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a free verse poem about anything
An interesting night, all dressed up no place to go, if I was capable of being frustrated, I might have been. I was pledged to go to the Dinner Train to Centralia something I had been wanting to do and the Odd Fellows reserved a car. Tre and I were gonna go but he got sick and I couldn’t find the take off spot. The guy at Caseys didn’t know nor did the guy at the bookstore. So I bought a book. If I were up to the technological norm I could’ve looked it up easily, instead I just accepted it wasn’t going to be. Next time.
Thank goodness I have had ample opportunity to walk through a lot of frustrating situations with people and encourage them to roll with stuff outside of their control. I also read and preach a lot of stoic philosophy. All that helps me just roll with stuff enjoy the ride be flexible. I might do a lecture on stoic thought when I finish my series on self esteem. Got some good students, one with 8 pages of notes, cross referenced by topic because I like to skip around.
Most interesting conversation I’ve had has been on facebook. We were talking about judgement, he critiquing my encouragement of Fire your Bank day. (4.5 billion dollars pulled out of banks I heard on Marketplace and more people have joined a credit union in the last 6 weeks then in a normal year. That’s a nice protest with the multibillion dollar hit.) Anyway he cited Bruce Cockburn as saying we all want judgement on somebody else and said the Occupiers were as greedy as the banks.
I conceded his first point but challenged the second that banks with more resources are more liable to judgement for not helping the poor and that activists with some notable exceptions often take a financial hit and have a sincere desire to help and a simple lifestyle. He commented back saying salvation comes from belief not good works. But I wasn’t saying you get to go to heaven for doing good, I just said you face damnation for not. But we’re talking about different stuff, I don’t buy the concrete version of heaven.
The heaven I believe in is more conceptual, an idea, the memic universe. Do you want to know if you are living forever? Are you living forever right now? Investment in the trappings of wealth or power block out the eternal now that is accessible in a child like way to anyone who reaches out for it. That’s what I’m saying. Greed and accumulation make people scared, shuts off from real experience and transcendent awareness. I know because if they had it they wouldn’t act like that. You couldn’t if you value others like yourself.
Mostly I want to put up more poetry. This one I wrote a slight variation on the first line in my first chap book 16 Best. I took the title of the book from the CD that John Glenn took into space Neil Diamond’s 16 Best. I wrote on the top of a blank page something like “I can write a free verse poem about anything” as a statement that I could finish it on a first draft and have it be a pretty good poem. I couldn’t, and ended up hacking out a short little shitty thing. Some time later though in a late night manic rush I blasted through the thing in its completed form in only a little more time then it takes to read it ( a bit over 3 minutes unless I’m doing it in a slam with 3 minute time limit which I pick up the pace. I consider it my definitive slam poem.
I can write a free verse poem about anything
If I want to extend my ego
Or I can just let the world be
All fucked up and beautiful
Six billion lives alone
Living in self imposed exile
From real experience
Cast adrift in a specific social milieu
Which is then projected onto the rest of humanity
Except for those, few or many
We think of as “others”
People so alien to our experience that we deny our common existence as people
Greeks and Barbarians
A five thousand years old idea
Which still dominates our consciousness
And of course it does
How we clothe ourselves, how we feed ourselves
How we have shelter and transportation and the frivilous entertainments that make a C+ life feel like a solid A-
Can I hear an amen please?
Because of course I’m preachin’
In a free verse poem about anything.
The last frontier of the wordy hypocrite
On vacation from responsibility
When the knowledge that we are all one
And the world is in pain
Often and harsh and often preventable
If we can care more, know more, do more
more, more, more, or
nothing…
Block it out
Return to the acceptable
Accept the inevitable
Of the way things are
Just sit back an enjoy the fringe benefits that go to those citizens and their neighbors who get to vote every four years or so for one of the two guys who learned how best to suck up to power and gets to be the CEO of the big stick of Capital
Bread and circuses baby
Only now its on a hundred and fifteen channels
And the bread may take a little longer to get then it used to
But its so good
That’s why most of us have to make it
Or serve it
Instead of painting and writing poetry
Singing and dancing and growing gardens
We wouldn’t want them to do that would we?
