Performance Poetry and Me

I just wrote what, aside from "Anarchy Baby," may be my first poem in the performance poetry tradition, which when all is said and done may be the one form of poetry that I have the most experience with. I got my real interest in poetry from liseaning to Indeefeed: Performance Poetry, which I have linked to my blog. As such, I've been thinking that I may try and become a performance poet. I'm still going to write poetry, but I am also thinking that if I can find any, I might try my hand at the poetry slam. (Is it just me or is my writing starting to have a more distinct flow?)

It may not be that I'll be good at slams, but it may just be that this is where I have learned how poetry works, and the reason I though hey I should get involved in poetry because this is cool. And I am starting to get the style, and it is remaining my own. At least, Nora, who heard the poem, called "LEADS Employment Services," said that she liked it, because she likes my writing, so I figure that it sounds like me. It always makes me feel good to write a poem, because I usually write poetry in one go, but I think it over in my head and decide that this is what the poem is going to be about. Sometimes I go back and edit, but not often, maybe because I don't write much poetry. I think I'll write more later, I even have two ideas I'd like to get started on. Nora suggested a project that we can work on, which could lead to my first publication in an actual book. How great would that be? I'm even thinking of recording some of my poetry and sending it over to Indeefeed: Performance Poetry. I've been toying with that idea for awhile, and with this boost of confidence from Nora, I think I may be able to do it. I'll have to check with a friend who I know has recording equipment. I hope I can get on Indeefeed, because that would be one of the high points of my life so far, and when I'm on my death bed I could probubly consider it one of the top ten points of my life, but since I'm only nineteen I'd have to wait awhile to be sure. It would certainly be up there with my first kiss and the time "Cattle Man's Folly," was first published.

So finally, I'd like to bring up the fact that as soon as I'm done publishing this, I am going to send a link to this to Mongo, the guy who runs Indeefeed, so he can read this. I just checked his website and noticed that he hasn't had any comments on the blog for awhile. I know how it feels when people don't comment on your blog for a long time, and I want him to know that things are alright and that he is doing important things. So Mongo, when your reading this, thank you for all you have done. I hope to be on your podcast someday. Keep up the good work.

My Sentence Is Up!

After five years I have completed my tenure of High School. For the next two months I am in limbo, preparing for University and hopefully getting some money.

The feeling of being cut of from School is kind of strange. There's a great emptiness in my life now that school isn't there. I don't know what it is I'll do with myself while I'm unemployed. I've been talking with my LEADS specialist and she's given me some ideas on next steps I should take. She says I should look through the newspaper and Job Bank of Canada to find work. I think I'll check out Job Bank and see what I can find.

Just found it, the only thing I could find is Taxi Driver. I can't drive and the environment is to faced passed for me. I guess I should check the newspaper next. I'll do that later today.

Since it's Summer, I should develop a summer reading list. At the moment I'm reading Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison and Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut. I figure that to create a summer reading list I'll need to find every book I have on my shelf that I havn't read and read it. Also I'm trading books with my Church pastor. She's going to give me books about Christianity and I'm going to give her books like On the Road, by Jack Kerouac and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, by Tom Robbins.

My mom says she'll take me to the University of Waterloo every week so we can map out routes and acclimatize me to the area. We'll find routes to my Aunt and Uncle's who live in Waterloo, the video store, used bookstores and anywhere else I might need to go.

The following are all the books I feel a pressing need to read.

1. Watership Down, by Richard Adams
2. Farewell, My Lovely, by Raymond Chandler
3. Dhalgren, by Samuel R. Delany
4. Tales of Neveryon, by Samuel R. Delany
5. The Fall of the Towers, by Samuel R. Delany
6. Tapping the Dream Tree, short stories by Charles de Lint
7. A Scanner Darkly, by Philip K. Dick
8. Notes from the Underground, by Fyodor Dostoyevesky
9. The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes, by Arthur Conan Doyle. Short stories and The Hounds of Baskerville
10. The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco
11. Deathbird Stories, short stories by Harlan Ellison
12. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
13. Riders of the Purple Sage, by Zane Grey
14. The Novels of Dashiell Hammett, by Dashiell Hammet. consists of Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass Key and The Thin Man.
15. To Sail Beyond the Sunset, by Robert A. Heinlein
16. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
17. Revolt in 2100, by Robert A. Heinlein
18. The Cat Who Walks Thorugh Walls, by Robert A. Heinlien
19. Time Enough For Love, by Robert A. Heinlien
20. Friday, by Robert A. Heinlien
21. Expanded Universe, by Robert A. Heinlien
22. Variable Star, by Robert A. Heinlien and Spider Robinson
23. Conan the Adventurer, by Robert E. Howard
24. A Thief of Time, by Tony Hillerman
25. Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo
26. A Voyage to Arcturus, by David Linsey
27. Insomnia, by Stephen King
28. The Eyes of the Dragon, by Stephen King
29. The Shining, by Stephen King
30. Hearts in Atlantis, by Stephen King
31. The Phantom of the Opera, by Gaston Leroux
32. The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Tales, short stories by H.P. Lovecraft
34. Remembrence of Things Past, by Marcel Proust, translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff. Volume One, consisting of Swann's Way, Within A Budding Grove and The Guermantes Way.
35. Midnight's Children, by Salman Rushdie
36. The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie

