I'd like to say life has been busy, but it really hasn't, i've settled into my schedule of classes and socializing. I've realized that my life is almost entirely set for me right now, not in terms of determinism, but in the way that i have scheduled it. For example: Monday i teach from 3:30-8, and then i drive up to Su's for dinner. Tuesday i have Modernism at 9:45 - 11, which precededs my 5 hour break, which leads to Chamber choir from 4-5:15. I drive home and have supper at about 6. Tuesday night is set aside for studying and working on papers and research. Wednesday i have Popular Lit at 2:30-3:45, i then drive over to ACAD to see Su, hang with some friends, and then go to Safeway (always safeway), to get grocery's for dinner. We make dinner, watch some TV, and i go home. Thursday's i have Modernism at 9:45-11...i practice choir, and studying during my break, have choir at 4-5:15, after choir i eat a piece of pizza (its always pizza because i don't trust anything else at our cafeteria), then i have Theatre at 6:30 - 9:30pm...i start driving home, i call Su to talk, and i go to bed. I have PopLit on Friday at 2:30, and half the time i skip because its a silly little class meant to boost my GPA, after class i go to ACAD and hangout for awhile, and then go over to Su's, again its usually Safeway first though. Dinner. Friday's are date night and we usually try to go to openings or shows. Tonight though its her roomates birthday dinner, and we're going for Morrocan. Saturday we're having a sort of Post-Thanksgiving dinner, potluck style for everyone at Su's place. Next week it starts again....
I haven't written here in awhile, which is a shame, i used to post here quite frequently. I guess i'll give an update as to what the heck i've been up to.
May: I spent most of the month of May in England. I went there on an English trip with school to study how authors used the landscape in their writtings, and how landscape effected them in return. The trip was extremely eye-opening, and wonderful. Lots and Lots of stories.
June: After I got back to Canada i needed to find a job to pay for my month in England. So i searched, and i searched. It can be very hard to find a job after high school gets out, because all the students fill all those openings quite quickly. Eventually I found a job: working over-night at Walmart doing renovations. I know, it sucks. I'd rather not talk about it...
July: Walmart took it....
August: Ditto. Except the last weekend in August i went camping with Su and a bunch of people from ACAD down near Pincher Creek. Su and I took some time away from the group to go for a walk, and being such an outdoorsman i decieded we should go on a hike. After about 30 min of walking we turned off the road, and started walking directly up a hill, headed for the 'summit'. As i entered a clearing I looked up and saw a wolf. Big. White. Looking directly at me. In one smooth motion i took a step backward, turned around, and started walking down the hill. I calmly said to Su, who hadn't seen it "Su, you should follow me this way", to which she replied "Why?! we were going this way before, are we changing out minds again?!"- now i feel i should explain her comment. Earlier i had led us the wrong way, which resulted in us walking back the way we came, for about 1 km, and it was really hot out, so i can understand why Su was a little perturbed. I calmly responded "Su, you REALLY should come this way, slowly". She gently turned around, and started sauntering down the hill again. After we were a safe distance away she asked 'Why did we turn around', and i said 'Because there was a wolf there, looking right at us'. Now, i wasn't concerned that there was a wolf there, i was concerned because i saw the wolf in the first place, and secondly, that it didn't run. If it didn't run, that meant it had a reason not to run, which is what troubled me. I explained this to Su, and she said 'i wouldn't have been scared', which was all fine, and as she said this, a June Bug flew passed her face and she shrieked....
My Darling Su I think im going to write another poem for you This one will have ryhmn So it will take a little more time I also want to work on my beat So, please, your attention i wish to keep It's hard to keep from sounding cheesy When words that I insist on rhyming are easy Which, to me, Is where true talent must be For use of metaphor and anaphor Are much more difficult to make cause for And it really points out the weakness in my vocabulary When the only word i can think to use next is; Larry. That is a big problem you see Because Larry isn't even a word, its an addresse! Now i've gone and fallen astray From the point that i've been trying to convey
This next month is going to be very hard And i don't think i'll be much of a bard As i travel to and fro You know how things go: You get caught up in the particulars of life And they cause you such stress and strife; Everyone wants something from you So much so that you don't know what to do. You get frustrated with yourself And peace of mind finds little wealth. See, this is where i always step in And hold you until the beat kicks in; And your feet feel as though they've grown wings Lifting you above all this toil and sting, To the cloud that is your bed Which we would prefer to be upon instead Feeling my beard tickle your face Holding you still, calm, and in place Fighting away the calamity of stress By mearly holding you to my chest. And see, that last line is what is called 'half-rhyme' When syllabes don't match all the time. But again i digress, Which is a problem of mine i must confess.
