate.

You're more likely to die for doing the right thing
and more likely to earn a profit for doing the wrong thing
and there's all these things laying around
radioactive, poisonous, dangerous
littering the ground we call history
but it's nobody's story but our own.
You wrote it.
I wrote it.
Worse yet, we let people we hardly knew
write it for us,
and our silence gave them consent
as long as we were kept content.

You've listen to this same song a hundred times . . .
i think by now
you know the refrain.

From the 2 Train Journals: Pursuit/Elusion

2009-10-06T20:18:00.000-07:00

the nature of this mystery i pursue
makes me wonder who's stalking who
rakish basilisk basking naked
adjacent to the azaleas,
brazen and emblazoned with
razored blades arranged
like blossoms that could be eyes;
this whole synthesis could paralyze
any system of allegory
that endeavored to tell its story.
fearful distances render feral dances
into microcosmic storms, atoms and
mad planets translate eternity into
something the senses can almost grasp,
grappling with the vatic beast
that sinks its teeth into my heart
and turns back into the night
with a scrap of me caught in its jaws.
it will not bear the locks and bars
of language's cages, passing
through my fogged glass like a whisper,
like a ghost, like smoke.
sleep eludes those who pursue
this dream that walks awake among us,
stung with wonder, sudnered
as if by thunders paws rending me into surrender
until hunger pains only remain
to entice me to chase it again.
beds and friends alike have fled
before the sligthest glimmer of it
in the eyes of those who've seen it--
it forces me to translate the oracular
by embracing the vernacular
without having an incestuous relationship with it;
and no matter how i make the verbs cavort
and nouns contort, the right words
forever elude my cages . . .
all i can do is show you
the holes it's torn in my soul,
and say,
"it's shaped sort of like this . . . ."

Feverish Rambling, Blogsprawl, and Dream-Journal #3: The Cacodaemon

2009-10-05T15:57:00.000-07:00

Felt on-and-off feverish for the past 24 hours or so. I finally weakened and took some aspirin, along with some goldenseal, just in case there's something in my system that needs to get purged. I don't know if it hurts or helps that i'm drinking Mountain Dew Voltage, but maybe the ginseng and caffiene will help rush the aspirin and goldenseal on its way. Either that, or it'll make having a fever slightly more entertaining.

I'm also having a case of "blogsprawl." I still have some passages that i want to mine out of my Myspace blog, which i don't post in anymore. Now i have a poem that i've posted in Facebook, because i recently discovered the "notes" tab where i can post more than a few lines at a time. Not that anybody's more likely to read my Facebook than they are this rambling diatribe, but i like to spread myself as broadly as possible in the internet. I had a Livejournal at one time, long ago, but most of that was cannabis-induced raving or just general ranting, or a combination of both.

I also need to post the dream i had last night. Like i said, they're becoming more vivid, either because i'm now making the conscious effort to remember them, or because i haven't written much poetry lately and the creative process tends to "spill over," or both. Anyway . . .
***
In this dream, i'm walking along a road in some mostly rural area . . . it reminds me of pictures i've seen of India, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, etc. There's a crowd of people ahead, dressed in various styles, apparently mourning a man who is laying on a raised concrete platform. Two other men are at a shrine at one end of the platform, cutting themselves and splashing their blood all over the corpse and the shrine. I understand that this is some kind of rite to try to raise the dead. The two men who have cut themselves have almost eviscerated themselves, and staggered away from the platform. The dead man begins to rise up, and a woman . . . perhaps a wife or mother, i'm not sure . . . runs over and says, "You've returned to me, _____" (The blank is the man's name, which i cannot remember). The man laughs in a horrible voice, and says, "_____ is DEAD!" I then understand that a demon has inhabited this corpse, and now staggers almost drunkenly, with a horrible leering smile on his face, to a corral where there is a small bull-like creature. He stands and lets the creature attack him, goring him . . . and then the bull's face distorts, and i realize that the demon has gone from the body of the man to inhabit the bull . . . the creature runs out of the corral, and i am suddenly afraid to meet it's gaze, or draw it's attention in any way . . .but it sees me and runs over to me, not goring me but rubbing up against me. I am repulsed by this, and i cry out, "I bind and rebuke you in the name of Christ! I cast you into the Abyss on that Authority!" The bull then seems to crumple, and then fades out completely. None of the people who are around appear to notice either me or the bull's bizarre behavior and disappearance, but i'm overwhelmed with a sense of relief as if from some tragedy barely avoided. At that point i awaken.
***

I think i know what it was.

Poem: Untitled 10/03/09

2009-10-03T17:40:00.000-07:00

Untitled: 10/03/09
***
to bend the untiring ear that listens,
you want to stand in the wind and scream silently,
mouth open as if
you would swallow the moon whole
and become something for coyotes to sing about.
why mourn the loss of things you never had;
when opportunity knocks, only to apologize
that it's mistaken your door for someone
more important, more deserving,
and wouldn't you feel better giving them a handout
like dharma-bum wannabes
who live their entire lives
in a state of mind
that they call "Zen," but is as easily achieved
by pharmaceutical accidents and moldy cheese?
something like a fever crawls just
below your eyebrows, behind your eyes,
an animal thing that crept down
from the aurora borealis
to lay its eggs in your frontal lobe.
when the temperate rainforest changes its garb,
trees shedding green for scarlets and yellows
that burn away so rapidly,
and you hate the sight of clocks
and feel the eyes of something stalking you,
as it eyes that connection between brain and spine
where the animal and the archetype meet . . .
that thing might be a poem with a dagger in its teeth,
or the last breath, last drink, last cigarette, last
sharp inhalation of breath for a scream
you'll never give birth to.
it doesn't matter. the impossible never happens
when you're waiting for it.
there's no recliner in which to view apocalypse,
and CNN isn't going to bring you hourly updates
on the burning of human souls
as you reach for the remote to switch
to a more comfortable channel.
consumers are a commodity, just something else
that is ultimately consumed.
autumn is here, the children locked in schools,
men and women locked in jobs
where fake fall foliage is decking their stalls,
a failed attempt at levity in a place
where the counting of heavy metals
only increases the gravity,
and the moon is getting closer every night,
but the coyotes are blind
and only the poets can howl.

Dream Journal #2: The Mephit

2009-10-01T22:17:00.000-07:00

In this dream, i am in a place that appears much like our family's camp on the Greenbrier River. Throughout the dream, there is a child's voice, narrating the events as i experience them. I am vaguely aware that there are other people in the campsite, but i neither see nor encounter them directly. There is a creature that i first identify as a skunk, loose in the room. I try to get it to leave by throwing various objects at it, but it isn't deterred by this. As it moves about, it seems to become more intelligent, somewhat anthropomorphic. It begins moving various objects in the room, tilting pictures sideways, disarranging various knick-knacks, and otherwise "messing things up." I was distressed by this for reasons unknown. The creature moves into another room, apparently intending to further it's mischief, when i hear the child's voice talking about the creature, saying, "But he didn't know about the _____ upstairs that was going to stop him." (The blank represents a word that i don't know). At that point, i hear a sound from the attic space. It seems to be a mixture of an eagle's cry, and owl's call, and a woman's scream. It is frightening because i don't know the source, but i also understand that it means to harm the creature and not me. At that point, i awaken.

Out of the Ashes XXIV: A Poem

2009-09-28T23:52:00.000-07:00

he experienced
the whole thing
in a dim room, and--
as always--it starts with a dame.

in the shadows, the most curvaceous
temptress whispered lasciviously,
reclining like a Titian
in the bowl . . .
"eat me,"
and, oh,
she was
juicy to the core.

planting the remains
by moonlight
seemed almost a sacrament
to mark that sweetness
forever in the small rites
that made up
his life.

in later years
in that city, lovers
would--when departing
temporarily from
one another's company--
exchange the word
"pear"
like a wet kiss.

Alchemy 101: A Poem

2009-09-27T10:02:00.000-07:00

Alchemy 101
***
can i use alchemy to enhance my poetry?
or is that a faux-pas? is it a Freudian slip when i let my pheromones
combine with oils of white musk, sandalwood,
patchouli, and mango
to achieve some substantial subliminal impact,
and reach an even deeper level
in the trenches of your mind?
and how about those "energy drinks"
that turn me rabid, jitter my nerves and jive my senses
until i'm keyed up like a piano
tuned 2 octaves higher
than the rest of the orchestra?
oh, i see.
you thought i was talking about
metaphorical alchemy. we ALL do that.
this whole poetic quest is reaching for some Philosopher's Stone,
but i got a C in my Philosophy 101
for telling the professor that 90% of all philosophy
was just convoluted excuses people came up with
for doing what they would have done anyway.
i guess my philosophy of poetry is that it is alchemy,
a sort of neverending journey into Mystery
seeking the Sublime.
i didn't have to contrive a philosophy for this,
it's something that's encoded into my DNA
by the Master Alchemist . . .archived in the tomes of the Most High.
He teaches me as i go along . . .my alchemical skill is still
that of an apprentice, but Who better to teach
than the One by whose Word Void became Light,
and Death became Life
when the stone rolled away
to reveal the true Rock to a desperate world?

Shadows of a Twilight Empire: Chapter One

2009-09-26T20:39:00.000-07:00

Reading over the blogs of two of my friends, Jeff Crook and Browning Keister, i'm realizing that my style and format are somewhat lacking. I'm not really discussing anything of radical importance to any "scene," and most of the work i do in this blog is dealing with the convolutions of my own twisted psyche. Outside of a couple of halfway-decent poems, most of this is just rambling, and probably incredibly boring to the people who persuse it (assuming that anyone does). I'm experiencing a sort of mental version of writer's cramp . . . the mental muscles i've used for so long to write poetry have been focused primarily on what i might call "slammetry," i.e., poetry specifically written to be performed. It's ironic that, while living in one of the spoken word capitals of the United States, i took very little advantage of the opportunities that surrounded me at the time. I've also wondered why i haven't "blogged" about my adventures and misadventures while living in NJ and then in NYC.

