Psyberartist's Blah-blah-blog

and meanwhile, more words

2008-12-02T03:16:00.004-05:00

Is it possible to speak without uttering judgement? Language differentiates, separates me from thee and us from all.

In the nonverbal realm, things merely are; the cosmos merely is. Images and feeling - un-contained, unconstrained by definition.

Hence, perhaps, the silence of meditators, monks and mystics.

Crystallization and dissolution.

Shake Your Booty Santa

2008-11-19T01:59:00.003-05:00

Now that all the witches and vampires have been put away (tucked into broom closets, crammed back into the basement crypts), the flashing, rattling, Xmas merchandise is out. Trees in store windows, racks of plastic Santas and gaudy red reindeer dusted with glitter.

Last week, I passed a little store in New Preston, CT where the tree was hanging from the CEILING; the base had been glued where a light ordinarily would be attached. The tree top ended about 3 feet above the floor, giving mice and renegade rug rats lots of crawling room. This tree, 100% artificial, was hot pink, perfect for the next money-making holiday (Valentines day), and still without ornaments. Perhaps the Yuletide angels or V-Day cupids didn't like posing for weeks with their heads down and all the blood rushing to their brains.

That was the best piece of Xmas decoration I've seen since encountering the "Shake Your Booty" Santa last year - Push button; gadget screeches some ditty as Santa lifts his butt in the air and his ass jiggles in time to the music.

Performance Art of Yogis

2008-05-29T16:32:00.006-04:00

In an email, a friend wrote about Tai Chi: "When I heard that one position was called "Lady at the Shuttle" I naturally assumed it was the shuttle bus she was waving to. However...tai chi is about two thousand years old, so on closer thought, I figured it probably meant the shuttle on a loom..."

My reply: Well, maybe you could do the moves while waiting for the shuttle as well. You could wear a sandwich board (made of light weight foam core) saying "Crazy Lady in Motion", wear a traditional fool's cap, and turn your exercise routine into a kind of performance art......just in case some "do gooder" calls the leering men-in-white-coats to "rescue" the bus stop lady whose strange movements are overturning comfortable definitions of "what is normal"

You know how they (the nameless "They") like to assign days special meanings and labels? National Breast Cancer Awareness Day, National Literacy Day, Earth Day, and so on? Imagine a National Yoga Day or a National Tai Chi Day, when every practitioner or bumbling student does the movements while waiting for the bus, the train, or even that cup of Starbucks ultra-yummy cappuccino? While in line at the supermarket or the post office? For one day, every sidewalk in every city would be the stage for performance art. Maybe even some of the cops would join in.

And maybe this fragment from an email correspondence will have entertainment value for anyone who stumbles onto this blog.

Sparkling dahlias and tie-dyed daisies

2008-05-26T21:50:00.002-04:00

The lilacs are blooming; sniff me, inhale a whiff of hope, their fragrances invite, The lilies-of-the valley dangle, dainty white bells ready to chime in harmony with the music of the spheres. Yellow butterflies flit, as befits their species, and red-tailed hawks soar. Dragonflies hop across invisible bands of air. Lacy fern fronds unfurl from nesting fiddleheads. Buttercups blossom in a constellation of gold and dandelion seeds waft up, furry tufts on their journey of haphazard exploration. All's well among the flora and fauna, until one steps inside the supermarket.

Beside the check-out line, they tempt you with candy bars and magazines offering instant sex appeal.. They sell batteries, packaged razors, so many "Oops, I forgot about that; good thing they have it here" and "She'll kill me if I don't bring that home" items. Among the merchandise offered for impulse or last-second-thought sale are flowers. Roses factory-made from thin balsa sheets painted scarlet. Cut real flowers, presented as proper bouquets held in place by shiny silver paper spattered with candy-pink hearts. Mere flowers aren't good enough; they can be found in any garden and thus are too ordinary for the customer waiting behind a cart of potatoes, toilet paper and Friskies. Flowers, if intended for someone or something special, must be made special. The merchandising experts have special-ordered especially sparkly blooms.

Daisies dipped in vats of dye until the petals glow neon orange, lipstick-magenta, hot chartreuse and screamingly bright turquoise. Dahlias sprinkled with glitter until every petal glistens like a brand-new Hallmark card. Some glitter rubs off at the touch, drops onto the clothes like dandruff; the dyed daisies, if held too long, stain the fingers blue, but this is a small price to pay for a message of love or condolence or respect at that special sometime or someplace.

Spring time is a good time for the flora and fauna. At Christmas, when all the flora are hibernating, they sell live poinsettias varnished in several layers of glitter next to plastic reindeer that dance unembarrassed next to a Santa who shakes his booty at the press of a button.

Kvetching Cats

2008-05-26T21:06:00.002-04:00

I listen to the joke about the partly deaf but extremely articulate dog who mishears "fetch" as "kvetch", and promptly starts complaining. "Hysterica!"; I laugh.

Meanwhile, my cats fuss at their food and meow "I send you out to hunt for real food, and what do you bring back? No delicious mousebacks. No filets of vole. No grilled toads. You do what's easiest and bring back some factory's left-overs pickled in chemicals, so-called preservatives which are really poisons. You bring back unnamables that someone's labeled 'grilled mackerel' or 'salmon feast', but the unnamable shreds stick between my dainty teeth and sink like balls of elephant dung in my gut. You, you're lazy and cheap and insensitive. My luck to have a lazy, cheap, and callous jailer. Step aside, you stingy lame-brained wretch, and let me taste what you take for yourself!

And so, Tessa the girl-cat nibbles tiny morsels of avocado from my salad and even laps up a bit of the italian salad dressing. The cat who mistook herself for a bunny? But then Marti, the polka-dotted and often comic, master-of-escape, hellraising Houdini cat licks the cottage cheese and smiles a Cheshire grin.

Cat's Paw - an art show

2008-05-26T16:59:00.002-04:00

When her own cat decided to use an architectural model as a cat bed, interfering with the artist's work plans, Jacqueline C.MacKenzie deftly turned frustration into opportunity and found inspiration in her pet's pestiness. The giant sculpture of a cat's paw, which protrudes from and totally blocks the entrance to Joker's Child Gallery, features steel claws and white mink covering fiberglass. "When your cat won't let you work, you have to work around your cat", says the artist in a moment of unexpected profundity; viewers crowd the corridors outside the gallery and trip over the claws as they clamor to touch the gargantuan kitty, while critics shout their acclaim:

"Brilliant!" writes Felix O'Pause of New Barker Magazine. "Anything featuring cats is always popular. Combining this knowledge with understanding of the fact that bigger is always better, MacKenzie has created a sure-fire crowd pleaser. Truly American in its extravagance and size, this cat colossus is sure to put money in the kitty and mammoth smiles on the most stoic faces"

Further information on the exhibition and artist can be found at www.the jokerschild.com and www.tail_of_two_kitties.com. The websites also feature new Art Star Marti, the cat who scratched his way to fame to become a giant among his peers, resting snug as a bug in a rug inside the architectural model he mistook for a mere box.

Download the poster:

Allergic to Art?

2008-05-21T11:02:00.005-04:00

Strange article about a weird art exhibit:
New Eldorado, New Mexico - May 20, 2008

Fort Neukem, closed for nearly two decades, has become the site of a new public controversy.
Behind barbed wire fences and abandoned sentry posts, ten Artists, calling their group "Screeching Canaries of the New Millennium" or SCNM. hosted an art show as potentially hazardous as military weapons. The show, titled "I'm Allergic To My Art" featured sculptures and flat work made exclusively from materials to which many are now allergic.

P.U.Nod of Cartersville TN wove a vest from unshelled peanuts and gloves from cat fur. "My house is carpeted with shed cat hairs and I always need to keep tissues on hand for the guests who sneeze" says the artist. who needed six months to vacuum up the ingredients of her wearable piece. J.P. Reynolds of Greensboro. NC created gas masks made from lobster claws, unshelled shrimp, fish eyes, live tendrils of poison ivy and moldy cheese. Noting that bees housed in differently shaped containers hum at different pitches, U.G. Craft of Harmonium, CA staged "The Honeybee Jamboree", a short concert in which trained bees hummed "God Bless America"; several bees escaped during the show, making this more dangerous and more memorable than her earlier performance piece, "The Squeaky Toy Jamboree".
Instead of the usual cheese, crackers and wine. visitors to the opening reception were offered antihistamine tablets in a bowl, a plate of syringes pre-loaded with epinephrine, brandy snifters of Nyquil and tablespoons of anti-itch cream. Tissues replaced the customary napkins.
Officials from the CDC, FBI and Homeland Security were called when John Buck, allergic to peanuts, collapsed in anaphylactic shock and was heliported to the nearest hospital. "I survived, thanks to an immediate shot of epinephrine," says Buck, "The artists were prepared for emergencies, but it was still irresponsible to expose the public to such dangers." Many share this sentiment and several visitors to the show are threatening to sue, despite suffering only runny noses and rashes.
Twenty FBI officers in Hazmat suits stormed the show just three hours after its opening, evacuating participants and seizing the art, as evidence and for testing. Homeland Security has barricaded Fort Neukem indefinitely as a biohazard zone. The artists face possible fines, imprisonment and litigation.
"Let them sue us," counters Nod. "My net worth is $300."
"We're the squealing canaries," says Reynolds. "So many more people have allergies today, and more serious ones, maybe because they've been sensitized by all the pollution and food additives. People with allergies are canaries in the mine, warning us what could happen to everyone. Our art is a wake-up call - listen to the canaries!"
Although the original art remains in federal custody, the artists are selling meticulously photographed posters of select pieces through their new website, artallergy.com.