But Su, This month i won't be there for you And when you feel like life is overwhelming Like all the bad things are circling and surrounding Think of the times we spend upon your sheets When it is the stress we beat, Painting each other images of the future And of the summer, within nature Our walks, Our talks, Of how things should be Making our own world of clean White washed canvas' Waiting to be brandeshed For the first time with paint Letting us be our own saints Setting life as it should be
Stress will come This is not new under the sun So when those moments threaten to steal away All of that peace that you've made Remember our world where we exist And in which no pain can persist. Our Lost City of Atlantis; Our Tower of Babylon. Perhaps this place only exists in our mind A world like no other place; We set it apart as a State of grace, For it belongs, and exists to us alone And it remains our home. And the way that poets typically end poems like this Is by adding a 'volta' to add some bliss As It takes away from the melancoly By adding a bit more fun and folly. There is no way to prove that Atlantis exists For it is only a rumour that persists Do you remember the security guards theory That states Atlantis is mearly Antartica in disguise? And in terms of proof, love can be demonstrated in giving; Our relationship consists of the efforts we give of swimming towards a lost city Where love is rumored to be living. And everyone else is left looking for this Atlantis.
Your entire body shakes when you laugh As if your sense of humor was built on a fault line And the coast of your heart falls into the ocean of your self and I'm left looking for this Atlantis Left looking for this place that exists in stories told by old men who were there when mathematics assured them Their willingness to believe was greater than their determination to dismiss I'm left looking for Atlantis Regardless of the scientists that insist my efforts would be better spent unearthing clues to where the wild things went Try as it might Faith can't put a dent in fact So we must settle for watching science reenact the world As if the universe was curled around this globe And is we consider that the universe is never-ending then we're not even a microbe We're like a death threat from a pacifist, we're nothing But the Hizenburg Uncertainty Principal states that: "Nothing is fo' shizzle" And the interesting thing about that is it insures the principle itself can't even be a fact But we still act as if this time we can see the forest through the trees Regardless of the softwood lumber levy we fall in line like reforested pine It's all straight rows where everything grows a little less wild and a little more hum-drum-ho-hum We come from a mentality that rarely sees the horror in symmetry Or the beauty in non-conformity We insist that for us, everything must be clear cut But what about philosophy? What about the tree that fell in the forest that no-one was around to hear? It's a little less clear and a little more deep Deep like: If Oprah Winfry farts in a bathtub and no bubbles come to the surface is there an alternate universe where the price of gas is cheap? Possible... But we can't prove it Anymore than we can prove that light can move fast enough to stop a monster hiding in the closet We deposit our faith in fear but clear our minds to the possibility that maybe we as adults secretly sometimes still get scared of the dark Things that go bump in the night And I can't prove that I have ever loved anyone But despite the smoking and the overweight body, I want to grow old with you Go through muscle and joint pains to the point that every time it rains we can feel it in our knees Get arthritis so bad that every time we move we sound like two bowls of Rice Krispies We're all: Snap, crackle and pop But we still take the time to stop and take the time I'm looking for Atlantis Letting faith turn this fiction into fact As if I've tracked this missing continent for decades and all I know so far is that it's somewhere under water I'm looking for clues in those blurry photos of UFOs and thinking: If aliens are so smart then why don't they start making their spaceships look like airplanes? That way we'd just point to the sky and say "Oh look, an airplane! How commonplace and not at all suspect" We're all shipwrecked on this idea that everything has to be explained But maybe we just need to believe that lemming jump off of cliffs to prove that they love us And sure, that sacrifice is as empty as the box of condoms politicians used when they thought that could fuck us But it's nice to believe that somebody up there cares enough to plummet onto jagged backbreaking rocks in an attempt to tell us we're beautiful Tell us that as far as life goes Our fingerprints are like snowflakes We leave them on everything but they melt in the time it takes to touch someone's tongue But if we're lucky Maybe we'll remember long of the sunken cities of lost continents This is