Red Hook in Post Postmodernism

Yestaday I went ta Red Hook. Had ta go, it was a byootiful day, long summer shadowz, stray clouds in da sky, had ta go. I wuz bikin up Bedfud and I askt dis guy ow do I get ta Red Hook. “Red Hook,” he zayz, “you gotta long way to go. Take Washington all the way to the en’.” 

But i’ was fine. I took da scenic route ‘long Washington all da way. Left on Union, an askt some more people long da way an fin’lly, I got deya. Oll da streets had dese ol’ Dutch names, Van Brunt, Dikeman, Coffey. I stopped at dis motacycle joint, wannid ta know if I waz goin da rite way. I askt dis guy, real Brooklyn you can tell. Short curly hair, slickt back, dese cleah blue eyes, sharp nose, chin, good lookin’ guy. Tells me I’m goin da right way.

I go down to da Faihway. Da streetz is cobblestone, is quiet, deyaz nobody deya. Dismount da bike, get off and take it in: gorjis day, Statue a Lihbedy’s real close, Staten Islan, dese ol unuse street cahz an da broken lectric linez. Real remnants. Da factareez ah oll old, shuttahed, antebellum, with da classic Brooklyn design, da Amstahdam stah between windows. I’z ungry, so I asked some people wheya tak get some Mexican food. These people, deyr in touch wit da Brooklyn spirit.

Ate some chicharroneyz, and biked home troo da ubiquitwitus brownstones, toll sycamohz, real Brooklyn. Biked fast ta see ma baby, but not too fast – didn wanna get da gollywobblez.


Daniel Adler wuz bohn in Bay Ridge, back in Brooklyn wit da rest uvem.

Continental Lovegames in Post Postmodernism

Daniel Adler serenading his  true love.

Americans are afraid to fall in love, because they’re afraid of being made vulnerable. In South America, they know how to play the game, so they play it, and they play it well. There’s a girl with beautiful blue eyes sitting at a bar, and an Argentine man approaches her. “Hey, why don’t you get your nails done? There’s a chip on your fingernail.” This infuriates the girl, and she in turn wants him. In Europe, a Spanish man approaches a beautiful blue eyed girl. He says, “I’m going to make you fall in love with me," and tells her about his positive attributes, complimenting her on her gorgeous jawline and earlobes. In California, a surfer dude approaches the blue eyed girl, “What gorgeous blue eyes you have.” Of course she knows this, but he has to tell her this to establish ties, to make him a legitimate competitor.

Europeans love the game, almost wanting to lose, savoring each play as if it could be their last, South Americans want to win at all costs, but Americans, we are simply afraid to play. Capitalism has engrained the mindset that if you aren’t good at something, if you stand to lose, there’s no point in risking it – and so the battle for who goes first can often take weeks, and once the first move is made: a triumphant battlecry! Hahaha! You made the first move! And weeks more of sparring and balancing the power scale before the next is made.

Oh capitalism, how we deplore you, and need you at once, for you are our saving grace. But in another 50 years, when the American aristocracy is further entrenched, and socialism begins to rear its ugly head, then what? Then will we take more risks in love, be more willing to sacrifice and lose?

Daniel Adler, Hot Love on the Wing

Drugs in Post Postmodernism: The H Train

 There was a knock on the door. It was Buckley. He was solemn, with puffy eyes and a sadness that emanated from his soul. “Hey man. How are you doing?” His voice quavered slightly. Gabriel last saw him a few days ago. He invited him in and they walked down the hall to Gabe’s room. He knew something was wrong, that it had been too long since he and Buckley had talked seriously, and that a random knock on his door occasioned more than a catch up. They sat down, Buckley on the bed, Gabriel in his Captain’s chair, at his desk. “I have a confession to make man.”
“You've been doing H intravenously?”
“I do heroin.” This didn’t come as a shock to Gabriel; he had supposed that his friend was caught up with the "H train" for a while. “ I've done it for a long time, and I haven't told you but you're the one person I can trust and talk to outside of my junkie friends. I did it back then, I did it all this year, I still do it.”
“Shit man.” He knew that to lecture his friend immediately would be inappropriate, that the reason he came to him in the first place was because he wouldn’t come down hard on him, but would want to hear his side of the story first. "What's it like?” He was curious, but he also wanted Buckley to be able to get all of the details off of his chest.
“Honestly it's not even that good. The first time, I went over to this guy's house, and he's been doing it for two years or so, and my best friend at school man, he has thick veins, he can carry that shit deep in his veins, but me, mine are thin, so this dude tied up my arm, and when he finally found the one that everyone shoots in, he said, “I found that motherfucker, and now I'm gonna pop it!” And he put that needle in and it spread through my body for like 30 seconds, and I passed out man. I practically passed out for three hours. It’s that fuckin intense. I woke up the other morning feeling like shit like you do some days, and I wanted to tie up. And when I tried to find my vein, because I have thin veins, and I couldn't find it, I was poking and poking, (he made a motion like he was jackhammering one handed with a sewing needle) and I must have pricked 20 or 30 times, and it was a fucking bloodbath man. It was ugly.” Jack's face was sharp and pinned. He looked down the entire time, but felt lighter with each word. He balanced against the history of their friendship like a cane.
The while, Gabriel listened like a shrink, nodding approvingly, thinking about his poor friend, his expectations for his success being washed down the drain by a drug. Buckley looked down at his hands, then up from behind his thick cocoa framed glasses, and wanted to express the pain of his past year and a half.

