A Poem

I wrote this poem recently after reading some Walt Whitman (he is the poet that Nicholas Sparks' character Noah Calhoun reads from in Sparks' book The Notebook). Whitman is a man's poet, his writing is great and proves that poetry is not created and enjoyed only by those with two X chromosomes.  

                                                            Blue Song

 

My song is slow and peaceful, blue like the whisperings of the night sea.

My song is comfortable and unconcerned, it does not play as often as I’d like

It floats on a breeze and is often unaccompanied but relishes instrumental help

It is old and has been played many times before, but it is also unique

It knows who it is and thinks not of comparisons, it simply is.

It is full of emotion and sometimes indecipherable, but there is understanding for those   

          who will listen

There is learning in its simplicity and wisdom in its lack of knowledge.

It is two friends on fire sharing a warm blanket underneath a starry sky

It is two lovers sharing their day atop a world of wonder, senselessness, and pain

It is a man searching up and down for meaning and yearning for the pure love of God,

            All the while walking forward through wolves and waterfalls.

It is a sunset bleeding crimson and peeling orange over a city that is busy watching

television on plush couches.

It is a woman who knows she is not society’s doll

It is rivers running free and fast, never looking back, spilling over into torrid terrain,

Splashing equanimity like droplets of justice.

Stirring something deep within that you are not even conscious of,

Speaking to your soul like the best friend you will ever know. 

It is not formatted or structured, there is no planning, it is spontaneous and fluid, it is a

deep, dark, river of connectivity that glows brightly inside of you.

It is the vitreous veins of our sensitive condition.

It is the silver glass through which is reflected universally the caustic longing, the great

rejoicing, the hysterical laughter, the uninhibited weeping, the epic and rollicking

story of  failure, triumph, mystery, searching, finding, running, and resting.

 

Divided We Stand

I am bothered and unnerved with the level of dissension amongst Americans.  This country was founded upon precepts of justice, equality, and unity.  Today, there is such an influx of intolerance and ignorance it makes my head spin.  It makes me wonder how history has taught us so little, how, after the tragedy of the Holocaust genocide, the world stood by while people were 'systematically eliminated' in Darfur and Rwanda.  For perhaps the first time in American history our morals are as bankrupt as our banks.  I wonder why it seems to be the pattern of humanity to fear and hate that which is different.  Bob Dylan told us "don't criticize what you can't understand,"  I think often of that, and certainly at times I'm guilty of criticizing  what i simply do not understand, but i want that to end.  I am no politician, I am neither Republican nor Democrat, I am neither liberal nor conservative, and perhaps neither right nor wrong.  I guess what I'm saying is that America likes to say that 'united it stands', but the very foundation of our government is contingent upon two disparate political parties.  Our government operates under a pretense of unity, but in truth it is divided right down the middle like a chasm carved through the floor of a desert.  We post our flags in our yards and flaunt our differences of opinion, we are adamant upon separating ourselves from each other. Perhaps in truth we all just want to belong to a group, we want to feel a part of something.  We want to associate ourselves with a tribe, per se.  People display this desire as early as grade school, go to any school in the country and you will find that the athletes associate with the athletes, the theatre kids gallivant about with their thespian comrades, and the nerds play Dungeons and Dragons in the library with the other nerds.  We all want a tribe, and when we grow up and become adults we want to associate ourselves with adult tribes, like elephants and donkeys.  I mean, it all seems quite childish.  The Republicans and the Democrats have so much more in common than they acknowledge.  They should find common ground in their humanity, in their American nationality, in their love of this country, but they do not.  Instead they regard each other with animosity, because they belong to different tribes.  Divided we stand on crippled legs atop a world of ruin and beauty. 

 Belief is and will always be the prevailing killer of the innocent here upon this planet, and the reigning rapist of rights.  Belief drove planes into the World Trade Towers on September 11th, belief killed millions of Jews in the Holocaust, belief turned human beings into slaves for hundreds of years, and belief is threatening to take the rights of the innocent again in the year 2008.  Belief is a scary, amorphous enemy that lurks inside the brain and metastasizes into the heart.  And sadly, I don't think there will ever be revealed an antidote.  Keep this in mind, a fundamentalist is someone who knows they are right, and entertains no other possibilities.   I am sure of only this, I know next to nothing, and my ramblings may not even make sense, there is undoubtedly no resolution to my conjectures, and most of it is probably a cyclical carousel of logic that leaves many more questions than answers, and that is precisely why I will never stop writing, or reading!  There are too many unanswered questions!  Thanks for staying with me to the end of this rhapsody.  

Blue Like Jazz

I was in Barnes and Noble recently because I was in need of a good book and stumbled upon a title that caught my eye: Blue Like Jazz. I thought that was an awesome title, it captured the feeling of jazz music, that feeling you get when you hear someone close their eyes, contort their face and travel into that wonderful world of notes and sounds that transcend what their mouths and fingers are actually doing. Good jazz musicians, perhaps even more than others, feel the music, you can see it on their face if you watch them play live, and you can hear it in their music.  Like the blues, jazz is a style that is so feeling based, hell, it doesn't even fit into the rules of music theory, it's sort of a mystery, and i think it's very telling that both the blues and jazz were created by black slaves.  They created something lasting and beautiful in the midst of one of the biggest injustices humanity has ever seen.  (such a shame that today's generation of young black people are more into songs about getting drunk in the club that have no instruments in them at all). Seriously, I wonder what B.B. King and Buddy Guy think when they turn on the radio and hear Lil Wayne rap about his money and his bitches. Miles Davis and John Coltrane must be up in heaven jamming on their saxes and thinking of ways to bring jazz back. But anyways, I finished Miller's book Blue Like Jazz and am reading another of his called Through Painted Deserts currently, but Blue Like Jazz is full of witty, funny, and uncommonly honest writing.  It is a memoir, written in a really unstructured way that makes it even more interesting to read.  The book deals with many large ideas: God, spirituality, the flaws and deterrents of organized religion, life, love, and relationships, all without ever becoming even remotely bombastic, or annoyingly profound.  He writes very earnestly and doesn't come off as some pretentious theologian spurning all humanity for their endless array of sinful characteristics.  He is very human, and does not try to transcend said human condition with high-sounding syntax and a persistence on his own godliness.  Rather, he acknowledges the frustrations of his own humanity and the mystery of God and the universe.  He talks about his flaws with a sense of humor and reveals his doubts, fears, and insecurities in an endearing way that is easy to connect with and relate to.  I highly suggest Blue Like Jazz for anyone interested in a thought-provoking, funny, and entertaining read.  

Myspace has brought me here

I think i might be the youngest (i.e. dorkiest) blogger on blogger.com, but that will not phase me.  I love writing and it is fun to have a place to post things besides myspace, because most posts on myspace are about as shallow as a shower and as thought provoking as table salt.  My blogs are not littered with phrases like "i totally stay away from like drama...and like i know how everyone totally says that, but seriously i hate it...." Searching myspace for quality writing is like sifting for gold on the moon, which I'm fairly certain is lacking in gold.  So, anywho, I'm a big fan of words, playing with them, looking at them, speaking with them, (occaisonally) and posting blogs keeps me busy and keeps my writing chops up, so that, coupled with my intense hatred of myspace 'literature' ,(loose terminology) has led me to join the blogger.com bandwagon. Please tolerate my sometimes pointless, seemingly arbitrary, nearly always venting, posts. Gracias, and me aculpa in advance for any offensive things i am bound to say.