A PORTRAIT OF A POET by Lewis Morris (1700 - 1765)

I wonder how the poor devil of an offeiriad ( priest ) goes on now. I don't hear anything of his being to be turned out. I suppose they don't drink as much as they did, poverty hinders them, and the alehouse will not give them credit. Nawdd Duw rhag y fath ddyn! ( God protect us from such a man! ) What beggar, tinker, or sowgelder ever groped more in the dirt? A tomturd man is a gentleman to him. The juice of tobbacco in two strams runs out of his mouth. He drinks gin or beer till he cannot see his way home and has not half the sense of an ass, rowls in the mire like a pig, runs through the streets with a pot in his hand to look out for beer; looks wild like a mountsain cat, and yet whenhe is sober his good angel returns and he writes verses sweeter than honey and stronger than wine. How is this to be solved? His body is borrowed or descended from the dregs of mankind and his spirit from among the celestial choir: what a stinking dirty habitation it must have.


From: 'Morris Letters'

Claribel Alegria (born 12/5/24) -Small Country.

Behind you
a riot of pallid orphans,
children with protruding bellies,
mendicant mothers
exhibiting their kids
full of flies
tricky beggars
who pour their life
onto a clotted, scabby leg
and filthy bandages.
I stop and yell:
'The sky is falling!'
'Dear friends,'
the fat lady comments,
shuffling her cards,
'have you heard the latest?
They say the sky is falling.'
At three in the afternoon
the board meeting starts.
I rise and say:
'Gentlemen,
there's omly one item
on the agenda today.
The sky is falling.'
The manager is upset.
'I propose,' he exclaims,
'the construction of a vault
under the earth.
We must protect our archives,
our valuables.'
The sentry reports the order
to the barracks.
'Have the troops fall out
in combat fatiques,'
screeches the general.
'Raise your rifles and bayonets,
hold up the sky.'
The day is overcast.
A normal quota of events
takes place.
Butchers sell 3/4s
to the housewives
and charge them for a kilo,
fat old maids vent their hatred
in classrooms,Don Juans
peacocks with their pals
while maids
ruin the meal,
and contemplate abortion.
Soon the small tree by the cafe
will issue red cherries;
sugar cane, honey,
marching cotton
and meaty clouds
will turn into Cadillacs
on a casino night
upon renting a suite in Cannes.
I sit down at the table of intellectuals.
'What can we do? I ask.
'The sky is falling.'
An old radical smiles.
He saw it coming twenty years ago.
'And if it's true,'
an angry student asks,
'what will we do?'
With a gesture appropriate
to the historical significance,
he pulls out a pen
and on the tablecloth
begins to compose a manifesto
by intellectuals and artists.
I don't go out for days.
The sky is not falling.
The politicians have said so,
the directors,
the generals,
even the beggars confirm it.
For every young lord
there's a knocked-up maid,
holding her own.
For every fat matron,
someone tubercular picking cotton,
for every politician
a blindman with a white cane.
Everything is licit, right.
My terror, infantile.
The public show
of anxiety
is bad for people,
is rotten for business,
scares children.
Tomorrow I'll go to the market.
The psychiatrist prescribed it.
I'll be in a position
to offer ten centavos to a beggar
and to feel compassion.

Liliane Lijn ( b 22/12/39.- Receiving Change.

Liliane Lijn was the first woman artist to work with kinetic text ( Poem Machines ) and moved in the same circles as William Burroughs, Brion Gysin, Grecory Corso and Sinclair Beiles. She has described her work as a constant dialogue between opposites.She sees the world in terms of light and energy. It never stops.The duality in man and woman is set free. Their is ritual, their is the act, their is the moment.

Receiving Change

... the act of receiving, the passive act , is in essence active the moment it is accomplished with awareness. It is this specific awareness which is the particular characteristic and moreover the function of the artist.Call it attention, care, love. I see it as a tenderness with which I perceive the world. In looking I am caressing what I see. I allow it to pass through my system carefully with regard for its every attribute. This is my intention and my pursuit. Is this feminine? It is the way of pleasure and feeling. I speak here of the way in : reception. I speak of a way of receiving which I consider whole. At once passive and active. Passive in that its receiving is an acceptance as opposed to a taking. Active in its attention and its ability to focus. Focusing is the most natural way to make choices.

