All I know

It wasn’t the cockroaches and bugs coming out of everything I owned that bothered me as much as it was being caught in her bedroom with no explanation. I wasn’t even looking for her panties. No idea why I was there either.

 

Just an hour or so before (in central standard dream time), I was un-packed in my newest abode. I was happy with my house and my room. The decorations were up and the party had just begun. My ex-roommate came by to return a few things that turned into many things as my other friends returned from a holiday in Layover County and my house filled with new things and it was cluttering and cluttered and my mother arrived to visit the same time I was served my eviction notice.

 

I knew I would survive. I always survive. I survive. It get’s harder as I get older and want to stay in the same nest but this was my dream so I wasn’t older or younger I just was. I was reactionary.

That’s the girl I like came by from Texas and we somehow missed each other.

 

I gathered everything I owned and hid out wherever I could and I was alone. That’s when I appeared at her house with my bags full of stuff. It didn’t occur to me to knock like a human being so I came in through the bathroom window protected by a hope and a prayer. I was trying to straighten out my stuff. Stuff. My crap and the bugs started appearing everywhere. I thought it was controllable so I started killing them and then I looked up and saw the ceiling covered in them. At this point I was concerned with getting them off of me and ought of my hair. The door opened and it was her. Chelsea. She used to be the love of my loins that got away. I used to obsess so much over her but not at that moment.

 

Chelsea was in shock seeing me there she didn’t notice the bugs. I said “We need to talk but outside” as I shut the door and noticed her younger and now hotter sister and closed the door and the bugs were everywhere.

 

“What’s happening? What’s going on?” her sister asked.

 

I wish I knew.

 

I woke up and took a thorough imaginary shower and tried to remember more of this hallucinatory horror show of my mind.

 

This is all I know.

NIGHTMARES ON SALE – GET 2 FOR THE PRICE OF 1

I TRY TO IGNORE THE WHISPERS LOUDER THAN THE SCREAMS. IN DREAMS I WALK WITH YOU. You Roy.  I AM TRAVELLING. Always traveling. Moving. New apartment. New house. New CCITEE-Y. NEW STATE. STATE OF MIND. Party goers and house warmers and birthday goers and CHRISTmas mass attendees gather. I know some then I know everyone. I am no one. They don’t see me this way. He doesn’t see me this way. She. You.

 

MR SANDMAN BRING ME A DREAM.. I know you. I love you LOVE! I carry buckets of paint to your house and the party has just begun. I GET NO KICK FROM CHAMPAGNE either Frank, baby. Seven sisters of love pies stare at me and glare at ME AND THAT LOOK. THAT LOOK. IT SENDS CHILLLS DOWN MY SCARS- inside and outside that run against my heart. Let’s get this CHORDETTEONIAN PARTY STARTED MR JIMMY!

 

I put my arm around Grandmom to say I love you. People STARING. People caring. Empty people fill the crowded party. Acting hearty. Listing their character defects. Last chance. MY DEAD GRANDMOM TURNS HER HEAD AND SAYS “I KNOW WHAT YOU DID!”

 

 

I wake up smoking and drift back along the sea of asphalt, scraping my fat ass and ripping my favorite dream jeans still wondering what I did. WHAT DID I DO THAT GRANDMOM KNOWS I DID? Was it last summer Jennifer Love?

 

I am alone. ALONE. MY NEWEST OF THE NEW HOUSES. Sir Raleigh comes with news. I thought he said PRESIDENT REAGAN HAD DIED OF INDECENT IMPLOSURE. I didn’t care until I realized he wasn’t just dreaming about my Dream girl locked in his dungeon TIED UP WITH VINES and THE SISTERS OF REJECTION.

GIVE HIM TWO LIPS OF HATRED AND VIOLENCE. RESTRAINING ORDERS, BRIGHT LIGHTS AND SIRENS.

 

“SHE’S A COKE HEAD” HE SAYS.

“SHE USED TO GIVE BLOW JOBS TO HERMAPHRODITES.” HE SAYS.

 

My throat fills with vomit and joy. IN DREAMS I DO COKE WITH YOU.

 

Stolen emotions and borrowed gifts are shared at the airport and train stations and parking lots and I’M STILL NOT SURE WHICH IS WHICH. IN DREAMS I TALK TO YOU. Us is back and you is cornered and still slip away. Reptilian monkeys bred become bread for the children of Elizabethan peasants but I grab two of them and hand them to the girl with ruby slippers and she vanishes like the Dark Knight into the dark night when she hears Bruno approach.

