137.
The Orogeny of Meaning
Part Ⅰ
explain,
order the chaos
harmonize naturally organize.
free the everything
suffering song bird soul sing
dark reaper blood drinker harvesting
cross come forward bow down
be inclined
requires only lying
no truth in you
be unkind, tell the mean lie
but far from a painful sigh
makes hearts flutter
kiss
the mouth, the tongue, the lips
much more primitive
you need this and Aye
lovers seeking like animals
only guilt makes the act inhibitive
all confronted past mistakes
those came before
how long is it that pleasure takes?
with emotion condemnation
impossibility in devotion
sexual energy condensing
pulsating
predestination limit further finite
lingua mostly cunning
cunnilingus
but of course you saw that coming
and comes and comes:
We were always meant to be together.
When placed before the terrible beauty
Of our own existence,
Primitive
Means
Advanced.
It's been said already
Free your mind.
Cower in unnecessary cobwebs
latticed existence, bannisters, railings
buttressed by
Will release the vision of the unity
That burns like the fresh winter snow.
preferability meaning yesterday
rocking lullaby words
beauty alone
Springs from love of the universe
a thematic regularity
off course that ceases
inextricably linked,
criss-crossed
with communicative expression.
only by personal choice
flooded by personal desires
refused all ire amid refuse fires
burning all love letters Aye sent to Mi
the idea flood circle the living sphere
all such presupposed knowledge
voices itself
orderly explanations
gift wrapped routine presents
a recurring daily scheduled presence
rap upon the box's door
wrap yourself up in a coat of many colors
construction workers' treats
tender, succulent, pink sweet meat
given that the present exists
merely as a springboard to past and future
even hatred relents when retribution
spirals back in upon the hatred
nobody wants to claim the
vanilla bean white bread soylent disgust
they dreamed up on their own
while the truth took a shower
and set off into the hills to roam
those two just above Rome
it's not too late to think about it
if you can think about it
when it gets that way
there will be remorse
and sorrow
as the purging flames follow
their natural course
you scream
caveat reveals no meaning
vacuum unified existence
Room 12b
vacuuming a strangers dead skin shed
so it can become a plant again
But how this leads to seeming weird
usage of terms
Past and future
create disunion in 8 dimensions
turned on its side
split and tearing down 32
numbers games and place ace aces
tear drop nose rings in pretty young faces
breaks into two parts
half of the whole
buried in a hole new way to die
implacably torn apart, in pain
and paying the rent on rent asunder
next step a nexus
creating a framework for an office in Texas
where the most evil
wear ear rings made from dead boll weevils
sized to fit, tiny foreheads with an 18 pitch
pitching another hissy fit
man in history ill will work
far more conducive
extraplanetary dabbling
traced to networks identifying
that which we think of as
ultimate now
a satellite lens, a milking cow
she sat, got a light, lends a smile,
and wow,
she knows how good she looks, and how
future present method eulogized
buy one which one describes
the death of the occidental tourist
an occurrence, an oxidation purist
that has knots yet
taken to a place and kept very still
ordered to catch and delivering still
the fullness of the moment
one twinkled eye looks forward anxiously
and another one to the rear
the method has a half-life
of porcelain cleansing after thoughts
always too close too near
patience came completely undone
upon arrival of the tiny ideas
swimming in unison
the product of centuries old venereal want
how could she look forward
without ever looking back
at all the fun in the rear view mirror
When will it always be here already?
right after and before it comes
The present, then, we can’t be divided
or separated
one creature under pleasure
indivisible, with proof
uncanny places touched
oh perfect,
seek an explanation means
gods, don't stop
division of the cells, the self, the attention getting
intersected with temporal conjecture
take the love and with it inject your mind
with hardcore reality, the gravity of the act,
alone all solo flying brazen blossoming
verbal expressions loosed like thousands of tiny arrows
aimed at visual interpretations
audio reception, huoh huoh huoh,
physical potential mystical intentional
a specific point in space taking up no units
divided and divided and divided it all comes together
at the center here is nothing
wrapped around and emptiness
opening doors into places nobody has ever seen
doors and hallways never built
searching inside finds nothing
searching outside finds nothing
it's all balanced on an edge wrapped through light
winking lasers skimming out of sight
a living sentient creature
knows no beginning nor ever an end
divine awareness a childhood friend
the whole place speaks to you
from you know not where
a great many things are said
but you do not dare
repeat a silent syllable of it
to digest and digress through these terms
to caress
gives us ideas
it's nothing less
we are only our senses
our eyes our ides
If we are at all frightened
it's not time to die
To digress even further
Might lead one blather on and blunder
experience utter self familiarity,
Even question the existence of other people's garity
To believe that he or she
(darn, which is it?)
