Archive for the ‘colors and scents’ Category

jack

Thursday, April 11th, 2013

I’ve spent so much time, my whole life it seems, proving that I can do everything/anything myself, that I no longer know what I do best.

I have/am wasted/wasting my time doing everything myself that I should be having others who do it better do for me that I am no longer excelling at anything.

I truly have become a jack of all trades and master of none while I have been deluding myself that I am really a master of all and jack of none — guess I don’t know jack, even though he was my father.

But wait — my dad was named Jack but rarely did he attempt to do everything himself though he could be quite handy and often tried. He was perhaps trying to emulate his adopted father John whom was truly handy in so many ways.

Yet he too didn’t try to do Everything. Could it be a trait I picked up from my father’s biological father whom I never met or knew — or something I mistakenly took as a directive when hearing that phrase —

jack of all trades and master of none?

So here I am at seventy, trying to do everything and ending up feeling wasted and wan.

I’ve tried to be Jack and I’m only John.

nonday afternoon

Sunday, October 21st, 2012

Today feels like a Nonday.
I know it’s a Sunday
but then there are
Mondays that are Nondays
as well as
Tuesdays and others.

What day is it?
What time is it?
Does it really matter?
Should anyone really care?

It is always Today
which can be a Nonday
If I really want it to
And what if

I ran the days of the week
backwards
or sideways or
upside-down and
inside-out

What the hell
as long as it is Myday
And not Yourday
Or Anyone Else’s.
By the way,
What time is it?

bannini & chinasky

Tuesday, October 16th, 2012

So, is it that I think my life is too boring now
and maybe it was less so in years past?

Maybe so but, I think that I may be able
to get my writing to sort of run along with things
and eventually catch up

or is it the other way around, that my
activities may get more interesting if my life catches up
with my writing?

Now I’m confused.

Nothing new.

I watched the film
based on John Fante’s story
“Ask the Dust”.
It really brought
his writing to life and also
the anguish of his persona.

And also, how his writing
was an immediate recording of events,
laced with some fictional embellishment.

I can see his influence in Bukowski’s writing
very clearly.

When I read either’s work, I get the feeling
I’m just sitting there listening – rather
having a conversation with, them — there
voice on the page, mine in my head.

Their experiences sound so familiar
and their tone so much like that of a close friend.

I think this is going to be a great help
in getting the plug pulled for me s
o that my words can flow.
They are certainly dancing around
in my head all the time lately.

Maybe it will help my constipation too.

enough

Tuesday, October 9th, 2012

Why am I not writing anything? Well the simple answer is all I can think to write about is my not writing and who cares about that? Even other writers can’t stand that kind of self-serving drivel.

I want to be writing about things that are amusing or intriguing or at least engaging in one sort of meaningful way. I could ramble on about my daily activities or dreams or just random thoughts as many do I suppose. But that too becomes disengaging, so there. Stare at these blank pages awhile and see what YOU come up with.

If you’re not a writer yourself, maybe you are a reader. I know what that’s like. If this starts to either put you to sleep, bore you or otherwise not click, forget it. So, that’s why I’m not writing anything right now. Or, at least it is my current excuse.

I put my artwork, my painting on hold for awhile after not being able to make any sales of late. I thought that writing felt like a good alternative outlet and actually got into writing some poetry and short essays for awhile. Like so many things I’ve tried, the work of it became just that — work.

To me creative acts are most exciting in the energetic concept development stage. With painting, or writing that’s the mental/spiritual/physical acts of putting down the flow of words or colors/shapes. After that comes the rendering, mounting and framing or with words, the editing and composing. It’s that second part in writing that can for me be what kills the project. With painting, that second crafting stage is more physical than editing words. Yes of course removing a word is “physical” but it is done with only my fingers on a keyboard or on paper with a line or erasure — too simple yet so difficult. I love the physical rendering of visual arts like painting, sculpture and the like — but words, hmmm; maybe it’s just bad memories of school or something.

Then too, I’ve noticed lately a disdain for most poetry. How can that be since I found that writing poetry felt so right for me as a means of expression? Now I can’t stand to see so many overused similes, so many fruity ways to express something ordinary pouring into my mind from all kinds of sources mostly from academically ensconced professional hacks churning out a constant stream of carefully crafted whining fluff, gagh!

