Why?

Why?  Why do we want weapons and a chance to live?  Sometimes I just want to be armed when they try to snuff or hurt me as early as possible, preferably when I can't tell anyone how much I want to live because I don't have a voice yet.  I couldn't trust you to give a damn when they were hurting me, even when I told you directly what was happening; why should I trust you to protect me now or ever?  Self-reliance, right?  Grow up, right?  Get over it, right?  This world is cruel and heartless, and it's your world, not mine.  Even now, you want me to shut up and get in line to be hurt by doctors too busy to see me, police just doing their jobs, preachers who can't be expected to represent God, or even best, slaughtered in the womb so I'm not a financial or emotional inconvenience to the rest of society.  That's why.  And it's not some nebulous "them" or "they" who are responsible, because it's you, directly you because we are all responsible for each other, right?  It's the system, right?  Guess what? It's your system.  So now I get so sign a deal with an orange devil, and he is a devil, for a measure of self-determination, or wait around for the grand party of empathy to care.  Schizophrenics don't have a flag or a month or a year or five hundred years or a hashtag or even anyone to listen for five minutes.  I'm not holding my breath for you, because I'll die first, and that's what you want.  Tell me I'm wrong.

Choice

 Legally, we can't legislate God in a Doctor's office.  Abortion is legal.  Make a choice.  That said, I think abortion for convenience is the wrong choice, and an awful one.  I understand being scared, desperate, and wanting a way out.  There are no easy choices for many women in a bad situation.  I can't make that choice for someone else, even from the pulpit, which is closer to my situation on this blog than being a pregnant woman.  However, I have substantially less empathy for a mercenary abortionist who does that sort of thing for a paycheck.  Please, women, if you're out there reading, make an earlier choice than the very last minute:  put some distance between a child and a choice, or choose life.  Please, abortionists, if you're out there reading, it's never too late to stop and not base a livelihood on taking advantage of legalities for personal gain in a trail of blood.  Adoption is an option, and should be a better one for children, mothers, fathers, and couples.

Arbery

 Ahmaud Arbery was lynched in the fullest, ugliest sense of the word.

Rittenhouse

 Even racists have a right to self-defense.

Inspiration and Bullshit

Ibram X. Kendi is an inspired person.  He wrote an impassioned piece in The Atlantic about Martin Luther King's legacy.  I loved it.  Precise choice of words, parallel structure, and cadence showed through in his prose.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/martin-luther-king-critical-race-theory/620367/

The same writer wrote wrote this in Politico, and I couldn't disagree more.

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https://www.politico.com/interactives/2019/how-to-fix-politics-in-america/inequality/pass-an-anti-racist-constitutional-amendment/

To fix the original sin of racism, Americans should pass an anti-racist amendment to the U.S. Constitution that enshrines two guiding anti-racist principals: Racial inequity is evidence of racist policy and the different racial groups are equals. The amendment would make unconstitutional racial inequity over a certain threshold, as well as racist ideas by public officials (with “racist ideas” and “public official” clearly defined). It would establish and permanently fund the Department of Anti-racism (DOA) comprised of formally trained experts on racism and no political appointees. The DOA would be responsible for preclearing all local, state and federal public policies to ensure they won’t yield racial inequity, monitor those policies, investigate private racist policies when racial inequity surfaces, and monitor public officials for expressions of racist ideas. The DOA would be empowered with disciplinary tools to wield over and against policymakers and public officials who do not voluntarily change their racist policy and ideas.

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This is not Ancient Greece.  We are America.   Art belongs to all of us, as do politics, war, religion, and everything else.  No one kind of person owns the keys to any heaven, including and especially me.

Help

If I someone finds me and asks for help in the way only I can accommodate, I try to help.  The God I speak to regularly rebukes me when I don't.  Turning a people away while nervously deciding how much time is too much time and wishing the powers that be would remove that nervous decision before anyone would notice a distressed people is profoundly against the God who speaks to me.

Hello Blog

I'm writing here for the first time in years.  Time escapes me sometimes.  When I'm outside the written word, I feel naked.  I don't feel complete without it.  I know I'm an opinionated jerk, but I've always thought on some level redeemable, even loved.  Right now, I don't feel like I've made a mistake.  I feel like I am a mistake.

Columbia Makes More than Coffee

http://columbiaspectator.com/…/our-identities-matter-core-c…

Ovid is still important. Ibis is always fresh. Ancient Rome was not prudish; much of the literature is carnal. If students at Columbia worry about Ovid's Metamorphoses' sexual overtones, and manage to change the curriculum to something more Politically Correct than an old Roman pervert, I think the entire student body should ex-post-facto apologize to the world for employing Allen Ginsberg. Allen Ginsberg isn't disgusting because he's homosexual. Sappho already did that in style. Allen Ginsberg is disgusting because he treats sexuality like a bad manual typewriter missing the lower-case "t." To be honest, Catfish shocks the world. Sodomy just doesn't cut it as disgusting content for a modern poem with nothing else going on but the sexiness of an old metal thermos full of almost-rotten tapioca pudding. Make up your damn minds, so-called liberal OG shot-callers at Columbia: are we going to ruin the future of literature or not?