Is alone
Singular in the mind of the gods,
And if that were true
Then what gods could there be
besides the one true self,
Crying out to see another self
joined forever as one and happy
and by seeing that doom the notion
That the universe belongs
to anyone.
In Guatemala as a Youth
When I was in Guatemala in 1983 at the tail end of a long civil war, and not extremely long after the devastating earthquake in the 1970's, the culture was friendly and the climate was perfect. I was only 12 years old when plans for the trip got underway. I went there without my parents. I've never stopped wanting to return.
I stayed on a coffee plantation owned by a close friend of the family. He was an architect, and was educated in Louisiana. Unfortunately I drank from a well on the plantation and contracted Montezuma's revenge, the real variety of which is entirely amoebic in nature, is not contagious and has nothing to do with food.
The ruins of old stone churches and haciendas in Antigua have provided a lifetime of ponderance. One of the world's highest lakes is also in Guatemala, Lake Tenochtítlan. The air up there was spectacular.
I was too young to go where I really wanted to, apparently. I did not muster the voice to clamor for a visit to that house. I didn't stop hating myself over that for a long time. Later I found out there was no place of ill repute, and that the whole concept had been dangled in front of me just to make old people laugh. So very funny. *__*
We were unable to go into the northern jungle. The jungles of Central and South America can be dangerous in more ways than one. I got great historical photographs of the Mayan pyramids in those jungles as a consolation prize. The area surrounding them looks nothing at all like it did before clearing and restoration of the sites started. People can go see them now.
The antique dealers and book sellers in Ciudad Antigua have mind boggling deals. That city also serves as a trade center for the gorgeous textiles of the highland Indians. My host for the trip, the architect Vides, designed one of the five star hotels there. The accomodations are out of this world.
-
I was studying the Montessori Method and Jungian educational theory last night. The elevator became sort of frightening on the way down from the third floor stacks at the Middleton Library at Louisiana State University. We on the elevator disembarked with great haste as soon as the doors opened. ('011)
I stayed on a coffee plantation owned by a close friend of the family. He was an architect, and was educated in Louisiana. Unfortunately I drank from a well on the plantation and contracted Montezuma's revenge, the real variety of which is entirely amoebic in nature, is not contagious and has nothing to do with food.
The ruins of old stone churches and haciendas in Antigua have provided a lifetime of ponderance. One of the world's highest lakes is also in Guatemala, Lake Tenochtítlan. The air up there was spectacular.
I was too young to go where I really wanted to, apparently. I did not muster the voice to clamor for a visit to that house. I didn't stop hating myself over that for a long time. Later I found out there was no place of ill repute, and that the whole concept had been dangled in front of me just to make old people laugh. So very funny. *__*
We were unable to go into the northern jungle. The jungles of Central and South America can be dangerous in more ways than one. I got great historical photographs of the Mayan pyramids in those jungles as a consolation prize. The area surrounding them looks nothing at all like it did before clearing and restoration of the sites started. People can go see them now.
The antique dealers and book sellers in Ciudad Antigua have mind boggling deals. That city also serves as a trade center for the gorgeous textiles of the highland Indians. My host for the trip, the architect Vides, designed one of the five star hotels there. The accomodations are out of this world.
-
I was studying the Montessori Method and Jungian educational theory last night. The elevator became sort of frightening on the way down from the third floor stacks at the Middleton Library at Louisiana State University. We on the elevator disembarked with great haste as soon as the doors opened. ('011)
A True Story
My grandmother said I killed my father. Such a thing was not possible. Somewhere someone took her very seriously. It nearly killed me when he died. I wanted nothing of his. I wanted no material possessions. I did not want his real estate property. I wanted none of it. I threw all of it away that I could. I'm still trying to throw the real estate out the window. I would have killed many men to keep him alive. My entire life is open. Take what you want away from this with you. No one has permission to disturb what is sacred between a father and a son.
