Anal & Nasal Retentive Ramblings
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This notebook, subtitled "Random & Ridiculous Thots [sic] and General Hysteria," was made during the NYC Angst period, and contained stuff transferred from other notebooks and journals, plus a ton of original writings, artwork and comics created directly in it. It was a labor for the love of Carrie Sue, housed in a Pearl Paint acquisition, filled with grid paper (oh so hip at that time). Here's some of the stuff that's in there that I put on here:

Bugs

The 2nd Street Carny

Revealing the Sub-Strata of Woman

Lunatics

Encounter with a Jew for Jesus

Larry Kegan

Winter Wonderland
Ed Weenis
Nut People
Heroes

Every Morning Blues

A True New York Story
Lunar/Mental Eclipse
Merv, Picasso & Me
Problems
Death Song

Here's what the cover looks like (it's gotten quite beat up over the years):

The "cover story" is as follows: "When he danced, his hands flared limp, wildly flailing in silver gloves and disco lights. He looked like sparks shooting out his arms. The girl called him 'Roman-Candle-Cuffs'."

Here's the back cover, which quite captures my state of mind at the time:

Lots of the stuff in here is pretty lame, stream-of-consciousness crap, but here are a few assorted nuggets I feel inclined to transfer electronically. Whatever. -g

Bugs

 

New mutant insects

feed on metal

larvae festering

in a mercurial

amniotic fluid

of chromium,

under bumpers.

 

Mature worker swarms

known to scavenge

cars by the lot-full

in hours.

 

Food for the queen

is abundant

in the city.

 

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The 2nd Street Carny

One year after moving to NYC, I moved from Crown Heights to Alphabet City (on the Lower East Side of Manhattan). This was by far the sharpest turn I had ever taken in my strange life-travels.

211 E. 2nd Street was a habitable building, sandwiched between a block of burnt-out husks of abandoned ones, built on the narrow triangular sliver that separates Houston from 2nd Street between Aves B & C. The entrance, fortunately, was via a courtyard facing Houston Street (the door was labeled 308 Houston, though 211 E. 2nd was the official address), so I mostly managed to avoid the 2nd Street carnival. But, perched in the window of our "Penthouse" apartment, I spent many many hours observing 2nd Street, below. Directly behind us was a fire station, and the world's largest outdoor drug market. "Toilet," referred to below, was the name of a "store" located in a hole in the outer wall of a completely burned out building two doors west, where junkies would go to buy smack or whatever. Standing on the roof of our building, we could peer right down 4 flights to the first floor through the burned out hole down the center of the building next door, and if we dared to traverse the remaining roof up there, which we did, we could see straight down through the rubble into Toilet. There was an impromptu crosswalk painted on the street between 211 and the fire station, on which someone had painted "O.D. Crossing." Many a time did I witness "dead" junkies being revived by the firemen at the station. The fire-guys would shoot 'em up with some kind of drug, and they'd wake from the dead, sitting bolt-upright, wide-eyed, ready to go get some more and do it again.

So, this little slice-of-lower-east-side-life pretty accurately reflects my physical and mental experience, as I sorted through the radical changes in my life, having moved from the relative safety of Humboldt County a year before, to the Crown Heights experience just abandoned, and now attempting to adjust to my new life as an observer/resident of Alphabet City:

They're out there. They're always out there on the streets. Short, squat characters with round, vacant, staring eyes, round faces with nostrils filled with finger, and rot, or some gelatinous substance, collecting in tooth cracks, aiding in the issuance of foul aroma'd breathwinds. Others, tall, thin, emaciated figures with wild eyes and hair to match, partially toothless and hunched forward as though ready to follow into the air their mad, frantic rap; hairs growing in all the wrong places — sooty, torn clothes over too-long legs which crash mercilessly in a forward thrust through broken bottles, floating newspapers, cigarette packs and feces.

A whore likes my shoulder bag. "Hey, sweetie! I'll give ya a blow job fer yer bag! — Aw, come on, baby — I'll blow ya fer it!" The barter system is alive and well on the streets. Young negress, battered but pretty, hot pants too small to hide pubic hairs coming out, and see-through blouse; the girl pops penicillin tabs like we take vitamins. Nipples pressing hard, wanting out of that blouse, and her pimp walks over, acting like he's god's right ball, loins gravitating toward his chin: he's one slick dude. Walking up, he smacks his girl hard on the face, once, twice, thrice. I cringe, reluctant to be involved, chivalry buried beneath layers of fear. Sensing this, the little human buzzsaw turns to me and says, "condemn the deed, not the doer."

