GedosProject

Incohate Beginnings

gedosproject — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 07:04:48 +0000

This poem I originally wrote in late 2007/early 2008. It was lost to my personal slushpile until a few months ago. Not really sure how it holds up.

INCOHATE BEGINNINGS

I promise to you, myself,

To shed to inconsistencies of our past existence

Become a unified whole.

Mind and body, I would like you to meet soul

Like Christianity, without the third, all hope is lost.

Hope is soul and soul is hope.

The active manifestation I call will.

Psychologists call it ‘male drive’

But I know they’re full of shit, at least their modus operandi is.

Qualities cannot be quantified, heck, they barely even qualify.

But given the condition of the palpable world,

Someone else, show me more.

On the surface, our situation is grim.

Prospects past

The thread of innocence needs no thimble

A rock for support, if you will.

This man is an island.

I believe in the concept of the one.

Don’t lie to me, eyes, and process the totality of your surroundings.

You are better than this

Which of the synapses are terrorists?

Your eyes are Magellan’s oceans

Only the intrepid explorers circumnavigate

Yet the emotions they convey are fear, pain, and degradation.

Given the time and place, outcomes are excusable

Suburban bliss is suburban abyss

In my automobile no one can touch me.

Doors locked no one robs me.

But the back patio remains unlocked

With the rotating window-locks in the garage rusted out

And screens easily jimmied

I have greater things to fear than fear itself.

Take me back (I remember)

gedosproject — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 06:57:09 +0000

This is an edit of an old poem that I cut out of my novel. I originally wrote the rough draft at a Panera in Columbus, when my old boss was on the phone in his car:

Take me back (I remember)

Take me back to a time when it was sweeter than it is now,

Back when people knew of heritage and hospitality.

Our psyches weren’t filled with migratory regret:

Body and soul were united as one.

I remember the time I stood at your thatched hut,

The generational conflict hadn’t been conceived.

We speak of the love for our ancestors:

We don’t even know their names.

Take me back to the time when it was sweeter than it is now,

Back when Mother Nature was more beautiful than she is now.

I know there was a time where I could seize the day,

Be awestruck by her beauty and let her seize me too.

I remember the time I walked El Camino de Santiago.

The sirocco blows hard; I cover tight with my shroud.

The pastoral wind blankets the sirocco.

It dutifully conceals the olive mystery.

Take me back to the time when true love reined supreme,

Back when the corporation didn’t deprive our autonomy.

Let me live in a time where there isn’t such hostility.

Let me live in a time where there isn’t such mentality.

I remember the time I walked the river Seine with you.

You were a perfect blend of charm and prettiness.

The energy of our eyes is the God behind our love.

It burns like beauty on a chilly November-born.

Take me back to the time when the mind was new,

And not enamored with the contrivance of now.

Let me be blunted by the dull sword of ignorance.

I can be freed from the shackles of self-consciousness.

I remember the time when my thought was suppressed,

It was during the third great wave of eremitism.1

In the monastery, I’ll sequester myself.

I can’t bear to live a life in this modern world.

Take me back to the time when you looked in my eyes

And in these eyes you saw the seed of the future.

Back then I knew we could never hurt each other.

Back then I knew we could never love each other.

I remember a time that hasn’t happened yet.

Let my self-fulfilling prophesy come true;

Once the wanderlust permeates my reality,

I’ll do a victory lap around the world.

1 hermitism

I am not my brother’s keeper

gedosproject — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 05:56:01 +0000

I am not my brother’s keeper

I am not my brother’s keeper
I’d rather not allocate funds
Just let me live my life
Anything else is a breach of contract

Fuck our ability to be contented with the product
How much happier could our lives otherwise be?
Were we not enveloped by these useless philosophies
Had we taken our coats and laid them on the ground

But we must not be satisfied with our dream of a better life
We must look at ourselves in the mirror a different way
We must perform a sweeping audit over disparate societies
We must dictate a form of money backed by precious metal
We must understand the egalitarian nature of health, shelter and education
And we must overhaul the tragic ghetto
The first thing would be stop calling it a ghetto

I don’t want to be central planner
I’d rather be a slave to imagination
Please don’t give me responsibility
It ought to burden a P.H.D.
But they’ve proven their ineptitude

