Even the Dew Is Porous - 2 Track EP

Here's a link to a free download of two new pieces, one of which is a bit of a remix of "An Elegant Explosion of Zen," a piece I composed earlier this year. Though it may be foolish to refer to these tracks as an EP, they do seem to keep good company. Hope you enjoy!

http://www.sendspace.com/file/8a8hv6

Playing On the Riddle of Speech

Words are not on but in and of the body

Words are not inside (the book) but twirling (from its pages)


Speech (as heard in whisper) is our mirror


We seek the quintessential ear

that frames sound's flight from earth,

a water-pocket in the throat that burns through weeping


Fear: the wet revolutions of a hiccup,

a purple light allowed entrance to the shallow

reposit of a tumbling river

"Hey Kool Thing..."

4AD records is offering a free download for the holidays. Just thought I'd post it here.

P.S. More of my own music coming soon...

A New Order....egad!

For the sake of inclusiveness (and not to mention publicity,) I've decided to change the modus operandi for this blog. Think of the new version as the tree from the 1940's children's book, Caps For Sale; its many facets will be like so many monkeys wearing brightly colored hats.

In this spirit of diversity, I present a link to download an eclectic mix for the holiday season; may it help you find your inner ape.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/rofm17

Here's a ramshackle track-list:

Harmonia and Eno - Sometimes In Autumn (Shackleton Remix)

Celer - Cantering In a Copper Dress

Oneohtrix Point Never - Betrayed In the Octagon

Byetone - Plastic Star

Klimek - Greed, Mutation, Betrayal

Alva Noto and Ryuichi Sakamoto - Broken Line 1

Zelionople - I Put All My Faith In Her

Radian - Subcolors

Mike Slott - Snowbirds

Ben Frost - Through the Rough of Your Mouth

in a bed, self beds

in a bed, self beds

self pulls

and tugs at listless sheets

while a fever

soft and lulling

coppers the space where all is green

the textured plain

where mischief ripens

teasing out the fur of angels

while smoothing every stocking-sheath

pulled over gnashing teeth

tonguing vacancy through velvet mesh

forming a face with absent tastes

recalling love that lust remembers

a green love frail and trembling

The Future Isn't Thirsty

Yet another piece related to my degree project. Hexagrams: #39 Obstruction ---> #33 Retreat

The Future Isn't Thirsty

This season, there is an over-abundunce of cacti in the foyer. Spiny and plastic, anchored beneath wood chips, they invoke a breed of nostalgia that is not compost-able. Rather, they are indestructible creatures from a B movie, able to haunt the most unexpected corners of the mundane; any moment one could lumber off the set and devour our morals. Given this threat, the guests are vulnerable; I have been hired to protect them.

To accurately play this role, they have outfitted me in the garb of Wyatt Erp, and I am drowning in my own sweat. Fifteen feet above the entrance, a giant banner reads "THE FUTURE ISN'T THIRSTY." Rolled vinyl emits a whooshing yelp as the custodial staff lowers a projection screen along the eastward wall. At stage left, key members of the press (those hired for the occasion,) flash posed pictures of W.P.C. (Water Purification Committee,) members addressing the historic importance of the event. Heard in its polyphonic grandeur, the room's chatter suggests a jungle-like diversity of sounds, or perhaps the condensed echo of rush-hour traffic were it rising to ground-level from beneath the Amazon, (the likes of which now festers with mutant-life.)

I pace deliberately around each rectangular garden, a sentinel lost to daydreams. Each garden is adorned with a mechanical fountain spring; their combined gurgle is enough to tease urine through a kidney stone. The event is meant to preserve the utopian tone of the last presidency, when it was assumed that we'd be able to save Africa.

Occasionally, my boredom becomes painful; it is then that I call upon my favorite trick. I perform a time-lapse of the moment, condensing the lobby's occupants with its furnishings, until all loses its trace of animation. Though the water's trickle continues to tickle my ear, each motor ceases to turn. The face of every guest remains awkwardly posed, exuding its own calculating glow. Guest's hands grasp outward at traces of frozen conversation, some clutching the dregs of a glass of champagne. These uptowners would be shriveled bodies were they lost in the desert. There, hands would reduce to bone, and with them, each plea in want of an oasis. For me, the oasis is real; the dream is not dead; the dream is something rooted in my marrow, the spongy profane core of my body's structure. The mystic in me screams: "The antidote for thirst still lingers in the air once every cell has putrefied, but the dream is nameless!" I realize that if I had to, I could wander through myself like this for days without end. With this, my desert-scape disappears, and the guests return to piddling about.

I wonder who built this theater. That honor must be held by the Bureau of Water Purification. I'm sure its solvent; the state subsidizes environmental projects, and these days, they're the only organization with enough money to do so.