I.M. Noone - WACK-E News

http://axgallery.freeyellow.com/fake1.html

The Dump at the End of the Universe

2007-09-18T23:25:00.001-04:00

Where is the Soul Recycling Center? Do souls of corrugated cardboard wait together in a specially labeled dumpster, separate from fragile ones made of glass? Are sturdy but time-rusted ones unloaded into a spiritual scrap-metal heap? Do those radioactive or toxic with rage come pre-packaged in orange bags stamped with "danger!" signs? And when are they relegated to the Cosmic Landfill, being unsuited to further recycling?

According to rumor, the Soul Landfill near Andromeda is nearly full, and due to close soon. The whole universe knows that used-up souls must be dumped somewhere, but the NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) Syndrome keeps any galaxy from taking on the responsibility. Heaps of used-up souls grow higher and wider; clearly, the universe will stink for a long time.

inspiration

2007-09-18T22:51:00.000-04:00

Clatter. Tinkle. Hum. The buzz as a million thoughts flee the skulls that had imprisoned them; they squeeze through pores and wriggle out nostrils. Those with glittering wings recognize other dragonfly-thoughts and rush forward, swarming upward in a silver cloud. Firefly thoughts meet firefly thoughts in a convocation of fireflies - a firefly-concept of blinking gold.

One of the humans feels a thought squeeze out his nose, then sees it hop and alight on his finger before it scampers away towards others of its kind. "I wasn't the only person with grasshopper thoughts," he mutters in amazement to himself. "I believed that I was the only one with such ideas and feelings, and that only one thought of such appearance and character existed. But....there were hundreds, thousands of thoughts just like mine; my thought was just one in a common species."

Another human inhales deeply, sucking pollen, oxygen atoms and tiny dragonfly thoughts deeply into his lungs. "What a wonderful, fantastical idea!", he thinks, and prides himself on his brilliance. He has breathed deeply, and is enthralled by inspiration.

Crock pot of love

2007-09-16T21:47:00.000-04:00

Some people fall in love with humans. Some fall in love with dogs and cats. Some fall in love with the flowers that symbolize love. I fell in love with a pile of peppers.

They were miniature peppers, each creased and walnut-sized, in a tumble of delicate yellow, ember orange, luxuriating crimson and fragile green on a dark turquoise cloth. I could paint them, honor them by trying to preserve their beauty forever on canvas, but my work could never approach the artistry of nature; my colors would never vibrate with such inner radiance, my shapes wouldn't twist and turn with such intricate elegance. To try duplicating their beauty so lamely seemed like sacrilege.

I could eat them; they were on sale as food. But eating them would require biting into their glowing skin, destroying and desecrating their beauty; to eat them seemed like sacrilege.

I couldn't keep them forever. I needed to eat; eventually, they'd rot. At home, I threw my beloveds into the pot and watched them boil.

Prodigious

2007-09-09T05:34:00.000-04:00

Prodigious
(as told by "Steve", a genetically-modified, super-smart monkey)

While the double-wide was parked just outside Dallas, Mark took Arabella to see Dr. Elmore Wonder, the greatest neurologist in Texas. Outside his office, Arabella jabbed my side with a fountain pen and kicked me with the shiny red shoes bought especially for the appointment. Mark hissed for her to "Behave!", then pointed to the brass plaque on the door: M.D., Ph.D. in neuroscience, PhD. in Psychology, Ph.D. in Xenobiology, Diplomate of the American board of Neurology, licensed therapist and clinical counselor, Professor Emeritus of exotic neurodegenerative diseases, certified developmental specialist, Fellow of the Transatlantic Academy of Neuropsychologists; the plaque was almost as tall as me and the string of small letters, capitals, commas and periods after his name advertised his expertise.

"She used to be smart, an infant Leonardo," Mark explained to the doctor, "Now she's not even average, not even ordinary."

Arabella stared blankly at the two men; I shrieked, clapped and bounced up and down on my tip-toes.

"Oh, we don't usually allow pets in here." The doctor scowled at me.

"Oh Steve?," Mark hastened to explain. "He's not a pet, he's Arabella's special companion. She doesn't go anywhere without him."

Arabella reached for a magazine and tried to hurl it at me; i dodged aside and it landed, pages crumbled, on the floor behind the doctor's desk. I darted behind her and pinched her butt while she wailed "Smart ass monkey, smart as monkey, smart ass monkey!" until the doctor silenced her with a lollipop jammed in her mouth.

"So she used to be special? But is no longer extraordinary?" The doctor flicked pages in the open textbook on his desk, leafing past pictures of sliced brain and swollen neurons. "In here,' he mused, nodding towards his book, "We have pictures of tragedy, extraordinary tragedy. Children with rare genetic diseases whose neurons started swelling with fat and exploding before they were six. Children who met the wrong virus and had brains full of holes, like sponges, by age eight. But your daughter?" The doctor shrugged, then raised both palms by his upper arms in an "oh, well!" gesture.

"My daughter's a unique case,"Mark protested, and began tugging out the photographs and news clippings he'd stashed in his pockets.

"Of course," the doctor soothed in the voice of a trained peace-keeper. "She's unique, I'm unique, the ape's unique; we're all genetically different, and so, unique. You'd be surprised how many mothers come in here, convinced that their kids are geniuses, there's an epidemic of misunderstood geniuses in the world today. If the kid turns out average, the mother claims that he used to be brilliant, a prodigy traumatized by the environment, and wants me to restore the kid to his old state. Maybe your daughter's a little slow at reading or has trouble with her times tables; maybe you, being a proud father, thought she was brighter than this. Those are just little glitches. I deal only with exceptional cases; you'd be better off spending your money and time elsewhere."

Arabella, finished with her lollipop, spat the tacky white stick onto the floor and glared.

"Steve's not an ape, he's a monkey," Mark snapped, then dumped a pile of cut-out, yellowed news articles on the doctor's desk. One drifted to the floor; I snatched it up before Arabella could crush it under her grimy soles. "You want proof, here's proof!"

The doctor picked up the clipping closest to him, leaned back, and began to nonchalantly read aloud:

"Arabella Gorman, daughter of Mark Merlin-the-Magnificent Gorman, is only one, but she's no mere pretty babe; when she recited the English, Greek, hebrew and Cyrillic alphabets before an astonished full house at our very own Theater on the Green, she showed all the makings of a future scholar. 'She just sucks up knowledge, sticks her nose in a book and sniffs in information,' her father, a professional magician, commented, 'I don't know how she got the gift; neither of her parents even like to read. I forget everything a minute after I finish the book, so why bother? But she's already reading magazines and can recite a few poems by Longfellow; she didn't do that tonight, because she has stage fright'. When asked about the prodigy's mother, Mark said that she had 'vanished, done another disappearing act, was probably spending his money somewhere in Mexico.' "

The doctor pulled out a magnifying glass and held it over the clipping.

"The photo doesn't look much like her," he observed. "Those rows of ribbons and those puffs of lace are hardly slimming. But, even taking the dress into account, this is the fattest baby I've ever seen."

Mark nodded.

"We tried putting her on diets, but nothing worked. She ate more than a sumo wrestler, and always figured out how to open the locks on the refrigerator." Mark sighed. "She lost the weight at the same time as she lost her smarts. Maybe, all along, the fat in her belly was thinking, not her brain."

"Things don't work that way, Mr. Gorman; fat cells don't think." The doctor smiled wryly. "You're a circus man, aren't you?"