Okay.

I lost most of my material wealth thanks to a housefire. I had books, CD's, and all of my papers certifying that, yes, in fact, i AM Robert Todd Pack, a legal resident of the United States, not a terrorist--well, an ART TERRORIST, maybe. Also most of my clothes and some knick-knacks that, while not exactly precious, certainly had some sentimental value. Part of this was that, apparently, a large box of my stuff i'd packed up was either mistaken for trash or simply purloined by the people who came in to fix the house. I was lucky to rescue my cat, my computer, certain books, and a couple of tomes of hard copy of my poetry. Pretty much everything else was toasted, smoked, or soaked. (Even this small scattering of stuff was later partially destroyed when the basement of the house i had lived in in the Bronx--where a lot of my stuff was stored until i returned to Roanoke--was flooded). As far as my job in NJ was concerned, that was the least of my worries . . . my district manager was happy to transfer me to a store in the Bronx . . . and my friend there was giving me a rent-free room for 6 months. I thought, "6 months, cool, i can accomplish a lot in that time, and will surely find some other place to live by that time." Some of my earlier journaling in my blog reveals that optimistic state of mind. I was getting good hours at my job, but i ended up spending a lot of what i gained as simple "mad money." I've never been very good with finances . . . an understatement, to be sure.

About a month after i'd moved into my furnished room in the Bronx, i was sitting on my bed, writing poetry, listening to some music, just pretty much chilling out. Outside, i heard 3 loud sounds that i immediatedly identified as gunfire. I'd never heard gunshots outside of a few adolescent hunting trips (and, partly because i couldn't keep my big mouth shut even when hunting, there weren't many of those either, because i succeeded in scaring off anything living that didn't require a hearing aid). I turned off my music, and outside heard a loud crowd of people . . . it sounded to me like a mob. One voice shouted out over the other voices, "We're number one! We're number one! We're STILL number one!" Then, as the other voices died out, i heard a car, and the same voice in a lower tone say, "Come on, let's get out of here." The car drove off . . . not speeding, but not taking it easy either. At that moment, my brain kinda vapor-locked, and i thought, "Oh, shit, i'm living in the Bronx." I was the whitest cracker on the block. Later on that night, some detectives came around, asking questions. I simply told them what i'd heard. When asked by one cop if i'd looked out the window when i heard the crowd, i said, "No, sir, i did NOT look out. I distinctly heard three shots, which meant that even if the shots were fired from a revolver, there were three bullets out there, and i didn't want my name on any of them." The cops took it easy on me, they could see i was shaken up a bit. That was an understatement. The next day, i saw a shrine up by the bodega, for a kid--he couldn't have been older than 16, if that--called "Li'l Bit." I stopped and lit a stick of nag champa incense that i carried around in my backpack, and said a brief prayer for the kid's family and friends. Three Black guys who were standing nearby watched me carefully while i did this, and as i stood up to leave, one of them stepped closer to me and said, "Good lookin' out." I looked in the newspapers the next day, but not one mention of the kid. NOT ONE. No, instead, the front pages were plastered with the latest Hollywood scandal. THIS KID HAD BEEN SHOT AND NOBODY GAVE A SHIT. When people hear my ranting or pronouncements about the media, the "system," etc., they call my paranoid or cynical. My parents have even said that. FUCK that, that was REALITY that night, and my idealistic visions were shattered as sure as if it was the gunshots that hit them. Crack, crack, crack! I also realized at that time the simple reality that a lot of New Yorkers seem to accept without a qualm: this stuff goes on all the time. The people i hung out with at the park--"Park Rats," some of them even took that moniker on themselves--could just as easily have been that boy. I think of how i'd felt if it had been Spider or Smoke or Shadow or Papo or Pharaoh or one of the other guys i now called friends, who'd been shot. I mean, Pharaoh even had scars where he'd been shot before--i'd seen 'em. I knew that a lot of those guys were what the "norms" would call "criminals," "hoods," or "degenerates." Almost all of them drank, and several of them used cocaine. Almost everyone at the Park smoked pot--even i did (yes, i smoked pot, okay, fucking deal with it), but almost everyone in NYC either smokes it or has smoked it at one time or another (wonder what my Grandmother with her "when in Rome, do as the Romans do" philosophy would have thought about that, ha ha). Mostly, when i went up to the park, i was either involved in playing Magic the Gathering, or talking poetry, philosophy, and theology. It always amazed me how many of these streetwise kats were actually intellectuals in wolves' clothing. Or maybe just intellectual wolves. And there i was, a sheep in wolves' clothing, not dangerous, not a fighter, a whitebread guy from the South, and yet i was accepted. It took a while . . . and not everyone there trusted me, i found out later--in fact, the ones that didn't trust me were the least trustworthy themselves, and seemed to regard my honesty and lack of "hood-pretense" with suspicion.

It was Spring and Summer, and i spent most of my days well into twilight and evening there, associating with riff-raff . . . or so some would say. There are no limits to friendship, and quite a few of them came to regard me almost as a go-to guy when it came to the Christian faith. I encountered some opposition because of it, but not as much as you might think. I was always willing to talk to someone who had questions, and didn't pretend to have all the answers, and i didn't try to cram my beliefs down people's throats. I felt like a Lone Ranger for a while, until Conscience and i met up and started to hang around. Jesus didn't get a corporate job or hang around with the high and mighty . . . He spent His time with the people who were lost, the "losers," the "outsiders." People knew that what i had, i shared. I'd buy energy drinks, candy, whatever, and just share them around. Smoke particularly started respecting me early on, because i brought him a matching hat, scarf, and a pair of gloves back when i was living in Jersey, after i'd started making a regular weekly trip to the park to hang out. Pharaoh and i had spent hours of time together at his place in Jersey, staying up all night playing "Soulcalibur 2." These guys weren't BAD people. Yes, they engaged in illegal activities. Yes, they did a lot of things that i wouldn't do, and i could have gotten "bagged" by association by cops who--in New York--are just as happy to harrass two for the price of one. I didn't have "respectable" friends. But i had friends who, at the very least, didn't pretend to be things that they weren't. Sure, they had flashy names, and some of the typical macho bragging went on, but everybody knew when it was real and when it was bullshit.

Whereto tends all this? Other than trying to give people a sort of play-by-play of my experiences, and how they've impacted me, i'm simply saying i'm fed up. I'm tired of the way these so-called "criminals" and "outcasts" are regarded by society. Even people who are close to me in every other way seem to look down on my friends. These are people who shared what little they had with me, and who helped me out in whatever way they could when i was down-and-out . . . i'll go into details about this in later posts (this has already turned into a rather wordy chapter). IF YOU CANNOT WALK AMONG THEM, YOU CANNOT HELP THEM. No amount of political action, ratification, "charity dinners," or other elitist posturings are going to do them any good. YOU DON'T KNOW THEM. And when one of them gets shot, you just label them "thugs," and think "good riddance." When you think like that, i want you to remember what the Ghost of Christmas Present said to Scrooge: "It may be that in the sight of Heaven, you are no more fit to live than this poor man's child."

Morning Mourning

2009-09-26T09:45:00.000-07:00

Last night, i had a dream about performing a poem. It was a new poem, one i haven't written. And when i woke up, i could actually remember a whole section of the poem . . . and, like an idiot, i didn't immediately transcribe it. And now it's GONE!!! I can't even remember a single LINE from that poem, and i'm really frustrated and angry and pissed off and several other words i won't mention even in a blog.

It has been a busy morning. My parents and i did a major cleaning of the kitchen . . . we've been going room by room, cleaning the house, washing the curtains, even putting new carpet in the TV room. Today, new blinds in the kitchen, and it was also a cooking day. Mom started out making her ginger-snaps (i had the first one hot out of the oven!) Then, it was my turn, baking up homemade party mix (Dad's recipe), and later today Dad's making homemade bread. At some point, we'll mix the mulling spices with the cider and put that on in the crock pot. And all day long i was mourning the loss of my dream. I've got to stay on target with that.

Right now, i feel very blah. So i'm going to wait until later and try to post something meaningful in this blog.

F'WAH!

2009-09-25T18:24:00.000-07:00

Fwah, also spelled "F'wah," is a cosmic sound made by the Universe. Sort of like, "Om," but less dignified. It can also be used as a sort of enthusiastic greeting, usually immediately following the person's name. Also known as an emotion of impending disaster.
"Galactus! F'wah!"
"This cosmic notion fills me with a great sense of fwah."
"Tony! If you don't turn off that Gravonic Blaster, this whole neighborhood is gonna go f'wah!"

http://www.urbandictionary.com/

Drive-By Ranting

2009-09-25T09:18:00.000-07:00

There's a hurricane driving by
in an old Hudson Terraplane, screaming
about some future fusion of YouTube, the New World Order,
and something that some people call Utopia
and a state of mind some people call Bliss
and a fear that not enough people are Pissed Off enough
to whistle up a wind of change.

Obama's promising change, but it hasn't added
any loose change in my pockets, and isn't apt to.
Cheney hasn't changed, his eyes still like two
rabid animals in their sockets, gibbering about
terrorists that may be roaming the streets
while he earns money every time something blows up.
The overblown drama that ensares so many of my friends
hasn't changed; they've only added new faces to their rosters,
a roll-call of losers and outcasts in which i'm depicted
and captured as well.
"Money Changes Everything," Lauper hiccups, but
money hasn't changed itself. We sell hours of our time
for less of it every day, and exchange it for even less,
and having it has become a set of shackles
that binds us like Marley's ghost.

