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We tell the story every year— how we peered from the windows, shades drawn— though nothing really happened, the charred grass now green again. We peered from the windows, shades drawn, at the cross trussed like a Christmas tree, the charred grass still green. Then we darkened our rooms, lit the hurricane lamps. At the cross trussed like a Christmas tree, a few men gathered, white as angels in their gowns. We darkened our rooms and lit hurricane lamps, the wicks trembling in their fonts of oil. It seemed the angels had gathered, white men in their gowns. When they were done, they left quietly. No one came. The wicks trembled all night in their fonts of oil; by morning the flames had all dimmed. When they were done, the men left quietly. No one came. Nothing really happened. By morning all the flames had dimmed. We tell the story every year.

Natasha Tretheway-Incident

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Where do my Bluebird Fly?

I haven’t been writing much, if anything at all.  It has been a year since I graduated college and I’ve been in this mental block. I’ve still been reading a decent amount, but I don’t write as much as i’d like to.  I have a lot of ideas in my head, some which know are worthy of being written, yet my lack of confidence in what I write prevents me from giving as much effort as I would like to.  Do I hold myself to too high a standard? 

 I would like to be compared to the literary greats I suppose, but that’s not what keeps me writing.  For me, writing comes from the desire to be heard.  There are plenty of things that I have to say, but do I deserve to be listened to?  What makes what I think and what I write so important?  These are some of the very questions that make up the wall of doubt that I’ve built for myself.   Recently, near my birthday, a friend of mine who studies neurology told me “you better use this year wisely, your brain stops developing at 25″.  I knew he was being flippant.  Just because your brain stops developing neurotically, doesn’t mean you stop experiencing things and changing.  There’s a latent shadow of truth beneath it though.  I think that the older you get, the more content you get, and the easier it becomes to settle for less.  The same can be applied to any artistic endeavor of course.  If I stop writing, I’m afraid I’ll grow content in not making anything at all despite whether or not I’ll be heard.  So maybe I’ve somehow derived the truth of my situation, that is to say that I’m growing passive.  Nothing stops me from improving and showcasing my writing except for myself.  I should stop seeking validation in others, and seek that validation in myself.  Approval from others will follow. The fact is, is that the old “carpe diem” cliche might act as an excuse for people to engage in wanton debauchery at times, but maintains its personal merits at the same time.  We only have one life to live or else we’re dead.  If I don’t write in this life, then will I ever write in another life?  If you aren’t doing what you want to do in this life, then why are you alive?   Life is one long dance.  Will you sit on the wall sulking, or will you beckon the apple of your eye to boogie saying 

“Had we but world enough and time, This coyness, lady, were no crime.” 

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If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happens better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

Mary Oliver, from Don’t Hesitate (via violentwavesofemotion)

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Wasting Time

-Christian Bowman

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The first of the undecoded messages read: “Popeye sits in thunder, Unthought of. From that shoebox of an apartment, From livid curtain’s hue, a tangram emerges: a country.” Meanwhile the Sea Hag was relaxing on a green couch: “How pleasant To spend one’s vacation en la casa de Popeye," she scratched Her cleft chin’s solitary hair. She remembered spinach And was going to ask Wimpy if he had bought any spinach. “M’love," he intercepted, “the plains are decked out in thunder Today, and it shall be as you wish.” He scratched The part of his head under his hat. The apartment Seemed to grow smaller. “But what if no pleasant Inspiration plunge us now to the stars? For this is my country.” Suddenly they remembered how it was cheaper in the country. Wimpy was thoughtfully cutting open a number 2 can of spinach When the door opened and Swee’pea crept in. “How pleasant!” But Swee’pea looked morose. A note was pinned to his bib. “Thunder And tears are unavailing," it read. “Henceforth shall Popeye’s apartment Be but remembered space, toxic or salubrious, whole or scratched.” Olive came hurtling through the window; its geraniums scratched Her long thigh. “I have news!” she gasped. “Popeye, forced as you know to flee the country One musty gusty evening, by the schemes of his wizened, duplicate father, jealous of the apartment And all that it contains, myself and spinach In particular, heaves bolts of loving thunder At his own astonished becoming, rupturing the pleasant Arpeggio of our years. No more shall pleasant Rays of the sun refresh your sense of growing old, nor the scratched Tree-trunks and mossy foliage, only immaculate darkness and thunder.” She grabbed Swee’pea. “I’m taking the brat to the country.” “But you can’t do that—he hasn’t even finished his spinach," Urged the Sea Hag, looking fearfully around at the apartment. But Olive was already out of earshot. Now the apartment Succumbed to a strange new hush. “Actually it’s quite pleasant Here," thought the Sea Hag. “If this is all we need fear from spinach Then I don’t mind so much. Perhaps we could invite Alice the Goon over”—she scratched One dug pensively—“but Wimpy is such a country Bumpkin, always burping like that.” Minute at first, the thunder Soon filled the apartment. It was domestic thunder, The color of spinach. Popeye chuckled and scratched His balls: it sure was pleasant to spend a day in the country.

