edison resisting the musical use of the phonograph;
the difficulty of seeing a single pixel of red light blink;
the lasting satisfaction of cherry tomato hidden in mashed potatoes;
the museum of sound.
poor horse, poor horse, im sorry poor horse. never again, ill never ride again.

i can call him up and tell him what i want!

Jesus.mp3

(first im gonna tell him, again, how i love glorious sound; the tambourine forever convulsing, the concertina and horns in stereo imperfect mirroring, the full stop || to announce the entrance of guitars. the church bells, and beautiful beautiful the one man who comes in wrong towards the end but everyone smiles through. thump thump hit your foot on the floor and all this worry goes away. and ry cooder isnt even really supposed to be cool, is he?)

am i sick? do i want to get well? is such a goal possible? i am goalless, theres just thump thump this beat, and merely attending to each new downbeat, thats what im going to do. after every hit of the drum there another one coming up. on it. right now im riding fast through midnight a slipper of ice, and the walls of night are a million cymbals suspended and waiting for my playful picket fence stick. im hitting more than ever...abandon the metaphor for a moment and revel in the quotidian count, ive got 7 plays lined up for the first 6 months of next year, and i am thrilled psychedelic sick about each and everyone. listen: a cabaret, a song played on a solo saxophone, a train to catch, a gun goes rooty toot toot, russian rock n roll beamed into outer space, prayer both silent and full, and finally a birth of light. i must be fucking crazy. i must be! am i sick? do i want to get well? these seven bursts of metal with wonderful souls talent so beautiful, none of them will be the single goal, each night will be another cymbal sizzle crash through starlit wind flying past me as im riding so recklessly down the hill, weaving past cars technicolor lit, and its going to blur in the speed to just one stream of light pouring out exhausted. i love the challenge, the sleepless push to hit every next note, keep playing, keep going, i want it.

i can call him up and tell him what i want!

do i want more than this? im making a living at it now. im paying the rent on these outbursts now; and the people are good, everyones mind is reeling in another way and i love the laughs each one gives me. how can i ever come close to knowing them all? is there room for me? do i want more than them? maybe, maybe. real success, that elusive flame of fame, ha ha my musical opening on broadway in 2007, my god, why not, why not. i can call him after all, and ask him for this, right? what i want. what i want.

when the whiskey veil wears away for just a second i look down at my hands and they are white knuckled for im freezing cold causing im going so fucking fast and i forgot my gloves or i lost them in a bar on mission street or in the bart station, but i cant go back because i jumped the gate, i jumped the gate again almost every day a bart train renegade heart racing fast everyday but i cant remember right now. i must be crazy. there are so many things to wrap your hands in anyway...and look at her with her mittens fingerless, and her with her hat fizz fuzz blue, and her with her legs i can see fishnet stockings, garter and all, under a wider fishnet hose, that lovely leg all wrapped twice. every woman around me wrapped up different and my fingers trembling no matter where or when for a little more warmth, a fabric new always, why? why? i must be crazy wanting that when ive already got those eyes to get so lost in that temperature vanishes like direction in the dark, floating through centigrade in a shivering sweat flawlessly true. i must be crazy, but i can ask him, what i want, what i want.

i dont want anything, i dont. god, please i dont. please let that be the truth. cause ill get so sad if i want it and dont have it and ive got so much right now that im almost blind. i can be what i want to be/i can choose whatever heaven grants. but i just want to be whatever heaven grants, any cymbal so bright and lovely to be seen when im riding fast like this, god its like a new moon gold in the sky! crash a cymbal that i want to hear ring clear, crash peel, i want to hear them PEEL!

and i fear the shallowness, maybe theres too much and im not there deep where i could be. theres someone ive known as long as possible in real pain and i cant understand it really, cause i felt real pain once and said never again? no, surely not? that was so little...
but solo now so: lo the cymbals,
only the cymbals and my bike out of control too fast, but god theyre so glorious shiny! ive been working on riding no handed so i can grab a stick in both hands and catch my ears in the nodes and hear a mountain range valley strange of waves in the cold night air.

one asked me, why do i perform? i cant answer you, i cant. i have no idea. its what im here to give? its just there and its beautiful and thats all i can do. maybe im doing too much? i can barely feel.

tomorrow ill make the drummer a vegetable lasagna in exchange for a haircut, god my hair is so long, its the only helmet ill wear. i know how to make a good vegetable lasagna; i just have to pick the right vegetables, and only a few, so that its about *mushrooms*, or its about *broccoli*, its about the *one* taste, dont lose it, dont lose it//

