::::A few things that I feel like posting here tonight::::

And the days are not full enough
by Ezra Pound

And the days are not full enough
And the nights are not full enough
And life slips by like a field mouse
Not shaking the grass



The Sick Rose
by William Blake

O rose, thou art sick;
The invisible worm
That flies in the night,
In the howling storm,

Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy,
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.



Bereft
by Robert Frost

Where had I heard this wind before
Change like this to a deeper roar?
What would it take my standing there for,
Holding open a restive door,
Looking down hill to a frothy shore?
Summer was past and the day was past.
Sombre clouds in the west were massed.
Out on the porch's sagging floor,
Leaves got up in a coil and hissed,
Blindly striking at my knee and missed.
Something sinister in the tone
Told me my secret must be known:
Word I was in the house alone
Somehow must have gotten abroad,
Word I was in my life alone,
Word I had no one left but God.

I have found your waterfall
the deep crevice where mossed rock
gives up to scorching air
and time rolls off the edge
with dizzying fervor.

my eyes bathe coolly
in the languid rhythm of your ripples
the humid tropics of your crash.
your blue is turbulent,
your descent suspended
in a weightless rushing of atonement.

the foundation of my dive slick
with your kisses –
bubbling around my feet as if I were
some clamoring crab
thrown live into the ready pot
dancing buoyantly
then settling into the lazy roll of my boil.

throwing myself prone into blowing mist
I fall endlessly
my source replenished with each leap.
I feel you in my ears and hair
toying with gravity
supporting me as I fall
covering me in white diamond dew
your grace broken every second by
the roar of your demise
calling to me with a thousand tongues
to drift with your corpse downstream
floating on the memory of our embrace.

in muted thunder I am cast
into your blue-green underworld
held still in an inverted sunrise
of swaying light and bubbles.
my heart gasping I reach and kick –
your orb of broken silence
above me beckoning
keeping me at bay with the force of your tumult.

on the wings of waves I heave
and sputter
watching my own involuntary retreat
helpless against the remnants of your passion.

You know how you go through things in life that you think will never be over? I mean, even when the situation has ended, but the time of recovery/growth/getting used to your new perspective seems to stretch into the infinite spaces between your cells...
Dull, aching anger; wrenching loneliness; subtle apathy; forged hatred; all have been my companions at one point or another within the past 6 years... and now I find myself in a place as foreign and exciting as it is curious and ephemeral. I feel new and awakened, yet experienced and wary. And I think I can finally say that a brutal pain that once rent me is now still and reflective - my body relying on its own spirit and ferocity rather than the will of some cherished captor.

But all that is just ramble, the point of this blog is closure. This song flows out of me as if through my own pen - every syllable igniting my veins and reminding me that the past is past. Finally.

What you did to me made me see myself

something different

Though I try to talk sense to myself

But I just won't listen

Won't you go away

Turn yourself in

You're no good at confession

Before the image that you burned me in

Tries to teach you a lesson

What you did to me made me see myself

somethin' awful

A voice once stentorian is now again

meek and muffled

It took me such a long time to get back up

the first time you did it

I spent all I had to get it back, and now it seems

I've been outbidded

My peace and quiet was stolen from me

When I was looking with calm affection

You were searching out my imperfections

What wasted unconditional love

On somebody

Who doesn't believe in the stuff

You came upon me like a hypnic jerk

When I was just about settled

And when it counts you recoil

With a cryptic word and leave a love belittled

Oh what a cold and common old way to go

I was feeding on the need for you to know me

Devastated at the rate you fell below me

What wasted unconditional love

On somebody

Who doesn't believe in the stuff

Oh well

The life and crimes of the music biz

The record industry is careering towards meltdown. A good thing too, says Simon Napier-Bell, after 40 years of working with its most notorious moguls

Sunday January 20, 2008
Observer Music Monthly

The lobby of the Sony building in New York is 70-feet high and heavy with music business ambience - gold records, photographs and the 'Sony Shop of New Technology'. Upstairs, the main reception is like the lounge of an exclusive club. Young people, dreaming of stardom, stand in wonder breathing in the atmosphere, looking at memorabilia - platinum CDs, photos of stars, framed press reports, Billboard charts. For an aspiring artist or manager, just to step into the building is a thrill. The impression is of a corporation dedicated to the success of its artists, almost altruistic in its understanding of their needs.