Sorry to condemn your ways
Do not take it personal

Cannot conceive congruency
Syncretism and solipsism
It’s all provinciality

I am constantly changing
You are stuck in the mud
Get with the fucking times

Don’t want to be the cog
Want to be the wheel
Don’t want to be the piece
Want to be the puzzle
No such thing as answer
Answer is solution

Don’t want to be a poet
Don’t want to be a prophet
I am not a soothsayer in disguise
I am just a person

I do people-like things
And I think people-like thoughts
I am the same as everyone else

I’m only different in these ways:
I’ve been to Valhalla in the dead of night
I’ve seen the Atlantis of Plato’s dreams
And even the glory of Elysian Fields
I’ve been lost in a Breughel landscape
As Icarus, I fell from the sky
I couldn’t control my insolent pride

I want to write literature
I want to write philosophy
I want to write about harmony
Between a body and soul forever at odds
Between grandiose visions of an actualized self
Between the triumvirate of past, present and future
The past and the future are constantly changing
Only the present is expected
Do not be surprised by the moment of now
For that is the kernel behind carpe diem

I want to know the fabric of destiny
See how many threads there are
How soft and plush to human touch
Which was the first thread? How long ago was that?
How many people have contributed to its creation?
Who was so lucky to drape the fabric over their shoulders?
And come into contact with ancestors past
I want to know if they looked like me
Hoped like me, dreamed like me
And if they sounded like me
Speaking a dialect long ago muted
By that white, Aegean foam.

When I think of 399 I think of the death of Socrates
And the development of his most faithful pupil
And the subsequent journey of self-discovery
Coming to terms with the infancy of history
Coming to terms with the infancy of technology
And admitting guilt for an ideal obsession
And its disastrous effect on the natural sciences

When I think of 75 I think of the Colosseum
And its completion after two hundred thousand tons of concrete
And the celebrations which ran constant for a hundred days
A fresco in Ostia has started to decay
It belongs to noble Roman stock.

When I think of 174 I think of a general on the Danube
Adopted as a child by that same noble stock
And thus proving the supremacy of nurture over nature
I think of him writing in his tent
Redefining an old philosophy
Fighting the same battle generation after generation
And in his kernel is the triumvirate of time
He unwittingly signals the end of an era
I hear the men chanting in a back-alley
Militaristic men chanting Mithraism
Setting the stage for the son of God
Closing the first era of Western history

When I think of the sixth century I think of migrations
A throng of bodies marching to Southwest Europe
They are protesting the loss of culture
Silently, by heading to warmer climes.
I think of the first wave of eremitism
And of the fourth, fifth and sixth church councils
And I think of the monk in Bordeaux
Growing undrinkable wine
Writing trashy Latin romances
And sculpting a marble Jonah
I saw in my hometown museum
When I was a little boy.
Little did I know it was from this time
Little did I know it was from this place
Little did I know it would form an imprint
Card catalogued in the cultural amalgamation
I take a snapshot with my mind, the memory will last forever.

When I think of the ninth century I think of Eric the Red
When I think of 1066 I think of the Battle of Hastings
When I think of 1179 I think of the foundation of Pisa
When I think of 1265 I think of the birth of Dante
When I think of 1348 I think of the Bubonic Plague
Nearly destroying the new urban bourgeoisie
Halting the development of new perspectives
Bringing back the old solemnities
I read the transcript between some Florentines
Recorded in San Miniato al Monte
They couldn’t hear the rumblings
They hadn’t put their ears to the ground
But it was coming like a deluge
Signaling the end of International Gothic
Capping it off with a modern marvel

When I think of 1508 I think of Leonardo’s unfinished fresco
When I think of 1604 I think of the death of Edmund de Vere
When I think of 1620 I think of the Mayflower
When I think of the eighteenth century I think of boats in Cote d’Ivoire
When I think of 1803 I think of the Louisiana Purchase
And the journals of Lewis and Clark
Claiming some undiscovered country
Building bridges, building railroads, building factories
Bringing us to la fin de siecle
And Van Gogh’s experimentations
Meditating on a canvas
Solving an equation with four dimensions
Not knowing what it means to be vindicated
I’ll cut off my ear and give it to Gauguin
I’ll paint seventy canvases in seventy days
Discounted in my life as a prisoner of insanity
I shot myself in the stomach
When I died Cezanne was there
He only needed ten more years.