(but on cannery row hazel pours all the half drunk drinks into a single jug, and comes home with a wild punch maybe champagne spiked one night and fernet the next. one taste.
i have no idea what all of this tastes like,
i have no idea what god looks like,
i have no idea how there can be so many sounds in the universe that when i open my mouth next time ill sing one brand new song, once and only once always one note to the next never ending, never goal, just sound all the way SHHHOOM! to the end of the universe getting absorbed by all around it cymbalstars bursting and dying brand new)

well, well, well,
im almost home, solid ground. four days to the condor. far too much has happened, potential blogisodes lost to the parallels forever by my present universe letahrgy. yes, i slept in the hillside vineyards of cinque terre and thus missed the boat and spent the night in promenade carnival genoa, yes, i got into an absurd physical fight, all pulling and hip punching, with a turkish cab driver ("hippodrome, not hipotrom!"), culminating in a jury of turkish merchants and mutual flicks to the temple, "TEH!", yes, on sea days i watched four complete seasons of 'friends' and was just weepy giddy throughout. these things happened, and now i am those things. im really growing up.

what will happen next? i dont know. but it is sure to be

rome (& taormina)//two dueling images, filmfictions that prey on me:

1. the perfect murder, the suited man, shaved glass in the omelette. i believe this from alfred hitchcock presents. oh my, good evening.

2. the perfect outlaw, breaks the bottle over the bar and pours the whiskey down his raspy throat and stubbled neck. hoo-wee!, good night.

so, when i bottleopenerless attempt to open my big peroni in the park and the glass top breaks off (a-fucking-gain!), with possible whisper glass tendrils waiting gleaming terribly possibly within, well then what then do i then do?

ey?

istanbul//on the way hand, yes, i absolutely believe in the idea of life as art, of my every action and interaction and view of the world being the great living artwork that i spend my life creating. and thus so long as this piece is given my attention, concentration, my skill and love, my work towards mastery, then i am living the complete life, the life full and worthy. and my artistic endeavors, the silly songs and scattermess writings, are just a small part of this larger more important whole, my life, my god and love and child. this is the way hand, smiling and clear.

the other hand, is, such a raging jealousy everytime i read or see or hear something that ahs me to the core. and i want to do that! i want to do that! i want to do that! gallileo crying in the snow, this hurts so much. oh it does. it does! i want to write a novel, and have a platinum album, and make a series of internet sensation videos that get optioned by hbo. oh the fame and the quality are entangled, i know they are. i do, damn it, i do! oh hell! i do!

still, in istanbul we managed to get into a very posh club (having learned the hard way last time to avoid the nightclubs filled with prostitutes, unordered food {fruit, though, all delicous fruit!} and YTL40 drinks {$28ish}, closer to 100 should you buy one for the finebellied lady), in which we were originally refused entry because we were girlless. girl-less. three drinks and one horrendous turkish eighties cover band later (the slowest version of "blister in the sun" ever, with strange minor thirds in the happy melody. why, why?), we went back, and were unrecognized, and walked through confident and tall...then stopped half way in, but no, no, turkish girls, turkish girls told us to meet them here, young beautiful turkish girls, mira and sonya...here, at carvot, they told us to meet them...no, we dont have their number, they are up there, and we start to walk, and ok! go ahead! had ha! up four, five flights of stairs to the pulsing rooftop party with jamiriquoi (my band will be instantly spellable) videos projected on a screen against dark turkish sky. but thats not the music, the music is pure turkish, tambouras zinging and voices ayayayayayyaaaing over quarter tones triumphant. what a dance, and in the drunken darkness grabbing for a handful of spicy nuts accidentally grabbed a few shells and a butt from an ashtray. oh, terrible, terrible, wonderful craze and this music all around and people sitting raise their hands in the air and i realize i am in the midst of it, in the midst of one of those nights, where everything is interlocked tender. and finally clinches it is much much later on another roof i am brought to woolen warmth by mr bob dylan, oh you sweet you, anachronistic crooning "one more cup of coffee" of all things.

he gets me! he did it! i want to do that, i want to do that.

but on the cab ride home, i was the crooner. we are drunk and speeding and he doesnt speak a lick of english, and we not a lick or turkish, and so we are miming the cruise ship destination to our bedazzled cabbie. i swim airbutterfly! i toot airhorn! i aircast fish! all for him, and hes sir smiling crazy laughing and turns the music up as loud as possible and im drunk and gone and theres of course a doner in my hand. howling at the moon! the cabbie loves it, i love it. we are arting each other supreme.

arting each other supreme, that was the moment, that was the golden moment.

mr. dylan, did you ever do that? i mean, exactly that? precisely that ocombinationo of movement and sound? no, no of course not!
it was a hit, a real charttopper, the kids in my head were dancing smacking their dashboards to it all summer night long.

and so im okay, for today,

(oh but that thirst, that seldom acknowledged desert thirst.)