-Daniel Adler, "Hot Love on the Wing"

Sunday, Sunday

It is Sunday, and people are playing cards in the street, their chairs arranged in circles. They laugh and smile in the hot afternoon sun, wiping their foreheads. At restaurants, bottles of water sit in sweaty ice buckets, and crowds wear sunglasses. The tables are full and there are waits. Everyone is happy that they do not have to work. They drink their coffee and live in the moment.
   But when the light grows softer, and the shadows lengthened, then that feeling, that five day creep would filter into our minds, and we would think about the long week ahead.
    That is what these crowds are doing now that the streets are emptier, emptying, as it quiets and people make dinner. And it gets quieter and quieter as the evening proceeds and everyone embraces Sunday to the last of it, the very end, as they remember their responsibilities and work up the courage to make the work week work.
    
Or, it is gray and cloudy with the sky's impending rain. You eat brunch, and get hungry before dinnertime so you snack and sit idly, not knowing how to spend the rest of the day. Ennui sets in, and you try to watch tv, but nothing's on, so you find a family member, only to leave their presence out of frustrated exhaustion of things to talk about. They're doing Sunday things, like tidying rooms, or sketching, or other solitary activities. And when night comes, you're ready for the week to begin, anything for Sunday to just be over already. This is the wrong way to live a Sunday. 


Try Sunday Funday.


-Daniel Adler (in case you forgot)

Happiness in Post Postmodernism

A recent most popular article in the New York Times exemplifies how the generation of Daniel Adler is jettisoning the “work hard, spend hard” mantra that kept capitalism thriving throughout the latter half of the 20th century. It’s too easy to get stuck in the cycle of buying and shopping, only to go back to work and do it all over again. Alas, a lack of sustainability is changing that.

If you didn’t do well during the recession, you were probably an idiot. If you still have money today, chances are you will probably have money for the next 50 years. If you don’t, wake up, there’s no more upper middle-class. You’re middle class, or lower class, and you can expect the prior to shrink considerably over the next 10 years.

 This weekend my little cousin, 17, said that he wants to experience something different in college, because after that he’s going to be settling into a suburban routine (I paraphrase). But it doesn’t have to be like that. The American Dream doesn’t have to be the American norm.

What if you don’t work as hard, don’t build up as much debt, and instead simplify. Choose a passion, and stick with it – don’t care about what your parents expect, or what your roommate from college is doing. Focus on relationships, high literature, and non-material things. That’s the 21st century American Dream.

It's My Birthday and I'll Party If I Want To.

Daniel Adler : 21st Bday Pic.

I know some of you may be resentful of people like me, but I get what I want on my birthday. Not presents. I don't care anymore about material shit like that. But little things, like the music on the radio. What kind of wine we're having for dinner, etc.

I share the president's birthday, which is cool, because when I'm famous, Aug. 4th will be a birthday associated with great men.

And now that I'm 22, I'll be able to press on in life, and as a writer. When you're 21, you go into the bar and you're the youngest person there. People can still call you a baby. Same goes with 22, but for one, it's even; you feel a little more grounded during even years. And secondly, you' re a little bit older, closer to being at an age when you can make a splash. That means that you can expect more from my work, since I'm not a baby, and I have the extra experience that a year brings.

Anyway, I appreciate you following my thoughts on post postmodernism,  avant garde art, and high literature, and I look forward to getting better. Till next time.