Why does the fabric enslave me with its history?
Why do I treat the beauty as a burden?
Why am I the only one who cares?
Is it because I’m the only one who knows?
Could my conceited self think these thoughts are new?
But I haven’t been proved otherwise
And I haven’t seen the truth in your eyes
Eyes that betrayed the fabric
Of genetic heritage and cultural patrimony

I visited the plundered foundry
All the good materials were taken
But then, in the rubble, I found a missing link
A few beautiful shards which made me cry
Brushing away dust, I was the archaeologist
No thought is without its ramifications
When I disclosed the thought
It slaughtered my soul at the mercy of the sky

And I want to know why it is my duty
Why I am obliged
To do the things I do
Whatever it is I’m willing to sacrifice
At first I was not so sure
But now I know it’s because of the fabric
To which I’ll contribute my thread.

Gedosproject Update

gedosproject — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 19:15:13 +0000

Hello all, many apologies for not having posted recently. I am going to be posting sections of my novel, as I finish them, over the next several weeks. Will not be until September 1st that I am completely done. Hope you all enjoy.

Blueprint for Arts in Baltimore

BFACE — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 02:50:06 +0000

Baltimore City arts teachers, including dance, drama, music, theater and visual arts, along with cultural institutions and organizations such as Young Audiences Arts for Learning and Arts Everyday are writing a model for arts standards and benchmarks in our public schools. We are looking at the NYC Blueprint for Teaching and Learning in the Arts and establishing a working document to be used in Baltimore City public schools. Strands we are working in include art making, developing art literacy, making connections through visual arts, and community and cultural resources.

If you have any suggestions for documents to use as research for our writing or particularly successful art curricula please feel free to share them here.

We are collaborating to save the arts in our school system and any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Journal Entry 05-24-09

gedosproject — Sun, 24 May 2009 19:49:00 +0000

It is 3:10 pm on a Sunday and I am trying to re-habituate myself to the task of writing. I sit down in front of my computer, only to read The New York Times online and the plethora of articles which could serve as a time capsule for future generations: Suicide of the ex-President of South Korea, a dry article on organic farming internships that I had already read in the Plain Dealer, a commentary on Obama and his willingness or unwillingness to flip-flop, depending on how you look at it, a review of the Memoir by Walter Kirn, who I had only vaguely heard of but sounds like a sort of Bobby Fisher but without the chess, and a couple others, Sikh murder in Vienna, an even dryer article about catching trout in Tierra del Fuego, and yet another article about that miraculous shot made by LeBron James on Friday night. I am making the prediction that the name Lebron will enter the top 100 American male baby names by the year 2020.

I read all these articles, and it is just to pass the time, to avoid the inevitable, my task, which is to continue working on the novel I have been writing for the past ten or eleven weeks. I have 46k words, 99 pages in the word document, but that blank 100th page pops up in Word, staring at me with its attemps at intimidation. Yes, it is intimidating, but it not only the intimidation or the writers block or the fact that I have been working at these mind numbing jobs for the past year, hoping to retain some sort of intellectual independence in the highly segmented American society. The intimidation is that when I get the ball rolling, the momentum will carry the force toward unforseen ends. But that is what life is: unforseen ends. And I have been trying to discover those ends with my writing, for the past two years (since I started writing, working towards semi-regularly) and for the past almost-three years (since I said to myself, when I graduate from college I am going to write a novel). This has been discussed in previous blog posts, so feel free to look around the site a little bit and document the journey for yourself. It has been exciting for me, and I hope that with some of these journal entries I have done, I have been able to transmit a little bit of that excitement in my life.

