When you are doing time, you have the time to realize how doing art can keep you free." -Welmon Sharlborne, who served 22 years in Angola Prison.
Today I got a little freaked out because I am in a risk group and thus feel I can't go outside, which is pretty vital. I sort of wish I was in a cabin in the Maine woods. But that's our culture, always wanting to be somewhere else. I think a lot could come out of this time of being left to our own devices. A lot of great art comes from constraint.
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Our father owned a star, and by its light we lived in father’s house and slept at night. The tragedy of life, like death and war, were faces looking in at our front door. But finally all came in, from near and far: you can’t believe in locks and own a star. I wrote this some years ago but in many ways my life is even better now. Here it is, plus a few pics...one thing that has happened in the past few years is taking and enjoying more photos. I took a cell phone photography course through an outdoor group I belong to and learned a lot. Cell phone photography is apparently a Thing. Pic's: Scarborough Beach, Point Judith, RI (boy do I miss that!) A revitalized mill canal in Nashua, NH Wishing tree in Frick Park Things to be happy about That we are alive on this earth at this particular time That far above us is the cosmos. No—we are part of the cosmos—above below within it That it is possible to separate yourself from the toxicity of the culture. That each of us walks around with stories, and memory within the stories. That I could stand by the grave of my friend the other day and look out at the muddy raw field and say, well, ya sure picked the right spot and imagine him laughing Orchids at the garden center and hints from an old lady That it’s not hard to clean really you just keep going That even though controlling people give me a headache I eventually get over it That when xenophobic Northeasterners get weird about things like Mississippi, I know they are morons due to my trip with Kelly around that state (also ironic because in my city of Gardiner, there was an old farmhouse which was at one time the local Klan headquarters. They marched against immigrants/Catholics, especially French_Canadians, in Maine's big cities. The house was on the main drag and burned down not too long after I moved there). |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
May 2024
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