 

“I’ll whip you now my pretty and your LITTLE MAN too! Hahahahaha” Bruno yells but not enough to find her. I find her in her Old Kentucky home with three wooden porch steps away and I go into seizures. Jules Vern hides Tu-Tu Hundred Feet Under The Sea Under The Porch. I pass out. DUM DUM DUM DUM DUM DUM DUM DUM –DUM DUM DUM DUM DUM. MR SANDMAN WAKES ME. The ape lizards have grown by the time I reach the inside. The Dark Huntress awaits me wearing a smile and a bra. I am excited to see her but worry about poor Mr Vern. Guilt reddens my pink face knowing that I shouldn’t be THERE. The Queen would be quite jealous and take away my deconstructed addictive Kingdom. SHE IS THERE AND SHE IS THERE. IT WAS A DUBIOUS PLAN OF THE HUNTRESS OF DARK TO HAVE Mr Vern under the porch and watch my web of lies unfold. The evil one IS not Bruno and I NOW KNOW WHAT GRANDMOM KNOWS I DID. I JUST DIDN’T DO IT YET WHEN SHE TOLD ME.

 

Caught in the trap admiring the salamander gorilla’s ability to change in size determined by the cage they are in. I imagine if they were let loose if they could grow bigger than the entire world. My Darling Queen and my Miss Huntress dance and change clothes despite the height and come out laughing at me and yet forgiving me and I feel a calm as MY DEAD GRANDMOM SAYS “ I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID.”

Angel Train and a Cup of Joe

Sometimes I think she’s the prettiest girl alive. She might be. She certainly is to her boyfriend (I hope). Long black hair. Big brown eyes. Petite and well proportioned. I’ve never had a real life conversation with her. I haven’t even physically seen her in a couple of years. I rarely see her post on facebook. I rarely think about her. This has little to do with my story except it’s about her. Carmella or Bailey. The 2 names I’ve assigned to her for anonymity sake. She is still my guardian angel. I only have interactions in my dreams and they are not always significant either. She’s in my life and subconscious for a reason.

 

Her face was the last one I saw before my alarm went off at 7 am this morning. I woke up with a smile. The thought of her always gives me a smile. My dreams of her always give me a smile. Maybe I should think of her more so I smile more.

 

The dream wasn’t anything out there or cosmic. It was a dream of hanging out with a bunch of friends after an unrelated dream. Half of the friends I knew and half I didn’t. Only Joe, Brian and Seth were actual real friends from real life. The rest were acquaintances and people I’ve seen before like Bailey who I choose to call my guardian angel. We were all riding a train going ot an event of some kind. A concert, a parade, a convention. It was some event I normally wouldn’t go to and ride a train to. I was hanging mostly with Joe. He was out of character. Not at first.

 

Joe was his usual self drinking a coffee and letting me talk when I spotted Bailey. I wanted to point her out to him because I’ve talked to him more than anyone about her. He seemed too distracted by the people and the good time and tuned me out. This wasn’t the unusual part. Just as I was trying to tell him about my guardian angel personified he chugged a 5 hour energy drink and as we got off the train Joe ran off into the distance forcing me back in the crowd next to Bailey and a girlfriend of hers that I have spoken to but didn’t know real well. I was forced by the crowd to exit the train next to Bailey. I told her what Joe had just done.

 

“He drank all of that coffee and a 5 hour energy drink on an empty stomach? That’s crazy. No wonder he’s running off with all of that temporary energy.” Bailey spoke to me for the first time in what I perceived as real life in my dream.

 

How did she know all of the details when I didn’t know them all? I was just overjoyed that she spoke to me and said something back to her to make her smile. She has the brightest happiest smile that made me smile more. The damned alarm went off before  could talk to her more. That’s all I wanted.

 

But still, I woke up with a smile and felt compelled to write about it. About her.

 

Is it possible to be in love with someone I don’t know? Or am I just in love with the Bailey that appears in my dreams? I’m not even sure what love is. This dream and my thoughts of her will fade within the day and it’ll probably be months before I think or dream of her again but I know she’ll be back. I wonder what this means. Then again I wonder a lot of things.

Excerpt from The Official History of Tomorrow’s Dream page 36

NOTE: This is an excerpt from the book I wrote way back in January  2018 and published in May 2020.

