A POEM BY WALLACE STEVENS

bird in space

constantin brancusi

               OF MERE BEING


          The palm at the end of the mind,

          Beyond the last thought, rises

          In the bronze decor,


          A gold-feathered bird

          Sings in the palm, without human meaning,

          Without human feeling, a foreign song.


          You know then that it is not the reason

          That makes us happy or unhappy.

          The bird sings. Its feathers shine.


          The palm stands on the edge of space.

          The wind moves slowly in the branches.

          The bird's fire-fangled feathers dangle 
                                                              down. 


                                        ---Wallace Stevens
                                            1879-1955

blue feather

alexander calder

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KESELOWSKI FINDS CLEAN AIR

jr peels out from a pit stop 

The race this Sunday at Chicago satisfied what I like in a race. No wrecks. Two fenders were crunched from a run-in with the wall, both easily repairable on pit row. A motor or two blew. I saw Joey Logana cross the finish line with a blown motor. He was around fifth heading for the line and the cloud of smoke appeared behind him that says engine blew up. He crossed the finish line dragging his smoke behind. No better place to lose your engine. Nobody was close enough behind him to have advantage from  his sudden loss off momentum. Brad Keselowski took the win. I've been watching both these drivers coming on with some solid racing this year. Logano is a good driver with a passionate drive to win. When he has the car to do it with, he can run out front, in clean air, as they call it. The air at a race track during a race is not anything near clean. The pollution is worse than London or Beijing, much worse. The aroma of exhaust rich with raw gas and the molecule clusters leaving all the tires at all times gives the air it's scent particular to a good race. An upside down bowl of intense air pollution hovers above the track, over the seating area. It's part of the thrill of the race. The volume is like at a good rock concert so you cannot be heard screaming into the ear of the one standing next to you. It is, indeed, that loud. The thrill is much the same as a good concert. I saw the Cars in the early 80s and did not need ears to hear it. The surface of my body vibrated like it was all eardrum. Great concert. A band I never had the opportunity to see, Rage Against The Machine, but have all their cds. The audience at a race I felt when I was in one, was ecstatic as a Jane's Addiction concert. I make these comparisons, because it's how I felt at my one live race in Charlotte. The ecstatic part is remarkably similar. 

joey logano quik tire change

I love the rush of a race so loud you're deaf to anything else and the intense pollution, the scent in the air we've known since birth. Before oil, it was the scent of horse manure in air. The aroma is the familiar scent we are so accustomed to we don't smell it, intensified ten thousand times. Or more. I'd rather watch the race on tv. None of those ecstatic aspects of the race come across on tv, but I can see the race better on tv. And it's a lot less expensive to watch. I can see the cars working for position, passing somebody difficult to pass. Brad Keselowski started the race fairly far back in the pack. I don't remember what kept him back there. All the while he was laying back, I was thinking I'd like to see him pass everybody and win. I knew he could do it. The crew might have been adjusting the car until they found the key. When it came time, he passed car after car, drove up to the front, passed everybody in the lead and left them behind. Clean air. I've been paying attention to Keselowski this year, simply because his driving demands attention. He does not mess around. With the car that will do it for him, he'll win the race. His team has put together some good cars for him this year. Kurt Busch was tapped by his brother Kyle just enough to lose traction. Kurt started into the sideways slide, caught traction and brought it back. Didn't even lose much momentum. His ability to catch traction has impressed me about Kurt Busch's driving for a few years. I've been watching the race enough for the last three or four years to associate drivers with their numbers in some cases. 