Fringe Performances
1. Go to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting with a whiskey pint bottle half filled with watered down coke, so that it looks like whiskey. Try to hide swigs from it as people start talking. Begin talking when you feel up to it. Work in things like this: "I really think I could have a chance in this program if I could just make it through the first few minutes (swig). Hey! Why isn't there any coffee? Isn't there supposed to be coffee at these things? I'm going to need that if I'm going to stay awake through an hour of this."
[This from somebody who checked himself into a detox center, while absolutely clean and sober, because it was too expensive to run air conditioning during one of the worst heat waves in Louisiana history. They had not only air conditioning, but free food too. That individual left -- the temptation to make up bigger and better stories was just too great (not to mention the temptation posed by a certain young lady also there.)]
2. Wondering if anyone has ever seen a live performance from a "techno" band. Do people realize that the musicians play drums and instruments to the extreme for some of those recordings? Just because it sounds perfect doesn't mean it wasn't created live. It is the heighth of arrogance to assume that computer assisted production of finalized musical copy makes it any less real. In fact, many people might be surprised by how many "bands" using instruments were created by ONE person only.
3. Go to criminal court once or twice a week for a couple of weeks (or every day, if you aren't scared of dying of boredom -- it's a great way to learn decorum and statutory procedures). On the third week fall down when the bailiff says all rise. Be sure to have a shirt with pockets on, filled with marbles. Make sure all the marbles come out on the floor. Pick them up clumsily for the first few minutes of court. If you feel really ballsy do something similar the next week.
4. Go to an art opening. Find a piece of random, harmless, abstract art. Begin protesting the vulgarity of it loudly. Make sure to have a cell phone. Call actual people who might be offended by vulgarity at an art show (Christian organizations, right wing bastions of society). Make a real stink. The artist will hate you for it at the time, but love you later.
5. Take a little baggie of small round green seeds out into a very public place. Try to look as sneaky as possible while planting the seeds in open landscapes. Look over your shoulder. Hide in the bushes as you take the baggie in and out of your pocket. Run if you see law enforcement, or just to make sure some get called.
6. While at the doctor for an injury, after receiving a prescription begin talking loudly about how opiates help your sex life. Mention how they give you unbelievable staying power. Try to engage a nurse in the dialog if at all possible. Try not to do it if you are using your real name, or close to home. You may never get anything again.
7. unrelated - News carried a long story about the gang "The 18" in El Salvador. They called it the largest gang in the world. What about the Sandinistas? La Familia has nothing to do with any criminal organization. It's self defense when men who have committed crimes of consent tell authorities that. I will not give voice to the organization's name. I have values. News: Very frequently untrue in the places I frequent. No lawsuit can be filed against an organization for spreading name unspecific rumors, and there is no way to hold the owners of news organizations accountable. They are quite above the law. I've done my best to separate fact from fiction here, but it is very difficult when every source may be corrupt and often is.
[This from somebody who checked himself into a detox center, while absolutely clean and sober, because it was too expensive to run air conditioning during one of the worst heat waves in Louisiana history. They had not only air conditioning, but free food too. That individual left -- the temptation to make up bigger and better stories was just too great (not to mention the temptation posed by a certain young lady also there.)]
2. Wondering if anyone has ever seen a live performance from a "techno" band. Do people realize that the musicians play drums and instruments to the extreme for some of those recordings? Just because it sounds perfect doesn't mean it wasn't created live. It is the heighth of arrogance to assume that computer assisted production of finalized musical copy makes it any less real. In fact, many people might be surprised by how many "bands" using instruments were created by ONE person only.
3. Go to criminal court once or twice a week for a couple of weeks (or every day, if you aren't scared of dying of boredom -- it's a great way to learn decorum and statutory procedures). On the third week fall down when the bailiff says all rise. Be sure to have a shirt with pockets on, filled with marbles. Make sure all the marbles come out on the floor. Pick them up clumsily for the first few minutes of court. If you feel really ballsy do something similar the next week.
4. Go to an art opening. Find a piece of random, harmless, abstract art. Begin protesting the vulgarity of it loudly. Make sure to have a cell phone. Call actual people who might be offended by vulgarity at an art show (Christian organizations, right wing bastions of society). Make a real stink. The artist will hate you for it at the time, but love you later.
