Back in Seattle

I've been traveling alot lately. The last month is a blur. I'm hoping to get my wits about me over the next couple of weeks so I can get back out there in the mix.Until then, my own bed feels real good .

greetings from green mountains

Bukowski pt. 2

I went to see the documentary "Bukowski: Born into this" a couple of years ago. It is a decent movie about Bukowski. It definitely deals with the whole man. It shows the great pain and violence contain in him, the hard worker, the romantic, the poet, the writer and all the other things that make up a dynamic human being.

The disturbing part for me was the footage of him reading in the clubs and theaters. It was more performance art than poetry reading. The audience was there to see the atrocity. He was nervous, angry and scared on stage. He would drink to calm his anxiety and then the crowd would egg him on and he would drink more in a vicious cycle.It was sort of sad. These performances were a necessary cash cow, they advanced his career through exposure and the creation of the myth of the man. He is reported to have hated these gigs. Hank would have been more interested in writing or being at the race track.

When I was watching the movie there were several inebriated members of the audience, probably over half. They cheered the excesses of his alcoholism. Like at his poetry reading, they were drawn in by the spectacle and not the man.

Bukowski really curtailed his drinking after illness late in life. He dabbled in mediation,healthier living and using his beloved Apple computer. He wrote his last book "Pulp" and some of his best poetry during this period. It seems to me that he had found a little peace at the end of a turbulent life.

This taken from wikipedia:

Bukowski died of leukemia on March 9th, 1994 in San Pedro, California, at the age of 73, shortly after completing the novel "Pulp", his last. His funeral rites were conducted by Buddhist monks. His gravestone reads: "Don't Try".
According to Linda Lee Bukowski, her husband's epitaph means something along the lines of "If you spend all your time trying, then all you're doing is trying. So don't try. Just do."

TS Eliot

If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?
T. S. Eliot

radiohead in my head

radiohead are working on a new record. I can't wait, it will be the perfect soundtrack to how I feel right now.

Bukowski: A Wonder Filled Poet

I've really come to appreciate the poetry of Charles Bukowski. There's a certain dance between truth and beauty that delights me. It would be great if he was remembered more for this than being a drunk.




liberated woman and liberated men

look here
the one you considered killing yourself
for.
you saw her the other day
getting out of the car
in the Safeway parking lot.
she was wearing a torn green
dress and old dirty
boots
her face raw and living.
she saw you
so you walked over
and spoke and then
listened.
her hair did not glisten
her eyes and her conversation were
dull.
where was she?
where had she gone?
the one you were going to kill yourself
for.

the conversation finished
she walked into the store
and you looked at her automobile
and even that
which used to drive up and park
in front of your door
with such verve and in the spirit of
adventure
now looked like a junkyard
joke.

you decide not to shop at
Safeway
you'll drive 6 blocks
east and buy what you need at
at Ralphs.

getting into your car
you are quite pleased that
you didn't
kill yourself;
everything is delightful and
the air is clear.
your hands on the wheel,
you grin as you check for traffic in
the rearview mirror.

my man, you think
you've saved yourself
for somebody else, but who?

a slim young creature walks by
in a miniskirt and sandals
showing marvelous leg.
she's going to shop at Safeway
too.

you turn off the engine an
follow her in.

workin' together

You've seen her before on this very blog and she's back again. It's the Hezza from Nashville. After many hours of phone time, we have decided to use our super powers for good and do a co-authored photoblog. In each edition, we will both post a photo from our own location. It will be a visual continuation of all the long phone conversations that we have had and will have. It's called seatac to bna . Check it out.

wintery weather

"Ravenna Icy"
Originally uploaded by Figgy Studio Assistant.

I got back from San Francisco on Friday night. It was fun and warm there . On return, Seattle was and is frosty and cold. The side streets around my house are iced over. I can't get my van out to the main roads, it drives terribly in the snow and ice. I'm snowbound, holed up watching television and sleeping. Feeling recharged now but I have a little cabin fever. I hope it thaws tomorrow.

Moon Over Bloomingdale's

Moon Over Bloomingdale's
Originally uploaded by Figgy Studio Assistant.

