big four

by bofa xesjum

'

message in a bottle 2009

i was reminded of this by a comment in an e-mail from a friend. i wrote it about 10 years ago but never posted it because i did not think i was getting my point across very clearly. i offer it here as a period piece and example of failed prophecy.

once... my life was a glorious feast where all hearts opened and all wines flowed. - rimbaud , "a season in hell" "you are saved,... saved! what has cast such a shadow upon you?" - melville, "benito cereno" ---------- three or four years ago there seemed to be dramatic changes in the way books were presented and distributed, and the demise of the "book" itself seemed possible. for now, the changes do not seem to be nearly as great as expected. the e-book has established itself, but an e-book is still a book - you can obtain e-books of the novels of george eliot. i tried to think of the most unlikely book i could to be available on kindle and came up with macaulay's "history of england". it is available, apparently complete, in more than one edition. how about grote's history of greece? it is available too, but in what seems an abridged edition. anyway, you get the idea - "everything" is on kindle. and people still write, read, and buy books, e or paper. maybe more than ever. and still want to write and "publish" books. why? why not just put things online, on blogs and websites? obvious answer - so they can get paid for them. but i would think some people would be willing to give up on or forego payment - especially if they are producing things with little or no "commercial potential" anyway. and there are great positive advantages to putting works directly online - the complete freedom to do anything you want, bypassing all canons of taste, tradition or the marketplace, and being free from the judgments and whims of editors. and from the costs of reproduction. well, you say, you could always do that if you wanted - you could be like henry darger in his little room, writing and cutting and pasting* his books and piling them up in his closet. but with the web you have the illusion (at least) that somebody somewhere will stumble across what you have done and take a look at it. also what you make is not nearly as easily destroyed as if someone finds it in a closet or desk drawer and just tosses it out. i know there are writers who have put books online and later had them published, or who have developed followings on line and gone on to publish. and i know there are millions of online works of fan fiction and genre and romance novels. i am thinking of something a little different - of not only not trying to publish but of taking advantage of the possibilities of not having to go through editors or publishers. i would have thought that by now somebody or something would have made a mark by producing works online - works that could not be produced otherwise, or only otherwise at great expense. surely somebody must be out there trying - maybe a lot of people. maybe i am just not hip enough (oh no!) or not looking in the right places. but i don't think anybody doing it has become "famous" - not even for the proverbial fifteen minutes. none of this is intended as an argument or manifesto. any comments or feedback are welcome. * obviously it is a lot easier and faster now to "cut and paste" than to do it literally with scissors and glue. not to mention having billions of images and words at hand instead of having to go out into the "real world" and scrounge them up.

bigfoot's summer vacation

the butler

we have walked this way before said the butler to the geek i bought that tennis ball for madam only last week and he pointed to the window containing toys and games and the store began to tremble and burst into orange flames the firemen came running with their ladders and their hoses and the toys flew up to heaven and fell down again as roses you are quite the droll magician the geek noted with a smile your effects are not unlucky but are somewhat wanting style the butler only nodded at this compromising praise but his soul was filled with thunder and exploding gamma rays how dare this little upstart from a country who knew where presume to judge his genius they passed a fish and chip shop at the corner of the square the butler bid his guest adieu with a smile most debonair oh by the way he asked the geek with a curling of the lip i forgot to ask if you prefer to be a fish or be a chip the choice is up to you my friend the geek replied unfazed and the two magicians dueled as the stars looked down amazed the butler turned into a chip and fell into the gutter but then assumed a red moth's form and rose up with a flutter the geek was soon downgraded to the state of half a prawn but retained a cool composure and the battle lines were drawn dawn found the two combatants with all their powers spent the butler dusted off his hat and took the train to kent the geek looked up into the sky as if some sound he'd heard he consulted his timetable and left without a word the banker on his way to work the constable on his beat had no notion of the conflict for they had been discreet

2 imitations

by chuck leary

arctic light blues paul bunyan would have loved this silver eternity … the rubbing of the wings of bodhisattva flies ( flies are the supreme bodhisattvas) in the purple twilight of pocahontas and cabeza de vaca thumbing rides on brooklyn bridges of li po enlightenment over rainbows of rheingold beer bottles as the spiders of nothingness crawl through the beard of john greenleaf whittier passed out on the sidewalk of heaven and the bing bong bix beiderbecke ping pong canaries of gertrude stein answer the burger king prayers of tao ch’ien in the thirteenth enlightenment or maybe the 14th arrondissement where edith piaf devours a smiling croissant under the disapproving gaze of madame butterfly who missed the last train to istanbul or heaven (call back later)

a real poem the insolent embolisms of the baroque are patiently encapsulated in the querulous cornices of a watercolored zeitgeist and the abandoned ashes of a forgotten auto-da-fe... boo! boo ! fuck that weak shit! let's have some real poetry! attenuated bilaterally in the dolorous fortuitousness of the moment... dolorous is right, asshole! get him out of there! boo! booooooo!! all right, how about this it's three in the morning and i've finished my pint of wine and i'm taking a shit behind safeway and it's hard, it's hard but i'm almost there and suddenly a car drives down the street in front of the parking lot and stops a cop car a cop gets out i shuffle back into the shadows with a stab in my guts ohhhhhhh! it moved back in a little and the cop strides across the parking lot it's a lady cop with something in her hand and i try to move sidewise like a crab with my pants around my ankles and the hard turd stuck halfway out my ass and she hits me full in the face with her flashlight and she says "this is it, big boy - the end of the line"