portifino//the boar is looking at me and breathing. burlap sides expanding. this is not a pig, it is a boar. it is burlap brown and its face horrendous. alien awful. we are staring at each other. staring. i have no idea what animals think like. it looks away, draws a circle in the dirt. rummages in some leaves, finds a wooden disk about the same size as the circle, moves it along with his snout. stares again. there it is. boar. it wants me to know about the circles, thats clear. and the circles rhyme. rhyme. oh yes the world rhymes! i rememeber.
boar, core, door, before.
a beast, a center, a change, a time...will i go like that?
theres more: pore, sore, soar, pour.

mustard makes her cry, the memory of her home mustard premortared makes her cry, and she rolls the r, crrrrry, so you feel it. her eyes black outlined, she draws on her eyes so i can see her seeing me.

the boar is a car with wash me on the windows. i go to pour sweet smelling soap water down its side, dripping into his pores which are golf hole huge when i become little. but my bucket is empty, and both ways are blocked; my bicycle is surrounded by bees, four of them, flying in and out of the frame silently. strange to not hear them, to only hear wind and her crying and the boars words in my head,
more, roar, four, gore.

what is this? what fantasy does this become? if i coax her crying to a lion roar, then may i pass? i dont want gore, no gore in my life.

theres a scratch on my leg.

taormina//cold blazing he is, frostbit boiling as he granites his gaze through the tour bus window, and of course to multiply his frustration the seat is there right at the window pane, and forward or behind the view is so cut, cutcut, and cut like his and unkindest cut with the frustrations of the job, feeling for the first time the bad boss feeling, the knowing of *i am right* over this boss who is not, this silly foolish man over man who does not deserve to be there, and this sole interaction, the previous nights events (a vindictive bass line, a critical comment, a smallizing meeting) pasted crude upon the possible italian beauty around and he is just raw, just dumb with anger and disdain, and all the morsels of the world lose their delight and see him in this state unsated to the land of darknod, sleep dead hate, the sun growling through the glass at just the wrong angle, how can the sun seem so ugly. this is the attitude of the approach, the space in which he approaches, taormina--

land of mcw's praise, holy culture radiant, and i know that i approach this place with the sacred ghosting that so much of this trip has had; for i am not the first fire, here, others have blazed these european paths, and i see these womens ghosts perfuming across the piazzas. god i want this subjective objective to end...but i am he, and they are she, and we twirl together through this space only, time irrelevant as i hop though the town that another woman so lovely so fine young traveled first, and hope i hope this ghostlight will beautify heal me...

and i want to believe that but dont--- that's critical here, i dont believe it, my whole bus drive from messina to taormina, sicily, i am bitter boy and every tune that ipod shuffler unto me is discredited under my headache bitter, and i am not buying it, i am ready for the bad days. some days i hate so much...its no use denying it, this is ahh i am, and they so stupid fill me with such rage and i unbuddhasize myself into such rage, so small my anger, so small a man i am in this mix, oh god you bastard you dave malloy bastard, and i am hate for this boss and this band and this life that makes me work when all i want is song wine and arms around me.

and so: heres the point: im committed to this bad feeing, i know ill have this bad day. and the bus drops us in taormina and the guests ask me silly and there the boring dancer asking me to sudden coffee and i am trapped and ugh my god this world and so own am i, my mind is convinced so low. i travel as a tour escort, pinned, a tattooed gecko on the wall, and i walk amidst tentacles and get out quick, rush ahead to the greek theater and there climb the stairs high up and sit in the bleachers and everyone looks small and pretty down there; and thats a little better.

and this is nice and lovely that i can sit quiet on their stair and the world calm of ease moment, but fundamentally i am still raw ajar boy, grr vinegar man, leave me far away.

thats when nature lady starts it really in. the map has two kinds of paths labelled: "archaeological ruins" and "natural beauty". i go for "natural beauty". which starts out pretty shit, a winding narrow sidewalkless road, killmecars whiz. grr! but, a respite at a cemetery, with the photos on the tombstones, old sicilians gazing blank into eternity, and then back to the road. mmm/grr. mmm, sure. but then: grr. im back to grr. fucking pebble, etc.

but only for a moment, because, hey hey. there. there, there! theres another off limit staircase!! oh, how lovely that my lifes author is working from a consistent symbol pool! this one leading down, down into overgrown green. im wearing pants and sandals, and the grass is dewy wet, so my toes get instant tickle. and this stair is crumbling, whole steps missing, just brown dirt, and the bushes are bigger and bigger and the prickers blocking my path require my careful thumb and forefinger attention. and my wet little toes, and the smells are everywhere, and my god look all around im in italy. im here. im right here right now. oh yes. and then from nowhere an elderly british couple appears, walking up, speaking cheery, and they warn me: wild hens. mmm.

and sure enough, wild hens. and im smiling in spite of myself. once again, my mind seems to have an infinite number of subsections, crisscrossing all dueling for eyesight supremacy. and so nice, for now the grumbler has lost and im healed.