 

I was in no position to take any of Halloway’s shit after a 5-day binge on cooked Euro-celery root and the headaches. God damned headaches.

First thing he comes on with I should start off with the incision from the carnie side of the cerebral influx not remembering yesterday’s lesson about shape shifting and hemorrhoids from Dr Ghastling. Halloway was a real stinker like my pappy said.

No effects on the vortex even if instantly watching unlimited moving pictures for a quarter had nothing to do with the skunk hangover of the patented patient. Fades faster to pinwheels and the smell of audacious ringmasters.

Holloway’s brother-in-law, Chromebook had no jurisdiction on this side of Camden yet he bullied Frank and his sister incessantly for information just to get an emotional contact high. It’s been known that in some hidden forgotten satanic circles that emotional vampires take authoritative forms such as lawmen so they can put the squeeze on faster and easier.

No one noticed my scalpel shaking in my appendage while rotating the blade diagonally against Dr Halloway’s orders. Shit. The necroband anesthesia was wearing off. I needed a hit before the patient. He was just a meat baby anyway. An adult bodystocking. He signed the papers so it was all on the up and up. The operation was.

“I hate to brag.” I said which is untrue. I love to brag.

“I’ve once had a hunchback on the table break out in rage when he woke up to see his intestinal visceral in my hand.”

Halloway finally shut up and listened as he injected the patient with 1,200 milligrams of Delaudid so I could continue my jackhammer approach differing from anything I did before on a patient.

“The hunchback grabbed his insides our of my fingers and sniffed them mumbling something about malpractice and I was more afraid of the word malpractice than I was of this monster waving his insides out and about.”

 

Halloway rode my ass a little more while I tried to finish my tale telling me to concentrate on the surgery at hand. It was my hand at hand so I shoved him and he knocked nurse Mia into my Nitro supplies. Instead of freaking I grabbed her and told her to get orders out to clean the mess and fill out proper procedure forms for sexual harassment against Halloway. I’d back her up and say I saw him touch her thighs in protest against the patient’s skullectemy. As she left I tucked mr meat baby’s skeptic under his rear circular lobe.

“No malpractice here Mr Moto. Now sit the fuck back and let’s put you together.’ I had to use the ball peen hammer to knock him out because a needle wouldn’t hit the mainline fast enough. The Nurse at hand did the injection shit and I did my Indian Healing Dance before shoving his yuck yucks back in his body. I had to reach down his throat manually to find a piece of his Duodenum lodged in there. I used a pocket sewing kit my daughter had given me for Saint Patricks Day to get the insiders job inside before closing him up. Sometimes you have to make due with whats available. You ever hear of Seward’s Theory of Skull Unification and Carcass Connection?”

 

I looked Halloway in the eye and asked again. He hurried off forgetting his final instructions to wind up the wound with scarfree tape. He also left his bottle of vodka.

 

Sheriff Jejun got wise to ole Chromebook’s iniltration on his turf. If anyone is going to shake Frank and Jane’s beans it’s going to be him. He needed the fix more than his rival Chrombook. Jejun was more of a gentle emotional werewolf draining the families only 3 nights a month and usually while they slept so they were better form now knowing. An after effect of an emotional werewolf is more like a night out one ecstasy the next day. Slight discomfort and spinal shaking. The vampire however drains you until the point of death then releases you. Sometimes the vampire works slowly over the course of several days maybe even a week. It takes weeks to recover.

The battle between Jejun and Chromebook goes back centuries worse than any invisible underground catastrophe imaginable.

I think Halloway is an emotional vampire afraid to show his colors in the office, which explains his pent up anger, and skin corrosion.  I guess I’m warning you less subtly then I do my comrade Doctors and nurses. Fuck the doctors. Their mostly hacks and dictator individualists that have no talent just training. Don’t get me started on the nurses and the pandemonium that ensues just looking at one.

As Mr Lloyd Johnson used to say “They are all antidotes for an erection”.

