Is anyone out there known to have learned skills of building just so that they could destroy, to start anew? If these walls could talk. If they could absorb.
Would they swell, well, wail?
With grief of past renters? Laden with uncomfortable memories of someone’s poor sitcom taste? Or spooked by the inability to comprehend an old tenants’ idolatry? Or find humor in and joy of private dancing with the likes of us they contain?
Are they pleased with the blush-colored tiles that coat their kitchen parts?
Do they revel in the bed banging against them ferocious, and ache for more as well?
Because if everything has energy, then there stands a chance at a secret life that we know as much of as to think that birds just migrate without communication, but magnetism and instinct? Greedy, narrow, humankind.
So then, am I their favorite thus far?
Should I lean up against them and divine their favorite music? It must be Nina- the album with her in front of a pond in Central Park…
The walls. Inert and unable to grow, only wither in time. Unable to self-fortify. But- able to hear? God ears? You are probably not alone.
Turn off your halogens. Be true be true! If someone or something is always the witness, could you really be you?
You can find a hammer and smash till you’re blue. Or bang out a window to let the air through.
If these walls could listen. If they’ve been listening all along- how would you do?
Posts Tagged ‘entertainment’
Considering Wall Witnessing
Posted in art, musings, ordinary madness, photography, poetry in motion, prose, random, Uncategorized, tagged art, entertainment, humor, life, observations, photography, poetry, random, reflections, street photography, writing on January 26, 2018| 2 Comments »
1 and 2 Sides of Same Name
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged entertainment, musings, opinion, random, writing on January 11, 2018| Leave a Comment »
There are 2 places to write from/ 2 ways to write.
The 1st: when one is writing, journal quality- where feelings are expressed in reporting fashion.
It is often sourced from the raw heart, but the other side of the heart. The side where the flowers don’t grow or pepper the in-between-places of words. Visual description is scant, exchanged for survival mode.
The side that is blood-swollen and rugged tender raw. Like half an hour to an hour into a wasp sting.
It’s to the point.
An aggregate of hurt, observation, and questions on the factory line at the beginning of processing.
It’s fresh and harmed. Or fresh and ruby red. Or fresh and perplexed. It’s still warm and may be beating.
The 2nd is once the thoughts have entered the bloodstream. Once the thoughts have become brain food, or maybe even the body has digested all the possible health or false nourishment and excreted the rest. Or maybe it’s sights upon describing the excrement. Or sights on love. Or sights on love that was. Or a safer place in reprieve of conditioning. All in all- it’s a place where art lives. Where words form tunnels that no one’s ever taken that lead to pieces of sky no one has ever seen. And the culmination of comfort, acceptance, and understanding leads to an ability to play with descriptors and bend them now to explain what was once impossible to catch in 2 hands/ to hold in one’s mind.
The same person will write in these two fashions. It is chew then swallow. It is egg then omlette. It is crawl then walk.
The brain intakes, assimilates, activates.
Reading a memoir of an author is likely to be the opposite of their flower writing. If you want to learn about a recommended writer, learn their work before grasping at their version of themselves. It is sleep then dream. But more so learn then understand.
*formerly titled “How To Read About Authors (for Dummies)”
Clouds are Easy
Posted in art, creativity, inspiration, love, meditation, musings, nature, photography, prose, random, travel, Uncategorized, tagged art, entertainment, games, inspiration, life, marqui, mind games, observations, personal, photography, random, reflections, science, street photography, travel, true story on January 7, 2018| 8 Comments »
Eves-dropping on neighboring cloud watchers across the isle:
–Young girl- maybe age 7- speaking in absolutes: “I see a hand.”
–Man beside her- maybe mother’s boyfriend: “I see it.”
Pause. Watch. Stillness. “I see some mashed potatoes.”
–Girl -calm: “Oh yeah. Yeah.”
“I see a coyote without legs. Do you see it?
Planes are huge. Almost bigger than the world. We’re almost to space. Did you know that?”
–Man attempts an explanation about atmosphere, stratosphere… starts out strong. Flounders. Reverts to talking about library books on the subject.
Girl turns her head from the window of Largest Views. She finds a heated shaft of sunlight taken to sitting on the top of her hand from the other side of the plane. My side.
Reflection projection.
Steady she holds it; her sun-hand. Her free hand whirling small fingers atop its partner’s radiance. Spinning a small dance above orphic golden. She wants to show her mother who sleeps;
Looking back and forth from mother to glow, mother to glow, mother to glow.