hmm, mmm. thank god for mutable time after all.

kusadasi//i wasnt expecting such a show, such a brilliantly executed piece of theater to cap my day. day spent on a tour of ancient ephesus, with trips to the death house of the virgin mary, where tied kerchiefs, paper scraps, plastic bags and leaves symbolize wishes of the faithful, and the st john basilica, including the tomb of said saint. i got on my knees to breathe in the magic dust coming from the tomb, wild dust of the fire eyed gospelist, and there saw a turtle walk as quickly as ive ever seen a turtle walk, among the dry grass and stones.

and then the days end, with just a stop, a quick quick stop our adorable guide beste tells us, at the carpet school, where young turkish women strain their eyes wool on wool, wool on cotton, silk on silk, a great vat of hot water and cocoons stirred with a wooden brush and 40 strands of nothing spinning up to the wooden bobbin. the handsome turk, sharp dress shirt well fitting and neatly tucked into grey wool pants, tells us carpet stories, the persian knot, and then invites us into the back room. a notably empty room, with carpets on the wall and carpeted benches all around, but a great blank void of floor in the center. and the turkish hospitality, free glasses of apple tea, coffee, wine and raki. and the man clasping his hands in front of him, taking in a deep breath, and behind him four more men have gathered, arms behind their backs, attentive, composed, ready.

and now:
FWOOM! the first carpet hits the ground and all ready I know im in for it. he starts with the simple ones, wool on wool, geometric, here we look at the quality of the wool and the colors more than the design, and behind him his men are marching about the room, throwing down carpets, FWOOM! we are not so impressed by these simple rugs, and he knows this, and his men are moving quickly, throwing down throwing down, as we move on to wool on cotton, now more intricate. and he dazzles us with numbers, months and knots and square inches, he fascinates us, as two men stand behind him with the first of these wool on cottons, a large one, rolled up and held between them as the ringmaster builds us up, waiting, waiting, waiting, and then FWOOM! they let it fall to the ground and there is a collective gasp from the crowd. aaaahh! and then the men are off again, dancing around each other so smoothly, such polished choreography, throwing down carpets on top of the now forgotten wool on wools. and theyve mastered the room, they know where to stand so that the unrolling carpets come speeding towards you and stop exactly at your feet. FWOOM! what a dance, so swift they walk, so erect and proud. and the ringmaster walks smoothly amidst the chaos, his saffron voice pleasing us all, the raki has my lips anisenumb. and now he tells us of us a special line, a special make that one must obtain permission form the turkish government to make, the specific colors, the specific patterns, two men behind him waiting waiting with carpet rolled, and FWOOM! and its the biggest one yet and its breathtaking. aaahhh! and now the men are throwing the carpets to each other, rolled carpets flying through the air ("yes, these carpets all fly, if you say the magic word. do you know the word? visacard, ha ha"), strange vertical parabolas complimenting the unraveling spirals of wool at our feet. the floor three, four five carpets thick, and we havent even finished, for now, it is the silk, silk on silk. so small the work that only an hour a day can be spent on the weaving, the eyes, the eyes, and this carpet, here behind him, waiting to be born to us, this carpet took three years to make. but first, but first, we have small ones, and now another flight pattern as tiny carpets are frisbee flung on the ground, twirling turkish tokens, shimmering woolen pizza doughs, the twist on the floor and as they turn the light changes them, the colors now glassy brilliant, now deep voluptuous. FWOOM FWOOM! FWOOM! some bigger ones, and two men together pick the carpet up and flip it over in another dazzling dance move, turn it so we may see the colors change. two carpets for the price of one, yes, ha ha. and then, and then finally the final FWOOM! the giant silk is unleashed before us, and yes, my god yes it is really beautiful. these were created here, created dancing shining colors, flowers woven impossible, and he is smiling, he is so proud, so proud of his wares. he is: right. and someone asks, someone finally asks, and were really not surprised, no, now we know that it is worth it, $20,000.

how many bought carpets? how many left, shipping papers tightly in hand? 13 out of 40. i did not, but i shook the turks hand deeply and kept the feeling of the carpets on my fingers later that night, in the rendezvous lounge, playing cheap jazz standards with a too showy trumpet player whose notes werent double knotted, they were high and shallow, and he didnt understand that theater can sneak up on you, theater can be subtle and fairy swift, theater can be carpets and coffee unfiltered, the joy to create, the well dressed pride.