I wonder if I really am cute in blue fatigues? Well, this CEO certainly thinks so. He's been ogling me for the past twenty minutes, his wife aghast at his lack of concern for her own fixation on the upcoming Purification Party gubernatorial candidate, a man who's tie sports its own second-rate globs of technicolor distraction. And these pricks think they're gonna save the world. I could really use a drink.

A Sense of Drifting and of Meeting

This piece emerged as the third experiment after having "built" the following hexagrams from The I Ching: #55 Development (Gradual Progress) and #44 Coming to Meet. My intention here was to provide a first person account of a fractured identity. I can't help but draw my own comparisons between Manuel Puig's Kiss of the Spider Woman, Kafka's Josephine the Singer and Genet's Our Lady of the Flowers; hence my bizarre dedication. Hope you enjoy :)

A Sense of Drifting and of Meeting

or an homage to Our Lady Josephine of the Flowers

A sense of drifting and of meeting. Is there something betwixt a lament and a song? I hear her calling, she who once gave shape to the operatic vowels, to the places without faces, without texture, without land. And what is between? Why can I not hear her tonal heights clearly as she soars far above the trees?

I wonder if she even remembers my face. Yet, it was just last night that I saw her out for a stroll through the park, chewing away at those florescent pink stubs of keratin - each finger bleeding as she bit. I'm not sure if she's starving herself or just nervous, but she's always at it, and her hair seems much thinner than it used to. Locks of straw. A tattered trench coat. Her aura aglow with an unkempt fragility.

And oh, how she loved nature! My skittish soprano was always complicit in a mighty chorus! She used to engage geese in the park and as she sang her lilt would synchronize with their aerial hi-jinx. Having mastered the birds she soon moved on to creating whirlpools in the pond. She progressed so quickly that she eventually learned to control the bringing of light, the darkening of the earth, and the great rushes of autumnal wind that wobble the empty rowboats. Every Sunday, she would again command the geese, though on this day she would revert to The Marriage of Figaro; this would promote a most erratic flight, scattering feathers every which way. Even the pigeons knew her voice conducted the meeting of ornithology and opera, and I have heard that if she could sing now, it might prompt the definitive merger of science and art.

Though never at rest, she would often sit with me over a latte and we would take turns sculpting and subsequently tonguing frothy beards from each other's face. We lived together for years, nursing wounded or aged creatures from the park back to good health, providing euthanasia when necessary. That's what I've been helping with lately at the SPCA. One day we brought a feral dog to the vet, who suggested that we keep her; she was a mangy, sweet little yapper. See, my singer and I used to sing together, but my voice is too rough since I had the operation. But she still sings day and night; she often keeps me awake. We were very close once. Sometimes I wake up thinking I'm still wrapped up in her dirty afghan, reeking of wet dog.

My therapist said I'll never really forget her; I'll just have to learn to love her like a sister. See sometimes the only way for me to see her is by going to the park and staring in the water so that I can dream a little about how I used to paint my nails and sing and walk my Chihuahua around the pond.

And when the wind picks up, I know it's her vibrato that causes this image to disintegrate, as the surface tension is disrupted by explosions of new rain on old water, and my newly bearded face struggles for congruence. And now the thunder scares the geese. And now the hotdog guy turns off his radio and Mozart's magic floats away.

t(w)o rise through metal

t(w)o rise through metal

Such a rascal! Come sit.

Careful now;

Mommy's breasts sore

One more story but

firsta

simple

lesson bout school

Sweetie,

friends ill never

speakforyou

baby,

one can never be two

(

)

butjustone

saccharine

lolly

may get baby

through

folly

Recollection relies on the sore spots

Channels their magnetism

Assembles crude tapestries of metal into protean orbs of reflection

No common center - starry - fractured

Somehow centripetal

Wait with alacrity. Form grows thin,

form grows thinner. Flesh arms

striated, aping red ridges

of clay and boulder

Wait here; whittle the memory,

whittle away your own thumb

He'd rather you mount from behind. A mountain

spring bisects conifer from deciduous

Leaves sweep away down-stream

What rises from flesh

has stench, yet is supple

as symbol when altered

through pain

Pesky Pronouns

Though I would have much preferred to not use any pronouns in this piece, I'm still pleased with its appearance and sound. There's always next time...

flowing over his lips, choices dance, flames

extend the rose-tinted orbit of each nipple

with a kiss, faith is wet, she

a vibratory chorus

unlocking new voices of revery

to hold what is lost

beneath breath

and release

what is scalding with water

like a faithful wish

lost underneath

a convex lid

each is held to a breast

bone circling

I once received a present

I once received a present.