A fire truck rolls casually by, reflecting red onto our little drama. Hot loudspeaker, we can't ignore fireman's 600 decibel belch. A flash of silver and Mr. Pimp's blade switches my concentration, still seeing red. "This here's whatcha call a Puerto Rican boxing glove," he says, fading away as I wheel my Schwinn Typhoon hastily towards the next unfolding drama.

I stop at the light. A raving, rickety old man comes stumbling outta the subway, walks right up to me, demanding to know if I wanna fuck a snake. "No, thanks," sez I. The light changes, pedals poised, the breath hot and rancid, his hand filthy and scraped, rotting, grabs me shouting he's gonna kill me, "goddamn muthafukka I'm gonna kill you." He's spinning — I've broken his grasp in a fast forward plunge toward the other side of the Avenue, weaving around broken glass. I'm almost home and it's starting to rain. Check that — it's pouring. Lightning. Thunder. Wheeling my Typhoon through a real typhoon, haggard and soaked, I see the "308" between two stripped-down, trash-filled, urine-reeking, abandoned cars. Key is in and so am I, locking my bike next to the odiferous trash in the courtyard, and up five flights. It's hot and muggy, and the air is filled with flashes of light and low rumbling groans. Over to the window, and the junkies are out in force, huddled together under the entranceway to the Kenkeleba House. One junkie, eyes up, is watching the lightning. His mind has made his hands move in synchrony with the lightning; he is the gloved hands of God, boxing the New York City sky with quick, constant, relentless jabs.

Toilet is happening — typhoon or no, ya gotta get yer fix. A car comes splashing through the river that 2nd Street has become, clearing the water, for half a second, off the "O.D. Crossing" — my eyes follow it over to the fire station. All the boys are standing in the garage doorway, affecting poses appropriate to men of their stature in the community. A young, soaking Puerto Rican girl follows her tits through the rain on the sidewalk — ten pairs of eyes focus on one pair of tits, and you could pretty accurately guess that a bomb blast wouldn't turn away the already turning, synchronized heads. The fire's in their eyes.

A bald, nodding black junkie weaves up to the group, but, the previous one being a hard act to follow, most of the boys go back inside. One of the remaining guys gets inspired, disappears, and is back in a couple of secs with a couple of surgical gloves, one of which he immediately stretches over his scalp to simulate the external cranial edifice of his bewildered junkie friend. All the poor junkie's actions are being carefully mimicked, mirror-like; the poor guy can't decide if he's looking into a mirror, struggling to understand what is going on, what is happening to him. Suddenly, through the heroine haze, a beautiful object is offered him. It's like a balloon, it's like a head of a rooster, it's like a hand — it's beautiful, and it's moving, and all reality is focused on this object, and he's weaving, unconsciously following the motion of the moving splendor of the thing. The fireman has inflated one of his surgical gloves, and, now that he has the junkie's complete attention, he's offering it to him, keeping it just out of reach. And yes, of course the junkie wants the magnificent object, he wants it with every vestige of his being! And just as he is reaching out to embrace this God-sent thing, the fireman lets go of it, shooting wildly off into a hundred directions. The bewildered junkie, shattered reverie, operating on a different time continuum, failingly attempts to follow its motion, stumbling backward into his fallen dream, back into the street and smack into a light pole — an impact spin, graceful pirouette, and slow-mo fall into the raging gutterstream. A sturdy lad, however swayingly, he rises undaunted from the waters, cranium gleaming with rain-spatter twinkles. He stumbles off into a void similar to the one in his own mind for further meetings with fate, firemen laughing hard and pleased with their own cleverness at creating impromptu entertainment.

