Section #8
Grant woke up from a long sleep.
Grant had been asleep since 1885.
Sleep or death (these are just words describers of things )
states of being
states of non-being
everyday speech
language—the stuff of tongues
terms, certificates, contracts, deeds, etc etc.

Yes “lies” Grant could hear the “lies” from inside his tomb.
“What fresh hell is this?”
—thought Grant

“…make America Great again?”

What “again” is “he” talking about???
If Grant could roll over he would.

But the uniform, the sword
and all the stuff
he was laid out- in- was not permitting the “roll”.

Grant was facing the nation from the bottom up
watching from the “tomb” located in New York City
looking over the mighty messy polluted Hudson River
wondering what this “new”
saving of the nation
was all about????

“I wish I had a cigar
or whisky and a plate full of truth.” Grant said.

WOW!! all those who fought for causes
still cast about in the bardo….
they crowd one another pushing and shoving
wanting to get to the light
they seek a second chance
but are caught in the space of limbo.

Grant says …”and me too…
Me too…
I am not done.
I can’t be still
I see
I hear
The lying Liar….
Rise up—or do you sleep too!!!
Rise up—You all who see
and know.
It is time to save the nation!!!
“Julia wake up help me–help them–!!!”

Complicity is a state of being according to the dictionary—that book  (the dictionary) which has ended up in the landfill with the rest of the books that clutter our shelves—yes “Webster” you have lost your place on the shelves of our new 21st century life-style.

Convenience is key to living—books are heavy—require holding—need to be dusted—re-read—underlined—loaned—borrowed—loved…..all some how inconvenient in this hyper post-modern century model of living.  

We like empty rooms.

We like no clutter.

We like a place that resembles ourselves perhaps?

I am not sure I am ready for the “cell” are you?  

The “cell” has captured us so far—the dancing digits keep us engaged with our wires that connect us to the big world…now what does the big world offer us?…  that is the big question ????….from the cell where I view my little world (here in Hudson, NY) ..here is what I see ….I see a community that is pretty much like other America here.  

We have a division between the rich and the poor,  between the sexes, between the races, and between those who worship and those who don’t.

We are typical of the trends of our early 21st century experience—someday they will define this trend—but it is hard to know the thing when one is in the middle of a thing.  

We see the acts of resistance fade as the work load piles up on the folks who have 3 jobs and 4 children.  

The kitchen table has been taken to the dump as well—no time to gather here either—cola has trapped us —convenience reigns supreme.  

Lately I have been wondering about Russia….how about you????  

I am wondering about a country that has failed to bury Lenin—just a reminder about that little incident.  Lenin the father of the Red Bolshevik Revolution lies pickled in a mausoleum in Moscow.  He died in 1924 —still waiting to be buried.  

And on another note the Romanov’s —too are waiting to be buried—they expired on July 16-17, 1918. Yes! a 100 years ago.  

The Romanov’s were the Russian Tsar’s family & servants murdered by the revolution.  

You see time does sometimes stand still.  

I am always looking forward and looking back…it is a bad habit….(some say)…yes..no…maybe???… but for me it is a way of measuring how things are going and how I am doing in this time of complicity, convenience, and a collapsing of time and space.  

Loneliness and isolation are the ingredients of authoritarian rule.  Eternal hopelessness is another tool used to kill the spirit of the individual.  The chant “that nothing will change no matter what I do” keeps the wheels of tyranny happy.  The idea that my vote does not count keeps the powerless in check and the powerful in positions of absolute power.  We see political power as the highest form of power—power arrived at by not playing by the rules.  Remember it is the little people who pay taxes and the rich who don’t.  It is too often the poor who go to jail while the rich buy their way out of a jam.  We need to band together and fight the malaise of this time in which we are now living. We need to look away from the magician that tweets and steals our focus. The rabbit and the hat do not satisfy us —we see the sleight of hand as it tries to steal our focus.  It is a time to act — freedom is a rigorous exercise–  be scared—take risks—move out of your zone of secure insecurity and fight the 1% who are stealing your future. We must resist.  Act now.  Do not wait.  Tyranny is at hand.  We cannot afford to lose what little we have.
It is now time to stand up and force change.  We cannot leave it to our politicians.  The political class has for the most part abandon our needs….the distance between government and the people is greater than ever. Rise up Rise up and defend your ground before you have no ground on which to stand.  The lonely must stop listening to the masters of spin—it is time to turn off the media and find an ally. The time is NOW.  There is not much time left.  No fooling this is real.