5. Take a little baggie of small round green seeds out into a very public place. Try to look as sneaky as possible while planting the seeds in open landscapes. Look over your shoulder. Hide in the bushes as you take the baggie in and out of your pocket. Run if you see law enforcement, or just to make sure some get called.
6. While at the doctor for an injury, after receiving a prescription begin talking loudly about how opiates help your sex life. Mention how they give you unbelievable staying power. Try to engage a nurse in the dialog if at all possible. Try not to do it if you are using your real name, or close to home. You may never get anything again.
7. unrelated - News carried a long story about the gang "The 18" in El Salvador. They called it the largest gang in the world. What about the Sandinistas? La Familia has nothing to do with any criminal organization. It's self defense when men who have committed crimes of consent tell authorities that. I will not give voice to the organization's name. I have values. News: Very frequently untrue in the places I frequent. No lawsuit can be filed against an organization for spreading name unspecific rumors, and there is no way to hold the owners of news organizations accountable. They are quite above the law. I've done my best to separate fact from fiction here, but it is very difficult when every source may be corrupt and often is.
Roll Call of the Lesser Devils: 133-136
133.
Today I take a vow of silence
The quiet starts a chain of events
The prisoner walks free
Markings burned into arms, face, back
escapes the worst fear
the human race has ever always known
fear
takes me silent takes me aback
the falling sheets, the last Rosicrucian’s towel
folded, irons on stretched out
gravity calls
and so you wonder what that means
consider if you will it
thrill welling up from deep down
foul mention decayed dominance
yet so easily submit, persuaded
having a phenomenal time, agitated
experience with internal workings
know know bounds
devices, all animals,
quivering sounds,
incorrigible exhibitionists that we are
sensational, climactic, grinds together
while you watch your rather lengthy
summoned false feelings grow so bored
slink away into dark corners embarrassed
by the moans and exhortations unto god
your brain takes you away to see incredible
frightening things, imaginary things
with legs and arms all breasts
no break into a sea of flesh
and when you come back
you find you
are the small caged rats just
animals with wheels and tiny black eyes
and people who judge think quality, heavy sighs
have decided you do not pass
inspection was exciting at least at last
a simple test, a pleasure cry
you were so busy being happy
have it hold it
the religious experience
shape it mold it
and so now you can not leave
and the towel?
the horror of knowing what you have seen
the things that crawled
the things that flew
may have been nothing
but it may have been true
a chemical imbalance
or so you are taught to believe
my goal is the perfect disrobing
when I reach that goal
I will have arrived inside
the great hereafter
as horrible as it may be,
somewhere in it there is perfection
such is the law of infinity
somewhere
out there
the only blot on my soul that still remains is my body
I will always
Write in the service of the great law
134.
it is hard to tell the time
when your only watch has crumbled
into many pieces of the sky
Byron bade me quench my thirst
then laughed at my awful plight
thirst undying
yet I just an ant in the continuum
with no power to drown myself
thirst for the first wellspring
of knowledge, unholy
and of the body
But for the three rings of Jesus
Our heavenly host
Surely would I have perished.
While I drifted
I spoke with Zarathustra’s society
They showed me how wrong
but oh how strong
blind before
it was all so that I could see
many secrets wait hidden
never break the rhythm
even when man has left you broken
and in a cage
the high spirits bade me this
135.
and so begins the next world
in the beginning there was a thought
and it was desperation
-desperate for the end
-desperate for the unkown
the worst thing that could happen
was a science
was a sign
after the moment left
I felt something back behind me
the nightmare was unclean
it wasn’t even mine
don’t go off and leave
I sense something back
behind me
I once knew a person
his name was unimportant
though it was sanctuary
all that is gone now
swallowed up by fear
what more could you want
than to gaze down from the mountains?
if only to escape this dark tunnel
trapped here for so long
alone and unarmed
with only a dim fire
the nightmare was science
like a pathway through the mind
many thought it led out
but they have perished
frozen in this nuclear winter
eyes piercing behind me
my hair stands on end
somewhere my hands play a guitar
slide down the bars
but why I have long since forgotten
all I can do
is wait for the sun to wake me
(unless this isn’t a dream
the sun will come)
136.
I no longer need the wind to blow
no longer a home at night
I have gone to search for the rumored
subterranean ocean
where the old ones dwell
I need to see
and when I find them
I will beg them
“Please take not my sorrow
And take not my mind.”