Take some pills! See a shrink! Watch TV!
Eat some fucking McFood! Go see a movie
the production costs of which
would easily feed an entire third-world nation
for a year! Set that terrorist alert level on Orange
and watch the voters scurry about
like ants when their anthill's been kicked apart
by some giant kid with a squirt pistol!
Take a picture! Post a film of something stupid
on YouTube! It's YOU! It's TV! The lowest
common denominators of reality
screwing each other into senility
while the pharamceutical companies and
insurance companies do a line-dance
to a tune called "We Are The World,
We Cause the Misery, We Reap the Profits!"
The opiate of the masses is . . . .
EVERYTHING! As long as you've got a lot of it,
it keeps you numb!

If you combine Gas-X and xenoestrogens and
toxic chemicals in our dryer sheets and
whatever brainkiller your psychiatrist prescribes
and toothpaste with flouride
and carbon monoxide
and something to curb your erectile dysfunction,
you get Fully Functional Plastic Poseable
Disposable Consumers, just plug them in
and they'll watch QVC and buy stuff
until their brains rot!

And the ones that don't plug in
are terrorists, paranoid, antisocial,
malcontents . . .
they'll make perfect scapegoats
for all the societal side-effects or,
failing that, Soylent Green.

Labels for this post: scooters, vacations, fall,
Humpty Dumpty, dumpster-diving, free-fall,
downsizing, No Skateboarding Allowed in This Park,
computers, and poop.

P.S.--Go watch CSI, so you can figure out what they're using
to prove that you're guilty, and fuck reasonable doubt,
everybody's guilty.

Repost of a Section of a Longer Rant on my Myspace Blog

2009-09-24T20:21:00.000-07:00

If you really want to change things, in any way, for the better, it's wise to start investing your time and energies in the upbringing and positive regard for the youth. Seldom do their needs get considered, except in terms of numbers or when some event (such as Columbine) makes the headlines. Even then, they're only used as platforms for various political parties. We had a "Million Mom March," now how about a "Million Youth March?" A lot of kids are disgusted with the moral decay and lack of concern in our nation and in nations abroad, but unfortunately our nation seems to be more concerned with sating or sedating the kids, streamlining them into one political party or the other, and saturating them with "SOL's" that don't provide coping mechanisms. Prayer in Schools: there's another issue that gets bandied about a lot, but it's a contemtible attempt by parents to shuck off the responsibility of their children's spiritual growth on a bureaucracy that is run by out-of-touch politicians and delegated through a bunch of overworked, underpaid teachers. I always felt like the prayers uttered by the various representatives of the school system were "recorded messages," completely devoid of meaning. That didn't stop me from praying on my own . . . silently, or with a group of friends who shared a common Faith. I certainly don't want the spiritual growth of my niece and nephew to be "handed off" to some faceless bureaucracy that claims to care for them while it's strangling the life out of them. From my own standpoint, the Christian Church is partly responsible for moral decay . . . by succumbing to various political views, by extravagant expenditures on funds to improve the buildings that house the body of believers as opposed to doing something constructive with the youth. I'm not talking about shallow indoctrination, either . . . kids AREN'T mass-produced, and have individual concerns and needs that vary greatly depending on their situation. There's that old saw about "you can't fit a square peg into a round hole." Well, then, STOP DRILLING ROUND HOLES! Stop EXPECTING everyone to easily be categorized or pigeonholed . . . to do that is to rob the individuals of the very individuality bestowed on them by their Creator!

Dream Journal #1: Two Dogs

2009-09-23T22:55:00.000-07:00

I've decided, based on the fact that my dreams are becoming more vivid lately, to begin dream-journaling again. Most of the ones i experience will be blogged. I recently had one that was oddly disturbing, and hasn't lost it's potency, which i'll transcribe here.

In the dream, i'm walking along a roadway through what appears to be a rather run-down part of a town. Most of the houses or buildings along the way are facing away from this road . . . back fences and garbage cans are present. There are several individuals sitting or standing along the road . . . all appear to be ragged, and i understand in the dream that they're homeless, and in various states of intoxication. I approach an area where garbage cans are sitting, and see a dog, possibly a mongrel with some German Shepherd ancestry. The dog is emaciated, with unkmept fur. Still, i attempt to befriend it . . . i call it over, and pat its head. The dog becomes excited, and through the dream i hear music, and what appears to be the dog's "thoughts." Although i don't recall the exact words, the run of the thoughts (which continue until i awaken) i'm getting are both plaintive and somehow menacing. The dog follows me, jumping at first in a way that seems almost playful, but then it grips my arm in its jaws. I'm not aware of any pain, but there is a sense of weight, tugging, and i'm hindered in my motions. I continue walking away, trying to get away from the dog, but it stays with me, not releasing my arm. I pass along a chain-link fence bordering what appears to be a baseball field. The overall look of the sky and trees appears to be winter, and there are spots of snow and puddles of water along the way, but no sense of cold. I become aware of another dog that's moving alongside of me, but on the other side of the mongrel. It appears as a full-blooded German Shepherd, but full-bodied and with a very healthy-looking coat. I sense this dog is extremely friendly, and doesn't wish me any harm. As i pass by the baseball field, there are discarded packages of half-eaten snacks along the way, an i think momentarily of trying to distract the dog that's holding on to me with these, but i also fear that it will only encourage the mongrel to follow me. It's at this point that i wake up.

New Poem: Ascension

2009-09-22T21:20:00.000-07:00

Ascension
***
perilous elements sublimated,
crucibled in a bone bowl;
rare earths birthed from base metals,
composition of a greater Whole.
Master Alchemist applies the flame
to His students' craft, the purifier
that burns away the dulling dross
revealing the vessels' higher.
Forged in golden sunset wonder,
sharpened by onerous toil,
we become gifts to give the Giver
in bodies no longer born of soil.

----------------

This is one i just wrote tonight. Not sure how good it is . . . it needs work, but i'm fairly happy with the result.

Crisis? WHAT Crisis?

2009-09-20T12:43:00.000-07:00

For the past couple of months, i feel like i've been "stuck." This is partly from my own frenzied and manic nature, partly because Roanoke is (God forgive me for saying this), in many ways, the same emotional and intellectual quagmire it was when i left, and partly because i don't see any real "progress" in my own life since i returned. Well, to rethink that last, i -AM- a great deal healthier and several very necessary pounds heavier than i was when i arrived here looking like one of those skeletons you string up on your front porch at Halloween to scare the living shit out of any trick-or-treaters.

This being Sunday, once again i attended church with Lewis Kleiner, as we're sort of "surveying" the churches in the Roanoke area. So far, the experiences have been mostly uplifting and on-point. And, as the tradition builds, Lewis and i end up talking up and down the range of our life-experiences, and we came to a focal point: does God really want me to go back to NYC, or am i misreading my own desire (one that's not without qualms) as God wanting me to go back to NYC? Now, this might seem like a non-question to people outside of my circle of close friends, or to people who don't give what God thinks a second thought, OR people who assume that just because they want something, it must be what God wants. If you've waded through those qualifications and are still standing, good. (If not, go look at some porn or look at your stocks or Google F'wah, whichever gets you off more). The point is, i really don't want to assume anything about this. When i talked with my Pops about this a couple of evenings ago, he said, "There's nothing for you 'up there,'" and by 'up there' he means NYC. I responded, "There's nothing for me 'down here,' either!" Maybe we were both wrong, or maybe we were both limited by our perspectives on this. What i need is God's perspective. I refer to my time in NJ and NYC as a "self-imposed exile into Babylon," which sounds campy and a bit bombastic, but it's really not much of a conceptual stretch. I needed some of the things that happened to me there--good AND bad--and have come back a changed person in many ways. I'm a little harder, a little more streetwise, and a lot more skeptical about the government, the "system," or anything else that pretends to be organized by cloaking itself in a bureaucracy that's supposed to "help people" while simultaneously generating a huge profit for the people who are running it. I'm also a lot surer that my Faith is the most important thing in my life, the only thing that remained rock-solid during that whole time. Now that i'm in comfortable circumstances, well-fed, and not quite as afraid of getting shot at, it's become very easy for me to slump back into torpor, a sort of stagnant complacency that sucks like quicksand. I SIMPLY CANNOT LIVE LIKE THAT.

In conversation, Lewis brought up several good points (and he usually does) that skewered me right where i needed to be skewered. I rise to the crisis well . . . i can be rock-steady in a crisis situation, especially when i'm manic, but when there's no crisis to contend with, i feel limp and useless, and have the self-destructive tendency to try to GENERATE a crisis just so i can feel like i'm actually "dealing" with something! Right now, the danger--or crisis, if you will--is the stagnation, the complacency, and my total lack of patience. It's going to take a LOT more prayer, and less "worrying," to get into the mindset i need to be in. Who am i? Who am i to God, and what direction or purpose does He have laid at my feet? I wrote earlier in my blog about "waiting on the Lord," and it seems like i talk a good fight but when it comes to actually walking it out, i'm falling flat on my face. Right now, everything i'm involved in (re-establishing the paperwork of an "identity," getting a job, taking care of myself re. health and--particularly--my Spiritual health), are not things that i'm going to see rapid progress in. It's a PROCESS, which means i have to go through all the steps--in order--to get where i need to be. And that's TOUGH for someone like me. But that's what needs to be done, and that's what WILL be done, because i simply cannot fling aside these necessities and go off on another tear, or have another emotional/mental breakdown that drags everyone around me down. Irionically, these slow processes (and, in the case of dealing with the bureacracy, often pointless and unnecessarily complicated) are creating the circumstances of a crisis. Just not the sudden, explosive kind i'm used to dealing with. It's not like having an autistic kid take a bite out of your arm, or watching several of your friends get drunk, loud, and increasingly aggressive to the point that sooner or later somebody is going to do something both painful and stupid, or being fired from your job because you won't kiss your boss' ass (or whatever lame excuse they use to cover up the fact that they're really firing you because your ass-kissing isn't up to the corporate standards thereof). No, this is a completely different kind of crisis. One that the patience and peace that only Jesus can bestow are completely necessary equipment for. I'm thankful for this time of peace, even though the lack of conflict sometimes scares me . . . i just need to make the most of it. Harder times and other crisis situations will come--that much i'm sure of--and when they do, God will give me everything i need to survive them. He hasn't failed me yet, and i know for certain now that no matter what anybody else thinks, says, or does, He will NEVER forsake me.

