Tag Archives: poetry

Apr 03 2024
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Art, Entertainment, Fiction, Film, Kangalee Arts Ensemble, NYC, Outsider Artists, Protest, Theater & Performance, War

THE LIFE & DEATH OF ART PREMIERES IN NYC!

THE KANGALEE ARTS ENSEMBLE RETURNS TO THE STAGE! TICKETS ON SALE NOW!

A Brechtian excursion into the brutality and angst of our times, this is a confrontational plays that expresses the darker corners of the class war, and the casualties of broken alliances under capitalism. Superb actors, a ferocious script…it shall prove to be a powerful, provocative and poetic experience at the theater. Both a play and a protest, it is the first American drama to engage with what is happening in both Gaza…and the art world itself.   Click here for more details. 

TICKETS NOW ON SALE–THROUGH EVENTBRITE. Premieres and runs April 25th – April 28th, 2024 at JACK Theater in Brooklyn, NY.

Original artwork by Brian Alessandro; 2024 depicting (L-R) Ward Nixon, Dennis Leroy Kangalee, and Tessa Martin as the fractious trio in The Life & Death of Art.

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Jul 14 2022
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Books, Entertainment, Essay, Journalism & Documentary, literature

William S. Burroughs, Words, Viruses & Books…

I am thrilled that Rebel Satori Press’ new book FEVER SPORES: THE QUEER RECLAMATION OF WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS edited by Brian Alessandro and Tom Cardamone has become a best-seller and includes my own essay on Burroughs and reflections on his impact on me as an artist, a writer, Black cis-straight man – who, as an outsider myself, identifies with the radicalism of Queer outlaws like him.

Rebel Satori Press’ new book, FEVER SPORES, features essays & conversations on William S. Burroughs by luminaries and independent authors alike

Ever controversial, the book seeks to re-contextualize the man, his guns, his history, his homosexuality, his relationship to women, transgressive ideas and writings – within the 21st century mainstream LBGTQ community and their new Queer outliers. Featuring interviews with luminaries such as David Cronenberg to Blondie to Samuel Delaney and urgent essays from writers such as Laura Schleifer, Jason Napoli Brooks, Michael Carrol, and Charlie Vazquez, FEVER SPORES will not disappoint and it opens new doors into new perceptions on Burroughs’ legacy and profound influence.

My essay on Burroughs explores the notion of words, oppression, the terror of language, addiction and the nature of art itself

You can go to REBEL SATORI PRESS’ website, Amazon, or order through your own local independent bookstore.

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Oct 30 2020
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Non-Fiction, Outsider Artists, Philosophy, Poetry

A New Way

In our new way

We saw the electricity finally that had been there all this time. As if a current had exploded right in front of us demanding to be seen and not necessarily heard…but acknowledged. Its joy had returned. As if the television went from Black and white into technicolor. And all that time we held our breathes foolishly, as if we were not going to make it. And we realized we were 44 not 14 and that was a beautiful thing… because although we’d seen the lower depths we could at least now imagine the greatest heights. And that was good enough. And if colors can remind you of that- or even your own reflection in the mirror (finally) well damn it you’ve kicked the insides of the snipers who await silently with the cops in your head ready to arrest your bliss at any moment. You won. And you can’t believe it. Cause you could never simply admit that you were worth more than the world you entered wanted you to believe.

 

A New Way: Portrait by Joshua Kibuka (2020)

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Jun 09 2020
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Activism, Art, literature, Outsider Artists, Philosophy, Poetry, Protest, War

“The Cops Will Kill Me: Vagabond’s Declaration…”

Filmmaker & Poet Vagabond Beaumont Alexander’s latest heartbreaking missive:

“God gave Noah the rainbow sign
No more water, the fire next time.”
– James Baldwin

 

mug-shot-1

mug shot by (c) Vagabond, 2020

This is a confession but not an apology… i’m afraid my death will come at the hands of the police… It’s a fear i live with… Every time i see the cops i think – ‘this could be it, this could be the end’. And i don’t mean every time i get pulled over or stopped or questioned, i mean every time i see the cops… Pulling up behind me, sitting on the side of the road, passing me by while i’m driving, in a store, at the movies, on a corner, i see my life flash before my eyes…

