Sleep, dear, fleeting sleep, in
such small portions you seep
into my world as I am curled
up hoping my sanity I can
keep. Oh snoozing is not
losing when in my mind I dream. I
am at peace under the sheets, the
landscapes agleam. Precious
dozing, as not so closed
in, all my fears I can
not see. I am the narrator, I am the
creator, all the stories are for me. So I am drifting
the weights are lifting from my shoulders not hunched. Sweet
serenity, calm amenity, no nerves bunched.
Oh, Mondays…
Photo by LincolnStein
I would’ve loved to change the world somehow…
Just me, a frizzy haired kid with a blog
and a cigarette-fuming will to set the skies ablaze if I could.
Photo by Jamesyu
If only I could taste by ear,
I’d have myself a six-pulse slice
of pumpkin-pomelo pie.
Black bags billow through,
like half-imagined tumbleweeds,
across plantations of scrapers
and irrigated subway streams
like congested pools of polluted blood.
This here’s no urban jungle,
but a farm, like any other farm out there—
serving to harden you and callused palms.
A cultivation of a culture,
of neglected men in the worn-out boots
of one mean generation;
a labor-life, where leisure
is a fresh scent of paint fumes,
mingled weed and man manure.
Things may tame the animals of the ghetto
who crave designer branding and shackles,
while feeding off the fodder of other men,
fueling feuds between Fifth Street
and Ninth Street’s gang of thieves.
This here’s a wilderness’ nest,
hatching the cuckoo’s cracked egg.
S’why we’re all so fucked up.
Isolated too, the lone farmer-man,
his nose stuck on a field of glass,
Those artificial pixels light the twinkle in his eye.
At least he makes his own foods, his crops
are what they call art here, because what else
can sustain him in such a place devoid of people?
So, Red Tails comes out in four days, and I’m sure we’ve all heard the big controversy over this movie.
Directly from CNN;
”…Hollywood continues to want to tell us that somehow seeing blacks on the big screen is anathema to their values…”
The article certainly calls for debate. Is this really an example of racism? Or reverse-discrimination? That seems to be the main debatable question.
As for my own thoughts, I understand that Hollywood is really only interested in what makes money - it’s a business after all - and surely there’s nothing racist about that.
However, I do wonder why the fact that this movie has a majority black cast is even pointed out. And because it’s pointed out so nicely, I wonder why wouldn’t a movie with a majority black cast make money in Hollywood’s eyes?
I love this comment posted by a user:
…it must have something to do with the simple fact that audiences want to see movies starring people who look like and act like they do or who otherwise have some role in the “white world” that white people can relate to. I think part of the appeal to white people of entertainers like Oprah and Michael Jackson and sports figures like the Williams sisters and Tiger Woods, not to mention the President of the US, is that they operate in a largely white world. If white people were only exposed to them in an environment populated exclusively by blacks, I don’t think white people would find them as interesting. A film that is not about athletes, entertainers or black US presidents but rather is populated entirely by black characters (of a certain time period no less) is difficult to digest for some. There’s no getting around that. That said, Slumdog Millionaire, with its entirely Indian cast, appealed to a wide audience. So maybe Roland Martin is onto something when he speaks of it all having to do with marketing.
Is it a question of race? Or the deeper question of the general public’s personal taste as governed by Hollywood and the media? And why is the media/Hollywood in command of what the general public will or will not like?
I guess the answer will come on January 20th, when the opinions of audiences and critics are revealed.
My last december night, enjoyed
best when indoors in dark spaces,
where, ear pressed to window,
hear the rhythmic whisperings
of rainfall lulling deep sleep
to cuddled bodies beneath tin roofs
satisfaction in the smudges made
as snug breath caresses glass,
and doughy fingers trace
the trail of patterned drops,
and still come out wet somehow,
yet with all the worries gone away,
that feeling of quiet abandon
seeps down through the spine,
flashes of light expose the magic
of rain-dripped dreams
heavy eyes closing, half hoping,
please rain, never stop falling.
Darkness sets slowly,
revealing his absence in stark clarity.
I fumble after things: a wrinkled shirt, once worn,
or the stiff pages of comic books once leafed through,
the ghostly imprint of a kiss-stained coffee mug
which my trembling hands carelessly drop
in a single, piercing moment of glass-shattering shivers.
I am left empty-handed; I become
the remaining pieces of fragile china,
forgotten in shadows.
Been reminiscing lately
to when London bridge was falling,
how the day ignited faces red
and our expressions crawling,
while we breathed in fumes
of summer’s sweet dandelion plumes.
And in my pigeon-toed haste,
stumbling after reason
for these fingers interlaced,
like the plait of pigtail braids
how they danced as mates engaged.
Little legs dangling from a tree,
naive indeed to think that we
could ever end up K-I-S-S-I-N-G.
So I see you strive to be a poet, sweetheart,
yet you don’t write anything down,
just draw me out and draft demands, do you?
I have had my bottom lip tugged,
stretched, until it was up and over my head—
my eyes gorged out by my own teeth and still dangling
out of their socket, spinning furiously by a single nerve.
I’ve endured a legion of Poe’s ravens
strike and peck and strike and peck
at my pair of blood-wept eyes until they
burst
and vomit flies free!
I have had pangs of hallucinated hunger induce
my ravenous self to bite into the forbidden fruit
only to see that it was actually stone and cracked!
The juice that dribbled down my chin was just ribbons of red sin.
Night in a suburban street finds an eerie stillness
in your soundless sleep. All you do is dream, honey,
when I crave for your sufferings and lust after your tears.
I want to see you cry until you’re swollen up and numb
and left with nothing, honey. I’ll suck you dry and leave you empty,
darling, a carcass of your former self to be wrung and
flung and left to hang among the clothes lines,
dead and dreamless above rhododendron beds.
Don’t be afraid to be insane, honey.
Inspiration ruptures out of you,
and I’ve been inside that active volcano,
spitting and spewing out not fire, but smoke
you can’t even grasp at, child, and the only
thing you can do is gasp and cough and wheeze
and intake poison, sweetie. (Poets are known to die young.)
And yet, still you choose to call me. I’m in the middle of it and
I’m burned alive and screaming, falling and spiraling and
I’m fading, yelling at the top of my lungs for help, my love.
For you to wake up from reality, for you to listen to the nonsense,
yet you don’t know how frustrating it can be, lost for all eternity—
the images, the emotions, and the words are gone forever, love
when you don’t write anything down.
Another bite of that pizza slice,
dignity chewed up in wads to swallow.
Seems tasty, but I’m getting fat and tired,
gray hair as stringy as the gooey cheese.
I pluck out pepperoni to stare at ventricles of brain.
The sauce I lick off my fingers with a smack of my lips,
drowning out familiar songs of Viagra commercials.
Sweat drops unhindered
for there’s a knock on the door and I do not get up,
I do not get up.
My greasy fingers leave their imprint
on the buttons of my control,
switching the channel down and volume up
on the Lifetime network.
(It’s about time something good comes on.)
Bite after bite, I ingest what I cannot taste,
I become what I cannot see: the empty cardboard,
stained, and coupon cut-outs advertise
the burning in my chest. The phone’s upon the counter,
but I do not get up. I lay down,
try to plea to the shadows,
belching out what sounds like a moan.