Facebook in Post Postmodernism

He signed onto Facebook, one of the earliest and most powerful social mapping sites that existed online. He was friends with both Daphne and Dela, in the same way he was friends with Tatiana; it was common for acquaintances to keep online tabs on each other. The key was to alert the former’s attention to the latter. His wall, an area where friends left comments, was relatively stagnant, with about one comment every four days. He needed to incite Daphne to recognize Dela’s existence. He clicked to Dela’s profile, to see a picture of her with Buckley and her parents at a nice dinner. Buckley’s cheesy grin and Dela’s sexy smile…there’s a good reason she was your first love…

“Hey hope you had fun at the concert. Let’s get some espresso soon :P Emoticon? Or no emoticon? No emoticon. Exclamation point? Ellipsis? No punctuation. It's just more for her more to interpret. It should be sporadic, a reminder, an apology, an acknowledgement. Halloween was in 2 weeks. He had to find out where the party was. He could take Dela, and then see Daphne there. Daphne would see him and be stunned. He would win.

21st Century Avant Garde Art

For those of you who haven't seen this, I think it's pretty characteristic of our post postmodernism. We love pure emotion - we laugh at it, mock it, parody it; I almost cried when I watched this for the first time.




Watch the above first.



Perfect. Not only can everyone relate to this, but even if you haven't seen the original you can appreciate the sound editing. Post postmodernism. This is funny. These people did a good job editing this. Now we can laugh at it and not feel embarrassed for him. Talk about self-conscious.

Sea of Consciousness

Why do we love the sea? Because we have absolutely no way of controlling it. Land we can build on, but unlike moutains - which even with great difficulty we can build on - the sea is wholly sublime.  The men who brace the ocean know that they have no chance of taming it - it's always in flux. Land is sturdy, water is not. The sea life - living on the ocean, sailing, boating - is a reminder of ubi sunt. Always changing - you can't build on it  - it will eat you, devour you, like it did the Titanic. The beginning of the 20th century was so proud. But after the war they realized their error, those late teen years make it clear.
As in adolesence, as in every century's adolescence. I'll live to see 2030 definitely. Will I see 2070? 2080? Do I want to live to see 2080? Meh. World's just getting nicer - more gentrification, now health care, less poverty. Leaning towards socialism, when Indians are all rich and happy and bodies don't float in the Ganges.
The sun sparkles on the diamondy water. Sailboats are like flags on the horizon. Muddled and in the vague distance, stray cumulus clouds hover in place. And the sun always fracturing into a hundred million gems, dissolving in the vast waste of distance.
Dayboats plough the ocean with jets of spray on their sides. I taste the salt on my lips.
Sea birds swoop. Barges truck. Faucets cry. Loose cirrus strands expand like a nebula.
Everywhere the sea does the same things, bobs and floats cresting; but nowhere is it the same. Like humanity. That's why we love the sea: because it reminds us of us.

That Big City Feeling

    
On a summer morning, when you walk along the street and people are beginning their days, you get the big city feel. It's inspired by sirens, or by the smiling face of another stroller, and it says to you, welcome, welcome to life, this hot day is another of many that you have been blessed with, and not just you, but millions of you, all beginning their days to do different things, in different ways, tens of millions, in areas and neighborhoods, commuting, relaxing, this is another day in life. It's the sense of volume that's distinct in the feel, it's the large apartment buildings and the early sun that do it, they let you know that this is another day, and that there are even other cities like this one around the world. There are billions of us, and we all cogitate and breathe alive, winter or summer, continents around the world, there are us.

The big city feel is different from the small town feel. The former makes you smaller because of your relation to the people living with you in the urbanscape. The small town makes you feel smaller because you see the landscape, and you realize that you're a creature inhabiting God's land, and that is different from a creature inhabiting a land that man has constructed on God's land. In the city, you have greater corporeal scope, you realize the body's relation to other bodies, as per Whitman and it can minimize your place, or enlighten you as you think of your relation to the multitudes.  In the country you have greater ethereal scope, you understand the futility of your place with relation to the passage of time, and it can make you appreciative or feel puny.

GD

A post postmodern dialogue between some New York writers at The Archive:

“I'm going to start a blog. It's going to be called GD.”
“Like god damn?”
“No it stands for gonna die.”
“Ahh.”
“It's going to be short posts about fuckin' shit that makes you wanna die.”
“Like fml?” says Gio.
“What's fml?”
“Oh, fml started as a blog?!”
“Yea.”
“Wow, that really went viral. I have a 14 year old cousin who says that.”
“What's fml?”
“It's a blog about bad things happening to this guy. It stands for fuck my life.”
“That blog sucks,” says Peter.
“It's actually really addictive when you first get into it.”
“So the first post is “I just ate a hot dog with no bun.”
“Shouldn't you be done by now? Your idea has been taken. It's been done. It's over.”
“I only have three posts so far, but the-”
“It's over. You're done.”
"It's really over? GD."