I can’t make my own fucking Big Mac can I?
It isn’t someone has to dig the ditches anymore
Now its the guy who gets to drive the ditch digging machine is a lucky bastard
With a fat paycheck and a good tan
A paid lunch and health insurance
May I take your order please?
Would you like fries with that?
I’ll suck your dick for fifty dollars.
Because of course a man has to talk about sex in a free verse poem about anything
Because money buys sex and not just servitude
Would you like fries with that?
If you turn your back I’ll kill you
Just for what you’ve got in your pockets
I can’t write ads to sell cigarettes to teenagers in Asia can I?
But I watch the same TV commercials that you do
Where the guy in the phat car gets the skinny girl with the big tits and perfect teeth
And guess what motherfucker
Guns are cheap
Would you like fries with that?
I don’t go to zoos
Good morning. I am up early drinking coffee, a Honduran light roast that is growing on me. Untold depths I tell you, really tasty. Probably this weekend I will have to get in the habit of having to roast my own. Having a live in expert coffee roaster is a rare luxury but I’m glad John made it home safe and hope is transition back to California living is a smooth one. Fido sure misses him and the dogs. The little guy follows me pretty devotedly now. I am up early, after get the coffee drank we’ve gotta get out and walk the trail and see if there are any sunrise visitors to the dog park. He really played up a storm our last visit. Nothing like a little isolation to bring out the social. He even played with an uncut Dobie that started out pretty intense.
Yesterday I blogged about my first poetry slam in Fayeteville Arkansas and noticed that one of my classic poems wasn’t up. This one I wrote the first stanza when I was crazed and then a couple few years I hacked out the next 2 stanzas rather quickly when I needed another Milk Carton song and that quickly. I tried singing it and Dan suggested I do it as a spoken word number which worked out pretty well.
I used it in the poetry slam, took first place and there was a newspaper write up about the event it was really funny because the biggest chunk of the story was people in the crowd ripping on me. It has an anti-materialism angle that some people found challenging. “No job no house I bet he still lives with his momma” one gent said or words to that effect. It was funny because I did at the time.
I don’t go to zoos
To see the animals in their cages
And I don’t go to work
To see the slaves bring home their wages
Because I know a secret
I know the score
I know that money equals time
And they ain’t making any more.
You can’t get ahead
Playing by the rules
Laws are passed
By the ruling class
And only obeyed by fools
So step back and think about it
There’s only just one you
Do you want to go down
In the history books
Doing what you do?
So why don’t you turn the TV off
And go to the woods for a day
You might just be a little surprised
At what Mother Nature has to say
She might just tell you
To fuck it all
And give all your money away
Sell your house and car
And VCR
And live in a tent by the Bay.
And I don’t go to zoos
To see the animals in their cages
And I don’t go to work
To see the slaves bring home their wages
I know a secret
I know the score
I know that money equals time
And they ain’t making any more.
Untitled #1
Watching The New World, the only Terrence Malick film I haven’t seen. Its pretty good but i’ve been way to restless to just watch a movie for a while. At least one on the TV. I got a late start on it, as its 2 hr 15 min but I was still giving a crack at the novel in a month. Got discouraged with my process. Might not be terminal but it sure ain’t healthy for getting a novel done. Maybe I’ll just have to try to publish a book of abandoned first chapters.
Maybe I’ll just blog. I was blogging every day most of last month and I rather enjoyed it. Managed to create a poetry page, which has allowed me to know for sure what I have up and gives me the chance to put up more stuff. It was fun reading a lot of my stuff too. Only found 2 duplicates.
One noticeable omission was Untitled #1 as I only had the second stanza up and that fairly recently. I wrote it as three separate pieces all in fairly quick succession as well as a handful more in what I remember as a red notebook maybe all in the same day. It was flowing then, I couldn’t contain it. I couldn’t get anyone to listen to it though. No one much wants to hear what a crazy person has to say. Definitely the worst part of a mental illness is how people treat you. fortunately I was protected by boisterous manic self confidence or I might have despaired not to create. I kind of wish I had spent more time writing, it was good stuff and am thankful for what survives. A lot of it I wrote and gave away so there might be more out there.