That ocean blooms like a flower
In myriad shimmering thoughts and words
Like oxygen fluttering
Up to the abyssal floor.
Even the young man
who taught the world to love
such wicked evil
Believed,
Though under the earth
We all know it will not be found.
I will never be ashamed
Of my unabashed fondness
For Howard Phillip.
Today I take a vow of silence
The quiet starts a chain of events
The prisoner walks free
Markings burned into arms, face, back
escapes the worst fear
the human race has ever always known
fear
takes me silent takes me aback
the falling sheets, the last Rosicrucian’s towel
folded, irons on stretched out
gravity calls
and so you wonder what that means
consider if you will it
thrill welling up from deep down
foul mention decayed dominance
yet so easily submit, persuaded
having a phenomenal time, agitated
experience with internal workings
know know bounds
devices, all animals,
quivering sounds,
incorrigible exhibitionists that we are
sensational, climactic, grinds together
while you watch your rather lengthy
summoned false feelings grow so bored
slink away into dark corners embarrassed
by the moans and exhortations unto god
your brain takes you away to see incredible
frightening things, imaginary things
with legs and arms all breasts
no break into a sea of flesh
and when you come back
you find you
are the small caged rats just
animals with wheels and tiny black eyes
and people who judge think quality, heavy sighs
have decided you do not pass
inspection was exciting at least at last
a simple test, a pleasure cry
you were so busy being happy
have it hold it
the religious experience
shape it mold it
and so now you can not leave
and the towel?
the horror of knowing what you have seen
the things that crawled
the things that flew
may have been nothing
but it may have been true
a chemical imbalance
or so you are taught to believe
my goal is the perfect disrobing
when I reach that goal
I will have arrived inside
the great hereafter
as horrible as it may be,
somewhere in it there is perfection
such is the law of infinity
somewhere
out there
the only blot on my soul that still remains is my body
I will always
Write in the service of the great law
134.
it is hard to tell the time
when your only watch has crumbled
into many pieces of the sky
Byron bade me quench my thirst
then laughed at my awful plight
thirst undying
yet I just an ant in the continuum
with no power to drown myself
thirst for the first wellspring
of knowledge, unholy
and of the body
But for the three rings of Jesus
Our heavenly host
Surely would I have perished.
While I drifted
I spoke with Zarathustra’s society
They showed me how wrong
but oh how strong
blind before
it was all so that I could see
many secrets wait hidden
never break the rhythm
even when man has left you broken
and in a cage
the high spirits bade me this
135.
and so begins the next world
in the beginning there was a thought
and it was desperation
-desperate for the end
-desperate for the unkown
the worst thing that could happen
was a science
was a sign
after the moment left
I felt something back behind me
the nightmare was unclean
it wasn’t even mine
don’t go off and leave
I sense something back
behind me
I once knew a person
his name was unimportant
though it was sanctuary
all that is gone now
swallowed up by fear
what more could you want
than to gaze down from the mountains?
if only to escape this dark tunnel
trapped here for so long
alone and unarmed
with only a dim fire
the nightmare was science
like a pathway through the mind
many thought it led out
but they have perished
frozen in this nuclear winter
eyes piercing behind me
my hair stands on end
somewhere my hands play a guitar
slide down the bars
but why I have long since forgotten
all I can do
is wait for the sun to wake me
(unless this isn’t a dream
the sun will come)
136.
I no longer need the wind to blow
no longer a home at night
I have gone to search for the rumored
subterranean ocean
where the old ones dwell
I need to see
and when I find them
I will beg them
“Please take not my sorrow
And take not my mind.”
That ocean blooms like a flower
In myriad shimmering thoughts and words
Like oxygen fluttering
Up to the abyssal floor.
Even the young man
who taught the world to love
such wicked evil
Believed,
Though under the earth
We all know it will not be found.
I will never be ashamed
Of my unabashed fondness
For Howard Phillip.
To Nijme
Azure air conditioner streamers
Humming fluorescent light
In the art studio by design;
Left with only thoughts of geography
And that pretty smile.
Dry outside, night air,
Filled with rhythmic locust buzz.
Every sight of the building
Brings it back;
Year lost in thought.
Humming fluorescent light
In the art studio by design;
Left with only thoughts of geography
And that pretty smile.
