If you would write the soundtrack to your life,
the background noise for every single hour
- those shining moments when you're at your best,
as well as when you're sad and dour -

what music and what songs would fill the space
when even time and motion seem to cease,
stretched far beyond the limit of your ears?
What voice conveys some sense of inner peace?

16 DEC 2008

Arise, new day, your way much like the last,
one footstep forward further from the past;
and in your wake leave only settling dust
that would try to preserve because it must,
or else subside to shadows that soon fade
as from their brittle bones new day is made.

Arise, new day, your time has surely come!

Your heartbeat echoes last night's funeral drum,
and pulses with the force of health and light
along the pale horizon, left to right.

Arise, new day, waste not a single breath;
lest you, too, slip complacent into death.

12 DEC 2008

Cheap hotel, out on the turnpike
between come and gone;
far too late for sleeping,
far too early to be getting on.

Who can tell? Sometimes the line
between what's right and wrong
fades into nothing
like an old fashioned country song.

You and me? It's hard to figure out
the bottom line;
too much time together,
not enough of it was very fine.

Some say love heals every wound,
and some say love is blind;
When it's gone,
it doesn't leave too much behind.

What we had is over,
and it really doesn't matter whose to blame.
Really makes no difference,
win or lose, you end with nothing just the same.

Cheap hotel, out on the turnpike
just a mile or so;
far enough to say I'm leaving,
close enough to nowhere else to go.

I've never met a President, I doubt I ever will;
In recent years, the only likely one for that was Bill.
They never seem to be much like the people that I know:
they have more money, that's for sure, and travel to and fro

persuading and attempting to convince me what is real
in case I haven't figured out the truth of the whole deal:
it doesn't really matter, in the end, who claims to run the show
or who claims some authority based on some need to know,

I'll do what I believe is right, just like I've always done,
and won't require one law to change, nor need to purchase guns,
nor back my claim with scripture, nor intimidate with threat,
nor count on anyone to help me but my work and sweat.

You see, it doesn't matter - 'cause if the whole world's insane,
the only thing you've got to fear is what's in your own brain;
and if you need approval from the masses for your truth
you might as well forget it. It won't be from voting booths

that your redemption will come forth; no, it will never be
so long as there need to be laws to give you liberty.
You're free already - it's your choice to stand or else to kneel;
you'll be convicted either way, so which has more appeal -

to live the life you know is right, be kind, and just and wise?
or wait for some new world to dawn? If you think that these guys
who look to be elected, either one, can make things right
and turn approaching twilight into dawn by skipping night,

can with some magic heal the wounds we've spent years making sore,
can get rid of depression, terrorism, hate and war,
can counter greed, and selfish interest, and make people care,
then you're off in some other world, and I wish you luck there.

But here, real change is up to you and me, and no one else;
there's only one who's fit to change your world, and that's yourself.
Unless you work to make this place, this time, worth living in,
you might as well vote with a blindfold. Don't bitch if you win.

03 NOV 2008

When surety retreats to shadows,
tenuous and mewling like a frightened child
that in the creeping dark sees monsters
and in a fetal shivering ball refuses
what assurance reason offers -
in that time between the second hand's
slow grinding pulsing on,
when the low thud of eardrums echoes,
drowning out each labored breath,
and the future seems as distant
as one blade of grass from another
in the scale economy of a flea
on the back of a mongrel universe -
in that moment of uncertainty,
the wounded soul heals
and by its scars is grown.

01 NOV 2008

NarcissusWorks: The Ghost Anthology:

No, it's not a real poetry collection.

No, I didn't write the one line poem attributed to me.

No, I didn't give my permission for, or seek, inclusion in this farcical volume.

But think about it. If you ARE a living poet and you WERE somehow included, it's probably one of the few, if not the ONLY time in your life that you will be included as a "poet" along with the likes of Rainier Maria Rilke, Walt Whitman, Jack Keroauc or even Ron Silliman.

This freak act of iambic penterrorism, or whatever you want to call it, has by the simple fact of random collection given you, me and everyone else on its table of contents a kind of legitimacy -- the same kind of legitimacy that we now share with 98% of historical figures, that we are referenced in print by yet another source.

In this world of screen names, false accounts, spoofed IP addresses, and other ridiculously easy ways to remain anonymous while spouting damn near anything from a virtual soapbox, maybe that's as "REAL" as it's ever going to get.

And as a parting thought ... think of the MILLIONS of folks who post what they call poetry on their websites, on poetry bulletin boards, anywhere they can get access, that their friends and readership laud with attaboys, right ons and "oh how deeps" ... folks who remind us all of watching American Idol audition outtakes (if they were for poets, instead) who WEREN'T included on this voluminous list. Why us, instead of them? Perhaps because some of us in this anthology actually ARE poets.

