Unatural Beliefs

Only then
will we know
who we are
what we are
where we came from
and the order
in the stars.
We are imperfect
innumerable,
invaluable
entranced
by baubles
waylaid by
pain and the
weight of
our troubles.

for those
that dwell in
the movement
of the past
or of other
will never live
in the moment
of now
will never live
with the sighs
of nature's breathing
out and in
of the damage
inherent in life
the beauty
in a dying tree
acknowledging
the cycle
we all seem
to be
festooned with
leeches and liars
and thieves
who believe their laughter
will continue
after death
in the hereafter
but smothered
like evil
in the furrowing
brow of tomorrow.

Random Bits

maybe then we can
in the hearts
of men

(it sounds like a chorus)

In the Garden of Stars

walk amongst trees
fly in her breezes
molten metals
burn in her heart
while her head and feet
catch a freeze.

I am with you
in the garden
of electrical
signals
and I bring
forth riches
and diamonds
and sky.

And I am made up
of carbon
and flowers.
fallen leaves
and vivid
tiger's eye.

My hairs runs
through streams
where vines part
and impart
scenes of sun
drenched
tides,
moons,
dreams.

What Inspires Me - Other Artists

The Call of Death, 1934 - Käthe Kollwitz



The simplicity and the starkness of this powerful image(like much of Kollwitz's work) has always struck me as beautiful. Someone who knew the only way she could tell her story was by shaking hands with death-that decay is part of the exchange of life. When its over, that becomes the point in which all the pain, anguish and hatred we experience in life suddenly meets its end in a moment of grace-everything is lifted off of us and we are free. Isn't that worth capturing and remembering, even showing as beautiful? I think so.

My Raw CV(still missing several entries)

(This is an in-progress CV)

Academic
---------------
BFA - 2000 Academy of Art College / Industrial & Graphic Design Major

Solo Exhibitions
----------------
1994 Forests of Glass / 20 Color Cibachrome prints - Ardenwood Recreational Center
1996 Another Visit to the Forest / 8 "E" Size photostats
1998 Dive for Memory / World Cafe
1999 Excerpts from 1001 Dead Umbrellas / Digital Photographs
2006 Body / Art - Drawings
2007 Body / Art Redux - Drawings & Digital Photographs
2008 Re(boot) / Mini show - Stompers Boots (commercial shoe renderings)
2009 Fetish Alchemy / 30 Drawings - (body landscapes)
2010 TBA

Group Exhibitions
---------------
2002 Mixed Open Showing / Brainwash Cafe
2002 Figure Drawing Group 15th Anniversary / MIC Studios
2004 PODS / Space Gallery
2005 Holiday Show / MIC Studios
2007 Figure Drawing Group 20th Anniversary / MIC Studios
2007 Hot Men / MIC Studios
2008 Fetish Lexicons / MIC Studios
2010 TBA

Other Projects
----------------
1992 - 1995 Soul For Sale / Music & Poetry Journal
Editor/Publisher/Contributor (8 Issues)

1997 - 2007 Nostalgic Futurists / 10 singles, 11 albums, 6 eps and 1 compilation
Multi-instrumentalist, Audio Production, Website & Graphic Design

1997 Drumscapes & Guitarcades - single
1998 Arizona Skies (unreleased)
1998 Beautiful Death Chorus - single
1998 Negative Planet - single
1998 Black Songs - ep
1998 Imaginary Movies - ep
1999 Astral Dead - single
1999 Forgetment - ep
1999 Hailstorm / Fire - album (as starspring)
2000 Laughter & Silence - compilation
2001 Excepts from the Super Summer Sunshine sessions - ep (promo only)
2001 33/45/78 (alternative pocket symphonies & pop songs) - album
2002 Dipole Moment - album producer (w/ JD Lenzen)
2002 Psychedelisized - album
2002 Legendary Children - single
2002 Sketch For New Dawn - soundtrack album
2002 Duality - single
2002 Antiquarian - single
2003 Digitalis - ep
2003 Digitalis - album / + extra tracks
2003 Forest Code - single
2004 New City - single (unreleased)
2005 Cave Killers - soundtrack album (as starspring)
2005 Blood Rose / Real Devils - split double a-side single (w/ La Diabla Absol)
2005 Na:tur - album (single track soundtrack)
2006 Interprocess Communications - ep (w/ Sansome & Sloat)
2006 ElectriCity - album
2007 Memory Fragments in Two Halves - album (as starspring)
2007 Loops - single (digital mp3s only)
2008 Electrical Fires: workbooks, textures and other bizarre failures in music (1997-2007) - compilation

Awards
----------------
1990 Excellence in the Arts / Alameda County School District / Sole Awardee

doin' the Goatee thing again...