John Ashbery- Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape

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Anagram

It’s really frustrating that ridiculous is one extra letter off from being an anagram of ludicrous.

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August, 'twas the twenty-fifth, Seventeen houndred forty-six, The Indians did in ambush lay, Some very valiant men to slay. 'Twas nigh unto Sam Dickinson's mill, The Indians there five men did kill. The names of whom I'll not leave out, Samuel Allen like a hero foute, And though he was so brave and bold, His face no more shall we behold. Eleazer Hawks was killed outright, Before he had time to fight, Before he did the Indians see, Was shot and killed immediately. Oliver Amsden he was slain, Which caused his friends much grief pain. Simeon Amsden they found dead Not many rods from Oliver's head. Adonijah Gillett, we do hear, Did lose his life which was so dear, John Sadler fled across the water, And thus escaped the dreadful slaughter. Eunice Allen see the Indians comeing And hoped to save herself by running; And had not her petticoats stopt her, The awful creatures had not cotched her, Nor tommyhawked her on the head, And left her on the ground for dead. Young Samuel Allen, Oh! lack-a-day! Was taken and carried to Canada....

Lucy Terry Prince-Bars Fight

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Lucy Terry Prince and the Poetry of Black America

I stumbled into the rabbit hole of the internet and was just kind of doing some random searching on African American literature.  Besides it is black history month: the month where I'm reminded that I have a history and culture, as if its something I had somehow forgotten (facetiously commentary of course).  Anyways I came across the name Lucy Terry tonight and was pretty interested to find out her elegiac ballad "Bars Fight"(~1746) actually became the first published African American Poem in 1855.  Quite simply, its a poem paying its dues to 5 people killed in a bar brawl between Native Americans and white men.   It's interesting that the first published piece of literature published by an African American was an account of a struggle between White People and Native Americans.  The parallels between the Native American disenfranchisement as well as African Americans' seem to come to a cacophonous convergence of violence.  It reminds me of the novel Blood Meridian where the act of violence as a right and legitimizer of identity comes into question.  Here, the author foists her eyes onto the aftermath of the brawl whose origins undoubtedly lie in conflicts of identity and rights.  Ultimately, the most historically oppressed and dehumanized demographic in America, a black woman, sees another oppressed demographic in their own struggle against a common oppressor.   Of course, I might be shoehorning racial parallels through a New Historic lens.  I wasn't there at the brawl and the poem was passed on for 100 years before being published. However, there is commentary to be made I think.   African American women did so much for African American history, and its shame that in a male-dominated society they don't gain as much attention or are not noted as much for their influence.  Some of the most badass soldiers in the battle for equal rights were women: Shirley Chisolm, Mary Shadd Cary, Harriet Tubman, Lucy Terry Prince etc... I slightly digress.   The trivialization of black poetics and identities pervades throughout American culture.  When we talk about American poetry we speak of Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, and Ginsberg but somehow the poetic influence of Amiri Baraka, Lucille Clifton, and Natasha Tretheway are all directed toward the black poetry messiah Langston Hughes (no disrespect of course).  The silence and simplification of black poetics deprives us of our nuance, competitive and veritable artistry, and identity.   When we read poetry we step inside the mind and see the world how they see it.  What we make of it, of course, is highly subjective (rolls eyes flippantly at post-modernism) but at the same time there are trends to be discovered within the study of New Historicism.  That being said where is the conversation of African American artistry in schools?  How come I knew of John Winthrops “A Model of Christian Charity” but  “The Narrative Life of Frederick Douglass” as a young black male learning about influential pamphlets in American History?  Why can most people name 100 white poets in America but only around 5 African American poets?   Now, in our cultural climate, its more important than ever to get black artists heard.  I’m speaking of primarily poetry here, but this extends to painting, music, and everything in between.  Too many times have the Adeles in history overshadowed the Beyonces, and no more should the Dickinsons overshadow the Lucy Terry Prince’s, but rather their respective arts should stand and be judged side by side as integral parts of American History.