Should you and I want to discuss
the ins and outs of our belief
(how one way suits and others don't),
let's keep it to the point, and brief,
and leave those things like faith behind.

For faith and reason do not meet;
the one without the other fills
quite different needs: pure faith exists
to carry us between effects
for which we find no logic's cause.

And reason? That's the evidence
that each will use to prove their case
(and often, when intents diverge,
can point so many different ways
and then make liars of either side.

But you and I, unless we hate,
can talk about our firm beliefs;
and find perhaps some middle ground
where our perceptions may give way
to solid ground, instead of air.

But hate? What good is that to us,
if what we dream we can achieve
is something more than us and them,
beyond the blame we both should share,
some kind of balance, some small peace?

Let's talk, and leave such fools behind
that would become what they despise;
instead, let's listen for a while
and let our voices, strained with shouts,
take time to heal before we speak.

15 SEP 2008

OK, so here it is. The current list of songs by other people that I might throw into a set.

Ain't No Sunshine
Almost Cut My Hair
Baby What Do You Want Me To Do
Back Door Man
Bartender's Blues
Blue Christmas
Born in Chicago
Brown-Eyed Girl
Call Me the Breeze
Casey Jones
Cheap Thrills
Cocaine
Crazy
Crying Time

Hi:

Not looking for any response, just wanted to let you know a little something.

I'm 43 years old and I've been playing electric bass continuously since I was 11 or 12. In that time, I've played a lot of different basses - Fender, Kramer, Gibson, Epiphone, Hagstrom, Musicman, Yamaha and Rickenbacker to name a few. Short scale, long scale, extra long scale. Roundwound, flatwound, half-round, nylon.

I've never been happy with anything but Rotosound strings. I've tried other strings (usually when I needed a last minute new set and couldn't get Rotosounds) but they always seem to fall short of the mark. Jazz, hard rock, blues, punk, r & b or funk, small clubs, theaters, orchestra pits, bars or festivals -whatever the style, whatever the venue, Rotosound comes through with a consistent punch, clarity and beefy bottom end that no one else can match.

When I first started playing, I looked to inspirational bass players for tips on what equipment to use. It turned out that the bassists I loved the most - John Entwistle, Chris Squire and Jaco Pastorius, among others - all were Rotosound devotees. That was enough for me then. Now, younger and less experienced bass players see me at work and ask the same kind of questions. I tell them the same thing. Rotosound. Swing 66. It's all you need to know.

Thank you, and best wishes for continued success.

As a pagan, I often overhear pagan conversations where the chief topic of concern is the negative affect that evangelical Christianity has on the "free trade" of alternative religions - its nature to limit, deny, persecute and eradicate viewpoints other than its own.

I wonder, however, if the "power" of the rough 70% majority (in America, that's about how many claim to be "Christians," whether they act accordingly or not) is not greatly overestimated by my pagan colleagues.

Historically speaking, the number one enemy of Christians is usually other Christians (or in the case of the Crusades, which weren't really about religion anyway, other monotheists). The Pilgrims and Puritans who sallied forth and assailed Plymouth Rock with their austere sense of righteousness were running from persecution in Europe and England, where they were being thumb-screwed, hung, burnt and otherwise imperiled by other Christians. The separation of the church and state was originally a way to prevent a Catholic state from persecuting Protestants, or visa versa. Those brave souls (and if they're yours, they start as visionaries and end up martyrs; those on the other side generally begin as heretics and blasphemers and end as capital criminals) who question the status quo of the Christian power structure from within are usually the most likely victims of Christian persecution; there's so much to harvest there (in terms of dissention, dissembling and disavowing) that I don't think at least in recent centuries there's been enough time for them to focus on or bother with non-believers. Sure, every now and again someone will get a Cotton Mathers bee up their bonnet and worry about the devil lurking in strangers. But typically (and ironically) it's much more effective to clamp down on "your own."

Of course, that depends on who you call "your own." Particularly when you've got more churches than congregants (where I live, there may be 300 churches for 17,000 people - on any given Sunday, there are between five and forty cars in 300 different parking lots). To sing, not to sing; musical instruments vs. voices only; women clergy or no; laity preaching; dancing; drinking; wine vs. grape juice; transmigration real or symbolic; Latin vs. local; tithe vs. time; literal vs. figurative; dip vs. dunk; limbo, purgatory, bottomless pit, endless fire, consuming darkness. About the only thing they agree on is barbeque - and then the sauce is different depending on which side of town you're on. Again, from local experience, there's one denomination that has two separate facilities - one for "locals" and another for "foreigners" (i.e., those who were not born and bred in town).

How could this group of divisive, in-fighting, bickering, nit-picking and otherwise non-collective souls agree on anything - at least, once they pass out of the church's threshold and return to their completely isolated and often hypocritical lives?

