There was a moment when he knew he had to make a decision.

He had left London that February evening on the ****** Velo Train to the South West. As the two hour journey got underway darkness had descended quickly; it was soon only his reflected face he could see in the window. He’d been rehearsing most of the afternoon so it was only now he could take out the manuscript book, its pages full of working notes on the piece he was to play the following afternoon. His I-Mind implant could have stored these but he chose to circumvent this thought-transcribing technology; there was still the physical trace on the cream-coloured paper with his mother’s propelling pencil that forever conjured up his journey from the teenage composer to the jazz musician he now was. This thought surrounded him with a certain warmth on this Friday evening train full of those returning to their country homes and distant families.

It was a difficulty he had sensed from the moment he perceived a distant gap in the flow of information streaming onto the mind page

At the outset the Mind Notation project had seemed harmless, playful in fact. He allowed himself to enter into the early experiments because he knew and trusted the research team. He got paid handsomely for his time, and later for his performance work.  It was a valuable complement to his ill-paid day-to-day work as a jazz pianist constantly touring the clubs, making occasional festival appearances with is quintet, hawking his recordings around small labels, and always ‘being available’. Mind Notation was something quite outside that traditional scene. In short periods it would have a relentless intensity about it, but it was hard to dismiss because he soon realised he had been hard-wired to different persona. Over a period of several years he was now dealing with four separate I-Mind folders, four distinct musical identities.

Tomorrow he would pull out the latest manifestation of a composer whose creative mind he had known for 10 years, playing the experimental edge of his music whilst still at college. There had been others since, but J was different, and so consistent. J never interfered; there were never decisive interventions, only an explicit confidence in his ability to interpret J’s music. There had been occasional discussion, but always loose; over coffee, a walk to a restaurant; never in the lab or at rehearsals.

In performance (and particularly when J was present) J’s own mind-thought was so rich, so wide-ranging it could have been drug-induced. Every musical inference was surrounded by such intensity and power he had had to learn to ride on it as he imagined a surfer would ride on a powerful wave. She was always there - embedded in everything J seemed to think about, everything J projected. He wondered how J could live with what seemed to him to be an obsession. Perhaps this was love, and so what he played was love like a wilderness river flowing endlessly across the mind-page.

J seemed careful when he was with her. J tried hard not to let his attentiveness, this gaze of love, allow others to enter the public folders of his I-Mind space (so full of images of her and the sounds of her light, entrancing voice). But he knew, he knew when he glanced at them together in darkened concert halls, her hand on J’s left arm stroking, gently stroking, that J’s most brilliant and affecting music flowed from this source.

He could feel the pattern of his breathing change, he shifted himself in his chair, the keyboard swam under his gaze, he was playing fast and light, playing arpeggios like falling water, a waterfall of notes, cascades of extended tonalities falling into the darkness beyond his left hand, but there it was, in twenty seconds he would have to*

It had begun quite accidentally with a lab experiment. J had for some years been researching the telematics of composing and performing by encapsulating the physical musical score onto a computer screen. The ‘moist media’ of telematics offered the performer different views of a composition, and not just the end result but the journey taken to obtain that result. From there to an interest in neuroscience had been a small step. J persuaded him to visit the lab to experience playing a duet with his own brain waves.

Wearing a sensor cap he had allowed his brainwaves to be transmitted through a BCMI to a synthesiser – as he played the piano. After a few hours he realised he could control the resultant sounds. In fact, he could control them very well. He had played with computer interaction before, but there was always a preparatory stage, hours of designing and programming, then the inevitable critical feedback of the recording or glitch in performance. He soon realised he had no patience for it and so relied on a programmer, a sonic artist as assistant, as collaborator when circumstances required it.

When J’s colleagues developed an ‘app’ for the I-Mind it meant he could receive J’s instant thoughts, but thoughts translated into virtual ‘active’ music notation, a notation that flowed across the screen of his inner eye. It was astonishing; more astonishing because J didn’t have to be physically there for it to happen: he could record I-Mind files of his thought compositions.

The reference pre-score at the top of the mind page was gradually enlarging to a point where pitches were just visible and this gap, a gap with no stave, a gap of silence, a gap with no action, a gap with repeat signs was probably 30 seconds away

In the early days (was it really just 10 years ago?) the music was delivered to him embedded in a network of experiences, locations, spiritual and philosophical ideas. J had found ways to extend the idea of the notated score to allow the performer to explore the very thoughts and techniques that made each piece – usually complete hidden from the performer. He would assemble groups of miniatures lasting no more than a couple of minutes each, each miniature carrying, as J had once told him, ‘one thought and one thought only’.  But this description only referred to the musical material because each piece was loaded with a web of associations. From the outset the music employed scales and tonalities so far away from the conventions of jazz that when he played and then extended the pieces it seemed like he was visiting a different universe; though surprisingly he had little trouble working these new and different patterns of pitches into his fingers. It was uncanny the ‘fit’.

Along with the music there was always rich, often startling images she conjured up for J’s compositions. At the beginning of their association J initiated these. He had been long been seeking ways to integrate the visual image with musical discourse. After toying with the idea of devising his own images for music he conceived the notion of computer animation of textile layers. J had discovered and then encouraged the work and vision of a young woman on the brink of what was to become recognised as a major talent. When he could he supported her artistically, revelling in the keenness of her observation of the natural world and her ability to complement what J conceived. He became her lover and she his muse; he remodelled his life and his work around her, her life and her work.

When performing the most complex of music it always seemed to him that the relative time of music and the clock time of reality met in strange conjunctions of stasis. Quite suddenly clock time became suspended and musical time enveloped reality. He found he could be thinking something quite differently from what he was playing.

Further projects followed, and as they did he realised a change had begun to occur in J’s creative rationale. He seemed to adopt different personae. Outwardly he was J. Inside his musical thought he began to invent other composers, musical avatars, complete minds with different musical and personal histories that he imagined making new work.

J had manipulated him into working on a new project that had appeared to be by a composer completely unknown to him. L was Canadian, a composer who had conceived a score that adhered to the DOGME movie production manifesto, but translated into music. The composition, the visuals, the text, the technological environment and the performance had to be conceived in realtime and in one location. A live performance meant a live ‘making’, and this meant he became involved in all aspects of the production. It became a popular and celebrated festival event with each production captured in its entirety and presented in multi-dimensional strands on the web. The viewer / listener became an editor able to move between the simultaneous creative activity, weaving his or her own ‘cut’ like some art house computer game. L never appeared in person at these ‘remakings’, but via a computer link. It was only after half a dozen performances that the thought entered his mind that L was possibly not a 24-year-old woman from Toronto complete with a lively Facebook persona.

Then, with the I-Mind, he woke up to the fact that J had already prepared musical scenarios that could take immediate advantage of this technology. A BBC Promenade Concert commission for a work for piano and orchestra provided an opportunity. J somehow persuaded Tom Service the Proms supremo to programme this new work as a collaborative composition by a team created specially for the premiere. J hid inside this team and devised a fresh persona. He also hid his new I-Mind technology from public view. The orchestra was to be self-directed but featured section leaders who, as established colleagues of J’s had already experienced his work and, sworn to secrecy, agreed to the I-Mind implant.

After the premiere there were rumours about how the extraordinary synchronicities in the play of musical sections had been achieved and there was much critical debate. J immediately withdrew the score to the BBC’s consternation. A minion in the contracts department had a most uncomfortable meeting with Mr Service and the Controller of Radio 3.

With the end of this phrase he would hit the gap  . . . what was he to do? Simply lift his hands from the keyboard? Wait for some sign from the I-Mind system to intervene? His audience might applaud thinking the piece finished? Would the immersive visuals with its  18.1 Surround Sound continue on the five screens or simply disappear?

His hands left the keyboard. The screens went white except for the two repeats signs in red facing one another. Then in the blank bar letter-by-letter this short text appeared . . .


Here Silence gathers
thoughts of you

Letters shall never
spell your grace

No melody could
describe your face

No rhythm dance
the way you move

Only Silence can
express my love

ever yours ever
yours ever yours


He then realised what the date was . . . and slowly let his hands fall to his lap.

A stage that doesn’t perform
This is far from the norm
Center stage being alone
A voice having no speech
No audience for anyone to reach
I am spellbound from where I stand
No orchestra and other performers being the caravan
An empty dance step
Definitely no coordination being met
No timing actually being set
Silence throughout the entire theater
Being show bound without any sound
A lonely performer with no production to perform
Once again far from the norm
It’s going to be an intervention of a one show
Just follow me and feel the flow
A performer’s combination being on stage
Having confidence and feeling the performer’s own amaze
The show must go on
The performer was on stage where he belonged
Even the theater was empty with no audience and other performers
Being alone doesn’t mean the stage has no performance
Having talent also doesn’t mean it can’t be shown
A performer himself has the inspiration that grows
Despite a half-opened curtain, the performer was determined in being his own certain
A half-opened curtain means having the courage to perform regardless
Not let it be a circumstance within contest
But always be ready at one’s best.

The glamour,
the lights and flashes,
the gold and the silver,
I call it home.

Crowds filling the seats,
then the shushing,
then the quiet,
and it starts.

They watch and follow,
little prying eyes,
where your feet goes,
where your fingers glide.

After all,
I'm a performer,
and this is the stage
that I call home.

But who stays
after the velvet curtain call.
When the show is done,
who remembers?

And what is remembered?
Aside from the weary bones,
broken ribs,
and flailing arms.

Who stays?
To sit on the red seats,
in the dark,
to watch a wretched performer?

Hey guys. This isn't truly a poem but a paper I wrote for English class. I wanted to share this view with people and this is the only vehicle I knew to use. So here it is. I hope you enjoy it.
-------------------------------------------------------------­--------------------------------------------------


The amplifiers were turned up to ten. The young and fresh crowd looked at us with anticipation.

What were they waiting for? As the music began I noticed the subtle movements and growing tension in

the crowd. Men shook their heads and we shook ours in a violent duet between the crowd and

performer. Women and men flailed their limbs as they awaited the ******. We knew when it was

coming; they did not. When we decided to let it all go I witnessed something crazy! There was a brief

pause in the music and when it began again we kicked it into overdrive. We shook our heads with a

more frantic pace. We jumped about like madmen. The crowd erupted; it became its own entity. You

could feel the heat and power of this new creature. We were locked in a violent psychic-sphere of

crazed young teens and when the ****** was over there seemed to be a sense of relief and happiness

in the crowd. Had my after school hobby become a healing agent, even if only temporary, in society?

This papers purpose is an attempt at piecing together the phenomena of catharsis by merging

philosophy, psychology, history and spirituality.



First, to understand the psychology of catharsis we must think back to the roots of this behavior. Since

human life has existed we’ve formed crowds for various reasons. The first reason held the sole purpose

of protection. Tribes of people, men as hunters and women as gatherers, teamed up for the benefit of

human survival. Erich Fromm says that “the meaning of life is not to be found in its fullest unfolding but

in social service and social duties; that the development, freedom, and happiness of the individual is

subordinate or even irrelevant in comparison to the welfare of the state.”(Fromm, 1947, page 51) This

states that a crowd is actually very necessary to the function of human life. The second reason crowds

gathered was in form of revel, shamanistic healing and worship of deities (Ehrenreich, 30). Men and

woman would often enter trances, speak in tongues and become involved in a collective ecstasy while in

worship of their God. In later years, politics, entertainment and rebellion or protest was a main factor in

the gathering of people (Ehrenreich, 102). People gathered at Festivals that were in the midst of being

suppressed and would dance in mockery of their Kings or leaders.



What exactly is catharsis? Catharsis is a purging of emotional tension brought out in a crowd through

the viewing of a tragedy or tragic play. In the article “The Power of Catharsis” Kearny says the following

More specifically he (Aristotle) defined

the function of catharsis as 'purgation of pity and fear'. This comes

about, he explains, whenever the dramatic imitation of certain actions

arouses pity and fear in order to provide an outlet for pity and fear.

The recounting of experience through the formal medium of plot,

fiction or spectacle permits us to repeat the past forward so to speak.

And this very act of creative repetition allows for a certain kind of

pleasure or release. In the play of narrative re-creation we are invited

to revisit our lives — through the actions and personas of others — so

as to live them otherwise. We discover a way to give a future to

the past. (Kearny 1)

I figure that, even though he states that it is a purgation of pity and fear, it could also be involved with

many other suppressed emotions. Take my introduction for example. These kids were not releasing

pity and fear, they were releasing their angst! They were releasing their desire for competition.

