tombstonetcs

Good to One's Word, At One with One's Art

Alone in a cabin

the babbling brook doing its

duties

as prescribed by its preceding

modifier

While I do the same

In solitary self-medicated

mutterings

metaphors no one understands

or cares to

The subconscious

is a dark place

and this cabin has but one

light bulb

dangling naked from the ceiling

an archaic filament illumination

No sense in saving energy

Not this time.

Give it all you got.

A Steely Dan tune plays

from the speaker of the record player,

I played with the idea of recording

the speech – the lyrics were appropriate

but I'm making a stand,

shotgun loaded

Plagiarism or borrowed language

would defeat the purpose of my

grand manifesto

So where do I start?

I suppose I have already.

I started out hunting Originality,

then Origin. Original Sin, a

singular Clockwork Orange

but there I go again, or rather here,

on my own, dammit I'm doing it

again.

Going it alone did me no good

May as well have been hunting

a snark; but snarkiness exuded

incidentally enough, I went and

cast derision at fluff in which I

could plainly see derivation

derived roots leading to a source

derived from something else

entirely, much older, distorted

down through the ages yet the

same old song

Someone told me that I had a

unique perspective, crediting me

for finding inspiration in unexpected

places.

It was then that I realized the place

I had found a muse (and by which

I had been amused) was nothing more

than a vacant vessel, previously inhabited

by food, but moreover a former source

of creative impulse for another writer

I know – in the interest of Intellectual

Property, I had been a thief, the ghostly

muse appeared more as an echo than

as a resounding original note

A noteworthy offense, the gravy train

to the grave for my poetic voice

Hardly enough food for thought.

My unintentional offense brought me

to build my own defenses, I built a few

fences

after two sentences, I came to my senses

I needed a cabin, and a roof

One single bulb, a typewriter, solitude

Here with the shotgun I make a stand

to defend my little lot of Intellectual

Property

I will die a martyr

While an old bulb dangles like the Hanged Man

But damn I've been stagnant,

damn I've been lonely

They never did come for me

or my Intellectual Property

I was starting to think this whole

idea was pretty dumb

I hadn't written a thing

I really should have brought

a feather duster

for that dusty old typewriter

As I type this

the dust kicks out from the keys

I already threw out my back

holding back a sneeze

It was pleasant surprise when the knock

came on the door one day

I don't get many visitors

Actually I've never had one

Even the one that appeared that day

turned out to be a ghost

If not a ghost, than a figment of

my imagination

But considering my condition

I'm not sure I would be capable of

inventing him

He said no one had ever invented anyone

That plagiarism is necessary

That maybe he invented someone

He didn't make much sense.

He asked if I had a piano in my cabin

Because he wanted to write.

He left his epitaph on my doorstep

Took my egoism when he left

When I came back

The typewriter was shiny

The blues on the record player speakers

spoke to my playfulness so I set to record

the events of the day, the reasons

for my hermitage, leaves had blown

in while I talked to the ghost,

I resolve to dust my broom first thing in

the morning

There's something about those old songs

Stolen, one bluesman to the next

Folk songs too

Americana

The American Dream

The same old song, so old none of

the dozens who claimed credit to any one

of them could possibly have been the

author

Almost as though they had just

risen out of the soil one day,

like a blade of grass in a barren lot

only to proliferate and cross-pollinate

spreading through the land

eventually decaying and swept out to

be kept amongst soil which will rebirth it

Perhaps the origin doesn't matter

What's the origin of matter?

What's the matter with originality,

other than the fact that it may or may not

exist? Of course this cabin doesn't exist

either, neither does the typewriter on which

I'm supposedly composing this, and that

ghost was a figment of my imagination after

all, and my imagination is alive and well

I suppose, so the story goes, the resounding

note of the Big Bang is now supposed to be

a reaction creating the Universe we know

from a pre-existing state of being,

Not the beginning, The Beginning of Being

a figment of Einstein's imagination

which trumped knowledge

But not really, not reality

And here I am, playing a dangerous game again

rolling the dice

babbling like a brook running by a cabin

the ticking of typewriter keys

like a time bomb.

Time to head back,

to get back into the game.

What's mine is mine, may have never

been mine to begin with, if there is

in fact a beginning, I'm begging to

let the games begin, mi casa es tu casa

And my mind is an open book...

In the interest of staying positive about everything, for those of you who haven't checked it out, I give you a link to the most ass-kicking tunage I have encountered in a long time, courtesy of Gonzo T. Nightcrawler, the Good Doctor, and his band, theRoadKill Orchestra. New recordings, new line-up, new album recorded at Tremolo Lounge. Check it, and rock out.


http://www.reverbnation.com/theroa…

I feel as though
I'm not in my right mind
Like I woke up
on the wrong side of the bed
The man on the radio
is screaming about the
Bill of Rights
while someone online
posts about suspended
Habeus Corpus

I haven't been able to write
There's a nagging concern
that my writings might haunt me
If the Right to Free Speech 
is suddenly deemed wrong
then what I feel I must say
might get me in trouble,
someday

Don't think of me as paranoid
That isn't quite right.
I'm lost in my own mind,
my thoughts convoluted quotes,
adrift in a desert quandary
I think I missed that right turn
back in Albequerque
again.