Every fucken time i see a cop the first thought that comes to my head is that i can be killed for no reason. The thought that immediately follows that is that my family and friends will be dragged through some bullshit investigation only to find that the cop(s) who killed me was/were justified and my murderer(s) will go unpunished… i think that outside of my untimely tragic death that this will be the hardest thing for family and friends to have to deal with, to have to endure…

If i’m killed by the police then i want this piece to be read like a last will and testament… This is what i want done after i’m killed… i don’t want a non-violent protest or rally or march or a candlelight vigil… i want a rebellion in the streets… i want the looting of police stations, courthouses and shitty halls… Take those candles for the vigil and use them to light up holding cells and jailhouses so they can be burnt down to embers… i don’t want peace… i want my death to mean something that my life couldn’t ever achieve… i want to strike fear into a shitstem that struck fear into me my whole adult life…. i don’t want mourning or sadness… i want rage to give birth to justice… And not the kind of justice in law books but real justice that comes from revolution…

Read the entire piece here:

https://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2020/06/09/when-the-cops-kill-me/#like-5535

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May 04 2020
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Activism, Art, Excerpt, Fiction, Human Rights, Outsider Artists, Poetry, Protest, spoken word, Story, Theater & Performance

Angela Davis & Jean Genet

The Protest Artist is like the ice upon a body of water; it’s the frozen lake – enabling the Activists (realizers of the vision) to carry themselves OVER the water to the other side, 

the artist is the bridge

the crossing is the activist, the arrival is the fight (revolution).  You can’t have one without the other.
The artist receives the prophecy, the activist must decide what to do with the prophecy.
The artist is the seer
the activist is the doer
(Somewhere in between…is the Actor)
—-preface to the poem “Coda for My Shadow”
image1
Angela Davis and Jean Genet in conversation, New York City 1969 at a​n Arts Festival. ​(Photo by Robert Cohen, circa 1969​ – ​ from page 69 of Art of Protest by TV Reed)
​The spring of 1969: as the Paris rebellions failed, a​ conference about the Black Panthers Theater took place in Oakland​,​ which ended in an argument about the direction the theater should take – ​ which by this point was in demise due to FBI infiltration.​..Angela Davis and Jean Genet confer before embarking on two separate routes to the same ultimate destination.
*

ANGELA DAVIS: If only I could only revolt as well as you create plays

JEAN GENET: No, if only I could write as elegantly as you revolt…if my words were as dangerous as your eyes I would not have the urge any longer to dream of a future. Instead I’d be living it.
AD: Yes but I was endgaming to the end of our imagination; I picked up a gun while you could still pick up a pen.
JG: The pen is not mightier than the sword.   It’s just more scary.
AD: If our words and actions were one we wouldn’t have to have this discussion. We could overturn society’s injustice with the swivel of a gun and the precision of a play and so…the world would not be a stage it would be our sun. And the sun is merely a star.
JG: But unfortunately for a star to exist one must be surrounded by darkness.
AD: “Let’s make new light out of love and erase all the darkness that comes with it.”  (I read that somewhere last year.  I think it was Bullins or Jackmon who wrote it; Huey had it painted on the back wall of one of Fred’s theater spaces in Chicago.)
JG: Is that act one or two?
AD: It’s the whole play
Or when the play –
JG: ceases to to be a play.

— Teeming Towards Triple Threats: Revolution in Radio Drama for a Podcast Age Vol. I 

Stay tuned for further information regarding transmission and production of the recorded podcast series: “Rebel Radio: Audio Works for a New Age” – coming this fall in conjugal with Speller Street Films LLC.  