They were making up for the violent feelings of agression they felt in their body that had been

suppressed by society for so long! They were revolting! Could catharsis also be used to purge other

emotions as well such as ****** suppression or communicative issues?





How would one come about actually attempting this catharsis that I speak of? We need to first look at

some ways in which people have controlled crowds in the past and realize that crowds form by

themselves but often look for leadership due to what Nietzche called that “herd mentality.”

In the article “Seducing the Crowd” by Urs Staheli it mentions that repetition is a key factor in beginning

to control the crowd. (Staheli, 69) This means that through repetition you can get the crowd to side with

your beliefs. The crowd could begin to think about what your suggesting and potentially be swayed by

the other people that are now following your ideas. It could also be repetition of body movements as

well. What better vehicle is there to sway a crowd than music? It’s repetitive in instrumental and lyrical

form!



Another way to “******” a crowd is to act like a madman! Specifically how I stumbled upon this in

the first phenomena place.

The leader himself is possessed and hypnotized by the ideas

and visions he holds, obsessed to such an extent that he cannot rationally exercise

control over the crowd. Instead, he devotes himself to fascinating the

crowd by more ecstatic means.8 He often resembles a madman but fascinates

by the mere power of his determination. What distinguishes the leader from

the rest of the crowd is his will alone, not any particular intellectual capacity

or a superior morality. (Staheli, 68)

The theory is that through mythological story telling or acting tragically and in a spectacle, we can

actually release negative emotions and potentially even heal neuroses or psychic ailments. Later in the

article he goes on to say that a shaman was actually documented to have cured a woman with a blocked

birth canal and in labor by telling her a story about a warrior trying to exit a cave that had monsters on

the outside trying to get in.

The function of a shaman is to heal his tribe. He uses drugs or plants to change his state of mind and

then by going over to the other side of reality he invokes spirits that help to heal.

In the séance, the shaman led. A sensuous panic, deliberately evoked through drugs, chants,

dancing, hurls the shaman into trance. Changed voice; convulsive movement. He acts like a

madman. These professional hysterics, chosen precisely for their psychotic leaning, were once

esteemed. They mediated between man and spirit world. Their mental travels formed the crux

of the religious life of the tribe. (Morrison 1967 pg. 71)

This shows an ecstatic crowd dancing and chanting while one man acts out a tragic spectacle. Through

this spectacle the shaman acts like a madman. This causes wild emotions within the crowd and allows it

to release their built up and suppressed emotions. Also, the dance and chants bring them to a feeling of

unity and oneness!



One may not believe in the spiritual shaman because of their own beliefs about God and religion. Some

may not believe in the other world that parallels our own.  It is a skeptical concept without a doubt and

there are probably many people who disagree with the legitimacy of the shaman. Is there a way that we

could think of the phenomena in a psychological sense rather than strictly spiritual? The answer lies in

Carl Jung’s theory of the unconscious mind and dream therapy as well as in Nietzche’s philosophy on art

and aesthetics.  



Carl Jung believed that there is a conscious mind and an unconscious mind. The conscious mind is the

everyday mind that occurs in waking life. It is rational and helps us survive. The unconscious mind can

be found in dreams or whenever you experience a déjà vu (Jung 1964 21).  He also believed that through

the study of dreams you could heal certain aspects of your psyche that have been altered by neuroses.

Symbols and archetypes make up dreams and the unconscious, and often you will find that archetypes

appear in the form  of people. Jung believes that through living in society that men and women have lost

touch with their feminine or masculine characteristics depending on their gender. Dreams can help us

get back into union with these lost roles through connecting us with our anima(female) or animus

(male) through symbols in our dreams or unconscious minds. Jung wrote that when society was

formed people took on roles and caused a dissociation in their psyche and caused a duality rather

than a unity when they suppressed one side of their mind.  He mentioned that at all times the

unconscious mind is connecting us on a psychic level.



How does this tie into shamans and catharsis? It seems like something completely different all together

right? My theory is that the shaman or crowd leader brings forth a forgotten union of the masculine and

feminine forces in the universe. Nietzche believed that there are two polar forces that are natural in this

world and in art. These forces are given the names of deities in his book “The Birth of Tragedy.”

The first is the Apollonian force that is masculine. This force in art governs form and dreams. The

Apollonian artist directly takes ideas from his dreams and brings them to life whether it is in form

sculpture or poetry. Apollo appears through an oracle often in tragedy or in visions of the waking life.

The second force is the Dionysian which is feminine. This force governs intoxication, revel and ecstasy.

Dionysian artists are improvisers and dancers and are usually tragic figures. Nietzche believed there are

three different types of artists: Apollonian, Dionysian and the fusion of both (Nietzche 1872 14). This

latter artist is what I believe the shaman is.



Through connecting these polarizing forces he fixes the psychic neuroses in his own mind. He becomes

a unified artist, or a magician of duality. The shaman, as stated above, takes drugs to intoxicate himself.

Often the drug of choice is wine or alcohol though it could be hallucinogenic drugs as well. This tied with

repetitive revel is the Dionysian side of the spectrum and also helps draw the crowd’s attention through

spectacle and repetition. Everybody is ecstatic and experiencing the collective vibrations of the crowd.

Through his intoxication he is able to go into the unconscious mind and produce dream symbols in

reality! The crowd follows the leader into this unconscious mind and brings back forgotten wisdom of

mythology and archetypes. This is the Apollonian side of the spectrum because it deals with the

unconscious mind and dream images. It also could be this “other world” that traditional shamans speak

of. Now the psychic duality is merged and a tie is formed between the masculine and feminine forces of

nature! People feel at one with themselves and the crowd and the societal suppression is vanished

briefly. All the neuroses caused by the suppression fades away in the ecstatic revel. This is the appeal of

the rock concert. Notice how many leading figures of rock bands have androgynous features and

shamanistic nature. This is because they have fixed the psychic neuroses in their own mind and become

at peace with the masculine and feminine duality of their psyche.



Stumbling upon this phenomena in my rebellious youth was very eye opening. Ever since I have been  

very excited about this theory and I’ve been trying to piece it together. It seems to be coming along

further and further in my study of this. What exactly this ancient wisdom is; I don’t entirely know. I

do know that I have witnessed this in reality and the subject is interesting and fascinating. My theory

still has a lot of work before it is completed but I think that within this article I’ve given a decent

amount of history about the topic as well as my own thoughts. Whether this phenomena is true or

not, we can leave that up to the psychologists and philosophers to decide, though I think many may

agree. Either way, catharsis surely does exist and it is a fun way of entertainment as well as a

therapeutic option for many stressed out individuals out there

A lonely bead of sweat rolls
from his widows-peak and tumbles
down the center of his forehead.
It comes to an abrupt stop,
resting on the tip of his nose.

He doesn’t even notice - he’s too
distracted futzing with his chair.  
The bead clenched on with
all of its might and then finally
succumbing to gravity, it hits
the floor. SPLAT!  

His lips become tangled in a web
of frustration.  Gooey, white,
cotton substance evolves in the
corners of his dry mouth.  His
tongue slithers out and scoops
up the milky residue.

Purple, worm-like shapes
protrude around his
temples and forehead.
His face begins to glisten, and his
white dress shirt looks like a
wet napkin.  He’s unmercifully at
war with his chair.

Finally the chair surrenders...

He sits down, tilts his head, and
uses his right forearm as a towel
to soak up the now-noticeable beads that
are slowly working their way towards
his thick, bushy brows.

His attention turns to the stylish, black
case that lies by his side.  The audience
members shield their eyes as the
beams of the stage lights are captured by
the curves of this beautiful tomb.

Eagerness pumps through
my veins as he reaches down
and unbuckles the case, gently
removing his instrument from its vault.

Heavily antiqued with a moderate
amount of crazing, the wood grain is
perfectly marred with its perpendicular
grooves. The colors are warm with a
golden brown tint just like his skin.

He rests the violin on his
lap and leans the bow against
his right thigh.  He takes a few, deep
breaths to perfect his posture.

His belly begins to recede.

His chest puffs out.

His shoulders slightly roll back.

His spine becomes *****.

He places the violin under his chin.
With his left hand he holds the neck,
gently pressing his fingers into the
strings.  His right arm soon follows,
bringing the bow to a quick and
delicate stop a short distance below
where his fingers lie.

Suddenly everything becomes silent.

He stares over the heads of those in
the audience, not making a single
move.  He’s in a trance-like state,
like a crocodile at a river bank
patiently waiting to lunge at a
wild boar.

Then, without warning, he strikes the first note!

His body jerks forward, backward,
left-to-right, moving around in all directions,
like a crazed man trying to undue his
straightjacket. He clenches his eyes with all
his might and puckers his lips, trying to hold
in the emotions that are imprisoned, but he can’t.  
A single, victorious tear escapes from the madness.

As the music further consumes him, he plays
faster and faster. Each note takes him higher
towards the heavens. The bow pierces the hearts
of the angels and the gods, bringing them together.
Tightly gripping one another’s hands, they begin
to waltz.
  
They dance on a thick stage built from the prayers and
dreams of mankind’s wickedness.  Even the beast
from below is dancing.  An arm reaches down into
the depths and pulls him up to join the gathering.  
She grabs his hand and waist, spinning him around
until he becomes dizzy and falls backwards.  
They both laugh and begin to dance again
for all eternity.  





I lean forward and turn the ****
counterclockwise, eliminating the commercial
that follows the song he just played.  I look
over at him and tell him he’s one a hell of a
performer.  He humbly replies, “Thank you.”  
We continue to drive and listen to the radio.  
I couldn’t wait for his next performance.

someone once said: only the natives can be designated
free speech...
the immigrants can have their dog
and let it bark, along with whatever thinking comes
their way...

exploring the last remains of thought -
well then... suit and boot me up for some "thinking"
as i extend it into writing...

if i were of the native stock... "elsewhere":
most probably h'america or australia... even in italy
having tea with mussolini i'd be:
an expat... as an outsider among outsiders
but among my sameness-namesakes of surnames
akin to jones and smith:

i will never be an "immigrant" among...
it's not even a voice of cocern, this little voice of
mine...
an englishman who decides to move
to h'america is an expatriate for the native
englishman who stayed behind...
he's never an immigrant...

perhaps other nations view the people that left
them in such a positive light?
where else to emigrate to that doesn't
speak basic english with a tinge of
a "welcoming" plethora of accents?

proudly having expatriated...
or having to have had to humbly emigrated...
bark bite and tail in tow...
my the luck of being an expatriate...
readily prepared with a francophile basis...
e.g., or some other: less frost-bitten
idealism as the work ethic of:
work work work...

we know the english immigrants
as expatriates... but i doubt that people
from where i from would call me...
an expatriate... they'd call me...
eh... hangman noose... a deserter...
god forbid the fact that i somehow managed
to integrate... but then found myself wondering...

have, have integrated into... "what"?!
today i was truly astounded...
after all... Romford, Essex... England...
can boast about a few things...
notably? it's the past place you can buy vinyl
without amazon.co.uk...
you can actually play the buyer and the person
that loiters with his shadow...
flicking through a dictionary of sorts...
finding a record...

i actually left the house for ulterior motives...
but i succumbed to the allure...
and as i walked the January 2nd 2020 highstreet
in Romford...
i heard english... as a spoken language...
twice in the pedestrian commute...
and of course when it came to a lingua franca
scenario of buying or selling something...
otherwise:

perhaps i retained my primitive instincts
and the tongue and should have left it with a ghost
of me back in the clarifying vicinity of
an airport 50 miles from Warsaw...
i have bigger things to worry about though:
how i should start learning Romanian...
even though: i thought bilingualism was a good
idea?
it's not?

not among the natives could i ever be
an expatriate...
an ever: never... like any more thesaurus
sharpening would do the trick to balance
the optics of "perspective"...

if it wasn't a mistake...
it has still been a purchase:
freddie hubbard on the trumpet,
jackie mclean on the alto sax,
kenny drew on piano,
doug watkins on bass
and pete la roca on drums...

the only reason as to why i bought
a gramaphone was to buy the only cheap vinyl
there is... jazz...
to escape the earphones...
to find the complete volume of space
that would later be deemed:
confined to a room... cell... or some alternative
variation: but... oh jeez...
how wrong it was of me...

make a note: alto sax jazz is not for you...
remember: alto sax jazz is not for you...

a sensation of being a foreigner in
an already double-dutch foreign sense of land...
anything that drops from clinching
to the London transport system
with the trains and the tubes and buses
is: england...
the england of my youth where i remained
like that... dunce in the ****** tunes cartoons
interlude...

and what of my citizenship on paper?
wave a passport around
like a benchmark or an otherwise easy
accent-identifier?
perhaps i don't even know:
Bristolian - my best guess with this acquired
tongue...