More Goals

Goal: To do more of EVERYTHING. More work. Have more Sex. make more Art. Make more money.

Swing my machete
through the jungles
of depression.

Winning is a choice. Being 'poor' is a state of mind.

Essential Listens John Cale / Fragments of A Rainy Season

Good for many reasons not the least of which is Cale himself. But this album is more-its Cale as virtuoso pianist, gifted interpreter, distinctive songwriter and charismatic performer. This is almost an overview of his whole career, including material from every studio album up to that point(1992) as well as his setting of three of Dylan Thomas' poems to music(and as far as I know, the first ever his estate has allowed published) plus old Chestnuts like Fear and Ship of Fools, plus his radically take on Elvis' Heartbreak Hotel which still sounds haunting. and of course his legendary arrangement of Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen.

People often mistakenly pin the principal talent in the Velvet Underground on Lou Reed but other than mentoring with the poet Delmore Schwartz and doing some songwriting for the Picwic record label in the mid 60s he didn't have that much going on outside his burgeoning drug habit and the lingering effects of shock therapy treatments. Cale on the other hand was already a child prodigy, had played with no less than Terry Reily, Tony Conrad, Lamont Young AND John Cage before he turned 21-WAY before he even met Reed. He's also acted as producer on some of the most influential albums ever(Patti Smith's Horses comes to mind but the list-Nico,The Ramones, Nick Drake, Brian Eno, et al is HUGE)and written songs with loads of others. a real artist and poet-someone who does it because there isn't anything else worth doing. inspiration.

Back the Same Day

all the husbands
and the sons
turned to heroes
boy soldiers
turn into men.
one day
before you die
you'll feel the weight
of a gun.

but is your soul ever
going to be
free?
that weight
its too much
when did it all
get so damn heavy?

even if we're different as
night and day
like baby to mother
from midnight
to high noon
over and over
one always follows
the other.

higher and higher
wider and wider
the sky opens
like a new flower
the first drop
of every rainstorm.
beauty to protect
from harm.

you never have
a chance
when its
sweet temptation,
but is your soul free?
you'll find the ripcord
someday you'll get release.

You've had a helluva time
lets put it out to dry
lets hang it on a line.
swing like two kids
pretending to spy.
teenage wasteland,
teenage kicks,
teenage dreams
are still mine.

Essential Listens The Cocteau twins / Blue Bell Knoll

I'm starting a new writing series. I'm going to call it "essential listens" because I think that they are albums which nearly everyone can find interesting on some level. Er, and because I love them. ;)



You can get lost for days in the first track alone. There are a hundred thousand lifetimes in that song.

Proof There is No God - Kirsty MacColl

Kirsty MacColl 1959 - 2000



God I miss her. If I could give a leg to bring her back I would. Even if all I ever got was her living out the rest of her life being happy, that would be enough. Her music has brought me so much happiness over the years it can't be measured. Sadly it would take a lot more than a leg to raise the dead, and I am not that gifted, or that powerful.

I first heard of her oddly enough singing back up for my favorite band ever, The Smiths. Her cracking vocals on Your Just Haven't Earned It Yet Baby are as passionate and yearning as anything I've heard sung, ever. Her voice was instantly recognizable, almost intimate and yet amazing sunny and effervescent.

I went backward, discovering her solo albums starting with "Kite" from 1989 and working my way forward. There's a lot of gold in them thar hills! For someone who's Father is considered one of the godfathers of folk(Ewan MacColl- the first ever I saw your face) she had an incredible pop sensibility and enough songwriting hooks to catch fish for the 5,000.