Don’t hide or run. Stay put and all will be as it can under the knife

Ezra POUNDed My Head

Ezra POUNDed my head today

I woke up in the (William) BURROUGHS of my mind

Unable to NEAL like Cassady and pray

I write like I am an ARTHUR (Rimbaud) of many poems but

I am really a HUNTER (S. Thompson) of words

A Patti wordSMITH

 

I am hungry for an Allan GINSBERGer with cheese

Flap JACK Kerouac rhymes touch my soul

I search as (Henry David) THOREOUly as I can for the

Right (Edgar Allan) POEm to come along and

It all seems so (William) BLeAkE like

Tasting rotten (Walt) WHITMAN chocolates

My creativity takes it (Gregory) CORSO

As I ponder on about Emily needing DICKenson

I have to make my MARK like TWAIN

And do as I WILLiam and say FAULKner you

 

I WILLiam SHAKEspeare this feeling

I want to have my (Robert) FROSTed cake

And (William Butler) yEATs it too

Mark my (William) WORDSworth

Smith, Burroughs, Curtis, Scarface and Shepherd

This story starts early on a Sunday morning. A couple of friends and myself took a ride to West Philadelphia to the last residence of our closest departed friends, Marcus. Our mission was to gather his belongings and get them out of the house. Since our one friend was in a hurry we didn’t have time to go through everything. When we arrived Marcus’s friend who rented the room to him greeted us and had all of his belongings packed randomly in milk crates.

Let me back up. My story concerning Marcus started a week before he died. Once my “childhood” (in my mid-20s) hero, Marcus turned me on to many authors, poets, music and some films that I may not have found without him. He was my Shaman and friend and I devoured a lot of his interests. He had bee in and out of hospitals this year and ended up in a nursing home to care for his final ailment, celulosis. I visited for the last time (unknown to me while visiting) a little over 2 weeks before he passed away. We talked on the phone a few times the week before he died.

For some reason I started reading poetry that he loved out of the blue, authors like Arthur Rimbaud, Walt Whitman, Allan Ginsberg, Patti Smith, Jim Caroll and William Blake. It wasn’t a conscious effort. I was writing poetry and devoured the greats that Marcus turned me onto. For some reason I actually understood the poetry for the first time. I even mentioned this to Marcus when he was lucid and not in pain, over the phone.

The day before he died I started a poem about him because he deserved one for his accomplishments and his contribution to the world. November 10^th I found out Marcus died from blood pressure and heart complications, I felt as though he jumped inside of me that day. “ghosts crowd the child’s fragile eggshell mind” to quote Jim Morrison who claims to have had dying Indians’ spirits he witnessed as a child jump into him. He stuck with that story until he died mysteriously in Paris, France in 1971. I felt Marcus in me for a at least a week or so. The extreme presence has faded but part of him remains in me.

The week of his service I was reading Arthur Rimbaud’s biography and discovered that Rimbaud also died on November 10^th, 1991, 120 years before to the date. How appropriate I thought. I told his friends that knew his love for Rimbaud and they all agreed that it was some kind of spirits working there.

So, my 2 friends and me are at Marcus’s last house, his last home before the hospitals trying to avoid the temptation of going through his stuff and loading it into the car. I did manage to take a few minutes to throw together a crate of books and cds for myself. I tried to go through more while we were driving but I was in the blind spot of the car so I had to wait. I’m still waiting but in no hurry because I have months of books to read and cds to listen to.

I am.

The very afternoon I came home I started reading Patti Smith’s autobiography/ Robert Mapplethorpe’s biography written by Smith called Just Kids. Patti was in the top 5 of Marcus’s favorite performers, poet/lyricists and both he and other friend mentioned how great of a read it is. I have been obsessed with it.

Another related side story. My love for Patti Smith, like the majority of my sub cultural loves, have come from Marcus. I listened to her tender and abrasive mix of songs, the spiritual punk rock Queen. Marcus used the line “the sacred and the profane” to describe her, stolen from her own words at a show or interview. I had heard her on vinyl, tapes and cds. Watched video of her, seen endless photos of her. I found out she went to high school, a grade between, my biological mother and my aunt in Deptford, NJ. I had never seen her.

One cold December night in 1995, while living with Marcus, I passed on the opportunity to see not only Patti Smith but legend Bob Dylan at the greatest and at oldest (it has moved but still the same vibe from what I’ve heard) Philadelphia venues, the Electric Factory. I was in my depressive, isolation mode at the time. Sometimes I would create some original art in these modes and I felt this was one of those nights. Marcus felt different. He bugged and pestered me to go with him, he would pay for my ticket (I had no money and he had money back then), It will be one of the greatest experiences of my life. I fought for my right to pout and stay home.

He left. I was relieved. The thought did cross my mind when he and my other roommate went to see David Bowie on his Spider tour with Nine Inch Nails and I regret missing that one. I’ve seen both bands before but it was a different show. Marcus wasn’t even gone an hour and he came back home and burst in my room.