Pagans: who cares what they think anyway?

"If you want to sing out, sing out." That's what I say.

I know, I know. There's that social pressure. Those potential cross-burnings. That shunning. The losing of the job, etc.

But why would you want to live in a town with that kind of thinking, anyway? Shouldn't you be looking to live among your own kind, like the Christians do? Or do you have the same level of schism with your fellow "pagans"?

I say again - if you believe in what you are, what you do will follow. If that is worth doing, then it doesn't matter who opposes it. Is living in any other way worth living?

Besides, I think it was Dan Rather who said in an interview perhaps 15 years ago that the most important question you will ever have to ask yourself is "what am I willing to die for?" Once you have that answer, the rest is pretty clear. If you're up against anyone in those sacred areas who hasn't asked themselves that question (and given themselves an honest answer), unless that's what they're fully committed to, you will emerge victorious.

Happy Independence Day.

If you thought the eight-track list was bad, check out the albums I owned in 1978-1979:

The Eagles - Greatest Hits 1971-1975
The Beach Boys - 40 Greatest Hits
Johnny Cash - Ring of Fire
Elvis Presley - Gold Records No. 1, 2, 3 and 4
Kiss - Double Platinum
Kiss - Ace Frehley
ELO - Out of the Blue
The Bay City Rollers - Greatest Hits
Queen - News of the World
Roy Clark - The Everloving Soul of Roy Clark
Linda Hargrove - Music is Your Mistress*
The Blues Project - Reunion in Central Park*
Freddie Hart - His Greatest Hits*
Maynard Ferguson - Chameleon
Columbia Jazz Sampler - 1958
The Music Goes Round and Round - Decca Vol. 1 - 1951-1954
The Music Goes Round and Round - Decca Vol. 2 - 1955-1957
The Music Goes Round and Round - Decca Vol. 3 - 1958-1959

* These I actually won in the fourth grade from a WKTN radio station contest for writing a Halloween essay.

So here's the rundown on my eight-track library circa 1978:

The Yardbirds - Five Live Yardbirds
The Yardbirds - Greatest Hits
Carlos Santana and Alice Coltrane - Illuminations
The Beatles - Love Songs
The Beatles - Live at the Hollywood Bowl
The Beatles - Rock and Roll Music
The Beatles - Singles*
Todd Rundgren - Runt: The Ballad of Todd Rundgren
Boston Pops - The Best of Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops
Various Artists - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (soundtrack)

The Beatles I got courtesy of my cousin, who transferred these albums from his vinyl collection to eight-track for a Christmas present one year.

The remainder were acquired in Kmart and various drugstore sale bins in and around Forest and Kenton, Ohio.

I listened to most of these albums A LOT. One bit of evidence of that is: I loaded up this Rundgren album and listened to it today, and knew almost all the words and every one of the vocal nuances. The piano songs and vocal style in particular were a huge influence on my writing at the time (1977-1979).

Having just seen (actually for the second time) the made for VH1 movie "Hysteria: The Def Leppard Story" and recently also having watched "Ray" and "The Five Heartbeats" got me thinking about all the movies I'd seen about real or fictitious musicians or singers.

Musical biopics, I suppose they're called in the trade; biographical pictures that because of their subject matter must include a great deal of music.

So I thought I'd put together a list, and over the next few months I'll be updating to add comments and ratings to these flicks as a guide to the newly needing to be inspired musicians on my reading list. Because I've seen most of these movies, over the years, and found them either inspirational, insipid or in some cases, wildly inaccurate about the way being a musician actually works. No matter, the accuracy, however, it seems that the movie-going public has ALWAYS been fascinated by biographies of musicians, whether they would have them in their homes or not.

So here's the list:

Prior to Hurricane Katrina, as most of you probably know, I owned a lot of books. Literally thousands. Between Sunny and I, probably tens of thousands.

One of the books I acquired in the months prior to the great water-log of 2005 was a slim volume by jazz pianist Kenny Werner entitled Effortless Mastery: Liberating the Master Musician Within.

I know I wrote about it, and quoted from it, at the time because it made a definite and deep impression on me, particularly with respect to why we as musicians feel it necessary to play at all, and what drives us to maddening attempts at continual perfection (maddening, for the most part, because these attempts are doomed to failures of varying degree).

I recently reacquired the book, and this time when reading through it, I was struck by a correlation between Kenny's philosophy and that line from Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince:

"...what is essential is invisible to the eye."

There are those that tell you that BB King can convey more with one note than most other guitarists can say in five minutes of scale shredding. I myself have said that playing the blues is about speaking the truth by creating each line of melody as you proceed, rather than simply hinting at it by playing circles around it. I think it comes down to that saying, "Life isn't about finding yourself. It is about creating yourself."