Mark nodded. Not just a circus man, he was a magician. Modern magicians had lost many of the powers taught in the secret schools of the alchemists, but they retained the ancients' reverence for mystery. The world was not always how it seemed; sometimes, we saw only facades and reflections of our own delusions. Sometimes, lead was not merely lead; sometimes, fat cells were not merely storage sacks for lard. If a Celtic sorcerer could talk the trees into mid-winter blooming, if an old world witch could convince a prince to transform into a frog, maybe ordinary fat cells could fuse into a lumpy, pulsating mass greater than all its ingredients - an organism that thought and remembered and wondered; a mouthless, limbless organism that communicated its thoughts to its host, who had a mouth to speak and arms with which to implement the ideas in the real world.

Wasn't the brain composed largely of fat? Maybe Americans were wrong to revile fat; perhaps, instead, they should view it with awe, set up societies for the protection of cogitating blubber.

Cupid's Heart Attack

2007-09-08T15:50:00.000-04:00

Like a heavy boot stomping his chest. Like a boulder crushing his flesh. Not the shrill, focused pain of an arrowhead this time; this time, the pain throbbed in duller but more insistent waves of destruction. Cupid, at least 2000 years old but with the perpetual grin and body of a three year old, wondered if cherubs could suffer myocardial infarctions and if he, himself, could die of a broken heart.

Does a Brick Shit-House Protect You Against the Fall-Out from Blonde Bomb-shells?

2007-09-08T15:00:00.000-04:00

"She's built like a brick shit house."

I've never seen a brick shit house, have no idea how one's constructed. I've glimpsed fertilizer silos, stinking of manure, but these have been wooden or concrete - shit houses, perhaps, but not brick. I've seen other storage facilities - large windowless buildings with electrified steel fences, to keep intruders out or keep the inventory (usually dusty boxes with factory-stamped labels) from bolting for freedom; sometimes, old windows are boarded-up and barred, to keep burglars out and escape-artists in.

Perhaps, a brick shit-house refers to an outhouse, more sturdily constructed than the average. The usual outhouse is a shoddily built shed - made from planks of left-over wood held together by rusty nails, or plastic that dents, then cracks, when enough falling twigs have thumped against it. A hurricane would tear away the planks, suck apart the plastic fragments, and the shit would go flying; a brick shit-house could better withstand the storm.

So how would a woman who's "built like a brick shit house" look? She'd be of large girth, voluminous to contain all the precious wares; she'd show an imposing facade of impenetrability. Barbed wire gouges flesh; protective brick walls crash only when attacked by a crew of demolition experts. To know her innards, one must destroy her and endanger oneself. The curious know to move on; they will burgle another, less formidable, building to explore its heart and soul.

Or maybe, she'd stand alone, a strong independent exiled due to the stench emanating from her core. Flies are drawn to her, as they are to carrion and rot and all that humans would deny; people approach warily and only when they must, gagging and creasing their noses in disgust.

The brick shit house of lusty dreams would be an armored Valkyrie, enigmatic and controlling, or a rural isolate, avoided because she reminds all of that which they'd rather forget.

Next: The devastation wrought when a blond bombshell is detonated and explodes.

To My Drear Sweatheart

2007-08-06T00:44:00.000-04:00

We all know of letters that begin "Drear Mary" or "To My Sweatheart", giving deeper (perhaps truer) meaning to terms of affection. And so:

Misspelling For Poets

Sometimes creative misspelling
Can be literally compelling -
Then new coinages come to light
Because a word's not writ quite right......

For example, without intention,
I typed in place of mere "detection"
The more specialized "dirtection":
Or "To spot all dust upon inspection".

So, for hands that tremble in true terror
Of committing one more doltish error -
Recall, despite persistent perspiration,
That mistakes can stimulate inspiration;
The letter, like the person, which doesn't fit
Sometimes gives birth to great wit.

from the land of the gray

2007-08-06T00:31:00.000-04:00

Every dog has his day
And in the dark, all cats are gray.
If the cat and mouse both are gray
How tell hunter from the prey?

By smell, of course. Mice smell musty, cats smell like rain-cleansed woods. And sound: When was the last time you heard a mouse purr? In the dark, in the night, in the land of the gray, present and future are defined by a squeak and a whiff.

subspecies: broccoli artificialis (& nanotechnology trout)

2007-08-06T00:03:00.000-04:00

Overheard comment: "In my daughter's kindergarten class the kids had an argument about whether there were two kinds of tomatoes, the ones that farmers grew and the kind that were manufactured in plastic boxes".

Tomato naturalis versus Tomato artificialis.

Ode to Health Food:

Give me soy bean burgers, unsalted rice cakes,
Tangy spinach for my midnight snacks;
Crunchy vitamin pill, when will power breaks,
Prized for the calories that it lacks....

Oh it's yummy, yummy, yummy
For a medi-coated tongue and tummy
Broccoli gurgles gaily in my guts-
Oh joy, oh rapture, I'm no blithering rummy;
I resist butter, beer and butts.

Surgeon General Warning: Eating Babes is Bad for Your Health

2007-08-05T23:19:00.000-04:00

modest proposal.....

Nowadays, we're too health conscious to eat infants; all that baby fat would surely raise cholesterol levels. And, if we take a lesson from our ancestors, we could surely make use of the kids after only a few years of being drained by them - as menial labor in factories, screwing caps on bottles, or as house cleaners for working couples. Two, three, four houses per day, let them work from sun-up to moon-down. And when they keel over, kaput, dead, batteries drained, at age 10 - we can say that we've metaphorically eaten one child a thousand times, sucked all the juice from his flesh and soul until be could be no more.

Better yet, we could eat our golden oldies, a.k.a. golden moldies, a.k.a. senior citizens, a.k.a. social security leeches, a.k.a. Medicare moochers. Scientists would have to develop an especially strong tenderizer, to be applied before packaging, if their deltoids, biceps, trapezius muscles and untender-loins are to be sold as grade A steak to humans of discerning palate. If such a tenderizer isn't developed, the meat, gristle, osteoporotic bones and degenerate cartilage can be pulverized and served to cattle with the usual swill of manure peppered with antibiotics; prime cuts might be added to Alpo stew, with its "variety of meats for a canine's variety of nutritional needs". Then, in answer to the question "Whatever happened to Granny?", one can honestly answer "Granny, she turned into a real cow", or "She went to the dogs in the end". About the stocky grandfather, one may exclaim proudly "Yes, he was a real hunk" - as in "a hunk of meat".

Merchants and dieters might retort "Haven't you seen the latest version of Atkins? It's all the rage. One can gobble all the fat one wants, just stay away from that nasty pasta", followed by the jingle:

Baby toes, dipped in cheese -
Yummmm, they're finger-lickin' good;
Tender, more bound to please
Than greased chicken ever could.

When the price of beef begins to soar
And you must serve as host -
Lure kiddie to your kitchen door
And serve guests toddler roast.

dream Dad

2007-08-05T23:05:00.000-04:00

from a dream:
The dean motioned me to sit before his sturdy mahogany desk.

"Claire, We have a little problem," he paused and fingered a single piece of folded paper. "Not the usual problem we have with students."

I stared back, speechless.

"It's a letter. From your father."

I frowned; my father couldn't be writing letters to the Dean.

"To Dean Emory," he began. "Let me read it all to you, it's not long......dean Emory, I'm writing in regards to my daughter, Claire Kuvok, who currently attends your art school. I am her father, I know Claire well, her personality and her talents. Her gradeschool pictures were scribbles; her junior high pictures continued to be eyesores. Claire is not an artist. She is an engineer; she hould be studying chemistry, physics and math. She shoudn't number among your students, unless you accept every student who applies."

I paused a long time, thinking.

"We don't pay too much attention to parental complaints," the deam continued. "But I thought that you should be made aware."

I coughed, rubbed my hands together, then spoke.

"I'll just remind him that he's dead," i said. "That'll keep him quiet. He hates to be reminded of the fact." i paused and shouted. "Dad, you're dead. D_E_A_D! Remember that - dead! Out of the letter writing business."

The dean gasped. You mean that your father is not alive?

"He's been dead for years. Eight years to be exact. Who the heck wrote this? Let me see it. Oh god! It's my brother's handwriting."

"Well, that explains it then. It's a practical joke."

"Only one problem. My brother lost both of his hands in a land mine explosion in Iraq."

longing

2007-08-05T22:58:00.000-04:00

And when the royals are feeling stressed
By popparazi and the press,
They long to be like average Joe
Who can freely come and go.
That Joe breathes sooty factory air
And strains in pain to pay the fare
The royals would not want to know.
For if the mundane doesn't glow
Where could blue royals long to go?

Soul Jam

2007-08-05T22:51:00.000-04:00

"I promise not to hide my face, if you promise not to suck up my soul."