The bald eagle was panting yesterday.

Bach and the Waterbottle Fugue

Johann Sebastian Bach loved his god. He dedicated every Sunday to him, and every Sunday for three years wrote a cantata. A cantata is a medium length narrative piece of music with vocals and orchestral suites. He was a master, logged in his 10,000 hours, and could sit down and write a three hour piece of music as if he were taking a shit. Not in any way to reduce his cantatas; I use that metaphor to compare the excretion of his soul to the excretion of the body, a regulated overflowing of emotion and passion. But it is his fugues that are really spectacular. And what is most spectacular is the self-referencing nature of his fugues - for in the composition, he became literally inspired, as his soul took refuge in the music and he became dissociated from his environment, his personality, wholly subject to the nature of his creation, so that his soul became interwoven with his music with a slight pause in between. Then, on the level of the music itself, the weaving nature of those contrapuntal lines is so mathematically perfect that it is impossible to doubt his genius.

As I sit here writing these lines, trying to create a fugue of my own, it is summertime, and though it is not humid today, I have my fan blowing so that the wind washes over my face while asleep - it blows at my bed, and next to my bed is a sidetable. On the sidetable is an empty water bottle, that, amazingly enough, continues to rock back and forth from the way the fan blows. This rocking has not ceased for hours, it lasted all through the night while I dreamed of horses and nightingales and subways. It is incredible that the water bottle does not roll around in its rocking, to move away from the wind, that it does not circle like a top and fall over eventually, but instead rocks on its center, situated in a contrapuntal position, in balance with itself and the wind from the fan. And this to me is spectacular. I've come to notice that the rocking increases in amplitude in a cyclical way, like a sine graph, so that it rocks faster and harder, then slows almost to a standstill, rocking the while, then speeds up again,  rocking more violently, following the rules of nature, in its valleys and its troughs.

Lamentation for the Semicolon

  Poor semicolon; Dr. Johnson ushered in the golden age for it, and after that it was all downhill. It's a very Ciceronian piece of punctuation; a method of concomitance that allows the speaker to continue on without stopping; the perfect punctuation for a speech, or a long digression. There's no need for conjunctions with Semicolon, but the hoi polloi refuse to understand that; they think that you can just use a comma instead -- and in many instances, you can.  But using Semicolon is more than just a sign that you went to college. Here's a grade school maxim: if a period is a red light, then Semicolon is a yellow light, and the comma is a green light.
      We love the comma. The comma shares the place of lamentable semicolon, in part because it's easier. When they see a ; they aren't really sure what to do. You can use the , for everything nowadays. Watch: I went to the bodega to get some beer, they were out of 40's. That comma takes the place of Semicolon. Why wouldn't I use Semicolon ? Oh, but it's so pretentious. It's like using the word convalesce, when I could just say healing, or getting better. I want to resurrect it. Semicolon has intrinsic value for linking phrases of differing content, and it isn't as abrubt as the dash. The dash is effective and is now often the favorite over Semicolon.  Don't get me wrong, I love the dash, but it's choppy, and Semicolon allows for relative fluidity, even if it does involve a slight pause. The Semicolon; now there's a piece of punctuation.
    Here's a nice example: “And as it was borne in on him that he would never see her again, that it was all over, that she was irrevocably lost, he felt his whole being torn apart; his tears, which had been gathering all day, overflowed.” Here, the commas serve as modifying clauses. Semicolon signals a break from, and entry into a new clause that supports the meaning of the sentence with plot furtherance  -- we are told after all the commas, a new piece of information, that he cried. The commas are steps in a sentence; Semicolon is a landing.
      I really want to start using more parentheses. They are nice because when you insert a clause into a sentence by bordering it with dashes, the emphasis can disorient the reader and he may have to reread it, which may or may not be a good thing.  This post postmodernist part of the blog will have more commas and parentheses and fewer dashes and Semicolons.
      This reduction of English grammar, I don't know exactly what I think about it. On one hand, it's nice because it's becoming simpler, which allows the lay to enjoy it. Not that I'm writing for the lay, believe me, I want this to be read in college classrooms one day. But I believe that Hemingway, for example, was so successful because his prose was simple, like the Bible. In a way it's him I have to thank for throwing the first fistful of dirt on Semicolon's coffin. It's the interpretation that gives meaning anyway, so why cloud my writing with excessive punctuation? Use it occasionally, and when I do, it becomes important for its relativity. 