but at least buying jazz is getting easier...
freddie hubbard a known name...
but... no... alto sax jazz is not for me...
now it figures...
i can get away on a whim when
a trumpet solos... but not when an alto sax
solos... i really can't stomach it...
will i give this Bluesnik record back?
no, i need a testament -
i have bought something
but the self-reflection is free...

there's only so much classical music escapism
you can try -
before long you realise that the people
listening to classical music...
mostly... when they make requests...
want "something soothing"...
want "something jovial"...
or usually it's a piece of music that has
been attached to a movie...
classical music - apparently doesn't feed
people a subtle stream of images...
and it's obvious: those requests are not phoned
in on by blind people...

imagine... the ****** of F... when you have ⠋
to work with...
what is an sunrise... a sunset but a dash
of colour... a spring of the heavens
an autumn of the heavens...
but my my... in this inverted listening of jazz...
⠙⠑⠑⠏
⠃⠇⠥ ⠑    DEEP BLUE...

if i were blind: and came to the pearly gates...
i'd ask for letters: primo pronto!
later i'd worry about colours and shapes...
as i'd probably stick to my first passion
and hearing this fathomless shapeless
sounds that... abide to no lineage with a recant
of a triangle's use of 90°...

otherwise... what if you've been fed
the: classical music when listened to when a child
will increase your i.q. -
but what are the chances that you will:
"regress" from listening to classical
music and take to jazz?
perhaps because jazz has to be felt,
it has to be heard, first,
rather than... the silence and scribbles
of a composer at his desk -
where a classical music composition
is very much like writing:
that whole a prior shabang!
none of the a posteriori zigzagging
of impromptu and jazz?

one thing is certain... i'm not going to
be a fan of alto sax jazz...
sonny clark on piano - yes...
art blakey on drums - yes...
kenny burrell on guitar - yes...
alto sax no... ah... but give me tenor sax
and... no please no big bang jazz
equivalent to thelonious monk...
at least jazz gives you pedestrian tastes
and whims...
nothing akin to bowing at the altar
of a Beethoven: or talking lightly of
the man - "the man"...

and who the hell said that being
objectivity "works all the time"
that objectivity "runs the marathon"...
alto sax jazz is pedestrian music...
don't get me wrong...
you want to walk down a busy street
and you want to drown the sounds
of progress: no horses sneezing,
no horses' hooves playing tic-tac-toe
chess on cobweb stones...
alto sax jazz is your take-out
walk-through...
but when you're hunched in a chair
and pecking at a keyboard with
ten good beaks of the tips of your fingers...

again: how do the hands rest before
the keyboard?
the right hand:
index middle, pinky and thumb...
the ring finger is used for the: delete button...
a revision - the pinky does the enter -
and the cascade follows...
the left hand?

primarily the index and *******...
the thumb is always attached to space...
shared with the right hand's *******
to space,
i can't remember if i ever used my ring
or pinky finger of my left arm...

so much for inverted chiromancy...
the polacks will never give me the wings
to be an expatriate...
i will be forever: he who abandoned
that land running with milk and honey...
but... look at how they stand behind those
from england that decided to go "elsewhere"...
they are not immigrants...
they are... expatriates...
have nothing filthy them it comes to
the connotation...
it's not sad it's not funny it's: somewhere
"in between"...

because we know that the only russians
that ever make it out of russia
are the oligarchs... and by that standard
of "sentiment": they're always welcome...
who wouldn't welcome the pharaohs without
giza pyramid ambitions of construction?!
passing chalk as cheese -
and passing... ink for blood...
perhaps i haven't sweated enough to be allowed
to write but as little as this...

there's always this sense of alienation
among the germanic tribes of "israel":
europe... even if they are the scots or the welsh
suckling at the teats of romulus & remus' lupa...
as the old saying goes among the slavic people
when "integrating" into a germanic-esque society -
by the time you have integrated...
there's this dog-**** pile of Babylon left...
and the germans are: "nowhere"!

the saying goes via:
if you go among the crows...
you must croak their croak...

here's to flying high as an imitation seagull!
brazen: into this arable land...
that's being teased by the Thames estuary...

passing through a Warsaw train station
i noticed the immigrants / the expatriates
on the eastern front...
mostly mongols...
notably the ukrainians...
but now in england i'm starting to think
in concrete terms... better start learning
Romanians...
and on the street: you can't see a focus of
who's here and who isn't here...
back east the Roma people stood out
like a sore thumb or a voodoo plum and...
that didn't bother the locals since they were
meshed like glue...
but, here, in england?
everyone's a sore thumb a voodoo plum...
because the natives,
the blessed idiosyncratic professional
eccentrics have left and...
i'm not going to be the first chasing them down...

London the only and last bastion is
overrun with the whole lot of us...
well: the "us" vs. "them" mentality...
don't get me wrong... i'll still listen to the concerns
of the peripheries... in this cest pool
of immigrants, degenerates...
old people who "forgot" to move...
the lunatics the in-betweeners and the old guard
clinging on...
perhaps, after all... english was a very
accomodating language...
it wouldn't take a genius to learn it from scratch
being thrown into the deep end of the pool
aged 8...
who was mute aged 8 going to school
being moved from "east" europe to this island
with... no prior to linguistic connection?
moi...

and now look at me... i'm teasing myself
with... sordid welsh as if i were ever the posterboy
for welsh nationalism...
scottish nationalism? eh... if they were to retain
their gaellic roots...

expansion:
the longing for those who have left:
in the anglo-sphere - expatriate...
the abhoring sense of those who arrive -
immigrant...
otherwise... the english are always
and everywhere: welcome...
hence the expatriate status of those
who have left their native land...
even in h'america: a shared language:
to be an immigrant... while speaking
the same language?! how preposterous!

the difference between eastern style
comedy presentation and western style
comedy presentation: on stage...

the eastern folk prefer cabaret: theatre dialogue
montages...
the western folk prefer stand-up:
monologue samuel beckett esque
performances...
'woe i... stand alone in this infinite
space and... find others to laugh with...'

- perhaps we're not being less funny because
we're lowering our "i.q.": yes, the we are...
we are... lowering...
i find lee evans to be funny...
a laurel and hardy weren't exactly funny
by modern comedy standards that:
it's only funny if it's intelligent...
if there's a crossword puzzle at the end of "it"...

perhaps pride is the shackle...
and ham... what ever happened to self-depreciating
humor that managed to somehow
elevate you as also having a sense
of humor:
do intelligent men even laugh
at something that isn't a word-play or
a corset of wit?
perhaps we're experiencing a drying of wip...
perhaps the jokes are only supposed
to come: days after as a form of
reflection on the sigma canvas:
the joke has to exist outside the performer
and the stage... it needs to be: a live-experience...
it has to take on DASEIN qualities?
it has to be internalised?

that: oh yeah... that's funny...
perhaps the same thing has to be observed
and it can't be retold in an impromptu
fashion shackled to a stage?
the stage is the new camp-fire?
i thought so too... about the television...

as: here's to slagging off everything that's
being published online bypassing
the editorial process of selection...
well... if it weren't for all the seriousness
surrounding internet banking...
and internet shopping...
pen to paper...
******* clinching a ripped roll
of cushioning paper
and a pseudo-***** imitation
for a wipe while massaging my prostate
over the enlightened prospect
of dropping the blitzkrieg plump-dump-plum
into an echoing lake in the ceramic basin...
otherwise...

a seanse with that moment of realisation:
"something is happening to us
collectively"... it's as if: we're under a spell...
oh i was under a spell today...
watching alec guinness in the fall of the roman
empire...
and as coming from a people
that were never conquered by rome?
on this fine fine island that was...
well... my hopes were also high for
the conquests of the mongol empire...
and the remains of it in the form of the tatars
in crimea...

here are my tattoos... it's hard to break from them,
it's hard to wash them away...
but at least i can attest:
my brain might be all fat and sponge and
electricity... but there's some skull and skin
to be had of it...
otherwise... why would the year 1066
be important for me... why would the magna carta
be important for me?
i too have my years in tattoos on this big brian
of mine...

otherwise there's that copernico-darwinian
surge of: journalistic science...
i still find it staggering that darwinism continues
to capture the imagination of people...
"of people"... only in Wittgenstein was left
alone in finding that Copernicus did something
astounding... this surge of "awakening"
via darwinism: this statistical bombardment
like it was some tabloid journalism:
throwing a pebble at a mountain while
also ushering in a mantra: grow by
a poppy's seed added height! grow!

perhaps i'm just jealous...
among the polacks i will never be an expatriate...
what a jealous people...
an englishman who moves to france...
comes 20 year later...
he will have never experienced
the mark of cain: immigration "humphrey bogart"...
he or she moved to france...
perhaps to italy...
i remember being in greece and...
i was nothing when i said i was ******:
but with british citizenship! to add...
so what?
well... so what greece...
i latched onto some north africans
and went to **** away the night
in some strip-bar where i had
two strippers either head o' mine...
and it was constellations galore...
grandmother Etna said:
rest here, among the smooches poor child...

i borrowed Etna from when Aeneas
"left off"...
****'s sake... this is the Meditarrean
and not the Baltic? where is the amber
the whiskey and the leverage of gratations
of time?!

i will agree. Macedonia come night traffic
of quicksilver tinging?
if the metal is cheap and you douse it in some gold?
a mountain dripping fresh from some quicksilver
from the moon peering at it?
objectivity what?

the finite plateau of snow-riddled Serbia...
and perhaps that's because these people
speak their own language...
and have so... and i'm just the next
"english" tourist...
a jack kerouac americanism and:
oh sure! sure!
spectacular fly-over country tourism!
everything's so so different!
and yet all so oh so much the same!

darwinism was going to run the 5000 meter
race... it's currently running the 10000 meter
race... god help it in running the marathon
of still pretending: old news is new news...
i can't distinguish between darwinism
and copernican discovery...
only in the english-speaking world
would this discovery not escape a criticism
from ancient greece and some, some predecesor!

wouldn't anyone just bore of darwinism
if they were told: over and over again:
the copernican "reality"?
a scientific fact is... akin to a religious dogma...
until... it becomes regurgitated with
enough time, with enough journalism and...
tabloid wind... and after a while...
it's only worthwhile to be spoken to
amnesia peoples of the world: unite!
it's hardly "stupid" or "intelligent"...
more or less overlooked...
because a pebble thrown at a mountain:
is... no added mountain to behold...
conventional wisdom is the only wisdom
that there ever was made to be made:
available...

nonetheless, the circumstance stands...
unless from the slavic hemisphere
of europe...
unlike any other circumstance: other than
the one given, among islanders...
among continent builders akin
to australia and h'america...
the post-racial societies of post-colonial
spain in south america?
ever wonder why the brazillians don't
look for inspiration from the portugese
when it comes to football?
you'd think: those yanks better have
the best football team in the world...
they haven't exactly looked back...
back at "us": oh god... tea afternoon and cricket...
baseball wha'?
basketball? "football"?
why are "we" looking forward and "they're"
looking back?
perhaps i should learn some spanish and
get some insinuation about:
the argentinian sense of lack when looking
back into spain...

or what else is there to be had?
move to Greenland... admire Denmark...
**** it: do the whole stretch and find
some locals on the Faroe Islands...
perhaps i too will find a tomorrow...
but tomorrow i will find: sobering up
and having to deal with: everything beside jazz...

mmm... "delayed gratification" prospects...
seven kings: canon palmer catholic school...
when boys are educated alongside girls...
what if i went to Ilford County High?
what if i were born to immigrant parents
and wasn't an 8 year old immigrant?
what if i went to the Ilford Ursulines?
the all-girls school... the former, Ilford County High?
what chances of me being an intellectual
******?

what, oh the chances!
perhaps praying: segregated... is a tad extreme?
but perhaps ******-exclusion policies:
teaching boys throughout their puberty
as segregated from girls in the same hormonal
development "range" is...
well! how else! you take a boy and girl
and you put them into the hormonal cocktail!
just because it's in a shared educational
environment... why these teenage pregnacies
you ask?
i wouldn't ask such blunt questions...
not since the genius of Copernicus
couldn't attract these...
psychological left-over intelligenstia clingers...
that darwinism has allowed...
what it darwinism and journalism?
everything! the ant as the ego
inside the mind of an ape...
the dormant tapeworm embryo
inside the mind of an ant:
with siesmic consequence of a disturbance
of the collective hive network...