Without the aid of sight, time became a pebble

-strewn river bed; a harmonious clatter along

the bottom of existence; the light held

the milky rhythm of sand, and in certain spots

where salmon wedged between the rocks,

their silver flapping located distance;

soon, the river led me to the sea. Shadows

slid miles of beach without weather; honey

-infused nonsense oozed from the waves;

patterns bore their weight against folds

of flesh. Borges walked along the shore, jaded,

making fists before rapping me upside the head

with his shoe while condemning the whole affair.

I still remember the granulation of his hands.

can you sense the swell of newness

can you sense the swell of newness

sloshing around within the chalice

of all elusive sameness

in that moment before waking

when ocean overwhelms the bay

a diaspora of fishing boats washed up along a coastal roadside

splintered worlds of boats and fish affixed like stone within its pavement

as a token, wheel-well glimmer

offers spinning mica

to those fish who cannot tease apart the light

for this highway is opaque,

just now, translucent

yet, no angler is upset while reeling in a ghost ship

as the sea eddies in an unrelenting mime

Of Urbanity

Yet another piece for my degree; to lead the exercise, I "generated" the 12th hexagram, Standstill. This "changed," as it were, to the 56th hexagram, Wandering.

Of Urbanity

Defenseless, thought

undoes the noun

as when a womb

absorbs the sound

of life's fluid separations

Seismic verve wrinkles each world

and every light's

wet ovular fruit,

broken, runs along a crease

in the mergers midst each city's ferment

When there is hope, the evening sky

itself appears delicious, while

abstracted doubts ooze from the ground:

the conflicted palette

of urbanity

A Bird of Feather

Here's a new piece, tentatively written for the degree project.

Birds of Feather

Engulfed by mist

language labels its history

-a colloquial organ in flight

-a familiar form

(yet how each longs for escape from blue feathers)

-a flying V

writhing within

the frost of verbiage;

-an orphaned lark

abandoning her wings

with bemusement:

(but does time remember

the task of living

as life's lattices unwind?)

Manifest

within the wind

channeling the congress of lost ravens

a voice nuzzles the velvet

that envelops the night

Leyland Kirby's world of solemn beauty

Leyland Kirby is a Berlin-based musician/sound artist. Here's a little taste of his world:

a reel kunfewsin song abowt god

Here's a new piece for my degree project - again inspired by a reading from the I Ching. This time I decided to approach the random "construction" of a hexagram with a more hands on approach; after a series of coin flips, I ended up with the 37th hexagram, The Family. I chose to use the two-coin method. You can read about this process here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Ching_divination

a reel kunfusin song abowt god

I dont noe who rote it. Just luk i even fownd it. Was in that litel kapuchino shop down by Vincents. Just a scrap of sumthin fowl under a chare all sogy and smellin of kapachino. I cud barly make out the ritin. I didnt reely get what it ment ether. But let me tell ya it was reely sumthin it was just like a forchin. See I wuz on the floor to find my mug. Itd just been knocked clean off the tabul by a big assd rich lady wearin sum kinda fansee scarf. Her kids were all hootin and hollerin about italyin sodas and I thot she was a torist. U knoe how that goes thos rich peepul that cant keep there kids in line and cud giv to shits for the rest of the wirld there ushly torists. So this big ass lady...I mene serisly...her ass was realy big...shes screamin bak at her kids and dosnt even reelize her ass is headed strate for my tabul. Cuz shes defendin hersef ginst her litul tike...and hes bustin her up big time out of no wer. I dunno how this kid got so vishus...anyway morul of the story is her big ass noks my kapachino off the tabul and tryin to cleen up I cum cross this litul scrap under my chare. I tapd it rite here.

