Reading

Write a word, a phrase. Followed by another and another. I'm not convinced. All I want to do is read. Summer windows wide open, stacks of books beside the couch, in my lap, cool water and fruit in a bowl. Reading theory and history and folklore, science fiction and fact, fantasy and myth, Gorging on it, drowsing as if with too little beer. Luxuriating as if no one will call, for hours, for days.
    Roll me over, call me for supper, pour me a drink again and again, I have notes to take, breaks maybe for coffee and dreamy walks.
    Let the words flow into my sleep, let me start with a nod and try again to polish off the chapter before I lay the text, splayed open, on my chest.
    My yearning pulls me here, to this desire. So simple that if indeed I had days to squander, I'd be a fool and seek diversion elsewhere, forgetting this one true love and seeking distraction in some shiny, moving thing.

Starting Right Now

Do I have the time to show up at the office and churn out a short paragraph about my thoughts and feelings ? Do I have the time to moisturize my face after working outside with sun beating down and pallets of earth moved across alleyways? Do I have the time to worry about Antarctica and the ice sheets and the people and Hydro Quebec and radical skepticism and ill informed rationalism and people who think way too much ? Do I have the time to consider and reconsider and reconsider still my contribution to what seems like a confused and collapsing civilization? Do I have the time to make a comic book and dream of a career in the arts instead of selling everything I have and moving to a small cabin in the countryside?

    Ask me what I would do if I had five years to live and I wouldn't answer 'what I'm doing now' so why am I doing what I'm doing now instead of what I'd do if I had only five years to live ?
    Tell me about it. Tell me about my choices and my decisions and my set backs and cop outs and excuses and fears and paralysis and devil you know. Devil you know will strangle every last breath out of you, five years or no. And by you I mean me.

    Here we are accumulating garbage for the big parade. Accumulating garbage to tuck into the loose corners of our coffins. And coffins ! What an extravagance. We'd be so lucky to get a nice lacquered wooden box to rot in. Some folks never get the option. They sink into the field where they are struck down, maybe thrown into the ravine with the others.

    Sure, go back to school to get a masters degree, join the post docs in line for food and clean water. Wait for the corporate overlords to have their ghost of Christmas past moment, wait for Dick Cheney to shudder at his reflection and take it all back, take it all back, restore the droned children to life, restore the forest to it's majesty, restore the women to their humanity.

    Let's work a tad harder, let's do a little spring cleaning all year round, let's whip it out and get it on, let's high five until the sun rises, let's sort the recycling, reuse the reusables, take out the trash, forgive our shitty neighbours, rejoice with our cousins and see where that takes us.

    This is a moment of missives, this is the time for all times, we've made so many children, let's scrub the sidewalks for them so we don't have to pick glass shards out of their kneecaps. Let's turn off the power so they can breathe. Let's stop with the filth so they can eat some decent food and make their teenage parties something not tinged with ragged desperation born of hopelessness.

    We'll turn around in circles until we straighten out this mess. We'll pull the plug and wear extra sweaters in the winter. We'll collect family members to live with us. We'll turn this boat around, I swear, and plant gardens in every cop car.

    Starting now, starting right exactly now.

How I Got Here

It's been almost a month since I committed to writing a small text every day and uploading it onto a web log reserved for text. I have been making art all my life having drawings first published in elementary school. By university, though I drew often, I self identified as a writer.
    I participated on my college newspaper as assistant entertainment editor and joined my university literary magazine as graphics editor and junior poetry editor. It was there that I was confronted with the world of poetastering in all it's undergraduate nuance. I was surrounded by very confident young poets who made a point of loudly declaring what was and what was not a poem. I realized that by the standards displayed by my fellows, everything and nothing made the cut. My own poems were essentially glitter rock operas, rejected Transformer era Lou Reed lyrics and psychedelic guitar solos jammed with a thesaurus full of paisley dewdrops. None the less, I was a writer and I enrolled in the study of literature to enhance this love of words.
    That I alone of my fellows preferred a copy of Robert E. Howard to Ezra Pound in my pocket did not escape their notice. I got the gumption one day to show my poems to a young man a year or two my elder who after a quick perusal fed me the line that would haunt me for years to come : stick to drawing. Those three simple words made my writer self screech to a halt. I was hurt, of course, but more than that I took it to heart. I did already receive praise for the shitty juvenilia I was drawing at the time and saw no reason to stop collecting those easy compliments. But I wasn't impressing anyone with my poetry.
    I continued to write semi-secretly, mostly either purple stuff or forays into conceptual text work. Concurrently I was experimenting with concrete poetry and was enjoying that very much. I did not share this work with those in my local literary community, reserving it for strangers via international post. From the offices of the literary magazine at school I swiped a choice issue of a Canadian lit journal devoted to concretism and have developed a collection of these rare books ever since.
    So I drew. I drew posters for poetry readings and illustrations for the literary reviews. I knew writers and involved myself in small press. I started on comics and got published. My drawings and visuals were spread far and wide. My words, though, were written on folded up sheets of ragged paper in my jean jacket pocket, mostly bumper sticker remarks, song lyrics, slogans and band names. Short form writing is good for those in transition. I transitioned for years. I am still transitioning. I did some secret journalism by writing an English column for a Greek community newspaper. I submitted long hand and someone at the paper typed it up and typeset it. Invariably every single column was botched by typos and strange formatting issues. I have nothing to show for those efforts.
    I won a writing grant from Ottawa for a graphic novel. My comic book was mute, silent, wordless. I was now considered, according to the grant issuing body, a professional writer. I didn't use any words. This paradox allowed me to relax a bit. I also told the story of the 'stick to drawing' advice to a senior member of the local literary community. He asked, Where is that guy now ? What has he done ? He reminded me that I was still around, being active in the scene. This steeled me and I gained another bit of confidence. I submitted short prose pieces to small run zines on music and subcultural themes. This exercised the muscles. I gained more confidence when I found myself at a giant strip club at a high school friends stag party. There on stage, in his underwear, ridden like a horse, his own belt in the hands of a bronco busting stripper was my once confident poetic detractor.
    I stuck to drawing. I'll keep at it. I've rediscovered text. I'll stick to that too.