borrow too much from an ape...
borrowing from an ape is one thing...
it's the borrowing from all other
animals: with the ape as the backdrop
that's truly bothersome!
at least religious spew the same facts
over and over again...
scientific dogma? who keeps track?
tomorrow might be the next:
butter vs. margarine controversy!
what sort of "religion" is science
(it's not a religion... if it's not...
why does it have to cohabit a bed
with journalism then, to spew "new",
"improved" facts, then?!)
when... it's so ******* finicky!

look via the ape long enough:
it won't matter whether it's a geocentric
of a heliocentric system that
reigns above your head, no torso,
a pickled spine...
legs and arms floating about like:
an octopus experiencing spasms
pickled in brine...

perhaps these are the zenith years of
darwinistic popularity...
perhaps like the copernican popularity...
there will come a time of:
fatalism... that somehow all of this
is... inevitable...

i see one answer: this cage of grammar
this cage of whatever this god made human
pressures me into complying to...
to the last typo! i will stand against it!
without caging me into a use of emoji or
some other hieroglyphic purse of:
shortened "thinking"...

the "seven silences" might have passed
around my presence that i dare not
call it: in concrete - figure...
and still my eigth silence to unmask
nothing more than a mask...

who are these immigrants, these tight brewed
broods, these furrow brows
representing the native pensive "squint":
of anything beside the eyes and a thought
of h. p. lovecraft?
perhaps inside of europe:
but as ever... without a russian passport...
without a russophobia that's
a tickling hard-on... the "in-between-land"...
perhaps the balkans...
who are we... to these germans and quasi-germans?

we use their tongue, their zunge...
their everything they will otherwise allow themselves
to deny: perhaps this is not Dublin,
this is not Glasgow this is not Cardiff...
perhaps this is not Italy,
this is not France...
perhaps this is "europe" as long as
Scandinavia is involved...

woe a we unto us: the viking Rus...
or some lent word of lost vogue...
last time i heard:
these northern ******* are in no favour
of treating the Spaniards or the Greeks
as their equals...
as long as they have rich arab pimps
race their lamborghini brute ******
down... knightsbridge...

then! and only then! iz ist europa "reconquista"!
"reconquista"... i'll defend these poor polacks
that didn't think it...
"necessary" to only learn english in order
to comply to the global dictum of neu-communist
internationalism...
- what, they didn't teach you you stupid
**** that it only took to learn from english?!
- last time i heard... not teachings polish
to a canape of anything beside the french,
the spanish... also worked!

english as a language is oh so accomodating...
the people will react like antibiotics,
naturally... enough of darwinism and you'll
be found, bound, to having to reference it...
past a de facto menu:
and more like a subjectivity...
there's only so much truth that can be stated...
before fiction has to reply...
because... how many regurgitated facts
can be regurgitated...
before the desert of fiction and...
there's only the fact of a bottle of water...
that remains...
and there's not impetus to walk toward
an oasis...
a fata morgana is hardly a scientific experience...
when experienced...
it's something associated with
a desert and within the desert must either:
live... or die...

what if etymology was to become the new
standard for journalism...
what if one were to escape this contant
bombardment of darwinism...
like it wasn't the next new vogue akin
to the copernican "revolution"?

is that even possible?
whenever i return to Poland...
esp. in Warsaw... i'm a deserter...
i'm not an expatriate...
the native english call those who left
with a sense of longing...
somehow: or at least that's the leftover...
the expatriates from the inside-out
perspective... never the immigrants...

i'm an immigrant and...
a paper citizenship is: no citizenship at all...
a passport is only worth a passport
at a border crossing...
in between the everyday daily affairs?
'where are you from?'
****... 'Bristol?!'...
i'm hardly going to speak
the cockney cockers or an essex schlang...
am i? ***!
all but ******* plumbers and church pulpit
mongers... and some over-ripe
riddle fruits: if not simply left
bottles of wine for the bears...

the first part though, bothers me...

someone once said: only the natives can be designated
free speech...
the immigrants can have their dog
and let it bark, along with whatever thinking comes
their way... in mere thinking...
and a dog barking...

the natives will only have a freedom of speech...
what if an immigrant becomes a citizen?
just asking...
what if an immigrant is granted a citizen
status?
well then... i am your humble example
of a civic nationalist...
such a confusing term...
it must be: for the natives...

oh ****... what language am i using?
the language of the... natives!
rubric civitas!
civic nationalism is reserved for:
those that came from abroad...
i guess the ethno-nationalists never made
this distinction clear:
watching their contemporaries leave their
native pit of woe...
and they would never call them:
deserters... only... only... expatriates...
after all... aren't we in the postmortem of ancient Rome?!
isn't this the time when the remnant
english come out and glorify being
the conquered people of this: lettering?

what is civic nationalism?
what is learnt, integrated nationalism...
this is civic nationalism...
how about the english forget about something,
like solving crosswords...
esp. among the middle-classes...
and let's envision their globalist dream!
let them learn a second language
and let us all become bilingual!
oh no... not polyglots... just bilingual!

i can't be an ethno-nationalist...
em... because (a) (b) and (c)?
aren't the post-colonial commonwealth
remnants of the empire the sort
civic-nationalists there's talk of?
what language am i writing in?
hebrew?! mandarin?!

ethno-natioanlism and its tribalism...
civic-nationalism and its state...
where does the church fit into all of this?
it's like not being an amuptee but
nonetheless being prescribed a "missing limb"...
the **** would i need a third arm for?
wilt the third leg allow me to run faster?!

i guess the term ethno-nationalist is
conflated with civic-nationalist in the ethno-nationalist
realm of "debate"...
a civic-nationalist is your casual parlance
h'american patriot...
patriotism in h'america: nationalism (still)...
in europe...
if we have to: hello, my name is: bob
do it all over again with the squares
and dictum assertions and what not attached...
between the ethno-nationalists and
the civic-nationalists...
the inter-nationalists...

i'm a civic-nationalist because:
i fear people need concrete examples...
i will not move back to Poland...
except on the holidays...
to visit my grandparents...
which is why i have retained the labour
of a native tongue... and "identity"...
i will remain in England...
until England becomes: Alle-Land...
and even when all these
ethno-nationalists ******* to Australia...
and become civic-nationalists over there...
well: over there good luck!

why would anyone ask an ethno-nationalist
the question: are you a civic-nationalist or?
civic- implies:
i'm a Brit from a grand "beyond":
circa 3000km away...
civic is a bewildering prefix for the nationalist
of a ethno- persuasion...
it really is... esp. when this ethno-nationalist
doesn't believe in the existence of
expatriates... that he would remain... "stuck"...
and that somehow... ethno-kin could come
and replace... those kin that left: "in good faith"...

savvy?!

To realize, your malice intent,
and power hungry destruction of my
most hidden and vulnerable *****...

I am relieved to be free of your
vindictive and spiteful soul;
everything about you is abrasive,
brooding and angry, vicious and ugly

That person,  so gentle and endearing
is lost, I am not so sure he even exists,
just one of your many disorderly personas

And to think of my pain,
self-mutilating thoughts and attempts
to make sense of the shock
trying to free myself from your lock of
enamoring lies. I could feel the
end when we had just sprouted,
battling my intuition with a fawn dawn heart-
with you, I finally felt full after some empty time.

But upon reflection of your undeniable misogyny,
I thank you! I could not be more thankful for you exiting my life,
the confirmation of this delusion we called love,
I am so thankful I was tricked, you see,
without honesty, I could only give you so much, and
only that much, is what you could take away from me-

Leaving behind such vitality and adventurous expression,
Charm, wits and sentiment for living
the performer in me you never could accept,
Merely shaking the strength only a woman could have.

You could never break me, although you tried-
and in that I find pity, that you feel so small
You seek power in destroying a lover
like breaking a heart is a triumph,
You are no huntsman and I am not your doe
I refuse to be your object for show

Infinity - The name of the planet where the story takes place.

Eternity - The name of the main Continent where the story takes place.

Darkness - The name of the country where the sins live.

Chaos - The capital city in the country Darkness.

Tranquility - The name of the country where the virtues live.  

Glory - The capital city in the country Tranquility.

Lust - The wife of Greed and the mother of Anger.  Lust is a ******* and a ****.  Her husband Greed is her ****.  Lust has an affair with Hatred and becomes pregnant.  She gives birth to Anger.  Lust and Envy are best friends.  

Greed - The husband of Lust, the older brother of Envy, and the step father of Anger.  Greed is Lust's ****.  Greed is a ****, corrupt politician, gangster, and a ***** businessman.  Greed is Pride's right hand man.

Hatred - The father of Anger and Cruelty.  Hatred has an affair with Lust.  She becomes pregnant and gives birth to Anger.  He also has a fling with Envy.  She becomes pregnant and gives birth to Cruelty.  Hatred rapes Love.  Hatred is a terrorist, an assassin, and a cold calculated killer.

Love - The wife of Loyalty, the mother of Kindness, and the older sister of Truth.  Love is a humanitarian and a healer.  Love is ***** by Hatred.

Loyalty - The husband of Love and the father of Kindness.  Loyalty is a soldier and a warrior.  He gets revenge on Hatred for ****** Love.

Kindness - The daughter of Love and Loyalty.  She is the niece of Truth.

Anger - The son of Lust and Hatred, the stepson of Greed, and the half brother of Cruelty.  Anger is best friends with Ignorance.

Faith - The wife of Truth and the mother of Hope.

Hope - The daughter of Faith and Truth.

Pride - The elected commander who rules over all the sins.

Cruelty - The daughter of Envy and Hatred.  She is the half sister of Anger.

Envy - The younger sister of Greed and the mother of Cruelty.  Envy has a fling with Hatred and becomes pregnant.  She gives birth to Cruelty.  Envy is best friends with Lust.

Truth - The husband of Faith, the father of Hope, and the younger brother of Love.  Truth is the uncle of Kindness.  Truth is a soldier and a warrior.  He gets revenge on Hatred for ****** Love.

D.E.A.T.H. - A terrorist organization created and operated by Hatred.  D.E.A.T.H. stands for Darkness Engulfing All Things Holy.

Knowledge - The younger brother of Understanding and Wisdom.

Understanding - The brother of Wisdom and Knowledge.  Understanding is a teacher.  He and Mercy have a romantic interest in each other.

Wisdom - The oldest brother of Knowledge and Understanding.  Wisdom is the elected commander who rules over all the virtues.

Sloth - The wife of Gluttony and the mother of Ignorance.

Gluttony - The husband of Sloth and the father of Ignorance.

Ignorance - The son of Sloth and Gluttony.  Ignorance is best friends with Anger.

S.O.U.L. -   A humanitarian organization created and operated by Love.  S.O.U.L. stands for sharing our undying love.

Grace - She's a singer, entertainer, and a a performer.

Mercy - She is a member of S.O.U.L.  Mercy is best friends with Love.  She has a romantic interest in Understanding.

Limbo - A country that's in the middle of the two countries Darkness and Tranquility.  Darkness is to the west of Limbo and Tranquility is to the east of Limbo.  The country Limbo has a river of blood running down the middle.  There is a civil war taking place in the country Limbo.

Deceit - Deceit is a master of disguise.   It is a male and and a female.  Deceit is a member of D.E.A.T.H.

Written by Keith Edward Baucum

A Close friend said "The Perfect Woman"
is much like a shark.

if I am greeted in this ocean,
by a woman
I will allow her to look at me with all primal intent.
splay my wrist open and watch her

as she smells the little turn of blood
floating now in spirals between us

I'll have done it not for the pain, or shock
but for the honesty.
to watch a creature struggling to hold onto their facade
and the tears that start to bloom in the pink
above their sharp teeth.
Look, I know sharks don't cry.
it's not about the crying,
I crave the visceral emotion.
want to give my body to the indulgence
the electric moment where
I feel them feel conflicted
with my whole body
feel their suffering and internal struggle
in my entire manic smile
tight cheeked
all eyes on them like a paid performer
or Alternatively,
I would give them all this passion,
my body in anticipation of their opening
clenching to their masks,
They Devour me.

Awkwardly, I made my way to the back
To listen to the lonely performer
Pour his heart out over his guitar
And over the sounds of the crowd,
Too engrossed in their conversations
To enjoy the melodies unfolding.

With every transition they applauded
Politely showing their affection
And as the performer resumed strumming,
So did the chatter of the disinterested.

The lyrics were muttled, drowned out
By the inane banter surrounding the stage
But his fingers continued to dance nimbly
From one string to the next.

And for once I was happy
To not be the center of attention.

Infinity - The name of the planet where the story takes place.

Darkness - The name of the country where the sins live.

Eternity - The name of the main continent where the story takes place.

Chaos - The capital city in the country Darkness.