As is sometimes the case with immense talent that arrives before their time, Kirsty never had any huge hits although Comedian Tracy Ullman took her 1983 single "They Don't Know" to number two in 1986-including leaving Kirsty's backing vocals intact from the original and right up front like a duet in the chorus. Forever a fan herself Ullman said at the time "it would have been wrong to use myself-without Kirsty's voice the song is not the same. I love her and her voice." Although a few singles charted in the lower reaches of the British charts, she never hit it big in the US, though her husband Steve Lillywhite had massive success with his production for Simple Minds, the Smiths and of course U2-almost all of whom Kirsty did backing vocals.

After her divorce from Lillywhite and the relative failure of her 'divorce' album Titanic Days, she took time off. Raising her two children and generally writing songs on her own, but sometimes with others, she mostly kept a low profile for many years. So it was with much delight when she reappeared in 2000 with the album Tropical Brainstorm(her album titles were never without a little humor-even for an English girl). I began playing the album to death-to the point where my then partner Lee asked "could you PLEASE play something else?" It wasn't just a good album-it was her best. She was often quoted as saying "There's no reason to shove your face in the public presence if you don't have anything worthwhile to say."

I thought this album deserved to be heard by everyone and I made sure I mentioned it as often as possible. I rarely use an entire album to cheer myself up but this album is so determined to be sunny you can't can't help but feel the rays beaming out of the speakers. After her divorce, licking her wounds and looking for new directions, she visited Cuba for the first time. This was WAY Before the Buenavista Social Club and the influx of Cuban music that was cool in the late 1990's. Visiting several times over the years, she immersed herself in the culture, tasting the nightlife and recapturing her verve-including falling in love again with a somewhat younger man. They began writing songs. She wrote more with a few others, leading to the songs which became Tropical Brainstorm. The woman who wrote these songs sounds about as in love with life as you can imagine.

She was taking a quick last minute vacation to Cozumel, Mexico just prior to beginning a small tour in support of the album. She rarely toured and almost never in the US so the success of the first single "in these shoes" boded well. I was all set to finally get a chance to see her live and then...one Saturday morning in September...she was dead. In fact she had been killed while snorkeling with her two small children and her new lover, by a wealthy Mexican businessman driving a powerboat in an area reserved only for swimming. Kirsty died pushing her two children out of the way of the boats path, putting herself in their place. She was struck on the back of the head while her two children watched, narrowly missing being hit themselves. She was killed instantly. The driver of the boat didn't even stop. Because he was drunk. Kirsty's elderly mother has spent the intervening 10 years devoting herself to bringing the man to justice.

I knew how corrupt the Mexican judicial system was and was not surprised that they pinned the murder on some poor guy who the businessman claimed had been piloting the boat at the time of the accident. It wasn't true. One more reason to hate the rich? At this point I was just stunned hearing about it. She was only 41, in the prime of her life and in love again doing something she loved with the most important people in her life by her side. The wrongness of her death troubles me even now. I often find myself thinking of her and begin to cry. Taken at exactly the wrong time, just when everything was starting to go her way(Bette Midler even covered 'In These Shoes'-which was released as a single after Kirsty's death)and with SUCH a great album. Not a good album...a GREAT Album. And her best. She went out on top both as an artist but also a songwriter. You can tell she was the real deal, a one-off firing on all cylinders.

Everyone loved her-even in the notoriously backstabbing record industry-and she was the kind of woman you could call a 'broad' without her taking offense. She would have probably offered you a glass of red wine and drunk you under the table instead. Smart, sassy, gifted and a voice like a fiery red-headed angel with a personality to match. Even as talented as she was, with as many truly 'famous' people that she knew she always said her greatest achievement was her children. And in a way she made sure they would live, even if she might not.

Its been 10 years since her death. I play her music all the time-nearly everything holds up-even the 80's material. But its always bittersweet-and I find myself thinking of the what if's. What if she had lived? What would she be doing-would those concerts I never got to see her perform in have been the best? I'll never know. I just keep playing her records and doing what I can to share her truly vibrant spirit with the rest of the world. She taught me to laugh when it hurts and cry because it feels so wonderful to be alive.



I miss you Kirsty. Have a Margarita and a record player waiting when I get there, would you?

Love Steve

And for the record

FUCK Meg Whittman for ANYTHING. She thinks she can run this state like she ran Ebay - like a corporation. Well, some news dear...when you're in charge of the show and its your word uber alles that might work.

But...