Chakra Daze

There was a creative mood for us. In the 60's they went to Woodstock and listened to Bob Dylan, danced in the nude. Henry Miller played piano and jammed out with his friends. We do the same things, but differently.
    I remember one afternoon, when the artistic vibrations of a weekend grounded in open festival art were resonant. Sarah, Anthony's girlfriend came over while Anthony and Gio and Chris were selling art at the subway stop. We gardened and built up an appetite playing catch with her softball and her soft leather mitt. When we went to the store and bought food, we felt so exuberant – there was such abundance with a ripe canteloupe, prosciutto, red tomatoes, black bean hummus, a rosemary baguette, lemonade, gouda, and corn chips. We prepared a gorgeous spread and when everyone arrived, we fed leisurely, like a court of aristocrats, or European peasants. This feeling was the kind that inspired happiness and contentment.
    Full, I put on a pot of coffee and we rolled cigarettes, thick and conic, with a little bit of tobacco that dangled out the end to make it easy to light and looked like crazy hair. We stood on the deck, feeling the breeze, and talked about Yoga. Gio told us about how when he was younger, he was diagnosed with ADD. They put him on Ritalin, you know how kids sleep when they're on Ritalin? They jerk their heads and twitch. His mother didn't feel comfortable with that at all, with her little boy already on drugs. Drugs create dependence, especially when they're prescribed. When you switch from one to the other, it's easy to want to commit suicide. Someone told her about yoga. When she put him in a class, and he found his center, she eventually was able to quiet him simply by saying “Gio, ohm.” And he balanced. This was when Gio was just thinking about opening up a yoga studio on the roof of his loft, asking for suggested donations only – 7 dollars, which was perfect because no one has exactly 7 dollars, so they'll be tempted to either tip up or down based on whichever bill they have, and can feel good about it either way.
    He led us in the yard, which had just accepted a light rain, and was moist. The clouds were unfolding, curling and spinning in wisps, the leaves of the trees were buzzing. We did the motions, pulling the flesh away from our sitting bones, downward dog, hinyasa, warrior one, he demonstrated crow, where you put your knees on your elbows. Afterwards, we felt balanced, and everyone left, peeling off like layers, going where they needed to.

Mega Laundromat

In the laundromat I always have the most intimate experiences with children (no homo). Today a young Hispanic boy jumped onto a wobbly end table next to two red seats. The table was at the same level as the chairs and was connected by a black bar underneath. He treated the seats like an obstacle course or a hopscotch square, planting one foot on each then jumping onto the floor. He looked at me. I jolted my eyebrows in affected awe. He smiled; he was pleased.

He wore black Jordan III's, orange and brown boardshorts, and had his hair in that subtle fauxhawk that's popular right now, so that it was a little longer in back and hung down in a short spike on his neck. His two front teeth were missing. He was 5, I could tell.

I sat down after using the restroom and opened my book. He was running around, playing on the floor. I wanted to tell him as I saw his forearms rest on the ground, "Get up - it's dirty!"Clearly he did not understand the concept of a dirty ground, that you shouldn't play on it. His tall heavyset sister tried dragging him up. He was stubborn and yelled.

The matron slowly walked over - thick calves, hair in a bun on the crown of her head, a small purse slung across her body. She had big brown eyes and a frowning sullen mouth. She shook her head. The boy stopped, the sister let go. He knew what was coming. The mother took his ear. She walked with him in tow. He looked at me ashamedly, embarrassed, and as he moved his head the pain set in, he mouthed ow, but he didn't say anything to save some pride.

Oh, how I remember the ear tweak! It was a mild pain that lingered. And how degrading it was. I sat with my naked feet on my slip ons, unabashed, and was glad to be an adult.

Yes Poetry (and Prose)

 A poem that I wrote while in New Orleans a month ago is online in the latest issue of Yes, Poetry. Based out of New York, this collection has poets from all over the world, and is my first publication.

In the meanwhile, I’ve been working fiendishly on my book, Hot Love on the Wing. Its dualities are continually expanding and concretizing, and I’ve had some important revelations recently.  Remember that it is a kunstleroman, so this excerpt involves the narrator dealing with his critics:

If I weren’t a writer, then I would write a book later. But ever since that day in first grade when I realized that being a reader is only half of the equation, that if you can’t write you’re just as powerless as not knowing how to read, I knew what I had to do; even if it was an unconscious stirring in my soul, it was there.