Day two in San Francisco:

1. In the workshops, we finished up the FInal Cut Master Class. It was an alright class but it seemed a little short of a "master class". From my classmates questions, I wonder how some of these people get out of bed and get anything done. Steve Martin was an excellent teacher. I would love to take a small group advanced class with him. He gave us a full DVD of all the lessons . Fuckin cool.

2. Jobs gave the Keynote and answered the geeks prayers with the Iphone which is an amazing piece of technology. I however just want my phone to be a phone and do a good job at that.

3. Opening day of the Expo was a zoo. I went in early checked our booth, took a look at a few others and went to class.

4. Took an urban hike in the afternoon up to Haight-Astbury. My feet hurt but I had some really good lemonade and fried squid.

5. Tonight we are going for tapas at Cha Cha Cha on Haight.

Last night we saw "Pan's Labrinth" . I was skeptical going in but this was pretty awesome. I will dedicate a blog entry to this and "The Fountain", two excellent movies that the stupid main stream media will ignore to suck off Clooney, Pitt and all the other hacks in Hollywood.

There was a small eartquake here today, bad timing to be living in a tall building.

I'm out.

MacWorld

I'm in San Francisco for the MacWorld convention. It's the place where all things Mac are celebrated. There are tons of products displayed by vendors. Steve Jobs gives the State of the Union for Apple, new products are announced and there are loads of informative workshops.

I spent the day learning cool things about Final Cut Pro, checking out our company's booth and listening to a little of our CEO's presentation at the Apple store.

The weather here in a word AWESOME. This is the best weather I have ever had in San Fran.

Stained by Pomegranate

my fingers red from pomegranate seeds
your face flashing green asks the night sky
are dreams less sweet when we are screaming?
I lay back and look up the tree's dress
thinking about teachers lost in the dadada
maybe god chooses the brussel sprout over the cotton candy today
I can't hear your voice when I'm sleeping
but I can't forget your face
in waking life I hope for just a slice
my fingers are stained with pomegranate
for I will always choose red foods over orange
but it's the green ones that I dream of
is this the small part of the night or the sliver of morning ?
either way cut me off a piece
I'll need the energy fighting doubts like windmills
loosing street addresses to find my miss adventures
I could surrender now but that just puts me back at the beginning
I don't fly in my dreams but I do smoke sometimes
staring into your eyes sends me adrift
it's probably just illusion , it's probably just allure
it's probably destiny
did i mention my fingers being stained by pomegranate seeds?
oh I miss the days of Montreal!

Alejandro Jodorowsky : My Mind He is A Crazy Guy

Seems that the long unavailable or limited available films of surrealist film maker Alexandro Jodorowsky will soon be available on DVD. His movies are totally unique and an amazing experience. If you have never seen one of his movies you should. I think El topo or Sante Sangre are to really good ones to start with.

Flea market FUN!!!!

Flea market Fun
Originally uploaded by Figgy Studio Assistant.

I'm not so scared anymore. I just miss this woman. Her names is Heather and we live too far apart. Something has got to give.

Mati Klarwein: An Heir to Dali

I'm sure that you have seen a Mati Klarwein painting. He did a lot of Album covers for bands in the sixties and early seventies. He did some magazine covers and book covers as well. I think he's quite an amazing artist, truly talented and visionary enough to be an heir to Dali.

Anne Sexton

Anne Sexton was a great poet. She wrote an amazing body of work as therapy for her mental illness and as an award winning poet. I find her work extremely inspiring.

Anne Sexton married at the age of 19, worked briefly as a model and then started a family. Sexton suffered from depression and had mental breakdowns and suicidal bouts after the births of her children and the deaths of her parents. In the late 1950s she began writing poetry as therapy and was soon "discovered" by the literary world for her unapologetically autobiographical poems. The recipient of many awards and grants, she won the Pulitzer Prize in 1966 for Live or Die. In 1974 she committed suicide.

Born: 9 November 1928
Birthplace: Newton, Massachusetts
Died: 4 October 1974 (Suicide by asphyxiation)
Best Known As: Confessional American poet of the 1960s and '70s
Name at birth: Anne Gray Harvey


When Man Enters Woman

When man
enters woman,
like the surf biting the shore,
again and again,
and the woman opens her mouth in pleasure
and her teeth gleam
like the alphabet,
Logos appears milking a star,
and the man
inside of woman
ties a knot
so that they will
never again be separate
and the woman
climbs into a flower
and swallows its stem
and Logos appears
and unleashed their rivers.