This is California. People here don't like being told what to do-or watching some multibillionaire tell them how their money should be spent. Like the sticker on the fence of the newspaper machine said "God bless the Obscenely wealthy." and that's about it. We don't want you because you can make money-it takes MORE than that. I think you are VASTLY underestimating what kind of a thrill ride you are in for.

Its a Little Come Hither

But who else is looking back?



Back to a goatee - we'll see how long this one lasts.

Utter Exhaustion (whose to say we live in the moment)

not here....the other place.

Just weary I guess
I'd like to stop
sit awhile
and rest.

Been siphoning off
slow poison and
understood
its the top.

Laughing, transient
dreaming of
tangents and
the rent.

They all said cuckoo
but I still
fell for it
and for you.

utter exhaustion
no explanation
frustrated by
the question.

No brow to anoint
so how in orbit
late for my
disappointment.

New Goals / Sept - End of Year

Solid Goals

1. Solid employment
2. Get the hell out of this overpriced shit hole
3. New Blog/Website - As a place holder until real website is finished
4. Artist Representation -
5. Get back to making art like my life depended on it
--------------------

Well, I'm off to a great start. I already got #3 checked off and I feel the wheels of(industry)starting to grind forward underneath me. Its strategy time.

If You're Into That Sort of Thing

http://artofstevenpaigedavis.blogspot.com

Schizoid Plan gets Out of Hands

farewell
better be well,
when did my hand
kill the man
on judgment day?
did things get out of control?
trying to
express your soul,
unleashed feelings
like chopped off feelers
that no longer transmit
collar too tight
clothes too unfashionable
to fit.

Better ever, lopped off head
playing cards
flattened by insurrection
thinking too hard
stuck in the mud.
different names for people
who are all the same
different names for me
to keep track of the pain.
separation, inspiration
want to have one strong line
not nets and webs
that snake on
throughout the future
multiple, multitudes,
etudes, groovy tunes
where did my hands
get the idea to punish,
to move in space?

crushed feelers
not transmitting
curl up like ants
in the blaze of the
white light pinpointed fire
when put under
such solar scrutiny
its all for one
its all for nothing
its microscopic mutiny
where does myself bend
in the wind
like reeds
thrown like seeds
into the fields
of constellations
(underneath crawl
the scorpions
of unfettered desire)

Better I beat them
Well, I beat the drum
like the last lingering rhythm
in the afternoon sun.

Make It In The Straight World Part II

Make It In The Straight World

People often ask "what does it look like when you don't draw nudes?"


Now you know.

Title: "You Wait Until Your Time Comes 'Round Again"
Approx. 14" x 24" Color Pencil on 50% gray 80Lbs. cold-press stock

Chafing Against the Bones of Eternity

The real way to fight demons is to be a conjurer yourself. To pull something from thin air, see something no one has ever seen or see it in a way no one else can, make tangible the intangible. like a warning for evil spirits(the real ones) that you aren't going down without a fight.

The Healer in the Hope & Anchor (Mad Jack)

listen...

one two three four
on the surface
he seems sensible
but deep inside
the reasoning
is fading.
like a wall
that weakens
under the strength
of many seasons.
you can see the
lies
of the other side
for every passing
day is it any wonder
that I never close my eyes
thinking about you.

I rear up in
my madness
like snorting horses
revealing naked
foals on the
uneven ground.
Is it any wonder
I am always
thinking of you.
no matter where you
are

I can trace you by the stars
tonight

The moon is out(surrender to the tears)
The moon is out(there goes the light)
The moon is out(the shadows will come to swallow us soon)
The moon is out(not the only one counting clocks)
Is it any explanation
to say I've lost my mind?
No idea where to find
it; gone someplace
I can't get.

Is it any wonder
I never seem to close my eyes?
Is it?
Is it?
Waiting for the spirits
to come and steal the
thunder,
blunder into some
different state of
mind, all the laces
will finally
be undone.
all the traces will be
wiped away
by the sun

I'm Digging your scene - The Blow Monkeys

Doctor Robert...nothing has changed.

In 1986 I was 14 years old and this track was a hit on the radio, on MTV and elsewhere. It was one of the first songs to be very specifically about the AIDS crisis (they put your in a hole to fill in/but I prefer you to be seen). I should have been dancing and discovering the joys of being a teenager. Instead I was learning that being gay meant I was going to die of AIDS and all around me people I loved or knew of were already becoming sick or had actually died. People driving by in trucks screamed "Fag!!" at me on the way to school. Could they tell I was gay-that in my heart I fell in love with men? What was so wrong with me that they couldn't see the love in my heart? That I was just like them?

