John Cage Engaged and Uncaged
[by Jesus Crisis, 10 April 2008 and never and always]
Sunken funkin' telepumpkin
Tell a country bumpkin who I am
And then let him tell you.
Both will tell it true
Though their perspectives seem contradictory
I'm born of hickory and rectory
Blind Bartimaeus and insightful inspectory
True tale and muddled myth
On an identical trajectory.
John Cage or someone like him
(is anyone like anyone
more than anyone is unlike?)
Said disharmony does not exist
And the peaceniks are pissed.
Corn isn't hominy
But hominy is corn
And care isn't clothing
Though care can be worn
And all can be born
And all can be torn
And loved and forlorn
And warned and scorned
And according to some bother or brother or other
Reborn.
Sunken funkin' telepumpkin
Born of a couch potato
And a pureed tomato
An almost dead and buried berater
Blind hate hater
Lover
Elater
Thin ice skater
War abhorrer
Saint and horror
Mental (and governmental)
Master baiter
And sooner or later
Repeat reincarnator.
I am a living death
An awakened dream
Ash unconsumed
And a silent scream
Reconcilable so-called contradiction
And factual fiction
John Cage
Uncaged
Inadequately aged and yet
Timeless
A sublime mess
Subconsciously clothed and consciously undressed
Said worse and better are no less than best
Corn is hominy
And there is no disharmony
Only harmonies to which our ears
(my dears and our fears)
Are unaccustomed.
Sunken funkin' telepumpkin
Tell a country bumpkin who I am
And then let him tell you.
Both will tell it true
Though their perspectives seem contradictory
I'm born of hickory and rectory
Blind Bartimaeus and insightful inspectory
True tale and muddled myth
On an identical trajectory.
John Cage or someone like him
(is anyone like anyone
more than anyone is unlike?)
Said disharmony does not exist
And the peaceniks are pissed.
Corn isn't hominy
But hominy is corn
And care isn't clothing
Though care can be worn
And all can be born
And all can be torn
And loved and forlorn
And warned and scorned
And according to some bother or brother or other
Reborn.
Sunken funkin' telepumpkin
Born of a couch potato
And a pureed tomato
An almost dead and buried berater
Blind hate hater
Lover
Elater
Thin ice skater
War abhorrer
Saint and horror
Mental (and governmental)
Master baiter
And sooner or later
Repeat reincarnator.
I am a living death
An awakened dream
Ash unconsumed
And a silent scream
Reconcilable so-called contradiction
And factual fiction
John Cage
Uncaged
Inadequately aged and yet
Timeless
A sublime mess
Subconsciously clothed and consciously undressed
Said worse and better are no less than best
Corn is hominy
And there is no disharmony
Only harmonies to which our ears
(my dears and our fears)
Are unaccustomed.
perfect.
Reply to this
Reply to this
one for speechless would be good as well.
Reply to this
I feel like I'm at a coffee house, John. Where people are sitting around sharing all their creative endeavors today. How really wonderful... everyone has the creative bug going.
I like this, this is sublimely irreverent. Thanks for sharing this...
Reply to this
chris, this comment makes me want to listen to "the beat goes on"
Reply to this
LOL... how very Sunny and Cher in other word.
Everyone is just so creative today. Jc is just got the vibe go is all...
Reply to this
Thanks, Chris, and thanks, Meribeth! Welcome to the coffee shop. Unfortunately, we are short staffed and operating on a bring your own thermos or travel mug basis. But we have plenty of books, interesting folks and intriguing conversation. I'm drinking thick Colombian black coffee and trying to regain the mental clarity of yesterday evening. One more cup should do it....
Reply to this
is it think enough so a spoon can stand up on its own?
Reply to this
ummm... thick, not think. i think...
Reply to this
Unfortunately, no...
Maybe a fork....
Reply to this
And my mind, thick with morning, read "thick" instead of "think."
Maybe there's a poem in that as well.
Reply to this
isn't there a poem in everything?
Reply to this
Very good!
Indeed there is.
Reply to this
WOW very very good! Kudos haha.
Reply to this
Thank you so much, Shyloh!
Reply to this
Wow. The Minister is awed and humbled by this poem. He feels unworthy to even mouth the words... but was oddly compelled, beyond his ability to resist, to speak the entire poem aloud...twice. It is a most skillful interweaving of rhyme and slant rhyme, of hidden meanings ("master baiter" LOL) and puns and adapted, adopted words... It is... wow. Definitely one of the best poems I've ever read. Ever.
The Minister bows "Namaste" and scatters flower petals at your feet.
Reply to this
WOWZA!!! Great Stuff, JC!!!! ...i am unable to come up with a better assesment than the Minister's. ...you really are VERY talented and i am glad to have your inspiration.
Reply to this
Wow... thank you, Minister - and thank you, barbie.