Down that old rabbit-hole I go
if only to ever hide my head
in the sand
The landscape is rocky
the terrain is rough,
a train of thought must be tough
to tug its way through

There are those for whom
it is easy
Employing the left-most
hemisphere of their brain
their trains plot logical courses
leading to sinister stations,
while leftist thinkers jerk their
knees in a right-brain response.
I usually feel left out in the cold.

I don't think a number followed
by a percentage sign
can quite sum me up
I agree, there seems to be
some mysterious rite of passage
which one might endure
to be guaranteed the rights 
that supposedly exist for all;
some people pass that rite
right from the get-go.
The rest of us must yield,
as these folk always
have the right of way

Reading the writing on the wall
while yielding at a railroad crossing,
I feel that maybe it's time to write
another something of my own
The trick is to approach it
from the right angle
My writing hand feels about 90 degrees
still my words come back to me
seeming obtuse

That old disjointed train of though
bucking and hitching
left and right
teetering on the rails
through the left hemisphere 
to what I really feel
I'm in the right place,
but the timing is all wrong
No amount of brain salad surgery
is going to right these disjointed cars

I wish my left and right brain
could work together
be the Wright Brothers,
build a bi-polar plane
to fly straight on out
of this nonsense.

I'd fly past those who cling to a wing
Right or Left
leanin' on one wing makes you 
fly in circles
I'll glance down at the masses
gazing back like Ezekiel
trying to divine meaning
behind spinning wheels in the sky
Self-righteous streamers 
steadily plummeting
down to Earth

And rightfully so
when it comes down to rights
I have a right to write 
that which gives me some kind
of peace of mind.

If you need me
I'll be occupying 
just this side of the truth.

It's not the first time it's happened.

A co-worker from the cleanroom
stopped by the break room at work
to remind me about how shitty my job is

frankly, I don't know what the big deal is.
They see me sweep, they see me mop
they see me take out the trash.
They say
"Every day?" Man, I would go nuts.
I think: Been there.

This guy today though,

he said "I still can't believe
you work in here by yourself, in silence,
nothing but these sterile white walls for
comfort... it's like a psych ward."

I said: Psych wards are noisier.
And more colorful.

He started to ask "How would you know?"
But chuckled half-way through.
It isn't proper that my coworkers know
That I've been a patient
a ward of the state.
A slave to psychopharmacology
to psychotherapy
to psychos

So I let him think I was joking.
I thought hard, then, in my solitude
as the mop dragged 'cross the floor
about Ed, the stroke victim, who
had no business being in the psych
wing - but no other place in the state
would take him. Ed knew nothing else,
but to scream for help at intervals of 15
seconds. From the moment he woke,
to the moment he slept, he would
shuffle in laps around the psych ward
screaming "HELP!" as loudly as he could.
He was old. Toward the end of his life.
If ever there were a candidate for
pillow-smothering, it would be him,
after a week and a half of occupying the same
wing with him at the hospital. I was
discharged a few days later, which gave me
time to re-evaluate my stance...

I thought of John, the pastor
who poured over scripture,
counting his rosary,
as though he were feverishly reading
the Bible in the hopes of reaching
revelation and rapture more quickly.
He had a nasty habit of trying to
open his wrists - He wanted to know
the other realm. He couldn't wait for
the Lord to tell him it was his time. He
knew the grandeur of Earth, of mortal
reality, and felt himself not worthy.
Last time I saw him was at the outpatient
clinic, and as enthralled as I was
to see him years after he had been
released, when I went up to greet him,
he sobbed as the admittance papers
were signed and he was being walked,
with his head bowed, as if in revery or
silent recognition, that his fate for the
next few weeks entailed a small room
limited, supervised contact with sharp things,
and daily group therapy.

I think of Eric from Ghana, who thought
I was Messiah.
I think of Luis, from Puerto Rico,
who campaigned me for president
of the psych ward.
Lost souls, looking for a leader,
maybe I was poet laureate,
but definitely not savior.
I once fancied myself future
Patron Saint of the Crazies;
later I regretted saying that.
Now I don't know what to think.

