Life in the Empire
Bo's Request (an Art Thread)
Where is home?
Moved twelve times in the last 16 years. The transient in transit. Pierce Transit runs through it. Before I came here I was in Rush Limbaugh’s home town before I was surrounded by corn fed Norwegian bred Lutherans singing praise in perfect four part harmony to that Home on the Plain before I’m taken Home – Praise Jesus. I grew up in Iowa, Little Town on the Prairie an island afloat in the ocean of corn. Lived in SoCal, in the Desert where golf and plastic surgery reigns, might have the grit to stay in rainy Tacoma, but, I always say I’m from San Francisco - though I rarely visit anymore.
Home, where is home?
Home is where you are. Correction, home is where you and the two cats are.
What is home? That safe place. That place with love. I love that old car, it always brought me home. The ’75 Westphalia could be home. Or rather, the place that used to be home. Too old, too unreliable to be trusted anymore. Baling wire and duct tape. Just like the U-Haul I drive to the next place, hoping for home.
Searching for home. Migrants with heavy furniture. U-haul. Our orange travois with wheels keeps getting bigger. Full of stuff. Heavy Stuff. Stuff that anchors us. To a home of nostalgia. Anchors to a home that never really existed. That place. This is the place! Well bully for you Brigham Young. Bring ‘em young. Not young anymore, with more stuff each move to stuff in the moving van and every move leaves behind anchors that are mourned in passing.
A house burns down and the anchors are cremated and the past has passed on.
The bubble is burst. The house is on the market. The anchor is weighed. The trees we planted are left behind. Do the new owners love that Japanese Maple we planted as our 10th anniversary gift to our dream of home? Have they maintained the landscaping? Have any of the plants, the dreams, the love we planted been cared for in our absence? Or have they been torn up by the roots to make room for the next owners’ dream of home?
Where are the anchors? Is there a home port? Adrift. Without a home. Drift wood is picked up for beach fires to warm the beach rats without a home. Their shacks have been bulldozed like West Bank ancestral olive groves to make room for more condos and home-loving dreamers blowing a bubble. Pop!
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Permalink Reply by waldopaper on
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it's after 5 now and i'm gonna take a break...
Double Blind Sided
A Compost modern movement opera:
(Kafka’s German Process )
Overture
(Ich bin Gott im Frankenreich!)
(Chorus)
Ich bin Gott im Frankenreich!
Vir sind nicht die selbes gleich!
(Josef K)
I am God in France!
We are just not the same!
And now you know my name is Josef K.
Protagonist in a Kafka play And who is he? They say.
Me is who, who is he, he is she and dog is fish.
Anyone who studies Hebrew knows this.
So the Germans tried to kill them all in forty two.
And of course you know Franz Kafka was a Jew.
(Josefina)
France and God are not the same!
It is where He goes on vacation…
Josefina eye point out a panopticon:
A feeling someone is watching you… whether or not it is true.
Josef though…did not know… where to go… or what to do.
Anyone who studies men would know this.
So they published Kafka’s Trial in twenty five.
He did not even finish it! He was not even alive.!
(Copper Knot)
M.I. a cop or not? (sign with chorus: Mitts Insane... nahhh)
You look like a Black Horse- tenth armored cavalry!
You are thirty years old you say. Then you will remember the day.
Marked by menacing complexity! And Charlie had no tanks at Quang Tri.
Must have been cool with all them big machines.
Anyone who hunted Charlie knows this.
Out there it was just me and three marines.
And I say this not in jest.
(Knot and Chorus)
You are under…
(Josef K.)
Arrest?
Act One:
The matryoshka doll with no known ending.
(Josef K.)
The fabled matryoshka doll with no known ending,
We are living like God in France.!
Those woody weeble Russian dolls… one inside the other—
What else is a meta for? We have no pants!
The fabled matryoshka doll with no known ending,
Now the next one inside might be two molecules
Like a war on terror… mistake on an error…
Maybe we all are fools!
(Josefina)
The fabled matryoshka doll with no known ending
We act like we are opening the next one.
So small they were invisible before we were born
It could be too small to see… or not even there!
The fabled matryoshka doll with no known ending
We act like we believe all this shit.
A senseless disorientating menacing complexity:
It could be that this is it!
