You were over six feet tall
but never made it to 99,
but never made it to 99,
a man, a dynamo. I read that
you cried, wanted to be held like a child.
You helped bring yourself down,
but they killed you,
there can be no doubt.
The dead kill the living
throughout history, mere ripples
on the surface of placid humanity.
It’s all written in a zombie novel somewhere,
soon to be seen in a local movie theater,
soon to be eaten with the dust
of fallen suns,
mixed with shit and scum,
casually tossed in the fan.
The imaginary is taken for real,
and the real for fake,
and one day the real Borg will completely
replace the lost links
in the dead databases of today’s categories.
Complete connection will be complete
disconnection to the past,
and no Wild will compare
to the Lost that will prevail.
And it’s all good, you say, roll
over the concrete expanse skim-coated over
the ancient wilds of mind best
forgotten, you’re truly alive now.
But it’s not all good to me.
I don’t fit into the plan.
Call me luddite or philistine,
it little matters which, the result is the same:
a fall into the margins
where the last cries are
mashed with Baboon Blue
and Bengal Tiger Red to become
the grey of last year’s color.
I won’t plug into you.
You won’t fuck my mind.
I won’t work for you, won’t run
your tired treadmills
with my Flintstone feet.
All my avatar cutouts are sodden
in the rain that rolls down glass facades
and cheeks alike, over distended bellies,
pepper-sprayed makeshift tents, this year’s model
and the quivering gunman’s hand.
I’m tired running to stay out
of your race, of proving I’ve nothing
to prove, of putting out like a shameless whore,
birthing babies no one wants
as mountain meadows cover over
yet again with wildflowers.
Stand up and take notice:
your loves me loves me not mentality
has as much place in that field
as your poetic ooze in your
sector of the grid. One foot in,
one foot out, until your ability to write
the autobiography never written
—the one, justified—
is bitten off with your last
counting tooth
in your last
steak.
join me at the dVerse pub where folks from around the world are gathering today to share poems on the theme WILD
see more pepper-spraying cop images here
wow..lots of great images mark and lots of food for thoughts..read it twice...listened to your recording..(what a treat!!) think my fav lines are...
ReplyDeleteComplete connection will be complete
disconnection to the past,
and no Wild will compare
to the Lost that will prevail...
I think everyone will scream for "no Wild will compare / to the Lost that will prevail" -- the acorn of this final tree in a clearcut forest. I think Bataille says that the transcendent act in Lascaux -- no one knew to call it "art" yet -- was one of going into the beast to become free of it; harrowing the wild to awaken from the dreamtime. (I think that's what he says, but I might be paving him over.) And we've been at it ever since, distancing from our wilderness in the weird way that makes us more savage, thoughtful beasts without an instinct our greater survival. Of course, Lascaux can be read the other way, and that those first gestures of art were means of forgiving our awful humanness and going back to run with the wolves. But a wild aesthetic? When cultural fashion would have us zoot up as lions n tigers n bears oh my? Cormac McCarthy loathed the fencing of the west; Newt Gingrich would have those frontiersmen take a bath and get a real job. Thanks for stirring the pot and throwing in the bloody chunks. - Brendan
ReplyDeleteThis makes a fitting and acidic chaser to that Basquiat documentary clip. So much out there geared not just to pressure but to crush everyone in a mold of synthetic sameness, reject what won't fit by hacking it out...some excellent cutting work in this, Mark.
ReplyDeleteWonderful intertwining of the jargon and monologues of the tyranny of the Machine with your emotions and verbs. A manifesto of a downtrodden Self seeking to break loose of technos' stranglehold of mind, spirit, and heart by throwing back into jumbled soup of ideology words to be reborn in a brewing new order.
ReplyDeletewow dude...great write...love all the imagery and the strong voice in which you write...the conviction to be not a part of the machine resonates...all my avatars, that made me smile a bit in this online world...the pic itself is startling...guess you heard about the lady yesterday that maced the black friday crowd so she could get the toy...insane...
ReplyDeleteI don't fit into the plan either. a lonely place to be at times but it's better than being robot numb.
ReplyDeletesome of my favorites ->
ReplyDeletemashed with Baboon Blue
and Bengal Tiger Red to become
the grey of last year’s color.
of putting out like a shameless whore,
birthing babies no one wants
the autobiography never written
—the one, justified—
is bitten off with your last
counting tooth
in your last
steak.
"the dead kill the living"...to me that sums the whole piece up. When we die often we try to take down others with us..."misery loves company" and all that. This is synapse triggering writing.
ReplyDeleteWhat a deep, dark yet honest write. We're on the slippery slope nowadays and it's getting murkier every passing day. This speaks its truth on so many levels.
ReplyDeleteI've always tried to pride myself in never fitting into anyone's mold of how I 'ought' to be. I love being different and not seen as the 'norm' my whole life I've always said, why be a sheep if I can be the shepherd.
What a fabulous write and, read.
I kept reading faster and faster, taking in the messages, the images. Wild indeed. The autobiography never written. We have to change that.
ReplyDeleteThis touched me in my core because I too have placed myself on the outside of "mainstream" and I definitely "don't fit in with the plan"--hell no! Excellent presentation of your message, Mark.
ReplyDeleteLove the image of Flinstone feet, Mark... and really enjoyed this.
ReplyDeleteQuite a raw power here... To just unplug oneself from it all is so alluring... Strong words!
ReplyDeleteThere are too many wonderful lines in this to quote back. Suffice to say, it's inspired and jolting.