keselowski in clean air

Early on, I was just watching the cars. I figured all the drivers were about the same ability, and they are, but there is so much else involved. The psychology of the driver. The skills of the mechanics who build the engines, the suspension, the wheels, their abilities are also about equal. If any one of the mechanics involved in a race happened to be somebody I knew, like a neighbor, I'd be in awe of his skill, his talent, the same as an artist, Jasper Johns, an example. I'm guessing at least a thousand mechanics are involved in the crews of all the cars in a race, most often 43. Not including the pit crews, which are an entity unto themselves, like ants. I am told they practice all week long and work out flexing and strengthening themselves, keeping in tune. All the crews of mechanics and pit have their lead man whose mind directs the process that brings the whole together. The studio musicians and electrical engineers involved in pop music in Nashville, LA and NY, I see artists in the same way I see the mechanics involved with the race cars. The driver races the machine the mechanics put together, a precision machine made of computer engineering, You can see it when a driver has a car that is running just right. Kevin Harvick had a good car. He was a serious contender until Keselowski's momentum took the lead by outrunning everybody else and the one nobody could catch, until #2 turned up in his rear view mirror. Keselowski made some good passes. The race in the last hundred laps was a visible race. Half a dozen cars were taking turns in the lead. It was looking like Harvick might have it when nobody could catch him, before Brad K put his pedal to the metal. 

kyle larson blew his motor

All the drivers were giving it the best they had. Their cars were as good as they could be that day. So many of the cars were equal that it made a good race of one car dominating for awhile, then something changes and another car dominates in its turn. This race satisfied my idea of a good race. It was a race from the green flag on to checker. So many good drivers and cars, it looked like the win was up for grabs between half a dozen, depending on who was in front on the last lap. Then along came #2 and left the others in his air turbulence. In attendance at the track, I would not have been able to see the subtle strategies the drivers use for passing and for blocking while they're driving as fast as the track and the car allow, holding it there in intense heat and intense noise. I watch artistry in the driving the same as I watch artistry in a dancer. I call it artistry when it is a skill that has reached the place of using intuition, feeling, emotion in the delivery. Melvin switched the tv to football when commercials came on. It was so much better to watch football than ads for artery blockage stuff to eat, beautiful cars I can't afford and erectile dysfunction. Viagra commercials bring an association in my head of Lou Reed in his song Heroin, cause it makes me feel like I'm a man, when I put a spike into my vein. On one of the Viagra commercials I hear John Lee Hooker's guitar to the melody, I like the way you walk, I like the way you talk, I like the way you walk, you my babe, I got my eyes on you. The song is just right for the commercial and at once as racist as The Little Rascals. I laugh every time I hear it, but would rather watch football. Saw some good plays. Saw some good catches, some good drives for touchdowns. Good games today. Peyton Manning, quarterback with Denver, has artistry in his skill. I see him the artist as quarterback. The referee calls were good too.  

pit row

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DONKEYS POSE FOR PICTURE TAKING TIME

jenny and jack munch carrot

jenny and jack

I'm having a hard time reading the relationship between Jack and Jenny, can't tell who is Alpha anymore. I continue to give Jack first bite of carrot honoring his status, while Jenny reaches as far over the fence as the length of her neck and head allow. She's not demanding that I give her carrot first, nor does she attack Jack when I give him carrot first. She wants the carrot too much to wait. Jack has no me-first attitude in him, even as Alpha. Jenny is me-first all the time. It's just her nature. I can't train something like that out of a four-legged, let alone a two-legged, so I flow with it. Jealousy is her nature, like lust is Jack's nature. Earlier, I went out with carrots and camera. First, I wanted to get pictures of them among the purple and yellow wildflowers. I was setting up the camera on top of a fence post zooming in on Jenny when Jack came running from another direction. Jenny heard him galloping, looked up and saw the ice cream man was at the gate, turned and slowly strolled toward us, tacking like a sailboat, like when a cat is walking in front of you wanting your attention. Jack first and Jenny following has been their pattern since Jack became Alpha, but Jenny walking this way and that, tacking, as she approaches is new for Jenny. Seeing me first is the only clue I get that Jack is Alpha. If Jenny were Alpha, she would have seen me first and Jack would have followed her. This tacking approach has no aggression in it. It's a kind of Ol Man River, laid back rhythm stroll. She steps up to the fence a couple donkey lengths away from Jack, instead of attacking him for chewing carrot when she didn't have one yet. She knew hers was waiting. 