And I ask myself questions, when I get frustrated with how quickly the progress has been progressing: how much do I want it? — more than anything in the world. Do I have the intellectual verve of the generation? — more so then anybody else has that I’ve encountered, sorry to sound conceited, but maybe a little conceit is a good thing, and I don’t know anybody else talking about the materialism and the hyper-consumerism, the loss of imagination, the vapidity of America and the youth generation, the fucked up-ness of the financial situation and the larger geo-political reality, and so on and so forth. I know some people are talking about this, but if they are talking, what are they saying? Are they really saying anything? The other main question: am I happy with my progress as a writer? Yes and no. And I would rather call myself poet/philosophizer. A writer for me is somebody who chronicles adventures. A short story writer would be Raymond Carver, a novel writer would be Charles Dickens. But I don’t want to be Raymond Carver or Charles Dickens, even though I respect both of them greatly and I “have never really gotten into Dickens.” Two of my biggest influences are Dylan and Plato, one poet, one philosophizer. And I like writers who have been known to write different styles, Plato to Dante, Shakespeare to Arthur Conan Doyle. It is important for myself, not to compare myself to the writing of the day, but to these mammoth names who have so played a role in my life since I was roughly 15 years old, the point that i started reading for fun.

At this point, the only thing to do is continue. Because the ball is already rolling, therefore it must keep rolling. I will be posting more of my work as it continues. Hoping to finish sometime in July. I have a long two months ahead of me.

Things I have learned while writing the novel

gedosproject — Tue, 19 May 2009 16:28:17 +0000

Things I have learned while writing the novel:

- Computers and Typewriters are best for wiritng dialogue, facilitating the quick pace of the talking.

- Hand-written is best for regular prose and longer drawn out philosophical passages. Typewriters are O.K. and computers shouild be avoided at all costs. This is the reason why the majority of academic writing is so lousy.

- Never be afraid to discard something that fails to meet your quality standards, but don’t get into the vicious cycle of creating and destroying.

- Never delete a passage until you’ve slept on it and re-read it the next day.

- One teaspoon fact, three tablespoons fiction.

- Writing outside of the sequential flow of the novel can prove very beneficial. Ex. writing the middle first, then the end, then the beginning.

- Ask yourself the question: “Do I have my finger on the pulse of the verve of the generation?” If you don’t, stop writing.

One Goal

Tom — Tue, 19 May 2009 15:20:51 +0000

May 10th, 2009

Yesterday, LeBron James released a statement regarding his status with the Cleveland Cavaliers.

“‘I’m comfortable with being in Cleveland. I’m excited about it. I’m loving the direction we’re [going] in and I’m loving the teammates I have and the organization. So if that’s any indication of me leaving, then somebody must be looking out the wrong box.”

This was before last night’s game. If you missed it, then you missed one of LeBron’s greatest displays of basketball dominance in his playoff career. He was stroking from long range. Getting to the basket at will. Stepping up to the line by their frustration. And sinking mid range fadeaways with such grace that it boggles the mind why articles like this exist. And then it dawned on me, after my friend pointed out that at about halfway the 3rd quarter, LeBron was jawing with someone on the sideline. Toronto Raptor fans remember well that petty insults from the crowd get LeBron angry, and he will set out to prove you wrong. He went on to hit shot after shot, following each with a stare down, validating his supremacy. What this lead me believe was that he is just… good. He sets out to play the best basketball, and haters alike will just point out what he needs to work on next.

I wonder what they said:

All you can do is run people over, you can’t shoot from distance!

LeBron rises up from 2 feet behind the arc, and finishes 4 for 7 from long distance.

Those shots were lucky, you can’t hit it from mid range!

King James decides to attack, and executes 3 step back fadeaways from 15 feet.

Your teammates aren’t worth crap, and you’re not going anywhere!

LeBron responds with 8 assists, leading 3 other starters to double digits.

Speaking of those teammates, I’m glad that the media is really turning this ship around. The statement above stands out the most and confirms the simple idea that LeBron James it out there to play great basketball and win championships. He’s built this efficient machine of a team: gritty defense, hustle, and fluid offense, identifying and attacking weaknesses. He’s built this other efficient machine, himself: unstoppable when attacking the basket, deadly from long distance, shaping up his midrange game, perfecting his post game (which he didn’t even use last night - he didn’t need to), finding lanes off the ball while making spectacular catches and moves to put him in a position to score, and always being the model citizen by ending up on the giving side of a great assist as well. Wouldn’t he look for every opportunity to win and get better? Wouldn’t he think that after mastering all the techniques within the game of basketball, he would seek out and harness that next great edge?