 
















 









		

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Aug 03 2019

						
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						Art, Fiction, Film, Outsider Artists, Poetry, Protest, Theater & Performance
							

	

						

					When all is said and done
				

		
		

						
when the last betrayal has taken flight —unnamed you stand alone with a catalog of memories and actions. And like the Actor, it is our actions ultimately that define who we are, how we choose to fight or retreat. We all feel like the Nowhere Man sometimes…but maybe it is not failure or malaise that consumes, but risks that genuinely tried. Not “nowhere plans” but actual attempts – stabs at the wall, great failures perhaps – but proof one has lived and had thoughts and some passion for SOMETHING. And, if anything, at least my words can do what I can’t: resist trembling in the face of Capitalism and the force of obedience.  The “bastard literature” which may have given birth to my own madness is one that I claim with glee.  Radical art, protest art, works and ideas that rejuvenates every sense of urgency from the eyebrow to the bowels.  There is no more time for games. This ends it all.  Walk into the valley, the great wash of the sun. turn your back on mediocrity. make art that can’t – but tries – to alter the world.  And when they say you’re hateful, you’re diseased, you’re un-romantic – just let your sigh do the talking.  


The film “As an Act of Protest” returns to NYC on August 9th, 7PM, at the People’s Forum. A special free screening, open to all: https://peoplesforum.org/event/as-an-act-of-protest/

		

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Aug 03 2019

						
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						Activism, Art, Essay, literature, Poetry, Protest
							

	

						

					Coda for My Shadow
				

		
		

						
The world is becoming more acquainted with the names of dead Black Men as opposed to living ones


We’ve been tamed and perverted


into caring


when a Black Person gets murdered


uttering liberal platitudes and marching


instead of fighting for them – when they are alive. We’re all in collusion. Black men, in particular, like Christ or the Artist, are preferred dead. They’re easier to love and remember then. We prefer to mourn the dead rather than praise the living. While it is true most people on the planet — living or dead — don’t deserve an after-thought in the cosmos, there are still uniquely luminous individuals among us,


quite often they are loners or at the end of the line


or perhaps they startle when entering the café


or mesmerize when crossing the street,


sometimes it’s their words or voice we remember


or the scent of their clothes.


But it is safe to say that these people are never in positions of power. When they are — their murders sting, but they don’t surprise. Instead, we pretend we’re shocked when a harmless child or a struggling beaten down member of the Proletariat get killed. But all along we were just riding beside that Police Car, dispatching ourselves to the Fascists and believing in the sacrifice of our own


rather than the annihilation of a system


that seeks to destroy the Colored Man


with text, on screen, over radio, and in flesh.


Imagine a world where there will be no more funerals because there will be no more soil left to cover the bodies of the exterminated.


 


[The splendid painting “The Proud Father” above is by the South African painter, Gerard Sekoto, 1947. ]

		

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Aug 26 2016

						
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						Art, Excerpt, literature, Outsider Artists, Philosophy, Poetry
						Quote
					

	

				
		

						
 


Weir%20Building%201[1].jpg
Nina Fleck’s Weir Building 1 (as published in The New Engagement)
 


All responsibilities are thwarted when we concentrate on the tiny loans taken out on our life and the energy spent trying to be free


Like a cricket dancing beneath the glass —


Not realizing that every single shout and thrust of his body contributes to the demise of his legs which tremble not because he’s imprisoned


But because he can see through his walls.


It’s what we are missing and can’t attain that forever haunt us under Capitalism.


And art – a justifiable peaceful protest – is just a benign scream that tries to express the confusion of it all.


    

  • from “Kangalee: Monocords & Blitzes,” a featured excerpt of new poems in the recently published site & arts journal, The New Engagement. 
    • 



 


 


The Abandoned & The Broken…

		

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Jul 01 2016

						
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						Art, Essay, Journalism & Documentary, Music, Non-Fiction, Outsider Artists, Poetry
							

	

						

					Love N Roll
				

		
		

						
Remembering Sibyll Kalf, artist-musician-mensch-dreamer-gypsy-extraordinaire.


 


1967-2016






The quirky perennial outsider Sibyll Kalff
The quirky perennial outsider Sibyll Kalff






The death of a friend made me realize not how fleeting life is or how precious moments are, but how little time we actually shared enjoying ourselves.






She was aloof, eccentric, and at times utterly mysterious.  A fellow outsider artist, we’d hear from her, correspond intensely over several weeks…and then not again until years later.  Always in waves.