(Copper Knot)
When you believe in matryoshka dolls with no known ending
Or a planet who was born to fill your tank
You can get into heaven so you have better luck dead…
You might be some kind of a fuckhead!
Oh all the bullshit rationale we make has no known ending
We will believe what we want to without fears…
You can believe all the silly shit they fed you with spoons
You have been making your own for years!
(Chorus)
The fabled matryoshka doll with no known ending
We act like we believe all this shit.
A senseless disorientating menacing complexity:
It wood be that this is…
Should be that this is…
Could be that this is it!
Scene Two
Brandon and Valerie
(Brandon)
He began to think about Valerie.
(Valerie)
Brandon thinks about Valerie whenever he is bored. That is when he is not terrified. He would ask her to marry him. There might be some other guy, but that will not matter. Valerie will say yes. She wants babies, lots of babies. And love… lots of that too. Valerie. Like Brandon, she is twenty years old. She wants love and babies, and Brandon will come home in time to give her plenty of both.
(Brandon)
But it is hot summer. It is Chu Lai, Viet Nam. It is 1968. It is about time. Skinny older Marine comes in wearing cammies and no markings. Red Feather says he and his partner and all their gear weigh about 300 lbs.. Read Feather is probably a sniper. Valerie could carry the weight, but the space might be a problem. She has a flat-six 230 Continental up front; a lot like his dad’s Cessna 170 back home with muscles.
(Valerie)
Valerie is the tomboy type. She wears flannel shirts and smells a little like Ivory soap. Brandon got close enough to smell her hair when they were making decorations for the prom. He wanted to ask her, but afraid she would say no. Neither one of them went to the prom. Brandon never knew how Valerie stayed home and cried. He would have flown through a thunderstorm if Valerie would not cry.
(Brandon)
She read a lot of books and answered all the teacher’s questions. She was quiet and shy unless she forgot to be when engaged in a discussion. She was small with thick braids and even thicker glasses. Yeah, Valerie was a nerd… but so was Brandon. Now Red Feather and his partner show up at least two hours before sunrise. Even if it is dark Brandon sees the partner is a Vietnamese girl.
(Valerie)
Going up the water to Dong Hoi… they get aboard without a sound and Brandon fires up Valerie and she carries them off into darkness. She climbs like a homesick angel. Start the glide from FL 15 just as the sun is coming up and do it in the road. Plenty of people are watching us, but nobody does anything. Red Feather and partner hop out and we are out of here. Drop em off. Go home. Gas up. Go pick em up.
(Brandon)
Pick up by Bau Tro lake exactly 24 Delta Tango Alpha. Piece of cake. Not so easy at Russels Point on Hamilton Lake where Brandon would ask Valerie to marry him. They would have a girl who looked like Valerie who was shy and read books and climbed trees. They would have a boy who looked like Valerie who got into fights. And then another girl and another and finally a boy Brandon called Tail End Charlie.
(Valerie)
My boy Charlie pulls a hammerhead like nothing you ever saw. Better than his dad… or his grandpa before him. We land with the rising sun and Red Feather scoots out of the bushes and into the back. No partner. Some are watching us, and this time all of them have something that can shoot. Dawn stars pops and flashes small arms fire. Valerie’s engine roars and she climbs like a homesick angel, heading for home.
(Brandon)
If he had known how Valerie could cook, he never would have gone to Viet Nam. He would have run away to Canada where they live peaceful in a cozy cabin and make gingerbread boys. Most of the flashes eleven o’clock low bank right and head into the sun. 2000 AGL now and nothing is likely to hit us. If I knew how Valerie laughed I would have never listened to music again. Climb my sweet girl homesick angel.
(Valerie)
Red is squirming around back there he might be hit. Turn to check it out WHAM splinter pain. Somebody is shooting something that just blew the fucking right wing clean off. Hard left rudder aileron dive! Valerie is soft and ivory soap angel in happy home morning sun… with children laughter and pancakes and sweet maple cockpit on fire. Look homeward angel. Ground rushing up at two o’clock high.
(Brandon- as Valerie exits)
He began to think about Valerie.
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Permalink Reply by pan on
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A world premiere at Idaho State University in April (probably around the first and second weekend - don't have the exact dates handy) Got a composer from Missouri. Waldo is the librettist. Ms. Medusa and I are directing. We are gonna write for "Cultural Affairs" grant to bring the librettist out from Indiana for the premiere....maybe you should pencil it in for a road trip.