ReplyDeletePS--love the link to the pepper spray cop pix.
I agree - it is far too hard to pick a 'best line' in this. The imagery is intense, the emotion powerful and the language fittingly strong. It breaks my heart all over again, and at least partly because I cannot decide if I want to be 'normal' or not!
ReplyDeleteholy shit, but you've said it with brilliance
ReplyDeleteloving the spoken word, broken tooth, cast off the bullshit look into the world beneath the world no one ever speaks of
Powerful piece, love how you have carved the meaning into the trees here. Fabulous piece.
ReplyDeleteThe images are exact, sculptural almost, and come so thick and fast that they overlap and add echoes to each other. In places it's almost like looking at a montage built from transparent sheets. I've still a great deal to get from this, I think.
ReplyDeleteAn original and authentic write, full of perception and powerful imagery. I enjoyed your reading of it immensely.
ReplyDeleteManifesto for freedom
ReplyDeleteMan, this is just excellent Mark. real glad you had the SoundCloud recital up top so I could real feel it and hear it as you intended. Right up my alley. Grit, truth, real life without cliche or over-sentimentality. You got teeth and I like.
ReplyDeleteI should have said the sentiment you express here is so very similar to how I feel, I sat boiling and seething yet aesthetically satisfied. How's that for ambivalence? ha
ReplyDeleteMark! Utterly brilliant. I got chills like you won't believe. Listening to you read your own words was an experience I'll not soon forget - the tone and latent passion of the raging poet in an undiluted shot is a heady brew.
ReplyDeleteThis should be written across the sky.
Late to this poem, Mark-- utterly amazing, rich and terrifying and wounding. xxxj
ReplyDeleteYou do controlled fury better than anyone I know, and in your reading, you give brilliant voice to that fury with utter control.
ReplyDeleteMore and more of us out here in
ReplyDeletethe Wild, the cyber mists, the hidden
portals of poetics, are recording
ourselves reading our own words,
and it helps immensely. This diatribe,
this manifesto, this treatise stings
like a bitch as it bounces off the
soft spots on our skull, crawls under
our skin, kicks us in the butt, and
crones us an apocalyptic lullaby.
We move away from your verbal
feast remembering there was meat
on them bones. Love the line:
/soon to be eaten with the dust/
of fallen suns/.
"your loves me loves me not mentality
ReplyDeletehas as much place in that field
as your poetic ooze in your
sector of the grid. One foot in,
one foot out, until your ability to write
the autobiography never written..."
A wild write, indeed, Mark. The above is my fave ..I cannot lie how that is such a rally cry to me. Your start is certainly a wonderful tribute to follow the Basquiat vid...I'm not sure if societies vultures killed JMB, or if it was his unique spirit that couldn't handle the plasticity of our culture in general. I champion anyone who refuses to kowtow to the norm; keep it wild, my friend, no matter how much blood they try to spill. ~
[As an aside...I'm glad I listened for your reading is fab, but got sooo distracted for I felt like I was listening to David Sedaris on NPR. Not a bad thing...just a bit of a...whoa (smile).]
Whew! This is a WILD ride, indeed, and very powerful. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThis is wild Mark. The fury and the furious get blended. Yes, the mark of the non-conformist very apparent. Brave and an outward style, a raging storm. Great verse!
ReplyDeleteHank
Powerful.
ReplyDeleteThank you all very much.
ReplyDeleteBrendan: I think Bataille's view encompasses both, and more. Ancient man felt his increasing disconnection from the wild as loss, and his increasing 'humanity' as something shameful (Adam & Eve in the garden, naked). Unable to go back, he embarked on religious and artistic adventures in an attempt to heal the breach. W're still doing it. Indeed, Bataille says that we recognize ourselves in the caves. By the way, I see the classical period as something of a departure from this search, and the modern era as a return to the caves, a truer, more profound renaissance.
Luke: "boiling and seething yet aesthetically satisfied" - Love that! Likewise Susan, "controlled fury" - I'm flattered.
Angela: I do think Basquiat's death was due to his inability to cope, as I suggested in the prompt. I do not think he was "suicided by society" (to use Artaud's phrase about Van Gogh). I can understand how you made the connection, given that I wrote about Basquiat in the prompt. But I was thinking about Wilhelm Reich and his book 'The Murder of Christ' when I wrote the beginning of the poem. I didn't make any references in the poem to a specific person because I prefer to let the reader think of someone they may know or have heard about that fits the situation.
I approach the writing of a poem as if it's the first poem I've ever written, and the reader of it as coming to me for the first time. This helps me to avoid assumptions, to put as much of the necessary and as little of the superfluous into the poem as possible.
There is so much distilled in this poem, Mark, that bears reading and rereading to even begin to get the full measure of it. The Wyeth image with the superimposed pepper-spraying cop is,in itself, mind-blowing. I like Susan's anaylysis: controlled fury.
ReplyDeleteMy very favourite lines:
ReplyDeleteI won’t work for you, won’t run
your tired treadmills
with my Flintstone feet.
It was good to hear you read it.
"You helped bring yourself down" ... Don't we all?
ReplyDelete"a fall into the margins" ... [nodding my head] ... perhaps we should just write there in the first place and leave the page blank for the All to fill in
"your poetic ooze in your sector of the grid" ... I may tattoo that on my body. ... Seriously, slimey-slick words, Mark.
Wow, wow, wow. That's all I can say. Your brilliance astounds me. And those images? Funny and horrifying all at the same time.
ReplyDelete