rome & istanbul//im having a bit of a problem visiting touristed out ancient and religious sites. specifically, the coliseum and the blue mosque. theres problems on both ends, i think, so lets just go chronologically:

why the fuck are people going to these places? why the fuck am i going to these places? its really weird. im looking at a building. its a very cool building. and im looking at it. im soaking it in. and then its over...and thats really all there is. time moves on. but it needs to be more, it needs to be important, to last, and so the tours, the headphones, the lollipop signs guiding guests, the information, the history, the postcards, the tiny models and ashtrays, and then, the pictures, the pictures, the pictures. what is this? this plastered smile in front of the -it- is not so beautiful as the living smile next to you, holding the photos in hand, is it? why that same smile? i stopped letting people look at the camera long ago; i want the interesting pose, the unexpected expression, the loving nuance. but a smile in front of the coliseum is nothing…so soulless it seems! so uninspired! so done. and worse still the photos of just things. why are these pictures being taken? no one will like looking at them, will they? why a picture of every single thing? every single thing?

it feels to me so sad, so lonely, that life seems so empty and we need these photos to fill it up. look, look, i was here, i did this, i saw this, i did something. i have done something. my life has meaning. i am not this empty coincidence of light and sound hurtling through vast space for a infinitesimal moment. i am this, i was here. i did this.

and yeah, im not taking pictures, but im not letting myself off of the above hook. im traveling the world right now, and why? is my life so desperately empty and needing?

following this thread wont be pretty. so lets move onto the blue mosque, shall we?

whey the fuck are people letting people into these places? i like mecca. i like it that i cannot go to mecca unless i mean it. and thats what was killing me at the blue mosque, for there, just over this cordon, are people meaning it, on their knees, meaning it, filling up and emptying out, breathing, crying, needing this, loving this. this place is for them. and im standing there, my sandals in a fucking plastic bag in my hand, looking at the incredible dome, and then just looking at these people right in the middle of a most intimate sacred moment. and this is not a im-a-westerner-not-a-muslim thing, im certainly going to feel the same way next ride when i visit the vatican friday. this is a i-am-not-here-for-the-right-reason thing. oh the people that talk too loud in quiet jazz clubs, they are not there for the right reason...and it hurts, it hurts me when i am nearby and trying to listen to god on stage in this little jazz club, and now here i am just looking at someone while they are talking to god. im just looking at them.

now i work through this, i can see the god in all the tourists around me, and rah rah rah god in my own self scorn. and the god in my plastic shoe bag. and im having a great time, and in the end what more can i ask for, my life is empty, every life is empty, and i can fill it as i may and thats the life. i get moments of transcendent brilliance, suddenly all the filters gone and im listing to the man in the glass box intone the koran over a cheap microphone so his voice sounds like robotogod, and i love it. but i like the dream of mecca better, what i imagine it must look like, and the just as true god i see when im sitting at home, eating an apple, wondering what mecca must feel like, and suddenly i remember to taste, right there at home and not so many miles away and empty.

gibraltar// i used the map, followed glossy in my pocket, to find the footpath up, which began with great wide steps colored on the sides with the british flag and the word "apes". from there it devolved into a rocky path, and i felt so cool walking swiftly seeking new footsteps in my new too-cool nikes. hiking fast fast up, and think fast fast up in real present time, every synapse firing in seek of the next step; the quick scan of terrain rock and dirt, flash judgments on distance, stability and comfort. and so necessary to your unbreaking legs is this attention to the ground beneath the feet that all extraneous thought is gone, its just find the STEP, find the STEP, find the STEP, and is this suddenly meditation? perhaps.

then there the path ends and now a small stretch of narrow road, now a boring paved walk up up, and aw come on i wanted to hike all the way. ah, but: there: just over a blue gate: is: my god,

----a
--gigantic
---------stone
-------------staircase

going all the way up the side of the rock of gibraltar. easily three hundred steps. and its fenced off, because looking just a bit up i can see the metal banister is completely wasted, twisted and dangling towering-inferno-style, with a sheer drop teasing. yeah, they cant let people climb this. but they havent really done that good of a job of closing it, have they? just a sign, "no access", and a gate, but no, i could jump that very easily. and john cougar (premellencamp) stirs my blood-- "i fight authority, authority always win...well, ive been doin it since i was a young kid and i come out grinning..." and grinning indeed i was as i started up, so many steps, sweat pouring off of me, but knowing that at the top (assuming the rock cops arent waiting for me) ill see the rock a lot more clearly then my taxied neighbors.

something new on this contract is that i dislike my musical director quite a bit. he is old and tired. the soul is gone. he calls impenema. he condescends and yells. he forgets things. hes foolish. he talks incessantly. hes rude, belittles the guest entertainers and av staff to their face. worst of all, he is a terrible bass player, missing accidentals left and right. nothing so bad as a bass note a half step off. he got lost during naima and walked off the stage. and then he keeps playing these power fifths during jazz ballads...what the fuck? anyway.