Philip Roth. RIP

The writer takes an exit after leaving us with the grand body of work.

I am reading  American Pastoral.(written 1997).  

The story takes place in New Jersey.  Roth captures the 20th century by his genius.
The century that I have spent half of my life living.  The post war boomers and the product of their wealth is the content of this book.

What strikes me about Roth’s writing is his ability to get the spirit of the time–like a surgeon he cuts deep and with precision capturing the post WW 2  American landscape that quickly morphs into the Vietnam War  ( you have to read the book to get what I am saying).

I will give you one quote from the book which struck me as brilliant—here goes:

“The daughter who transports him out of the longed-for American pastoral and into everything that is its antithesis and its enemy, into the fury, the violence, and the desperation of the counter pastoral—into the indigenous American berserk.”
That about sums up what happened to the America that Roth writes about in this brilliant work—this is of a time that our generation—witnessed and we did arrive at  berserk….so smart is Roth’s critical eye.

Check Philip Roth out—if you have never read him—try it—if you have read him —— read him again.

Bang Bang Bang

The school shootings are now so common we hardly blink when the news crosses the various media wires that are hooked to our lives.  The information highway is streaming with kid in school killings.
Here in America we feast on the extinguished lives of our children—who are mowed down like hay.
School was a place to learn now it is a place for terrorists.
The empire eats its own.
We watch the landscape race toward more security and more guns.  Somehow the two don’t mix but it seems to be the solution that we look toward for survival in our post-modern 21st Century life.
Gun’s r us.
We now train to defend ourselves against the odds of a gun man with shot guns and military style machine guns that can and do kill the innocents in our hometowns—most likely at our schools.  

Bang Bang Bang is the tune heard more often than not in our homes, hamlets, movie theaters, churches, malls, & just about everywhere USA.  

No place is free from the fire from guns.
The guns that appear in the hands of the disgruntled minority who resort to violence as a way to settle grief is all too common.  

So now what? as the pols pray and continue to accept cash for for votes from the gunners best friend (NRA) we are caught in a moment that seems like we live in tar.  

How to get out of this mess –is daunting.  

I think it requires a revolution and the revolution is now.   

Not a new idea but each generation has their axe to grind and this for now is the moment for those who are adults in the 21st century.
18 is the number to settle the score.

2018 is a good number to rally around…for now 18 year olds can vote.  

YES —a small step but one that shows contempt for biz as usual.

As Malcolm X said “the ballot or the bullet “(you choose.)

So as Leonard says ” there is a crack in everything—that is how the light gets in….”
In the next century one will wonder who is Leonard?
The footnote industry will flourish as we watch the landscape be wiped clean of all
things that cannot be sold.
We have a little time for the light to get in but the architects are in the process of sealing
everything.
No cracks will be left unsealed.
The orders are coming in from the higher-ups
as I write this little text in the room where I have leaks and drafts–we see change.
The poverty of drafts has an advantage but beware this is coming to an end.
The cold April 0f 2018 is a sign and a signal that we are in the deep state where war lives as well
as other dark forces that steal our bread.
We tumble with these thoughts as we watch our neoliberal
leaders steal the batteries from the children.
Okay so what!!! we say to ourselves— as we flip our wigs and drive our Chevy
down the road singing a song of freedom.
Six guns trumped.
Gum shoes bought.
Cats meow.
Ride Sally Ride.
Me-TOO is real.
Stormy is more than the weather.
And if you are not sure which way the wind is blowing??
Call the weather-women.