I'm a bible boy. I love Jesus. I'm also thirty six. What's gross when you're twelve and Michelangelo's "David" is the only male beauty around, doesn't make an internet-bound adolescent's list of sexuality to explore tremble, shake, or drop acorns on the ground. I'd love to study Ovid as literature in a class. Unfortunately, professors seem to think that typical, boring, vapid wannabe Ken Doll named "Insert random sexual poet with no imagination" is a modern substitute. Ken Doll in His Own Dreams is not a substitute; he's a surrogate for poetry delivered into the hole on the other side of the mattress who can't quite figure out no one cares anymore.

Toni Morrison is an average novelist at best. I think she's horrible. Euripides manages to give his characters names. Homer gives her characters names. The allegorical names of John Bunyan work in Reformation and Counter-Reformation times, but Morrison's Song of Solomon falls flat with them. Who is Guitar Bains and why is his name Guitar? Pilate is a proper Latin name for someone who already matters. Morrison's Pilate claims a powerful name for reasons never made clear. Why would anyone give a phylactery to someone named Pilate--an Eques Roman surname--but is clearly a complete autodidact? Pilate's name is a loaded name that's been done to death. Yeah, I went there. Why not? Columbia seems intent on destroying literature anyway. Let's give some nineteen year old freshmen reason to think Hannibal is a serial killer played by Anthony Hopkins instead of a Carthaginian boogeyman who sacrificed infants to kill more Roman Legionnaires on the battlefield than anyone else could ever dream.

Scipio never gets an epic. I'm sorry Petrarch, but he just doesn't. "Howl" is not an epic; 112 lines won't do. Sappho and Ovid rocked it. Toni Morrison did not. I'm going to buy lunch for too much money and lament the downfall of America, which isn't Rome anymore, and probably has to climb uphill to be Brazil.

Attrition

The cocktail is a battlefield with victory measured in hard-fought disfigurement, compromised torture, and milligrams of lost hope.  My enemies, camp followers, and fallen pill bottles all look the same from here.  I don't want out; that would be too easy and pointlessly cruel.  I want through.  I will burn fields of sanity and sow my skin with Roman salt in pursuit of victory.  When the fog of war slips through momentary peace, I can only write about love I barely understand.  My hands are bloody, and my stomach is sore in ways only those familiar with the battlefield strewn with shattered weapons and moments I will never know again may understand.  The best of all outcomes is a stalemate; a draw between pain so the order of battle falls at the same rate.  I mourn for our Legions, but they cannot mourn for me.  I am the evil genius of my nightmares, and I will have what I need, no matter how horribly I come across it.

Please

Christianity is about granting the Grace of God to believers, not denying salvation from anyone who runs afoul of Paul's opinions on Corinthians. Please sort the forest from the trees and stop being cold-hearted bastards.

Williams-Lara

Lara beat him pillar-to-post. This is some BS scoring. Roy Jones knows it, and so does everyone else.

On trying to be something you're not

I usually don't expect much out of Gwyneth Paltrow. She's just another highly-paid celebrity to me. Perhaps I judge too fast. However, her recent blog post seems like a good place to start one of my own. I don't understand homosexuality and don't participate. It's not for me. I don't understand non-Euclidean geometry, either. That's also not for me. I'm not going to drag a math professor out of a classroom to give him a lecture on how advanced math doesn't make any sense to me any more than I'm going to drag a homosexual man out of a forum friendly to his lifestyle, like a gay bar or coffee shop, to give him a lecture on how I see whatever he's doing as wrong. However, if you're homosexual and in a forum friendly to my lifestyle, like a church I attend on a regular basis, I want the same respect shown to me. Arguing sensibly somewhere neutral is cool, but don't expect me to mix it up there, either. It's just not in me right now. I don't feel the urgent need to go on the rhetorical offensive against homosexuality as a whole at this crossroads in my life.

If you're literally inside the walls of my house, there will be some rules. Firstly, no bashing: If you've ever felt uncomfortable because everyone around you throws around poorly-thought-out, abrasive, somewhat insulting ideas with the assumption that everyone is a democrat, or a muslim, or a christian, a catholic, a lutheran, a steamfitter or whatever else despite the overwhelming evidence that not everyone is the same, you'll feel welcome here. I have lots of different friends; I want them all to feel welcome. I don't live in a gay bar, a high school locker room, a high school musical, a choir chamber, a church, or your local union hall. We're all probably different here, so keep the ganging up on different kinds of people to their faces or behind their backs the hell away from my house. Vigorous discussion is cool, and encouraged, but if it gets ugly, it's over. There are more rules, but those are the important ones for the subject at hand, and only apply inside.

