Crazy week! Or two. Fighting a cold and losing, succumbing to aches, pains, fatigue, trying to ignore H1N1 fear mongering, largely by the press and government. I was just discussing it with my niece and she said a friend was in panic mode and saying, “Did you hear about the healthy young man slayed by it?” Niece saw his picture and said he must have weighed 400 pounds. Apparently obesity is a complicating factor.

I don’t know, my GP says everyone should get vaccinated, to reduce the number of carriers, my naturopath says you have to eat a lot of dirt before you die, it’s natural and I swing back and forth. Naturally. I ignored previous plagues, even in Romania, the rumored origin of bird flu and never worried. People die of seasonal flu every year. This year’s variety, the swine flu is getting a lot of press and a bit harder to dismiss.

I’ve been spending quite a lot of time proofing the galleys for my new collection of verse, Three Blocks West of Wonderland that I told new FB friend Timothy Taylor was completed over a year ago. My still unpublished novel, The Town Slut’s Daughter is nearly as old as my dog and her chin is covered with white hair these days. In the meantime, Continue Reading »

Heading to the printers soon. Woo hoo!

The Proper Tool

I’m raring. I’m keen. Keen on the job, keen on green

suede, pea soup green suede. Round mountains

of breast meat. The taste of breadfruit. I’m fond

of blue fin, the Nepali coast. On off days I mourn

road kill, vanishing tooth fairies, yell above the wind

in ironwood trees or run over wild boars. I try to decipher

your posture, sagging down pipe. Was it something I said?

Did I wing a wrench into the works of your Stoly-propelled,

part-time life of letters? Did my leaky duck plump

body mangle your shift,

the entire working class hero period?

You don’t know your Gatsbys

from your Kowalskis, pub-crawling from slumming.

I buy jade, Siberian tiger’s eye. Thyme

infused bath bombs. Glass beads. Silk and suede,

green suede, so much easier to stroke than you.

Go saw yourself in half. Go nail

it in, back against the wall. Paint yourself, or it,

black. Into a corner. Weld your metal. Meld

the two halves of your dark side. Screw yourself.

Gather the loose ones. Punch yourself out.

Another friend dead! I’m starting to feel this race against time, hot against the back of my neck. In fact, it’s getting personal! Thusly, I’m crankin’ the tunes, drinking wodka, looking over my shoulder.

One of my dear LA friends, Brendan Mullen, with whom I exchanged FB messages only a few days ago has expired after suffering a massive stroke. I didn’t think of him as *old.* Brendan was working on a new book, had asked me to nail down the year of a Zellots poster from a show at the John Anson Ford Theatre we played with Faith No More and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I said, sure Brendan, I’ll get back to you, no problem. We always assume there is time, a next time.

To say that Brendan was a vital part of the west coast punk rock scene-a catalyst-as founder of the Masque in Los Angeles is an understatement. He was an alchemist, who despite the ephemeral nature of the performing arts routinely employed his intuition, power and skills to conjure up radical, earth shaking events, and thus history.

He continued propelling all that was raw and edgewise. In the beginning he provided a vital venue to bands like X, the Germs, the Go-Gos etc, etc, but post-punk he mixed it up royally as a consummate DJ and programmer with astute and eclectic musical tastes

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I came across some fantastic fungi in the forest while walking the dogs. They resemble chocolate leather buttons! I know they’re not psilocybin, doubt they’re edible and since they’re not in my field guide, on the ground they shall remain.

I found a toad residing in the hot tub cover and two yolks in one egg this morning. We get our cackle berries from the local butcher, Alderwood Farms just down the road and they are always so lovely and nearly as fresh as having your own chicken coop. SamIAm just caught and devoured a dragonfly! He’s faster than he looks.

I’ve been in a real funk since returning from Los Angeles, feel like jumping out a window or going to live in the woods. I’ve said it before, I am always so happy to see everyone down there but it makes me nostalgic, melancholy even, haunting my old stomping grounds. You are forced to face your mortality when a friend dies. I was discussing it with Gretl, Peter’s sister. At 40, she said

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Is it any wonder? I can’t focus, keep playing around with FB and email, skirting around the huge job I need to get done, curating the Visible Verse 09 screening.

I’m drained, keep listening to songs Peter and I wrote and sang together, going over it in my mind, all the things we *could* have done, the great potential we had, the promise, how we threw it all away. Well, I am apparently still trying to come to terms with it, never had to face it until losing him, our shared past. And I just plain old miss him! Hate the void…

Wednesday, Sept. 30

Lunch before I leave for the airport, Reuben sandwich in Beechwood Canyon with Teresa, right under the Hollywood sign. Odd how the fabled Hollywood came to be such a significant part of my life, moving here so young, playing in bands, hanging out with Hollywood punks. Like most of the rest of my life, I didn’t plan it. I’m no movie-eyed starlet. Certainly I arrived with ambitions but it just sort of happened, found myself in a band with Brad Kent who had played in San Francisco’s Avengers and had connections in LA, namely our drummer Karla Mad Dog of the Controllers.

Robyn Westcott, Byron and Maritza came by the hotel last night and we had a lovely visit. Robyn and I commiserated over those who were instrumental in Peter’s murder, those whose names make me Continue Reading »