Tranquility - The name of the country where the virtues live.

Glory - The capital city in the country Tranquility.

Lust - The wife of Greed and the mother of Anger.  Lust is a ******* and ****.  Her husband Greed is her ****.  Lust has an affair with Hatred and becomes pregnant.  She gives birth to Anger.  Lust and Envy are best friends.

Greed - The husband of Lust, the older brother of Envy, and the stepfather of Anger.  Greed is Lust's ****.  Greed is a ****, corrupt politician, gangster, and a ***** businessman.  Greed is Pride's right hand man.  

Hatred - The father of Anger and Cruelty.  Hatred has an affair with Lust.  She becomes pregnant and gives birth to Anger.  He also has a fling with Envy.  She becomes pregnant and gives birth to Cruelty.  Hatred rapes Love.  Hatred is a terrorist, an assassin, and a cold calculated killer.

Love - The wife of Loyalty, the mother of Kindness, and the older sister of Truth.  Love is a humanitarian and a healer.  Love is ***** by Hatred.

Loyalty - The husband of Love and the father of Kindness.  Loyalty is a solider and a warrior.  He gets revenge on Hatred for ****** Love.

Kindness - The daughter of Love and Loyalty.  She is the niece of Truth.

Anger - The son of Lust and Hatred, the stepson of Greed, and the half brother of Cruelty.  Anger is best friends with Ignorance.

Faith - The wife of Truth and the mother of Hope.

Hope - The daughter of Faith and Truth.

Pride - The elected commander of all the sins.  Pride is a priest.

Cruelty - The daughter of Envy and Hatred.  She is the half sister of Anger.

Envy - The younger sister of Greed and the mother of Cruelty.  Envy has a fling with Hatred and becomes pregnant.  She gives birth to Cruelty.  Envy is best friends with Lust.

Truth - The husband of Faith, the father of Hope, and the younger brother of Love.  Truth is the uncle of Kindness.  Truth is a soldier and a warrior.  He gets revenge on Hatred for ****** Love.  

D.E.A.T.H. - A terrorist organization created and operated by Hatred.  D.E.A.T.H. stands for Darkness Engulfing All Things Holy.

Knowledge - The younger brother of Understanding and Wisdom.

Understanding - The brother of Wisdom and Knowledge.  Understanding is a teacher.  Understanding has a romantic interest in Mercy.

Wisdom - The oldest brother of Knowledge and Understanding.  Wisdom is the elected commander of all the virtues.

Sloth - The wife of Gluttony and the mother of Ignorance.

Gluttony - The husband of Sloth and the father of Ignorance.

Ignorance - The son of Sloth and Gluttony.

S.O.U.L. - A humanitarian organization created and operated by Love.  S.O.U.L. stands for Sharing Our Undying Love.

Grace - She's a singer, entertainer, and performer.

Deceit - Deceit is a master of disguise.  It is a male and a female.  Deceit is a member of D.E.A.T.H.  

Misery - An island off the coast of Darkness.

I lap up your wetness
like a kitten its milk.
I wash my face with your moisture,
you wiggle and moan.

You swallow me whole,
like some carny performer.
Emptied, I sigh,
You lick your lips and grin.

He was engrossed in his performance
in the enthralled silence of the audience
catching the subtlest notes from the instrument
as his supple fingers played with the strings
erupting into the finest blend of ragas
freeing the souls of all the stress
converging his heart into his music
eyes closed as in a transcendental state.

But I could not concentrate.

The face behind the beard and the unkempt hair
was familiar.

From a long distant day
I remember those fingers performed in a different way.

The afternoon I came back from school
and mom told me her monies were missing
and he was the only visitor to her room
waiting in the pretext of meeting me
but after a while leaving hurriedly.

He confessed and the money was recovered
but never again the breached trust.

The audience rose in ovation fingers clapping
my own frigid in remembrance
of another performance.

He presents what you see
with impeccable finesse.
He hides everything else behind the curtains.
Heavily veiled by his smiles...
Cleverly masked behind his script.

He stands elevated, taking his stage.
From his vantage he sees all.
He allows his facade to bask in the light...
Whilst keeping his back in the shadow.

He's renowned.
By the light that kills the dark.
He's addicted to the nightly ovations,
cascading cheers and gleaming reviews.

But every show has an end.
Come every dawn, he wakes to the reality
that tolls at his door.
He's owned and he knows it...
Too well,
by the stage he built
and the drama he wrote and casted.

Fukiko had woken before her accustomed time. She was alone and would have prefered to sleep, and sleep on until Narumi had lit the brazier in her room and brought tea. But she had woken, and was aware that outside the world had changed. The world, her world of Yukiguni, where the mulberry fibres for paper-making were laid out in the snow-bleached fields. Her world where men from the cities sought the kind of woman she was, a woman uncultured in the ways of geisha, but possessing a freedom no city-bred geisha could possess. She had been schooled by an aunt, was accomplished as a performer on the samisen and though her voice was thin, it held a quality of understanding, it had a fine texture, though thin. And yes, this morning a change had come over the world outside her small house that looked over Hikachi Lake, that looked towards the southern flank of the Central Mountains where during the previous day and night the snows from across the seas had fallen on the landscape. She imagined the roofs of the monastery across the lake were heavily white, and as she sought the image in her mind’s eye so the large brass bell of the temple sounded, no, it throbbed across what she knew would now be hard-frozen water.

I am floating she thought, like the snowflakes I glimpsed in the reflected lamplight when last night I opened the shutters for a moment before bed, before sleep and descent into my dreams. For days now she had been dreaming like never before. She seemed to enter a dreamstate; she would then wake purposefully; she would then fall instantly into quite a different world; over and over this seemed to happen until she found herself wondering if she was dreaming within a dream; she would become aroused, her skin glowing with the ministrations of hidden hands and fingers; she would feel that presence on her upper thighs, a kind of perspiration born of that ****** sensation that, when awake, would sometimes steel upon her.

The coming of the deep snows before spring was always a delight, an excitement carried her from childhood. The way its coming turned daily life upside down. She would enjoy choosing her very warmest garments, the bringing together of layers, her rabbit-skin mantle perhaps, a bright warm scarf over her hair, which she would not today ‘put up’ but allow to flow comfortably next to and down her back, then the hood only if the snow and the wind persisted. She could tell from the warmth of her bed that this was not so, that outside there was a stillness. Even the birds were subdued. Only the brass bell broke the stillness born of this deep snow of spring.

She heard Narumi rise, heard her **** in her chamber ***, heard her roll her bedding away, heard her bring the stove into life and fill her mistress’ brazier with the few precious coals brought across the mountains. There would be tea soon, and this young girl, appointed by her aunt to her charge, would appear to kneel beside Fukiko and give the morning blessing her mother had given Narumi since infancy. Then, she would say, ‘Madam, the snow is deep this morning. We are bound in snow today. Our path has disappeared.’ Still a child’s voice, and still a child at thirteen winters, such a slight girl. And she would retire to the warmth of the kitchen and Fukiko’s cat who was not allowed into her mistress’ presence unless requested.

Fukiko could feel the warmth from the brazier. It was as comforting as the thought of the silent snowscape outside. Gathering her cloak around her, kneeling on the covers of her bed, she held the bowl of tea in her hands, letting its warmth caress her fingers. Standing up, she stroked herself as though to bring her body awake - her flanks, the front of her thighs, her stomach, her slight *******, the long curve of her bottom and then the back of her thighs, her right hand stroking her left arm, her left arm stroking her right arm from shoulder to fingers. She was awake, and placing her feet on the cold matting found her night cloak of deepest blue with the ornamental sash of red and white. She would open the shutter and gaze out into this fresh world of snow and light.

It seemed quite miraculous that a covering of snow could so change this view across the lake to the monastery and its attendant village and then to the mountains beyond. She had once seen a woodcut of this scene, in snow, and had been mesmerised by what it revealed. Despite her status, her profession, such as it was, any ambition she might have harboured to dwell in a city, evaporated at this vista, this snow country scene. It was as though she was living in a story book where she could imagine herself as a concubine of some favoured lord, even better, a princess groomed for a fine marriage, a marriage she knew she would be unlikely to experience. There was one, a land-owner beyond Huchin whose business brought him past her domain, who, widowed and childless, had been advised to seek her presence. And she had been charmed by his shyness, his lack of experience with such as the woman she was, or thought she had to be. And it was often that she would find herself thinking of his presence, and imagining her body melting to his careful touch.

Suddenly, out on the lake figures moved. Was the hard frost of the last week really able to sustain figures on the ice? The brothers from the monastery were tentatively moving too and fro, they were suketo, skating. She would summon Narumi. Her girl should see this sight. The brothers in their crimson robes moving to and fro across the ice, their robes flowing. ‘Narumi’, Fukiko said, ‘a sight so rare. Come and look, the monks are skating.’

So Fukiko and Narumi opened wide the shutters and let in the whole landscape, the lake, the monastery, the snow-roofed village, the mountains beyond into the room. The snowlight dazzled, the hard cold air rushed into the warm room filling its very corners with an enervating freshness. Narumi knelt beside the brazier in her best purple cloak, her hair already pinned for the day, her eyes wide at the sight of these figures dancing with movement on the ice. Although cold, Fukiko would not pull herself away from this play of forms, this wholly pleasurable sight. Just below her window her camellia bushes were in bud, almost budding, their dark redness, bloodlike, enhanced by the vivid snow white. And then the bamboo, snow on the bamboo, as though carefully layered on the fragile stems and branches. This morning no wind and a period of snow falling that had laid flake upon flake upon flake giving the bamboo a wholly different form and weight and body. Its stems bent as though in supplication, as though in prayer to bless the landscape of this snow country.

One must bend
In the floating world -
Snow on bamboo

Kaga no Chivo (1701-55)

Written on 11/20/2017

That awkward moment when someone flirts with you on a dating app and says "I like that you look masculine."

You see,
I never saw masculinity as a part of me.

My identity was always flamboyant,
wearing pink shirts and sashes,
crop tops with styling gelled eyelashes,
sparkling headbands and dazzling bandannas,
snapback hats featuring giant bananas,
I dressed with the raging flamboyance of flamingos!
Sporting a certain type of femininity that only a gay man knows.

All the trimming and cutting, and shaving and nairing,
for hours,
as time and body hair intertwined in the showers,
washed masculinity off my body down the drain,
Experienced electrolysis burns, but the pain
had infected my thoughts,
like each hair is unnatural.  

Purge it all,
Scorch and torch it all,
Leave nothing at all!
No trace
of evolution's flawed attempt to grace
me with an adaptive advantage to take on the world's harsh climate.  
I admit,
this hair entangles me and strangles me,
it also oozes out of me like pimples from a pore,
a ***** to testosterone,
poor me - a victim of nature's masculinity.
What a hairy situation I've gotten myself in.

--

Femininity.
Its bestowed upon me by society.
When I sashay or say hey gurl hey,
society recognizes these things as girly and gay,
not a very masculine way to walk or talk.  

Stereotypes about *** and gender are so easily manipulated.
Like a circus performer on the tight rope,
the suspense keeps people wondering where will I fall?

But hold me under a microscope and you will see it all,
a million molecules that makeup my femininity.
I wear skinny jeans and tank tops,
then get complimented on them by dude bros,
like yo that's tight- where'd you get it boss?

I bought it in the girl's section at Ross.

My toe nails painted and displayed for public view,
flip flops emboldened with matching turquoise hues,
Femininity is worn on me like a fabulous armor plate.

--

Fast forward to a fateful date during No-Shave November.
I remember,
growing out my ****** hair for the very first time,
I wore it like a mask,
portraying a fictional character who was masc-uline.
Bathing in manliness at this masquerade.
It was through this charade,
that I grew
... temporary happiness for me from all of you.

The compliments they poured in.
My once smooth canvas of a face,
waiting to be crafted into the Mona Lisa,
had been turned into an artistic masterpiece,
'Gay Man with Amnesia',
of who he used to be.
A painting of someone society wanted,
someone whose masculinity was outwardly flaunted.
But inside, I felt taunted,
each time they complimented
me and my newfound masculinity.

--

Then, it happened on Grindr,
a gay dating app.
This masculine mishap.

A stranger's message read, "I like that you look masculine."
It sounded even stranger in my head.
Their profile description read,

"Masc 4 Masc
Masculine man seeking other masculine men to hangout with."

That's when I felt it.
My mask had made me masc.

This particularly manic morning brought me to ask
myself in the bathroom mirror,
"Who the hell am I looking at?"

In sheer terror, I teared-up,
scanned the portrait of 'Gay Man with Amnesia',
and then decided to tear it up!