donkey jen chomps on carrot

cleopatra donkey

Jenny is so gentle with me after not quite a year that I can see we've bonded. In the first months with her I had to hold the carrot on the open palm of my hand and let her pick it up. Fingers on the carrot she'd go after with her teeth. She was mad at me and the world in that time. She was sold by a friend Jenny believed loved her. She learned in her experience that human love is fickle compared to donkey love. She used to make a dive for my fingers with eyes flashing, not rage, but a pesky attitude wanting to see me jump to give herself a laugh. I came to feel like it was a getting-to-know-you gesture. Early in knowing Jack, he played tricks on me to see me jump. It was friendly, no intent to hurt me, just to see me jump. First trick Jack played, he run straight at me full gallop like Usain Bolt, eyes on my eyes. I did not know him well enough then to guess what he was doing. I decided not to move, in case he was trying to intimidate me. If he knocks me down, I'll get up. I didn't believe he would knock me down, but didn't have confidence, knowing nothing then about donkey mind. Jack ran up to me and made a polo pony stop with his nose two inches from my chest. He looked at me funny and it was like I heard him say, I thought you'd move. Instead of scolding him, I broke out laughing. I recognized in his look that he was playing. It is donkey play to make the other jump like it is cat play, dog play, human play, even crow play. It is basic inter-species play. It told me we were friends, we had trust between us. A couple of dogs get acquainted and find out they're friendlies, first thing they do is want to play chase, run in a circle with one chasing the other, then switch so the chaser becomes the chased, running full-blast, ears straight back, a big smile on their faces and eyes sparkling. 

jack poses to have his picture taken

jack sez get one of me like this

Jack did the same thing next day. He appeared from another direction like he'd planned it and ran straight at me, full gallop, and this time made a 90 degree left angle turn just inches from me without touching. Again, it was polo pony grace. This time he looked at me with a twinkle of laughter in his eyes. First time, I surprised him by not moving. Second time, he was ready for me not to move. I felt like that was the first time I connected with Jack consciousness-to-consciousness. We trusted each other after this game. I trusted he would not hurt me with intent. He trusted me the same. It was important to him that I laughed at his comic trick instead of scolding him. I would go into the meadow to see him with carrots and sometimes sit on the ground when the carrots ran out and watch him graze in a circle around me. He grazed right up against where I sat and in a radius of ten feet or less, all the way around. I talked to him telling him I was happy he had come to live in my meadow, told him I'd always be good to him and take care of him through the winter. He listened to everything I said, closely. Instead of looking like he was paying attention, like we humans train each other to do, he was listening while grazing. He stayed close to where he could hear me, the only real sign he was listening besides the focus in his demeanor, like his mouth was grazing and his mind was focused on what he was hearing. Even now, a year later, all Jack's attention is focused on what I'm saying when I talk to him. Today at carrot time I talked to Jack and took pictures of him while I talked. I had not yet noticed that either one of them was aware of what I was doing with the camera. 