This one is three I pulled out of the notebook and put in my head when I was trying to sing with Milk Carton. It was a metal kind of song with heavy base and I tried out four as a spoken word piece. The first stanza was the most gothic and a lead in, the second I thought went with it and the third and a lost fourth verse I tried out and ended up keeping the third only as the song came together.
I used it as my first poem in the first poetry slam I was ever in down in Fayette Arkansas when I was visiting my buddy Jay with Rebecca in the fall of 1998. It was a gothic slam as it was near Halloween and I think people just liked it because it wasn’t as cheesy as the ghost and goblin stuff other people were doing. I also did” I don’t go to zoos” which I also need to put up, which scored a 9.7 from the English teacher judge and I ended up winning the slam and getting $25. Context really hit me, from the unlistened to ramblings of a mad man to getting 25 bucks to say it, context is everything.
Untitled #1
Slash, feint, perry
The mind is a weapon
Carving subject from object
Truth from fiction
The rational mind unleashed has become a threat to all life
And yet we still look to it for rescue
Salvation even
From the very problems it has created
Once there were alternatives
Other ways of knowing, of being, of caring
But those days are gone
Mowed down under the scythe of technological advancement
Until only It remains
Silent and gleaming
In the new darkness
Of unasked questions
Because there are no more words.
Spring can be as cold as winter
For the mind without purpose
The heart without love
New life is inevitable
But not your life
Not our lives
Our Acts of Being
Are as meaningful
Or as meaningless
As we allow them to be.
Spring can be as cold as winter
When we refuse to allow
The Life Force to shine out
Brilliantly and forcefully.
And what is to be done
With this world of ours
Seeingly able to absorb all of our passion
Yet rippling the missteps into torrents
The excuses mount steeds of excess
To ride over the backs of the innocent
The holy ones without voice
Watch and listen and learn
Halloween 2011
Wow what an eventful day. Such that I couldn’t even document it until this morning. I jammed out getting my counseling re-certification in. I needed 4 hours of continuing ed so I went into work early and pushed through a self study course. Took John to U-Haul on my lunch to get his tailgate installed and went by the post office to get that 10/31 postmark that saved me $75. Next year I am going to be more on it. Its getting to be like filing my taxes only the post office isn’t open until midnight.
After working a little over in a delicate kind of meeting thing I came home to see John with the trailer parked and van loaded and checking his fluids. Which then it really hit me that he would actually be going. Its been a huge blessing having John and the dogs come right after Dad died to ease that transition and though I am happy for him to get his life back in motion I was nonetheless hit by a wave of sadness still able to bring a little tear this morning.
So it goes without saying I didn’t get my jack-o-lantern carved. I ordered pizza and gave the delivery driver candy (plus a tip) and told him he had a great Dominos costume. I had 2 others, little kids from the neighborhood. I wish I would have given them more then a big handful of candy because that is all I got. I’m the only light on the block and anyone with a car goes elsewhere. Apparently people without cars go elsewhere. They were cute though a little Ninja and Pocahontas both around 3, maybe twins.
Halloween also marks the end of the blog a day challenge. I am glad my recent flurry of activity didn’t cause me to lose any subscribers. I unsubscribed to a blog I like mostly but he posts at least once a day and sometimes several and if it feels like a chore looking at my email inbox I start dropping blogs. I thought I had some good stuff this month and it drove up my hits but some were uninspired. Its been good discipline for the National Novel in a Month which I have thought about doing for years and decided to make the plunge this year so I expect faithful reader you will see a lot less of me for a while. I like posting and doing it every day made me realize how much I enjoy it. Will try to get back to you after my daily words are done but I wouldn’t get my hopes up.
i believe i am a pattern
I have been working on a poetry archive on my blog with links to each of the poems I have posted. You should definitely check it out if you’re into that sort of thing. One of the bonuses is it gives me a definitive list of what I’ve got up on the blog. This one I could have sworn I put up as I recall posting different versions as it came together but the the most recent version I came across in the poetry category was incomplete. This one I’m quite proud of as it says what I believe in a pretty tight and succinct way. Hope you like it.
