Gracious Beast

For many many years I held a practice of carrying heavy things.  There were branches, bundles, wheel boroughs, persons, abstractions of course: “the weight of the world!”; the bonds of so many friends, the promise of a purer life, the cruelty of man, the division of our souls from a unifying spirit.  There were animals, stalled cars, wood for building, produce for grand parties or huge juicing endeavors.  The weight of secrecy, modesty, or personal space, on the other hand, were not burdens of mine.  And the weight of a fragile or needy ego appeared and vanished manically for years.

Probably the most significant weight I managed was a stone.  I’ve carried a lot of rocks.  And I’ve moved heavier ones, bigger ones than this one.  I helped Rob Hite make stone benches and stone walls and stone walkways.  I worked with stone on Hudson Valley farms by monasteries and trains dressed in crisp autumn days with long rays of sun, perfect apples, beautiful horse girls… I’ve also carried ungodly heavy things that moments before wouldn’t budge by my effort alone, and carried them through spaces too small leaving other beautiful hip women in fashionably adapting ballet inspired clothing jaw dropped – almost in horror by the seeming magick of bending space and confusing mass – the physical tricked only by unreasonable persistence and maybe disenchantment with the so-called laws and absolute truths they had reluctantly abide by.  (I don’t remember if they were wearing ballet clothes.  I just like to imagine.)

This stone was very much bound by his assumption of being real.  It was as real as we assume: stubborn, rough, dense, heavy, mass.  The weight – the carrying was bound by – conducted by my brutish self.  No illusion.  No “cheating”.  Just whatever fodder I house that can be related to “man” – or bear and beast.  And maybe that thing is gone, spent, hibernating at least.  I’d like to think the passive, reflective, and quiet human being I’ve become is something more of a man – not to compete with myself (the time past version).  Just a residual clinging to images and definitions of role – tangible ideals, a measurable identity – if only redefining.

So Jesse (me bro) asked me to write a couple songs for Adventure Time and they aired!

Here’s a youtube link:

Breezy Songs

Golden, red.
Bleached and red.
Tattooed pale arms.
Teeth and squinting.
Dark rimmed eyes
paint scrapped windows
through inside walls
and up stairs
eyes each time tromping up and down
eyes stuck up stairs and red dresses and black tights
then wide smiles
and clicking assurances
.     giant teeth!
jumping from behind corners
with caffeine and sweets:
sugar plum.

3. Carrying

Buckling, burning, failing, so quickly, three, maybe a fourth step and he lurches forward and the stone stops in the exact place it lands.  He arches back amazed by the relief and in so much pain, everything screaming.

A few minutes to breath and build the will back up.  Then right the stone, to its point, rest, breath like a horse, rest, keep the toppling at bay, wrap hands, point toes, press chest and cheek, look to the sky, lift, walk forward, lurch, toss, and scream in agony.

This is not manageable.  A half-mile would take a day!  If he could even repeat this for hours.  Maybe right the thing onto a ledge, step below it and carry it on his back?  Risky, yes, but he might walk a dozen yards or more that way.  There.  There is a short wall.  With some struggle he can slide the stone onto the top slab.  It is not becoming easier.  Grit, grimace, spit, strain, under the edge, push again, back, thighs, calves, toes, and will, the stone reluctantly slides on top of the wall.  “Christ!”  And he paces back and forth breathing out like a horse again, even shaking his head back and forth and screaming out a little to keep from feeling sick.  Right it onto its edge.  The same.  Breath and curse.  Needn’t bring it to its point, thank God, fit it to his back instead, cupping hands under the edge, belt below the edge as well, head tilted forward for the bulges in the stone.  Let it topple slowly.  Slowly!  Cry and carry!  Carry!  Carry!  Stumbling steps.  Carry!  Carry!  Shuffling, jerking feet.  Carry!  Throw the thing off, oh God!  God!  Hell!

That was further.  That was not a good plan.  Boy is sitting by a tree staring at the stone.  This stone is heavy.  This stone is so much to bear.  He feels sick.  He feels terrible.  This is the right stone.