She is a kind child. I can tell. Her mother rests on, while dutifully with providence, she hosts the light.
Girl sees me looking and offers a soft-kid smile my way. It’s too late to look away. I’ve been indulgent in my dreamy observing.
Down she puts the sun.
Back to cloud-watch; the line between boredom and the ease of nothing else to do, giving call to the deciphering of true existences.
High game, low stakes.
Infinite interpretive possibility.
A pooh-bah baby; she tells what’s what. The crown in passing light.
In a flash I’m brought back too.
Times no linear thing when you’re suspended in the air and have exhausted your ink pad and reading resources and suddenly… I’m young again, head-scratching, squinting wonder, looking for what’s really out there.
By and by eking out that dolphin pattern of automatic coordination involving focus, locus and vergence.
If I’d stare hard enough… If she’d stare hard enough…
Now the mother’s eyes are opened and the three talk of sun. I hang on their words like heavy warm suds sky bath; well intentioned interloper that I am.
They share curiosities over cardinal directions; the great Atlantic acting to anchor the origin. Wondering just what they’re flying over. Wondering where the man’s house might be very right now.
In an instant the plane tilts- revealing a ground covered in snow. A secret held from us by the simple act of sheltering our eyes. Covered in snow, dotted in trees. All small far down. Snow inside of snow.
The clouds have begun to thread, actively uniting, they soon mimic the land below as a blanket and a few levels higher measured by hundreds of feet, or thousands if you’re good at guessing jelly-bean-jar-quantities; filtering sun, laying across us fly-ers, dressing us in riches of watermelon and orange juice two hues.
Girl, Man, Mother are quiet. My mind quite quiet. And the clouds- speak silence full into the figures we see of them. Wipe away to white. Begin again if you please.
You’re in the Jungle Now
Posted in art, creativity, inspiration, love, music, musings, ordinary madness, poetry in motion, tagged art, bizarreO land, color, creativity, discipline, entertainment, inspiration, musings on May 9, 2015| 4 Comments »
What’s the method to your madness? You know- the one where you pick at the scab or reactivate the cut again again, or bang your ever forever perma-bruise; only this time instead of puss coming out you get a fine, silky, viscous magic thread of your own musical splash.
Splash splatter shit.
All over your walls.
Hope your carpets’ not too absorbent, ma’ dude.
This welcomed mess; The kind you’ve been keeping your chin up for and doing all your positive visualization practices and your “this too shall pass” breaths. You’re totally pumped because boOm- your muse showed up just when you were trying to name it and give it form, and now all you want to do is make it suiting, stitchy clothes and dress it up like an angel. But it’s no angel, darling. You traded your soul for you art. And you knew that already.
Why do artists carry the cross? Why so encumbered? So fickle and burdened? I’m feeling a Stevie Ray Vaughn song coming on… something about sales… so dust off the wax and we can get those memory cells back on board. I don’t know that you’ll need them if you’ve got the right momentum, but a brain buzzing and flexing with optimal potential only services the rest of us too.
Good luck riding the rocket. And naming the fuel source. And being aware of when you gas up. Because the moon- she waits and the broom is busy.
Draw a picture for me when you get a second. I’ll be here trying to identify my own individual sound. For now all I know is that it’s likely set in minor chords… and probably a really sexy rhythm section.
Did it!
Posted in inspiration, love, musings, nature, photography, random, travel, tagged california, city, entertainment, excitement, fun, musings, nature, photography, possibility, random, starting over, taking chances, travel on September 15, 2014| Leave a Comment »
So here you are. You picked up and you moved. Finally. You finally moved- (Good job.)
Something you’ve been talking about for a thank-goodness-noone’s-counting long of time. Three years? Four? Enough time for change to brew to the point of the bubble over. So you ride out in the cascade, thinking of the times where you were so detached from holds and your spirit was far freer, though before you left, feeling tied-down you did not. You just felt… cozy. Comfy. Copacetic. And it’s those C words that can be dangerous.
Because that’s no place to stand.
So you took off in the name of new C words, like new conquests. Like crazy. Like can’t stop won’t stop. And it can all just be so fun. If only you let it. And if only you can conceive of it. Or perhaps just let. it. go.
So you done gave it all up. The pretty house. The fun & loving social circle. The sweet man. The main income sources. In the name of…?