I believe I am a pattern
A pattern of information
Built from millions and millions of simplicities,
Organized through emergence
I arise up from the bottom,
I am many but still I am me.
And I believe I am a pattern
A consciousness construction
Will, sense, imagination, memory
And though I surely rise up from my body
I am much more a story
Told in the hearts of everyone who knows me.
And I believe I am a pattern
A pattern set in motion
In oscillation with the tides
Not just the ocean
But the Universe besides.
In every mind’s eye there is a cup
Its not the one from which I drink
But its close enough
Occam’s Razor cuts simplest is the best
Is my idea of cup unique from the rest?
Or do we all drink
From the same cup
After all?
For I believe I am a pattern
A process not an object
Like pendulums swing together
When they’re on the same wall
My heart beats to the rhythem
Of the One and the All
And I am subsumed in
The One.
And I believe there is a pattern.
Black Iron Prison
Phillip K. Dick talked about the Black Iron Prison as a descriptor for ever growing systems of control. I like the term and have been working on a piece about it for the last four or five years. Five years after posting this I am putting in the final (for now, I’m still not entirely satisfied with the ending) stanza. I finished it maybe three years ago and reads a little prescient with the election of Trump. I am putting together a chap book tentatively called “Words for Dark Times” and leading with this piece. I finished it on a road trip to Death Valley for Christmas I believe three years ago. That Christmas John thought it was my best yet.
Black Iron Prison
There’s a Black Iron Prison
Casts its shadow across the land
From the tar-sands of the North
To The Wall at the Rio Grande
So show us your papers
Your biometric ID
And remember a time
When you thought you were free.
And power corrupts
As always we have known
And absolute corruption
Is what we have sown
Just as the sun sets in the West
It rises in the East
and Total Control is the Mark of the Beast.
And you’ll show The Mark
to buy your bread
And show it when you sell
And without a trace of irony
You’ll call out for your Hell:
“Oh keep us safe from terrorists
Those oh so evil men”
And lock us up in cages
‘Til its safe to go out again.
And watch our every movement
And listen to every call
Analyze the meta-data
Until you know it all
And what Hitler wanted
But could not have
Will have finally come to pass
And we shall be a people
A people…
Made of glass.
self esteem
I’ve been talking about self esteem in my Friday education group. It used to be a four week presentation but this iteration is looking like six. Its a really important topic in recovery because there is an inordinate amount of self sabotage amongst folks in substance abuse treatment. Intellectually the topic appeals to me because its so difficult to do anything productive on the topic. In general attitudes and beliefs are hard to shift and our sense of self is the oldest and most solid piece of who we are. It takes years of concerted effort to make serious headway and pointing people in that direction, laying it out and providing the tools feels like activism. “You Are Awesome” my favorite Occupation sign says. Its animated my thoughts.
I also like teaching on self esteem because it excuses me a chance to explore just exactly what we are and where we have emerged from. I discuss the mirror test, an ability to recognize yourself in a mirror requires self awareness. “Hey that’s me in there.” 6 month olds, dogs, cats, and monkeys they can’t do it. 18 month olds, chimps and other great apes, elephants, grey parrots, and dolphins can. What were we doing around that age, toddling around getting into shit. At some point we all went to touch the stove, that’s how babies explore the world and someone who loved us smacked our hand and said, “bad baby, don’t touch the stove”. What’d we learn besides don’t touch the stove. “I’m the bad baby who tries to touch the stove”. We are learning who we are.
How we view ourselves is so vital because of confirmation bias, the tendency to see evidence to support what we already believe. We like to believe we look out on the world in an objective way but really we only perceive what is in line with our existing beliefs. Now what is the risk if you believe you are a piece of shit? That is why it is so vital. The thesis I try to make is to pick a concrete strategy and stick with it for years even. When you achieve mastery pick another. I learned about self esteem and started to work on it around 16 probably in my high school psychology class. I’ve been at it ever sense. I’ve made some significant progress but my journey is not yet done.