This list is by no means over. I just realized how many books I own that I havn't read yet. I need to really get to work on them. I hope that I can finish most of them by the end of summer.

A post that I think is the first for Feburary 2007 that ends suddenly

I'm writing this at the public library. Why I'm telling you this I have no idea, but I feel you need to now. My usual computer is being naughty and won't let me go on the Internet, and the other one I just down right hate because it's to slow. Oh, Steph, this is for you, I probubly can't get to you anytime soon because of this. I'll be calling relatives in to fix it as soon as possible. So, I came to the library and am now writing it from here. I'm feeling that this is going to be a stream of consciousness post, because I seem to be in that mood.

So, today I met with the Employment Specialist, you know, the one from LEADS, the government organization that helps aspies get jobs. Well, it looks like I'll be getting a job at the local Rogers. The basic idea is for me to stock shelves and help people find movies. Shouldn't be to hard.

So, just after the Employment Specialist left, I joined a conversation with some local kids from my school. They seem like really nice people and I've had minor encounters with them before. The conversation was mainly about artistic stuff, and creating worlds. I didn't bring up Mythania, which I probubly should have. I really liked hanging out with them, if only for the conversation was interesting and I liked the way they dress. Don't really know how to describe it, I think the male one called the style "Fashion Whore," which I think means being a slave to a certain style of fashion. I think I may have that, though I don't seem to go for the style they go for. I really should try and describe it sometime, it would make a good writing practise.
So, I am now in a new semester. Here is what I am taking...

• English, Writer's Craft, A class were I get to write and stuff like that. I havn't written anything of great importance, but I do plan on bringing my novel in sometime to show off. Kind of to say "Look at me, I'm writing a novel."
  
• History Renaissaunce to modern era, Also fun, we're learning about the Renaissaunce. We saw a movie on the Medici family, which basically funded the Renaissaunce. The one guy, Cosimo de Medici glowered at the camera for the entire movie. "I'm Cosimo de Medici. Grr."
  
• Co-op, I get a job without pay, but with experience. It looks like I'll be working at a local museaum, which should be kind of fun. This cource is two periods long.
  

So, that's about it, except for a list I just thought off. It's basically all the traits I would like to have from other writers. There are other aspects of these writers, mostly style, but I'll put other things on the list. These are just the important things.

1. The Wit of Oscar Wilde, Oscar Wilde is really cool, and I'd like to be able to go to parties and just be generally witty. I think I have some degree of wit already, and I'd like to work it into my writing. I'll have to think about it.
2. The Cult Status of Michael Moorcock, I only heard about Michael Moorcock in the past few years. As far as I'm concerned that is part of what make's him so cool, that and his books are some of the best fantasy I have ever read. That and nearly all the books I own from him are out of print things I found in used book stores, and I'd really like to be one of those writers you can only find in used bookstores because that's were all the cool ones are.
3. The Mystical-Spiritual Leanings of William Blake, I'd like to write stuff that is really profound, kind of surreal and dosn't make that much sense. Again, this is a problem because the majority of my work at the moment seems to be leaning towards prose and when your dealing with philosophy in prose you have to be careful not to make it seem to much of a social commentary. I guess I could read some Ayn Rand and see how she worked her philosophy into her novels, and if it gets the effect I want I'll use that style. Mind you, I have a few problems with Ayn Rand and Objectivism which I will not go into at this moment.
4. The female-fan base of Neil Gaiman, Now, this may be all speculation on my part, but I have picked up that there is a strong female fan base for Neil Gaiman. I don't know if he actually got writer groupies, or if this is just a delusion me and several other teenage males who desire to be fiction writers dream off, but either way, if it does lead to something like that
5. The Weirdness Factor of Grant Morrison, I have yet to read The Invisibles, but I swear to God I will buy every copy. I've read the thing on it on Wikipedia and it sounds immensilly weird and cool, and just the sort of thing I would like to write. I don't know if I'd actually believe the crazyness I write, which Grant Morrison does, but I would still write crazy cool stuff like that.
6. The Stephen-Kingness of Stephen King, I don't know what it is, but I want to write something like the Dark Tower series and something like The Stand. I don't know what it is, but everything I've read by him I like.