New end of old times.

I haven't written very much in the past few months or so, I'll admit, nothing worth posting at least. I used to believe if I penned something every day I'd come away with a handful of end-products...fat lot that did, but what I learned was to adjust my own expectations. Not necessarily attaching less to myself, but redefining them as goals and turning my focus more on the free-write rather than "omg what have I produced lately". I suspect I'll be happier this year--with my own work if not what I do with it--more open, more exploratory, and (hopefully) far more consistent.

So I guess I'm not done yet...go.

when you go through 103 pages and end up satisfied with one paragraph.

Her name is not Julie.

Which in most cases is no great crime; names like Elizabeth, Raelynne, or Marlene are just as acceptable and effeminate without being Julie and no one bats an eye about it. Still, there’s a mesmeric quality about Julie, light and sing-songing, pretty…and the polar opposite to something like Corynne, especially when spelled incorrectly. The latter is earthy, muddy even, and well-rooted—or seemed so—does not readily draw attention but thrives when—most often by accident—it is bestowed. Medium in both hue and height, and well-shaped despite being unwilling to recognize those more aesthetically pleasing features that others like to point out, Corynne does not think of itself as belonging to a black woman, and this is a shared mindset between the two of them.

potluck can-can

Land of the—free at last

Lost home of the braves

                Roam no buffalo over shallow plains graves

I too?

More buzz than song—hum wild

And fresh off banana boat styles

Mangled star bannered on raised fist

Blazed on the back of afro picks

Manmade enclave for the guinea-mick

Oh beautiful.

And skies spacious overcast

Bootstrap foundation, built to last

Who says past?

Share croppers

Fence hoppers

Choo-choo chinaman

And the rainbow parade, down

                —Pride

(Or prejudice) A violet hour

Words like:

We

Are

Social

Power

mother

You are bombed brick immoveable

Full of whetstone promise

Having none of it

Strong, sturdy, stable

Pillar called truth, true enabler

Poised out of habit.

Mud hut cubed, packed pound

For pound against high water, hurricane,

(And the occasional hyena)

Knows no—all—strain, but three sisters

                And a glass ceiling,

How you stood between the world and I.

Born for bearing and daughter follows, but

You are bombed brick immoveable

                —Etched  wall standing

And I am only sand.

choke

Anxiety is—Tequila in the hall

Unsharpened axe grinding

                (teeth too)

Just after three am in the middle

Of Cleveland, Detroit if you’re lucky.

A present from the throat,

Stick-shift down to the stomach

—Crowbar in hand where

Green is the event horizon.

mistake on the lake

You’re a tower of indifference.

Muck foundation, made to stand on

 blue-collar hymns

Steel in the eye, voice, and toe.

We’re in the Land; Indian country,

No-man’s dog pound and long-cooled seats.

Collinwood mafia, Glenville beats.

Where you from?

O-H

Eastside suburbs, Erie coast,

The “Comeback City” (metro misfire)

Rust Belt baby,

 Cuyahoga pyre.

You’re one blue drop in a swing sea of red,

Two-one-six town, two-step after Broadway

                And fine of heart for patronage.

Poised on urban Renaissance.

Where you from?

                I-O

Rock on rock city, rock on.

tableau

Mix and match mud woman

                God-given brow

Hill high cheekbones

And mild-mountain nose

 Sloped bird-wide

(African pride)

Over sucker-fish lips

Fine land lineless face

Brown eyes looked black

Swoop almond, cornered up

They called them chink-chak

Topped off under matching naps

sXmmetrX

I have no bosom, only breasts.

A matched pair of fraternal twins taking

residence above my ribcage sans remedy

for improper proportion. Fighting fire with

readjusted bra straps I am firmly against

inserted padding;

firmly against added extra or redistribution, the

alternative scalpel. These, my mild landmarks,

pair themselves like two left feet. Least loved

heirlooms should all other pearls fail.

android

4:56 traffic breathes no unconditional

retrospect. Like ant hills of stigmatic prose.

The anti-poetic defined and derailed—tragic

or trite; consequences of breakneck speeding

to a crawl. Gassed march of reason at seventy-

five miles per hour and fine lines of man made

sense to be constructed--atomic paint brush. 

All without a single comma.

the curtain, an elegy

Night is when we find our refuge
Four eyes, two mouths; no more.
I’ll hear later, tongues flapping
against their teeth, but I am unwilling
now. So porous is my place beside you.