Home Court Advantage. Get the crowd on your side. Feed on the extra energy to give you that booster shot in the 4th quarter, when the game is tied and you can take that push to get there a second faster, an inch closer, to score that extra point. The team has already succeeded by securing home court advantage, behind the best home record in the league. How did he do it?

By not saying, “I am going to stay a Cleveland Cavalier all my career.” By not removing the possibility that he could leave, no matter how comfortable we may feel with him here. We use that slight glimmer that he could be gone to fuel our energy when we’re cheering. We don’t shun him or take him for granted. We follow his lead - take this one game at a time. Savor every moment, never fall into complacency. Root our heart out every game. By true support, we show that we are part of the team, that we bring energy to the table, and we understand that this is exactly what LeBron is trying to accomplish: We’re all in this together.

The guy knows how to make his teammates better.

Novel Update: May 6th

gedosproject — Thu, 07 May 2009 03:42:57 +0000

It is 11:11 p.m. so I guess I should be making a wish. It’s probably best to wish for something where you’ll have the ability to affect the outcome of whatever it is. So all I wish to complete my novel, have it done over the next couple months, and to make the writing the best that I can possibly make it. This is a dream that I have the power to control.

On Monday I passed the 40,000 word mark, 87 pages in the word document. In terms of actual length I could see the final draft somewhere between 75,000 and 80,000 words, so I tell myself that I’m about halfway done. But life happened over the past two days, so I haven’t been able to make any more headway. Tuesday I had to Valet for Cinco de Mayo and the Cavs’ thumping of the Atlanta Hawks; I valet in a lot located within 1000 feet of The Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland Ohio. Today I slept in indulgently late, then had to leave the house for a good part of the afternoon. My parent’s are trying to sell and we had a realtor and prospective buyers coming between 4 and 5. So I picked up a check from a gig, deposited that check, went to hang out with a friend, drove home, watched Lost, and tried to print out a free KFC coupon to no avail. Now it is 11:18 pm and I am writing this post to get back into the mode of writing. Need to finish up dialogue and prose section between Lansmere, TomArt and Mick. Gotta make the words flow like wine.

Life is gonna get in the way again over the next few days. Valeting Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Sometimes I think about class warfare, parking a BMW 7-series and not receiving a tip, but usually I just try not to fuck up and crash the cars. It’s always interesting seeing a manual transmission in a car where you would not normally expect it. Last weekend, I returned a Saturn SUV stick shift to two girls at the Cadillac Ranch. I made a lame comment about the car and received a two dollar tip. Thankfully, I’m not working until five on Friday and Saturday, so I should be able to pound away some on the old Selectric.

The story is starting to take shape before my eyes. I just need to trust myself and make the right decisions. To thine own self be true — how hard that really is! The question right now is how much do I really want it. Writing this much, I have proven to myself that I can do it. But that is not the issue anymore, the issue is whether I have my finger on the pulse of the verve. And that is the question with any good fiction writing, maybe any good writing in general. And now it is 11:36 pm and I have nothing else to say except that I believe in self-fulfilling prophesies.

Novel Journal 042709

gedosproject — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 19:39:48 +0000

Writing is going very well today, tinkered around a bit with the beginning and worked on a metaphysical, stream-of-consciousness section walking down the street. About 1100 words today, now at 34k+ words total. Glad that I have gotten back on the horse after yesterday’s frustrations and wasted time. Writing is fun when it’s going well and painful when it’s going poorly. When it’s going well, it can be immensely rewarding, when it’s not going well, it can be very frustrating. And the difference between going well and not going well is quite miniscule. So it’s important to keep writing and figure out the quality of the writing later.

I got past the mini writer’s block by writing on the typewriter as opposed to by hand or on the computer. Most of the novel so far I’ve written by hand and then transferred and edited on the computer. Usually, if I’m writing dialogue and I want to write quick to capture the naturalness of the dialogue, I will write straight onto the computer. But I think that the computer is a very dangerous tool for the writer. It makes the process too easy, to throw a lot of words up there and organize them later. Computers spoil writers to the point where they become dependent on them. The typewriter is the best of both worlds, it allows the work to progress quickly while still structuring one’s thoughts as one would would with pen and paper. For myself, no single mechanism is better than any other, rather the strengths and weakness of each need to be appreciated and applied to each particular situation.