“I am not going to let you miss this one time event, possible the event of your life. I bought you ticket and you’re going back with me.” He said.

I was guilted into one of the best and the most spiritual rock n roll shows I have ever experienced. Patti was first. Marcus made sure we were almost front row. I can’t recall the exact set list but she lived up to her “sacred and profane” performance and lyrics. The deafening speakers in our ears, the crowds cheering all became distant sounds as I became one with Patti Smith, with Marcus, with God. I was disappointed when it was over, walking to the back of the Electric Factory when the more than legendary Bob Dylan hit the stage. I’ve had an on and off love for Bob Dylan and his music. Patti blew me away and the several times I’ve seen her since.

Reading Patti Smith’s stories of New York and her relationship with the controversial artist Robert Maplethorpe almost mirrors my own memories of Marcus and I, Patti and I, art and I, God and I. I can’t stop thinking about Marcus because of our mutual connection.

In 1996 or 97, Marcus and a couple other friends went to a record store for Patti Smith’s book signing. Marcus had been into drawing his favorite writers and rock stars on t-shirts with markers or Sharpies to wear and show off his art, Patti Smith, Keith Richards, Marc Bolan, Walt Whitman, and his personal favorite Jean Genet. Knowing that Genet was Patti Smith’s favorite writer, he brought it to the signing, to show her (I thought because it was his favorite shirt). When it was his turn to talk to her get the book signed he gave her the Genet t-shirt and told her he made it for her. A mountainous sacrifice for Marcus to part with that shirt with his painstaking time consuming beautiful art covering the front. When it was my turn I told her that my mother went to high school with her. She shot me a dirty look and said “oh yeah?” I was speechless and grabbed my copy of her poetry book signed and followed Marcus, giddy as a young artist showing his first work to his teacher. I left pissed at Patti Smith for a while but got over it when I thought of how stupid what I said was or could have been interpreted.

To the last time I saw him, he swears that she wore it on stage at a show he attended. He was so proud. I missed that show. Oh well.

A few nights ago I had a dream about William S Buroughs, one of my favorite writers Marcus had introduced me to. It’s a recurring dream I’ve had for over 10 years where I have conversations with Burroughs or I am chasing him down at a convention of some sort. The next day I read about Patti Smith having a dream about William S Burroughs, one of her mentors, and then actually meeting him the next day. This blew my mind. I knew it was Marcus at work inside me.

The next day I went to Social Services in Camden, NJ. In the waiting room there are clothes for people to take. It’s mostly women’s clothes so I never bothered looking. This day there were 3 boxes of books. I didn’t expect much besides best sellers that I wouldn’t read. First I spotted a Howard Stern Book I already own. Then an AC DC biography I grabbed and put to the side. Like it came down from heaven I spotted the name Jackie Curtis on the spine of one of the books. I grabbed it so fast and gave up on the AC DC one, knowing I might not read it with all of the books I’ve been acquiring. I’ve always owning beyond my reading capability. It started with my comic collection. I had to read everyone I owned. The book was called Superstar in a Housedress: the Life and Legend of Jackie Curtis. Jackie was one of the early Andy Warhol’s drag actors. There was Candy Darling, Holy Woodlawn and Jackie Curtis. You might know the names from the Lou Reed song Take A Walk On The Wild Side. He mentions them all by first name. The book came with a dvd documentary about Jackie Curtis. Once again I knew Marcus had something to do with it being my only friend that knows who Jackie Curtis is and my fascination with over the top drag queens. My favorite was Divine from the many John Waters’ films.

I was feeling sick all day so when I came home I relaxed and watched the documentary. I loved it. I learned a lot about the actor, the writer, the poet, the addict and the superstar by the name of Jackie Curtis.

I was looking for another movie to watch after the documentary. For some reason I watched Scarface, not having seen it in years. I figured after watching a documentary about an artistic genius drag queen superstar I needed to even it out with a movie about a Cuban druglord. I usually watch the featurettes and extras when I am finished. I did. The featurette made references to the original Howard Hawks’ Scarface movie from the 1930’s and the phrase “the world is yours” was used in both versions of Scarface.