14th & 5th: A Poem, Before the Magic All Turned Black

2009-09-18T20:09:00.000-07:00

14th & 5th
***
saturday afternoon splattered with tuesday paint
off the pathtrain on 14th & 5th
follow the rush of wind up the stairs
shades mask the wolfish gaze
stepping into a maze where
walking is like wading waist-deep.
sleep abandoned me, hypnos and morpheus
are on a hunger strike, leaving me
lean as a wraith, hungry like cassius standing in line
at little caesar's, hungry for a poem
like a slab of broiled animal flesh on a bun
. . .or maybe just the animal itself,
something i have to hunt down while it's hunting me
like lon chaney with a hangover.
something this dangerous shouldn't be so much fun
something this turbid shouldn't laugh, or cough, or
walk, or run . . . a philosopher's stone, stoned
and tripping on the heat-shimmer ripple
over sizzling sidewalks and street-corner alchemists.
i feel like i could survive on the air itself,
something i could reach out and cut into slices,
priceless and poisonous and a thousand times more
carnivorous than any lean and tawny frame
leaning in a doorway. eyes
cut slices of me, a little piece for each,
plenty of spectacle to go around. i'm just
part of the whole sideshow, you know, not
freakish enough to steal the whole thing, but
snapshots of my own, apple peeled down to the bare core,
down to my favorite incense store
where the shopkeeper kneels and faces the east
his eyes focused on something i can't see.
i feel like i should take off my shades
and stand in the sunlight, gazing up in awe
like a tourist, another visitor. it makes me feel
naked, but i won't turn my eyes away, and i
won't pretend that i'm not amazed.
this is like a book i've searched for all my life,
and if tomorrow finds me half a continent away,
it won't stop me from turning to the east
several times a day
to the mecca i found. or maybe it found me.
or maybe we just met each other
on the street. i won't look over my shoulder,
i know what's following me, and
what i'm leaving behind. when everything catches up
with me, i guess i'll be right here
where i still don't know if i'm going to be able to
breathe, and i'm terrified, holding my breath, but something here
is doing my breathing for me
and each lungfull is just another poem waiting
in the wings, and another poem
is stalking me. thank God
the pen is still mightier than the sword,
or maybe they're just two ways of looking
at the same thing.
perspective is a piece of fruit
on the branches of this unknowable tree,
and something that holy is dangerous, but the fruit is ripe.
i have so much work to do.
the time for harvest is now.

The First Poem I've Written Since NYC: Lane's End

2009-09-14T18:03:00.000-07:00

Lane's End
***
the lights don't penetrate, here
where grapevines yellowing in the cooling September
cast their kraken-shadows
over a fire-scar.
a femur protrudes from the carpet
of tree-shed tapestry, other
bones no doubt lying deeper.
Micheloeb, Bud Ice, Southpaw, Miller Lite
glitter like cheap armor in the gravel;
Philly Blunts have spilled their guts,
a torrid adolescence read in these remains.
it's haunted, whatever
they said or did still hangs in the air,
the way the smells of cigarettes and sex
are caught in the curtains
of cheap hotels.
spearmint, motherwort, vetch,
yarrow, goldenrod, and rot
of blackberry-vince tangles
work their own magic. something
is caught, snarled
in these brambles
and empty bottles.
it was like this seven years ago;
now, only the names and faces
have changed, hanging
like ghost-mask lanterns.
here at the heron's bend of the creek,
the sleepers wake
to walk in the green dark
and search for what's left here
by those who've gone before
and left their mark
on the soul of this place.

***************************
This is the first poem i've written since i returned from NYC . . . it's about a place down at the end of a gravel side-road here in Bonsack. Not sure what i was getting at here.

How I Became "Grendel"

2009-09-13T20:57:00.000-07:00

Grendel, in Beowulf, was a monster of some kind. There are different concepts of what he was . . . some say a dragon-like creature, others say he was more like an ogre or giant, and still others say he was a descendant of the Biblical Cain.
The way i picked up the nickname is kind of humorous. Back in late 1999 and early 2000, there were a group of us--Slam poets--in my hometown of Roanoke, who started going to schools doing exhibitions of Slam poetry. Word got around to several middle and high schools that we were turning kids on to the concept of poetry, giving them a different view than what they'd had from textbooks. Teachers loved getting the kids hooked on something that would have been regarded as "dull"or "boring." We presented in perhaps a dozen middle and high schools, as well as a couple of local colleges. The first school we went to, we were performing for a single classroom (later on, we packed auditoriums!). The current unit that they were studying in English class was "Beowulf." The teacher asked if we could somehow tie that concept into our presentation. That "hook" was given to me, and of course i told the kids that Slam was actually a modern-day descendant of the old oral tradition . . . that the concept of "competition poetry" went back to ancient Greece, and to the Anglo-Saxon bardic tales . . . and then i performed this poem i wrote, called "Sympathy for Grendel," which was a re-telling (albeit much shorter) of the Beowulf story from Grendel's point of view, that Grendel was just a victim of "bad press." Pretty soon, the Slammers occasionally referred to me as "Grendel." When i moved to NJ, i dusted off the moniker, and decided that since Grendel was a predator who trashed the "status quo" of his time, that the new Grendel personna was perfect for my rants and tirades. It also fits with the kind of stage presence i adopt when i'm performing those rants . . . stalking around, glaring at the audience, kind of a "predatory" stance. When i went to the Open Mic in Newark for the first time, i signed in simply as "Grendel." That's how i was known there from that point on. Later, hanging out in NYC, i introduced myself to the Union Square "Park Rats" as Grendel, and that's what most of them still would call me. Ask 'em about Todd, and only a couple would know who you were talking about. Ask 'em about "Grendel," and they'll probably tell you some stories. Some of 'em might even be true. You never know . . . .

Deconstructing Inevitable Discovery

2009-09-13T20:33:00.000-07:00

Deconstructing Inevitable Discovery
***
you hear that phrase a lot if you watch
Law & Order. usually, it's the cops
or Jack McCoy with his bushy eyebrow-scowl,
saying, in essence, "Well,we would've found it anyway."
yes, indeedy.
after all the things they don't depict on TV shows go down.
after they bust down the door to your apartment
because of a "sound, suspiciously like
a woman being strangled" (you were
gargling in the bathroom), they charge in
and go tearing around looking for a victim and a criminal,
and in that frenzied search, a cop opens a closet
and your jacket falls out, dislodging
half a blunt that you stashed there
a week ago and forgot about,
and they call it "evidence of criminal activity,"
and since buying drugs supports terrorism(it said so on TV),
it's "aiding and abetting," too,
and then when they come to drag you
out of the bathroom, and you try to grab a bathrobe
because you're stark naked, they call it "resisting arrest"
and throw you down a flight of stairs, and
your face hits the pavement and your teeth get knocked out
and fall into the gutter, and they charge you with "littering."
and that's BEFORE the ATF gets involved,
assuming your apartment building is a drug operation,
possbly a terrorist organization,
or a suspicious gathering of people from other nations,
so they firebomb the whole neighborhood and get a commendation
from the President.
first it's Philly, then it's Waco,
guess who's coming to dinner?
paramilitary exercises in the ghetto!
Newark, you may already be a winner!
it's clearly evident that
the inevitable discovery in this case
is that things like this
have already happened . . . and,
inevitably, somebody will discover an excuse
to make it happen again. Pity there's no
real McCoy to prosecute the real criminals
in THIS drama.

TV Died

2009-09-10T20:40:00.000-07:00

Scanning through the available shows on the TV Guide channel is infuriating. Not just because, regardless of the number of channels, there's nothing that i really want to watch; what's worse is Hollywood 411, which is probably the most mind-numbing jackhammer of media drivel in existence. Just recently, it's been worse, because--even after the guy's been BURIED--they're still talking about Michael Jackson, or how the rest of the Jackson family is handling the situation . . . SHUT THE FUCK UP ALREADY! Of course, there's something suspicious about his death . . . the guy was completely messed up and, in latter years, had started to look decidedly creepy. And, anytime somebody "important" dies, well of COURSE there's got to be something suspicious going on, and if there isn't, by golly, Hollywood will MAKE it look suspicious, just to milk every last dollar out of a decaying corpse.