No peaceful passing of well wishes,
this parting, a waiting for some
revelation, or realization that I’m
whole. We are four minutes after
snooze, a last thought before sleep.

And, then you said I love you.
And then? You said, I love you.

each like a phoenix, the page
too smooth for your own good and a
backtrack  to long-buried butterflies
--in my belly
left-handed shoulder angel or
misguided oubliet
--poorly placed, but
as always your timing is perfect
for the worst.

and still
i still

The Use of Aesthetics in Prosaic Composition or "How to Trick Your Audience"

When concocting a narrative it is imperative to consider not only subject matter but the manner in which the piece is delivered. That is, structure and appearance. We are given examples of such consideration In The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy , from the infamous “black page” to the odd placement of the prologue and the many tangential paths taken by the author all throughout the work; or in more contemporary examples from authors such as Chuck Palahniuk who often flows from one narrative  to the next in a seamless sort of staccato. These are perhaps elements which we as essayists may also take into account when developing a writing strategy. Such pieces are, after all, written with the understanding that someone will be reading them, therefore it is not only for the writer’s vanity or aesthetic preference that certain choices are made, but also with the perception of the audience in mind. Still, one would be hard-pressed to call every adjustment that is made absolutely necessarily—even if they do contribute in the long run—without examining them.

Without doubt the subject is the most important cog in any bit of writing; what’s the point in reading something with, well, no point? Arriving at a suitable topic, however, is the easy part, because soon after a writer will realize that substance is required—particularly if an expected length is assigned—and the organization of this substance is where many of us tend to drop off. We are told from grade school that every worthwhile composition, be it narrative or informative, must have a beginning, middle, and end—whether or not we are equipped to fill these sections with interesting a relevant prose is another matter. How then is one to grip the reader if, even with sufficient material, the composition fails to separate itself from any other of its sort. The answer is simple, though likely underhanded: fool the eye. Even so, a smart author will recognize this technique as an opportunity to combine substance with aesthetic, thus ensuring that indeed someone will read what he has produced.

There’s something about the way a piece of writing looks that seems to have a draw all on its own, or a way of contributing some defining aspect to the work. This can be a matter of spacing between sentences—the typical double-spaced format used in academic papers for example— between paragraphs, or even between the letters themselves. Anyone utilizing today’s word processing programs may have noticed the myriad of options available in that regard. Page layout and orientation, separation by columns, spacing prior to a block of text or after it. All of which contribute to not only the aesthetic but the assumptions. Alignment, for example, comes in four option: left, right, center, and justified.

If you are reading an essay, right alignment is expected—justified if you’re looking for a particular sense of neatness—

left alignment for headers,

and center for “quotations”, Titles, or perhaps poetry—

though the last seems to have gone out of fashion.

Then of course one may consider margins, how best to format them and whether or not the default is sufficient for what you are attempting to accomplish. Many times the student pressed for time and out of ideas will make adjustments to the margins in order to create the

 appearance of a longer document—note that educators are rarely fooled by this

technique. Elsewise margin modification may be used to place emphasis on a

single block of text or to stylize. Again, this is both determined by

preference and necessity.

Although typically we find margin to be one of the least styled elements of any given piece, it is not to be neglected. Separation from the norm, if you will—which, incidentally, is sure to get you noticed whether you want to be or not. Remember that although your average margin is somewhere between 1” to 1.25”, 1.5” or -.25” are perfectly fine if you can get away with it.

Alongside the discussion or margin, paragraph indentation should also be mentioned, because unlike popular belief you will not find it everywhere. A blog, for example, is very well likely to be lacking—which is often made up for with extra spacing between paragraphs—whereas a semi-formal essay (as evinced here) may contain more indentation than could possibly be needed. Whichever direction you decide to go in regard to special arrangement, be sure to strike a balance between:

far

too

much

and: no one could possibly read this.

                                                The problem with formatting is often that, much like with cooking, it and its associated adjustments are to be treated as a spice—which means adding too much will detract from the overall and may cause whoever’s sampling to gag in horror. Which brings us to the subject of font and type-face. The first given anyone wanting to be taken seriously knows is to promptly avoid color; text should remain in all black with styles such as bold or italicizing used sparingly as well as the underline—save when proper citation or emphasis calls for them—and the strikethrough (which is hardly used at all). Our main concern, however, is with type face—or “font face” as it is known for modern word processing—which tends to be among the top fallbacks for padding an essay. Lettering appearance is important not only for readability but again, as with spacing or paragraph arrangement, the “vibe”, or the creation of initial assumptions about the piece.