so i am learning again the songs of hated authority, watching myself with mystery and glee when i am silent and cold, or harsh and belligerent. never am i so unenlightened as when i am dealing with bad authority. such small electric thrill, the game the cruel game i play to let this man know he does not have my respect. you dont get to have my jokes, my eye contact, my full conversation, my easy compliance. i will hold back from you until you remember what you are doing and start to do it well. so childish i am! so so! and i am not as bad as i was in the teen years, but sometimes i break and i bring it on and i am difficult just for the joy of watching him lose his shit. its human, its what happens, and i wont believe that its all bad when i can do it and he can do it. that is: not all negative interactions are necessarily bad. they are the whole, they call me out and slam me and challenge me and grow me. the world of ego cannot just be ignored. now i keep it down, and i try not to spend dinner in the mess spilling my complaints onto the others as so many crew members do, but i enjoy my private jousts, and i delight with fantasies of it going too far, i tingle when it starts to happen again and theres another experience to soak in.

in school a lot i got accused of challenging authority for its own sake, but this is not so; its only disenlightenment that i challenge, authorities who are cold and closed and cruel. and they get it, they get it from me, and i know its not constructive for them, i cant change them, but maybe it is constructive for me. let me feel it. let me remember my me deep inside, hard and inflexible. let me know how people work, what the lines are---

and most important how absurdity fits into it all. ie what if in the middle of this lecture i just start saying meowing at the man, literally meowing and clawing at my boss like a cat? answer to that one: i will get taken out to the deck and yelled at.

that happened a few nights ago. the tension did create some really hot music, ill say that at least.

at the top of the rock of gibraltar, above the monkeys who leapt at me, i climbed still further, off the road, on top of a lookout tower and high onto the rock cliffs where the sky was everywhere and the wind a sea of sound. and there almost at the top there were seagulls, seagulls everywhere, all screaming "CAAA! CAAAA!" and the higher i got the more they screamed at me. until finally they started diving at me, swooping right down at my head with the most deafening high shrill "CAAAAAAAAAA!!!!" and i ducked fast and the wind and the sky and the sea on three sides around me, africa in the distance, and one dropped guano just to my left in a deafening splat and another dive bombs me, CAAA!!!! and im maybe 20 feet form the top. but CA-CAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!! and so i, scared, screamed out loud, "All Right! All Right! Im Going!" and i turned back, back to my human world of taxis and roads and petty ego interactions so far removed from this raw rock and sky. ill play all i want in that human world, but the birds had authority there, and the authority of birds great masters of the heaven, is not to be challenged.

more aware of the melodies i was two nights ago, accompanying trombone through jobims wave, forever lovely the diminished rising second phrase, "dont worry bout the setting sun". dressed like a blues brother in a tux coat and long black tie, hair wet and spiked. playing less harmonically, less of the chordal clunk, more aware of the contrapuntal weave, this after seeing my own life through new emerald spectacles, given by hermann hesse, kicking ass as usual, in the glass bead game; the game being a culmination of art, science, culture, and religion, a chess like dance of ideas played by monkish master scholars, music and mathematics and contemplation tangled dangled (oh but not mangled!)------> all at once; instead of the passion of the periphery, the single minded obsession, instead the seek for oneness, summation, the journey towards the center, the sum of all things and the dance together.

i am not one thing--
no one is one thing--
and all of these not one things are one thing.

i walked through a drug store in key west, saw the colors of shampoos and lotions around me, the sunglassed dazes of fat tourists with waffle cones full and scorn furrowed quick, the coconut smell, the hemingway ashtray, and the muffled wail of portishead so cinema tragic with strings just beneath and snare and bass rattling my broken small headphones. and so much more, my belly hungry as i prepare to fast for our five day sail across the ocean, my neck tingle insistent as jamacian sunburn heals, and the key lime pie, and the crude tshirts. and all these spun together into one single instant that is the sum of an infinity of melodic thread, at each instant passing each other to form this chord, that chord, each melody distinct and holy yet never so vibrant as when the others around it surround absorb and electric blanket it.

like this gentle bach andante and fugue played on vineyard guitar the senses soak. all of bach independent melodies woven together, so very different from most popular music we hear today, accompanying guitars and pianos clunking out the chords. this starts to happen around mozart, alberti bass laying down the harmony with amelodic repetitions, and its lovely, it works, but its not melodic. it is simple and true, and an electric guitar strumming six notes all at once, and ah all those notes vibrating together and the rich rich, but is not six melodies on a vineyard guitar all at once, it is not the holy weave of bach, (oh and other music of the time; bach did not invent this. he was just soooooooo oooooooooooh), harmony created through the intersection of independent linear lines; a bass grounding, a tenor soaring, an alto stabilizing, a soprano lighting. the chords are there, but only as the consequence of this tangling.

