Ars Todetica

The market down 131 points

2010-03-15T16:26:00.001-07:00

Like today’s markets our hearts bottomed out
not in sympathy to those won or lost
nor those busted out, sure-broken from doubt,
but for one who remains, harried and tossed.
He chose his friends from kindness as his stocks
yet now the bell is rung on a dead day
for though they held, held fast like faithful rocks
they were men and faltered and fell away.

What rhythm’s left? What ragged rise and fall?
What empty planets whirl around the sun
with orders on the line to put and call
and the last man pinned under a mountain.

New Project: Barmonger

2010-03-15T16:14:00.000-07:00

Working on new web-based project that I hope to talk more about in the near future. For now, you can sign up for updates on the Barmonger home page.

Project: Todetica Acrylic Jewelry

2010-03-15T16:07:00.000-07:00

Is now on sale at Small Victories . You can see some product images here. The gear shapes are my own design, laser-cut from acrylic and finished with oxidized metal chain and ear wires.

Demand <> Supply A/V

2010-02-01T23:20:00.000-08:00

Demand ≠ Supply

2010-01-23T19:43:00.000-08:00

The price of flesh, adjusted by the day
The bones of want and their market value
I know the cost to turn the horse to glue-
but as to love, I really couldn’t say.

The Best Days of My Youth (A/V)

2010-01-20T20:58:00.000-08:00

Image courtesy of 'Bengal Tiger / Tigre de Bengala (Panthera+Tigris)'

The Best Days of My Youth

2010-01-04T13:22:00.000-08:00

Youth is not kind. It’s a kind of lying:
In tigers, time blurs—an opiate,
in lions, becomes a lying in wait,
but in bears—caves in—and hibernates.

Twin Tales of Thales (A/V)

2009-12-13T22:43:00.000-08:00

Twin tales of Thales

2009-12-04T14:21:00.000-08:00

I.
So busy his astronomy
Thales falls into a well—
Amid the stars a mind may dwell
but never mid humanity.

II.
585 B.C. and he
calls an eclipse of the sun:
The western science is begun
to proof of catastrophe.

Prelude (A/V)

2009-12-01T00:12:00.000-08:00

A landscape by my brother.

Prelude

2009-11-25T23:47:00.000-08:00

Outside: waiting;
outside

not a leaf leans forward
not a lark flies
not a stone bends towards
not a branch rends sky

Still. A white stag blurs the water as he drinks
Still. A huntsman sits, pommeled by his girth
Still your dead stir, crying
in damp earth.

Outside seeds are breaking;
outside bones are burst;

Fracture frees marrow and germ
from the seething berm.

My grandfather's globe (A/V)

2009-11-21T21:38:00.000-08:00

My grandfather's globe in A/V format.

My grandfather’s globe

2009-11-16T13:25:00.001-08:00

The world becomes intricate miniature
shrunk down to a sphere you turn in your hand.
One’s fingers slide from islands to mainland
without ruffling water’s cool composure.
Each country’s a tile of some precious stone:
mother of pearl, jade, lapis lazuli
whose hued reflections jockey for the eye
and whose contours belong to each alone.

Still they fit in smoothly with their neighbors
integrating the continents of land
to satisfy by completing jigsaw
a singular and comprehensive awe
that at such scaling knows no countermand
in populace’s destructive labor.

At the stop called grace a dieu (A/V)

2009-11-16T13:19:00.000-08:00

At the stop in A/V format. The image is one of my brother's from a series he did of lost, single shoes, gloves and other unpaired twins he found in his wanderings.

At the stop called grace a dieu

2009-11-08T14:54:00.000-08:00

Spare sun in Paris. Nothing goes right
he thinks as his belly lurches hungrily.
Nothing might appease him on an unappeasable day:
even eating implicates a future want.

A woman cries allez-allez in the alley
while a forked man shifts his long baguette
boarding a gray bus
at the stop called grace a dieu.

Cocoon (A/V)

2009-11-03T15:13:00.000-08:00

Cocoon in A/V format. The chrysalis image is courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Cocoon

2009-10-25T20:42:00.000-07:00

for D

Verdant leaves stretch out before the pillar,
but agony of appetite remains
an exclusivity of repertoire
that swallows ceaselessly to stifle pain.
Things curl or cocoon themselves even on
spreading surrender in a milky purl
which encases head in own depression
and broods in chambers dangling from the world.

Behold! What was done for mention of summer
now ekes out air, exfoliates color:
a chrysalis whose clamorous chewing
rips from voracious toil sap-slung wings
waves a manifold swathe’s purest butter
to grease the depths of the heart from dolor.