Coming out of the jungle-window, I move from one impenetrable world to another. I move through the apartment, scrutinizing the objects I have accumulated and their possible and varied potential fates. I hit upon a mirror, and in it see the largest object I possess — my own body. But, when I try to ponder its possible fates, I am at a loss. Could I end up like the objects viewed from above 2nd Street? All objects pass through this world, including one's own body. All is transient, nothing is clear. Far too much mystery exists. The nut we try all our lives to crack may be lying open already beside us, obscured by the junk (physical and spiritual) we collect in the name of enlightenment. Am I different, the object that is Glen, from my headphones, from my cameras?

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Revealing the Sub-Strata of Woman

Peer beneath the skin that clothes the female soul. Reveal the fathoms of unfathomable layer after layer, the mystic depths that lie beneath the surface.

Prepare it as a map, like a geologic cross-section. Mark each layer with symbols of your findings, as the chart takes shape.

You, professorially, point-sticking the map for the edification of your colleagues.

This, the most meaningful of educational experiences, if only it could be done.

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Lunatics

All manner of lunatics are on the loose, midtown Saturday night. Running solo, or in packs, they're out in force, on the streets and in the trains. A strange, subtle tension fills the air with an essence of "anything can happen...."

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Encounter with a Jew for Jesus

J4J raving on corner 6th Ave & 4th St about how he came to be raving atop a ladder on an NYC corner about Jesus Christ, his Lord and personal savior. Something about how the old testament predicts the coming of Jesus. Something else about how it's "Jewish" to believe in Jesus. He spots me, and climbs down his ladder to accost.

"I was just like you," he raves. "No you weren't," says I. Indeed he was, says he. "I woulda never believed about Jesus — would never have believed it in a million years." "Yes you would; you DID!" 12 Jesus-infested eyeballs focused on the man with the mouth — me. One pair walks over to me, sparkling.

"How would you feel if I told you I knew for certain, for a fact that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that those who do not accept him as his personal savior will burn in hell, and that I was so sure, I'd stake my life on it?" smiling.

"I would feel nauseous, like I feel now as you're indeed telling me. But don't concern yourself with it: you haven't completely fallen from my good graces. You can tell me what you mean by that remark."

"I mean that Jesus Christ, the almighty, magnifi..."

"No, no — what do you mean that you'd stake your life on it? Do you mean, for example, that if I could prove you wrong you would voluntarily commit suicide? Or what?"

"Yes. You know, I was exactly like you before I ..."

"You were never like me. We are fundamentally different. I will never be like you. We have nothing in common now, and I pray to god we never will."

"Aha! You are a believer!"

"Just a manner of speech, bozo. It means your ideas repulse me and that I would rather be dead than to be forced to succumb to the sort of mindless blind faith you people have, somehow living with the ultimate contradiction, that belief in Jesus is somehow Jewish! God forbid I do become like you, I hope at least one of my friends will have enough good taste, mercy and decency to shoot me."

Through this little oratory, the poor squat fellow's orbs widen in fear and awe, having heard words exactly like from the devil himself. The mind blown little creature scuttles off, back to the flock, trying desperately to hold off backward glances at me, or to even think about our encounter. No doubt, surrounded by his clones, I was soon forgotten entirely. But I will never forget those sparkling eyes skinning over, a consterned membrane; the milky reflection of NYC in stereo.

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Larry Kegan

Larry had a lot of bad luck. He was quadriplegic, having become paraplegic at age 15 or 16 (from diving head-first into shallow water), then quadriplegic just a few years later as the result of an auto accident. He died on 9/11 (coincidentally, not at any of the attack sites).

Larry hailed from Minnesota, and had some pretty amazing friends. He went to camp with Bob Dylan, with whom had been friends ever since. When Bob mentioned he wanted to check out what was happening with Hasidism (so the story went), Larry told him to go to Crown Heights and spend some time with his friends Miriam and Meyer. I just happened to be living in the basement of Miriam and Meyer's house at the time (long story, told elsewhere). One day, I come home from work and Miriam shushes me, whispering, "take a look at who's sleeping on the couch in there." Well, it was Bob himself, and I got to spend a little time with him while he was there. Larry came sometime later, brought by Alphonso, who was Larry's hands and feet. He also brought along the beautiful and amazingly talented Scarlet Rivera, with whom I was understandably dazed and heartstruck.