anyone who has taken a basic college counterpoint class will tell you that doing this well, creating even just two independent lines that sound good both by themselves and together, making sure that every chord you pass through gets voiced well, with a root third and fifth and maybe a seasoned seventh or more, and never double the fifth, avoid parallel motion, etc, and i in my passionate youth detesting the idea of rules in music (but oh the truth that the broken rules sound pretty bad). that doing all this, all this well is really, really hard.

but the feeling when it works:

ie the experience of listening to "dear prudence" with headphones and hearing for the first time that subtle chorused out guitar part under the more persistent ostinato melody up top. and hearing the tambourine part for itself, when it comes in just once with the bass, and john rubbing the first note of the melody, an e, against the guitar singing high f#'s every bar, and the third melody in the bass, down seven six flat six five, and later a fourth subtle guitar voice, faaa mi, fa mi, after every prudence, and then the ahs hanging forever on the chorus, and then cymbals for the first time? oh! then we really start in, hand claps now, and my god the cowbell is actually playing with the bass guitar, right along, and on top of everything a brand new voice comes in with george just wailing on guitar, and piano shimmering out of nowhere, so much so much!! and then WHAAA! the whole song hammers halftime, the sun is up, the sky is blue its beautiful and so are you, and the lead guitar rising rising rising and playing the highest note of the song right on "you", and the piano answering it with a little seventh chord! come on! oh my!! bass, low picked guitar, ostinato f# guitar, lead guitar, lead vocal, vocal ahhs, piano, and snare racing forward, tambourine swinging just right, and glorious cymbals shining their own. 10 part daisy chain counterpoint. and thats what makes this song juts floor me every time. open up your eyes, yes! they weave, they roll over each other, and that sand gets everywhere.

and why:
i got shocked with 220 volts of dangling transformer. right into the flesh of my palm the like a dry desert eel. i screamed and swore, laughed and was overjoyed. talking to the russian late in her room i felt twin strains of seduction and friendship welling inside of me, watched my gaze change from desire to companionship and back, as she spoke of russia, how there they are humble, and are judged by there deeds and never the words, never the words...here we shout and pomp "i am the best, i have done this difficult thing, acknowledge me", and it is believed, and always always the quiet ignored and misunderstood. drunk on vodka orange and red i felt such a joy to listen these melodies this woman weave with the others, every melody running through me developing timeless, retrograde inversions of my i. enough for this night to hear these stories and try to learn the tune. and i: love this dance. and i: love a woman far away. and i: love so many. ah, this is working, such a complex fugue she and i have allowed ourselves to feel, all of this happening all at once, growing close so far apart. i will never know who i will be until the very next second, right, *now*, (and right *now*), ((and right *now*)) ((((

glenn gould (famous bach pianist) detested music that wasnt based on counterpoint, and recorded some pretty hilarious recordings of classical and romantic music that just reeks of his scorn, yet transforms the music into something new. he treats the accompanying figures in mozart like another melody, strong and omnipresent and tenacious. and there is a meaning to it, to hear that sameness as a melody grounding and stone lovely.

how noble that life can echo music, how wonderful to know my inside a vast cathedral filled with an infinite web of thoughts, and that the spiders there are not so creepy but just small and smiling little halfsmiles, aware and dancing so agily as they swing on their gossamer and time every trapeze jump so they never crash with another, all lightbeams dancing.

lonely lonely so lonely a day of just lonely and lost and my whole body pouring with this empty water emotion, clear clear spring water running through me and my stomach a creek a whisper creak of sadness.

this is not a crybaby post!

its just interesting: when my body quivers with emotion, when i can really feel it. as tangible as a toothache or muscle sore for the climb. that lonliness of two days ago: once i had arrived on the ship and gotten my key and id and clothes ("why you say 16 1/2 if you not 16 1/2 man? now i got to fold it all up again man. the pins man! know your size man, know your size!") and moved in, and finally a moment of rest and solitude on the bed, above the blanket, and a chance to remember it all it all----------------->

the last two weeks being just saturated with love, san francisco friends lost in it, leaving it, looking for it, a jangled out of tune guitar, and me drunk with transvestites, and laughing in the street such comedies among the hills of mission dolores, and blurs of sleep and love, and wine and champagne and raspberries and kiss and kiss and kiss my goodness so sweet raspberry strawberry peach. i touch bare arms when i can; i hold elbows. and a dreaded lovetorn reunion, slow and stately as waves crash on the beach.
...and a gathering of animals cooing on a field and all pouring out of me as i say goodbye to *her*...
and then new york city tearing me apart with its brand new brand new, and i awake too long so the streetlights are moving and the sky is huge and feets afire and the friends i love most, singing me their voices and i have them forever and the sound so cool so cool doubled with a touch of chorus! so tired, so tired, i sleep over my drink, and a flute and a chorus of tribal drums looped looped looped keep me watching the edges for electrics. and he will have a child and laughs so loud, and he is in love and lauughs so loud. and chances taken, and the kindest compliment from a stranger with her arm in my sleeve. and the streets of that city flooded with love as always, legs on the subway, a girl smiling in slow motion across a bar just a small moment that will suffice for the rest of the whirlwind of moonlit rooftops and subtable icewax play that leave me just completely void, empty and clean, drained of lightning so hard did i shake the mountains that week and such a joy in my throat to feel the blast as they shake me back.