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I can love both fair and brown, Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays, Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays, Her whom the country formed, and whom the town, Her who believes, and her who tries, Her who still weeps with spongy eyes, And her who is dry cork, and never cries; I can love her, and her, and you, and you, I can love any, so she be not true. Will no other vice content you? Will it not serve your turn to do as did your mothers? Or have you all old vices spent, and now would find out others? Or doth a fear that men are true torment you? O we are not, be not you so; Let me, and do you, twenty know. Rob me, but bind me not, and let me go. Must I, who came to travail thorough you, Grow your fixed subject, because you are true? Venus heard me sigh this song, And by love's sweetest part, variety, she swore, She heard not this till now; and that it should be so no more. She went, examined, and returned ere long, And said, Alas! some two or three Poor heretics in love there be, Which think to ’stablish dangerous constancy. But I have told them, Since you will be true, You shall be true to them who are false to you.

John Donne- The Indifferent 

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continents, flakes

float all around the surface of the planet

drift up slip down

like cereal in a round bowl of a boy who woke up to school

child! your Pokémon cards are on the table

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Citizen: Socrates, you are really annoying.

Socrates: Interesting argument. Can you tell me what is 'annoying'?

Citizen: The way you ask all these stupid questions, that's annoying.

Socrates: Would you say that a fly buzzing by your ear is also annoying?

Citizen: Yes, I would say that is annoying.

Socrates: But you define annoyance as asking questions, and a fly doesn't ask questions, so do you really know what annoyance is?

Citizen: I guess I don't know how to explain it.

Socrates: If you don't know what annoyance really is well enough to explain it, how can you be certain, then, that I am annoying?

Citizen: I am going to scream

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The Hermit at Sea

The winds  tired this old ship and we the travelers decided on this shore.

The men, they scattered.

Some fled to the biting chill of the north some retired to the damp woods of the south where the snake doctors eye every corner but most think it best to camp on the shore and wait to join another aimless crew.

They sitt and wait like hungry, wet dogs begging for food in an Irish pub— their tongues lay held out like hands;  the night beats on their backs like a shillelagh.

Me, I jacked the damn boat  while the moon was heavy and wide and I was drunk and the waves were beautiful.  The men they roared like dying lions on the shore.

I had no concern for them or their abandonment so I left them in the wakes bathing in their stentorian yammer.

There is someone out on the sea breathing and floating like a balloon. He has a pen that oozes red ink with a tooth that bleeds the same and a tongue that rattles and yawps like a fetid bedlamite. And his wandering mind has no compass.  -Christian Bowman

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Spending today with @antoniusmajor’s library and Roxane Gay’s Difficult Women as he works on his thesis. 📚☕️

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A Note on Transcendentalism

I met a very old man at a bus stop in Atlanta who told me that everywhere he looked he saw ghosts. In the city the cars are dirty and loud, the streets are as fetid and angry as the people are. There are nooks, cracks, and crumbles scattered amongst the ground as if God himself had kicked Earth’s ass.   If there were ghosts, they floated amongst crying children, and dead, decaying animals, screams and smog and crowds with no room to walk or run or even float in lifeless existence like dammit who would want to linger in this shit hole? You’re crazy I told the old man I wouldn’t wanna be dead here and he said I’ll be dead soon anyway. Christian Bowman

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“Here, take this gift, I was reserving it for some hero, speaker, or general, One who should serve the good old cause, the great idea, the progress and freedom of the race, Some brave confronter of despots, some daring rebel; But I see that what I was reserving belongs to you just as much as to any.”