Hamlet take an exit
we are done with your complaints.
We are born crying.
This we know and forget
If Whitman is right— life is a sleep and a forgetting.
Is there a memory for this life or
are we lost in time and space.
Are we left holding our fist “like” when we left the crib of our mother’s womb
Or are we swimming to Cambodia with Spalding Gray– wondering what the war was all about.
When all is said and done we are looking for the ship that sails in the dark night….but there is no light only reflection from our eyes.
What am I talking about?—Yes this you would like to know.
Well there is no talking “about” but what I am saying is “that all we have left in our mind’s eye is a series of random thoughts strung together with a clothes line”.
Last night the big tree fell at my childhood’s home–I am free at last.
What remained was the big hole.
So there you are and here I am.
Happy as a clam!
April 5th Hudson, NY.

APRIL FOOL 2018

I have not been here in awhile.

Where have I been.

I have been here there and everywhere.

Yet –I have not left but I did leave to take a break from blogging.

I wonder sometimes what it all means to write these words to those I do not know.

The blogosphere is another mystery to me.

Somehow it all seems so like mercury—sliding—and unable to grasp.

The blog the blogger the one who writes and the one who reads.

A public and private space all wrapped into one.

Yes it is so slippery—now April 1, 2018 emerges and I am back here on the blog.

I have been busy.
Yes.
Time cures all.

Guns fire.

Elections make change.

Cash is king.

Hudson loses her center.

Cats age.

9 lives is a myth.

My life looks like those who gave it to me.

Who could think of being generous at a time like this?

Will they come forward those who fell down.

When will she get to the top.

Will the lesbian be a hero.

Can the dyke be a leader.

Did the whore bring down the ship.

Was Moby Dick real.

Did she slide home without getting dirty.

Well then is this the right angle or the left turn.

Is America yet.

Oh my my the pie is a force to be reckoned with.

Can I end the sentence with a preposition.

Did Lincoln die with his boots on.

Did those who loved women get to enter the gym.

Well we all wondered who was straight and who was gay after all.
But in reality after all it didn’t matter did it?

Didn’t they pray like there was no tomorrow.

Really now really now we were ready to call it quits but the game could not end.

The cards were stacked against us.
Would the President load the dice as the clock moved to midnight?
Passover, Easter,  and a Full Moon this is auspicious.

Martha

she brays in the play “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf”..

I ask do we have

time for this play

or another play.

Do we have time

to ponder why

some one does

something or

reasons why.

Do we mine our

thoughts in a time

of liars?

Yes Lying Liars.

Does Aristotle matter?

Do we need to know

the classics or

will they die with

us.

In time of war

we sacrifice

all the culture

for bullets.

Can we learn

how to load a

gun

or run from

the executioner

who wears a vest

loaded with explosives.

Or are we ready to

fight for what

we believe in or

are we willing

like Cato to

fall on our sword

for our leader.

Who will lead in this land o chaos

is there a way

out ?

Who remembers

the way in?

That is

the question.

July 1, 2017

The Waves was a project I did 40 years ago.  The adaption was a project where I worked on the deconstruction of a text by Woolf (Chapter #1). In 1978 as a young artist working in theater I was in search of women’s voices for the stage—frankly there were few available for me to discover except in literature.  Woolf and Stein were two writers I turned to and found by working on their texts I could begin to understand the sound of language which for me became equal to the importance of the narrative.  I saw through this work on the text of THE WAVES  (Chapter #1)that organizing the sound of a text was a means to the end for my thinking.  The WAVES is a look at what I was searching for 40 years ago—We plan on sharing this text with our audience here in Hudson on July 14th, 2017.  This event is a members only event.