Larry was a force of nature. He told me he wanted to come to Pearl Paint. I told him it would be near impossible to navigate his wheelchair through the skinny aisles and long, steep staircases. Larry would have none of it. I doubt there was an obstacle he encountered he didn't conquer. Anyway, I wrote this about him:

Sometimes, the positive wins. I slide through life, steadicam eyes, ingesting. The emotion lenses, the brain film plane, the receptors. These lenses, the windows of the soul they say, peer out of seeing, recording all, everything rich with hidden messages, with allegories and metaphors.

What these lenses see now: A fine, human mind — kind, warm, a creative soul imprisoned in a chair, chained by his own paralyzed limbs. Much to be sad for, yet much to be amazed about. Despite the inability to move of his own free will, to feed himself, or to control even his own excretion, the warmth — the humanity — the joy shines through the physical facade. So rich a ray that the most powerful souls are drawn to it. Great musicians and poets, Dylan, Jackson Browne, Scarlet Rivera, Ginsberg, find comfort in his warmth. My heart is sad for his dilemma, but joyous for the amazing heritage which is his. His is a light that shines above his own physicality: a testament to the limitations of physical quality. If such a rich life can be lived without a functional body, his example can only inspire one to grasp what must be possible without that limitation. Instead of succumbing to a morose melancholy about his fate, he has chosen to be a tower of strength, far stronger than those who are able to  do with grace the things he can only fantasize doing, were he able. Had I half his courage...

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Winter Wonderland

Winter is wild in the city. After a snow, there's a blanket of clean white tucked into corners, on branches, cars and roofs. Glacial gutters, everything frozen — even that which would normally disintegrate.

Walking around the frozen streets in a self-made steam-cloud, smoking from the mouth and nose, one sees a curious sculptural event: anything liquid having spilt on the sidewalk forms an exquisitely graceful sculptural study of gravity's pull on freezing fluid flow. A bum's piss has become a long, gleaming yellow, contoured peninsula in a sea of concrete. Spit becomes little grey islands. An overturned coke a ridiculous joke-shop item, easily removed from the concrete — a glistening, coffee-colored shelf connected to can.

Stalactites and stalagmites, gems of sidewalks and building overhangs, transform the city, overcast, from canyon to glittering cave. I, ever the explorer, peer into the crevices to see what lurks in the impending future, enjoying the winter wonderland that is this moment in the life of Glen.

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Ed Weenis

 

Ed Weenis

never had a problem with his penis

and all the other girls who came between us

got his hard-on

but never got his heart.

 

One girl said:

"Ed Weenis, (sigh)

Ed Weenis penis movements are the meanest!

Of all the girls Ed's done I was the greenest."

Ed's penis searchin'

Ed found a virgin to start.

 

But,

Ed Weenis

knows where the best place to shoot his cream is

as anyone can tell when they have seen us

Ed's penis perky

mine is the sure key

to his heart.

 

Ed Weenis

Ed Weenis

Oh, Ed's penis

Ed Weenis starts

and both our hearts

make the scene as

my joyous scream is

all Ed Weenis's

and all Ed's penis's.

And oh, Ed's penis

wherever it's been, it's

ultimately smarts

which keeps our hearts

entwined.

 

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Nut People

 

This may sound stupid, but "nut people" like Glen. Nut people single Glen out of crowds on Canal Street in order to satisfy some type of good-samaritanism normally impossible on New York Streets.

 

The first one was this little old Ukrainian hunchback, barely able to speak English. The little guy would dump a full scoopful of salted cashews in a bag for the price of a quarter pound. So Glen, appreciating his good will, returned by tipping him generously (an unheard of practice for street vendors).

 

One day, Glen was walking past his cart, toward the bank and tipped his hat to him, "hello." He called Glen over in broken English, brought him behind his cart, and sat him down on a milk crate. Then, the little guy bent his hunchback over, reaching inside a small chamber in the back, pulled out some plastic cups and a pint of Napoleon brandy. With a sparkle in his eyes, and a Cheshire grin, he held up a freshly poured cup. Glen was reluctant (not to mention dazed), it being the middle of a working day. He held the glistening beverage uncertainly, its fumes wafting into his brain by way of nostrils, creating images of crazed drunken office work. So the old guy sez: "what, you no a man?" smiling and gesturing open palms upward, as if to say "drink! drink!"

 

So, what could Glen do?

 

They carried on this relationship, always an enthusiastic greeting, for some time.