I have been working on eliminating the word “should” out of my self talk for five years. I still catch myself thinking it. (the re-frame for “should” is “could”). I pretty much ferreted out “can’t” (the re-frame for “can’t” is “I’ve struggled with this in the past but I’m getting better on it because I’m working on it” [not as pithy as “could” but memorable in its absurdity]). “Always” and “never” have had their place.
I teach a 2 step of do the right thing and give yourself credit. Challenging the inner critic instead of hiding from it or tuning it out. Ask it questions; “is this true?”, “does this preserve my life?”, “get me what I want?”, “keep what I don’t want from happening?”, “improve my relationships?”.
I told the story of getting shit canned at Food Town after 29 days when I was 17. Not because I wasn’t a hard worker but because I was to insecure to ask questions and didn’t know how to stay busy. Felt intimidated by the customers, not knowing where stuff was, and the bosses, easier to putter around the bottle room. I had always wanted to be a bag boy too. Mom wanted a kid to go to the store, you got to pick out the cereal and get a comic book at Crairie’s Drugs. When I was a little kid I looked up to the bag boys who brought our groceries out to the car back then. (You know when there were jobs for people to do.)
The bag boys seemed like gods. Kids who did what adults did, that’s what I wanted to be and I told my mom I wanted to be a bag boy and she said “You can’t because we’re not Lutheran and Francis Foods only hires Lutherans”. I told the story pretty matter of factly and a brother in the second row just looked dumb f0unded and said “You’re shitting me”. He couldn’t wrap his mind around a world where you couldn’t get a job because you were the wrong denomination. With all the growing problems of modernity, maybe things are getting better.
Drive By Darlins
Just got home from the Drive By Truckers show at the Missouri Theater. Sort of my last hurrah with John as he is hitting the road early next week. It was a pretty good show and a fun evening. Stopped by Gotcha and got my Guy Fawkes mask for Halloween (don’t tell anyone but I think I’m coming as Anonymous). It was priced at $11.05 which should have been a clue but the owner asked if I knew why it was priced that way and sang a little “Don’t you remember the 5th of September…” Very cute and with a busy set of activities glad to have come up with a costume idea and gotten the thing I need.
We had dinner at Booche’s a downtown bar opened in 1884 and I had felt negligent that I hadn’t had John in for a cheese burger. We also had the chili which was quite good but they serve it in a styrofoam bowl (I bet they didn’t do that in 1884). I do like the sign on the door, “closed on Sundays, see you in church”. They have some premium beers now with Boulevard Single Wide on tap. I had had Dad in some time ago to play pool and after having him in so many breweries and fancy bars where he couldn’t get a Budweiser he tried to order a Sam Adams which they didn’t have sticking close to the classics.
Then it was on to the show with the opening act Those Darlins. They were a little disappointing live not really able to fill the room. John was impressed with the Missouri Theater which is a fine looking building and looking sharp these post-rehab days. But the Drive By Truckers were pretty good. I liked the acoustic set which really let the steel guitar shine but mostly I liked that they were sincere and looked like they were having fun. I’m really not a music guy, I’m both tone deaf and fond of my own internal dialogue so I don’t listen to much and was only casually familiar with their extensive repertoire. They opened with Carl Perkin’s cadillac a catchy little ditty and there best song was “Let There Be Rock” which they had a lot of fun with.
I should be going to bed its well past my bedtime but still pretty wound up and game 6 of the World Series just went into extra innings. Congratulations for my local peeps, keep hope alive. I have a fairly busy weekend coming up. Going floating with Kirk from work, his first time in a canoe. We’re going to the Finger Lakes and doing it in spite of the Fall chill. Saturday going to the market with Sarah and getting some horse manure for the garden since compost doesn’t work in my schedule. Saturday night halloween party. Sunday I might take John out again, would like to show him Sycamore so he says good things about Como when he returns to the Golden State.
civil unrest
I am disappointed to learn about the escalation on the Occupy Oakland protest. An Iraq war veteran was shot in the head in close range with a police projectile. They were firing rubber bullets, tear gas canisters & flash grenades. How ironic to survive to tours of war in Iraq then to get a skull fracture at a protest. People in wheel chairs hit with flash grenades. The over-reaction begins which will only swell the crowds. God forbid we have people sleeping in a park.