I am 38 this year. That was almost 25 years ago now. Sometimes it feels like the world is still so full of hatred I don't know how I even go on, and is the world even worth saving anymore? I don't know what the hell I am doing sometimes...its like treading water but dying of thirst.

Brain please go to sleep - stop the world, I want to get off.

Thoughts on a Lizard

There were two lizards once.
They didn't have names.
Just lizards really,
not big ones.
Just simple
alligator lizards.
Part of the ecosystem.
Eating bugs.
moss, other smaller lifeforms.
Everyday they were there.
I would find them.
Everyday.
Some days sunning themselves.
ravishing in the
scorching sun.
Other times
hiding in dead
christmas trees,
hidden as if
branches.
sleeping,
for the fog
must be lifting
I saw them.
Many places
adjacent to
where I was working.
thinking.
smoking.
breaking from
the tyranny
of lifting 50lbs
bags of cement
no place to vent,
no one to hear
my desperate cry.
anguished, trying
to figure out
what was wrong with me.
why couldn't I be
purposeful in my
existence?
Why was I left
hobbled by doubt
and here
where two lizards
bathed, eating
mud and bugs
achieving a level of
perfecting I
could never know.
I fed them.
Gave them crushed bugs
to eat.
playing my
own part
in the bigger scheme
of things.
I admired their
persistence.
existence
on a much simpler
plane-freed from the
notion of nothingness
of emotional turmoil.
not embroiled by
tribulation.
Beautiful, eternal
perpetual and
timeless.

I figured the lesson was there before me if I wanted to learn something. I still think about the level of calm these two lizards(obviously a pair-a male and female-their skulls are very different in width from male to female)exhibited while I either held them or moved them repeatedly. I often acted in their own best interest over my own while cleaning a rather large yard side area full of debris, including making sure that no cement dust was left on the soil-which can burn their skin and making sure I checked each large piece of trash or dead wood as I scrapped it-so that they didn't get 'bagged' or crushed in the removal process. This caused a few stirs with Mark but I don't care. The animals were more important to me. They lived with truth and I felt deserved the right to live. The chance to let nature take its course, not be wiped out by one man's carelessness. IN my mind there is no greater life form. all living things have a value and a worth. Even though I eat meat and consume my fair share of resources as a human being-I like to think that I do my best to co-exist with nature and my place in the food chain and to show other living things I come into contact with respect-even when I might be eating them.

I referred to them as Jack and Jill because they were always on the hill together.

And yeah, this IS that lizard.



Look at that Stare!! Like he wants to kill your whole family and THEN burn the house down. Notice to the mice-you WILL be eaten!!

This is the female.



even though she was smaller she was still a good 11 inches in length. he was almost 12". There is probably a crude dick joke in there but I'll let it go for now. ;)

The Cuteness!!

After nearly 14 years these two still spend time with one another, grooming, playing and romping(though less romping for Tweed lately)and as always they are so photogenic its just WRONG!! And this pictures says a lot about the two of them. Tweed looks rueful and suspicious while Josquin is like "Hey! Look!! A CAMERA!!"

Love them to pieces...they help keep me together.

The Time is 15:00 GMT / the price of America

this program is coming to
you direct from the voice
of america
its hysterical
do I even care
he sitting in that chair
I laugh at him
his blank stare.
the gate
the hating
frustrating
experience
I was
I was euphoria
I felt victorious
I felt the vapor
asphyxiate us.
burnt to a crisp
tossed like
fuel into
the belly
of the phoenix
what came between us?
It felt beneath me.
and I was guilty?
and I was petty?
let all your devils
come and try to get me.
I blow out your candle.
I laugh at your haste.
one day you'll taste
the knowledge you can't handle.
attacked by vandals
your heart is black coal
blocked forest hideaway
you said we'd find a way
but I was lead astray
I thought we'd fly across
oceans and drink in
the spray.
instead you walked away
while we were in a trench.
I had a hunch
when it came
time to crunch
I'd be left high and dry
like an abandoned boat.
no chance for redemption
only worried
when you can't float.