 

One day, the little guy was gone, never to be seen again.

Sometime later, a grumpy old woman, probably Russian, and also unable to speak much English, appeared on the nut-vending scene. First time Glen bought some cashews from her, her grumpiness took flight, and she broke out into a wide, friendly smile. After paying, she motioned to the candy jars, offering a freebie. "What you like?"

"Nothing, thanx," sez Glen, smiling, with a tip of his hat.

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Heroes

 

All the heroes at large in NYC:

One hero walking down Mercer Street

occasionally thrusts his arms into the air

looking proud, looking victorious

as if

he had just won some major psychic battle

in Peoria.

 

He comes up to me

and says:

"I'm gonna make you wanna eat everything you can't."

 

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Every Morning Blues

Every goddamned morning at 10 to 8 there comes the infernal buzzing, the voice of electricity, to remind me of the impending nature of another busy, obnoxious work-a-day. So I, being the belligerent bastard that I am, slap the thing off, then turn over to doze off again.

But lo, a mere 10 minutes later and there the goddamned thing is again, nyaeurrrgggghhhh....  and again I smash the fucking thing and roll over. But this time, I'll dream, and I'll be having this beautiful, sexy dream, and I'll be just getting in there to do the thing, when... BRAUUGGGHHHPHHHHH...

And this will go on sometimes for 50, 60, 70 minutes - on and on and on until I am forced to remain awake due to a painful need for relief of a throbbing hard-on, or just plain fear of being "too" late for work. But even then, I can't move. I'll endeavor to prop myself up a bit to prevent the otherwise inevitable slide back into slumber, and I'll sit there, fighting the weight of my eyelids until I finally muster the energy to roll myself out of bed.

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A True New York Story

Glen goes out for a drink with a couple of friends from work one rainy evening. After a margarita or two and some pleasant conversation, as Glen gets up to leave, he spots a copy of that day's New York Post. Not being able to resist a good laugh, Glen folds the thing up, grasping it in his umbrella hand, claps on his wide-brimmed, grey fedora with black band, and makes for the street.

Crossing Canal Street, a guy in a Daily News delivery truck is staring at Glen and starts to point at him. Glen thinks, "this is odd," but shrugs it off. At some point, anything becomes acceptable under the "what the fuck anyway, this is New York City!" law.

Glen is walking towards the Moondance Diner when someone behind him shouts. He turns around, and a cop is running towards him. The cop stops Glen on the street, grabs the newspaper out of Glen's hand, his eyes darting from Glen's face to the picture on the front page of the Post, demanding to see Glen's ID.

Glen sees the picture on the Post cover and starts to laugh. Glen sez to the cop, "if I were this guy, would I be walking around New York City in this hat?"

Absurdly, the only article of identification in Glen's possession is his Humboldt State ID card.

The cop is pissed that he had to run 4 blocks to catch Glen. Apparently, the Daily News truck driver had flagged him down. Finally satisfied that Glen was not the same guy, the cop leaves.

Still laughing, Glen enters the diner, where he relates his story to the amusement of the diner staff.

A little while later, the cop who had stopped Glen, and his partner, coincidentally enter the diner for dinner. When the cop spots Glen, he points him out to his partner: "there's the loony who's parading around looking like the guy in the Post!"

[To Glen:] "Ya know, yer crazy walkin' 'round like that - you should be locked up in Bellevue! I hadda run 4 blocks to catch you! What're you, some kinda nut!?"

Everybody in the diner's laughing. Glen thinks it would be amusing to be the first person ever to be arrested for impersonating a sex-scandal millionaire.

Later, the rain stops. Walking up 6th Ave., Glen is recognized by some diners in an outdoor cafe, who stop him to ask him about something regarding his sex-scandals. It's all Glen can do to convince them that he is not, indeed not the Sex Scandal Millionaire.

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Lunar/Mental Eclipse

Washington Square Park was my muse: I was never, ever at a loss for things to see and feel and write when I plopped myself down in there. I considered the place to be a microcosm of the entire planet it embodied just about every aspect of humanity imaginable, the best, the worst, and everything in-between. When I was at a loss, as I frequently was, I would go there and simply observe, and write. The wealth of idea material and strange characters I found there gave me something to glom onto in exceedingly depressing times.