And you’re not quite sure, when people ask you this every-day-question, of quite how to respond to it. The answer varying, dependent on mood, on weather, on wind velocity, or based upon the most recent strangers’ interaction. All in all it is hardly surmisable.
It is the untouchable. And it takes focus to remember that not all is to come with a black and white outline. And it is to show that sometimes you gotta pull that thread from the old sweater. Perhaps those tired sleeves’ll fall off. Or it’ll just keep going until your left with a new ball of yarn. And you can be kind and donate it to the kitten company, bringing them a smile to wiggle their whiskers. Or you can go yarn-bomb the town.
And that’s California, man. The land of possibility.
The golden state, for it’s expanse, and so-many-subcultures, museums & eateries, everywhere art & art galleries & feral or lawful graffiti, mania, excitement; native pride & alcatraz take over; animal parades & freaky carnivals, pop-up-shows, seedy establishments, fresh-fortune cookies, raw struggle & swollen riches, lawlessness, confusion, and contagion, and on on on.
And ocean.
And green; for dripping night-blooming-datura plants; massive, shedding, fragrant eucalyptus, girthy taproot, secure base; established, luscious thick, envious jades; swishy, flirting-with-blocking-the-moon-palms; nooks and crannies: a dream for sleepy monkeys if only one would escape it’s captivity, or the ideal habitat for weary squatter and mangey pooch.
And brown; for trash upon trash in the city parks, don’t-drop-your-keys-in-the-gutter-because-how-dirty-streets; filthy, creepy alleyways where you must pretend not to have a smart phone or sucker you might be; curbside furniture left for days, covered in soot; mysterious weaves on the ground; white bums with black hands.
You might not have realized how grimy it could be. And how distracting, to boot.
But that’s ok- it’s your renaissance.
On your time. And you made it.
You are in charge of celebrations.
Viva su revolucion!
If You Please: A Mini Questionnaire
Posted in creativity, inspiration, love, musings, photography, random, Sexy fresh, travel, tagged culture, entertainment, fascination station, freedom, inspiration, life, miscellaneous, personal, photography, random on May 7, 2014| 20 Comments »
Can I ask you some questions? Would you be so kind as to take a moment to reflect for me? It’s about you. It’s for me… well, for now. But I have ideas OF COURSE. So if you prefer, you can answer anonymously. You can even have my personal email: thelighteningcan@gmail.com and I will respect your privacy when I reiterate. Though, I don’t think you’ll be feeling too exposed when you get right down to it.
I want to know 3 things.
- What makes you unique?
- What makes you special?
- What makes you fortunate?
I have answered these questions with my own brain to provide a template of depth I hope to find, verses some topical answer. Answer in one part, two parts, three parts… whatever. Get loose with it!
Baby L (me)
- What makes you unique?
a. Often- I’ll see people that seemed deeply embroiled in a heavy make out session, all intertwined and public. Then upon further inspection it turns out that it is in fact just one, solitary obese person.
b. A new vocabulary word that I have never used before will be on the tip of my brain upon wake, awaiting its debut in my conversations perhaps.
c. I dream about water bodies in some capacity every night.
- What makes you special?
I care deeply for justice and work towards it in some way almost every day. I have wired my life around it.
- What makes you fortunate?
a. I am fortunate because I have creative, tireless brain that when on the right trajectory has the capacity to produce beeeaaauuuty! And crazy drive. I am constantly getting new, cool ideas for art on a larger scale. I’ve always been dipped in some form of self-expression.
b. Also, I have parents that have been supportive of my zany ways that differ so strongly from their approach at life. We love each other.
c. I have a beautiful house and beautiful friends.
d. I’ve been granted with an overall positive disposition.
e. I consider myself pretty self-aware and am always striving to be my best self.
f. I got rhythm for days and I ain’t afraid of no dancefloor!
So there it is. Spice it up/ break it down. I’m listening. Sock it to me (((please!!)))!
How I Once Got My Groove Back in My 20’s, the Ocean’s Pull, & Don’t Mess with Gangs
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged adventure, art, drama, entertainment, freedom, fun, humor, life, love, mexico, miscellaneous, musings, photography, random, stencil, street art, travel on February 25, 2014| 15 Comments »
It was one of those break ups that leaves you a bag of bones. An empty vessel of a person, where all you get to be is mash up of organs working lethargically & only because they have to, long & stretched paled skin, sad mush brain, empty tired eyes, charred flaccid heart… The kind of sadness remediable by one thing and one thing only. One golden word: vacation.