Thinking is one thing. Feeling is another.
I feel for those souls, who wait in psych ward
Purgatory, the psychopharm guinea pigs
and soldiers of misfortune, left to fend for themselves.
While doctors take kick-backs, writing scripts and
forgetting, drinking or toking to get their night's sleep -
I feel for John the Pastor, trapped within faith, so
subservient to God that he would forsake this gift life;
I fell for Ed, the prisoner of his own corporeal form,
not capable of communication past the word "HELP"
It may as well be an anthem for a nation of psychos
a nation of weirdos, people who dare to feel
in a robotic society of repression and complacency.
I wonder if Eric ever made it out,
If Luis is in jail
I wonder about my peers' achievements and failures.

I know I'm doing ok, nowadays.
I don't mind mopping floors.
The silence is calming.
I do still feel, I refuse to forget
that some of the others
may not have been so lucky.

Screw you, cleanroom supervisor.
My job is great.
Not many can meditate
while getting shit done.
And meditation breeds introspect,
I'm a philosopher armed with a mop
You're a working cog who can't imagine
how one could enjoy silence or white walls.
The absence of chaos, of cacophony,
is welcome for me, most definitely if
I'm getting paid for it.
I've come a long way, and it wasn't
so that you could look down at me.

Fortunately, I've grown past
the immediate reaction of anger.
Instead I just mourn those lost
souls who may never have made it.
At least I can sleep without drugs or
booze. I make an honest living, I rest,
I do other things.

I just wish I could do more
for those who need the help.

 I have a job. It rules. That is all.

If you have no other plans tomorrow night (Thursday, August 5th) please consider going to That's Entertainment! , Worcester's favorite pop-culture emporium, for the Pre-release Listening Party for Aslan King's new record, "For Real". Here's his shout out to BP Oil (Recorded by the Lo-Z Records gang in Institute Park...)


Also, keep an eye out for tomorrow's Worcester Magazine, Aslan has a nice write-up in it!

For more info, as always, check out www.lo-zrecords.com

The madness starts at 6pm. Also, if you live outside of Worcester or otherwise can't make it, you can still pre-order a copy of "For Real" by contacting us folks at Lo-Z Records by e-mail.

See you then!

People have told me I look like different leading role type guys, like Johnny Depp or Brad Pitt - I think it was just people being very, very generous. I am a lot goofier looking than those dudes, certainly. The comparison I tend to agree with in so far as appearance goes is Val Kilmer, especially when he played Doc Holiday in the movie "Tombstone" (hence my livejournal handle...) So I guess I'd have Val Kilmer play me in a movie. I dunno, what do people on my friends list think?

Oh and the movie would be directed by Terry Gilliam.



Anyways, as far as people in my life goes:

Octavian - himself (Come on, is there a child actor out there that can even remotely touch him far as cuteness goes????)
Emilie - herself (for similar reasons - substitute "cuteness" with "beauty")

theryk - Hugh Laurie (for obvious reasons)
Jeff Siegrist - Ed Wood
Nick Davis - Some people make a Chris Farley comparison, which I guess is apt inasmuch as the party animal persona goes. Jon Belushi for the same reasons.
Jon Shyllberg - The kid who played Short Round in Temple of Doom. When he was a kid.
Brian Sampson - John Goodman
Joe Chaves - Jeff Bridges, although Zach Galafanakis reminded me of Chaves a lot in the movie "Hangover"
Tom Spears - Would be an animated cartoon, voiced by the guy who played Captain Murphy on Sealab 2021
Kurt - Some would say Jack Black, but I know it pisses him off. So I don't know...


I'm gonna stop there. This list is difficult to make without insulting people. Over and out!

Since I completed "The Persistent Phantasmagoria..." last August, I have done very little in the way of writing poetry... That's like a year sabbatical. I'm wondering if I can even come back from it. I have written some, just nothing I'm terribly happy with and certainly nothing that lends itself well to performance.

On the other hand, I've been writing songs almost constantly. Life is full of music; I laid down some tracks on Aslan King's upcoming album from Lo-Z Records (www.lo-zrecords.com), started writing the tunes for my next album, have plans in the works for a one-time revival of Skat Flatulence and the Plastic Animal Cramps, and started a Satanic Bluegrass band with Jeff Siegrist called Pontius Pilate and the Naildrivers. Kinda funny though; the songs that are to appear on my next album seem to be thematically centered around Heaven and Hell... while PP&tND is purely about our dark lord and master Lucifer... (teehee)

I am considering writing some non-fiction about some of the strange circumstances I've found myself in during the course of my 28 years on this planet. I find myself in a bit of a quandary about it. I'm not so sure that I'm an important enough person to be writing "memoirs", or that my stories are relevant to anything or anyone, or even worse, that the stories would be relevant to the point of being incriminating toward people involved. So I'm not sure how I'm going to go about it, but I think I have stories to tell regardless.

Any advice or commentary is useful at this point - I'm not sure where I'm going with this whole writing thing...

Buy, read and enjoy Wolverine: Old Man Logan.


So worth it.


That is all.