musings

I've failed. Miserably. I'm still trying. I hope to meet you there.

I’m realizing that, for all my hopes to ween myself off of fb, I’ve been on it a bit extra again recently, and the past couple days have included a bit of extra angry posting. While I do regret being on here more, generally, I realized I DON’T regret these few angry posts, particularly. I am *ANGRY*! The influx of AI into the arts reflects a deep, perpetual, profound disdain for artists and society’s unwavering preference not to provide support for us beyond lip service and occasional pats on the back. The influence of Trumpism over politics has fomented racist, nationalist, bigoted and otherwise fear-based tendencies, PRIMARILY IN THE VERY DEMOGRAPHIC IN WHICH I WAS RAISED! And stemming off of that, say what you will about the separation of church and state (which, to my observation, most people get wrong anyway), but *LITERALLY* GOD DAMN IT, “Where You Belong” is gospel, and “Where Freedom Rings” is nationalist propaganda! It is an OBVIOUS, flagrant, and brutish move away from the BEST overlap of American ideals & Christian ideals and toward the exponentially rising tide of fascistic “Christian” nationalism. Christian nationalism *IS IDOLATRY*! Period! Don’t come at me with your pious heresies about “chosen nations” or “shining cities on a hill” while you’re voting for plutocrats profiting off your compliance with their division-and-conquering! “Ours is the ministry of reconciliation”! The word “religion” MOST LITERALLY means to reconnect! But guess what nationalism does! Guess what jingoism does! Guess what tribalism does! Guess what fascism does! Us and them. Us *versus* them. Suspicion. Fear. Divide and conquer. And to the victor go the spoils, right!? Divide and conquer enough, and YOU’ll get YOUR way! YOU’ll get “YOUR” country back! YOUR party gets back… brings back… takes back… WHATEVER! Whatever YOU want! What shall it profit a man to gain his preferred candidates and lose his soul?! Guess you better keep hoping those Supreme Court justices were worth it, huh! Guess you better hope the rampant disregard and systemic abuses of the orphan and widow and the alien and the sick and the women at the well are all worth it! Guess you better circle the wagons MORE and clutch your pearls MORE and put up MORE curtains in the Holy of Holies! UNfinish it! Cast out perfect love with fear! There IS Jew and Greek, male and female, slave and free! Decide for yourself who your neighbor SHOULD be! Keep all possible records of wrongs! Celebrate and capitalize on your enemy’s defeat and only leave room at the table for people who’ve really EARNED it! Grab any and all social, cultural, economic, and political gain by the pussy! Repent of nothing! Cursed are the poor in spirit! Get YOUR Way at ALL costs! That’s what AMERICAN Jesus would do!

Invasive species How corporate are these interests? Whose thoughts are these?

A day to myself I took it away from them Air in my own lungs

A relatively courteous text message sent and a relatively curt reply received, I thought then I'd take this Mary Oliver book, this pen, and this notebook for a walk to the park. Boots and jacket on, I remembered an errand to run, so here I am instead in this bank parking lot. What little cash I have, I've deposited in the closest ATM I could find, not at a park walking distance from my house. My house which is not my house which I can only rent another month, in my car which is only sort of my car on which many payments still need to be made even after the one I can now almost afford to make today, three 20s and a ten fed into the machine that'll never know me from a gig at a bar that just met me Saturday. More miles, more music, and against all odds, more money. No more Mary Oliver just yet. No more stable income prospects yet. No more nature in the park just yet, just parked at a bank on Michigan, weather warming up, black asphalt wafting in my open windows, my stomach full enough for now, my gas tank needing to be Fuller before my next money can come in. Not sure where it'll come from. Not sure where I'm going next. I just know I'm writing. For myself. And I'm not taking that job that'll get me nowhere.

Pretty sure I'll never know what it takes to be a poet Sincere and cozy with a cliche so let's just get that out of the way Another emo kid with a pen but I promise there's more behind the lines of everything I say Like I'm over the white-wash schemes we try to sell To these race- and class-based dreams, I wake and say, "Cya!" The scar above my right eye I remember it well But this one above my left I have no idea Never really been in fights but I have worked my ass off Just to keep turning on lights and so they don't shut the gas off I'm a little bit hard, but I'm a lot a bit soft Like I'm currently mad at my former Lit profs Introducing me to Pound when there's Jay and Nas Hid the keys behind the curtain Only unlocked it by the oz Digress, redress, impress upon me just to make the sale Black Midas gold, obscured the soul behind a thin, white veil Pre-packaged brides You tried to hide colonial intention and WASP-y capitalist that I am, I guess I'm not supposed to mention Dress it up however you want, you can run but not escape, this art is not unique to you, give all the credit where it's due or this is all just culture rape

I shouldn't have to move to New York to be in counterculture. It's not 1977 anymore. It's not 1965 anymore. It's not 1959 or 1951 anymore. I shouldn't have to move to "an industry city" to create, buy, sell art. To discuss much less participate in a distinct, self-affirming folk-/pop-art scene/movement should not be the privilege or birthright of those "fortunate enough" to find themselves at the "right" place at the "right" time. The idea of counterculture having an approved-upon time or place is as ridiculous as it is hypocritical.