Having not seen anything i wanted to watch, i shut off the TV and decided to vent in my blog. I suppose i could create a good "rant" poem out of it, but i actually began to think about articulating my rage in prose. Reason being, the whole concept of Celebrities. Now, most of America somehow seems to believe that Celebrities (capital C added for ironic purposes) are different from "normal" people (i.e., people who don't have anyone chasing them down the streets with cameras or shoving those phallic-looking microphones in their face), and therefore should somehow rate more highly than the rest of us. People watch them play their dramas out in public scrutiny, and then try to ape their fashions, parrot their one-liners, or engage in other utterfly futile attempts to make believe that they're one of them. In other words, it's not only phony, it's faking somebody else's phoniness. I mean, honestly, do you REALLY give a shit what product thus-and-so is pimping on TV, just because somebody paid them an amount of money that makes what most of us make look like chump change (and, for most of us, that's exactly what we do make)? Do you actually think that those people are any DIFFERENT than you? Why are their flaws, foibles, quirks, mistakes, and failures any less a quagmire than the ones you're snared in, or somehow more INTERESTING than yours? Think about it this way: how would YOUR life look if it were scrutinized daily, if all the skeletons in your closet were dragged out, the bones gnawed by hyenas with camcorder-lenses for eyes, if you were nagged and hounded and picked apart constantly by pundits and media whores who get paid to do just that?

Personally, i'm tired of people who get paid so much just to parade around in somebody else's fashion lines, to advertise this brand of lipstick or motor oil or non-stick cooking spray (all probably made from the same petrochemicals), to trot across stage and display their talent so they can be elevated to some demigod-like status . . . oh, phaugh, run-on sentence. Whatever. No, i don't think it's wrong for talented people to get paid for their talents. I'm sure that performing a string of concerts or filming the same scene 50 times a day just because the director's got a bug up his ass that particular day--or any of the other things that Celebrities do that put them in that particular category--is tiresome, exhausting, and just as much a "job" as any other. But there's a limit to the amount of information or speculation about one particular person that should demand our attention. I'm reminded in particular of the shooting incident i heard--actually HEARD HAPPENING--at the end of the street i lived on while in the Bronx. A kid, couldn't have been more than 15 judging by the photos of him at the little "shrine" set up at the bodega up the street, was killed. I searched the papers the next day, and not one mention of this incident. It was as if the life of this child meant nothing. NOTHING. But on the front page of the papers was some Hollywood scandal (something so inane i can't even remember what it was now), about someone who--if they were shot--would have rated the same kind of Media Zombification that Michael Jackson is currently undergoing.

To regard Celebrities--regardless of their status or level of talent--as anything more or greater than the rest of us, is to devalue human life itself. After all, it doesn't take much to become a "media sensation;" if all else fails, grab an automatic weapon or a power tool and go on a rampage, or call a politician a liar to his face when he's making a speech, or what have you. Anybody who can do anything with a higher degree of skill than most is probably going to have the same experience as so many have: be all the rage for a certain length of time, then be vilified and hated and ultimately fed upon. And then after they die, everybody will be crying about how much this person is missed, and have gaudy tombs or shrines built in their name. And there will always be Media Hyenas around to suck as much marrow out of their bones as possible, people whose only "claim to fame" is how much profit they can generate off a corpse. Kennedy, Elvis, Reagan, MJ . . . people who were put on a pedestal and promptly fell off, only to be stuck up there again after they died. LET THE DEAD BURY THEIR OWN DEAD.

And shut up already!

To Wait Upon the Lord

2009-09-09T19:18:00.001-07:00

Had another good evening with Lewis tonight. It began as most of them do, with a coffeehouse stop and several bouts of MTG; later on, though, our talk--as it often does--turned to the Christian walk and our individual experiences and opinions of late. Lewis spoke of a talk he'd had with the Lord regarding me, and said that my current feelings of being "held back" weren't off the beam . . . what he'd heard from God was that my plan of spending 9 months here in the valley before "moving on" was a good one.

Thinking this over, i think i understood a little more about a phrase that appears in the Bible at several points: "wait upon the Lord." Because God doesn't do things according to a human schedule, we often become impatient and frustrated. It's as if, as i said in one of my many poems, we feel like we have a hotline to God so we can complain about the "slow service." I've done quite a bit of that lately . . . and now i see where i've gone wrong. "Waiting upon the Lord" can be interpreted literally! God is patient, and never does anything in a rush! As addicted as we are to "convenience," we often fail to grasp this. But waiting on the Lord doesn't just mean muddling along, expecting God to intervene at some future point. There are several things that need to be done . . . particularly in my personal case. First, it means to be in a mode of prayer and watchfulness. It's too easy for me now to lapse into a sense of complacency, to view this point of my life as a sort of lull. That's the wrong way to look at it. True, the opportunity for a rest, a "fall-back," was part of what He meant for me. But now, i need to be more vigilant, and to actively pray and pursue a course of life that will honor Him. I've been encountering a lot of negativity with old habits and old modes of thought reappearing. I'm committing, here and now, to banishing those old demons again . . . rebuking them, binding them in the Spirit. And i know i'll have to struggle with it, and if i don't depend on the Spirit, i will fail. It's nothing but the Spirit that's kept me from drinking again . . . it's easy to fall back into sin, easy to give up. But i can't give up now.

Another meaning of "to wait upon" implies service. If you're "waiting on someone," it can also mean that you are acting as a faithful steward, keeping things ready, and watching hopefully for your Master's return. Most of us can easily fall prey to complacency, or laxity, especially when things are going well . . . and then we wonder what's wrong when things fall apart! They fall apart for a number of reasons: first and foremost, because as Yeats said, "things fall apart, the center does not hold." No plan or organization of human design is ever permanent or dependable. Second, things fall apart BECAUSE we become complacent, let things run pretty much as they have since the dawn of time . . . and the Enemy uses those times to lull us into a false sense of security. Third, God often allows the difficulties that come when things DO fall apart to sharpen us, to test us with fire . . . not as punishment or wrath, but as a Father would patiently train a child. I need to remain alert, to perform my daily duties but not see them as humdrum or tedious, but as part of God's plan for me at this time. I'm going to have to accomplish a lot during the upcoming months . . . and i need to be really blessed to do this. I'm going to need the full strength and support of God's Holy Spirit in every task i undertake, and to remain patient when things don't go the way i think they should (and, with my anger issues and the thought-processes that a lot of people--my family notable among them--would regard as paranoid, things seldom seem to be going the way i think they should). It really doesn't matter in the long run what the government, the establishment, the system, the bureaucracy, or whatever other phrase i use to sum up "the way of the world," does . . . because, ultimately, God will prevail, in HIS time, according to HIS schedule, and not the short-sighted expectations of man. In every sense of the word, i need to wait upon the Lord.

http://www.postpoems.com/cgi-bin/displaypoem.cgi?pid=134769

Vocation Destinations

2009-09-07T14:07:00.000-07:00

I had a long talk with an old friend of mine, Leslie, the other night via Facebook. To boil it all down and summarize, the topic itself was something about what i wanted to "do" now, i.e., a job. Now, in the past 10 or so years of my life, my job was only something to do to support me while i continued to work out what i saw as my vocation, calling, craft . . . poetry. As Taalam Acey pointed out, "Poems don't buy big homes, and poems don't light up wrists . . . " Or, as my old mentor Dan Leidig once said, "Poetry bakes no bread." Of all the creative arts, poets are on the rock bottom of the hit list . . . maybe because a lot of poets understand that part of their duty is to say things that a lot of people would rather not hear (and, in particular, people who have money would rather not hear). Blah, blah, blah . . . I'll leave that for another rant. Anyway, Leslie asked me about what inspired my poems, what made me write. I responded back, "Everything. My life." She said, "Too general. I'm looking for specifics." That kind of rocked me back on my heels, and i had to actually think about it.

Most of my poems deal with one or more of the following topics: my Faith (and reflections on the Christian walk), Nature, what would loosely be called "Political" poetry (i'd call it more philosophical than anything, because unlike most politicians i don't pretend to come up with any easy answers or recoil with a predictable knee-jerk when i have to wrangle with something that doesn't fit neatly into a political pigeonhole), Poetic Portraits (depictions of people i've come across), and Self-Examination. Then there are those weird little outbursts like "I'll Get You, Squid McGhee!" or "Sandy Duncan is Trying to Kill Me!" I don't know exactly WHAT is going on there, unless they're like a sub-category of what i used to call "Myth Sticks," which were really more conceptual Rorschach blots . . . other people would tell me what they got from the poem, and i'd nod and look wise, but they were actually revealing more about themselves than anything (that was the point). Now, let me tell you, i haven't written ANYTHING poetic since i came back from NYC. NOT ONE THING. This scares me, because in dry times like these i feel like i've "lost the muse," or whatever. And, i'll tell you something ELSE . . . i am also afraid that i'm not where i need to be with God. I know God's been giving me a lot of lee-way since i came back, but now He's pulling in the reins, and i need to be paying attention. My creative energy is always a difficult thing to deal with, because it has a tendency to go running off on its own if i'm not careful . . . and, as always, i find that the process of getting it under control often means that there's gonna be collateral damage. Mostly because whenever my creative impulses run on their own, they always come dragging stuff back like burdocks in their hide.