(yeah, fuck it. I found the right guy to build a raft out of hell with already thankyouverymuch you evil bastard-and its NOT you. (waves at Bob ;)- (pushes cluttered block of ice out towards the sea)(goes back to making art)(this program is coming to you from the United Stated of America - this is radio america - this radio calling - this is radio chaos - are you calling? - are you stalling? - I am falling in love with this handsome creature - we're both teachers - standing ovation - radio programming coming to you love from aboard.....live...live.....what a world it is...

2 Compositions in Black and Grey / My 200th Blog Entry!!!

First off...Holy Cow! 200 Entries?! Its like I'm a writer or something. like, for real you know? grown up style!! Whoooo Whoo!!!

Okay, now that I have furiously poked a hole in my own self importance...on with the Art!!!

01. Spectral Underwater Apparition (Parallax Aggregate)



04. Elusive Dream Pianos (repetition for Steve Reich)



Not too bad for 4am on a hotel bathroom floor. Even tired and wacked on drugs I make art. I Win.

Composition in Black and White (Jazz solos for orchestra)

Notes on Myrrhman

did I mention
this space
your eyes
vertical
ascension
clouds made
of glass
hours pass
I can't pay
anymore attention
captured my heart
the aperture of
my flaws
recorded
step by step
in anethemic
art.

Shake my head
shake my hands
at the floor
I never expected
riches
or to be poor
I already seem
to have it all
to have you
to grab you
by the handle
tip your ideas
over and create
a scandal
in bohemia,
caffinated anemia
coffee stains,
dark teeth in the night
and black sheets
of rain
the depth of my decay
as it pours
wash the ink
like blood
off of stones.

------------

white sheets
violins and linen.
white wood
and black blood
compromise
like zebras could
if zebras would
take to you
like I talk
to the moon

--------------

only halfway
into the onyx woods
the sharp angels
and twisted branches
unsubstantiated
entrench chances
claw at the past
horses ride
ferries slip
into the gash
the river engulfed
laughter and card tricks
and the man who falls
in love with death's daughter
and her kiss
\(unfinished)

Reggie Watts is Muthafucking Genius

Lossless

You're so handsome
I don't care.
like in some
old Hollywood movie.
I stop and stare
You turn your head
what He said?
impossibly
groovy.

Art, Life and Post-modern Ennui

The other night(my birthday actually) I decided to test myself. I've been in a bit of a comfy spot concerning my work. I've developed this mature style of drawing over a period of about 8 years that for lack of a better word, has been dominated by nudes and erotic work. Now, I don't really know how that will translate into mainstream work' that I can make a living at and/or somehow make MORE of a living than I am now. I never needed a focus group to tell me I was good. In some ways I have done exactly what I set out to do-sorry if this sounds a bit Pinnochio-become a REAL artist and actually have other people I don't know buy my work and show appreciation. Now I WILL Go to the Ball!...she exclaimed.



Those are, as any artist knows, ephemeral goals that mean different things at different times in our working life as an artist. What is success, what is 'good' work? You do your best and hope that there is enough 'there' there in ones work to make it worth what you ask for it.

I've reached a point where I have done the things I set out to do as an artist, things I wanted to achieve and, for lack of a better reason, things I also wanted to avoid. Scaling the art world and its dangerously derailing curves has blown one than one artist off path and it has been with tenuous steps that I ever began to show solo. In group shows I was always a standout. My work was often singled out as being the best of the group or at worst, up at the top of a larger group of artists. Finally showing by myself was liberating but scary as hell. Will people 'get' what I am trying to do-when even I have no idea what's going on? Does my work stand alone, does it behave provocatively enough as an idea on (in this case) paper?

Then there is the constant struggle to balance the need to express with actually having SOMETHING to say. No one dances so that others see them dancing, but to dance although they can come together on the best of occasions. Luckily I think I have something to offer, something that IS different. Like all my favorite artists I managed to synthesize something from all my experiences-good and bad-to tell a story no one else can. I know that I am talented but would never say 'how much'. Talent, art and beauty are so subjective I am just trying to do what it is that ONLY I can do. I draw spiders that sing in the corners of my room. I look down at the veins in my arm and imagine a massive delta hundreds of miles wide doused with a blanket of stars-but when I draw it, it comes out as a Manta ray with a man inside interpolated with fins, forked tails, feathers and its all melted together. The spaceship has turned on me...."I'm sorry Dave, I can't let you do that."