Yet it's nothing but a flytrap. Artists go there dreaming of being signed. But out of every 10 signed nine will fail. A contract with a major record company was always a 90 per cent guarantee of failure. In the boardroom the talk was never of music, only of units sold. Artists were never the product; the product was discs - 10 cents' worth of vinyl selling for $10 - 10,000 per cent profit - the highest mark-up in all of retail marketing. Artists were simply an ingredient, without even the basic rights of employees.

Imagine the outcry if people working in a factory were told that the cost of the products they were making would be deducted from their wages, which anyway would only be paid if the company managed to sell the products. Or that they would have to work for the company for a minimum of 10 years and, at the company's discretion, could be transferred to any other company at any time.

Recently, the Wall Street Journal investigated the industry and concluded that 'for all the 21st-century glitz that surrounds it, the popular music business is distinctly medieval in character: the last form of indentured servitude.'

As long as the major record companies controlled the industry, artists had to accept these conditions. But the majors' grip on things has almost gone. For years they saw it coming but did little to change things. Now each week brings them more gloom. CD sales are down on last year, which were down on the year before, and the year before that. Sony and BMG amalgamated, but brought themselves little benefit in doing so. EMI and Warners tried to go the same route, but failed. So EMI was taken over by someone with no knowledge of the record industry. Guy Hands of Terra Firma fame promised to reinvent the whole business plan; he started by parting company with Radiohead.

Read the full article here.
I can't tell you how much the recent events involving the music industry have both made me sad and excited. I too have dreamed of being on a major label (namely Interscope through Nothing - LOL), but now that particular dream is lost. However the prospect of artists actually having control over their own careers is outstanding, and foreshadows newer levels of creativity that have henceforth been stifled by lack of capital, freedom, and choice. More power to those currently pushing for their own master recordings, releasing records on the internet, and demanding DRM free song files. The industry machine is thus struggling to catch up, and change (if not total coup) is imminent. Quite exciting - plus I LOVE to see the RIAA fumbling up its reputation in the public eye (did it ever have a good one to begin with?? lol)... times are changing for the effed up circus known as the music industry. Art will prevail - Love it.
*VC*

I cannot feel.

You know - the place between
loving and healing
between prayer and kneeling...
Caught in the unbalance
of longing and needing.

My bones creak and ache
like unopened books
my mind blank pages
suppressed and overlooked.

I have written my secret across you
in the architecture of your palm
in the foundation of your embrace
the child's hand in wet concrete.

walking the last mile
fingered flowers rolling over my cheek
the blue highway like a plank
drawn out over a bellowing tempest.
the wind sails through me
and rushes ahead
catching my hair
whispering guilt and conviction
raging around with invisible lust.

treading so silently
i bled for you gallantly
over the edge and swallowed
into the salt swirling black.
they killed you behind me
before I could gasp or breathe
unable to swim or sink.
my ocean eyes
perpetually staring out
the fragile blue aperture of sky
beckoning me
teasing me open and up.

the sunset ignites the roadway
making kindling of the vessel
illuminating its errant course
shining in my glazed eyes like gold.
my fingers numb and wrinkled
still clutching petals
that stick to my hands
smelling of blue brine and roses
my wrists marked by my bounds.

the taming of a restless sea
the warnings that I will not heed
all these words that tumble around
on waves of persistence and loss.
narrow passages channel me into your arms
floating and swaying
on rifts of song and thunder.
adornments drift down
flashing silver light stars under the blue
making me weightless
resilient and frail
rising on the wings of my mourning.

If you were honey
I'd love you like mason jars
waiting to get you inside
showing off your dewy glow
the nectar of a million clover
reflecting the sun.

If you were the nighttime
I would love you like an insomniac
cradling your stars and galaxies
dancing in secret dreams
a trillion distant eyes
watching us twirl.

If you were a peak
I'd love you like a river
curving my shape around you
softening your crags
with the depth of my devotion.

If you were a word
I'd love you like a poet
writing you over and over
in a script of prose
that rolls from my lips like rain.

If you were music
I'd love you blindly
letting your rhythm beat my heart for me
leaning closer to hear
the soft notes of your breath.

If you were me
(and I were you)
I would love you like a song
that only I could play
an articulate score climaxing
in a chaos of harmony
echoing sweetly of you.

-Vega Chastain