I'm not sure what this all means as regards Leslie's question . . . but i simply can't think of any other way to frame a response other than to kind of sit here and type it out. I can't climb a corporate ladder . . . that's not IN me, and i honestly don't think that's what God built me for . . . and a lot of what i'm hearing from my family lately seems to deal with "success" in the World's terms, which makes me sick to my stomach. ESPECIALLY as regards my grandmother, who--God bless her--will at one point insist that i could "dress like i was successful" (which, to her, means "like i have money"), and in the next breath say that she believes we're living in the Last Times (and, on that point, i can see some indications of that pretty plainly) . . . but it's the conflict between those two points that's giving me so much grief! YOU CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MAMMON. And who or what is Mammon? An appropriate modern translation would be Money, the Bank, Profit . . . and, it's true, people tend to go in one direction or the other. Whatever else i can see myself doing, it won't involve building a fortune for myself. My legacy will end up being a bunch of poems which will probably go unread until AFTER i die (and poets are usually only recognized for their vision AFTER they're dead, anyway), and in the actions and deeds that i've done. If anything, i want to pursue a goal that has to do with the ministry, in whatever function God has designed me to perform. I don't know exactly WHAT that is . . . but i understand He knows, and will reveal that to me when i'm ready to receive it. That means focusing a lot more on the skills and gifts He gave me, and being prayerful and watchful. Lewis has been a great help in this time . . . he's one of the few people i know who shares the Christian faith, a lot of similar tastes in music, a powerful creative gift, and a general distrust of the political system as a whole. He and i both agree that we'll end up partnering on something here in the valley while i'm here . . . and now i'm in doubt as to whether or not i'm supposed to go back to NYC long-term.

What do i want to do? I want to stop this state of free-fall and land somewhere for a while. I want to stop wasting my time and my talent. I want--at some point--to get back onstage and rock the Slam mic like i used to, and know i still COULD if i had the ambition and the focus. And most of all, i want to find out what it is God has prepared for me, and grab hold with both hands, and NEVER LET GO.

If i have to have some low-end job just to feed myself and manage my life while i'm doing this, well, so be it. Even Paul, when he was working on seedling churches that couldn't (or wouldn't) pay his upkeep, wasn't too proud to make a few tents.

Okay, Let Me Explain it THIS Way . . . .

2009-09-07T14:02:00.000-07:00

Wise Fool
***
God has installed
some pretty effective
equipment in me.
He encoded some things into my DNA
that are perfectly suited
for one who likes to ride the edge
in this realm of poetry . . .you see, bipolar disorder and poetry
come together in me
like this: when i'm manic, i can crank out the poetry.
once i wrote 7 in the space of 3 hours,posted them online, and received
much praise! and, given such an ego boost, i
start to strut a little, and then . . .just when i'm feeling full of myself
. . .CRASH! here comes the depression, the
other side of the hyphen i've come
to know and dread so well,
and now i know what Rimbaud meant
when he talked about a season in Hell.
and people get disappointed with me,
and . . . i . . . get disappointed with me,
and so i drag my scaly hide into my cave
and hide out for a while.
then, manic's back like Rocky Balboa,
ready to step into that ring again!
and, it feels so good to be back, that
the level of my poetic attack
rises each time manic has my back.
so, you see, this thing that provides
the emotional energy and creativity in me,
is also my greatest limitation. and, that inspires humility.
God created me
to walk a razor edge, and He knew
what He was doing, even though,
looking at me, some people would think
God is crazy (and, sometimes, i wonder
about that too)--but, if crazy is the tool
God needs to do this job . . . here am i,
send me . . . i will be God's wise fool.

You Can't Move Mountains With Tales Like These

2009-08-26T21:51:00.000-07:00

Nega-Sheep
***
now, you've all heard about how
we're like sheep. i mean, when
Jesus called us that, do you think
it was meantas a compliment?
alas, i'm afraid
sheep are stupid creatures
less brains than a cow . . .they'll walk right in to a slaughterhouse
and let you hammer their brains right out.
now, the time has come
for a new breed of sheep
to emerge, and so you see,
i am sort of a Nega-sheep.
my wool's not white,
probably quite tie-dyed, and
very seldom do you encounter
a sheep with fangs.
no, honey, that's not a smile,
i'm just baring my teeth for you.
yes, i bite.
this sheep fights back.
this sheep has a survival instinct.
this sheep has already been sheared
so some idiot can wear a sweater
but don't think this sheep's just gonna
let you hammer out his brains
so some idiot can eat lamb chops.
i got your chops, right here,sucker.
a sheep in wolf's clothing, yes it's true,
but i'll still bet i've got
more bite than you.

Varf!
***
Varf! Everything gets back to varf! What is varf? Where, there are
several potential definitions. Varf could be when your cat
hacks up a hairball on the carpet and it gets sucked up into
a vaccuum cleaner, where it develops a sort of vampiric life.
But, that's pretty nasty, so we won't contemplate that. Another
kind of varf could be a vampiric smurf, but let's just hope he doesn't
hack up a furball on the carpet while he's running the vaccuum,
because that would only complicate things by creating such conditions as "Smurfy Vampire Furf Varf," "Furfy Varf Vaccuum Smurf,"and even "Vampric Varf Smurfs Vaccuum! (Film at Eleven)." But the third and best definition of Varf is a tribe of Vikings,
who were also Veatniks (this was back in the day when
the letter B was excommunicated from the alphabet). They left their recipes on a runestone,
the "Varf Viking Veatnik Recipe Rosetta Stone," referring to such things as "Varf Vegetable Veef Soup," "Varf Viking Vaked Veans and Spam," and "Varf Viking Lizard Surprise." See, you didn't know that the fourth definition of varf is a kind of lizard. "Hey, there's a LIZARD in this stuff!" That's the surprise. It also refers to the fact that you have to surprise the lizard to get it into the stewpot.

Boxed
***
you think inside the box, and
lock your mind inside the box, and
throw away the key.
and then you start to forget
that there ever was a key
that there ever was an "outside"
that the box is just a limit
you've slapped on your head.
there are some people who use that box
like a harness.
they yoke your head to some idea, and you
just follow in line right into the
slaughterhouse, baaa baaa, baaa baaa . . .
oh, and just before they take away
your writing hands, they'll
staple your lips together, too.
if you hurry up, though, i'll
help you look for that key . . .it's gotta be around here somewhere.

Carpe Poem
***
"Seize the echoes of creatures struggling to live against the dagger of man."
--Orannia Hamilton
***
Seize
the naked poem, raw with
vibrant green light and
razored fangs, from the turbid air.
From dark moments, bright things
sometimes shoot forth
like meteors etching a rune
of fire across the aching
firmament.
*
Transform
each piece of dangerous terrain
into your territory, proclaim your
domain in the poetic tongues,
conquer your emotions and yoke them to your plow.
the Earth lies fallow, unless
it is broken to receive the
seed.
*
Blaze
your trail across this tapestry, and
make your path one of light,
translate the celestial messages,
make your relationships inspirations,
receive in abundance the
overflowing cascades of
blessings, flowing from on
High.
*
And may the poem always rise to greet you,
as welcome and expectant as the dawn,
pregnant with possibility,
where each moment
of ascending brightness
is a phoenix of experience,
and the poet is
reborn.

After the Storm

2009-08-05T10:42:00.000-07:00

It's been a little over a week since my return to the 'noke, and a little over a year since i've posted in this thing. I figured it was about time. I haven't quite had time to process everything that's been going on in the past year in NYC, and i'm still "in transition," which is usually a difficult time for me to write. Hindsight is 20/20, eh?

Since my return, i've re-connected via Facebook with several friends, including several of my old poetry slam cohorts. Steve Glassbrenner, Leslie Barger, Bill Payne, and Lewis Kleiner are all there. I also re-connected with my long-time friend Vickie Holt, who's remained a friend since my high school days, back when i ran with a group of oddballs we called "Saturn Pattern," and yeah, i was a wing-nut back then, too. I hope they don't mind being mentioned by name in this blog, but they're way too important for me to just give a passing "my old friends" mention.

I'm now 44 years old, which is like being dead in dog years. I'm confused about where my future lies now . . . i guess the path is laid at my feet, and this time of transition is my opportunity to pick the right one, or to screw things up royally again. As far as what i wanted to do back in NJ and NYC, i accomplished about 15% of it . . . i.e., just shy of a total failure. I did LEARN a lot, which may have been God's reason for keeping me up there as long as He did. I've written reams of poetry that, in all likelihood, nobody will read, and there's no slamma-ramma stuff going down in the 'noke anymore (and, considering my track record in the last years of that, i'm not looking in that direction now). Blah, blah, blah. And, no, this isn't-self pity, this is just me making another attempt at the pinnacle of Maslow's hierarchy: self-actualization. It's not enough to simply take pieces of other people's opinions or idealizations of what you are, there has to be some kind of "click" in your mind. One thing i've learned is that my inherent distrust of government, bureacracy, and "the system" in general might have served me better if i'd aimed some of it at the people in NYC i called "friends." I DID have quite a few good friends, but when my ship hit the rocks towards the end of my time there, i found out who were really my friends . . . and there were some surprises there. I'm not going into detail about that here . . . and if i ever do, the names will be changed to protect the innocent (and obscure the guilty). For somebody who can sniff out the connections of a conspiracy, i have the tendency to be far too trusting of my associates, especially considering that a number of my NYC associates are, in a legal sense, criminals. But they're still my FRIENDS, damn it, and i don't think God would be very happy with me if i wrote them off just because they happened to have a few misdemeanors on their record. When Jesus walked the earth, He was called a friend of degenerates and riff-raff (nevermind the fact that most of them reformed once they connected with Him). And some of these so-called "low-lifes" that society rejects and looks down on helped me out in my times of trouble, whereas the more "respectable" members of society left me hanging. So, yeah, i may have trusted some of them a little more than i should have, held them to a higher standard when i should have kept my expectations low. I'm not exactly a hero myself--far from it.

But enough of that for now. I'm sure my readers (the seven or eight of them) don't want me to belabor that point.

This is a poem that i wrote while living in Brooklyn, part of it composed on a subway (which was where a lot of poems i wrote began), and this is probably a work in progress which will undergo several iterations, but while it's still fairly fresh, here 'tis.