Walt Whitman-To A Certain Cantrice

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I met a seer, Passing the hues and objects of the world, The fields of art and learning, pleasure, sense, To glean eidolons. Put in thy chants said he, No more the puzzling hour nor day, nor segments, parts, put in, Put first before the rest as light for all and entrance-song of all, That of eidolons. Ever the dim beginning, Ever the growth, the rounding of the circle, Ever the summit and the merge at last, (to surely start again,) Eidolons! eidolons! Ever the mutable, Ever materials, changing, crumbling, re-cohering, Ever the ateliers, the factories divine, Issuing eidolons. Lo, I or you, Or woman, man, or state, known or unknown, We seeming solid wealth, strength, beauty build, But really build eidolons. The ostent evanescent, The substance of an artist's mood or savan's studies long, Or warrior's, martyr's, hero's toils, To fashion his eidolon. Of every human life, (The units gather'd, posted, not a thought, emotion, deed, left out,) The whole or large or small summ'd, added up, In its eidolon. The old, old urge, Based on the ancient pinnacles, lo, newer, higher pinnacles, From science and the modern still impell'd, The old, old urge, eidolons. The present now and here, America's busy, teeming, intricate whirl, Of aggregate and segregate for only thence releasing, To-day's eidolons. These with the past, Of vanish'd lands, of all the reigns of kings across the sea, Old conquerors, old campaigns, old sailors' voyages, Joining eidolons. Densities, growth, facades, Strata of mountains, soils, rocks, giant trees, Far-born, far-dying, living long, to leave, Eidolons everlasting. Exalte, rapt, ecstatic, The visible but their womb of birth, Of orbic tendencies to shape and shape and shape, The mighty earth-eidolon. All space, all time, (The stars, the terrible perturbations of the suns, Swelling, collapsing, ending, serving their longer, shorter use,) Fill'd with eidolons only. The noiseless myriads, The infinite oceans where the rivers empty, The separate countless free identities, like eyesight, The true realities, eidolons. Not this the world, Nor these the universes, they the universes, Purport and end, ever the permanent life of life, Eidolons, eidolons. Beyond thy lectures learn'd professor, Beyond thy telescope or spectroscope observer keen, beyond all mathematics, Beyond the doctor's surgery, anatomy, beyond the chemist with his chemistry, The entities of entities, eidolons. Unfix'd yet fix'd, Ever shall be, ever have been and are, Sweeping the present to the infinite future, Eidolons, eidolons, eidolons. The prophet and the bard, Shall yet maintain themselves, in higher stages yet, Shall mediate to the Modern, to Democracy, interpret yet to them, God and eidolons. And thee my soul, Joys, ceaseless exercises, exaltations, Thy yearning amply fed at last, prepared to meet, Thy mates, eidolons. Thy body permanent, The body lurking there within thy body, The only purport of the form thou art, the real I myself, An image, an eidolon. Thy very songs not in thy songs, No special strains to sing, none for itself, But from the whole resulting, rising at last and floating, A round full-orb'd eidolon.

Walt Whitman-Eidolons

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Confessions of a Killer Part 1

No, I did not plan to kill.  The idea of murder invaded my mental faculties.  It seized me under its spell.  I lived it, breathed it, walked it.  Even my tongue couldn’t help but taste blood in the simple pleasure of daytime lunch.  Murder lurked around every corner as a shadowy companion.  I didn’t see friends, family, or strangers, I only saw victims. I know, it was wrong. Or do I?  What is wrong?  Are we not confounded to our morals by the gates of society?  Is one wrong everyone’s wrong or just a façade to keep us all in order? I suppose that’s irrelevant since I am in prison.  Besides, what I did was anything but orderly.

………………..

In the piercing heat of mid-July, I watched a man jump to his death from the twentieth story of a skyscraper.  His limbs scattered like rats and his blood painted the concrete a grim maroon.  If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that God had become a nepotistic cannibal, vomiting chunks of bread and red wine onto us as a result of some pre-rapture hangover.   What I remember next was blurred chaos: mothers shielding their children’s eyes, grown men crying, police swarming.  Unconcerned with the racket, I, however, was curious.  Before the police came I inched up to a piece of flesh bathing in blood.  I bent down. What was it?  Maybe it was the flab of a cheek or the remnants of a thigh. Regardless, I was entranced with it. I studied it for what seemed like a whole day.  There were pieces of flecked bone thrown about it, all of it coated in that dark red. Then I examined the totality of the Rorshach-like tragedy.  As far as I could tell they were broken pieces of an intricate, turgid puzzle, or maybe even a fetid labyrinth for the city mice. My hypnotic lens was shattered by a cop.   “Excuse me sir we’re gonna need you to vacate the premises”.  His voice failed to register at first.  I was in a toad-like squat as if I were whispering to the flesh.  “Sir?” he repeated and reached for my arm. “Ah, ahem, yes sorry” I said and darted away. Alas, something had begun cooking in the pot of my brain.  Something…dark? No, no not dark.  It gave me too much pleasure.  Perhaps, something happily rapping at my mind’s door, a visitor maybe with a gift I’ve been waiting for my whole life.  And would I open that door and reach across that threshold?  At the time, I didn’t know.