I grabbed my electric razor,
grum grum grummm
as these blades grazed my face and chin,
I was offered sweet, soft, porcelain skin - my absolution.

pause

heh heh
When I came to and snapped out of the amnesia,
eager to see results of this restorative procedure,
the mirror was fogged with steam and slop.

I tried logging in to my laptop's webcam,  
for naught.  
The ****** recognition feature -- didn't recognize me
... but finally, I did.

Once again, I see the man behind the masc-ulinity.

Today we shall have the naming of parts. How the opening of that poem by Henry Reed caught his present thoughts; that banal naming of parts of a soldier’s rifle set against the delicate colours and textures of the gardens outside the lecture room. *Japonica glistening like coral  . . . branches holding their silent eloquent gestures . . . bees fumbling the flowers. It was the wrong season for this so affecting poem – the spring was not being eased as here, in quite a different garden, summer was easing itself out towards autumn, but it caught him, as a poem sometimes would.

He had taken a detour through the gardens to the studio where in half an hour his students would gather. He intended to name the very parts of rhythm and help them become aware of their personal knowledge and relationship with this most fundamental of musical elements, the most connected with the body.

He had arranged to have a percussionist in on the class, a player he admired (he had to admit) for the way this musician had dealt with a once-witnessed on-stage accident that he’d brought it into his poem sequence Lemon on Pewter. They had been in Cambridge to celebrate her birthday and just off the train had hurried their way through the bicycled streets to the college where he had once taught, and to a lunchtime concert in a theatre where he had so often performed himself.

Smash! the percussionist wipes his hands and grabs another bottle before the music escapes checking his fingers for cuts and kicking the broken glass from his feet It was a brilliant though unplanned moment we all agreed and will remember this concert always for that particular accidental smile-inducing sharp intake of breath moment when with a Fanta bottle in each hand there was a joyful hit and scrape guiro-like on the serrated edges a no-holes barred full-on sounding out of glass on glass and you just loved it when he drank the juice and fluting blew across the bottle’s mouth

And having thought himself back to those twenty-four hours in Cambridge the delights of the morning garden aflame with colour and texture were as nothing beside his vivid memory of that so precious time with her. The images and the very physical moments of that interval away and together flooded over him, and he had to stop to close his eyes because the images and moments were so very real and he was trembling . . . what was it about their love that kept doing this to him? Just this morning he had sat on the edge of his bed, and in the still darkness his imagination seemed to bring her to him, the warmth and scent of her as she slept face down into a pillow, the touch of her hair in his face as he would bend over her to kiss her ear and move his hand across the contours of her body, but without touching, a kind of air-lovers movement, a kiss of no-touch. But today, he reminded himself, we have the naming of parts . . .

He was going to tackle not just rhythm but the role of percussion. There was a week’s work here. He had just one day. And the students had one day to create a short ‘poem for percussion’ to be performed and recorded at the end of the afternoon class. In his own music he considered the element of percussion as an ever-present challenge. He had only met it by adopting a very particular strategy. He regarded its presence in a score as a kind of continuo element and thus giving the player some freedom in the choice of instruments and execution. He wanted percussion to be ‘a part’ of equal stature with the rest of the musical texture and not a series of disparate accents, emphases and colours. In other words rhythm itself was his first consideration, and all the rest followed. He thought with amusement of his son playing Vaughan-Williams The Lark Ascending and the single stroke of a triangle that constituted his percussion part. For him, so few composers could ‘do it’ with percussion. He had assembled for today a booklet of extracts of those who could: Stravinsky’s Soldier’s Tale (inevitably), Berio’s Cummings songs, George Perle’s Sextet, Living Toys by Tom Ades, his own Flights for violin and percussionist. He felt diffident about the latter, but he had the video of those gliders and he’d play the second movement What is the Colour of the Wind?

In the studio the percussionist and a group of student helpers were assembling the ‘kits’ they’d agreed on. The loose-limbed movements of such players always fascinated him. It was as though whatever they might be doing they were still playing – driving a car? He suddenly thought he might not take a lift from a percussionist.

On the grand piano there was, thankfully, a large pile of the special manuscript paper he favoured when writing for percussion, an A3 sheet with wider stave lines. Standing at the piano he pulled a sheet from the pile and he got out his pen. He wrote on the shiny black lid with a fluency that surprised him: a toccata-like passage based on the binary rhythms he intended to introduce to his class. He’d thought about making this piece whilst lying in bed the previous night, before sleep had taken him into a series of comforting dreams. He knew he must be careful to avoid any awkward crossings of sticks.

The music was devoid of any accents or dynamics, indeed any performance instructions. It was solely rhythm. He then composed a passage that had no rhythm, only performance instructions, dynamics, articulations such as tremolo and trills and a play of accents, but no rhythmic symbols. He then went to the photocopier in the corridor and made a batch of copies of both scores. As the machine whirred away he thought he might call her before his class began, just to hear her soft voice say ‘hello’ in that dear way she so often said it, the way that seem to melt him, and had been his undoing . . .

When his class had assembled (and the percussionist and his students had disappeared pro tem) he began immediately, and without any formal introduction, to write the first four 4-bit binary rhythms on the chalkboard, and asked them to complete it. This mystified a few but most got the idea (and by now there was a generous sharing between members of the class), so soon each student had the sixteen rhythms in front of them.

‘Label these rhythms with symbols a to p’, he said, ‘and then write out the letters of your full name. If there’s a letter there that goes beyond p create another list from q to z. You can now generate a rhythmic sequence using what mathematicians call a function-machine. Nigel would be:

x x = x     x = = =      = x x =      = x x x      x = x x

Write your rhythm out and then score it for 4 drums – two congas, two bongos.’

His notion was always to keep his class relentlessly occupied. If a student finished a task ahead of others he or she would find further instructions had appeared on the flip chart board.  Audition –in your head - these rhythms at high speed, at a really quick tempo. Now slow them right down. Experiment with shifting tempos, download a metronome app on your smart phone, score the rhythms for three clapping performers, and so on.

And soon it was performance time and the difficulties and awkwardness of the following day were forgotten as nearly everyone made it out front to perform their binary rhythmic pieces, and perform them with much laughter, but with flair and élan also. The room rang with the clapping of hands.

The percussionist appeared and after a brief introduction – in which the Fanta bottle incident was mentioned - composer and performer played together *****’s Clapping Music before a welcome break was taken.

While having a heart to heart one night,
My friend informs me that as a straight person, I will never understand what it's like to be closeted.

That there is a reason people understand the term "gay suicide" without context,
That love looked like moth wings that would flutter away or wither at touch,
That the secrets and shame are like locks on the door from the outside and you realize that there is no one out there with a key.

That same friend once asked me if I've ever thought about joining a nudist colony.
She said that the comfort I find in my own skin and my ability to separate naked bodies from beds was admirable.
I told her, there was a reason I never read her my poetry.
I told her, I don't wear make up at Wal-Mart.
That I turn off the lights but still let him love me.
I read to estranged ears.
That bareness was something I would never grow into.

"Darling!" I told her, "there are some things you just aren't meant to see."
I have been truth-or-dared to strip naked, and its not as easy as you might believe.
There is a little something that sits at the back of my mind I like to call "modesty."

Modesty can be defined as the quality or state of being unassuming or limited in the estimation of one's abilities.
"Darling," I wanted to tell her, "You have no idea what these hands are capable of."

There was a time I was proud of that.
They were small and feeble, but holding a blade firm they became strong.
They became what I needed.
My skin became less of a barrier and more of a costume. When I slipped it on, I became original.
I became identified, if only to myself.
The scabs were a serial number the First World girl who was a little too white,
a little too straight,
and a little too doubtful could call her own.

But I was a little too weak,
and a little too lonely
and had a little too much time on my hands to wrap around the knife.

They became my drug. I became a liar.

My skin became an apology for everything I thought you should blame me for.

There was a time I would have done anything to show you, but I have always been a performer.
No one ever asked to see the curtains close.  

My friend told me that I would never understand what it's like to be closeted.
That secrets and shame are like locks on the door from the outside and you realize that there is no one out there with a key.
The tally of every moment I'm locked in is a timeline of my mistakes, visible on my own skin.
There are some things you just aren't meant to see.

(added) Prologue: "we'll get the baron, i swear. the ratings will go through the roof..." nick spoke nervously into the phone he held in his good hand. the other rested at his side, burned beyond use. one of the commandos whispered in his ear. "sir, we have his location.... yes... yes sir..." he hung up the phone and turned to the commando, "scramble the troops, we're going hunting..."