Battery Acid #1
***
question: how are we going to
rescue the economy
reduce our carbon footprint
win the war on terror
and provide a future for our children?
objection! too complicated? i'll rephrase:
how many corpses
piled on our doorsteps
or stacked like cordwood
in our toxic back yards
will it take for us to think,
"ummm . . . maybe we fucked up,"
but, since fucking things up is both
easy and profitable, how much longer
can it go on before people
get wise to the act and stop paying
for new and improved ways
of getting screwed? it's like
paying a rapist to rape you again,
only HARDER this time!
pick a problem, and you'll find
50 or more self-help books
(available at Barnes & Noble,
occasionally ostentatiously autographed
by the author)
to help you solve it, but
as any third-grader can tell you,
increasing the number of options
in a multiple-choice question
just creates a greater potential for picking
the wrong one,
and since i don't have all the answers either,
i started by picking up a pen
and writing a poem--say hello
to my little friend!
"you believe the children are our future,"
so you'll croon that song
while making sure that future generations can
be taxed into servitude
eat genetically altered food
watch 500 channels of increasingly stupid tube
and won't worry about what defines "torture"
until it's their turn to get screwed
(and, i might add, if the children in question
are currently involved in conflicts in countries
whose exploitable resources don't warrant
our "liberation" lube,
the future's already dead)!
you're a nation of people who
are kind to others,
as long as it's a tax write-off
or pays dividends,
all smiles while you bury knives
in the backs of your friends,
shoot up that corporate ladder so fast
you get the bends,
and everybody pretends
that they're not losers,
even though nobody ever really wins.
you've got fully functional cybernetic wombs--
think "The Matrix," just designed by Martha Stewart--
and cell-phones and ipods and other pods and mods
that keep you totally connected
but unable to make a connection,
and text-messaging is a lousy substitute
for intense verbal interaction,
and for those of you NOT PAYING ATTENTION,
that's what THIS is!
did you MISS it?
maybe your brain turned off when you unplugged!
they've terraformed the wrinkles out of your mind,
leaving it smooth as a baby's behind
and full of the same runny, yellow crap
until that cosmic roundhouse slap
arrives to wake you from your nap of dollar dreaming,
and you'll leave the world the way you arrived:
fists clenched, naked, covered in blood, and screaming!
oh, and just as a postscript?
if you believe the children are our future?
watch out--they're sneaking up on you
to write "the end."
maybe you'll make good fertilizer, friend,
because that's all you can really do
with
BULL SHIT!

This Just In

2008-07-26T18:22:00.000-07:00

I was mulling over the concept of writing, just now, and a simile sprang to mind. I'm going to improv on it now . . . this is stream-of-consciousness, so bear with me:

Ore
***
most people look at their past experiences
with mixed feelings, maybe wishing
they could somehow wade upstream against Time
and rearrange the geography, but
they're missing the point entirely.
writing poetry
is like this: panning for gold.
that streambed is full of silt and grit, true,
but when sifted finely,
sometimes one finds bits of gold,
and how many men have sold their fortunes
just to buy the property
where that stream runs through?
it's worth the effort to sift my past
exceeding fine, to find that raw poertry ore
that will pass the test of fire . . .
and, now, looking back at my history
i see that God is also sifting me
exceeding fine, to reveal
that within me
that will pass the test of fire.

After a Long Hiatus

2008-07-26T17:57:00.000-07:00

It's been quite a while since I've posted anything in the blog. I suppose that real life takes me away from the computer more often now, and what time I -DO- spend online is mostly wrapped up in the Poetry Tag group or other such matters. It's been a relief to get back to the stimulus of PTG and Rage, after a dry spell where I didn't write for a couple of weeks.
you
just
walk down the block like you belong there,
half scared to death in your
tattered jeans,
and the wise shadows
are clustered under the trees.
their whispers
are cigarette smoke and cannabis,
and their eyes show only
as chips of starlight
in the gloom.
_____________
More on that later, maybe.
I've written several new poems, but I'm currently wrangling/wrestling over some of the word-choices, trying to decide if i can hew closer to the bone by changing a few. Anyway, here's a couple of recent writes.

Bronx Fires
***
under a steely sky, the sun not so much seen
as felt . . . the trees themselves seem exhausted, there's no
hint of a breeze, and in this motionless torpor, the Bronx
is broiling.
the souls of those who repose on the streets
have taken the burn, and scorched by summer and by
torrid corporate greed, rising prices going up
like the temperature . . . how much hotter
can things get?
i hear the murmur in the streets, the voices beginning to stir
and speak things that haven't been suggested aloud
before . . .
there's something here, a fire that's burned
underneath our very feet
as we walk the streets unawares.
i'm cooking my brains in this oven
so that all the people who think i'm only half-baked
will have to shut down . . .
the dogs in this neighborhood howl
in solidarity
at the tarnished copper coin of a moon
rising from the polluted haze in the East
like a brazen beacon for nightmares.
suddenly, we're all strangers up here again,
where the heat can drive men mad
and create a thirst for blood
that's never slaked, and oh God,
i fear the bloodshed's very near,
hidden behind the haze of heat-shimmer rising
from the broiling Bronx streets . . . .

------------------------------------------------------

Collateral Consequences
***
oh, the initial blast and hard radiation's
quite enough in and of itself, but
it's the FALLOUT that gets ya.
i mean, i know enough about that
from 3-way fights between my mom, sis, and myself
where i always ended uplosing . . .and, that had its own collateral damage,because if i'd stayed around the house more
i might not have gone out in the forest
and gone mad from drinking strange water.
i'm a victim of my own collateral damage, mostly
side-effects of things that, had i known there WERE side-effects,
i doubt i'd have done . . .but that's ink in the water under the bridge, now
making little ideogram-like squiggles in the flow
as i pour out what's been keeping me up nights
and making me lose weight no matter what i eat
and, see, somehow this makes me "other-directed"
which means the system didn't quite like the taste
and i got spit out . . .hey, look at me, America!
i'm your end result,
your collateral consequence,
a grim visage of your future wherein
EVERYBODY will look this scrawny, underfed, and strung-out,
because
we will be.

------------------------------------------------------------------

More later. This screwball blog template apparently doesn't like line spacing, so it takes it away. Woohoo! Ain't modern technology great? We invent New & Improved ways to Seriously Fuck Things Up. Artificial intelligence, my ass. How can we create artificial intelligence when we don't even have the real thing going on?

Postmodern Bestiary (& Other Disjointed Ramblings)

2008-06-15T14:50:00.000-07:00

This forms a small part of a "postmodern" bestiary, and is probably a work in progress that will do absolutely nothing but languish in cyberspace.

Hobnoblins: hobnoblins are individuals who gather together to discuss trivialities; typically found in malls, or on city sidewalks and other high-traffic areas, they instinctively locate the area that will most impede everyone else, and stand there in a loose group, chatting, and giving dirty looks to the people who try to pass by them or, heaven forbid, THROUGH them.
Butt Blockers: butt blockers are oblivious fat people who typically walk side-by side through malls, stores, and on sidewalks. They move half a pace slower than everyone around them, and of course resent anyone trying to get around them. They are similar to hobnoblins, but butt blockers (because of their size) are seldom encountered outside of pairs.
Hippiegriffs: hippiegriffs are either old hippies who've held on to their hippiness, or the children of hippies, or people who were somehow raised ina hippie culture. Often surrounded by clouds of incense and/or cannabis smoke, hippiegriffs generally live on the fringes of society and seem to be quite happy there.
Bluggemsnatchem: a bluggemsnatchem is a term for a generic monster of some type that suddenly lunges out of the darkness to snatch you up. Typically, bluggemsnatchems are seen only briefly during their attack, which is quite fortunate, since bluggemsnatchem features are unattractive at best. Fortunately, bluggemsnatchems are solitary creatures (you'd be solitary, too, if you looked like that!)
Yupsters: yupsters are yuppies, typically in the mid-teen to mid-twenties, who want to be "hip," so they adapt things from the hipster culture, generally making them fit for mass consumption, since yupsters tend to move in herds. They are a subgroup of posers; a distinguishing feature of yupsters is that they resent anyone who has less money than they do and still manages to be more hip.
Suitmorphs: these are the middle-echelon corporate businessmen, who have adapted to the whims of their culture by being able to change their paradigm to match that of the head bozohemian (q.v.) They can often be encountered in fawning groups around a bozohemian, or in corporate coffeeshops, bars, and restaurants. You can tell the alpha suitmorph by the fact that his tie matches perfectly the one the bozohemian is wearing. They typically ignore other cultures unless members of that culture somehow become an impediment to their ladder-climbing.
Bozohemians: these are the clowns who think they're supporting the whole circus on their shoulders. Most bozohemians only pay attention to the trends of other cultures in order to figure out how to best turn a profit on them. In spite of their ostentatious clothing and conspicuous consumption, bozohemians are actually quite boring creatures, and respond in predictable knee-jerks to most stimuli.
Zobops: these are undercover cops who still stick out like sore thumbs. Their purpose is to distract you from the undercover cops who actually DO blend in.
More later.
every rose has it's thorn, honey,
but there's
something
in the azaleas over there
with eyes like chips of bad moon
and an appetite
like a gas oven, so
breathe carefully
amongst the blossoms, and
while you're at it, watch
the mountains. they're
sneaking up on you.
(bologna).
You know, this heat is really driving me crazy. Half the time it feels like you're wearing a big wet fur coat, and then it feels like you're wearing a straightjacket made of nettles. I only have mild allergies, thankfully, and i pity those who have even moderate allergy problems in this weather. That thunderstorm we had last night hammered us, but it didn't seem to do anything to lower the temperature. Fortunately, there always seems to be a breeze.
Your
thoughts break up
like really friable rock, and
the chips that land
in your bed
make it hard for you to sleep
at night, so instead of
cleaning the rocks
out of your bed,
you take pills
so you won't feel them
poking holes
in your soul.