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some revisions:Double Blind Sided
A Compost modern movement opera:
Kafka’s German Process
written by waldopaper ©
Overture
(Narrator in Nazi Uniform)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Panopticon is a type of institutional building designed by English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the late eighteenth century. The concept of the design is to allow a watchman to observe (-opticon) all (pan-) inmates of an institution without their being able to tell whether or not they are being watched.
Chorus
(Very friendly cast all wearing uniforms)
Ich bin Gott im Frankenreich!
Vir sind nicht die selbes gleich!
(Josef K as himself)
I am God dam France!
We naught juice not dean sane! And now you know my name is Josef K. Protagonist in tin. Kafka play who is he they say. Eye is who. Who is he? He is she. Nan dog is fish. Anyone who studies Hebrew knows this. The Germans tried to kill them all in forty two. And of course you know Franz Kafka. Waste a Jew!
(Josefina in French maid uniform may be a Nun.)
France and God are not the same! He goes on vacation there. Josefina point eye panopticon: A caring someone witches Yew. Oral knot is true. Josef though did not know. Where go shit to do. Anyone who studies men would know this. So they published Kafka’s Trial in twenty five. He dead knot finish it Bratwurst snot live.!
(Copper Knot in marine uniform)
Issue Michigan cop or not? You look like a Black Horse- 10 A-CAV! You are thirty years old you say. Then you will remember the day. Marked by menacing complexity! And Charlie had no tanks at Quang Tri. Must have been cool with all them big machines. Anyone who hunted Charlie knows this. Out there it was just me and three marines. And I say this not in jest.
(Knot and Chorus)
You are under…
(Josef K.)
Arrest?
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Permalink Reply by Mouse on
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Smoking my pipe by Jeremy Bentham's cadavar, the fellow with the face that flickered and squeaky shoes came back and asked me to dinner. I had a whole lobster and he ate oysters, watching me breaking in with silver hammer and shears. It took a while. When I asked, he preferred the book about Moses
which I'd not read.Close by was the roof upon which dry bread
fell.
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Bejabers mum! I should be collaborating with you! You wanna put that in there?
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Permalink Reply by BO on
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Yep, she's good. I'm humbled by the amount of talent 'round here.
Down in Southern Oregon having fun. Managed to tour the Oregon Caves today. And went on a jetboat tour up the Rogue yesterday. Tomorrow is Shakespeare in Ashland -- Henry V.
Didn't expect to encounter so many rednecks in these parts. Lots of homeless too. Got to blind to not see the collapse happening in real time...
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How nice of you to say. Wot, an invitation? Oh yes, I'd love to put it in. It's just the view from here, looking back, looking round.
Must make biscuits for the hungry children fighting over justice. Mother has been to the school to object to the new rules, "zero tolerance for tale telling". Now they punish the good children when they object to being pushed around. It is a new standard.
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Permalink Reply by Cal on
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I had the first disciplinary hearing of my life yesterday. Lesson in corporate hierarchy 101. If your boss is deaf & mishears what you have said & starts laying into you about it, and then you attempt to rectify the misunderstanding & get told 'not to lie' ... then you may not call the man a fucking arsehole & storm out of his office.because you happened to be a little over the top emotionally on account of one of your dogs fighting for his life in hospital. I was very good at the hearing - apologized and very politely at the end said this was a first for me in 54 years that I had had to work with an adult man was unable to simply sit down with me & resolve differences & misunderstandings. He was deviously evilly rude to me in front of one of my reportees today. We all stood around in a totally embarressed silence looking at him for fully 30 seconds before I apologized to the reportee for being unable to assist her with the question we'd gone in to ask & left the office. I went back later & asked him not to do that to me again .... please. He said I was the one who had been rude. I left work, contacted HR & an labour lawyer & will take the mother fucking bastard psychopath out or go down trying. Latter is the more likely. But root for me all you can .... I really wasn't that naughty.
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Yes Cal, well done.
Bravo, what forbearance and tolerance meets in the light of day sometimes appalls. There is much to shudder the soul in the ways of men.
Have made some particularly appealing coffee and walnut cakes and will partake of one now in especial celebration of your initiated action, with tea. Yes.
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