remember the transience of our soul-talk, the muted violence

leering at the corners of each flightless word; for there are birds

that may not hover with the angels or their vices, and gaps in

logic that may yet demonstrate reality's slippery hold

Isnt that sumthin! Its like a reel kunfusin song abowt god! I mean...its like for why we should be carful not to beleev in god just cuz other people do! I gess Im not reel sure wut its abowt. But I lik it any way. So this wuman is all thumbs juglin bags of prisy clothes and her kid is throwin down hardcore like some kinda cracked out ninja...it was kinda scary...and i feel reel bad abowt it but i cudnt stop lafin cuz this kid was like a fukin manyac. Id never seen any thing like it. So after I cleen up the cofee I stuf the sogy scrap in my poket and book it outa there to chek on my lawndry. I run over to get my clothes in the dryer and that only takes about 15 minutes. Soon as Im finished with that Iv got nothin to do so I hed back over to the kapachino shop but as I turn the corner I see a cupel of cop cars parkd in front of the place and I can heer a siren sumware clos. Im prety kunfewsd so I peek threw the windoe to see whats goin down. When i peek threw the glass I see two grups of pepul in the bak of the room where i was sitin. The wons on the left arnt standin. Sum on the right are standin and sum arnt. Then I rember that was ware the lady was gettin beet on by her son. So I sneek bak insid and first thing i heer is that kid screemin and holerin lik a fukin beest so I go tak a looksee. Hes bein held down by a grup of men and skwirmin lik a fish and his eyz are way wite and freeky and won man screms to won of the othiz to tak off his belt and put it tweene his teethe. I look bak to the othur grupe and I see won of the mothurs hie heels stikin out of that bunch of peepul. Won wuman is neelin down at her side askin if she can heer her and thers all sorts of angree sownds and noyzy pepul worein with each othur but I dont think the muther was takkin at all. I hung round long nuff to see them kart em both to the ambulints and tak em away. I dunno wut happen to em but I aint to weryd cuz I think they wuz both ready for sumthin nue.

Waking Womb

As is suggested by Julia Kristeva in her essay, Powers of Horror, a state of "in-betweenness" has the ability to paralyze the mind.  The uncertainty of such mediatory phenomena is what compels the psyche to transmute this experience, or in the language of Sigmund Freud, sublimate that which traumatizes.  However, unawareness as to the origin of a feeling of fear could be said to aid the artistic process, as it allows the psyche to invent this origin.

Upon waking one morning earlier this week, I realized that it was not yet necessary for me to rise from bed, so I closed my eyes in the hope of falling back asleep.  As I began to drift off, I suddenly heard the distinct whine of a feline engaged in battle in the alley beneath my window.  However, I soon found myself listening to the conversation of a fictitious couple beyond the premises of my own domicile, and too, the inquisitive mewing of their house cat.  Somehow, the creature had made its way from one apartment to the next - and I could now feel every whisker of its face and each of its slender legs brush against me as it came sauntering across my bed.  I shuddered; having jostled myself awake, I realized that I had just dreamed this encounter - an experience as palpable as the comforter that enswathed my body.  

I would characterize this mode of consciousness in much the same way that Kristeva characterizes the experience of birth.  In both cases, the experience is such that cannot be easily compartmentalized on either side of a dichotomy, (here, the examples are waking life/dream and prenatal/postnatal.)  However, though my psyche could and can not easily categorize this experience during the twilight of dream-state (with a house cat that may or may not exist,) it is now viscerally connected to my being; the experience was terrifying, for it unwed dream from its isolated position in the nether region of my world; however, its comprehend-ability requires invention; for, though I felt a house cat glide across my body, the cat simply does not exist in this realm.  The question remains: is there any other?   

 

After Dark

Here's a new piece for my degree project.  Before writing this, I used a series of randomly generated "prompts" from the I Ching, or The Book of Changes, the ancient Chinese book of Oracular Pronouncements.  For this, I generated #63, "After Completion," and #13, "Fellowship With Men."

-After Dark-

Silver country.  Silver trees.  Silver earth.  

Our world is made metal by the light of a wrinkled face.

For many hours, our gravitas awaits; 

she is overhead,

licking her lunar lips; but there, she said,

this salt - it has no taste; for it is a potion,

a mineral to be absorbed

among your people

...Dedicated to Joshua Lambert...

Well, here goes nothing.  After a series of casual conversations between myself and the friend to whom I have dedicated this new endeavor, a new blog comes into being, effortlessly generated while its host charred the grilled cheese.  See, Mr. Lambert decided the time was right to set this blog in motion while I couldn't stop him; his god-like work was stealthy, and determined...while he typed I slaved away over a grilled cheese sandwich that no doubt left him craving an antacid.  

I suppose I'll use this blog as a venue for fragmentary theoretical ramblings, related discussion, and of course, poetry - a creative mode deemed proper for pretentious mystics, curmudgeonly squirrels, tea-sippin' pluralists, hippy-dippy-gossipers and...me

Here's a new piece (though those acquainted with Facebook will recognize it.  Oh yeah - I'll now use this blog as dee place for all future poetry-related posting.  Word, indeed.)  

cold ushers
the heat
forward

a friend
that flows through thought,
and projects its course
through the neighboring
stars - nothing more
than a nameless
quest for maybes,

hypothetical lights
that tease us-we,
with listless turns

a transmogrification
of forest fruits
that shock the tongue,

- the glistening scales
of a puckered gulp of air

Oh yes!  I almost forgot - I'm hoping to generate discussion.  And I mean this in the damn near Socratic sense of such a thing - so feel free to get nasty if ye' need to.  Just make sure you can feel the tinglin' in your toes.