Fables (A/V)

2009-10-23T14:48:00.000-07:00

Fables in A/V format. Another work by my brother. The palette here always reminds me of Degas' La Coiffure, which serves as a hidden echo to the third stanza of this poem.

Fables

2009-10-19T12:51:00.000-07:00

So now—tell me what you are
to lay long vowels like bricks
thatching hearthouses with straw
then huffing down what sticks

     I am a grim wolf’s brother

Well now—tell me where you are
that you groan green evening’s thickets
gleaning crumbs that glimmer in craw
though gingerbread protests

     In the saline freshet, north of despair

There now—tell me who you are
upright, unclimbable tower
twisting melodies into lengths of hair
that you never lower

     I am Shekkinah

Zion (A/V version)

2009-10-17T11:09:00.000-07:00

Zion in A/V format. The trophies from a larger single canvas by my brother. The blurry disappointments of middle age after the vivid glittering of childhood triumphs.

Zion

2009-10-14T17:53:00.000-07:00

Outside my boyhood temple stood a sign
I misread as “Save Palestinian
Jewelry.” Now whatever its design,
my own came out casting gold medallions,
poured out a perplexity of bright beads,
sun-dazzled bangles and metallic ores
so molten in the molds of my own needs
they could not keep the saving they stood for.

Later, when I was old enough to hold
that error and the terrible traction
of errors hammered into old errors
I hungered for old crucibles of gold
that smelted out pieces of pure Zion
not as bullets, but as decorative wear.

One Pass Round the Clock (Video)

2009-10-07T16:44:00.000-07:00

Here's the multimedia clip to accompany One Pass Round the Clock. The dreamy image, again one of my brother's, was from a fanciful series of blue-filled non-representational paintings he released under a pseudonym. Consider this one a clock come undone in the wake of a thought....

One pass round the clock

2009-10-06T00:04:00.000-07:00

I. Ascent
Time bears no features
outside the self.
It wears a face
in our hands and fingers
taking it’s twitches in a mind
winding itself
like a clumsy clock.

Thus, caught in a world
which bears one up,
like a ferris wheel, rocking,
each moment marks
a rough deliverance:
happenstance, terror.

II. Descent
Left none but memory,
he takes up his mystery
like a cloth.
Unwinding
curious concatenations of a self
to morning’s threads
whose rouge licks,
coloring his deeds.

And bearing down time’s footmen
for late review
he finds himself happy, a magpie or crow
delighting in golden cuff and buckle
whose gleams ripple the loss and lull
wallowing in the wake of his mind.

Woot! Gemkitty is live!

2009-10-03T13:45:00.000-07:00

Gemkitty is live. We've got two different product lines that hopefully scratch the bling-hunting itch. There's a limited edition section for those looking for exclusive, ready-to-wear gemstone jewelry. And to awaken the designer inside of you, we have our "DYO" section where you can design your own necklace, which is then crafted to your specification and shipped right to your door.

A bit of a departure from the usual poetry, but every bit as much a labor of love.

"The Jaggers" (Video)

2009-10-03T13:38:00.000-07:00

"The Jaggers" in still image/audio format. The image is taken from one of my brother's series of woodsy-still lives. Unfortunately, the computer does not do justice to the quality, vivacity, and nuances of the greens in this painting; he somehow seems to have packed the whole spectrum of light and dark within a single band of color.

"The Jaggers"

2009-09-26T16:54:00.000-07:00

At the road’s curve, an undeveloped lot
our motley cohort christened “the jaggers”.
That’s where our wild possibilities were set
to messy tangles of weed and briar.

Come spring, our mouths and fingers spotted stain
proving berries pleasures by the bleeding.
Come winter, snowballs parceled the terrain
with kingdoms won and lost to annexing.

Nothing that flourished there clung to order;
yet owner proved indifferent to that
knowing adult hands could alter its state.
But we were children and we did not see
what natural choices would disappear
in developments of maturity.

Fourth of July (Video)

2009-09-23T00:06:00.001-07:00

Here's an audio recording (disguised as a video) of Fourth of July. The image, as usual, is one of my brother's. He went through a period where he wanted to expose the geometry of the frame and fabric underlying the painted image. The artifice revealing its skeleton. I always perceived the exact opposite: underneath the outer skeleton of the painting lies a deeper painting....

Fourth of July

2009-09-19T21:19:00.000-07:00

I. The View from Brooklyn

We tenants ascend in tune tonight
coughing and laughing, squeaking and scuffing
round around stairwells, always rising

to congregate and murmur high aloft,
stubbly silhouettes on rooftops
that await the spectacle of fires’ start.