My blog is different. Read and respond. I only delete obvious spam.

Two Liars

Two people can't keep a secret. I just saw Keith Barry, who calls himself a "mentalist" trick two awful liars to give up information on TV. I suspect the whole thing is a set-up. If the piece of film was legitimate, those guys couldn't lie or stall long enough to fool a keen observer for an hour. If the cops are worse observers than Keith Barry, and criminals are worse liars than these two, we're all a rather sad bunch.

CLONE WARS/GRAPES

Jive Poetic, I met him at the 2005 Austin International Poetry Festival. He's a great writer and performer. We wouldn't see eye-to-eye about many issues, but his talent and acumen are obvious. I can't speak like he does anymore; the tardive dyskinesia in my jaw is not getting much worse thanks to practice, but it's still there. Performance poetry was never my thing, but now, I don't think I can compete with guys like Jive Poetic with my lungs and tongue. I must live on the page.

A Rededication Of A Myth For My Love

The Taj Mahal shows its beauty in white marble for anyone who cares to look. Four minarets guard the tombs of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal, without whose love the Taj would never exist. When a rich man truly loves a woman, he will go to no material end to show that love to everyone. Shah Jahan commissioned the tomb, but made none of the sculpture, calligraphy, architecture, or any other art in this greatest romantic edifice.

Not everyone can afford white marble domes, and inlaid poems stretching into acres of poetry for the most special woman in the world. This is me: Shah Jahan left enough room in his symbol of love for the rest of us, too. I cannot make a White Taj for Sarah; I can only make a watery reflection that looks black at dusk. I will not measure my poetry for her in acres, but in lines, stanzas, cantos, and perhaps eventually, reams. I cannot keep Sarah's spirit beside me in stone; I can only write and love her for as long as she chooses to stay next to me and look into the Black Taj together. These are not the first words I've written to her, but these are the first words of my dusk reflection, the first public drop of water in a language we can both understand, and the first dedication of our Black Taj.

So I took Another Look At The Pacquiao-Margarito fight

This fight should have been stopped after the ninth round. It's a frightful beating, and the officials should not have forced Pacquiao to carry Margarito. That said, they might have punished Margarito for wearing plaster of paris in his gloves. I don't disagree with punishing Margarito, but it should have been in prison, not the ring. Pacquiao looked amazing; he would be Floyd Mayweather Jr.'s toughest opponent since a prime Castillo.

Wait

I'm keeping kosher. The wait between meat and dairy is insufferable. Right now, I'm looking at a cheesecake. I want some, but it's not quite time yet.

I Was At The Rally

The crowd of liberals at the Stewart rally were much nicer than the crowd of liberals I encounter at poetry slams and readings. No one threatened me with violence; it was ok. I only found the timing suspicious. After taking over in 2008, the mouthpieces of the Left talked only about national mandates and how with a majority in the legislature and the presidency they could pass any legislation without veto and without participation from the Right. Now that Democrats and the powers-that-be are headed into a potentially tough election, the mouthpieces of the Left only want to talk compromise. I prefer compromise, but promoting that compromise should have come a long time ago without any threat of losing incumbency. Work together, folks, and maybe we can stop the two-year cycle of extremism, and get some work done.

Rally to Restore Sanity At The Next Steelers and Ravens Game

Ben Rapelisberger gets a reduced suspension instead of prison time that everyone else would serve. Six guys can't go into an alley where one guy winds up dead, and no one faces punishment. They're just ball players, folks. If someone wants to rally to "Restore Sanity," how about we start with boycotting overpaid professional athletes, or at least holding them accountable for their criminal actions. The next 70 thousand Steelers, and Ravens fans with tickets are a good group to start the outrage. I won't hold my breath.

Ok, everybody, save a purple shirt for October 20th

Bullying is in the news a lot, and often against homosexuals or those perceived to be homosexuals. Those of you who know me know that is unacceptable to me. If you don't, check out the link above. This sort of thing must stop. A friend of mine named Ryan Cassata let me know about a day to remember the youths who took their own lives in despair, and oppose the bullying and abuse of young, school-aged homosexuals. I'm wearing purple on that day, and so should everyone else. I would love to see a sea of purple outside on the 20th of October.

If you're having trouble endorsing homosexuality for religious reasons, don't think of October 20th as a way to endorse the practice, think of it as a way to endorse good will, and show that God's love is not just for you, your congregation, or your Church. God's love is for everyone, and we don't get to make the decision to take that away. Every homosexual is a child of God just as much as I am. I'm not going to shut anyone out of Christ or salvation because of largely blind prejudices: that kind of thinking and speech just discourages people from seeking Christ later, when everything depends on accepting Christ as the savior. Hateful words and cruel seclusion are counter-productive and wrong far more than any love between two men or two women. God does the judging; we just spread his word and his light to as many souls as possible.

Wear purple on October 20th. It's not about prejudice; it's about peace.