Dry outside, night air,
Filled with rhythmic locust buzz.
Every sight of the building
Brings it back;
Year lost in thought.
Missing in America
Sean Paul Kelly posted a brief thing about what he misses most about Asia now that he is home. He said it's undoubtedly, "...being able to walk out my door, be it in Istanbul, Singapore or India and walk down the street to get what I want, see my neighbors, smile at strangers and stretch my legs." That's possible in a lot of heavily populated urban areas, but that's not what he's talking about. Kelly was referring to the isolation that now exists because of the automobile culture here in the United States.
A great many people made the culture of driving a topic of discussion because of the insane gas prices last year. Driving everywhere has made social interaction much more difficult. The sense of community from knowing people in your neighborhood, or even in the same building, has significantly diminished because of the amount of time spent in cars and trucks. That's obviously not true everywhere, but it's getting much more widespread over time. The phenomena of traffic isolation makes normal social interaction much more difficult. It's becoming more pronounced as new generations grow up without knowing any other way to live.
The social and cultural damage from the automobile is only one way in which it's making the world a worse place to live. It's insane that we have covered massive portions of our towns and cities in concrete. Our society has been so profoundly altered by the automobile that it means more than life. Nothing grows through concrete or cement, and the two surfaces hold heat.
Getting out of a car in the middle of a big parking lot during the hottest part of the summer is like stepping into a corner of hell where they ran out of air ducts. Any living thing that gets stranded out in the middle of a parking lot is dead for sure. Earth worms are a no-brainer, of course. They wind up crispy in a matter of minutes. Lizards could survive a little longer, but that's not saying much. Lizards, amphibians and other reptiles, while being cold blooded, will cook up deader than shit on asphalt. Birds, puppies, human babies - these are all creatures that will die if they get stuck in the middle of a hot ass parking lot.
Babies die every year. Some lady leaves her baby stranded in the middle of a parking lot. It gets so hot that even when babies survive such neglect they are likely to have brain damage, depending on the length of their stay out there in pavement hell. The forgetful parent always looks shocked and devastated. Just how stupid does one have to be to think pavement is good for life?
Cars spew noxious fumes and emissions into the air at an incredible rate. Regardless what sort of "safety controls" are applied to the internal combustion engine, the entire concept is flawed to the core from an environmental standpoint. By the time we are burning fuel in vehicles the substance has already impacted the environment at ever stage of production.
Even when oil production is not disastrous it's still not great. Offshore drilling in the United States has resulted in millions of gallons of oil spilled in the Gulf of Mexico and the other oceans. Oil transportation has been just as detrimental, or more so, than production. Then after the oil arrives in refineries the production of gasoline creates gigantic quantities of air pollutants. The entire downtown area of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, smells like slow death because of it.
People who love the combustion engine are slow to admit such facts. They like to believe that there's nothing wrong with hundreds of millions of cars blasting pollutants into the air. If they admit the truth it means they have been wrong all along. A little ego goes a long way to perpetuating myths. In many cases specific personal debates about the environment only continue to exist because people hate to admit when they lose.
Taking all of these things into consideration, just about anyone with money still drives an automobile around. People are still sitting in slow moving traffic, or stopped altogether, running their engines as the money burns up and floats into the atmosphere. How many people don't really know their neighbors very well?. It's silly to even hypothesize they may know some of the people driving to and from work around them. They are isolated from human contact until they get to work, unless they pop into a store or stop for food, and then they're isolated until they get home.
There's a breakdown of human interaction that has gotten worse and worse. That may not be as bad as drastic climate change, but it's not really open for any debate at all. Cars have done wonders for jump starting the destruction of modern civilization. It's silly to think we could return to simpler, more trouble free times, but it's not crazy to think that we can change the present for the better.
Or you could just buy a big fucking Hummer, pay your wife Botox injections in return for stiff mouthed fellatio and scream "Yippy-kai-yay Motherfuckers!" as you jump out of a plane and destroy the world as we know it. I won't try to stop you. Somebody has to be an ignorant asshole in order for me to get laid for being sweet and attentive. And it's going to take a lot of work to repopulate this rock when the right wing survivalists are nothing but shadows on their Unabomber sheds.