Through her I was introduced to the work of poet Robert Mitchell (rest in peace) and Lynda Crawford, who was one of the first (if not the first) American editor to publish my poetry in North America (Manhattan Linear poetry magazine/site).  Nina and I met Sibyll online in 2005 while living in Berlin, slowly emerging from our own hell and getting involved in a whole new phase of living, feeling, and being. She read some of my poetry, admired Nina’s photography and began to send us recordings of her music and sound poetry – many of the songs, in fact, with texts by Robert Mitchell.  We fell in love with Sibyll’s spirit.  She, in her own idiosyncratic way (she would always share our art work with whomever she’d come in contact with in Cologne and in return we’d do the same) represented the Last of the Romantics. She was peripatetic as we were and always seeking, searching for the next landing on that great mountain we all climbed – or tried to: Transcendence.  Her death sent chills up my spine because the last art-work she sent to us recently was a hand-made notebook she wanted me to use for some new poems I was intending to write and send back to her.  I never did.  Another collaboration that will never take place.






Sibyll, you were relentless in your optimism — or rather in your insistence on being hopeful in the face of all that life’s ugliness and daily unnecessary cruelty flings at us…But that’s also how we as artists burn out.  The desperation for something better, for a life in flow, for some harmony in and out of all that we do…Sometimes it never comes.  When good spirits fall to their knees – it is not they who lose out. It is the rest of the people in the universe who never got a chance to experience just a glimmer of what you share with some of those lucky enough to have been in your orbit – however briefly.






Thinking about the child-like rawness and the lovely crudity of your art-work, of course my mind goes back to the heart and soul of rock and roll which you loved so much…and in particular the punk of NYC’s old hey-day.






Sibyll, I know you yearned to return to the Big Apple. But trust me, NYC did not deserve your death. While a person’s death doesn’t matter as much as their living — there are constellations of energy in thie life that simply do not warrant our impassioned pleas or cries of resistance. New York has not been the city you first visited in the 1990’s in nearly 20 years and maybe it was good in a way that you never returned to see the mess and disappointment it became.  It, and the world, has changed so much, too quickly — that the promissory notes you clutched tightly became worthless.  And maybe you sensed that something around you too was just simply not worth it.  And I don’t blame you. Your courage is inspiring.  I hope your exit was joyful, wherever you bowed out…and I hope you keep them honest in the artistic pursuits beyond the stars or the molten lava.  Wherever delicate and beautiful souls like you go.






This song is for you, darling.




The Jim Carroll Band: “People Who Died”











		

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Nov 20 2015

						
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						Activism, Horror, Journalism & Documentary, Poetry, War
							

	

						

					October 18, 2015 (for Mulu)
				

		
		

						
And you will die with the Star of David


Twisting before your eyes


Blood on a stretcher


In the middle of Beersheba’s


Final countdown


Of a night it not only owned,


But created in the 67th year


Of the century before


A century when all things came to a head


Like teeth


 


The fatal blow was not the sound


Of lost little shoes doing a jagged tap-dance


Along the gravel at Dachau


But hearing the words of its Nazi guard


Echo in the mouth of a Jewish spinster


Who achieved a crooked morning glory


By sending the final death blow


Into the body of a Brown Man


With a boot heel that had


More certainty than Meursault


An Arab, an African –


All the same


Israel’s arid assurance


As crooked and brisk


As von Verschuer’s scalpel


Rattling on the limbs


Of the bloody mantra


“You will die with the star of David


Burning in your eyes”


Mulu Habtom Zerhoma, a wounded Eritrean, is evacuated from the scene of an attack in Beersheba, Israel, on Oct. 18, 2015. [AP Photo/Dudu Grunshpan]
Mulu Habtom Zerhoma, a wounded Eritrean, is evacuated from the scene of an attack in Beersheba, Israel, on Oct. 18, 2015. [AP Photo/Dudu Grunshpan]
*


So this is how we live.  This is what goes on.  Everywhere, somewhere.  Israeli security officials said a 21-year-old Arab citizen of Israel, opened fire in a southern Israeli bus station, killing an Israeli soldier and wounding 10 people. Zerhoma died of his wounds after an Israeli security guard fired at him, apparently thinking he was the shooter!  CCTV revealed an Israeli security guard shooting this African man as he crawled on the ground and outraged Israeli news sites said the man was kicked by bystanders as he lay in a pool of blood. ‘We have sewed the seeds of Kitty Genovese’

		

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