Nine o’clock. Night has dragged out her notions
pinned up her stars, embroidered the city’s outline,
smoothed out the ebon set of her threads.

And beneath her slip, two thighs of water
the thickset Hudson, the pale East river
on them, the scows that suspend her garters.

II. The Exaltations of Fire

We hear a tssss—initial hiss and crack:
watch flickering flare, white which breaks
in inverse of normal light and thunder.

Nor cower, but climb to vigor and fury:
blue and gold showers, scarlet flurry
silver spatter, oohs and ahhs accompany

apprehending each species of sizzle and spark
flames within flames, the patterning stark
till retina prickles with punctuation marks.

Burn, out of blackness, is becoming:
is feeling, is making, alike by such blazing-
the raking of substance from nowhere.

And our powers are more than mere delight
imagining themselves so radiant
that by such imaginings, they’re able to create.

III. The Tribune of Works

On and on their sudden, dashing ambient:
through freewheeling and fervid tumult
to forms that in time begin to repeat

Each of them fades, as if sunk in a well,
having lived to the last, consuming themselves
made to witness their own going still.

Now the littered light of latecoming squadrons
illumes a spreading roil of smoke and plume
obscuring the crests of Manhattan.

Works too much themselves to be charged as metaphors,
shimmers shorn of death and nightmare:
it is enough that they lived and once were

nor terror, nor the ignorant repetition
nor the vitiated innocence, again and again
only this—truncated, cut short of their vision

till it whelms old scars of sad’s propinquity
and overlays the tall, trumpeting finale
like a briar crown: crimson and bloody.

2009-09-16T22:01:00.000-07:00

Gemkitty's Facebook fan page is up and the number of fans is growing like kudzu--w00t! Let the semiprecious revolution begin!

Carnival of Moods as Miniature Animals (Video)

2009-09-16T21:54:00.000-07:00

Carnival in the usual video (really audio with still) format. Another of my brother's series of Polaroid paintings; unlike the last I posted, this one is not anachronistic. He just really had a thing for "crazy" animals. This one is a crazy dog.

Gemkitty is on Twitter

2009-09-13T21:20:00.000-07:00

Gemkitty is live on twitter!

Carnival of Moods as Miniature Animals

2009-09-13T21:14:00.000-07:00

Courage
I should lionize
breath that flees the lung’s device
no routine roaring, but proof of life.

Melancholy
The birds mass
flight for
autumn’s
through the leaves.
I am torn
by the dying that
never
made some soar.

Delight
So many leaping beauties!
My heart gazelles over strands
of old gloom.

Bewilderment
This ape beneath the skin
beating on pots and pans
sounds a better rhythm
than the man.

Remorse
Lickingly content, the bear of hindsight
lumbers from his wintry hibernation:
bent and bloody in his brute bite
the should-have of past miscalculation.

Despair
It’s something to encounter all your hurt,
immaculate and snowy as an owl
gazing upon you from beneath its cowl
unblinking eyes as golden as they are inert.

Roman : Romaine :: Human : (Video)

2009-09-09T19:12:00.001-07:00

Video (really audio) of Roman : Romaine :: Human :. The accompanying image is from a series painted by my brother of "anachronistic Polaroids". I always took this one to be Antony; he always informed me it wasn't. But so it goes.

Etsy shop is up

2009-08-30T22:08:00.000-07:00

My assemblage art is up on Etsy. I'll be adding more over the next few days, but I'm pretty happy with how they turned out.

Roman: Romaine :: Human:

2009-08-27T19:19:00.000-07:00

Antony orates for ravenous Rome
aware that even rare meat of Caesar
never preserves a dear taste from the tomb.
His leafy words strike a salad pleaser.
Speech disintegrates—livers swell their fill
my sorrow pounding beneath a dunghill
refusing parsley’s thyme, sage’s rosemary
I ate deli tongue of Mark Antony.

And udders declare for the best afield
hoping nipple will wean away grim world.
But no, grass proclaims for both Atlantics
and I, pat as biological beef,
take Antony’s lips for their sorest truths:
two liars lost in the green of their grief.

Unread (Video)

2009-08-25T21:34:00.000-07:00

Here's Unread, in video (really audio) format. The accompanying image is my brother's, a longstanding favorite.

Unread

2009-08-22T15:04:00.000-07:00

Compelled by visions of faith,
they lived on ink and sweat.

They died—
their blood spilled ebon and fleet:
tumbling from bridges
burning in Italy
wasting through Africa
guttered by America.

What rough magnificence
fled from their skins
to angels underneath?

What smooth eloquence
flowed from their pages
as martyrs’ defense?