And then when I was eight, finding an old journal entry, my first, and being delighted at my ability to record the past accurately. I remember sitting on the floor cross legged, holding a single sheet of looseleaf paper that was wrinkled and scrawled over in pencil, and being ensnared in the power of my history, standing up and being inspired to write again, and eventually come back to it in another few years and have a repetition of that delightful feeling we recognize as aging, learning.

 In actuality, I could have been disgusted at how poor my writing style was, how inaccurate were the events, and how naïve I was as a mere six year old to attempt to write. You see, I don’t really know. The first way was nicer, it could have been true. But then again, it was so long ago that to remember exactly how I felt at the time is impossible. To try to give it to you, I glorified it the way I would glorify my youth if I wrote a coming of age story as an old man. It’s nice and sweet, sure, makes for good reading, but when you come down to it, it’s the dualities that are worth exploring. My feelings of how I wrote it or read it are untenable, and honestly isn’t it more fun to wonder? To make your own decision based on how well you know me, or rather how well you don’t know me? So my true goal is to allow you to understand my psychology, so that you can see how I might have interpreted my history, whether it was 20 years ago, or last night. We’re in it together, trying to find our way through the recesses of my memory, and interpret the light shining through the corridors as an exit, or maybe as a way to get lost deeper in the labyrinth. And who knows? Maybe we want to get lost. As long as we’re not alone, right?

4 am blog post.

I just watched a cool xx video that I wasn't really sure what to make of. I actually fast forwarded to the 2 minute mark, to see what would happen without having to understand the sadistic decay of motion. That's part of our digital age I guess, take it or leave it. And what else, we had this paella tonite for dinner that was called Soccoran which means the bottom layer in a paella that soaks up all of the delicious juices from the baked ingredients, among which were shrimp, scallops, mussels, clams, scuttlefish and pistachio colored lima beans. To drink we had a Ondarre wine from the Rioja region of Spain. Even with the seafood, it was a classic comparable to Tuscany's Chianti.
After a night on the L.E.S., I skated to the J train and whipped out my mouth harp while waiting. I'm learning "John Wesley Harding" (just wait through the German ad - it's 4:23 and I'm not about to sift through YouTube covers and that shitty band with the same name). Flushing St. Down many stairs and onto Humboldt, smooth skating, minimal pieces of glass, and undulations in the road that keep my bearings happy. Teeth brush. Wat drank. Bloggy wog. Sleepybie.

Flarf

Flarf: a kind of corrosive, cute, or cloying awfulness. This is a strain of avant garde poetry that began around 2001, in which Gary Sullivan, the coiner of the phrase, intentionally submitted bad poetry to Poetry.com to see if their standards held any ground. This is where poetry is headed in our digital age. Now I’m all for post postmodernism and the suggestiveness of Internet speak, but I don’t know where to put my finger on this one. I guess I’ll have to try.

If Yzerman and Kwame Kilpatrick
Don’t launch me to Google’s top spot,
Lindsey Lohan ankle bracelet is a searcher
that’s hot, and it might. Babelfish can help me translate this line of verse I wrote into… fuhgeddid.
Animals strike curious poses observed the heat between me and you.
Oh, but when they saw my penis strike a lampcatcher,
they wanted more. So I gave it to them, right up the Ace.
Hotels with coffee bars
make my jiggly wiggle, figglety figgle. Spigglety spiggle.
It was just for jizz and giggles that I did it. No I like girlz, as long as dey HOT. Hot, hot.
Lost series finale, n korea, safina, us soccer, ronald defeo jr, maybach 57s…

Not bad right? I kind of like this flarf movement.

Daniel The Writer

I have a website! It features some of my favorite writings, some compiled from this here blog, and others previously unreleased. It includes a short biography of my life, some of my favorite quotes, and some really nice scroll bars.So check it out, and browse through the goodies. There may still be a couple of writings that haven't been filled in, but you can now officially call me Daniel The Writer.

