getting older now [who isn't getting older, no one i know] i worry about atrophying in my habits and forgetting that no matter how fucked things become living is a goddamned trip packed as it is with passion for knowledge and experience. the former is easier to do and quite frankly is a tired cliche while the latter takes quite a bit of effort.

but is that effort worth it. um, depends on the day and sometimes the time of day. yet, in spite of my pessimism there ain't nothing better than being alive and to know it. e. g. last night i was watering the garden which i sometimes do at night. i looked up and noticed the stars for the first time in what seems a very long time. i live in a city so light pollution is a barrier against the scrim of stars that have very little chance of being seen. and yet, there were more than a few in the night sky. and yes, it is a silly cliche to get all pumped by the night sky, but there you have it, and i was and i know that there is beauty to be found. if we open ourselves to beauty, that is.

and but anyway, i am getting tired of my writing style and techniques. the poem i posted here last night i think is okay but it ain't nothing new and tho i enjoyed writing it i want a greater ambition in my work. it's easy enough to become depressed and i have to fight the temptation to rip up everything i've written in the hope to begin again. that's when i know i've got to step out of my normal routines and just try to chill. in this kind of mood i want to write a manifesto on new writing ideas but that sure as hell won't do shit but make my frustrations more intense.

writing the splat poems last month helped in clearing the air. i am drawn more and more to the poetics of the messy. that the writing becomes process rather than product, even tho writing is both and the idea of product v. process sure didn't originate with me. i suppose what i'm thinking of is a kind of bad writing but done out of love and passion. not bad writing as in blah my 3-year-old can do that better and in crayon. a writing that is sensate and forward-moving with little care about being correct. deliberation, process, thought and passion all at once. 'first thought, best thought' yep 'i do this, i do that' uh huh; but also the majesty of bernadette mayer's pieces married with jimmy [the jam] schuyler's quotidian beauties.

hmm. . .still puzzling it out. however, one thing that attracted me to the new zealand poet richard taylor [link to his blog on the right] is his ideas of the poem as ongoing constructs of writing, that life is a series of palimpsests and so are the poems. each carbuncled line and cross-out are parts of the whole.

another poet, jim mccrary too works with this process. at least that is how i read jim's work. and nyc poet steve dalachinsky as well writes wonderful improvizational styled pieces. i've long been an admirer of dalachinsky's work.

so now i read that sf writer dodie bellamy's soon-to-be published barf manifesto is a piece about passion and error as 'an intellectual stance' which more than likely solidifies my own thinking better than i can manage. can't wait to read it and adopt its ethos as my own. in the meantime, i'll recharge my batteries by going back to my roots so to speak. one of the things i love about the worst kinds of world cinema is the lack of artifice which becomes part of the art. recently, talking to a friend about film stock in '70s exploitation films i said how much the washed out graininess becomes part of the aesthetic upon which my friend asked if i thought the filmmakers used cheap film as an aesthetic choice or if they used them because they were cheap. i said their financial choices became part of the look and appeal of grindhouse movies.

i am trying to recharge my batteries by watching movies, reading poems and pulp and reading magazines such as shock cinema and pop-culture blogs like scar stuff [this blog needs updating; i find it endlessly entertaining and informative with a lively collection of links] and just trying to get like a jedi knight and chill and use the force to the best of my abilities.

we'll see how it goes. meanwhile, see below, a reading by steve dalachinsky.