jenny tacks her way to carrot time

jack dodges Jenny's next kick

Jenny's jealousy kicked in after she assessed I'd taken enough pictures of Jack. It was her turn. I had just taken several pictures of her face. She put her face between the camera and Jack, and paused, then stepped forward enough to put her whole body between the camera and Jack, and stood there in her I-am-Donkey Jen stance on four feet. She did not move until I moved and turned to taking pictures of her profile. She turned her face to me to get more pictures of her. She was posing. She relaxed toward Jack and he came back to the fence wanting me to take more pictures of him. He posed and posed for me. Again, I spent too much time with Jack and Jenny lit into him, biting at him, and they swung their heads and necks around like they do in their matches of biting and avoiding a bite, back and forth like in martial arts sparring. Both of them lost the attention given to posing and between pictures I heard the particular slap of Jenny's hooves to Jack's ribs. Jack swung his rear end around on her and she stepped out of his range. Jack turned to me to have more pictures taken. I got several of Jack's ears every which way and Jenny came back, pretending to graze. She wanted to run Jack away from the camera. She reached for it with her lips like she really wanted to feel it with her teeth, unaware of human concepts like breaking something. She also had an air of wanting to bite it for taking pictures of Jack, to get it back. It made her mad. Who knows? So many wildflowers in the meadow now, may soon go out with camera and spend time with them taking pictures of them. Now that I know Jenny's limit for how long she can stand to see Jack getting exclusive attention, I can time my visits with Jack accordingly. I'd like to sit down on a day when the ground isn't soaked and let them go back to grazing and get pictures of them in a world of wildflowers. The mystery for them of what that odd thing the ice cream man pointed at them is evidently solved to their satisfaction. Now that the donkeys are aware of what I'm doing with the camera, they will pose for me like show donkeys. Sometimes.    

jenny's back

jack got an itch

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9/11 BLOOZ

diana toma

30"x 48" mixed media on canvas

It has been September 11 all day. It's a day I don't pay attention to the news. It's all 9/ll corporate news-speak. I'm sympathetic in my heart for everyone concerned who survived or left the body by surprise one morning at work. I'm sympathetic with everyone in NY that day and soon after. I have no patriotic feelings around it. I don't believe anything we're told about it. Don't know what happened and will not know in this lifetime. I only see it as first day of American police state. It miraculously gave birth to the Patriot Act, the virus that deleted the Constitution. After WW2, Remember Pearl Harbor justified perpetual war thereafter. Now Remember 9/11 justifies police state and eternal war on poor people around the globe. Keeping Wall Street booming. It's been a major disappointment in my life to see the American people throw away democracy with such a popular zeal. Even in the most jaundiced moments I'd have never seen it coming. In hindsight, it's clear as 1-2-3. 9/11 makes me question why I pay attention to the news at all. I do, however, see certain progressions acting out step-by-step giving a sense of what's coming and explains much of the noxious malaise in the air now. It helps me understand the senselessness that seems to be in the air. It's everywhere. What was bad before, like poverty and prisons, is worse now. I've not seen a single honey bee this year. Have seen some bumblebees, though so much smaller than usual they look unhealthy. A lot of flowers that seed this time of year have no seeds. I saw a relative few butterflies this year. The Joe Pyes in flower used to be covered by shimmering halos of butterflies. This year I'd see one butterfly, sometimes two. We're in serious trouble. The television has kept us asleep while Capitalist excess swept us aside. We'll lose hi-speed internet soon, as Comcast and Time-Warner are spending millions on lobbying to take what democracy is in the internet away from us. It will happen. USofA is about money, not us.

everyman

This is where 9/11 takes me. I can't get any feeling from the incident having to do with flag waving and memorials. It's too serious a matter for me. It's not something to celebrate. I know, three thousand plus. It makes the event all the worse. I don't even want to go into it. It's too dark and murky a place created by mis- and disinfomation. I must let this go, must separate self from concerns about it. I've come to see 9/11 a moment in a country on a downhill run that kicked in the nitrous oxide, NOS. I'm glad to be in the last years of this lifetime. Maybe next time I can turn up in the mountains of Romania with parents who play traditional music of the region, a place that hopefully has nothing America wants. My greatest disappointment with Obama is that he did not charge Bush, Cheney, Rummy and Rice with war crimes. He symbolically accepted their war crimes into American infallible exclusionism. It wasn't like he really had a choice. He, too, is a corporate marionette. I must concede that what I wanted for the USA all along has been its own ideals, the ideals we're taught in school. Like much else we're taught in school, it must be unlearned to function out here in the world, so to speak. I'm naive of what is going on. I live in a world that I see diminished day by day so fast it makes the head swim. On the one hand, I would like to be like my friends who aren't interested in anything on the news, pay no attention to politicians, don't vote, just live their lives at home with the family bringing up kids, work, hunt, grow a garden, have a riding mower and a pickup and ride the economy's ebb step by step. On the other hand, I like having some insight into the "big picture." I didn't realize before today what a gloom 9/11 brings over me. So much died that I thought was good with the falling men and women and others who didn't make it. The planes did not implode the buildings. That's the beginning and the end of it for me.  