So who am I to judge these “Masters”? Well for one, I am a reader and one who has a low threshold for bullshit. I am a “writer”, whatever that connotes, open to criticism and anything else my readers might throw at me, like plaudits and money and looks askance and, who simply wants things to be simply and clearly stated with soul rather than some prescribed decorative phrasing. I love a good pun now and then but, like most, have been overloaded on that front by those enduringly clever journalists and there cute headlines.

Now I’m the one rambling and being irrelevantly boring. Maybe I’m just giving myself another session of self-learning out in the open — the one where I figure out something like how to appreciate the process of editing to simplify my writing and make sure it doesn’t fit the loathed categories I described here — how to cut the fluff and keep the rough bone, blood and gristle. Enough.

Stay tuned.

success?

Thursday, August 2nd, 2012

I get bored with what is already known after assimilating and understanding it.

I crave exploring the unknown, the as yet undiscovered and seek it out in the abstraction of random creativity.

It seems to me most people are primarily occupied with what is known and are fearful of the unknown in every aspect of their lives. They crave the routine of sameness and the known.

That area of focus is where human culture thrives, it is the fabric of trade, politics, civilization and survival. But without those of us poking our heads into the unknown, that survival would be jeopardized.

so what do you want?

Saturday, July 28th, 2012

So, what do you want a poet to say?

Something that will make you think
everything is alright?

Something to make you happy
in spite of all that’s going on?

Something to make you feel safe?
Something to make you laugh?

Maybe something that will
sound cool and glib or
words deep and meaningful?

the buying obsession

Wednesday, July 25th, 2012

Always anxious
Looking for something
Having to find the best fit
Wanting the highest quality
At the lowest price

Desiring is wonderful
Searching is divine
Finding exciting
And acquiring sublime

Then comes the using
The applying
The carrying out
Of those anxious dreams

The looking and finding may last a week
The acquiring may involve a bit of a wait
The initial use can happen fast
Continued use tapers off

Is the acquisition of tools a habit?
Is their application a job?
Then why do they cease to satisfy
Launching another cycle of quest?

Never really satisfied
Except in the search
Once fulfilled
It starts anew.

xhoices

Saturday, June 2nd, 2012

This is about a man lying in his bed one morning.

He felt that he wanted to write about something and thought, why not write about how he feels uncomfortable in social settings. Like how even if he knows some of the people gathering for an event that he somehow prefers to be on the periphery, just looking on.

Then, he rolls over in his early morning revery, as he often does, believing that the blood flowing to a different part of his brain will generate different thought patterns.

Now he thinks maybe he might write about eating pussy. Trying to remember his first such encounter he can’t recall who or where but his memory feeds him the best highlights of many times — of the similarity to the enjoyment of a ripe apricot, a little fuzzy on its soft but firm exterior and the exciting potential of all that soft luscious juicy warm aromatic and tasty fruit inside, once past the steel wool surrounding it.

What a divergent choice of topics and then he realizes perhaps they are really part of one over-riding subject — his successes and failures, his social demeanor, his ability and preference for focusing on one person at a time rather than a crowd.

This is not a matter of success or failure he now thinks but one of preference and bearing — he prefers intimacy without an audience. He realizes that he also enjoys the response of an audience — without personal contact.

The dichotomy could cause a decision to forget about the whole thing.

But of course the more personal topic wins out.

He is an artist and a writer nonetheless — of course he prefers to be alone when creating. Of course this, he reflects, is why so many artists and writers turn to drink and other such escapes that drive others away physically or virtually. This too must be why he sees eating pussy as a creative endeavor, an art form — and would explain his reluctance to embrace group activities.

He turns over again and as the morning wood passes he arises alone, walks to his table and begins to write in the dark.

wondering

Tuesday, April 24th, 2012

When you are a tree in the wilderness and there are no people around
you wonder why you would fall over if there are none to hear the sound
but other trees who are wondering the same thing.

When you are an artist without an audience
you wonder why you are making art when there are none to see it,
not even other artists who are wondering the same thing.

When you are a lover without a mate
you wonder why you are loving when there are no mates to reciprocate,
not even others wondering the same thing.

In the end you are alone and still wondering, still falling,
still creating, still loving though there are no others around
not even those wondering the same thing.

res ipsa loquitor

Saturday, May 7th, 2011

in Latin means literally ‘the matter speaks for itself’

in Law, the principle that the occurrence of an accident
implies negligence

as an artist I know that accidents require negligence and
that there would be very little art without it

and that matter speaks for itself, literally.