After dreaming about transvestites, fame, writing, Patti Smith and Tony Montana, I awoke confused, groggy yet awake and ready for the day. “The World is Yours.” rang in the back of my mind. My morning rituals, when I don’t have to rush off anywhere, are to find some decent light music to listen to, drink coffee, write and read, alternating the reading and writing. I even alternate which novel, prose or poetry I write and the books I read. The Patti Smith biography, Just Kids has been winning out as my reading choice more and more.

I came upon the part of Patti and Robert’s life where they are living at the famous worn down Chelsea hotel in New York, home to celebrities (underground, big names and has-beens), junkies, prostitutes and everyone in between. They get in with the Andy Warhol crowd slowly by showing up every night at Max’s Kansas City another celebrity haunt. Patti meets Jackie Curtis and is asked to be in her latest avant-garde play called Femme Fatale playing a male role, playing opposite sex roles was common and almost mandatory in a Jackie Curtis production. Marcus at work again, I thought after reading this. My mind was blown further when I read a comparison of a neon sign Patti and Robert were looking at to a scene in “Howard Hawks’ movie Scarface where Paul Muni and his girl are looking out the window at a neon sign that said The World is Yours.”

I used to think Marcus was full of shit when he would tell me of his visions and special stories or that they only happened to him Now they are happening to me with Marcus there every step. I’m not the only one.

A few of his closest friends and even those connected with him from a distance are feeling his power, his life, and his soul. Some are in the form of lucid yet surreal recurring dreams while others actually see and feel him while conscious.

In life he wanted to be famous, to be remembered. In death he’s keeping his dream alive. He knows if he comes to me I will write about him and keep him alive.

Out of the Closet

When I came out it wasn’t a closet. It was a trashcan.

I’ve known for a long time what I am or I should say who I am.

I am an artist. The most precious blessing and the most horrific curse. Forsaken and trampled. Survival is rough. I must persist.

“Resistance is futile” as the Borg say on Star Trek. I cannot assimilate with this world. I am an artist. It’s not a choice. It’s not a lifestyle. It’s the way I was born. I nurture it when I’m not fighting it.

“Get a job” you say.

I have a job, thank you.

I have a job. I must create to live. To feel. Alive.

It’s my job.

Job.

I like my job but the pay sucks so far.

Writing and drawing is my life. Your career or your family is your life and art is mine. Why do you push your life on me? I never tell you to be an artist. Far from it. I say “stay away from it unless you are already wealthy.”

There were times I considered and even convinced myself I wanted to be like you. I wanted to fit in. I wanted to be liked, loved and accepted. The older I get and the less I want your life the harder it is to live mine. I have no choice really.

I can’t change my skin color, my sexuality or my need to create. I guess I have to change my acceptance of you.

The Loss of an Angelic Soldier (for Marcus Shepherd)

NOTE: I wrote this November 10th, the day Marcus passed away. I haven’t been on the internet so I am posting it now and I still feel everything I wrote.

Lost another soldier. A soldier of angelic visions and pain. A true warrior of lost souls finding his way. As many times he wandered off the path of enlightenment he always came back to share the sometimes soutrageous yes spiritual paths he found.

Marcus died today. My muse. My confidant. My hero. My friend.

A friend of almost 20 years. As best as he could be. Good enough for me. We became each other despite our extreme differences.

Never have I experienced a friendship that transcended reality like the one I had with Marcus. Marcus Shepherd. A million private jokes. A million laughs. A million cries. A million trips outside and inside ourselves discovering, discussing and over analyzing emotions, theories, thoughts and the world surrounding our soft child like yet genius brains.

He was the only friend that knew everything about me and actually understood me. Missing him is an understatement at this point. At any point. In and out of my life at times as friendships do yet always in thoughts and prayers.

I met him in March 1992 and knew there was something special there. I never dreamed we’d play in bands together, live together and become so close. I couldn’t imagine that this tall skinny guy in eyeliner with long full black hair that wears frilly shirts and leather pants would become my inspiration turning me on to writers I never heard of like Jean Genet, punk bands like Television and even foreign films like Goddard. A new world sparked from this unusual friendship.

His visions, which I once thought were bullshit, unfolded in front of me. Light and dark. We talked of these things. We talked for hours about the here and now as well. Our emotions and desires. Exposing each deep secret we’ve ever had through the years.

We hung out at coffee shops in our 30s like 2 art school kids to meet artists and people to inspire us especially the girls. Then we discussed our love for them. The women. The art girls. Frantically, desperately seeking our soul mates from any hot young artist girl.