Consider your default fonts: Times New Roman, Arial, Vedana, and—recently with the coming of Microsoft Office 2007—Calibri. No matter which you use a certain air of professionalism seems to be assumed, because the letters are proportionate, smooth, and clear. These are what we call “sans-serif” typeface—with the exception of Times New Roman which is “seriffed”—because they lack structural details at the end strokes, which often gives them a more rounded appearance. Times New Roman is included in the group of “preferred” fonts because despite being a serif font it is not difficult to decipher and presents itself as polished or proper. One may notice that some of these faces are naturally larger than others, Verdana as compared to Calibri for example, which adds another consideration when deciding on font. Other font-faces may be used to achieve a certain look. Courier New for something akin to the way a typewriter produced letters, or Lucinda to emulate handwriting; still it is necessary to take into account both the sort of piece you are writing and the target audience before delving too far into elaborate font. Else you may come up with something lovely to look at but impossible to read.

That’s “impossible to read” for anyone not fluent in Wingdings.

Essentially, and if nothing else, what one must remember is the “who”, “what”, and “how”: who is this composition for, what is it you want them to get out of it, and how are you going to keep them from tossing it after the first sentence. Although most of the weight will be shouldered by subject matter and conveyance strategy, aesthetic is nothing to shrug at. After all, no matter how good the book is, the price tag is on the cover.

Oppression is Trendy

One thing that's sure to make me tune out a person in any discussion of race problems in the united states is the "my ancestors" statement. It's treated like it's supposed to be the ghetto pass of race talk, the thing that'll make me say "why yes you can understand all about my plight so your argument that racism doesn't exist must be valid oh color-blind messiah of kum-ba-ya".

I'm sorry, what?

How are "my ancestors" relevant? I'm not disputing the oppression of the Irish or how badly immigrants were treated upon coming here or any other group typically used with "my ancestors", not at all, but would you please explain to me how that effects YOU? Are you likely to run into an issue or be on the receiving end of prejudice, bigotry, and race-stupid today because of it? Probably not.

If I'm talking about the issues that I and other people in my similar "category" are working to dissipate currently, why do you think your argument about how several generations ago people you were related to experienced the same and oh! it's still happening in country X that isn't this one where you live is a needed insertion? Please, please explain how this is relevant and not your (maybe unintentional) attempt to divert by painting yourself as "just like you".

It's like the kid who wishes he had to wear glasses because all his friends have them; but just because you are not experiencing the problem on your head directly doesn't mean you'll be excluded from discussions on how to solve it, so why the attempted race pass? And if you're using it as a reason why you think you aren't part of this magic majority that often comes up, that's just as silly as "I have gay friends" or "black people can't be bigots".

When no one's pointing the finger at you personally and saying "shame on you White Man, shame" but you feel the need to somehow distance yourself from "white man"--that's telling; and when they are pointing the finger "my ancestors" only fans the flame. It doesn't "shut them up quick" like people who use it like to tout, rather it creates more tension and defensive attitudes when bridge-building ought to be the objective.

What happened to those ancestors is certainly to be included in broad discussion of the history of oppressed and/or ill-treated peoples in this country, and even in a global contemporary setting. However, when the topic is what's happens right here, today, charging in with "my ancestors!" when it's not directly relevant to the time-frame or country makes you look ignorant or at least (if well-intentioned) desperate for inclusion.

One: Pre-

Today I bought myself another journal (four dollars on clearance); I am obsessed with the idea of writing—more so, I think, than the doing. Someone said that language is always an approximation, quite so, concocted of imaginative things. Furtive, fictive, and sometimes heavy in a poignant flamboyance. When I tally my most productive periods I discover that it is easiest to write during the downward slide, the point where both ends are at balance and I am thrown into creative frenzy. Conversely, the upswing works in much the same way, inner monologues—either on myself or some other world—that slosh around, over spilling at random and puddling together. Successful writing, however, requires consistency, motivation to continue on someone else’s time frame rather than only when you are struck by need. There is nothing more frustrating than focusing energy on one thing when its real orientation is toward something else, makes me wish for a button. Worse still when words bubble up and fizzle before any chance of expression or reproduction occurs.

I haven’t a coherent end to this note. The symbolism does not escape me.

…oh hello.