The Sky never stops.

Martin Ramirez (1895 - 1963) An accessible happiness.

Separado!

Last night I went to see the film Seperado, a charming searching film seen through the eyes of Welsh pop music legend Gruff Rhys of the Super Furry Animals while on both tour and journey to find his distant uncle and famous over night Patagonian poncho wearing guitarist Rene Griffiths.
In 1880, following a controversial horse race that led to an unresolved death Gruff Rhys's family split as Daffyd Jones took his young family to join a burgeouning Welsh community in Patagonia. There was to be no contact between the families for almost a century until 1974 when Rene Griffiths arrived in Wales with his latin infused Welsh love songs and became an overnight sensation. He traces the footsteps of the Welsh colonists who fled their homeland in the 19th Century for Argentina, and it is truly a fascinating glimpse of Welsh history.
Director Dylan Goch follows Gruff on a tour that takes in theatres, nightclubs and desert teahouses of , Brazil and the Argentinian Andes as he discovers what became of his family, the Welsh diaspora and its musical legacy. He takes us on a kind of psychedelic road trip and what has been created is really quite magical, a portrayal of a beautiful and at times harsh isolated land, offering glimpses of a parallel universe. Building many bridges and links discovering many more sundry musical talents along the way.

It managed to hold my attention and most of the audience whilst not sidestepping the issues of colonisation and the beast of globalisation and its ravages. It deals successfully in my mind why a number of Welsh speakers went to Patagonia in search of a new life, in order to preserve their way of life, their language and the many conflicts that arise when people look for a new paradise and heartland.
It was of particular interesting to me to see the long lasting influence of intermarrying with the indiginous population. Their Welsh seemed to me to be clearer than our modern Welsh despite being handed down, and perhaps paradise was not truly found but they have managed to preserve their language and culture.
A must see whether a fan of Gruff Rhys's music or not, very enthralling in a hip, arty ,ramshackle way. Whimsical with a magnificent broad sweep.

Bill Hicks - MY PHILOSOPHY (AUGUST 1993 ).

I love to smoke. To me, everything, about smoking is cool. When I hear 'Kinda Blue' by Miles Davis, a cigarette magically appears in my hand, and I am THERE. Smoking is Miles Davis. Smoking is Tom Waits. Smoking is Keith Richards.
Billy Ray Cyrus does not smoke. Michael Bolton doesn't smoke. Paula Abdul doesn't smoke. Is this clear? I'm not saying people who don't smoke aren't cool - although there does seem to be a pattern.i'm saying a lot of cool people smoke,and smoking is part of their coolness. I know I surprised a few people when I toured the UK last year. During the first tour, I was smoking and discussing my love of smoking onstage. By the time the second tour had begun, I had quit smoking, and all the people who liked what I did before seemed genuinely hurt and betrayed. People wre yelling 'Judas!' and 'Traitor' and throwing cigarettes at me onstage. It was like Dylan going electric. While it was all done in good fun - except the lit ones - I explained my new lifestyle quite ingeniously. ( There's nothing quite like a hail of burning embers raining down on you to make you quick on your feet.) I told everyone the pont of my old smoking routine was that I should have the right to smoke even if you think I SHOULDN'T. Now, I should have he right NOT to smoke even if you think I SHOULD. The pont is - THE FREEDOM TO CHOOSE. After explaining this to the audience, they calmed down somewhat. While cigarettes were still thrown fewer and fewer lit ones were flicked at my head.
I don't want to toot my own horn here - you couldn't hear it from this distance anyway - but, I think I'm fairly open-minded when it comes to ideas of Freedom. I think I'm one of the only former drug abusers and alcoholics who doesn't decry the years I partied, or regret them. Instead, I look on those experiences As fun and exciting and crucial to getting me where I am today. And I believe all drugs should be legal and available. In fact, I believe that as long you don't harm another person, or get in the way of their freedom ALL THINGS should be legal and available. As no amount of laws passed seem to prevent people's love of freedom, nor squelch their curiosity, nor their basic humanity, we would do better to look through the eyes of love and compassion, rather than condemnation and fear.
Drug abusers are not criminals in my mind's eye. At worst, they are just sick, and I know of no jail that has ever healed anyone.
I ascribe to a philosophy of Gentle Anarchy. I believe people are inherently GOOD, and left to their own devices - with the free exchange of ideas and information - a joyful lightness would spread across the face of our dour world.
I am aware there are many people who do not feel this way. This is why I figured out a way to make everyone happy, while also furthering the idea of Freedom. Here it is: for those people who think smoking, drugs, abortion, and prostitution should NOT be legal and available - they're not, they never were, don't worry, we're cracking down. There. That way, the world would remain exactly as it is now, only without the onus of guilt, shame, and legality.
Does this mean I am suggesting people smoke, take drugs, get abortions, or go to prostitutes? No. I recommend you do what you want to do, which is what you're going to do anyway. I am merely suggesting we accept life on life's terms instead of drowning in a quagmire of niggling SHOULDS and SHOULDN'TS which have done NOTHING to freeour spirits from the cloud of guilt and shame that shrouds this planet. Again- forgiveness rather than condemnation, compassion rather than judgement, and love rather than fear. And keep in mind, this radical philosophy is coming from me - an avowed misanthrope. If I can feel this way, surely there is hope for us all. Have we learned anything from all this? I have. The next time I tour the UK, I'm not going to tell the audience I quit smoking. I'm going to tell them I quit fucking, just to see what they throw at me then. I look forward to seeing you.