But the inside of this camera is already filled with too many souls - souls packed too closely together to writhe and wriggle; souls sweaty and gagging from the stink of so much perspiration, souls deaf from one another's screams. You couldn't squeeze another soul in, unless you let one of the prisoners out. But that wouldn't be a good idea, would it? Not when the freed soul is also deaf and mad. Not when its muscles are cramped from such long crowding and its hot wet skin is overgrown with mold; such a soul might seek vengence, punitive damages from any photographer for the years of freedom it can never reclaim. Best, then, to let rotting souls rot; best to keep trapped souls in their cages.

Photography will be safe as long as imprisoned souls stay shut in, and picture takers don't buy new cameras.

Temptresses are a dime-a-dozen

2007-08-05T22:23:00.000-04:00

Dream Dangler

"I'm so mad at The Jerk!", Trish exclaims one evening.
"Huh?"
"The jerk! My Ex! El Stinko!", Trish croaks. "I was supposed to get my money last week - LAST WEEK, mind you! Well, this weekend, I called my detective agency and got them on the case. And ya know where he is?"
Anne stares.
"Wales! Of all places! If he thinks he's gonna skip out on me...We know his address now, and know that he HAS to come back on a plane either Saturday or Sunday. I'll be there, both days, waiting! My lawyer says -if I don't get the money out of him and he flees again, we can get a bench warrent on him; the moment he sets foot in this country - wham, bam, it's the slammer, damn you, until you pay up!"

-----

The next week, Trish appears in her usual attire - one of her exotic dark purple hats, with feathers sewn along the brim, a bit of "character" bought from a vintage boutique. She struts in her high heels and a short skirt clings tightly to her thighs. "You gotta show them some leg," she says. "Don't do the breast thing, that's too much, distracts them too much. When you do business with them, you want to keep their minds on business, but also keep them a bit disoriented. Get their hormones going a little, but not too much - then they play right into your hands; you've got them like putty". The world's top 10 temptresses spritz themselves with only a subliminal scent of musk.

"Well, the Jerk came through," she announces. "Caught him at the airport, was right by the door when he de-planed. Handed him the papers and dragged him to the lawyer's office. Signed everything - everything! He knows I mean business and that I won't give in -"

"Right, tracking him to the airport and all that, " Anne mumbles, "He's got a tough adversary; easier to give in than fight, sometimes."

"And he gave in on everything. This divorce'll be a breeze".

Anne merely nods and squints at the buses lined up behind the red light, looking for #61. Tiers of tiny windowlights twinkle from the highrises. The windows at street level glow golden, each vendor hawking a dream. Dine here and imagine yourself lady of the manor, doted on by attentive, efficient waiters trained since birth in the art of servitude. Wear this sleek red dress; buxom Brunnhilde becomes willowy Scarlett for a mere $99, without spending years in plastic surgery, charm school and psychotherapy sessions. One benefit of aging, Anne thinks, is that you're not expected to go gaga over every new fashion, not expected to play seductress - a relief to the world's wallflowers and to those who prefer serenity over power plays.
-------

The next week, Trish raves about astrology, and how it can be used to manipulate men. Using astrology, she's ensnared the best men in the city - a master photographer whom she hopes to make her new "mentor", and an entrepreneur whom she's "shown a lot of leg" and who now has her in on the wheelings and dealings for opening a new tavern. She met her latest heart-throb "Allen" on one of her freelance photographic assignments. "Allen's drop dead gorgeous", she proclaims; when she rode in the elevator with him, her eyes were rivetted on his cascading black curls, his fathomless black eyes, his jutting cheekbones. And, she adds, "He has a cute ass and knows it....Just watch him parade around the room - a model's strut."

"He's gotta be a Scorpio," she asserts, "With those intense eyes, nothing else. And I KNOW how to handle Scorpios; it's all layed out, strategy by strategy, in 'Love And the Stars'. I tell you, if word about that book got out, this planet would be chaos - everyone knowing too much about how to handle everyone else. That book's a real treasure; good thing it's not well publicized...Anyway, I tested out the chapter on Scorpios - winked at him when he was looking really intense; he got all bent out of shape, did one of those dance-in-place routines, a sure sign of a Scorpio. But, wow, was he ever cute when he did his dance! So now, I'm just following the book, working my star magic and reeling him in, little by little."

"Looks like he's already reeled YOU in," Anne chuckles, "You were sold on him when you saw his eyes"

"I'm sold on the book," Paula asserts. "Like with Dale - the guy who's opening the bar - the minute I saw that mane of curly yellow hair, I thought 'That guy's got Leo in him big time'. All Leos are actors of some sort. It's a fire sign, they're hot, make themselves seen"

"Well, I don't make myself seen and I'm a Leo," Anne comments, "Most people don't notice me. I'm invisible. And my hair - well, that's probably genetics. My mother, my grandmother - they all have this kind of hair"

"No, not just genetics, it's also the lion at work. You may not think you're seen, but you are seen. Leos have to be seen, find ways to be seen. The way to get along with Leos is to applaud them, feed them praise, a morsel at a time. Like Dale...When he's angry or down, I just feed him something for his self confidence and he perks right up, gets all golden and smiley again; the roar and sulking turn into a purr. That's the Leo. I just toss him tidbits of praise and now he's panting after me like a puppy".

"Interesting," Anne drawls. "But what about the smart guys, who figure out what you're doing? Maybe they just play along to see where the game's going. And what - uh, in every mugshot, I look like either a paid killer or an inmate at the funny farm. What if guys take one look, and run?"

"Not a problem when you know the moon sign, the rising sign, which planets are in which houses. That tells you about the deeper parts of their character, what really drives them. When you know that, you can be subtle. I can lend you the book, let you study it. You'll see, it works. Even the bearded lady can get a guy."

Anne shakes her head. "No, I'm busy right now, a lot of work I have to take home. Maybe some other time". One benefit of aging, Anne thinks, is freedom from shame and the need for pretense, freedom from the need to fake being tempted by the flesh; no one expects old shrivel-face to ogle the guys. Even if Anne, with just a few crow's feet on her lean mean assassin face, caught a guy, what would she do with him? Would she have to feed him? Listen for hours as he repeatedly asked "Do you love me? Do you really really love me? What do you love about me, oh please please tell?"? Answer to the call of his latest whim, just when she was beginning to feel settled? Relationships might be touted as the best thing since the invention of champagne, but Anne isn't tempted by all the hype.

A bus hisses to a stop. Trish, going places and with men to conquer, leaps aboard. Anne gazes up at the siloetted skyscrapers in this city of a million temptresses and ten thousand shops selling temptations. On this street, where everyone's a seller of dreams and sold on a dream, she waits for the #61.

no news

2007-08-05T22:03:00.000-04:00

N. states that "Chekov talks to [her] more than does Tolstoy", who tends to use literature more often as a political/philosophical platform; Chekhov's plays are snippets from the intimate aspects of everyday life. The intimate, "little", everyday bits of life probably reflect more of what's universally true for people everywhere; political movements come and go, but the basics of love, jealousy, greed, fear, loss, etc.... stay the same. And, when old political issues no longer mean much, the politically-motivated may not speak much to us.

And no news is new...except for scientific discoveries and technological innovations. Looking at the latest political story is like looking at the closest reflection of a grimacing gargoyle, in an infinite regression of identical horrors dating back to pre-history.

quantum spy

2007-08-05T19:30:00.001-04:00

A psychic once told you that your aura was especially small, cramped around you, its tentacles withdrawing. "Some people enter a room and instantly are seen, instantly command attention," the psychic said, "They are miniature suns, shooting plumes of orange heat that draw in Pluto and command the planets; their energy touches and moves everything. But you...." She shook her head and sighed. Your aura barely rubbed against adjacent air molecules, barely tickled the arms of your bed-mate. You were the unseen spider watching everything from its high corner, the natural stalker gifted with unwilling stealth, the historian and observer who (despite the protests of quantum physicists) didn't affect the observed. "You're doomed to invisibility," she muttered, "You of the shrunken, invisible aura. A social presence smaller than a nanometer - You almost don't exist."

Another invisible man singing the jail-house blues to walls-without-ears. A subterranean squirmer, writing blog entries for an underground without electric outlets, One of the non-existent, not even a cipher or a fraction of a figment in anyone's imagination. You are nobody.

That makes you an ideal:
Peeping Tom
burglar
spy

peep show

2007-08-05T18:49:00.000-04:00

Great turnout to the show, but no sales. The multitudes came; hundreds (Sorry, not millions) packed into their black SUVs. The streets of Torrington, usually a large town without major traffic jams, echoed with the blasts of horns. They wiped the dripping sweat from their jowls, cursed the blinding sunlight and burped as they drove towards the show, where the artists waited, hopeful but realistically cynical and without expectations.