So, Mexico, eh? $400 some odd bucks to get myself from the dreary rainy season that wrapped itself with prodding, icy fingers around and throughout the town that my ex and I shared that felt frighteningly small? Oh God- yes, please.
So a plane. And then some wayward nights spent in a few different places. Increasing fun. Throw in some new travel friends. Sprinkle some hitchhiking adventures in. Put me on a beach with my home girl in the middle of a stashy surf hub, full of sun-kissed surfer-boy babes and feed me a couple of drinks and you got yourself a real good story on ze boiler.
I shook my ass. I let my hair down. Real Julia Roberts kinda stuff. I was holding that. If I had to wear a neon sign reflecting my mind-heart-soul state- surely it would have flicker-buzzed that tricky, multi layered word: Healing. And with the all-too-common recklessness that accompanies a proper heartbreak, I got mine.
And I met Ernesto. His tall shadow across the sand taking over my memory. His flash of black curls. Big, knowing hands. Sexy swagger. Of calculated movement. Eyes open. He had game & was connected. He was street. He was bad. So good bad. He was in a gang… I did not realize what this meant. Either way he was very yummy. I liked him, though I was on vacation- don’t forget. So naturally I dispersed my time in many different ways…
And so Ben. Another local. A lone-wolf surfer. Compact body carved by the ocean. A total romantic. Dark & deep… In a rival gang. Who knew? And I thought he yummy too.
And so haay rebound. And so you go girl n’ shit. Allathat. And ride that wave until it crashes & lord watch for the shore.
My time with Ben turned out to be probably just four intense days together before he was convinced that he was in a painful kind of love with me, which I found quickly terrifying. He went off the deep end when I cut him off, the little bit of what we had. I’m not qualified to diagnose, but still maintain that homie was certifiably crazy, & I pity the woman who may very well be stuck with him somehow at this point of life. Needless to say I spent long days after avoiding him, which was no easy task, as there were only a handful of places where the nightlife action was. I just wasn’t ready to leave.
Truth of the matter is that either of the hes’ are not what or whom I think of when I think of the week & change spent in this spot. This little beach town- a town that healed me, gave me love, restored my spine, provided amazing times, helped me develop a shining (over) appreciation for tequila… I think not of that so much. I think of one night where the boomerang effect hit me smack in the face.
It was another night music & friends & Ernesto. Another night of avoiding poor Ben. Another night with the perfect salty air enveloping me and putting me in tropical trance… The way that breeze skimmed across my skin… I found myself on a rooftop bar where people were dancing & drinking. This is where memory & accuracy begin to get muddy. I remember free flowing, generous mezcal shots. I remember feeling annoyed that I had to keep running away from someone who wanted to work out nothing workable. I remember needing a cigarette & asking some local guy if I could have one. I thoughtlessly asked him for one in Spanish but instead of responding to me saying a simple yes or no, he chose the unscripted option of inquiring aggressively in English about where I was from. When I responded, slightly taken aback- about being from the states, he got up in my face, pointing his stranger hand right up in to my nose, to say the following: “You are from the United States and you are asking ME for a cigarette?!” And then, whilst furiously shaking: “FUCK YOUUU. FUCK YOUUUUU.” And on and on and on, with this weird stupid finger in my face, fuck youing me to pieces, backing me up until I was smashed up against the side of the building, with his terrible, angry, misdirected, spittle-maker-face against mine. And I blacked out. And did I hit him? Push? Did he push me? I’m not sure because don’t give me tequila & yell at me for your hang ups. Next thing I know, I’m in the middle of the floor but getting pulled back by two or Ernesto’s boys, while others from his crew swoop in on this guy and remorselessly remove him from my sight, pushing him down the stairs, taking him out the building, far out of my sight or anything I would ever know more of.
I remember yelling because I was shocked & drunk. Yelling because I was bugged out & confused. Yelling yelling yelling in English because I’m more used to speaking English now. Who knows what was conveyed, & I was being held back by these guys, & then there is sad, crazy head Ben with his boys, in my face- from where anyway? And now would there be a rumble? Ben- telling me to calm down and trying to hug me & drunk drunk drunk me, no memory.