This man,
this woman
with their double hunger,
have tried to reach through
the curtain of God
and briefly they have,
though God
in His perversity
unties the knot.

Moon Full of Doubt: Give Me Grapes and I'll Make You Poetry

Steamboat Island
Originally uploaded by Figgy Studio Assistant.

Can't we let the dreamers sleep
can't I stay tucked beneath my covers
warm , lost in embrace
no lines tangled and fragile across the landscape
just your face pushed near mine
just your small slow breathing
as the dream birds of night
switch shifts with those of day
you lazily get up and walk across the room
and out the window you go
swimming through the air
a scarlet bird with some funny sounds to delight the skies above
I just gaze off clumsily
tasting words like berries
you laugh back at me
it sends a shock wave through our little window
it explodes in cerulean blue confetti
gliding back, you come to me
clumped together in warmth
cooing a song about past neurosis
to help prevent their return
can't we let these lovers dream
so they may find each other
beyond this moon so full of doubts
in the day to day dreams
where they can take pieces of each other's wounds
finding them as roadside treasures
and build this house again
in a place where wires and phones speak only
to the outside world
where dreamers awake
seeing double as just one vision

Is this really that boring?

I spent some time last night reading blogs. I decided since I was taking the time to write one that it would hurt me to take the time with some others. So off I went into the ether looking at images and reading words. I have to say 95% of all blogs are just mind numbingly boring. Even the blogs with some sort of keen insight seem to have been borrowed from some one else in a really boring fashion. Some blogs are just accumulations of cut and paste of web intrigue. Mostly made up of things seen again and again.

I think the internet is a grand place because it empowers us all to get out there and express ourselves. The revolution will surely not be televised but it will be on Youtube. The sad part is the lack of individual expression. It seems most people are content copying each others inane drivel.

I ask is this how my blog appears to a stranger when they click on it. I certainly hope not but then I also realize it really doesn't matter. We aren't here to make careers. We aren't pros. We are just people prattling on emptying ourselves of words so we might express our experience of being human.

Painting

rose
Originally uploaded by Figgy Studio Assistant.

I spent a great deal of time painting on discarded and scratched records. I figured it was a great way to recycle old vinyl and these smaller piece could be sold at a reasonable fee. It allowed me to get more art out to people who really enjoyed it that didn't have a lot of cash. This is one of my favorites.

I use to.......

I use to do many things like paint but I don't anymore. What will the new me be? Caterpillar will become a butterfly.

Refugee from Myspace

salt and pepper squid is exquisite


dirty eyes

need

a squeegee

stop looking at that

too late

you are now legally blind

dumbass

Video Painting and Music from 2006

This is a piece I did during the rainy season last year.

missing

I miss this woman even though she scares me.

Lucinda's New Record: West

On February 13th Lucinda Williams will be releasing a new album "West" on Lost Highway Records. It's exciting to get some new material. I didn't care for a lot of the new stuff I heard a couple years at her show in Seattle but I'm sure that it's ripened since then.

The record has a really exciting cast of characters working on it. It was produced by Hal Wilner and Williams. Wilner was the musical director of SNL and has been the captain on several very creative/star littered tribute albums to Monk, Disney, Mingus, Edgar Allen Poe,etc. He has produced Lou Reed, Bil Frisell,Elvis Costello. Gary Louris(Jayhawks) is a featured member of the crew. I think his "Rainy Day Music" -Jayhawks is one of the best American records of the last ten years. Lucinda's longtime guitarist Doug Pettibone is on the record. The rhythm section is great as well with the legend Jim Keltner( the best in the business) on drums and Dylan's bass player Tony Garnier who played on "Essence". Looks good on paper , we'll have to wait to hear the results.

It's been almost for years since her last studio album I hope "West" is worth the wait.

Sound Zone 1: Tennessee flea market

Here's a little look into the fabulous sounds of the Saturday Flea Market in Nashville.
Click on Title to listen.