The day I turned 38 I decided to test myself and draw "bigger". To see if I could, and the effect it would have on my work. my life is in a different place, as am I. What does my work look like NOW. Right now? Am I a photographer? Am I a fine artist working with traditional mediums? am I a multimedia artist? a writer? a songwriter? and don't even get me started on catagories!!



A craftsman? How to harness all this potential and still have time and money to allow for work to happen naturally-not so totally shoehorned into somewhere it badly fits. I have seen the neurosis of NOT being able to create. Not being able to write music for almost 2 years? Not being to able to make so much as a single guitar strum or single key of piano? fucking christ I don't know how I have managed. There are thousands of songs in my head. thousands. if I could just get them out somehow...somehow.

So what am I? Am I lost or am I like the stars. You see them in the night sky, but the star's light is an illusion-a trick of time-and what we actually see is the compressed energy of the light being shot through space from hundreds of years ago-but we think its right now. It feels like that is what is sometimes happening with my art. I just keep emitting, hoping that somehow in time(not hundreds of years mind you) that someone will see my light, someone who can mentor me and help me figure out how to better wield my flaming sword without chopping my head off or burning the house down.

At least I have a muse....and I'm up for the downstroke. love on ya.

Oh, and I passed the test.

Death In A Rowboat

autumn comes
for the loved and
the loveless ones all
bearing its thorns
its cutting edge
and scorn

Mirrors crack
doorways freeze
spirits rise
too great to erase
trapped like
gas in a corpse,
leaking through to this
universe one soul
to the next.

Emblazoned

a place in
fire
to burn
forever
killer of children
mind thief
no love waiting
no more pain
gestating
you will not
harness their
souls in the afterlife

you will be introduced
to the devourer
of souls
the lone gull
cries
as you gurn
tied to the rocks
like prometheus
flayed.

there is a place in fire
a small black ring
for those who wear
the masks of god.

damned(Be)

better to be dead
better to be damned
than to be forced
to exist
in a no-man's land
separated from
the one thing
we all want
its love...

I don't understand
the way it is
the things have been
truth thrown down a dark hole
I don't know where its been.
built up to who knows where
better to be damned...
better to be dead

Have You

cup for your coffee.
sugar and your cream
once just a dreamer
see inside the dream
have you?

stones in the pathway
darkened under
moonless skies
transition
into what you are
compassion
for the lost
and wandering
star...

Have you?

Cool Gay Ally

Miss New York Claire Buffie. Google her-wow is all I can say. watching her talk makes me burst into tears.

I Am Free

walk 100 miles
in the cold snow
dive over waterfalls
to catch you
climb over mountains
that reach into
the sky just
to reach you
before the day
you only
live in
dreams.
(take me with you, won't you, when you have to go)

Art - Damaged

real paper
and then music
Orange blossom
pathways.
clovers, lavender screened
roses, curling over
green jade seafoam,
waves, petticoats,
palettes and shore birds
calling past,
calling past you
calling situation
nostalgia remains
fragile in
the underbrushed
polygons, stagnant thrones
of past kings
in death throes
cast lights on fountains
remain tragic in concrete
ravaged by entropy
the pecking of birds
pasts winters
acid rain blisters
sinister pictures
with foreign visitors
remand you
to current stage
exit one
option nothing
just damaged
again.

In Another State

play
like somebody
murdered your heart
all the songs
and voices
melodic choices
pulled me right
out of the stars

and all the night
was racing
like horses
and rivers
and slivers
of lights
in the creosote
blackness
where madness
attacks us
it all seems remote
cold fights
and shivering
god gives
the whores
self effacing
wings for flight.

Is the light on?
Are you home?
Its so lonely
when you sleep
alone
close your eyes
angel I won't sleep
'til I find you
the light
in my heart
will burn through
you 'til your gone.

(*Deleted)

I'm 38 Years Old Part IV / Ink & Wash

All shots within a 3.5 minute period. One single 65 watt back reflector and a clip on light from a hardware store. Ansel Adams my ass. Where's MY museum on 4th street?

Bastards....

I'm 38 Years Old Part III / Trees In A Dream

Yo, Don't need cocaine. Already insane, thank you very much.