"N-no... not this again..."  Baronyx muttered in his sleep. "I wont... i wont do it..." it was the same nightmare that had plagued him for years. he was what the Two-legs called an Exotic, one of the few hundred dragons left in the world, and a showpeice for the high paying two-legs.
Baronyx had been captured once and forced into slavery as a circus act and performer for many years before he escaped and burned an entire city with his fiery wrath, killing some ten thousand two-legs in his path and sending a message, "don't cage a dragon..." ever since he had been plagued with nightmares of his experiences while enslaved. "stop... No!" he ****** awake and roared in fear. the full moon's light shone on his sapphire scales and temporarily blinded him until his green slit-eyes adjusted. his mate, a green scaled dragoness named Lyra licked his cheek and put a comforting claw around on his shoulder, "its the dreams again, isnt it ***?" Baronyx nodded and stared outside of their cave den.
He glanced over his shoulder at his daughter, Tali, her young yellow scales getting a tinge of green. Baronyx sighed and said, "she's growing so fast... she'll have your scales..."
Lyra looked as well, "and she'll have your eyes, baron." they watched their child sleep a moment longer before Baronyx stood and stepped outside the den. "i'll be right back." lyra nodded and lay back down with her eyes closed. he spread his wings and with a powerful downstroke took flight. Baronyx closed his eyes and glided into the wind currents and to the cliffside where he went to clear his mind and sort out his thoughts. his claws clicked across the hard rock as he landed and tapped rhythmically as he walked to the edge of the cliff and hung his claws off the side. a wild wolf howled in the distance somewhere behind him. something in the air was different tonight and Baronyx felt uneasy. he lay his head down and snoozed for a while, oblivious of what was happening at his den.
- - -
Tali screamed as
Two-legs with metal-spitters swarmed the den and threw heavy nets over her and her mother. "ma! ma! whats going on?!"
"tali! just stay calm.. just stay calm." Lyra roared in protest as the two legs brought lightning-sticks and began prodding at them. "don't you dare touch my daughter you *******!" she shouted even though she knew they wouldnt understand her. to her surprise though, one two leg stepped forward and said, "we won't touch you or your daughter if you tell us where the Baron is."
"i'll never tell you, monster."
the white man chuckled, "from my point of view, you're the monster. and you'll be a wonderful addition to the show..."
- - -
Baronyx heard tali's scream echo In the dark forest surrounding the cliffside. "No!" his roar resonated farther than tali's scream.
at the den a few moments before, the two-legs had caged Tali and Lyra and had set about stabbing at lyra with the shock-prods hoping to draw Baronyx back to the cave. Lyra kept her cries quiet and had refused to satisfy their wishes. the two-leg in charge snarled. "Enough... last chance, dragon. Tell me where he is!"
lyra growled at him, "i'll tell you nothing, worm."
"fine, suit yourself." the man turned his back to her. "lets see if you're daughter has the same resolve, shall we?"
"no! don't touch her!"
"i'm afraid its quite too late for that, dragon."
"tali i'm sorry!"
he turned to Tali and jabbed her in the side with a shock ****. tali groaned and gritted her teeth but did not scream for the man.
she growled at him said, "that tickled." tali grinned at the man with her sharp fangs fully exposed.
the man glared for a moment and then smiled cruelly.
"temporary pain doesnt have an effect on you... maybe something more... permenant will bring him to me. bring the iron!"
two-legs carried a white hot brand in the shape of a greek Omega. the man pointed to tali and said, "on her throat. make it burn."
more two-legs had muzzled lyra to keep her from screaming. the iron cut into tali's scales and burned into the flesh underneath, forcing tali to scream as loud as she could, even after the iron had been taken away. she collapsed on the ground and the tears spilled over her eyes as she continued to scream.
they heard a roar passing over them all as Baronyx rushed back to the den.
"well done, everyone. the prize is near. get your guns ready but DO NOT FIRE!"
* *
baronyx flew faster than he ever had before. he growled  as he swooped down toward his den and saw the two-legs. he screeched in protest as cables wrapped around his wings and limbs. forcing him hard into the ground. "Nick you *******!"
the white man grinned, "so we finally meet
Again, baron. and you have a nice little family i can use to my advantage now."
baronyx looked at tali and Lyra and loosed a mournful moan deep in his throat. "what do you want, nick?"
the man stepped forward and replied, "i want you, back in my show, just like old times. or i'll torture your mate AND this lovely little child of yours. sound like a deal?"
baronyx shut his eyes and nodded as a tear trailed down his cheek. "just know... when i get out, everything will burn... just like old times..."
(add on 1)
The white man and the other two-legs shackled Baronyx and his family with heavy chains and electric collars that would shock them randomly. they were put on a train car headed east and the collars were taken off. Baronyx immediately examined Tali's neck, the brand already scarring over in a whitish pink Omega. tali's voice was hoarse and tears came to her eyes. she buried her head into her father's chest. "i'm so sorry tali, lyra... this is my fault.." the family embraced as they knew there would likely be very little contact with each other after the train stopped.
the train traveled a little while longer and the family shakily said  their goodbyes as the air brakes hissed violently. the doors shrieked open and they were met by Nick. immediately. baronyx pounced on top of him and roared. they stared eye to eye for a moment before they heard the clicking of the two-legs metal spitters. baronyx kept his eyes on Nick and said quietly, "touch her again... touch EITHER of them... and
I swear, no amount of metal spitters or electricity will stop me from hunting you down and tearing off your head."
as baronyx stepped back, nick stood up and replied, "i won't harm either of them, hell, i'll give them whatever they want, as long as you do as you are told, Baronyx."
baronyx thought this over and after a few moments said, "i have one more condition, i want full access to them. whenever i choose."
nick chuckled a bit, "we'll see... we'll see... it all depends on how you perform."
baronyx nodded. "then lets get this over with..." the white man beckoned some two-legs to lead Tali and Lyra to the cages inside the massive pavilion that stood before them. two of the men brought the brand again and put the Omega on Baronyx's throat much like they had done with tali. he gritted his teeth and let the tears come but did not cry out or roar. when the pain had subsided, he asked nick, "when do i start?"
nick looked up at him with a sinister twinkle in his eyes, "right now."
*
Nick and a handful of two-legs escorted baronyx back onto the train, but not the same traincar. this one was blue and had ornate gold lettering on each side. once baronyx was inside, a string of lights came on and he saw his old armor plates each polished and the dents pounded out. he took his helm and stared into his reflection.  "i swore i'd never touch this stuff again..."
an intercom system beeped above him and nick's voice filled the car. "Baron, you have five minutes to suit up. the game starts as soon as we arrive."
baronyx sighed and donned the cold armor one peice at a time. he looked into the mirror on the wall and turned away in disgust.
"for tali and lyra..." there were a few peices left, the ones he never wanted to see again, they were sharp talons that fit over his claws. in the show, he had to use these to **** his opponent. nick's voice came over the intercom again, "arriving at the arena now, the press is fired up for your return, baron. DON'T disappoint them."
Baronyx growled and said a silent prayer for his family. the train screeched to a halt and the door opened. baronyx stepped out onto a black carpet and was assaulted by blinding camera flashes and the deafening roar of the crowding two-legs. over the crowd, an announcer shouted, "Its the Baron! he's back and looks better than ever!"
baronyx kept walking until nick stopped him for the game briefing. "you'll be going up against a group of wyverns, so you should have no problem killing them." the wyverns far outnumbered the dragons, wyverns being the dragons' slightly smaller, less intelligent cousins.
nick began walking away when baronyx asked, "what do they get if i win?"
nick turned, "they?"
baronyx bared his fangs. "my family. what do they get in return for my win?"
nick thought this over for a moment before replying, "they will eat, sleep, and live in their own hovel. and depending on your performance i'll let you stay with them."
baronyx growled, "then lets get this over with."
*
Baronyx was led to the arena doors and he waited patiently for his introduction and call to the game. he looked around at the all too familiar sights, the fight screens, the scoreboard, and the dim light that would signal his entry into the arena. it would be a few minutes before the match and in the meantime, he thought of all his old strategies and gameplans. "i wonder if tali and lyra will be watching..."
nick came out of the shadows and said, "remember, their future depends on what happens next."
the light turned green and the doors opened, spilling light into the room. when baronyx's eyes adjusted, he saw the all too familiar sight of the ****** arena, mangled corpses being dragged away from the last battle. "the baron! he'll be going up against seven wyverns from the northwest territories." baronyx roared as loud as he could as he stormed into the arena. the wyverns on the other side cowered for a moment before charging him. the first one lunged at him and was caught in his
Claws. baronyx looked into the wyverns eyes and saw the fear, the terror of a beast facing his own demise. "for them..." baronyx tore the wyvern's throat out with his claws and threw the body at the next assailant, bowling him over.
the next wyvern was impaled by baronyx's tail and tossed aside to bleed out on the ground while he set about killing the others in various other ways. when the bodies stopped twitching, baronyx's armor was coated in blood. the crowd was silent and he became worried. he looked to the trainer's balcony and spotted nick, who gave a subtle nod of approval. baronyx looked at the timer: one minute seventeen seconds. it was a new record, the shortest match in history. the crowd roared and applauded long after he was led out of the arena. "an amazing, record setting performance by the returning champion, the Baron!"
baronyx was met by the press' cameras outside the arena. Nick's two-legs stripped the ****** armor and allowed him some room to move around.
The camera flashes continued to blind baronyx but his mind was elsewhere. nick finally showed up to answer the press's questions, while baronyx glared at the group of reporters. after an hour of questions and his agitation reached its breaking point, baronyx growled at the reporters, silencing them. when they didn't move, he bared his fangs and roared, forcing them to make hasty retreats and fleeing the conference. once they were gone, nick turned to baronyx and sighed, "thanks. i thought they'd never leave..."
baronyx stared down at him. "we had a deal."
"so we did. and for that breathtaking performance, you will stay with your family in their hovel."
baronyx started walking towards the train, "then i have to go."
*

The man in galoshes with the world on his back,
strolls along the broken track.
Weather beaten,
Fighting the rain.
It's lashing him.
He's tied to the kerb.
Anchored only by the weighty boots on his feet.

He's out there fair weather or foul.
Desperate to keep his public happy,
With a timely siren,
the arrival of an infants birth.
He is the performer up the garden path.
At least the rain's outside again.
So is he poor sod.
The postman, nearly demi-god,
or nearly dead.
He's tramping through the rain and the snow.
He had to let you know,
you know.
The latest news and hot reviews,
a little bit of useless information.
There's nothing better than a letter,
unless it's from the revenue.

Our fair weather friend he has so many uses.
A warrior, he fights wild dogs.
He's churning up the grass,
his only means of escape.
He's wearing an orange hat,
it's curled up at the edges.
He uses it to fight the rain.
The orange hat so luminous,
he's looking rather fruity.
He's forlorn and in pieces,
because he's getting washed away,
He has one every morning in his place,
each and every day.
Stacks and stacks of bits of paper,
Life and death wrapped up in his sack.
(C) Livvi

A word performer Yes I am,
as words I write sending no spam.
I bind with thee and do not tarry,
words I string as if to marry.

I stand on balcony of page,
and inside light I walk as sage.
To touch with words that dance in mind.
To make readers feel yes divine.

And if perchance my words give sight,
I will cheer gently with all night.
For then I’ll know my jobs complete.
Perhaps someday we all shall meet.

StarBG © 2017

Hurricane fighter
Life and death celebrator, Spicy food eater
Street performer and Harborer of ships
Weather-beaten, resilient, colorful
The City that Care Forgot

They tell me you are beaten, *****, and old, and I acknowledge this, having seen your streets and limping buildings, water-marked and sagging
They tell me you are cruel and dark, and I agree, I've seen the voodoo shops, and the papers speaking of crimes
They tell me you are raucous and crowded, and I respond, "Yes, I know. I have walked through her streets and through the ear shattering sound"

And having said these things, I look again to those who ridicule my home, my city and tell them:
I dare you to bring me news of another place that's been beat down, and yet time after time rises again, singing even in death and anguish, wearing the dingy but bright colors of life

Laughing in the face of defeat, walking proud, and even as its guts tear each other apart, she sets her jaw and keeps moving forward
Fierce as a gator grappling with a hunter, clever and bright as a bird
Battered,
Falling,
Flying,
Soaring,
Hurting, healing, grinning
Beneath the ******, dirt smeared face, she smiles with a brilliant grin
Beneath the harsh reality of injuries and setbacks, fire dances in her heart and soul
Dancing even as a wizened soldier knowledgeable in pain but carefree would
Twisting and spinning over and around obstacles, taking the occasional hit, laughing in the ***** air, lifeblood of the city coursing through her veins
Dancing!
Laughing the weather-beaten, resilient, colorful laugh of Youth. Proud to be a Hurricane fighter
Life and death celebrator, Spicy food eater Street performer, Harborer of ships,
The City that Care Forgot

Memorized by a vacant lot. At the edge of an abyss. Darkness is solitude. Solitude for a crowded my mind. There is no break for a mind. Constantly crunching away at what is reality. The concept of nothingness makes the mind clock overtime. Are we creatures of logical limitless. Or finite beings who cant grasp that nothing is infinite. We are here to observe. To learn. To yearn. In search of a purpose. In search of anything that keeps us from thinking we are worthless. We are creators. We are makers. We are breakers. We are fakers. We are individuals. We are imitators. I am you and you are me. One in the same. On an even plane.. on a round earth. We are haters. We are lovers. We are creatures of similarity. We are creatures of contrast. Idiosyncratic nuances that make us a so far apart but so alike. The performer with a mic. The crazy man on a soap box. The angry in jail. The stoners in a hotbox. The gated community members. And the thieves breaking pad locks. The rich and the poor. The nun and the *****. The killer and the doctor. The lover and the boxer. All so far apart yet always united with a common theme. One in the same. He is her and she is him. Cell by cell. Limb by limb. United until every atom that we were connected through is torn away into nothingness. Vacant lots at the edge of an abyss.

I realized I was definitely
Capable of loving more than one person
As I stood ****** in a bar
Positioned at a table between
My partner and my ex-fiance
My ex and I had gotten food beforehand
My first time seeing them in a year and a half
And I swore to everyone that it wasn't gay
I believed it too for awhile
Up until they said they didn't want kids
Which was part of my own logic used
To explain our incompatibility
Hearing their stories made my heart ache
All of the things I'd missed in their life
All the things they missed in mine
Then that night at the bar
When a performer was called on stage
My ex mentioned that she was my favorite
A small fact I didn't think they'd remember
Yet it carried such a significant feeling
That left my heart heavy and fractured
And when my partner looked at me I felt guilty
They must be able to see it
To sense it
These residual feelings
That I swore were not there and were
Definitely not gay
And while lost in my mind
My ex looked at me and asked if I was ok
They could still see me
I wanted to run away
My mind kept screaming for an escape
And yet I also heard a whispered voice
Reminding me that this time with them
Would be the last quality time I'd have
Before we returned to being strangers
So I shouldn't waste it
Because as much as I crave their friendship
I know in my heart it'd never work
Friends would never be the word
It's always been and
Probably always would be
Something much more than that
So I'll let it go
I'll let myself mourn these feelings
Despite the dreadful pain of it all
Because we all deserve to be happy
And by giving up this ill-fated dream
I know one day I can be

I have two facts for you that exist in my mind -
1. I am normal
2. I do not 'feel' normal
I have never considered myself to be normal.
I knew i wasn't normal when at the age of eight after my Dad left my school hired a counsellor just for me,
and i wasn't normal how after then i was the only pupil to be from a single parent family.
I wasn't normal when just after this abandonment my body entered early puberty,
and so feeling weird didn't stay a feeling, it became a reality.
Picked on for things out of my control, i felt like a freak.
Even at the age of eight, every aspect of my identity was up for scrutiny.
I knew i wasn't normal when in secondary school i would purposely get detentions
to spend time with teachers, because the the turmoil of the school yard was a teenage no man's land.
The company of those my own age is something i will never understand.
I knew i wasn't normal when i would hesistate in conversation when someone asked me who i fancied in my class.
The name of a random boy rolled from my tongue in an attempt to not blow my cover.
I knew i wasn't normal when my tweets coming out as bi were passed around like breaking news.
When i tried to defend myself in the interrogations, teachers would sternly say to me -
'That's not appropriate to be talking about in school' like my sexuality was a hushed secret, even though the straight girls were never silenced.
I knew i wasn't normal when i had to say i was bi, when in fact this was a lie. A lie to help me pass, pass and hold on to some straight privilege.
At the age of sixteen i questionned my worth and value as a person, trying to blame myself for the treatment i was subjected to.
I knew i wasn't normal when i decided to place my emotional pain onto a physical space, then patching up the damage as a form of ironic self-care.
I left school for a college, desperately seeking freedom from the constraints of a Catholic school.
I never felt comfortable in sixth form, being there my mind felt like a spinning waltzer i was strapped to for two years.
At seventeen i knew i wasn't normal when i was prescribed the maximum dose of sertraline, then mirtazapine, venlafaxine, fluoxetine.
By this point in my life i was on a tally of maybe six counsellors and two CBT therapists.
I knew i wasn't normal when i started to blame myself for the therapy not being successful. Maybe i was just meant to be depressed.
Changing my thinking styles, emotional regulation, journalling my feelings and triggers, i knew exactly what i had to do.
I knew i wasn't normal when i clung onto certin things as comfort, like my adoration for florence and the machine.
I started to experiment, toying between wanting to fit in and wanting to be myself, painting bright eyeshadow on my lids as a vibrant mask to carry me through.
I knew i wasn't normal when i reached out to the local crisis team experiencing auditory hallicinations, hearing sounds only meant for my ears.
My emotional states are a product of my trauma, which is difficult to navigate as the world's greatest performer.
Maybe i was meant to face this internal torment, or until now i hadn't considered i could be neurodivergent.