The multitudes came, but they didn't come to buy. They came to fulfill family obligations: Aunt Trudy or Cousin Bob or Nephew Ned is trying to prove his talent, and family members must play their prescribed roles, read from the supporting actor's script and display the polite, encouraging smile on cue. They came for the experience of seeing art, much as they'd go somewhere else for the experience of tasting new flavors or hearing tunes or seeing the latest artful arrangement of merchandise on racks.

Maybe we should charge admission to the show, call ourselves "performance artists" who also happen to be selling a commodity. Charge them for the privilege of being spectators; charge them to get a peep at the stage-set (each piece of art, and the gestalt of how it's uniquely hung in a larger installation), and be in the audience that eavesdrops on artists' blather.

husk

2007-07-21T18:06:00.001-04:00

What's in a husk but another husk, and a husk within a husk, an infinitude of husks? What's in a crabapple, shriveled on top and oozing from a sore on its side? Rot, flesh liquifying back to formlessness, seeds which have forgotten their purpose as decay overtakes them. What's in a tree strung with a thousand crabapples, all too weak to hold on longer, all ready to let go their proud identities and merge with the mud? What's left for grass smothered under a shroud of paling leaves? What's left for the leaves, dead as paper, but to dry into shreds and fragment to dust? What's left for these last black birds but to join together and rise with the snuffling wind - dark dust-storms blown to the promising south? What's a sky where clouds greenish gray as pus, ooze from horizon to horizon, to seal in the earth? a husk within a husk, and a thousand husks fallen to the soil of a husk.

vanilla memories

2007-07-21T17:46:00.000-04:00

Sniff each bottom, where the gaps in the cellophane allow the scent to leak out. Very Berry Raspberry, Apple spice cake, almond toffee; the new, updated fragrances emphasize kitchen coziness, a dinner where tantalizing aromas and the oven's heat warmed even the coldest soul.

Today's vanilla candles smell the same as the ones she sniffed as a child, She'd wander away to the candle bin, while Mother huddled with her cronies at the luncheon counter. She'd lift each furtively from its box, rest her nostrils on its round bottom, and inhale. The alluring zing of cinnamon. Strawberry candles, like strawberry candy, soon bored with their excessive sweetness. Vanilla soothed and warmed her; vanilla hummed a magical, mellow tone.

"You can't stand there all day, kid,' the manager would bark. "Buy something or get out. This is a store, not a day care center"

She'd slink back to Mother's droning conversation. Mother's clothes reeked of stale cigarette smoke mixed with a throat-grating whiff of detergent; the other lady exhaled the stench of decay and near death, despite the gardenia perfume that she sprayed over herself like a veneer.

Maybe someday, Mother would buy vanilla candles for the house, instead of the unscented beeswax ones which were too expensive to light. Maybe Mother could buy her her very own vanilla candle for her birthday, instead of tiny cut-glass bottles of cologne, with its aggressive odor that knifed and shredded the inside of her nose. Her very own candle to hold forever, smell as she fell into sleep. An odor to comfort her in all seasons.

Milky Way

2007-07-21T17:34:00.000-04:00

Those heavy udders bulge, leak, might drag the ground if these were ordinary cows; the cows long for thirsty calves and overzealous milkmaids.

Where do you think the Milky Way came from?

Ever hear the expression "When the cows jump over the moon"? Some of them, when jumping so far and high (over a moon made from blue cheese) leaked a little. This was the result of extreme exertion, of leaping such a long distance by an animal accustomed to chewing and leisurely moseying. A drop here, a trickle there: The cows' journey was marked by a spatter-trail of milk.

Word Dump (Verbal Litter)

2007-07-21T17:15:00.000-04:00

Kitty stares ahead, silent. The humans think that this is because she doesn't understand speech, or lacks the vocal equipment to respond. In reality, Kitty is thinking "Humans are the loudest species around. When they're not gabbing, they're blasting radios or TVs, roaring down roads in screeching cars or stampeding down the stairs in clattering shoes. They pollute the planet with their noise". But Kitty, liking the luxury of frequent naps on a soft mattress and easy meals, keeps mum.

"I've composed a poem about these people," Kitty murmurs to her sidekick. All cats are secret poets; how could any creature who purrs so sonorously and meows coloratura not appreciate melody and cadence. Kitty yawns to inhale deeply, and sings in a rhythmic soprano:

Word Dump

Where do the words go
when speech is done, the last page turned?

Do they burn
in the dump of discarded cries,
Do they churn
in the Lost and Found of misplaced "why's
and "what"s and "who"s
(stinking of fish rot
and the mold of too old speech)?

Do we dig a hole for them,
drag moist mud on top of it
and hide the place under rubble?
Do we let them fall to mute dust
from one-time bricks-steel beams- or seeds
let them shrink while we
go on, plump and ripe with talk?

"What are you kitties crying about? I fed you already." the lady's voice shrieks. "Is your litter box dirty? What's wrong, my precious, my sweet little howler?" she cajoles. The noisiest species on the planet, trying to silence song with pleas and shouts.

disembodied humbug

2007-07-21T16:34:00.000-04:00

In the dream, the others were berating me: I wasn't fit for the job. I didn't have the character, grit or skills for the career or the company. What would they do with me? Would they send me to the reform school for incompetents? Would they hurl me into the Losers' Landfill, where I could howl and beg and screech forever with all the ragged, stinking-of-garbage, semi-mutant humanoids? While they deliberated and glared, I disengaged from my body and floated up to the ceiling. Emotions are felt through and in the body, and expressed by the body. I knew that, if I were to keep the job, I mustn't show my true feelings; wasn't that the first rule in the Group Survival Handbook? But, with my awareness disengaged from physical self, my body could sit in place, respectably impassive; the judges might even give me a break, due to my admirable, courageous stoicism.

I had to remain in the room, had to be alert to signs that I needed to whiz back into my body to respond to them with words. So, I hovered near the popcorn ceiling tiles, each pocked and white as acne-scarred vampire skin, and listened to them jabber.

As a dream, it wasn't as good as those in which I'm totally disembodied, no longer weighed down by bones and muscles and guts to drag around. A three-star rating at best; the dream lacked the intriguing visuals of my five-star dreams-of-disembodiment, where I float up through many stories of a high-rise, seeing in cross-section all the beams and pipes laid between ceilings and floors and the steel skeletons that hold staircases in place as I float up through the walled-off "back-stage" of an escalator or indoor fire-escape.

But, the dream reminded me of how I disengage so often. Sometimes, I have to meet with other people and find myself thinking "What a time-waster! The business could have been settled a lot more efficiently by email or in a chat room, where everyone agrees to convene at the same time. No time wasted with commuting or with the usual 'Fear not, I hail from a friendly tribe' small-talk/greetings. No time wasted circling around the issues, not when people edit their words before they type and have no need for drivel to fill gaps of silence." So, I mentally float away. Unfortunately, I can't leave my body and all its gravitas, but I journey mentally. I don't have anything substantive to add to the discussion; they don't need me here, I'm just here because I'm expected to be here, a serial number in its proper place,and I'm fulfilling expectations merely for utilitarian reasons. I throw in the occasional morsel of small talk,......but, really, the whole meeting could pass without them guessing that I "wasn't all there", that I'm mute, though not invisible; I'm better off mute - nothing substantive or entertaining from this mouth.

Maybe Scrooge wasn't the last of the curmudgeons. (Probably not. He was popular because he was an archetype exaggerated into a caricature, right?)

The Write Cat?

2007-07-17T04:07:00.000-04:00

The Write Cat

My tom's a bright and big boy -
He does it to annoy.
When he's lonely and he's
Ignored, he stomps upon the keys.

Should I teach my pet the alphabet
Hope he pats out witty prose?
Teach him edition and derision,
Hope each kitty ditty shows
He can add up what he knows?

Or will Cat, nipped by the rage
To peck pointless periods on a page,
Type no tyke teasers or hypotheses,
But pat out parades of parentheses?

Teach his mate to nap upon the spacer
Just because he's cat-curious,
Counting nanoseconds til I grow furious
Enough to scream and chase her?
Teach kit to leap and race her
Claws (without pause or erasures)
Until white's stippled with a luxurious
Excess of "@g$*&mF09+!"ers?

Hard-Wired Kitty

2007-07-17T04:05:00.000-04:00

My cat once preferred the mouse.
Now he prefers the keys;
Leaps and lands and like a souse
Types a tippler's nonsense pleas.

Kitty's a computer pet
Who ogles at the internet.
Though of the wired generation
With wild-child panther concentration,
She'll take lap and nap over browsing
And virtual carousing.