A great many people made the culture of driving a topic of discussion because of the insane gas prices last year. Driving everywhere has made social interaction much more difficult. The sense of community from knowing people in your neighborhood, or even in the same building, has significantly diminished because of the amount of time spent in cars and trucks. That's obviously not true everywhere, but it's getting much more widespread over time. The phenomena of traffic isolation makes normal social interaction much more difficult. It's becoming more pronounced as new generations grow up without knowing any other way to live.
The social and cultural damage from the automobile is only one way in which it's making the world a worse place to live. It's insane that we have covered massive portions of our towns and cities in concrete. Our society has been so profoundly altered by the automobile that it means more than life. Nothing grows through concrete or cement, and the two surfaces hold heat.
Getting out of a car in the middle of a big parking lot during the hottest part of the summer is like stepping into a corner of hell where they ran out of air ducts. Any living thing that gets stranded out in the middle of a parking lot is dead for sure. Earth worms are a no-brainer, of course. They wind up crispy in a matter of minutes. Lizards could survive a little longer, but that's not saying much. Lizards, amphibians and other reptiles, while being cold blooded, will cook up deader than shit on asphalt. Birds, puppies, human babies - these are all creatures that will die if they get stuck in the middle of a hot ass parking lot.
Babies die every year. Some lady leaves her baby stranded in the middle of a parking lot. It gets so hot that even when babies survive such neglect they are likely to have brain damage, depending on the length of their stay out there in pavement hell. The forgetful parent always looks shocked and devastated. Just how stupid does one have to be to think pavement is good for life?
Cars spew noxious fumes and emissions into the air at an incredible rate. Regardless what sort of "safety controls" are applied to the internal combustion engine, the entire concept is flawed to the core from an environmental standpoint. By the time we are burning fuel in vehicles the substance has already impacted the environment at ever stage of production.
Even when oil production is not disastrous it's still not great. Offshore drilling in the United States has resulted in millions of gallons of oil spilled in the Gulf of Mexico and the other oceans. Oil transportation has been just as detrimental, or more so, than production. Then after the oil arrives in refineries the production of gasoline creates gigantic quantities of air pollutants. The entire downtown area of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, smells like slow death because of it.
People who love the combustion engine are slow to admit such facts. They like to believe that there's nothing wrong with hundreds of millions of cars blasting pollutants into the air. If they admit the truth it means they have been wrong all along. A little ego goes a long way to perpetuating myths. In many cases specific personal debates about the environment only continue to exist because people hate to admit when they lose.
Taking all of these things into consideration, just about anyone with money still drives an automobile around. People are still sitting in slow moving traffic, or stopped altogether, running their engines as the money burns up and floats into the atmosphere. How many people don't really know their neighbors very well?. It's silly to even hypothesize they may know some of the people driving to and from work around them. They are isolated from human contact until they get to work, unless they pop into a store or stop for food, and then they're isolated until they get home.
There's a breakdown of human interaction that has gotten worse and worse. That may not be as bad as drastic climate change, but it's not really open for any debate at all. Cars have done wonders for jump starting the destruction of modern civilization. It's silly to think we could return to simpler, more trouble free times, but it's not crazy to think that we can change the present for the better.
Or you could just buy a big fucking Hummer, pay your wife Botox injections in return for stiff mouthed fellatio and scream "Yippy-kai-yay Motherfuckers!" as you jump out of a plane and destroy the world as we know it. I won't try to stop you. Somebody has to be an ignorant asshole in order for me to get laid for being sweet and attentive. And it's going to take a lot of work to repopulate this rock when the right wing survivalists are nothing but shadows on their Unabomber sheds.
Roll Call of the Lesser Devils 132
132.
what I am through
Dionysian chained blue thoughts
break them or
bend yourself a space
make words confessors
make sentences to keep up the blinding pace
with thoughts that are slow, though even they race
open the face of the clock,
rocking back and forth, bent double
no clock tells time
they all lie
but they love to drop hints
nothing escapes, not a peep
certainly none of the hidden winces
on a face that's hidden quite well
the ideas all say I am begging you
and you motion back, class dismissed,
then comes to me, my dirty mind
a beautiful scene, go, shaker shake
lovely and you know what it makes
me feel
as the timeless walls send out emissaries
to gauge the proud's fall
no, clocks to make time
will never unwind
the kinks and knots
of a permanent obsession
between you and me
possession
makes not a bit of difference
as long as someone owns
this, takes charge
with responsibility, and canters happily
with wicked candor, private or publicly
elicits unquenched wants, needs, moans
nothing could be closer than home
but knowing that the need pierces down to the bone
now can you hear me?