This one was written early in my NYC career, while I was still living with the Hasidim in Crown Heights, still trying desperately to figure out how I fit into my New York world. -g

Watching the full moon rise over Washington Square Park, preparing myself with my pen for the total lunar eclipse, with the idea that, once again, it's time to attempt to tune with the universe. Been pretty discordant lately, and that's a fact. Thinking, I'm trying to play in key, but can't seem to hit a note — then a giant firecracker-blast echoes through the park and buildings, reverberating through the environment that is New York City. Trying to imagine NYC topographically, and thinking that I'm sitting deep inside a canyon, instead of leaping across rooftops to keep level. Seen from directly above,  it must seem that rooftops are the surface of the city, the streets deep pits in it, and I, of course, in one. So what else is new? The moon, at least, but I'm wrong again, because it's FULL, not new, and hopefully there's some symbolism in that error. It's rising now over an NYU building, seeming new to me, anyway — shining under the cityscape as reflected in the fountain I'm sitting near. An appropriate place to endeavor to tune, too. With any luck, the frequency adjustment will aid me in harmonizing with the humanity around me, which now seems so far from my grasp, though at my fingertips. Enough people here to tear down one of these towers by hand, yet inaccessible to me: I keep hearing the theme from Twilight Zone going through my head. I just can't get past some mental barrier. With all the anarchy around me, it's no wonder there's plenty of it in my brain. Probing at the moon with mind through eyes, seeking stability, finding none through the aural chaos that prevents concentration — but then again, I've never been able to concentrate anyway, even in quiet solitude. Can't focus long enough to tear down my mental fence — can see what's on the other side, but can't touch it — cutting links or tearing out slats from time to time, weakening its structure, but not removing the obstacle. Even in moments of seeming clarity there is ever the fog, obscuring goals, torturing me with its see-thru barricade. A hunk of trash floats in the fountain, right next to the moon, waiting, as am I, for darkness to spread over the face of the light, as in real life. Now it has floated into an obscuring view, creating its own style of eclipse, blocking the light of the moon.  Everything happens for a reason, they say. I don't want to believe it. But I think I do, although, not now. You see my dilemma? I simply do not know what I believe, what I think. Where has my positive attitude gone? And when it comes back, why? This is the edge I live on, finding murky waters whichever way I fall. I think I live on a very long, narrow triangle, two sides so long they seem parallel, obscuring that one very small side by distance, the side I need to see, to gaze through into the tunnel of clarity under my feet, too close to see. I have this feeling, like the universe can reveal that edge to me as the first light sliver after total eclipse. A bum laying nearby is laughing maniacally as I am writing this, either at me or at nothing. Perhaps some construct of his imagination gathered together into the air before him. Either for a purpose or not, depending on my mood, which, just now, is indecisive. I abstain. I abstain from judgment. I abstain from thought. I abstain from life. I abstain.

I write, but I don't know what about until I read it later, and then I can't figure out what the hell was in my brain when I wrote it. And now, I wait for a signal from the universe. Watching, in a way I can understand, the cosmos align. I abstain now, from as much as I can, save pen, paper, and moon. Blinking outwardly, looking for a speck of darkness to appear on the light, blinking inwardly, looking for some light in the dark. I'm obviously not the only one here watching for a signal. Others nearby are watching, but, from where I'm sitting, I could fart with nobody noticing. Even if its odor is as toxic as the mind that pushed it out into the open, no one here would give it a thought —— a strange quirk in reality that allows disharmony to harmonize with the environment. Even now, a thin cloud right out of "An Andalusian Dog" slices across the face of the moon, and heavy thumps are reverberating from distant fireworks. I'm looking down from above again, down into the crevices of Manhattan, seeing the flash of the firework, and watching the soundwaves shoot through the canyons, colliding in the center of the great square crater that is Washington Square park. I, sitting near its center, listening, watching, blinking. Wanting to complete the experience down there, but knowing there isn't time -- I see the crevice I must now walk through to get to the tunnel I must ride through to get over there — see? — under the waters of East River, into the shallower crevices of Crown Heights, Brooklyn, USA.