In other words, that one note from BB means more because it is in fact the only note that could be played at that time. It's not a suggestion or potential answer, despite BB's humble apology that it goes "...something like this."

A musician has depth because each note they produce has chiaroscuro, something else I've talked about before:

Nothing holds a shape without its shadow,
that place at the edge where the lines are rough,
and sharp defined shapes blur in a limbo
made of innuendo and the small stuff

that, in shades of gray, fills up silent space,
shifting with the slightest movement of light
to redefine the angle of a face,
moving what was once unseen into sight.

Compared to that substance, that space within the jar that makes the jar useful (to paraphrase a Zen parable), the effort from a predominant number of musicians can seem like a cardboard cut-out, an endless parade of meaningless notes, a cacophony of mind-numbing technical exercises ... a lot of "talkin' loud and sayin' nothin'".

Kris Kristofferson has a song called To Beat the Devil. If you haven't listened to the lyrics lately, they're about a recommendation from the devil on the meaninglessness of trying to change the world with your music, and Kris' response to that challenge. The Devil's argument goes like this:

"If you waste your time a-talkin' to the people who don't listen, "To the things that you are sayin', who do you think's gonna hear. "And if you should die explainin' how the things that they complain about, "Are things they could be changin', who do you think's gonna care?"

There were other lonely singers in a world turned deaf and blind,
Who were crucified for what they tried to show.
And their voices have been scattered by the swirling winds of time.
'Cos the truth remains that no-one wants to know.

Well, to be honest with you, I've felt that way a lot. There are definitely times when it seems like nobody's listening, nobody cares what I'm saying, and it wouldn't really matter much if they did.

But I tell you what: that's defeatist thinking. I used to say that in order to change the way people think, you first have to make sure they're thinking. That's a bit of a downer, too. It's a cynic's approach to life. That everything sucks. That there is inevitably a need for either bitter coating on the sugar pills, or sugar coating on the bitter pills. The cynic lives their life believing that human beings, and this must needs include themselves, are intrinsically no damned good. And what, pray tell, is the point of that? Better, I think, to retain at least a little optimism, or at least perseverance and stubborness of purpose, if you can't muster a bit of a smile, so that like Kristofferson, you can say:

And you still can hear me singin' to the people who don't listen,
To the things that I am sayin', prayin' someone's gonna hear.
And I guess I'll die explaining how the things that they complain about,
Are things they could be changin', hopin' someone's gonna care.

I was born a lonely singer, and I'm bound to die the same,
But I've got to feed the hunger in my soul.
And if I never have a nickle, I won't ever die ashamed.
'Cos I don't believe that no-one wants to know.

If we're not supposed to affect the world at all, if we really are just a moment's ripple in the ocean, then what's the frickin' point?

One of the blogs I read pretty regularly is Dave Pollard's How to Save the World. Occasionally, something he writes strikes a particularly resonant chord with me --- like his February 4th gem A Miniature Truth: Becoming Authentically Yourself.

I'll admit, some of these things I've thought and compiled myself over the years. But to see these 9 ideas strung together, in fact, dependent on each other in such a way that in order to accept one as truth, you really have to accept them all, for better or worse, in order to truly understand the implications of each, is a step I'd never taken until reading Dave's post. In summary, these truths are:

1. We do what we must, then we do what's easy, then we do what's fun.

2. Things are the way they are for a reason; if you have any hope to change something, first understand what the reason is.

3. Life's meaning, and an understanding of what needs to be done, emerges, most often, from conversation in community with people you love.

4. Community is born of necessity.

5. To get people to change, first Let Yourself Change, to become a model that shows people personally, one-to-one, a better way to live.

6. You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.

7. Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.

8. To be nobody-but-yourself --- in a world that is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else --- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.

9. Our civilization is in its final century.

For more detail, please refer to Dave's blog :)

OK, so as of January 4, I've quit smoking. Roughly a 25-year, 2 pack a day habit and now it's done. No patch. No gum. No Wellbutrin XL (which my better half who also quit needed to help her over the first week). I did have a doozy of a cold, though, which qualifies somewhat as cheating --- since I tend to not smoke whenever I have a fever-cough-chest congestion condition and I get them for a week once or twice a year. This one happened to coincide with the smoking cessation date. So sue me.

I'm hoping that the non-smoking, in combination with voice strengthening exercises from Jaime Vendera, will help me recover what has for the last 8 or 9 years been a slowly increasing loss of range (about an octave and a half lost in that time).

I wonder, however, whether it in fact is the smoking that has been the primary factor, or the lack of use. I also wonder about polyps. My cousin had them and had to have them removed, and I've known several other singers who have suffered the same situation.

---
1 month 5 hours 32 minutes smoke-free
1,254 cigarettes not smoked
$238.26 saved
4 days 8 hours 30 minutes life saved

One's destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things. - Henry Miller, US author (1891-1980)