A Brooklyn Discourse

I was born in Brooklyn. Once its own city, it was consolidated into New York in 1898.  That is not to say that its character as a city has become subsumed, leaving it as nothing more than a borough. Instead of being competitors like San Francisco and Oakland, or Baltimore and D.C., Brooklyn and Manhattan are sisters. One is the runway model, the other is the athletic one, bound for the big leagues. She's a cauldron of pluck and bubbling verve that enjoys being removed from the limelight that bathes Manhattana. And geography plays into it too. Manhattan is patently phallic. It was gridded more than 400 years ago because the Dutch settlers knew that it would fill with people, and that all of them would eventually vie for space. In Manhattan, it's not possible for a building to take up more than a square city block. It is a city of autonomies, of arid scimitars. Brooklyn, south of Manhattan, also has easy access to the River and spreads, north to Queens and the Island. But it's vulvular. All of the streets come together to form a V, slanting and coy, taking you from one neighborhood to the next, as long as you know your way. They'll accept you, even if it is with a raised brow or an evil eye. And because I was born there, not in the graceful cradle of pomp and circumstance, it comes  reflected in my character. It's why I'm adventurous, yet wary of standing out, because Brooklyn is not about standing out like Manhattan, it's about who can stand out the best while blending in. Sometimes I press on with insouciance away from the stage, preferring instead to revel in the glory of size, biding my time quietly, comfortably, in the way Brooklynites are proud. I live for authenticity, because that is a true New York characteristic, and Manhattan is ready to deceive with illusions of grandeur and bright lights. Brooklyn can't be swindled. The former is a place for work, and tourists, and millionaires. The vast ocean of Brooklyn lies removed from the hubub and centerpiece of Times Square and the financial center. Across the East River, well into the 21st century there are neighborhood enclaves of immigrants, and they point to the old bubushkas with pushcarts and the slick haired kids elongating their vowels outside of salumerias, the affordable brownstones, the Puerto Rican auto body shops; that it is here where the poor immigrants came and slaved all away to make it in the world delivered upon them. 

Inanimate Urban Wildlife

Sometimes, when I’m walking down the urban streets, I see a flurry of movement, a flutter in the wind, and my attention catches. Is it a bird? A mammal of some kind? What is going on over there anyway? I wonder. Then the wind picks up and I see what it is.

Plastic bags scuttle like ragged claws over a pavement floor, they nest high in the branches of trees, and when kicked loose, they float and soar on thermals, with nothing but pride weighing them down. Bread bags, staple packs, newspaper bags – they’re all different species, commingling together in a concrete jungle.  Their only predators are the garbage men, those recycling can wielding fiends. If they got the chance, they’d burn them all into compost.

When I watch black or clear plastic bags get stuck somewhere, it’s like they’re hiding, resting, or biding their time, whether it’s under the wheels of a car, or the chimney of an apartment building. Then I watch them get rolled over or stepped on, and  I’m reminded of their inanimateness. It's a post postmodern homage to industry. I think, how natural it is for humans to assign our characteristics onto things over which we have no control.

Speaking Engrish

When I visited China in 2006, I was appalled at what they ate. Speaking no Chinese did not help the situation, and for our first dinner, I was able to physically communicate that I enjoyed chicken. I was brought a steaming tray of chicken paw.

Needless to say, there are many other differences that separate east and west. Toilets, subjugation of women, and most obviously, language. Here are some of the worst malapropisms popping up in China these days.

Whodoesn’t like a cup of Marxism in the morning?

It seems so simple…but then again, I don’t know Mandarin.Maybe they confused incontinent with impatient?

It upsets the deities.  

                                                            Mmm…thirst quenching.

Some of these signs could pass for avant garde art.

New Orleans Recapitulation

New Orleans' geography is inimical to its well being. Located at the delta of the Mississippi, it was a regional port of entry, and strategically placed for the distribution of goods along the waterways of the United States. In turn, it was also the city on the Gulf of Mexico, and arguably the Southern U.S. Today it has been replaced as a regional center by Miami, whose geographic location on America's wang allows for the reach into Latin America that generations of Cubans have appreciated. I heard it called Norlins more often than Nawlins, but anyway you pronounce it, the city has felt the devastation of rising water levels, giving literal meaning to the old saying, "Come hell or high water." I spoke to some residents selling beer on Esplanade, which is a beautiful oak lined boulevard that takes you right to the French Quarter. They said that they live in a fishbowl, because the dykes that surround the city give way in Hurricanes, which is why even the fire hydrants four or five feet high. Needless to say, in its age, it has immense culture. The unique idiolect includes words like laignappe, and picayune demonstrating the blend of African, French, and American influences. This is a musical sample of the old blind mouth harper, Grampa Elliot:





The following was composed in Napoleon House, 500 Chartres St., New Orleans, Louisiana:

The Half-Loves

Memories of beloveds, now gilded
In the cool, evening sunshine of my mind,
Decay in dead silence, ivy strangled,
Covered in the soft, green mosses of time,
While I, a tourist, wander the cold streets,
Watching shadows lengthen, enfolded in black sheets
And study for clues these ruined sculptures of mine.