I know I ran. I ran I ran I did not stop until I had to because I contained breath no more. I had run to the beach, ignoring peoples warnings against going alone to at night for various unheard, far-from-convenience-reasons, but reckless & still somewhat broken, I did not care. I needed ocean solace. I ran onto the sand & I melted. I cried cried cried cried. For more than that night or the moments of shit roof. I cried out of frustration for Ben; cried for loss of my boyfriend & how the fracture was my irreparable fault; cried for fear of/for that merciless seeming roof guy who was so angry at me who was nobody to him, & how much bitterness one must carry to hate strangers. Plump drunk dehydrating tears, bent over, standing in a loosey goosey forward fold, until I felt a sudden excruciating pain grip my legs & run up the length of my body faster than lightening. Tsunami faster. I felt like I was dry brush on fire, the flames licking me, twist biting at my skin- everything terrible. Fire ants. I had chosen my melt down spot to be perfectly situated atop a hill of fire ants. Hysterical now, in retrospect. Just perfect. But holy did they hurt so unbelievably bad. With out thought or alternative I found myself bolting-same-time-stripping soon-to-be-diving into black night ocean.
By morning the bites no longer bothered me. At least my memory does not hold that. I don’t even remember how I saw Ernesto, but I know that when I did see him, did ask him about what happened to the man from the roof, his eyes serious & fast- told me never to ask about him again. Impenetrable. I remember feeling Latino 90210 town on steroids. Tired. Drama lama ding dong.
I was done. Full. I’d had enough. My heart had been restored. I’d filled in the gaps between my vitals. The blood coursing through me- purified a la beach mode, despite the maybe murder… Ready to go home.
Haiku Break Part 4
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged entertainment, haiku, haiku break, humor, miscellaneous, musings, photography, poetry, random, weird on February 16, 2014| 6 Comments »
Crazy West coasters,
Putting Ranch on everything-
Shaming your pizzas.
Filled to the brim, I’m
fit and tied to team over
with proper fodder.
When the petals fall
on my head and in my hair,
that’s where I want them.
Is there a better
marriage of words than FUCKING
LOVELY? I think not.
We must reclaim the
word constipation. Has
untapped potential.
Riding my bike brings
peace to all the right places.
What a love machine.
Sometimes you got it,
sometimes you don’t, but don’t fret.
Can’t all be like me.
Talk to me only
in minor chords. Sullen speak
goes right to my core.
There are no boxes
that can contain me. I’m an
irregular piece.
They need a contract
making antiperspirant
mandated at gyms.
Somnambulant is
my new vocabulary
word. I woke up with it.
Just wait, icicle
Don’t pierce my heart before
I melt my own way.
You’re not a true friend
If I look in the mirror
to find spinach tooth.
Pavlovian proof-
I hunger at sitar sounds
for good Tandori.
One day I’ll travel
the world in the name of sweet
poetry. Just wait.
When it rains it pours
and your still my favorite
puddle to jump in.
Go On, Bright Sky
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged art, creativity, entertainment, fresh, inspiration, life, miscellaneous, music, poetry, random, song, unique on August 26, 2013| 8 Comments »
Part 1:
You tell me- how can I not invoke the cosmos when I’m writing? It’s a tricky thing to keep at bay when I have no control of the tides.
How can I be expected to leave the moon where it was? These arms gotta hold for something and who wants a bunch of armor or perishable groceries taking up space when tales of Venus are tugging at your tongue.
The epic love story lays in the ether, wondrously waiting it’s bounce. That finicky thing.
These hips of mine await the rhythm- the pulse of ozone before the pour.
Perpetual motion.
Part 2:
-unrelated-
These songs we create. These sketches we doodle. These seemingly insignificant sweet little diddys’. With the proper frame work they are great achievements because we allow our minds to wander into realms of the unseen and uncharted. We let roam and go spin cycle. We free range.
Here we are now, who knows for how long, standing, sitting, laying on this earth. We are fashioned to make. Fashioned to connect. Built to link- in the physical, in the mental. Here we are, the trees bare gifts, our hearts and minds the same. We are abundance from the smallest of ways: humming while we prepare food, to creating feats like the Sistine Chapel. La Sagrada Familia. And here we are still.
Even if you don’t think you’re very good. Even if a white piece of paper seems daunting- it is your duty, in a sense, to exercise your creative mind. So open up and sing and feel real good.