jesus jesus! stay alive! stay alive! im empty and exhausted and ready for more. ive got to stay alive for some more of this. ive got to keep this up. ive got to keep moving in place to keep my feet warm and my hair dry and my eyes shiny shiny!

the best part is when the ball gets really close to the pole, almost touches it !game over!, but then you THWACQ! hit it right back the other way. it doesnt take long for that ball to swing around and come back your way again, only this time its closer closer wow how did it get so close to your face. so you have to swish your head back, really cool fast martial arts like, and the ball is going so fucking fast as it spins past you and gets ready for another pass, fwip fwipfwip! the promised violence of that thing just whacking you the fuck in the face, man, thats fun.

another great part is those sloppy hits that make the ball hit the pole and then go fwoop! flying up into the air unpredictable, into the grey and distant drizzled sun, the sky so huge with the birds small but elliptical, until the rope grabs it back to earth and towards miles and i's upturned smiling faces. miles is 8, lazy eyed, slow and dreamy and sweet when he talks about getting married and having a dog and sweeter still when he doesnt do his homework but spends all day working on a valentines day card to his mom, one piece white notebook paper, folded once, with intricately lined letters on the front -i love you mom- and the inside a four line essay of painstaking cursive and love in banal form...
-happy valentines day i love you i hope you had a good valentines day-
but then the lovely:
-you are pretty-
and he lazy eye smiling and checking the cursive against the alphabet taped to his desk.

and so now we are out here in the drizzle whipping the shit out of a tetherball at each other, and we are looking up and there are great black birds circling us. and were getting wet. and we never win, neither of us ever wins, we just bat it the fuck back and forth as the birds circle us, and sometimes the birds and the ball and the THWACQ! just so great and he cant hold it and a "shit!" sneaks out and then, shy, shoulder down eye up, a little "excuse my language". but too much lost in the laugh i am not going to stop him from saying shit on this day when theres a tetherball and a black bird and a grey drizzle all hitting him the fuck in the face and his mother is so far away. i get hit in the teeth, he jams his fingers. ive got don henleys "dirty laundry": running maniacly through my head for some reason.

a couple nights ago a good old friend came over and i felt like i didnt have enough to say. everything has slowed down and gotten simple and my life is in just three or four places, the wild drizzle, the long bus, the hermited room, the faraway la. and i float from one to the other with little of the huge water shaking feeling that filled so many years past. now just walk and see, and not too sad and not too happy, just walk and see and guess at how time will move next. and good the flowers are lovely, and good the man in the tacqueria gave her limes for free, and good shes beautiful as she and her mother speak language misterioso on the bus and both perform the cross at the same time, a look up, a grin, in their frantic conversation. but i see and dont add and am only the drizzle or maybe just the tree at the top of the hill at the edge of the yard that watches our mad spiraling tetherball and slow circling birds and invisible circles of rain. must just be the colors she sings as i walk through the mall and cant rememeber. so slow and undefined.

but then that tetherball THWACQ! buzz so fast the wind against my cheek and theres a child screaming in my arms; a child screaming and swearing in my restraining arms and trying to hurt me as badly as he can. and then a sleep dream bus ride and then theres a perfect love underneath me and theres a beautiful new harp never heard above me, and then we do it all again and its all a little new but im comfortable and *safe*, feel so safe in her arms. and circling: not as slow as the birds, but not as fast as that tetherball motherfucking coming right! for my face!.

and those moments are thin and forgettable if its drizzling too lightly like this...but in the forgetting nothing too bad, only the past that is gone and right now its small wonder or blank stare or small tear or vast love unknown and too real to understand. so this is okay/.
right? right?
i think so...so undefined and not at all attached, not at all attached to a pole bolted to the asphalt with a ball tether flying all the way the fuck around you so fucking fast to come and hit me in the face. oh fuck its going to hurt me it is going to sting so bad when the ball fast and wet with tingling drizzle hits me the fuck in the face. and i love that game and i love you sweet slow miles when you are screaming in my soft forceful restraining arms, and im sorry, im sorry, this is as soft as i can hold you, this is as soft as i can hold you. and i want to play with you and show you this game i know where the tetherball can just whack you surprise alive in the face.
and i want to play tomorrow, cuz i dont think im playing right now.
wait...am i?

well well well! look who is so fancy and can do so many fancy computer things!

oh, well well!