The Hundred Fleas You'll Never Meet in Hell

2007-07-17T03:53:00.000-04:00

Not your ordinary flea-market:
Some came dressed in black vests and bowler hats cut from parchment; others, trailing gowns of tinsel, pirouetted and leaped across the stage as a symphony of crickets played triumphantly. Every flea, from the most haughty princess to the pauper wearing not even a tatter of decoration, came to the execution, where the paper figure of a human hung in effigy. This was every human, but also a human of the very worst sort - his hands misshapen, his legs ending in clumsy duck feet, his arms dangling impotently, his eyes soulless black dots, his mouth empty of words and molars. The human was charged with the felony of exterminating fleas. He should hang today and forever; any flea who didn't agree was guilty of betrayal.

Dump Fetish

2007-07-17T02:29:00.000-04:00

You have a dump fetish, You enjoy going to dump your trash three times a week because you're itching to see what other people have left on the side by the paper bin - the "claim me" section. You found a patinated 1920s composition and rag doll there recently, in her original clothes, faded to sepia and ivory. In the past, you found a metal 1930s Deco meets Nouveau Salmagundi Whitman metal candy box.

I look forward to a guided tour of your found finery. Maybe, if you want to convert your apartment into a museum of the uncollectible, you could attach little labels to each object, and a short fabricated history of each. Any history will do, as long as it's amusing.
------------------

If I clean the mess here, I'll probably have to buy a 15th pair of scissors. And my cats might not recognize the place as home; they're used to slob heaven. I succeed where even hurricanes fail; I'm congenitally incapable of neatness; when I walk, I unleash every demon of chaos in the universe.

You'd get to see the mural I painted in the hallway, especially the picture of one cat sniffing another cat's butt (Who says that I don't paint "realism"?). Then you'd get to sniff the tantalizing aromas of Friskies' tuna delight, mixed with the heady perfume of paint thinner and the grit of airborn plaster dust. Who knows? - This "Mystique Melange" might be marketable as a perfume - the hottest thing out of France. Or maybe, Iraq.
--------------------
When I first rented near here, I left a legacy for the landlord. I was renting a 1 floor cottage composed of one huge room and a tiny kitchen and bathroom. There was a drop down ladder leading to a "crawl around" attic with fiberglass flooring. So, I stuck a really hideous clay head I'd made (and painted) up there, surrounded by fiberglass - like a corpse's head sticking up out of all the muck. The hideous clay head was gaunt and pale, making it look almost like a skeleton. I figured that, possibly, no one would look in that useless attic for years, then wonder where this mysterious lone artifact had come from.

Your landlord was not as understanding of the typewriter you'd epoxied onto the porch roof. No one would notice for a long, long time....you'd thought----- You'd planned to sprinkle mud on the porch roof, then seed it with something that grows anywhere, maybe blow dandilion fluff over the whole expanse. Come spring, you could ride down the street, and see saplings, violets, crabgrass, a whole garden of weeds, growing wildly above the top tier of windows! And shrug, call the floral showcase a freak of nature.

You've thought about filching public restroom signs (One of those male/female figures would be ideal to hang on your front door). You also want a "please don't feed the fish sign, to hang on your toilet, above the drain where algea thrive. Anything to create a showcase home. So far, though, you've only painted catfish on the insides of your toilet bowl - with waterproof paint, of course.

Alias Houdini (The Making of an Artist)

2007-07-17T01:42:00.000-04:00

The Meowing of an Artist

Can't help it, I've always liked aliases. Here's the story behind two of my aliases, "Henri Tupperson" and "Alex d'Angelo":

A friend owns 2 cats. One, King Henry Houdini, is a black longhair who purrs as passionately as a Latin lover and triumphs as an escape-artist who squeezes through slits in pursuit of tasty plump mice. The other, tubby Tuppy, is an orange-haired fat boy who likes to mimic sofa cushions. From the 2 names, Henri Tupperson was born - a round-bellied Victorian banker with a secret life as an artist.

The same friend provided 2 dogs for my pseudonymn addiction. One (now deceased) was a a terrier named "Angel"; Angel's favorite pasttime was snoring. The other, "Alex", is a senile, eccentric, incontinent and nearly bald bichon frise with extreme separation anxiety. He's talented at begging and scrounging for treats in the trash; in a prior life, he might have taught the homeless the finer points of dumpster diving. Whenever humans leave him alone, Alex yaps and pees; when humans eat, he limps on his 2 good legs (while dragging the other two, mole-spotted ones along) to the table and cries "Maw, Maw", or perhaps "More, more, Mama". The pseudonym "Alex d'Angelo" was borne of their fused identities. The name suggests a darkly handsome young man with the blood of exiled Russian nobility on the distaff side. Or a master chef from a long lineage of chefs, ready to turn piss into vinegrette and poop into succulent sausage. Or perhaps, he's a stooped old woodworker who merely looks "in pain" when he attempts the Brad Pitt smirk that once worked such charms on the ladies. The name hardly suggests a balding dog who knocks over trash cans to devour gravy-spattered wrappers.

When I wanted to exhibit more than the allotted number of pieces at a local co-op art show, I simply introduced the gallery to the work of two previously inactive members - Henri Tupperson and Alex d'Angelo. Both received official "membership cards" and welcome letters. Who says that cats don't paint, or that dogs can't draw with their nimble tongues?

Here's the email I sent to my friend, after I'd signed her cats and dogs up for the artist's life:

"Hello!
"Artplace has just gained 2 new members: Henri Tupperson and Alex d'Angelo, who live together in a notorious blue cottage on M. Street. Both are multi-media artists and will be contributing pieces to upcoming Artplace shows.

"Yep, it's me playing with aliases again....But this means that I can really enter *more* pieces in each show (There's usually a limit per person), albeit under brush-names. And, it's one way of clearing some of the crap out of my house. If someone notes similarities in color choice and style among 3 Artplace artists - ah, well, Henri, Alex and I live near each other, often critique each other's work, and have markedly influence each other aesthetically.

"If anyone calls from Artplace about the work of Henri Tupperson or Alex d'Angelo, you'll know what's going on. Of course, neither chap can "speak on the phone right now"; both are too prone to snarl, yap or yowl with minimal provocation. But, if Artplace calls to say that a whatchamacallit fell off the back of one of their works, making it impossible to hang, you'll know to call the usual imp.

"Take care and don't lose it,
art-agent, agent provocateur

As artists, Alex d'Angelo and Henri Tupperson were prolific:
My friend's elderly Bichon Frise, capitalizing on his episodes of fecal and urinary incontinence, now uses poop to create impasto textures and pee for thin "washes"; painting with brushes made from only a few fine hairs plucked from the tip of his curling tail, he's emerged as a leading member of the Canine Expressionism school. Of the cat's work, critic's have written "Thousands of short and long, fine and course, orange and black hairs embedded in the paint add a dimension to the work rarely seen anywhere other than an unvacuumed rug"; Henri Tupperson, famished for realism in a world of the "virtual" that lacks both taste and smell, has depicted fish scales, fish grins, Purina nuggets and mouse entrails in his series "A Cat's Eye View".

My friend responded ecstatically to my news:
"You are the BEST artist's rep in the world. Henri and Alex A. have been fretting and fretting about how to get their work into galleries. Alex...well--do you remember that artist who decorated his painting of the Madonna with elephant dung? (I believe that was when Rudy Giuliano threw a hissy fit and wanted it removed from the Brooklyn Museum.) Anyway, Alex D' A. has some magnificent works composed ENTIRELY of dog poop--and he's so glad that he'll have a good venue in which to show them. As for Henri--who can deny that his "Portrait of a Mackerel Resting" is a masterpiece, not to mention, "Mixed Grill at Twilight."-- a thought provoking work which takes some daring risks in its use of color and medium (I believe that the addition of anchovy paste to the paint is truly innovative and will start a trend.) Anyway....they are delighted and they'll be eagerly awaiting word of the critics and gallery-goers response."

And that's the scoop (about poop) - dog-it-all, doggerel from the straight from the cat's mouth.

Your friendly neighborhood plastic surgeon

2007-07-17T01:09:00.000-04:00

Send her to your friendly local plastic surgeon. She'll call him a "miracle worker" until one of her cheek implants falls down (gravity will have its way; ah, so much gravitas affecting the human condition) during a super-charged boogie-woogie; then all those ogling businessmen and their once envious blond escorts will titter "Hmph! I didn't know that Mark stooped so low as to marry a *freak*!"