2. Lifting

Second or third largest?  It is the largest that he could budge, and budging is something completely different from lifting and carrying.  As pretty as the stone is it is awkward: taller than the boys torso and head, blinding him or forcing him to walk sideways; wider than would allow him to wrap his arms around the front, to squeeze with elbows, chest and hands; thick enough that his hands can’t pinch the edge.   The “point” of the stone – the corner that can be imagined as the point to the arrowhead – should face downward, leaving boy with the most manageable width and a sloping edge that would let him cradle near the base without having to work his fingers between the stone and earth – no pinching or crushing – though the angles would quicken his clock against gravity – slipping, not just the anticipated weakening grip.  And the task of setting the stone onto this point is its own challenge: brutal of course, but delicate too.  Precise.

Right the thing.  Turn the stone to its edge.  You might expect that he would try once and barely lift an edge, and the second time he would lift with grimaces and spitting exhalations and muttered cries from his navel, driving up with more steam as he can get a full arm and shoulder under the beast, then using his thighs, calves, and toes push the stone to the edge, too forcefully past the edge on the uneven ground, trying to catch the sudden falling away with outstretched arms and an already overexerted back…

Yes, once.  The second time (third) after recovering exhalations, panting, pacing away and back again with hands on hips and head tilted back, he fashions a surface for the edge to sit, and a line of rocks to aid in the catching.  And with an effort no less dramatic he rights the stone – to its side…

Now to the point.  Learning from these previous efforts he kicks smaller rocks into place and others out of the way.  He even unearths a perfect divot for the point to sit in.  And again with anguished faces and grunts and spit, sliding feet, dropping knees, and strength unimaginable from this waif of a boy the thing finds herself balanced on her narrow point, always threatening to topple mercilessly.

Boy hugs her, wide legged and desperate to catch any breath that might regain his balance let alone the wide stone’s.  Exhaling through closed loose lips, he understands the horse working hard, and laughs that he’s made the same sounds.  Even after he is done laughing about it, he breathes like a horse, and closes his eyes, holding the stone, feeling his sweat and the breeze.  And with his hands wrapped around the thickness, toes pointed east and west, his chest and cheek pressed firmly against the granite slab, and eyes to the budding canopy, he lifts the rock.

1. Choosing

There is a heap of stones.  At first the seemingly twiggish boy chooses the largest of the bunch.  But giving all his back – “all” save tearing lean muscles from thin bone – he can’t shift the thing; not one grain.  He tries his hand a few times beyond reason but not so much to waste the day, then goes about choosing a better stone.  This one, the second or third largest, is a better shape: a gigantic arrowhead.  Lifting this rock will prove a brutal task, but when it slid a foot across the pile with his second push, he was certain.

I just added a page to this website:

“Academic”

It hosts my year long Senior Study that I completed for partial fulfillment of my undergraduate studies at Goddard College.

There are three main projects: 1. I’m Fine (Novella) 2. [t]he Guide’s Role (6 part podcast) 3. [t]he Guide’s Role (context paper for the two creative projects, including the transcriptions of the podcast).

Check it out!

You know it’s like I really really really want water, and I am sitting near a stream.  And if I drink the water I think it would be bad for some reason but I can’t remember why.  And when I look away I start to forget about needing to drink, but sometimes I get so thirsty and sometimes I accidentally turn around.  And there is the stream and it’s so beautiful, and I want to drink, but I can’t.  But I can’t remember why.  And I am so thirsty.  And I want to cry but I don’t have any tears. My lips are chapped.

There is a monster.
She is a terrific beast and I am so entirely at her mercy.

I cannot slay her,
she is a lamb – no, a treasure
that must be left to live and grow.
I could infect her kingdom too easily.
But she is no lamb,
in a moment she could strike me into a thousand pieces.
That is her power.
Still she has to remain safe from me,
because she is the unicorn or narwhal or some other beasty magic that has a horn or…
Also if I destroyed her I would be shattered a thousand times again.
So I am her victim
and also her nightmare.

I have decided to run from her,
but she is in every beautiful and hideous thing I see.
Every stone and flower.
Every pretty girl and terrible boy.
Every waking and sleeping moment.
Every moment of happy or sad.
Every memory I have of her is my home and prison
and I am banished and captive by both!

And so at this divide I am the serene madman.
At any moment ready to act beautifully, hideously, or to explode in tears,
but none ever come
so I remain feeling as if I’ll lose my mind
but as still as the calm before the world crushing storm.