Red Clay and Bukowski are better artists than you

If you don’t have to make art, don’t.  This shit is difficult and the hourly pay sucks.

I remember when I was in college one of my poetry profs would regularly deliver the one two reality punch of encouraging students  to write as much as possible, right before stressing that you should only make it a career if you had no choice.   The ones that had no choice knew who they were.  We were the ones with that far off look in our eyes and wandering gaze, the ones who walked into class on clouds and talked sestinas and sentence structure till 3 in the morning clutching a jug of wine and chain smoking hand rolled cigarrettes.  We’re all broke now.

But of course, it’s what we do.  No regrets over here.  Especially when you run across a work that changes the way you look at life, offers a new vantage point, or gives you hope regarldless of the stupid shit that happens on the day to day.  There’s that old saying that “hearts speak to each other” and while I’m not ready to get on The Secret Metaphysical, I do believe that you can spot a true artist a mile away, someone who does it because they have to, cuz there is no other option.  Who, even if they were down to their last dime, dumpster diving they’d find a top to bang on, a pencil to write with or a song to sing.

Filed under: Art, Hip Hop, Music, Poetry , Art, Charles Bukowski, Hip Hop, Music, Poetry, Red Clay

Tehran poems, open sex and the freedom to move

A poem on Tehran’s streets:

This is one of the most moving things I’ve read in a minute.  It’s been making the internet rounds since last weekend went things in Iran went Ballistic.

While everyone I know has been stunned silent by the Neda video, to me this young woman’s words are just as moving.

In that respect, here are a few more pieces that take an unexpected sidedoor into the revolutionary ideology.  Nothing’s loud or obvious, just enough to challenge conceptions.

Read more. 

Filed under: Activism, Poetry

A poem a day…

Three Oddest Words

When I pronounce the word Future,
the first syllable already belongs to the past.

When I pronounce the word Silence,
I destroy it.

When I pronounce the word Nothing,
I make something no nonbeing can hold.

-Wislawa Szymborska

Yes, I admit it. I’m a poet, and there doesn’t seem to be a cure for it.

As long as I can remember it’s been there-an insane fascination with words, how they can mean and the hidden truths that poetry can uncover. And while I know this will piss some people off I still maintain that poetry is the purest form of writing.

Sonia Sanchez reads at the New Jersey Public Library

Regardless of the form, style or lack thereof, poetry can act as a vehicle for self and social observation in ways not commonly found in fiction, essays or journalism.

Poetry has the ability to mine deep down to the really dirty shit. Those ideas and feelings that might not make make it into everyday conversations, but make up the basis of who we are as individuals and as a culture. Idealistic? Probably. But doesn’t the best art spring from larger than life ideas?

So in addition to the tech, culture, and all the randoms posts that have and will be showing up in this space, I’ll be making a more conscious effort to include more poems, video and audio, poetry news, collaborations and criticism. I’ve started posting daily poems over on my Twitter feed and will be archiving them here. Here’s the first set. If you have any recommendations or suggestion shoot me a message.

Filed under: Poetry , Poems, Poetry

Ursula Rucker as alternative to bad poetry

So earlier this week, in a bit of creative hissy fit over all the marketing and journalism work I’ve been doing lately and the great but oh-so-business-focused Tweets I’ve been recieving, I decided to send out a poem a day, 5 days a week, to add a little verse into these heavy tech and business conversations.

So far there’s been this great piece from Martin Espada, a poem from Kevin Young’s brilliant “To Repel Ghosts” a collection insired by the paintings of Jean Michel Basquiat, and this spoken word/house anthem below, from 4Hero and Ursula Rucker.  This came out a while back and was one of the 1st pieces that I thought “got it right” when it came to blending beats and spoken word w/o sounding corny as hell.  

Filed under: Music, Poetry

New Poem: Fire Sciences

This is a poem that I’ve been working on for a while-an introduction to a new series.
The idea for “The Fuckers” series was taken from “The Vandals” poems written by Alan Michael Parker and ideally is a way to use poetry to talk about all the things that I usually don’t use poetry to talk about: politics, social conditions, race and the small group of insanely self absorbed but powerful people who “run” the world and who constantly fuck things up for the rest of us.
This series is my little way of fighting the fuckers, throwing rocks at tanks if you will, and hoping they explode.

Fire Sciences (prelude to The Fuckers)

1.
Some years ago I was watching a show on criminals and forensics and there was this one case where southern California arson investigators were convinced that this man had set his house on fire intentionally, to kill his wife and collect the insurance money. The prosecutor presented stacks of proof piled to the ceiling, enough evidence to lock the suspect away for five lifetimes, reports said.

The case was open and shut guilty until, quite out of the ordinary, the court got a call from a fire scientist. From Maryland I believe. This man’s job was to study fire and it’s patterns, the ways it was born and lived. He admitted he didn’t know much about arson, but he assured the court that he knew his flames, calling out the investigators and their proof.

“This is not arson, I’m sure.”

At first he was laughed at but the man persisted. “This is not arson, this is something else, I’m sure.” In the coming weeks the fire scientist drafted a report that proved without a shadow of a doubt: the cause of the fire was faulty wiring, not insurance money. And the subject was released.

While interviewing the scientist afterwards, the host wondered where the firemen went wrong. “Their job is to investigate fires and look for arson” said the scientist. “If you’re trained all your life to look for something, even when it’s not there, if you look long enough, you’ll see it.”

Filed under: Poetry , Poems, Poetry

11/18 Urban Real(i)ty Art and Poetry Show-Bring ya Asses!!!!

So I’m involved in this event so I have an admitted bias, but hell-it’s gonna be one fly ass event so I think it’s warranted, yes?

Prosody Castle and Otherside Media Present

Urban Real(i)ty

Filed under: Art, Galleries, Graffiti, Oakland, Poetry, Promotions, Street Art , Aimee Suzara, Chris Stroffolino, d. scot miller, Danny King, Gallery of Urban Art, Peter Spannagle, Prosody Castle