Such effusive praise makes me blush again... especially considering its source.
Reply to this
All we need now is some beat music in the background. You, me and Kerouac's ghost could have a good time in anyone's attic on a Tuesday night.
Reply to this
I'm there, bro!
Thanks for your comment - and I find it interesting that when I opened it I happened to be listening to King Crinmson's "Neal and Jack and Me."
Reply to this
This would really sound heavenly set to music with a rock beat. So do it and video tape it. lol
Reply to this
The beats are long gone
But the beat goes on
With John
A one man song...
Reply to this
When I opened this comment, the first thing that came to mind was Meat Beat Manifesto.
Perhaps one of these days....
Reply to this
Like the beat beat beat of the raindrops..
The sounds make poetry.
This is one I wrote and is more a picture than word rhymes.
PICTURE PUZZLES
I pick up the pieces of my life
Try to fit them together
Colors are sorted into like hues
The background becomes trees
Skies, flower gardens and pools
One can recognize animals
By their fur, ears and eyes
Never blue or forest green
Some pieces fall on the floor
I have to search for them
When a face appears
Do I recognize it?
Where does it go?
Perhaps next to the house
Or maybe on a path
In the flower garden
In the whole picture of life
Pieces are missing
Faces change
My space is
Fractured
By time
Reply to this
The heart beat beat beats
The art never retreats.
Reply to this
POETRY
TRY TO BE A POET
THE ANAGRAM IN POTENCY
SYMBOLIC
LICK THE SYMBOL
WORDS OF MEANING
CREATE MEAN WORDS
IN CRUCIFORMS
THAT CRUCIFY MEANING
DARING TO JAR
SENSIBILITY
WE COME TO OUR SENSES
WORDLESSLY
HOPING TO IMPRESS
WISDOM
IN THE DOMAIN
OF THE LESSER WISE
Reply to this
Interesting... cool.
My favorite part is this:
"WORDS OF MEANING
CREATE MEAN WORDS
IN CRUCIFORMS
THAT CRUCIFY MEANING"
I think I once wrote a poem about licking "the symbol" or "the cymbal," but I don't remember ever sharing it publicly. If I can find it easily, I will post it for comparison.
Reply to this
Can you hear me snapping my fingers in applause?
Magical, profound, lighthearted, all rolled into one.
Here is one I like:
Drummer, hummer, on the floor,
Dreaming of wild beats, softer still,
Yet free of violent city noise,
Please, sweet morning,
Stay here forever...Bob Kaufman
Reply to this
Very very cool, Susan!
Strange that I didn't see your comment until now - perhaps I'm losing my mind with age... lol.
But I very much appreciate your kind words - and very much dig the BK lines.
Thank you!
Reply to this
This is really good Crisis, felt raw but sad too? very original, different than what I usually see around Myspace, much better.
Hugs,
S.
Reply to this
Thank you, Suzette! I very much appreciate your feedback.
Reply to this
enjoyed the poem. need more of your new stuff.
when we lived on the 40 acre farm on Paradise Prairie, my mom fed me hominy. i told her i couldn't eat it. she forced me. i vomited it all over the dinner table. won my argument.
" is dried maize (corn) kernels which have been treated with an alkali of some kind.
The traditional U.S. version involves soaking dried corn in lye-water (sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide solution), traditionally derived from wood ash, until the hulls are removed. Mexican recipes describe a preparation process consisting primarily of cooking in lime-water (calcium hydroxide). In either case, the process is called nixtamalization, and removes the germ and the hard outer hull from the kernels, making them more palatable, easier to digest, and easier to process.
Commercially available canned hominy may have a slightly stronger scent when compared to the traditional preparation.
The earliest known usage of nixtamalization was in what is present-day Guatemala around 1500–1200 BC. It affords several significant nutritional advantages over untreated maize products. It converts some of the niacin (and possibly other B vitamins) into a form more absorbable by the body, improves the availability of the amino acids, and (at least in the lime-treated variant) supplements the calcium content, balancing maize's comparative excess of phosphorus.
Many Native American cultures made hominy and integrated it into their diet. Cherokees, for example, made hominy grits by soaking corn in lye and beating it with a kanona (corn beater). The grits were used to make a traditional hominy soup (called Gv-No-He-Nv A-Ma-Gi-i), a hominy soup that was allowed to ferment (Gv-Wi Si-Da A-Ma-Gi-i), cornbread, dumplings (Di-Gu-Nv-i) or fried with bacon and green onions.
Some recipes using hominy include menudo (a spicy tripe and hominy soup), pozole (a stew of hominy and pork, chicken, prawns, or other meat), hominy bread, hominy chili, casseroles and fried dishes. Hominy can be ground coarsely to make hominy grits, or into a fine mash (dough) to make masa, the dough used to make tamales.