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Merv, Picasso & Me

I was at a seminar, given by Merv Griffin, for some reason. It was morning and in some small theater in the World Trade Center basement. It all seemed overbearingly straight and innocuous, Merv all smiles and clean cut, a boring slide lecture on the wonders of life. Merv leaps up and herds us (me — there was a group, but I was the only one there), all smiles, out of the theater, onto the escalator, and out into the wide, wondrous world. He herds us through many places, to view varieties of wonders which get progressively weirder as Merv develops an eerie glow in his eye, still smiling. We slide through labyrinths of tubes. We roll naked through tactile diversities. We end up in an "artists making art" gallery, where art flows fluidly out of artists' hands without materials, and one girl has formed a sort of octopus holding plates of giant, odorless turds, and Merv suddenly stands in the center of the room. Without a word, all attention is focused on Merv Griffin, as we all watch in awe a phosphorescent glow develop around him, concentrating around his head. He's standing still in this light, arms to his sides as we watch invisible razors shave his head into a mohawk, and roots of fluorescent orange creep up from his scalp to absorb the remainder of his hair. The light fades, and after this incredible spectacle, as though nothing unusual had happened, Merv cheerfully herds us on towards our next destination. We were back at WTC, on the escalator going down. Merv's up ahead, orange hair like the holy grail we were chasing. I turned around and said to the Glen behind me, "this is incredible — we start this innocuous little voyage with a clean cut Merv Griffin, and end up in a spiraling crescendo of weirdness, peaking at its place of origin behind Merv Griffin's fluorescent orange mohawk!"

We are led into another theater where Merv cheerfully invites us to watch a film. It is a film about Picasso, but he was me. Picasso/I was taking a break from a Merv Griffin seminar, taking a horse drawn carriage ride through Central Park. The driver was a black woman who was also somehow me. It was no longer a movie I was watching, I was living it. I had her stop the carriage and we went into a fancy restaurant. It was all opulent inside, all red and gold. We sat down in a booth and we were talking. The softness of the cushions and the blaring opulence of the light crept into our conversation. Across the aisle, a booth filled with celebrities were scrutinizing us. I was livid. I leapt up from the table and went through a doorway, and I was once again Picasso, but I was now also consciously watching Picasso in the film. Merv's mohawk and smiling teeth glowed in the corner near the screen. He was radiating a "now watch this and you'll be amazed!" attitude. Picasso/I slammed the door and found ourself in a small dim chamber. People were outside, banging on the doors and walls, wanting him/me to come out. "No," he/I said, "I'm going to make pink." Fishing a dowel out of a crack in the wall, Picasso began to flail it about the chamber, which was growing darker. He was in a rage, whipping his stick in a mad dance around the room, until finally, a section of the stick near the tip began to glow in a pink band. Picasso/I stood in the center of the room, heroically posed, glowing pink, the walls and doors breaking away, and crowds of people bursting in, surrounding him but not touching, like he was in a bubble, a pink, jubilant, glowing bubble, looking straight at me in the audience. Merv in the corner gleams in phosphorescent approval, seen from the periphery of my vision, which is locked into the gaze of the me on the screen, whereupon I woke up and wrote this down.

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Problems

 

Eating make me uncomfortable.

Exercise makes me tired.

Solitude makes me long for companionship.

Socializing make me yearn for solitude.

 

Reading makes me want to write.

Writing frustrates me.

 

Food for thought makes me hunger for knowledge.

Knowledge overwhelms me.

 

What I see, I want.

What I see that I want,

I want 'till I get it.

 

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Death Song

 

Oy, the angst! -g

 

 

just some words runnin' 'round my head

makin' me feel like i'm better off dead

thoughts collide with a violent motion

eating up my brain with the following notion:

 

i'm dying in the void of a world without passion

i am living in a void filled with meaningless fashion

 

lift yer head up

hold yer head up

keep yer head up

prop yer head up

lop yer head off at the neck

better off than on a wreck

of a human being with no direction

like the one whose life escapes detection

by the higher beings who help the man

with the transplant heart or the diseased gland

which festers and swells until detection

then removed with surgical perfection

 

but not the one without the head

the one the gods have left for dead

in a purposeless world, without any meaning

what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming

was the death of the man who has left this world screaming

 

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Last Revised: Thursday, June 26, 2008
©Copyright, Glen Eichenblatt, 2006

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