Don't Be Scared! Really.

Blauer Schlumpf (Blue Smurf), 2009
Andre Butzer's show at Metro Pictures, "Nicht furchten!" (Don't be scared!) lasts until May 1, and is a menagerie of color, popular culture and pathos. These huge canvases are slathered in paint, an effect that the viewer can actually smell upon arrival. Globs of neon green, explosions of red, and faint recollections of images we know and love - the Smurfs, Winnie the Pooh, Aladdin - are all intermingled in a post postmodernism show robust with a joie de vivre. These signs of culture are abstract, yet lucid, and the heavy colors don't obfuscate - they invite.

A certain self-consciousness is apparent in the naming of these pieces, from "Blue Smurf" to "Entombment of Winnie the Pooh." All of these figures are suggestively abstract, and the names of the pieces reaffirm your suspicions of what you thought they resembled. It's like the formal act of creation calls upon our knowledge of culture, and our love of color, to attract us. Upon inspection we can see that there is a method to the abstraction: the artist carefully etched brushstrokes into the larger globs. We pause, back up, wonder, remember our childhood with these figures. Mr. Butzer said that this is where painting is now, that his use of color and subjects is not arbitrary.

The three paintings from which the show gets its name strike a more somber note. On the large canvases of colorful and exciting facture are oddly shaped figures that come to overpower the entire painting. The first presents a star shaped, flesh colored piece that sits in the middle of the painting, and yet strikes a harmonic balance in its dominance. Its amorphism is curious, but no more so than the black spidery figure in the second piece. It seems to be growing increasingly powerful, as its color blackens and its legs spread over the Matissean color field, but I think back to the title and am reassured. Finally, in the last piece, the black figure has gained complete control; only upon inspection is it possible to see a trace of green or blue. Otherwise, the black is the painting, hanging in thick smudges and smears. If this is the end, then it makes sense that we shouldn't fear it - the bright colors of the other avant garde art made it, well, not quite so bad.

Eye Scream Sunday

The other night was sultry, with gray clouds rolling over the sky and a mid-August feel despite the fact that it was only April. The magnolia in the backyard rollicked in the breeze, its pink petals just beginning to bloom at the top of the tree, and I ate my spaghtetti and arrabiata tomato sauce outside, with a napkin tucked into my collar. Aakash was busy working, moving back and forth from his apartment to the backyard patio.

Aakash had neon orange cutouts that he had measured to fit over the wheels of Guillermo's truck. I sat on my stoop, eight steps high, drinking a bottle of San Pelligrino, listening to the Spanish conversations of the men who worked at the auto shop next door, as Aakash set the neon cubic structures. Guillermo came home and was kind enough to sit in the car and model. We chatted and saw an ice cream truck sing past us with its characteristic carnival jingle. I had long wondered why the trucks flocked to our street, and assumed the existence of a depot, while telling my friends that really they sold ice cream during the day, but after 8 o clock, they sold drugs. We decided to place the neon cubes over the wheels of the ice cream truck.

When we walked over, an older man walked back and forth from the truck to the shop carrying big bags, and a young girl spoke on her cell phone. We asked if we could use the truck, and then the owner appeared saying that he wasn't sure, he didn't want his truck to end up in the New York Times and not get anything for it. Aakash reassured him that it was nothing like that, and I decided to buy some ice cream to assuage the situation. 

The girl, who was about my age and would have been pretty except for an overbite that made her lisp, sold me an ice cream bar, and I eagerly ate the chocolate on vanilla. Aakash wanted us to act natural and so we started to chat.

She was ecstatic and said that we were so cool to be taking pictures of her truck, that she was so happy, that all she ever does is work, and this kind of thing is so much better. I asked her about her family's drug cartel and she said yes, they sold weed and coke, primarily, but they were willing to submit special requests.

When we said our goodbyes and thank yous and got home, we decided to look at the avant garde art pictures for which one to put on display. Out of the 127, we chose one, featured above. This one we chose over the one with me and the girl interacting – she leaning out of the window with her hands over the glass like a puppy dog hopefully waiting on my reactions, me standing, ice cream bar in hand, gesticulating widely over some forgotten aspect of conversation.