photo by constantine manos

Swing down sweet chariot stop and let me ride, Swing down sweet chariot stop and let me ride. I hear George Clinton in my head and see him on stage with the Funkdelics, Swing down sweet chariot stop. The world would not be real without George Clinton and his beautiful song, Fantasy Is Reality In The World Today. Just keep hangin in there, my granddaddy used to say. Something like that. I'm ready to start calling for a chariot to pick me up and take me to what's next, be lifted up like Ezekiel into a ufo and zoom away at light speed to a place where people have evolved past conflict and killing, and die there. Sounds like Costa Rica. I'd rather die on my mountain. I could not leave my mountain. I could not leave my culture or my friends or Caterpillar without dying. The corporate takeover of our government sideshow is in my mind. Lord Have Mercy. Why do I want all that shit in my mind? All I have to do is turn off that channel in my mind, switch channels. I have control. I could change my focus to the Paris Surrealists, look at pictures and read the writings, read books about the Surrealists. Were I to give as much attention to them as I give to our DC government, I'd have something a whole lot more interesting in my mind after a year. Yesterday I ordered a cd by Boubacar Traore, a singer and guitar picker from Mali. It's the lope of the music, the walk of a camel, a long walk on foot, that pulls me to this music now. He's from a city in the desert near the Niger river. His music flows into me from another world, from outside the world of my experience, foreign, exotic to my ear as a one-string violin. Something new. A new musical experience. I could take myself on my own light-speed flight by switching channels of my focus of attention. I could be reading a biography of Constantin Brancusi or the new biography of Vincent van Gogh. Or have a funkathon listening to George Clinton. 

charles ray

I found the picture at the top, the angel painted today, September 11, on facebook by my facebook friend Diana Toma. She said she had been working on it, was dissatisfied, washed the image off and went after it to satisfaction. A friend who saw it said he saw the towers and the scene on the ground. Diana suddenly saw it. She did not know she had painted the towers, nor did she know she'd painted the chaos on the ground. She was painting an angel making no association in her mind with 9/11. She said she felt like she must have channeled it from the energy of the day, but her mind did not see it. I love the image without the association, but its way of happening without the artist knowing it, slipping around conscious mind, gives it a quality that makes it live. Diana's paintings and drawings have the spirit of life in them. As in the angel's face, Diana's faces are living, individual faces. First time I saw the image, I made no connection by association with 9/11. I saw it an angel between two worlds. The instant I saw the facebook comment about the towers, there it was, like a Rauschenberg silkscreen. I can still see it without seeing the towers. I see it back and forth, with and without, and see it both at once. The image on the one hand is independent of the 9/11 association and on the other hand could be a poster for the Oliver Stone movie. The quality of being both at once, yin and yang together in the turning circle, gives it life. In the angel's face I see a child's innocence looking to God in a beseeching prayer for her mother's life. It's a powerful image. Diana's images are so powerful with feeling they have a living presence. She can paint a cat such that I feel the presence of cat. This is her gift, the power of the feeling in her work. It's a feeling in the heart. The faces she paints show an individual face and an individual feeling. She has a website www.artbydianatoma.com. I found a variety of images googling diana toma artist and clicking on images. And there's a photograph of her favoring Grace Slick in the time of Surrealistic Pillow. Diana's angel painting that happened of its own lifted my spirit about the day. It shows such tremendous compassion, you know an angel like this was there.  

diana toma

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