Giving Thanks

Afresh in my milieu, writing in my quarters, I know home life will always be mundane. I thought by coming home from college I could breathe new life into my kinsfolk. Perhaps I’m just a boring literary mercenary; but my parents never whispered the words of Metaphysical poets into my ears as an urchin; my parents never played Mozart’s Requiem as I slobbered in the cradle. Were they flag-bearers of autodidactism? Were they merely impecunious progenitors of lower working-class ancestry? My father the machinist. Dyed-in-the-wool from birth. A hidebound rigid in his convictions. My mother the coddler. Ma, who worked menial jobs. Ma, politcally and religiously apathetic. How can I make sense of my own stemless inquisitiveness? I’ve risen from an abyss; but down there, in the unlit gorge, my parents planted a seed. They watched me hastily sprout. I imagine they expected a ginkgo. What they garnered was unforeseen.

The sun is hastily rising now but I haven’t gotten any sleep. I’ve decided to brew coffee instead. I got sloshed last night at Vince’s. I smoked ganja till my eyes became jelly-filled slants. Surprisingly I haven’t entered slumber mode yet. I expect to sleep late into the day though. It was a good-humored, amicable night. I spent much of it outside admiring country snowdrifts. I burned cigarette after cigarette. Kyle decreed me The Raj. Apparently I’m the most spiritual of my friends. I can’t rebuff an appelation that signifies a man’s search for divine peace. His quasi-pronouncing put me in good spirits. In truth, I wish religion were logically sound. Sometimes I feel pious devotion is a salient asset.

I’m drinking my coffee black. I want to go running. I want to be naked. I want to lie in a field somewhere in Iceland. If only my dreaming contained candidness. If only the moon would speak to me on those drunken nights. It doesn’t realize I’m alone. That drunk ball of yellow in the sky. Speak to me. I want to attain a philosophy of life. I don’t want to live a wino. I want to rest my head against her skin. Near the fireplace. I want our parchment-colored skin cheek by jowel.

I’m drinking my coffee black. I’m wishing I didn’t reside afront this country facade. I respect my parents for allowing me to burgeon into an independent young man. But now I must adhere to my abortive instincts. I’m tittiliated by the Verbatim theater of my dreamscape. I must leave. I have Debussy mentally accentuated. I have Cummings in my heart. I have ideals. I am no gankgo. I did not rise from an abyss. I grew up under a solid, insulated roof but it’s time to leave. So to my parents I owe a thank you. Here they come.

Free Jazz And Kaufman’s Oeuvre

Recently I went to see the Danny Janklow Quintent. The sumptuous flow of Coltrane sets had me leering ear to ear. I’ve always been allured to his improvised free jazz; and Janklow, only a sophmore at Temple, was the sheperd up there on stage. He had ascendency over every soul in that building (if of course we have these so-called “souls”). The five dollar tab I paid to enter Chris’ Jazz cafe was a small outplay for the grandeur I experieced last night.

Afterward I waded in the puddle-wonderful streets over to Ritz at the Bourse. The jaunt deluged me as I slivered like a Caecilian. The cobble roads in Old City were like the bottom of a river. I don’t mind wet weather; but I was austerely soaked. Fuck it. The show was was a jaw-dropping display of genius.

Synnecdoche, New York. An elephine warehouse for theater–massive theater. A depiction of the farouche life of a genius loci-reclusive. A man with a thing for poop and bosomy women. An eggheady drama of lifelong inadequecy. How can I sum it up? Truly there’s not a justifiable response to negative reviews, for the movie was like a freak-folk film of absolute abhorrence. How can we approach the meaning of life if the meaning of life is inapproachable? It’s a lockup; for some a cassone of heradly; for some a chest of gold; for some it’s the written words engraved on a trestle desk. It’s ambiguous. Caden was obssessed with narcisissim and morbidity but he had enough sense to hold onto life. And that’s how I feel about Charlie Kaufman’s new film. This was his oevre; his magnum opus, as my friend Margaret called it.

The Cascade Of The Church

CNN’ s Rick Sanchez interviews a Kansas minister who insists Obama is a Muslim. What a woodenhead. If this doesn’t prove the church is a lockup I don’t know what does. I suppose he’s just part of the lunatic fringe; but still, it perturbs me to think such steadfast Christians can be chilled to the marrow like this. I’m just a lost, off the beaten track nullidifarian, thus this probably won’t mean much. But this pastor should gain an understanding of what Christ asked him to do before he goes off inventing his own religion.

The Rock Garden

Mimicries in the rock garden
lull me into sleep.
Nestled in the brier,
where the Oneida people
cropped land
and skinned the flesh
of buffalo.

The jade mountain
was made for me
and this song
that the sparrow sings,
could line a winejar with silk;
could sprout life in a snowdrift;
could turn a cornstalk into a violin.

I awake to a genial sight;
gloss in the thicket–
pale-faced and beautiful,
her vellum skin mild,
and like a calico gold fish
she slips into the water.

I see her naked back
like parchment glowing in the sun;
The beads around her neck,
the emerald hair pipe,
swing and catch me in a daydream;
all is peaceful in the rock garden.

“Oh No”

This is Andrew Bird performing “Oh No” live at the 2008 Music Now Festival. His forthcoming record, Noble Beast, drops in two months. This is an impending preview of sheer brilliance. Listening to it makes my brain cells jitter like little bugs.