POSTSCRIPT.

There was never a next time Bill Hicks died on February 26th, 1994.His honest ability to cut through the bullshit still very much missed.

.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Hicks

Terence Mckenna - Culture is your operating system

Llwybr Llaethog & David R Edwards - Ffansin Ynfytyn

Cicumnavigating: an experiment

River Teifi


It was fun, oh how we laughed, the driftwood floating, chasing
moss, dreaming of schemes, counting the hours, unpadlocking
the gates, half-in, half-out, a way to blue through a tunnel of zen
paradoxes unfurling wading through time, latitude and longtitude,
earth rythyms wearing their cloaks of anomynity
in these spaces  are the tiny resources of hope.
Alcohol is an anaethesetic it numbs the pain of silence
something that allows us to  hastily rearrange
moving round in circles,with detail pencilled in .
it is the last stand in the sorting room,
seeds of ideas breaking out
running backwards the honesty wanders
memory upturned, weight of the west meets east
towards another summer ending getting dressed
looking beyond grey, walking on goodtimes
Rising towards tomorrow
i'd like to know that acceptance is not surrender
old ghosts collect the rainwater
every day wears out..
to beat time I do not understand.
beat time i do not understand time beat i do
not understand we will vanish smiling we will rise
home is eternity.
The secret is surprise love is always here
delusions of heavens and sweet summer scents.
wild fermentation and from ancient springs we gather
waiting for dust to settle as the weekend laughs in secret.
Perseverence is never defeated
from beginning to end
I am an initiate of invisible chains
reverberating through existence
as beautiful threads bloom again
seek out satisfaction.
Amber gathers dust
echoe comes back from sound
these polished mirrors reflect the shape of things.
How soon is now? sooner or later
we will tiptoe on the water,
what follows is destiny
circle of ceremonies removes all
boundaries and wildness becomes visible,
the invisible  rising sustenance in us  all.
Is paradise's one hand clapping?
When is it time to surrender
follow mystic river down to the sea
tumbling beyond precarious tensions.

Antonin Artaud (1896-1948) - Revolt against poetry.