The friendly plastic surgeon will stitch the cheek implant back in place. Just a little steel wire here, a twist of hemp there;an invisible disappearing thread with only a little pain but so much gain; for a mere pittance, he'll even reinforce other cheek. All is honky-dorry, A-OK, copecetic, until Sassy Lassy bites down to hard on her lip and the lip implant starts oozing out, just like stuffing through a rip in the sofa upholstery.

No worry. Friendly plastic surgeon can re-stuff and reupholster her. Then, half of her reshaped, rejuvenated nose falls off, giving onlookers and up-close and personal view of her snot-clogged nasal turbinates.

"He married a freak.....but maybe she has a good personality", they'll say, and offer her condolence doggie-bags filled with last week's almost moldy turkey loaf. Be grateful for the kindliness of snickering strangers.

What is a year of life?

2007-07-17T01:01:00.000-04:00

I've sometimes imagined a kind of time travel, where I could spend a week in this year, then time-jump to next year and spend the next week of my life in 2008, then time jump to 2009 and spend a week of my life there.....By the end of one year of my life, I'd be 52 years into the future; after 20 years of "my life", I'd be 20 x 52 or about 1000 years into the future. Talk about a thrilling adventure! If I knew that such technology existed and I was offered the chance to do this, would I give up everything I have in the present and embark on the journey? Yep, without doubt; I'd love to see how the story plays out.

What really happens? I live much of my life on auto-pilot. I've learned how to zone out during the boring parts of life, disappear to some other realm and return with no recollection of where I've been. Counting all the seconds, I may have spent a total of 5 years actually focused on what's in front of me, actually in my body and in my life. Does that make me only 5 years' old in experiential time? As ancient as a toddler?

Underground Gala

2007-07-17T00:44:00.000-04:00

I've sometimes daydreamed about "taking over" an abandonned subway station and painting the walls......keep people out with those cone barriers and "keep out" yellow ribbons until opening day. Then, the 1st underground art show, heated only by the elements, in NYC, with viewers commenting and sipping fizzy water as trains intermittently wail.

I don't know if I saw it in a dream or in something I read about or in a movie - the image of people "happening upon" water-proof art hanging in a sewer.....in the part where the sewer opens into a tunnel much taller than a man and the water just trickles around one's feet. Sort of a modern version of cave paintings, in that the art's in an unexpected, hard-to-reach place that seems a bit sinister.

all that shit (Or, PC stands for Political Crap)

2007-07-17T00:17:00.000-04:00

Hmmm, what about petrified (a.k.a. "scared stiffs") turds? Fossilized dinosaur turds now sell for a fortune; some specimens can also look quite beautiful - lumps with colorful striations and patches.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coprolite
Coprolite is the name given to the mineral that results when human or animal dung is fossilized. The name is derived from the Greek words κοπρος/kopros meaning 'dung' and λιθος/lithos meaning 'stone'. It serves a valuable purpose in archaelogical and anthropological circles because it provides a picture of an early organism's diet and environment.[1] Coprolite may range in size from the size of a BB all the way up to that of a large appliance. [2] (Article continues)

Hmmm, and future astronauts may drink processed urine, which can actually be converted to distilled water by filtering and boiling. Easier to recycle what comes out of the body anyway when one's in space; the cost of storing/transporting water on a spaceship is astronautical...oops, astronomical (but probably not astrological).

Thinking metaphorically - Recent political crap still stinks and soils the hands of anyone who touches it. Old political crap seems to stink less, often seems not to stink at all, and doesn't contaminate those who touch it. Historical events seem cleaner than current ones; time possesses magical powers of decontamination: The ancient offices of political fossils are filled with political copralites, a.k.a. the treasured artifacts of their empire.

the smell of green

2007-07-17T00:14:00.000-04:00

Green - the color of vomit and the color of leaves, the color of nausea and of new beginnings.

Spam & L'Eggs

2007-07-17T00:10:00.000-04:00

Spam Poetics
by <>
a.k.a. "@%^*Spam*&*L'Eggs**#%@"

Today, before emptying my junk mail box, I actually glanced at the subject headers. Some informed me that I had been turned down for that nonexistent loan or approved for a temporary million dollar credit line; others assured me that I could stop paying for any kind of car repair, suggested that my "Outstanding Balance" might be outstanding enough to induce nightmares, but reassured me that "the news is good for the economy" and that I could enjoy "Great Rates, no gimmicks" at a motel which rents rooms by the hour. Some offered to show me the world of living and lively "lesbian sex" as an "always satisfied spectator", to introduce me to acrobatic strip-tease at "Chickago-go", or to let me cybersexually fondle the virtual, but not virtuous, "Big Red Toy 4 Adults" while watching "5 XXX DVDs For $1 - free shipping (included)"; all the women were girls and all the girls were "extremely hot", even in Siberia or in boardrooms where it's "cool" to be perpetually passionless and without perspiration. Ads offering "Dr. Approved Manhood Enlargement, results guaranteed" followed soon after one liners promising "Breast enlargement without silicon, in 1 week" through the diligent application of a cream made from Aphrodite's milk. Others cooed coquettishly "Give her something to smile about" or offered magic potions that would either "cure wrinkles and aging instantly" or turn me into a human Shar Pei too senile to complain that she had been conned; another exclaimed "Control your life!", but failed to mention that I'd better do do before the chemically tainted anti-aging cream turned my hair gray, and my brain to necrotic mush.

Other mail, designed for erudite underground geeks who hide in damp basements and whose mattresses never buckle under romping sex, offered "New technology that guarantees you'll learn a new language in 10 days!"; this would allow the geek to screech Russian arias and Swahili chants in his mold-lined shower, in a voice guaranteed to deafen the ears possessed by any wall. Others advertised spy software to "View their eMail" or "LOG EVERYONE'S PASSWORD!!!"; while one mentioned a mysterious "jm Windows 2000 Datacenter" and another the seemingly clandestine "online no-cost ops_info", none offered courses in how to hack into the computers of three-letter agencies often described with four-letter epithets. Other headers, working undercover and knowing that such suspect words as "girls", "loan", "drugs" and "sex" alert the guardians of email security, sneaked in under such code names as "jniyvumhel", "roapxxm" and "jszchn"; the false identity "kalmuk" probably belonged to a camel merchant or Klingon dictator who wanted a moniker he could pronounce, while "gorton" belonged to either a genetic mutant or the manufacturer of a tough elastic fabric.

After deleting such mundane entries, I encountered headers that ranged from inspiring to humorous to thought provoking; here's today's list of winning Spam titles:

Spiroketal Wavelets
caretaker drones
pocketbook dicks, dicks, dicks!
biopsy Ci@lis
Red Sex Game
serenity caps
Manhood enlargement for you brownian motion
hotpus sywil low
babe scumhot
ascomycetes
break the seams open
half price Works

Do some subject headers sound like possible names for music groups? A polysyllabic scientific term goes well with heavy metal and this week's number one group is "Ascomycetes", dressed in grunge which nourishes some sort of fungus. "Biopsy Ci@lis" screeches in goth angst while the rapping, foot tapping, hip-hopping, arm slapping "Babe Scumhot"s hoot and toot about crude dudes in the town as the rival group, the "HotPus-s-Low"s blow some snow and get ready to show their stuff. "The Serenity Caps" wallow through the blues and the all-female "Spiroketal Wavelets" strums guitars and drawls it's latest heart-breaker hit "Break the Seams Open":

Break the seams open
And let your whole heart show.
How can I ever know
You, if your heart's all sown up?

The listener relaxes, afloat on a pink cloud drifting through a romantic's utopia. Or, if made of hard edged metal and cynical stuff, he quickly turns the dial to listen to "The Caretaker Drones" or "The Half Price Works", brooding bands with lyrics that caustically criticize society from its pigeon-pooped spires to its roach infested basements.

Some headers transport us to a parallel science-fiction universe. "Serenity caps", the high-tech new and improved variety of Valium, are electromagnetically charged helmets that alter brain waves and thus induce tranquility. "Caretaker drones" are genetically engineered or robot drudges in that brave new world where bargain hunters shop at "Half Price Works" for a discounted artificial heart, stomach or brain that works as well as the full-priced mechanism. "Pocketbook dicks, dicks, dicks!" refers to the purse transporting a wallet-sized detective, shrunk by the same machine that shrunk the kids; in another scenario, the private dick, a.k.a. the private eye, walks right out of the TV set and, maintaining the same size as he had on screen, hides in the lady's purse to do covert surveillance.

Other titles take us to the harlequins - to the paperback romances so predictably overwrought as to verge on the comical, and perhaps to the comedians themselves. "Manhood enlargement for you(r) brownian motion" calls to mind the pre-Viagra Lothario who, unable to enjoy the orgasmic raptures of a "quivering manhood", laments that "damned Dicky down-under" is only capable of barely detectable Brownian motion and calls his urologist for a prescription of magic pills. In the "Red Sex Game", co-ed players streak onto the ball field clad only in red socks and shoes; in version two, unfolding during the Cold War, the debonair, deft and daring 007 penetrates a ring of Soviet spies by having sex with one of their own, a very red Queen of the sensuous.