Procrastinate Less, You’ll Get It Done

I’m a little drowsy from the rain. Somewhat bemused by the intermittence of it as well. I have never seen such erratic weather. There are men outside wearing matching penguin suits and red brown tumbled oxfords (or at least it appears to me). The ash on one of the crony’s coffin nail is burning the filter. I might have to run out there and save him and rip that tiny cylinder from his pursed lips. He’s a buffoon. But I like the way he and his workmate dress. I wish I could afford to be a little more stately. Well that isn’t entirely true. He’s probably a March hare. And he probably listens to classic rock. And he probably knows economics like I know Pound’s poetry. I’m not as enthralled as I thought. I would be a corporate raider. Fuck him. If he upsizes any more operations I’m gonna…..

That cigarette is damn near dragged to its last hit. This guy really is a buffoon.

I was reading the New Yorker the other day and came upon a shout and murmur by Woody Allen. I think I fumbled the gist of it. For a second I understood what Woody was saying to me. Then he goes on to write about grandpa who “spent fifteen years translating ‘Anna Karenina’ into pig latin.” I didn’t think I could ever emulate the absurdity of “rationalized” cannon fodders or, more recently, expectant fathers; but Woody did the trick. He serves his words on a dish only fit for the gods. I read it four times and came to the conclusion it wasn’t out-and-out risibility at all. I suppose it’s good to challenge your intellect every so often.

This all occured after the thunder-striking headaches of Saturday afternoon. Last night was an esteemed round of drinking that kept me from sleeping a wink till the sun shone on the city of Philadelphia. The headaches, of course, hurt like the dickens. And that fraternity house on Susquehanna wasn’t administering milk of human kindness either. I think I got trampled on in the basement. But I dropped my five dollar cup. Three minutes passed before I found it nustled against the leg of the beer pong table. Someone kicked it when I tried to pick it up. I called him a “lamebrain fucker with zero aesthetic values” but it didn’t phase him. I hadn’t realized I said such an absurd thing until one of my floormates told me so. I was a little embarrassed about being such a straw man; but at the same time I was proud of myself for declaring the man an idiot in the most intellectual fashion. I don’t think I could have did it without the drinks.

My laptop is playing “On the Sunny Side of the Street” by Lester Young. I’m imagining myself lieing low in the streets. Crime bust. Good sultry jazz. New York City circa 1952. Bobby sox and oxfords. Mmm Lauren Bacall looks fabulous. Draggin’ luxury cigarettes. Fantasia-wonderful.

In my reverie I’m about to make an impact on this socially conservative country. The police recieved a tipoff from one of the buyers. I’m the only drug baron of the time and I’m about to take all and sundry to the verso. The Jazz Age. Ginsberg opines the same thing. Mutual nostaligia? Nah. We’re poetic wheeler-dealers. He’s a tad more flowery than myself, I must admit, though he’s my spinal chord. Metaphorically and imaginatively of course. Let’s gyp that buyer’s friend. The one with the suade oxfords.

Fuck. I have a paper due tomorrow on racial identities during the Black Panther Movement. Free Assata. Free Mumia. Eh that’s all I got.

Latest Sigur Ros Video

http://www.last.fm/music/Sigur+R%EF%BF%BDs/+videos/16158783

Sigur Ros videos used to move me in significant ways. Now it appears one of my favorite bands do indeed possess a certain effrontery. I’m not feeling my heart-rending self after this one.

Artistic amateurism to the side, it is music, not videos, that is their metier. I could roll up in a kasha blanket and dream the wildest things. This isn’t no gyp joint. It’s a well-put together masterpiece (the music that is; forget the video).

Shows, The Election, “Change”

I have not kept up with writing. No doubt my ambitions are volatile. If I choose to start a blog, it’s liable to reach the coda in a few weeks. It’s nice to think my life is so inexorable, and not so glacially slow. It’s nice to think I’m not a dormant creature. The crux of the matter is my life is moving posthaste in the right direction.

I spent my last two Friday nights at The Electric Factory. First it was a fancy-dress party and the idiosyncratic Of Montreal; next it was The Decemberists and their lovely Bristish folk kind of music. In truth, this is why I chose to come to Philadelphia. The shows are head and shoulders above what Pittsburgh produces. The steel city makes notable attempts, but the city is second-fiddle in cultural advantages. I abhor the absence of aesthetic variety.

I’m writing all this somewhat gingerly, keeping in mind there’s a new president-in-waiting. The changes President-Elect Obama promised, though fruitful in theory, won’t entirely amend the past administration’s gaffes. To think our country will be dramatically restyled is foolish. I expect President-Elect Obama to inseminate some basic health care system; put checks and balances in place to manage the 700 billion bailout (excuse me, the “rescue plan”); reinstate banking regulations; provide incentatives for green-collar jobs; draw a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq; close Guantanamo Bay. But Obama probably can’t change foreign policy on Israel or Palenstine in any significant way; take a public stand on gay marriage; or build a Canadian-style health care system.

The United States is making a beeline for its political quietus. As a country we’re not taken seriously by the international leaders of the world. High-level military personal doesn’t intimidate anymore. Capitalism is taking a toll on the bell. I’m making a go for the Alps. Who is with me? There will be snacks.

“There’s only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that’s yourself.”