the warp tries to choke me
off before you struggle to know
like a partial muscle must struggle to grow
when there's not enough space to let it show
and maddening the impropriety
of not giving someone what they want
my gods but you're a wicked one
the words need to plead
but the eyes must cease
seething in advance,
while breathing, shallow
through small eyelets wink
a body that's written all over
like scrimshaw on the bawdy captive
and nothing in ink, none the worse for wear
though red does it make the face
the hoots and catcalls show everyone cares,
that's cover, disguise,
forbidden skin, and still can't rise
too late to stop or quell, so again
all thoughts inside a silent shell
wrapped thrice in leather,
strapped and tightly
a banquet where lust feeds nightly
just not the prisoner bound hand and feet
no sound but pleas for release
Bacchus chained such thoughts
but now
though I was almost through
the time went by and far too soon
the fleeing fingers quickly captured
only halfway down the laces
of the first of three binding bodices
choked by what's real again
it knew long scant reference
does know needs won't
be granted, no wishes and only strict
delicious
noes, no flow comes
tis now a rhyming schematic
capricious mystery,
no longer secret,
It's the mistress who makes me keep it.
Did I dream I wrote this or was it worse?
Am I still trapped in this mummy's curse?
Did I think this straight into text,
Or has she come to punish on another pretext?
[Note: This poem is naughty. This poem is exactly like all the poetry I burned in 1992 (?). It's about sexuality that was condemned by the Christian church. Church fucked my head up. I used to be afraid of myself. I sure wish I had not burned all that work. Over the years it has occurred to me time and time again that it was some of the best writing I ever did.]
what I am through
Dionysian chained blue thoughts
break them or
bend yourself a space
make words confessors
make sentences to keep up the blinding pace
with thoughts that are slow, though even they race
open the face of the clock,
rocking back and forth, bent double
no clock tells time
they all lie
but they love to drop hints
nothing escapes, not a peep
certainly none of the hidden winces
on a face that's hidden quite well
the ideas all say I am begging you
and you motion back, class dismissed,
then comes to me, my dirty mind
a beautiful scene, go, shaker shake
lovely and you know what it makes
me feel
as the timeless walls send out emissaries
to gauge the proud's fall
no, clocks to make time
will never unwind
the kinks and knots
of a permanent obsession
between you and me
possession
makes not a bit of difference
as long as someone owns
this, takes charge
with responsibility, and canters happily
with wicked candor, private or publicly
elicits unquenched wants, needs, moans
nothing could be closer than home
but knowing that the need pierces down to the bone
now can you hear me?
the warp tries to choke me
off before you struggle to know
like a partial muscle must struggle to grow
when there's not enough space to let it show
and maddening the impropriety
of not giving someone what they want
my gods but you're a wicked one
the words need to plead
but the eyes must cease
seething in advance,
while breathing, shallow
through small eyelets wink
a body that's written all over
like scrimshaw on the bawdy captive
and nothing in ink, none the worse for wear
though red does it make the face
the hoots and catcalls show everyone cares,
that's cover, disguise,
forbidden skin, and still can't rise
too late to stop or quell, so again
all thoughts inside a silent shell
wrapped thrice in leather,
strapped and tightly
a banquet where lust feeds nightly
just not the prisoner bound hand and feet
no sound but pleas for release
Bacchus chained such thoughts
but now
though I was almost through
the time went by and far too soon
the fleeing fingers quickly captured
only halfway down the laces
of the first of three binding bodices
choked by what's real again
it knew long scant reference
does know needs won't
be granted, no wishes and only strict
delicious
noes, no flow comes
tis now a rhyming schematic
capricious mystery,
no longer secret,
It's the mistress who makes me keep it.
Did I dream I wrote this or was it worse?
Am I still trapped in this mummy's curse?
Did I think this straight into text,
Or has she come to punish on another pretext?
[Note: This poem is naughty. This poem is exactly like all the poetry I burned in 1992 (?). It's about sexuality that was condemned by the Christian church. Church fucked my head up. I used to be afraid of myself. I sure wish I had not burned all that work. Over the years it has occurred to me time and time again that it was some of the best writing I ever did.]
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