I am not a poet,
Never intended to be one.
I am not a singer,
Nor can I sing swell.
I am not an actor,
As I cannot fake about anything.
I am not a painter,
As colors are all same precious to me.
I am not a dancer,
As I understand no rhythm.
I am not a performer,
As stage is not my world.
I do not really know what I am,
But I am definitely not something I don’t intend to be.
I am rather a person who fail at everything,
Yet passionately stand at feet,
Yearn to learn.
I am an ARTESS…
I rather master the art or die trying..
I am an ARTESS…
And all art is my Imagination within the living dream, I dream.
I am an ARTESS..
And I never intend to stop creating a masterpiece for the peace of my world.
I am nothing at all,
But I am everything.
I am a Dreamer,
My dreams that I imagine  are my art.
I thrive to make them true..

Interested in interesting things within your variety skill? Below a fresh plan. Make mosaics applying huge stained-glass items just like setting up a stained-glass windowpane, as opposed to utilizing smaller sections slice to the stagnant, normal models associated with pieces, rectangles, and also triangles. After following that regular practice for so extended, My partner and i grew uninterested in that plus wanted different things. We taken out my own mosaic-artist hat as well as worn my stained-glass-artist head wear for the wonderful modify connected with tempo. Determination number of stained-glass hangings, the item dawned about myself. You should incorporate mosaic skill by using stained-glass fine art? The very first element proved attractively, as good as expected, and that i location checked again considering that. Make understand how you actually, way too, can make all these amazing mosaics.

The initial crucial factor I personally mastered when producing mosaics coming from stained-glass shapes is to reduce the camp material for the specific measurements a regular ready-made open-back frame. That reduces the risk for forking over more the price of a custom shape. We wait for definitely the pastime keep to place their particular ready-made open-back casings available for sale regarding half value and so i usually fork out regarding $25 for any attractive figure, including the installing, paper backing, plus suspending electronics. One of the best dimensions are 18-inches by way of 24-inches. The favorite selection of base material is ordinary 1/8-inch hardboard, which you may get at your best hardware store. I usually get the blankets pre-cut to 2-feet by 4-feet around $5. Hence, for just a meager five us dollars, I have got adequate foundation material for two mosaics, which is superior in the event youe the eager performer on a tight budget. That imperative that you understand that 1/4-inch concerns because thick since you can enter the item installing thoroughly into a ready-made open-back figure. The base material is 1/8-inch thick as well as stained glass is all about 1/8-inch thick, that creates your finished piece regarding 1/4-inch thicker.

Gauge and after that cautiously along with correctly trim the actual hardboard for the actual measurements this open-back shape you plan to use. Let think you wish the actual 18-inch by way of 24-inch dimension. A saw means that you can help make better reductions as compared with wanting to guideline your circle saw physically. If your round saw is actually you could have, this can be achieved, you need to your time and efforts and also wear hurry your cut. Right here guidance. I discovered a new "refurbished" Skil saw on the internet this expense exclusively $80 together with shipping. Whenever it arrived, it checked in addition to operated for instance fresh. I managed to get an amazing $250 spotted after only $80. The trick is to browse on line for just a "refurbished" system as opposed to fresh. Right after calculating as well as observing your hardboard (determine 2 times and become correct), you should definitely format a observed edge to take on your cut-line therefore the resulting portion is just 18-inches by simply 24-inches. Put simply, add trim on the fishing line because the ensuing portion are going to be something such as 18.8-inches by way of Twenty three.8-10 inches tall, which is often they cant suit effectively within the framework. Just about every ready-made shape defined as 18-inches by way of 24-inches in which Internet explorer purchased have been in a curly hair connected with 18-inches simply by 24-inches. Now there not much place with regard to mistake whenever slicing the bottom content, thus determine double plus align this cutter correctly for the slice series. If your ensuing starting material is inside a head of hair with 18-inches through 24-inches, itl fit beautifully into the ready-made open-back figure.

As soon as your starting material is minimize towards the best dimensions, paint them white. Make the most of white colored roof paint primarily because that quite a bit less expensive than common divider coloration. I apply a pair of applications hence the dark-brown hardboard is vivid white. The particular whiter the base content, the actual richer a goblet will be once you hold fast the item towards the aboard. In the event you put on fresh paint the bottom fabric white, the particular wine glass can look unexciting and also dreary about the dark-brown panel.

Seeing that ones platform materials are all set, basically transport a person's stained-glass design towards the board. In case you have absolutely no attracting knowledge, locate a charming stained-glass style on the net or even on your favored activity retailer along with switch your sample to your bottom materials. You can find shift newspaper in your popular interest retail store at under $2 some sort of piece that will sufficient to fund the 18-inch through 24-inch basic product. The beauty with switch report is that you may put it to use more than once prior to it no excellent. For instance eked out up to in search of coach transfers (we.electronic., nine mosaics and stained-glass works) prior to newspaper do not relocated a searching for very well will start to see the lines plainly.

Determine and also cut (in addition to grind the edges when you have a new mill) a stained-glass parts such as you have been developing a stained-glass screen. That i work with really see-through or maybe solid a glass colours to make sure you can observe by it to check out the actual stick when stuck to the base material. For your variety, rather than joining this parts utilizing direct emerged or copper foil and also solder because you might using a stained-glass work, simply glue the actual parts set up over the style for your foundation product making use of simple white PVA fasten (age.h., Elmer Epoxy All or Weldbond), abandoning with regards to 1/16-inch space between pieces. Your spacing may differ as much as 1/8-inch, however wouldn head out just about any larger when compared with 1/8-inch space because I consider the broader space seems to be sloppy in comparison with thin spacing.

While each of the portions will be stuck in-place and also the adhesive features dry out for about 2 days, populate the particular places with your favourite cement colouring, as you'll if the variety had been through with the normal smaller bits of rectangle or maybe triangular shape styles. My partner and i mostly utilize medium-gray cement, yet this most recent preference is usually charcoal (dark) cement. The better mosaics I actually do by using dark colored grout, a lot more I love the idea. Cement coloration can make or break one more look of a person's mosaic, if youe in doubt in what cement color to use, your best bet is with medium-gray.

When the cement possesses dry right away, use the mosaic in your popular hobby retailer while theye which has a sales upon ready-made open-back structures. The best shop incorporates a 50% sales every other 7 days, therefore, if it a strong off few days, I delay weekly. Select various body styles and colors, as well as put them over your variety, one at a time. Have on be happy with the 1st body you get. Check with the particular worker which will figure he believes appears to be very best together with your variety. View which shape allows spotlight the colours in your variety. My partner and i generally consult some other clients inside the speedy space the things they imagine, as well as theye normally wanting to supply their opinion. Once you have the ideal shape, your clerk can install your current mosaic, make use of the newspaper support, and put in this draping components and also cord.

Isn't it about time a gorgeous mosaic to carry on your wall and also allow like a found. The particular neat benefit of it truly is that it common, not the same tedious variety style wee noticed for centuries. That fundamentally a new stained-glass screen set up on some sort of body together with grout while in the rooms rather than solder. You acquired notice that many times. Effectively, not really until finally the many variety music artists on the earth read through this write-up and plunge to this procedure!

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The slaves of their passion built this pyramid
But now there’s no sign of civilization
But ancient artifact have been found
The great migration to the underground

I look at the hieroglyphics on the wall
It’s an epic story oh I’ve seen it all
This place was taken by industry
Powered by fame and the illusion of money

They perverted the artist’s proud, heartfelt ways
Forced the true artists out for the ones who stayed
They create things that sound the same to us
Dropped their talent sold their souls to business

Lost their land to a cult of executives
So now they put out songs without messages
There puppets without any ideals
But it’s amazing for album sales

They were tempted by the glorious pop charts
Every follower goes by the formula
Produce garbage without connection
With no real emotion or expression

Their distorted auto tuned emptiness
All to be on TV and in magazines
Want exposure to be recognized
Their careers won’t fade they were never alive

This place *****, robbed lied to n even forgotten
The ones who stayed chained to the corporation
Not for the sake of art but for the money
Lack of feeling and effort plain to see

The slaves of their passion built this pyramid
But now there’s no sign of civilization
But ancient artifact have been found
The great migration to the underground

Can’t understand what their saying
Fan base is alienated
Rather be an icon than a star
The space between performer and audience grows more and more

So the true artists have left n disappeared
They’ve been out of sight for many many years
There somewhere where you don’t need to be in style
Might not find them at the left of the dial

No they don’t care about TV or radio
They just want to make something with all their soul
They are all now opposed to the fame
Crossing their fingers it won’t be the next craze

But today we still have the artifacts
Amazing and impressive sounds of the past
Better than the sell outs we all know
Talent, determination, originality flow

The slaves of their passion built this pyramid
But now there’s no sign of civilization
But ancient artifact have been found
The great migration to the underground

Someone poisoned the main stream
So now it’s the same to me
Did I read the hieroglyphics wrong I don’t know?
But it was the rise, fall and return of rock n roll

When I lived in the city, night, true night, never came.
The natural day gave way to the artificial day,
a day made possible by streetlight, by humming billboard.
With sick pinks and near-white greys, the early hours
hiccuped away. I slept or didn't. And this time in my life,
as any time in my life, is marked by a woman.

I won't say much about her. She was a performer,
and I've never been a steady fan of much of anything.
So when I kissed her the last time, I kissed her like it
was the last time, a kiss calibrated to say, "It's been."
When she kissed me the last time, she kissed me
like she didn't know it was the last time,
a kiss not so much a kiss as a mouth half-opened eternity,
where the sun didn't shine, nor was there night.

It is so measured that rising arpeggio, only to fall and rise again in quicker values, through the dominant seventh to the heartache moment of that minor ninth, a very apogee of dissonance. Then it goes higher still to the fifth, holding to that Phrygian harmony before returning to the tonic minor and a measured fall in the bass. This is a deliberate descent to the sub-mediant, and Bach’s touch of magic, the equivalence with the dominant minor ninth. But then he gives us hope: an extended and joyful play through sequences that rise and fall within each bar, to rest finally on the mediant’s echo of that opening, that measured rise and the quickening fall. We have hardly smiled with relief when Bach pulls us back into the insecurity of the dominant of the subdominant, that V of IV acting like a bridge to a long, long discourse in the dominant, a pedal E holding firmly to itself whilst rising arpeggios and falling decorations and sequences pull and pull through innocently related keys. Longer and longer play the rising passages until short motives of imitation interrupt, treble to bass, tenor to alto, until:  a first inversion arpeggio of the dominant seventh measures out the opening rhythm. This happens twice in short succession, as though holding the progress of the music to account. A questioning perhaps before a four-fold sequence asserts the dominant and a chorded caesura. There is a pregnant, though faintly resonant silence as Bach spins the dice of tonality and chooses the subdominant to bring the music towards a waiting Allemande. The music moves through a play of subdominant to dominant, minor to major, the mix of flattened fifth and flattened ninth. It is those intervals that determine Bach as the father of ambiguity in the 20C school of jazz harmony, Arpeggio then a falling scale, and repeat and repeat again, but moving ever higher by sequence. At last five chords – merely a shorthand for closure via the expectation of a right display of the performer’s improvisatory prowess. They prepare us reverently for the tonic minor before the stately Allemande leads the music into the elegant steps of its walking dance.