Perhaps not everything in junk mail is junk; perhaps some junk, if polished or seen through distorting lenses, shines like silver. Perhaps seemingly random associations of words irk us, and we struggle to make sense out of the silliness; then we find ourselves envisioning dreamlike scenarios that are comic or profound. Next time you find yourself feeling numb or blocked, visit your Spam box for an inspiring dose of the random and nonsensical. Perhaps you'll end up writing a poem on "Brownian Motion Love", or even designing the board and rules for the "Red Sex Game". You might even, like me, find yourself following the advice of one header, which said "please write".

The Jew's Buddas

2007-07-16T23:47:00.000-04:00

My grandfather was a devout old Jew who collected Buddas - hundreds of them, mahogany and brass and glass and silver and jade, all sitting serenely stout on his living room tables and shelves. As a kid, I'd glance at my slightly green reflection in the mirror-surfaced coffee table, wait for the dust that smelled of age to settle back into the sofa cushions, and browse through shelves of wood creaking incomprehensible mantras.

Here was the automatic Buddha, the instant Nirvana machine. Insert a coin, pull a knob, and your very own plastic Buddha thudded into a bottom tray. Put in 75 cents for the silver-painted trinket, 50 cents for the bronze model, a whole dollar for the deluxe gold version who'd put in a good word for you with the keepers of the karmic account books .

Here was the fortune-telling Buddha with a crystal-ball belly, Rub his belly and misty visions whirl through his innards; stare into the navel and spy on your future. His belly's more reliable than a fortune-cookie, and often more optimistic in its predictions. And Buddha won't taunt you and keep you coming by telling you that you'll cross a bridge in the future or splash through a rainstorm; he's too enlightened for such trickery.

Zen Spies

2007-07-16T23:30:00.000-04:00

They're all masters of feline Zen, but the ginger one is the master among masters. That's Belleo, my miniature lion with the fiery mane and regal profile; he's the best of the best, the most accomplished of the accomplished. He holds the world's record for staring at nothing; he spent 53 minute and 7 seconds gazing uninterruptedly at a white wall six inches in front of him. Every time I looked at him, I wondered what was so fascinating about that wall. If I had X-ray or UV vision, would I see hundreds of critters scampering over the plaster, all with very long tails?"

Wave a hand in front of his wide amber eyes; he won't even blink. Maybe he just sleeps with his eyes open?

"No, he's meditating on the world's problems," a wise man once told me. "Cats have amazing powers. They can disappear instantly - feline teleportation. They're here, then they're not here; they're prowling up above, silent and unnoticed as shadows, hearing everything. They'd be the perfect spies, if only the our linguists could decipher their language and eavesdrop on their gossip."

Frenetic Splicing, or Growing Hybrids on your Computer

2007-07-16T21:50:00.000-04:00

Here's a formula for creating an infinite number of permutations of one (artistic) form, thus guaranteeing that you'll never get lost in the wastelands of minimalism:

http://frost7967.freeyellow.com/mathematical.html

Meanwhile - after and before and midway through re-designing my own web site, that is - I'm called upon to set up a site for a local art group. "Keep it simple, you flamboyant, baroque-eyed, contrarian smart-ass," the Boss-man directs: Make it look like an expensive art book, rarely flipped through, never read, bought mainly as a status symbol for coffee tables by those who want to look cultured; make it staid, understated, as tediously reserved as the old-money patriarch following antique templates of style.

Doing the web site is frustrating, because Boss-man demands that everything be so damned stark. Sure, it makes sense for the artists' index pages to be minimalist - no background design to distract from the art. But the home page should have a bit more pizzazz, at least in my opinion....something to visually suggest that it's an ART site, not the home base for a company selling plain white paper or a group of color-blind mathematicians with greased-up glasses.

Man, I hate minimalism when it's taken to the max. If I'm going to look at something, I want some "theater" in it.

In the Gallery of Once-and-Future Masterpieces

2007-07-16T21:27:00.000-04:00

A few times, I've had a dream wherein I fly/hover/float through the "museum of all past and possible art works" - labyrinths spanning thousands of miles and filled with sculptures, wall works, hanging works, works suspended in midair by some unknown technology, and so on. Of course, I only get to see a tiny portion of the collection, a room or two, before the alarm clock zaps me back to mundane reality; I awaken with new images of interesting, coolest-of-the-kool, hottest-new-thing, awesome wow-ers that I could create, a dizzying extravaganza of temptations.....

When I'm in the museum of all possible artistic creations, I never notice how the wall works are framed, even *if* they are framed. In waking life, I don't tend to notice frames either - don't notice if they're made of gilded scrollwork or antiseptic steel, if they're hanging straight or tilting at 45 degree angles. Likewise, I tend to get my frames at the Salvation Army thrift store, recycled and environmentally-correct frames, hand-me-down frames that are good-enough as long as their glass isn't broken and they're sized correctly. Cracked wood, flaking paint, a chipped edge - Who cares? Isn't the buyer probably going to take the thing to the nearest frame shop and spend a fortune so that the frame matches the sofa (or perhaps, the color of his ipod)?

Unfortunately, many judges of artwork do notice frames. One juror supposedly automatically rejects from a show any work that's poorly framed - "A sure sign that the artist isn't serious about his work, doesn't respect his work. Putting good art in a bad frame is like putting a painting on the sidewalk during rush hour in Manhatten or like dressing a model in baglady rags". Good for comedy or irony or political commentary, but not good for serious art (And yes, art must be serious and taken seriously by all).

Idea for an art show: Lots of work hanging, but what faces the viewer is the *back* of the frame. The viewers seriously ponder each hanging: Hmmm, an aesthetically pleasing juxtaposition of wire, screws and steel bars, a comfortingly rustic combination of maple slats and plywood backing.

Probably the show, called something like "This Way to the Hangings" or "We've Been framed" would get rave reviews. Silly enough to seem mystifying and thus meaningful - and thus appealing to those who pride themselves on being avante-garde.

the artist has been framed

2007-07-16T20:39:00.000-04:00

Someone suggested (in email capitals.....so, suggested quite loudly) that I insert a photo of my ugly mug on my website about my art.....said that a picture of the artist makes the whole thing seem more personalized, lets the viewer have a long-distance relationship with the artist, yadda, yadda, yadda. Said "This is non-negotiable, in my not so humble opinion"; I said "blah, blah, bah humbug!). And, I imagined a gallery of artists - literally....the real artists in living, breathing, squirming color, all hanging inside frames, maybe suspended by their pigtails from nails in the wall; every viewer could get to see the artist up-close-and-frighteningly-personal, maybe get to smell his/her garlic breath, even hear a few sacred words if the hanging artist hasn't fainted from pain.

As for pictures....Well, I personally DON'T want my photo on my page. In fact, I really hate it when people insist on putting a picture of the artist on the site with their work. Aside from the fact that I haven't had a flattering photo of myself since grade school (I usually look mentally retarded, insane or like a serial killer), I also like viewers to react to my work, not to me. Yes, I am the producer of the work, which means that my "essence" is transferred to and expressed through the work. But, I want the response to be to the work itself, not biased by what they think they "read" in my face.

Philosophically/emotionally, though, I'm dead set against the artist's photo being there......so, expect a bit of stubborn balking here.

I know that I'm probably in a tiny minority here (although R.O. seemed to agree with me during one discussion we had several weeks ago). Personally, I tend to overlook all the biographical info about the artist as a lot of distracting "trivia" - prefer "all that crap" to be a footnote instead of "cover jacket information", which I can reference if and only if I have particular questions about how the artist's life may have led to the final product. Call me an impersonal schmuck, but most of the time I don't give a damn; the artist's face and personal story don't change how I feel towards the outcome (art) being presented to me. That Van Gogh was nuts and chopped off his ear doesn't influence how I feel towards his art. The message is more important than the messenger.

the seven dragons you'll never meet in heaven

2007-07-16T20:16:00.000-04:00

All the dragons I've met have been friendly, like scaly golden retrievers. Sure, untrained dragons sometimes start forest fires; huffing and puffing out flames enthusiastically, they can be dangerous to condominiums and the city's last remaining barn. But, with a little instruction, a dragon can be the next best thing to a walking flick-your-bic barbecue lighter.

Dragons aren't pack animals. Thus, like cats, they can't be herded. If only they purred with contentment, instead of croaking.