I stopped by the Como Occupation today to see how it was holding up in the rain. There was a sleeping dude under an overhang. I dropped off some bottled water, apples, hygiene kits & a poncho. I am proud to live in a city that welcomes democratic action, free speech and freedom of assembly.
Rumor has it a coalition of law enforcement entities will try and clear out the San Francisco protesters tonight. People in masks have torn down the fences around the area cleaned out by the cops and are building a memorial to Oscar Grant, the unarmed guy gunned down by BART police.
All of this both troubles me and gives me hope that the movement will grow and change will happen. It has shifted the debate and energized folks for change. These are good things in spite of the cost as change needs to happen. If you don’t have people invested in the system then they withdraw their consent to business as usual and things get rearranged.
It doesn’t matter that there are no simple concrete demands. Radical action wins victories for liberals.
spoiler alert
My fourth day of road tripping in a row and I am holding up strong. This morning rode out to Chesterfield for a conference with a co-worker and really enjoyed the trip. You only get to know someone so well at work when things are busy and not a whole lot of time for life stories and the like. We left at 5:15 am to be in Chesterfield (St Louis suburb by 7:30) so I set an alarm. It had been years since I had and it probably allowed me to get better sleep then having to be more conscious of the time. It was business attire, don’t ask me why so i wore a shirt and tie. Getting talked at for a day ain’t worth wearing a suit for.
The drive out was fun and MFH always puts out a nice spread. It was at some version of the Hilton and they had little breakfast burritos and surprisingly good coffee with fresh melon and pineapple. The morning presentation was on Health Literacy. A bit of yawner there for most of the presentation. Most people read poorly, a sizable chunk not at all. If you put out stuff so people can actually understand it things don’t suck as much. Captain Obvious made those points taught the “teach back method” which is pretty much what it sounds and then the last 10 minutes through out all this great practical stuff faster then you could write it down. Short sentences, no more then 2-3 syllables, simple fonts, helpful pictures and diagrams, lots of white space, good paragraphing, no italics or ALL CAPS and stick to the Need to Do not Nice to Know. Might be other good stuff in my notes.
Someone also taught how to optimize Word’s reading level assessment tool, you do chunks avoiding numbers & headers and the like that can throw it off and never write above a 6th grade level. It was cool stuff and raised it in my consciousness so I shouldn’t complain. Especially not after the lunch we had, rare roast beef with all the fixings and a sweet array of cakes.
The afternoon started with this activity that turned out kind of fun. We were given instructions to a card game similar to spades with no trump, ace high, two of clubs leads. The winner of the first game advances to play other winners. You’re not allowed to talk. We tied at my group but I was feeling pushy and like playing cards so I silently offered for our team to advance.
We lost the first trick and I threw a king on the next only to see my partner throw on the ace. I was still reeling from the fact my partner had no strategy whatsoever as there wasn’t even a rule about following suit when my partner led into my ace of clubs. The other team raked in the trick which led to a non verbal argument that got a little heated. Ultimately we were told to play cards by the facilitator after I had note pad taken away and was pantomiming why it was my trick. They kept the trick but I kept the lead and we took the rest of the tricks but i wasn’t so into it. The trick of course is we had different rules, his said ace low mine said ace high.
That was cool but then it was the return of Captain Obvious as we talked about it for over an hour with people making the same of course points. Then like a weird replay she broke out these cool tools you can use to evaluate a coalition and went over them hyperfast in the last 5 minutes.
Nonetheless not bad as these things go. We went to Trader Joes before heading home. I cooked some dinner and am gearing up to watch Horde. this time i mean it.
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