I helped him discover that he was just as superficial at times as the rest of us the way he brought the artist and serious poet out in me.

I could go on and on and I probably will about stories and adventures of the man I call friend and mean it. Keep reading. As much as I miss him, I know he is part of me and will stay here.

Silence My Lamb

.Butterfly

Poetry is for Wimps

I hate poetry. It’s for cowards that don’t have the balls to say what things directly and tell you what they really want to say. That’s what I used to think. I thought that for the years I’ve been writing my ramblings and prose because a lot of the standard poets I’d been exposed to were boring. All fluff and evasive.

 

Let me back up. As a teenager I loved poetry. I loved rock music and I especially loved the lyrics. I loved the Beatles. I had no idea what their words meant all of the time but I got something out of it. In the 8^th grade I discovered Jim Morrison. Well, the Doors then Jim. I followed the trend of what everyone else was listening to and since there wasn’t much great popular music my Middle School and High School were into classic rock. Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, AC DC, Jimi Hendrix, The Doors etc. All great lyrics. I loved the simplicity of some and the complex descriptives of others.

 

Then I found the book called No One Here Gets Out Alive, the biography of Jim Morrison. I fell in love with his persona. I bought every Doors album and learned every lyric. I bought Morrison’s poetry book. Morrison led me to reading William Blake and Dylan Thomas. This was poetry I thought was cool. Many people I know call him a hack. Maybe he was  but so am I and almost every artist, musician, writer, director etc. that I love.

 

Jump ahead to my mid 20s. I lived with a couple of friends and one was into a lot of the art, music and books that I was. He had spent his entire life building up knowledge of beat writers and their influences and punk rock and it’s influences. I grilled him for knowledge and books and records. I learned constantly about writers and bands I heard of but didn’t get into. He was my muse.

 

It was my second childhood of many more to come. I was making art constantly, listening to the Sex Pistols, The New York Dolls, the Velvet Underground, Patti Smith and reading William S Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and eventually Arthur Rimbaud and Jean Genet. It was a learning experience I will never forget. I started writing poetry, lyrics and short stories. They weren’t the best but I was trying to find my voice if I had one.

 

I started showing my art in galleries, coffee shops and book stores. I was actively participating in poetry readings. It was one of my many new beginnings. These artists and my friend have become part of me on a deeper level that is still with me today.

 

Years past and I evolved into other creative activities. Life started taking over like working and paying bills and girlfriends. I kept going. From that point of my life I knew I was an artist and had to create on some level or another.

 

Back to poetry. I went through a period and all I wrote were prose. Mostly simple stories and journals sometimes incorporating heavy descriptives then back to simple writing. I was developing as an artist, a writer, whether I liked it or not. Even when I’m not drwing or writing

 

About 9 or 10 years ago I got heavy into writing and I wrote and wrote non stop sometimes. That’s when I stopped liking poetry. That’s when I came up with my opinions stated in the first paragraph. That’s when I thought all poetry sucks. Then I remembered Charels Bukowski and a lesser known and in my opinion the greatest poet ever, Steven Jesse Bernstein. I prefer their prose but I love the way they write poetry. No rules. Just say what you want however you want.

 

My life’s mission statement is stolen from a poem by Patti Smith’s poem calle Babalogue that she recite before performing her song Rick n Roll Nigger. “I am an American Artist. I have no guilt.” I try and remind myself of that everyday.

 

The reason I was thinking about all of this is because I was at my favorite coffee shop last night for internet access since I don’t have it at home and I discovered that there was an open mic planned for the night. I hate open mics these days. I wasn’t in the mood to hear a bunch of people singing and guitars etc. then I found out it was a poetry and spoken word open mic. I thought this might be more interesting. I over heard some of the people that were there and went back and forth whether they are full of shit or interesting. I went with interesting.

 

I listened and there were some pretty good poets that also knew how to read it aloud. I listened to each poet and considered reading. Once I mentioned it to the older woman sitting next to me she gave me a push. I was actually a little afraid of reading. I picked out a few of more short more powerful and humorous pieces and eventually I read them. I could feel the energy of the room rise with each word that came out of my mouth as I read from laptop. I was nervous but still pulled through. I tried to be humble afterwards knowing how great I was, I am, as people complimented my poems.

 

It was a good night. I felt good having read after years of being out of the scene. It got me to thinking about poetry and my personal history and my mission statement. I am an American Artist. I have no guilt.

 

I might even go back next time.