Aggressive Statements (Baiting the Inevitable)

2008-06-13T20:55:00.000-07:00

Well, here we are again, another evening at the old blog. I wonder who made the word "blog" up, and exactly what they were thinking (and probably smoking) when they created it. A blog sounds sort of like a creature that might creep up on you out of the fog. Well, i guess in a metaphorical sense, my blog is like that. It's just lurking there. Reading this over your shoulder. Annoying habit, i know, this particular blog doesn't have very good manners.
MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!
Okay, now i've gotten THAT out of my system. Honestly, today i felt like i was ready to pounce on somebody. It could have been anyone. Heading down to Popeye's for some chicken, i was overcome with a sudden urge to randomly grab a passer-by, and scream, "HERE! HERE! IT IS THE BEATING OF HIS HIDEOUS HEART!" or "I'M MELTING! MELLLLLLLLLLLLLTING! OH, WHAT A WORLD, WHAT A WORLD!" or something of the sort. Then, at Popeye's, as the pert and perky cashier asked me, "What would you like?" i practically growled "A PIECE OF MMMMEAT!" She wasn't in the least intimidated by this response, a reaction i put down to (1) being totally ignorant of the fact that Grendel was standing across a very short counter from her, (2) being totally ignorant, and/or (3) being a New Yorker. But, for some reason, i'm feeling very aggressive lately. I've also been eating like a horse. Literally. Feed-bag and all. Well, not really, but i HAVE eaten more than is customary for me, which usually indicates that i'm going into a prolonged manic phase. Whee-hah, happy days are here again. The way this usually works, i'll crash at about the time i'm supposed to be leaving my humble room here in the Bronx, and i still have no freaking idea what i'm going to do. I just pray i don't get on some self-destructive kick towards the end of the manic phase (it seems to be a kind of natural reaction, almost like you're trying to put the brakes on because your mind's strapped to a rocket-sled).
Something occurred to me earlier, and i've been trying to work it into "April Fool's Resolution." I was pondering "casting pearls before swine," and then i started thinking of what pearls were. Essentially, they're tiny pieces of grit or other foreign matter that sometimes gets trapped inside the oyster's shell. What the oyster does is build up a layer of what's called nacre around the irritant. This layering continues, eventually developing into a pearl. The seed of the pearl, one might say, is something unpleasant or irritating or painful . . . but, at least in me, the irritants are surrounded by layer upon layer of words. So, i cough up poems instead of pearls. And, given that analogy, the pigs just MIGHT trample my pearls into the mud . . . i'm not worried, i've got more. LOTS more. See, there's that aggressive kick again. I should probably write a few rants when i'm in this mood, that always cheers me up and sometimes actually generates a bit of poetry in the process. Some people, apparently, do not consider my rants "poetry," and since their tastes are so refined, they'll probably be happier in some dark closet performing biologically impossible acts on him or herself, and i cordially invite all such individuals to go and do so immediately.
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . .
Just an aside, i sometimes wonder how Aryan Nation or KKK members or whatever they're calling themselves now survive in prison, except that maybe some AGENTS OF THE STATE AGREE WITH THEM, and maybe they've got a few COPS ON THEIR PAYROLL, or maybe THEY'RE ON THE COPS' PAYROLL, or something of the sort. Yes, i did say that.
I guess saying something like that in a public blog COULD be considered a self-destructive act, considering the possible repercussions, but . . . sheesh, almost all of my poems have some sort of potential repercussions, a lot of them unpleasant . . . but i can't quit being what i am just because being what i am jeopardizes my life. Scared? Yes, i'm terrified. I've told people time and time again that i sometimes scare MYSELF with the intensity of stuff that comes pouring out of the old poetry faucet, and what i'm committing to by speaking them aloud. I pray to God not to hold the liberties i take against me. I've also told people time and time again that God is literally holding me up, and holding me TOGETHER . . . i've flown apart in pieces before, and it's not pretty. I know, people don't wanna hear about God unless it's got their particular brand-name slapped on it, like there's different gods for Catholics and Southern Baptists and Seventh-Day Adventists. Well, just deal with it. God. The Creator. The Supreme Being. The One. And, yes, i'll say Jesus, too. If you've got something better, go to it. And, yeah, i've ranged all over the field in this particular paragraph, but it comes to a focal point: i am not PERMITTED to write what i write, i am COMPELLED.
I may be KILLED for speaking uncomfortable truth, but far better that i die WHILE speaking truth, comfortable or not.
Those are aggressive statements, or to put it another way, "them's fightin' words," and i don't think it's going to be a self-fulfilled prophecy, i'm just baiting the inevitable.

A Postmodern Moment

2008-06-12T09:18:00.000-07:00

I was just reading over some of the comments in my Postpoems page (this was sort of an aside to looking through the poems to find one that might be usable in performance), and one girl's comments about a poem struck me. In one sentence, she was saying that the poem could be interpreted in so many different ways; in the next, she was saying that nobody could deny the meaning behind what i was saying.

Huh?

If the poem can be "interpreted in so many different ways," apparently i was NOT communicating. Now, there are two types of poems on my Postpoems Page. One type is very direct. There is no doubt about the subject, or my feelings about it. This, at least in my opinion, was VERY blatant. The metaphors may have been a bit over the top, i'll admit, but it wasn't THAT inexplicable. The other type are poems i usually refer to as Myth Sticks, which are really metaphorical Rorschach blots . . . a person's response to one of THOSE poems, and their interpretation of it, really reveals more about them than it does the poem. And, in that case, that's the general idea. I don't specifically mark them or set them apart from the others (although i did at one time).

Other comments i've received have also left me scratching my head. One frequent visitor always makes reference to vegetarian, vegan, animal rights, etc., and somehow ties this into the poems i've written. I'm cool with that on the Myth Sticks poems, but, on some of the poems this reader missed the point entirely. Am i not communicating effectively, or is that person just using a random line as an excuse to mount a soapbox? Now, i have nothing against vegan or vegetarian diets. I simply cannot EXIST on one. For the record, i'm an omnivore. My eating habits include such horrible things as refined sugar, pork, mechanically separated chicken, cholesterol, complex carbs, and FAT! OH, THE HUMANITY!! I can pratically hear the vegans scattering as i approach, lest they smell the carnivorous pheromones and become infected with a desire for a LAMB GYRO. If you don't like what i eat, don't watch me eat. And, above all, don't LECTURE me . . . because that's apt to provoke me . . . and since i'm always being told that "you are what you eat," i am one fucked-up chimera, but it's better than being a walking salad.

April Fool's Resolution

2008-06-09T19:14:00.000-07:00

THE FOLLOWING POEM COMES WITH A MAJOR CAVEAT. READ NO FURTHER
IF YOU ARE A WIMP, AFRAID OF RAW HONESTY, OR BASICALLY IGNORANT.

You should also stop here if you're: easily offended, gender-sensitive, or weak in
regards to your opinion of me (which, by the way, is none of my business).

(Consider this the equivalent of the Haunted Forest in "The Wizard of Oz." I'D TURN BACK IF I WERE YOU).

April Fool's Resolution
***
i've made a resolution to hereafter
make all my resolutions on April Fool's Day,
which makes perfect sense, because,
most people who make resolutions
know it's an April Fool's game, because
they have no intention on keeping them . . .
and even the best of them
seldom even survive through March.
but, this April, i made a resolution
that's final. that's right, i'm
giving up sex. Oh, don't look at me
that way . . . like any other male, i
suffer from testosterone, but
sex hasn't done anything for me
but distract me from the Muse, and she
can be one jealous bitch. She demands
most of my attention, and her company
is entertaining . . . no, i'm not complaining,
i rather like it this way. But when a
twenty-first century male stands up
and openly resolves to give up sex,
people wonder why, so, caveat lector
and auditor, let me lay it out for you:
the modern thing is to "embrace your sexuality,"
which is easy if you've been given a choice,
but a big piece of radioactive ore
has been buried in my past, and
it really screws up my personal navigation system,
so pardon me if i steer right clear . . .
what happened to me wasn't something i chose,
a bitter fruit of a tree i wasn't ready to taste, and
asking me to embrace that
is like asking me to go to bed with a monster.
Not all the booze and zoloft in the world
seemed to be enough to keep it in the past,
that motherfucker was buried alive.
Every encounter with it since then
is another radioactive exposure, and
sooner or later that stuff starts to sink in,
and speaking of which, is THIS sinking in?
Don't hand me that line about "you just need
to get LAID," for the record, i am NOT
a virgin, and also for the record, it did
NOTHING to solve my problems,
it FED them.
I believe everyone has the right
to choose their own path, so damn it,
at least affirm MINE.
Now, i'd better stop this raw honesty
that peels me down to the bedrock,
because i've been warned that
people aren't READY for it, and
i've also been warned about
casting my pearls before swine, but
i sometimes have a hard time
distinguishing the pigs
until after i see what they do with it.
Yes, men are pigs, and i have
experience to prove it. Yes, i'm
chained to the same Y chromosome,
braincells saturated in testosterone,
the same thing that makes men
think with their little heads
and talk to girls' breasts instead of their faces,
the same thing that makes some men
take from other men
what no woman will willingly give them,
so, don't look at me like i'm some alien, because
we're really not that different, are we?
the only difference is, i've
found a solution . . . and if, by now,
you don't understand, who's
REALLY the April Fool in this picture?