But what if you said yes? The possibilities seem endless. The possibilities seem dangerous. However unlikely, the idea of actually being with you brings me right to the edge, to the brink of my unworthiness. I am patently unworthy of you and precipitously unready for you. It seems. But still in dreams, day and night, the idea that we might, an idea of us, some idea like this, brings me right up to the precipice. And out past that you seem to be, and out beyond that drop probably the only way we could become a we. Out there, mid-air, you’re walking or maybe just sitting. Not waiting for me, waiting for some sign, some guidance maybe. And I don’t think I have it. I don’t think leaving my feet, leaving what I know, will immediately bestow upon me some right answer, some perfect, pithy wisdom to make any leap of mine make any more sense, seem any more sensible. I just know that’s where you are. So, that’s where I want to be. With you. And what could I, leaving all I’ve known behind, possibly bring you? If I find myself inexplicably able to walk on air, then, amazing!, I get over there, but can my inadequacy and insecurities come, too? Can you walk on air weighed down? You still feel too far away, and I can’t quite see, how many of your fears are still out there with you? How did you hold them without your feet firmly planted? Did the fears become lighter, too? If so, I guess I do know at least some of what I’ll bring. And I’m not sure if that’s better or worse than nothing, but despite how empty my hands, how full my head, how stooped my shoulders, can I just… join you? But then I feel my feet again, and I doubt, I don’t feel I have reason enough to believe that you’d even want me to. I don’t have reason enough to believe that you want me, too. But I can’t quite seem to leave. I can’t quite seem to get my feet to turn around, can’t quite keep my eyes from softly butterflying out and landing on you. So, here I am. For little else but the time being. So, slouching, crouching, I trick my feet to compromise with me, and I dangle them off the side. I sit on the edge of this mid-air shore, my normal, old life behind and underneath me, holding me up from both ways, gentle waves of wanting lapping up against my outstretched eyes. What could we do out there together?

[A friend] got me in a Jimmy Eat World mood, and after a long, shuffling while, "Hear You Me" finally comes on, and like... I miss when all of us thirtysomethings were all teens or early twentysomethings, and we were posting sad stuff all the time and funny stuff some of the time and wearing black even more than we do now and getting "in our feelings" even more than we do now and spending hours getting things JUST right on our MySpace and Xanga pages and wondering if the WHOLE, DAMN WORLD would ever really GET us, ya know.?. And a bunch of us had at LEAST the sneaking suspicion that we could CHANGE the whole, damn world if only it did get us and give us the chance. But it seemed like it never seemed to, and we slowly eroded away and went from putting black stars and hearts on things to putting minimalist, meaningless triangles on things for a minute and then straight into putting on "respectable" clothes (often over our tattoos), and we closed down our MySpaces and Xangas and got "real jobs" and largely just gave the world what IT wanted, or at least what it seemed to want. But maaan... the world could've really gotten something from those kids we were, ya know.?. The world could've done a lot worse than us. I think the world could still do a lot worse than us. So, I dunno, NEVER cheer up, emo kids! I still love you!

No, literally! It calls itself "Zen tea"!

"Attachment" Another Tinder match went up in smoke This time minutes after we first spoke But certainly not the first time, certainly not the worst time It always ends as everything always does Whether minutes or seconds, whether after a month or coming back for seconds, it always ends as everything always does But thank God for Buddha! Thank Buddha for dying, thank buddha nature and tao for trying without trying There was transience in this place, and I didn't even know it! But now I've seen the might and the maybe, the holy impermanence and the way we cling, everyone to everything and also to everyone And I feel like I am the first among the clingy Scraping, clawing, scrapping at all the trimmings and the trappings of relationship But if Buddha came back, we'll never know how Whatever we think we know now, we're bound to ground down to powder, whether quietly into that dark night or louder, that's where we'll be like here now So, here, head caught between a new and familiar rock and hard place, I'm at least temporarily awake again to a syncretic kind of grace And if not Middle East Jesus or Buddha of the East, at least these of the East Coast 50s and 60s So concerned with TIME for a time, and the good times came and went as they must San Fransisco, Denver, or bust in busted up boxcars or rusted out Cadillacs, not then, but if looking back from when I am, they are now, and wow! Is that some kind of insight!? Some kind of Buddha-blesséd hindsight!? O, wait, that's probably not a thing, and here I am writing, waiting for the phone to ring Not dressed up and noplace to go because I can't get hardly anyone to show interest in me for more than a few weeks And this probably sounds like a pity party, I suppose, but part of what I'm trying to say is that I know that's just how it goes It always goes as everything always does Look! Now! There it is and AGAIN it goes, there she blows, there it blows, there it blows its nose as it goes, flows down on the road And I'm a beat down, beat up bad imitation bum, unmentioned gas station attendant at best But I guess my moments have merit I guess I, too, just grin and bear it when I'm not crying And here I am trying to learn how not to try so. damned. hard. But clearly that's coming and going, too, as everything always does Perfect rain starts pelting, putting out all sorts of fires, and I'm melting a little inside Hopefully unwinding Hoping I'm finding some truth in that Buddha of the East Coast 50s and 60s But still that stubborn little flicker of light like, "Will any of these matches ever miss me?" Then and now somehow always wondering what this or that match meant All my ranting and raving, chanting or praying, I'm still really, really, really craving attachment

Goodnight.

Someone I want to be with a while

Happy Independence Day, friends 🇺🇸❤️

SHH! I don’t care right now! Other people are right about things!

Laundry day for teal and grey