Rockihominy, a popular trail food in the 19th & early 20th centuries, is dried corn roasted to a golden brown, then ground to a very coarse meal, almost like hominy grits.
Hominy can also be used as animal feed."
Reply to this
Glad you enjoyed it... and interesting how they make hominy... suddenly it's become a bit less appealing to me.
More poetry will be forthcoming. I feel as though I've broken through a wall.
Reply to this
That's good, because personal walls are meant to be broken down... I'm sure it must feel good to have that happen.
Reply to this
Indeed
Reply to this
Why do we launch on a corny discussion of hominy? I have re-read your John Cage poem and find it interestingly enough a sort of stream of consciousness kind of writing. The words come from thoughts not visualization, the rhymes are words that have been in your mind and associated with ideas and concepts that you have been writing about lately.
It is a kind of free association linking to your insight about yourself. These thoughts and words are cleverly opening up something called blockage or as you put it a wall that has been impeding you. I find this extremely interesting writing as it reveals a lot about you.
Reply to this
Thank you, Elena.
Reply to this
Okay now...I really enjoyed reading this! It is one to be read out loud.
Reply to this
Thanks, Joan! I enjoyed yours as well.
Reply to this
So much to enjoy here - and yet I still like to pick one place as a marker for my memory of this and so I pick - "True tale and muddled myth" and every time I think of this I will hear the song of hominy and corn. Fabulous sounding write
Reply to this
Thank you so much, Oma! It's nice to meet you!
Reply to this
After viewing your site, so much of your beliefs and your karma are found in this piece. Excellent write. I enjoyed it immensely.
Reply to this
I'm grateful for your comment, your checking out my site, and (above all) your friendship. Peace....
Reply to this
Message slides down painlessly, even when i disagree-- awesome word play and written intelligently
Reply to this
Thank you very much!!
Reply to this
funky and awesome and my favorite lines are
I am a living death
An awakened dream
Ash unconsumed
And a silent scream
Reconcilable so-called contradiction
And factual fiction
Reply to this
Thanks, Q!
I'm pleased to meet you.
Reply to this
Here are three more comments I received upon posting this on MySpace (thank you so much, everyone!):
How true and well done thank you for sharing
Posted by Sidhabhair on April 24, 2008 - Thursday at 3:27 PM
Damn Transmigratory repository of word horde for my ache'n noggin to spin on and on and on... ON!
Posted by Will Northerner 2 on April 24, 2008 - Thursday at 5:23 PM
trippy yo
Posted by Smoke that KUSH...Ball like Swoosh on April 28, 2008 - Monday at 5:31 AM
Reply to this
Your poems make me Google. As in, "Who the heck is John Cage?" I'm probably your least knowlegeable reader, on many of your favorite subjects at least. But, I'm learning a lot. I read this about John Cage: "Cage is perhaps best known for his 1952 composition 4--33″, the three movements of which are performed without a single note being played. A performance of 4--33″ can be perceived as including the sounds of the environment that the listeners hear while it is performed, rather than merely as four minutes and thirty three seconds of silence" My first thought was, heck, I could do that. My second thought was, but I would never Think to do that. I guess that's what makes him a genius.
Anyway, I love this poem. It's kind of like a very artistic logic puzzle. I love the idea that there is no disharmony. We see disharmony because we don't understand what we are looking at. Often, we don't see the big picture.
Posted by Tara on May 14, 2008 - Wednesday at 9:30 AM
Reply to this
Thanks, Tara!
In prison, I read John Cage's book Silence - a very worthwhile read. I want to try to find it again. My journal from that time is littered with Cage quotations. Musically, however, he's much more difficult to quote.
Reply to this
"Confusion is a word we have invented for an order which is not understood." - Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn.
Posted by Jesus Crisis on May 19, 2008 - Monday at 11:05 AM
Reply to this
Wow, that just flowed..
Awesome piece. And kinda hits home too.
Posted by Inappropriate on May 19, 2008 - Monday at 11:54 PM
Reply to this
Thanks, Mandi! I'm glad you like it.
Reply to this
Me again!
Favorite verse:
"Corn isn't hominy
But hominy is corn
And care isn't clothing
Though care can be worn
And all can be born
And all can be torn
And loved and forlorn
And warned and scorned
And according to some bother or brother or other
Reborn"
Every time I hear mention of hominy in art I always think of Tori Amos--her song "Little Amsterdam" is one of my favorite songs in the world (growing up as a Southern girl as I did).
Again with the play on words--you have such a talent for internal rhyme!
Reply to this
Thank you, Rebekah!
Tori Amos has always been one of my favorite artists.
The first time I read this poem publically, a dude asked me if I was familiar with some "Hominy" poem by an author whose name I could not remember when I returned home. one day, I will find it.
Reply to this