We have never written anything except against a backdrop of theincarnation of the soul, but the soul already is made (and not by ourselves when we enter into ppetry.The poet, who writes, addresses himself to the Word, and the Word to its laws. It is the uncoscious of the poet to believe automatically in these laws. He believes himself free thereby, but he is not. There is something back of his head and over the ears of his thought. Something budding in the nape of his neck, rooted there from even before his beginning. He is the son of his works, perhaps, but his works are not of him; for whatever is of himself in his poetry has not been expressed by him but rather by that unconscious producer of life, who has pointed life out to him in order that he not designate life himself; and who obviously has never been well-disposed toward him. Well, I don't want to be the poet of my poet, of that self which fancied it'd choose me to be a poet; but rather a poet-creator, in rebellion against the ego and the self. And I call to mind the old rebellion against the ego and the self. And I call to mind the old rebellion against the forms that came over me.It is by revolt against the ego and the self that I disemburden myself from all the evil incarnations of the Word, which have never been anything more for man than a compromise between cowardice and illusion, Aad I only know abject fornication when it comes to cowardice and illusion. And I don't want a word of mine coming from I don't know what astral libido completely aware of the formations of, say, a desire that is mine and mine alone. There is in the forms of the human Word I don't know what operation of rapaciousness, what self-devouring greed going on; whereby the poet, binding himself to the object, sees himself eaten by it. That is a crime weighing heavy on the idea of the Word-made -flesh, but the real crime is in having allowed the idea in the first place. Libido is animal thought, and it was these same animals which one day were changed into men. The word produced through these men is the idea of an invert buried by his animal response to things, who has forgotten ( through the martyrdom of time and things) that the word has been invented. The invert is he who eats his self, and desires that his self nourish him, seeking his mother in it and wanting to possess her for himself. The primitive crime of incest is the enemy of poetry and the killer of poetry's immaclacy. I don't want to eat my poem but I want to give my heart to my poem. And what is my heat yo my poem? My heart is what isn't my ego. I am that forgotten poet who one day saw himself hurtle to matter, and matter never will devour me, my ego. I don't want those old reflexes, results of an ancient incest come from an animal ignorance of the Virgin law of life. The ego and the self are those catastrophic states of being in which the Living Man allows himself to be imprisoned by the forms that he percieved by himself. To love his ego is to love death, and the law of the Virgin is infinite. The unconscious producer of our selves is that of an ancient copulator who frees himself to committ more vulgar magicks, and who has pulled off the most famous wizardry by having brought himself back to his self-same self over and above his very self, eternally, so that he was able even to pull a word out of a cadaver. The libido is the definition of that cadaverous desire, and the falling man an invert criminal. I am such a primitive, discontented with the inexiable horror of things. I don't want to reproduce myself in things but I want things to happen through my self. I don't want to reproduce myself in things but I want things to happen through my self. I don't want an idea of my ego in my poem and I don't want to meet my self again there, either. My heart is that eternal Rose come from the magic power of the initial Cross. He who crucified Himself never returned to himself. Never. For he also surrendered to Life the self by which he sacrificed Himself, after having forced it within himself to become the being of his own life. I want only to be such a poet forever, who sacrificed himself in the Kabbala of self for the immaculate conception of things.

translated by :
Jack Hirschman.


A CRY

The little clestial poet
Opens the shutters of his heart.
The heavens clash. Oblivion
Uproots the symphony.

Stableman the wild house
That has you guard wolves
Does not suspect thewraths
Smouldering beneath the big alcove
Of the vaults that hang above us.

Hence silence and darkness
Muzzle all impurity
The sky strides forward
At the crossroad of sounds.

The star is eating. The oblique sky
Is opening its flight toward the heights
Night sweeps away the scraps
Of the meal that contented us.

On earth walks a slug
Which is greeted by ten thousand white hands
A slug is crawling
There where the earth vanished.

Angels whom no obscenity summons
Were homeward bound in peace
When rose the real voice
Of the spirit that called them.

The sun lowe than the daylight
Volatilized all the sea
A strange but clear dream
Was born on the clean earth.

The lost little poet
Leaves his heavenly post
With an unearthly idea
Pressed upon his hairy heart.

Two traditions met.
But our padlocked thoughts
Lacked the place required,
Experiment to be tried again.


A.A.