I'm 38 Years Old Part II / The Visuals

This is my birthday portrait for 2010. rock the fuck out y'all.

Interlude for Heroes

I'm 38 years old

never thought I would be here
or end up here.
couldn't see this
from back there.
I just kept trying
even when I
was on the verge
of giving up.
blind faith
or stupidity,
I can never tell.
Optimist
in a pessimists body
privately obsessed
with pleasing the public
but never satisfied
with myself.
Still shy-hard to trust people.
Has it really been 38 years?
35 since my dad died.
20 since I graduated high school.
10 since I graduated college.
0 in my bank account(mostly).
limitless ideas, restless mind.
still believe that love
changes everything
despite vast
evidence to the contrary.
not that smart,
as it turns out.
but brilliant in
some respects.
respectable(occasionally).
on occasion focused
other times all over the place.
too stuck in chaos
to process myself
out of reason.
How did I get here?
I don't know what I am doing.
its all chance.
its all art
its all music.
there is a soundtrack
playing in my mind.
the psychic shield.
the safe gray area
without walls where
my mind could retreat
shaped everything
gave clarity
in a life spent in
clouds of
self doubt, self loathing
a facade so well
polished.
I could only see everything
and everyone else.
never looking inward(too terrified to, mostly)
trying not to look backwards.
get too lost.
wild goose chases.
car accidents
and leg braces.
straightened teeth
and scarred faces
but smiling still.
still!
I have no idea how I got this far.
I have no grand plan anymore.
realized I was living
to make the plan work
and
not actually living.
The electicity flowed
but the fuses
were all cooked.
didn't learn to cook
for myself.
too stressful.
I just make a mess.
distressing just
making dressing
or reading directions
or reflecting
on what a long strange trip
this has been
and is being
Ladies and Gentlemen
we ARE floating in space
spaceman steve
my spaceship made of art
too feeble to let it all go
should have stopped
some of this long ago
but I slither
away anyway,
another skin, another me.
wonder what 39 will be?
still lots of dreams
blood sweat and tears
I knew it wasn't easy.
I never wanted
an easy life-I wanted a real one.
to open doors.
not be boring.
add smiles.
take away unhappiness
when I can.
still up for it.
not crawling away
tail between my legs
I don't care how long it
takes even if that's forever
I don't care if people don't
like me-only that what I do has
SOME EFFECT
on the world.
not done yet.
not perfect.
still...

Spell Boundary

red reflective
light casts dreams
here in the august night
jasmine sweets the air
chorus and joy and house music
all bursting, flowing, fully deployed.

lined with hallucinations
a million different eyes
greedy hands with
cold hard cash
gold rush
catch
you in a net,
all the brilliant sparks
a thousand
warm elemental colors
gentle in the summers
ever like green leaves
ornament the weather.

Crescents On the Edge of Deserts

desert gasses
rise and
meet the
burgeoning sky,
blue glass, light
heat
trapped in
new mexican winters
sweep the
heartfelt heroes
landing with icy fingered
hands, sanded down
blown flat
and clear...

What color is the space
between what is
and what will never be?
There arn't enough blues
to grace these
places
for all the cerulean
and eggshell
clouds
for all the worlds
cocoa and bittersweet
vapor trails
dithered and diffident
from a high, high place
grasped and swirled
around the vortex
of earth, its guilty
faint breath the
cast off smoke
of dead centuries
in and out
of the starlight
across gridded and golden planes
stratified by diamond hunters
in veins of vanilla lightning
streaking overground brown
earthen reminders, untoward
endless angles on
the dark arcane...

atmospherics divine
oceans from the gas of time
carve waves into halves
and deftly blinded
in the arid nights

Steven on the Bathroom Floor

God, I can't sleep. Been trying to get this damn other wireless card I have to work for like an hour and just can't get it to work. The other one makes this fucking annoying bell sound every single time it connects, playing over the top of everything and full blast. I will never buy another netgear product. They are awful, totally NOT user friendly at all!

So here I am on the bathroom floor, typing my little fingers away. I know I have been getting way too much sleep and that is why I am 'up'. I had two drinks, sure, but spread out over like 3 hours-at normally that would have made me sleepy and I would have zonked out....So I am a little perturbed. Bleeding a little too, and cramped up.

Ah, I'll just process some photos I guess.