for each child who is a monument to the ones who came before Maybe the best that we can hope for is that those we leave behind find comfort in knowing They were born out of love and not science That biology explains the how but love explains the why So in the event of our deaths we herby bequeath all of these words to you And they are only meant to say that uncertainty is something everyone goes through And there's not much in the way of proof but believe me We loved you We held our breaths for your first step, your first word We laughed when it finally occurred to you: lemons are sour This is for every time love becomes the finest minuet in the darkest hour This is for those who scour the streets wondering where the wild things went For the believers who leant us their madness This is for everyone we miss And this is for the children who were lost Sadness is nothing more than the cost of being able to smile once and a while And grief is the trial we stand to offer evidence that your fingerprints were left on our hearts and our skin And in terms of proof, love can be demonstrated in giving Our lives consist of the efforts we give of swimming towards a lost continent Where you are rumored to be living
The stairwell is 5 flights, and is covered from floor to cieling with different kinds of paint; whether its aerosal, oil, acylic, or some other medium, the entire stairwell is covered. The first time i went in it was overwhelming. There is so much colour there it will amazing anyone. There is also something to be said about having a subversion like that inside a school that teaches 'high art'
Let us take a sack of spray paint and spray paint over the paintings. Let dance through Paris; kiss in the shadow of the louve, crawl inside its windows, scroll manifesto's over its canvas', write morris' code on the sculputers, roll a sleeping bag on the floors to sleep inside of, tell one another a story by flashlight, unearth everything from before, burry each other inside the other, feed grapes to the ants, light fireworks in the fists of sleeping kings; kill a monach. Break back outside and find a world to do all these same things to; up and upon against break the bricks, climb over them, and when the sirens scream, laugh aloud,hold my hand and run fast. Run through the streets with me with a bunch of bottles, a bucket of gasoline, a mouthful of matches, a pocket full of paintings and fresh faced batch of policemen to chase the fires we are lighting, laugh on a shoulder of gold. And i thought that the museums where cemetaries where the dead paid the wall to hold what we had so that we could walk through what we once were, And children take their sculls to turn into gardens, to pluck for forefathers and farther stars, that on some nights resemble an armless mother praying for her arms to return. Every tooth that we tear from our jaw to fling at the black gloved riot soldiers as another shadow that we are trying to lose. Let every giggle be filled with lust; let us laugh this night away and i will fuck you like you were a prayer. I could save me by having my mouth around you, and i will hold you afterwards like you were the pullpit and i was the sky, and this love that danced between that hardness was a telephone line of holiness that those two things spoke through. Take me into your heart like i was a saint, and you were a face of forgivenss blooming in a valley destined to sink further. Be a river with me; Be the storm; the bend in the path; the front porch; the heat in the south; be a boot full of banjo strings; a fist full of written songs; a mouthfull of chocolate dust. When they come to take us, stab them between the eyes. Do not take your hand from around mine. Make a fist with the other, and punch spines like guilds, spit, sweat, kiss them like a grandmother. How will open mouthed terror love filled? And when they come to cut out hair and ask to hear pennince come from inside us, say with me loud and trembling, but loud and clear that: "i have already emptied myself. I kissed regret goodbye, took the hands of another backwards angel, and rode backwards into the rain" When the hangman of morrow comes to hang the sun in its daily execution say this with me: "'Sarah we are apples, our love is an apple; im unbuttoning my shirt; painting a circle over my heart, please,, just shoot straight."
-This poem is rooted in history. Milos is a greek island that is home to the Venus de Milo (the famous statue of aphrodite), which is not on display in The Louve in Paris.
Stress will come
This is not new under the sun
So when those moments threaten to steal away
All of that peace that you've made
Remember our world where we exist
And in which no pain can persist.
Our Lost City of Atlantis;
Our Tower of Babylon.
Perhaps this place only exists in our mind
A world like no other place;
We set it apart as a State of grace,
For it belongs, and exists to us alone
And it remains our home.
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