a permanent message

"Bednarik: You had some profound influences on your early writing, Rimbaud and Rilke and Whitman, and claim the first section of “Suite to Fathers” was actually intended to shed yourself of Rilke’s influence.

Harrison: But you never can. You never can. There’s a marvelous book, Edleman’s Neural Darwinism, that I read for The Beast God Forgot to Invent. When you lay down those maps—if you read Rilke or even Neruda—you lay them down permanently. These people are so powerful as writers that you’ve permanently affected the structure of your brain by reading them, and you can’t get rid of them. It’s just like reading Dostoevsky. That happens rarely in one life—at best, say a dozen people who overwhelm you with the immensity of their work. But you’re laying down, in your twelve billion neurons, a permanent message.

Bednarik: You mentioned that the unwritten poem is a force within the artist.

Harrison: The biggest force within an artist, I think, is this restlessness for the work that’s just over the lip of consciousness. You’re waiting. You know that old thing Wallace Stevens said, “Images collect in pools,” which turns out to be somewhat accurate in terms of brain structure. It’s a storage aspect. You’ve stuffed all these images which are filtering down to this pool and when it gets full—then whether consciously or not consciously—you’re prodded to begin. Fascinating idea. Not my idea at all, though I’m not sure where it comes from, but that kind of excess that burbles over."

above taken from a wonderful interview with Jim Harrison.

spread out and blur

{"I will save you my son" Ink, and Watercolor. 12" by 16"}

Some days, I walk out to the studio, turn on all the machines, and begin a violent boxing match. I throw punches and duck, move my hips, and lunge. Bite my own teeth. Somehow, on these days, music always seems to kick my ass. It knows the moves I intend, before I even think them. I turn the machines off, and back on. I make tea. I stretch. I play the other guitar. I grow more and more frustrated with each melody or sound that I cannot find. I try all of my old tricks, like playing two guitar parts backwards and one forward. I use the volume pedal. I put down the guitars, and try to sing. I drop the rules, and kick music in the balls, stealing words from Rilke. But Rilke’s ghost doesn’t like this, and things get worse. I grab my towel and wipe the blood. I let the studio remain silent today. Still.

I walk inside, grab my book, and sit down to read. Some days, I guess I’m not supposed to make anything. The world doesn’t want to hear a sound from me. I wish today that I could go fishing with Ben Jahn, and Christian Kiefer. We’d creep out onto the rocks, the slick granite, and tie the lures. We’d watch the brown trout erupt from the clear, snapping flies. We’d drink beer, and feel the bite of the sun, our backs red. The small, slick beasts would rise up on the line, jumping and shaking in the air. We would laugh and yell. We’d split them, and empty the guts into the water, watching it spread out and blur. Opaque. We’d light a fire back in the trees, and cook them in oil, then eat with our hands. Sleep with the moon. Summer; I await.

peanuts

{"froce of hmuan nrtaue" ink, watercolor, and newspaper. 12" by 16"}

And the sun recoils, pouring grey into the sky. It drags its heels into the drudgery of this late thursday afternoon, and I reluctantly pull the cable on the light. The chains that come on with grey. The clanking. I pour a glass of wine, and tumble the peanuts into my mouth. Think of peanut memories.

Sitting in that smoky room with my grandparents, bourbon and nuts the afternoon snack. Coca-Cola for me. Or rootbeer. That early spring evening, one of the first I spent with Ron, sitting outside looking at the bay, drinking beer and dropping the shells on the ground. A memory I am deeply fond of.

A song from Jacob Golden comes on, and I wonder where he is. Why his website disappeared. I wonder if he will ever know how deeply his music touched me, and how it changed my life in some way. How profound and uncommon that is. A gift.

The cat stirs, and jumps onto the table. Looks left, and sniffs, his marble eyes looking into my own. "Welcome to life," sings Jacob. "Welcome to life."

around and around and around.

{"Sara Two Birds" ~ ink, watercolor, newspaper. 12" by 16"}

yesterday, the sun came. i fell in love. i stood on the porch, just standing there, feeling it on my face. i sat upstairs writing, taking frequent breaks as it blinded my eyes in the late afternoon. i sat outside, for the 2nd time in months reading a book. my hands freeing up and going numb. but today it is grey again, a hint of blue off on the horizon. some other person, in some other town that i can even see from here, is standing with the sun on their face. sometimes, a short distance can seem so impossibly far.

yesterday, amongst other mental diversions, i considered pulling the car out of the garage into the driveway, and riding my bike around in there, in the tiniest of circles. a bird, spinning the sky. a deer in a field. around and around and around, the wheels on cement. the bicycle is begging me, seducing me. it is nearly irresistable. the mouth waters. the legs. the skin. the man. oh dear spring, let me have you. stop playing hard to get, and lose yourself in my arms. i need you.

a good {non-cycling-in-circles-in-garage} diversion.

the weight of water

cover #2 of I am not in Spain {of which there are still some left}

in early june, three days into the desert, i thought i knew what the desert was; how the beast functioned and moved. what desolation was. the weight of water on the back of a bicycle. similarly, i thought i knew what winter was, back in early february, as it had all become a bit heavy on the shoulders. but today, the snow continues. it snowed all of saturday night, and all day yesterday. it snowed last night. it is snowing now. of the last ten days, i would say it has been snowing or entirely grey 95% of the time. i have begun obsessively checking {by my standards, meaning that i do so daily} the ten day forcast, in search of some slight glimmer of hope. i know it is out there, but it is off on the horizon, beyond my vision. of the days leading us into april, only two of them predict any sun, the rest snow. the amazing thing about this lingering greyness, is that it causes one {me} to at times believe that everything i do, everything i've ever done is utter crap and meaningless.

and so i paint in the mornings. ride the bike in the garage, watching the snow fall. i think about the sun dangerously often, and wonder if maybe, for twenty minutes this afternoon, it might shine. i write in the afternoon for three hours or so, and i play guitar. i imagine drinking beer all day and far too much wine, and admit that the hour of the glass seems to be coming daily now. and earlier. i begin new projects and finish old ones. i've begun, for example, attempting to assemble a book of all the songs i've ever written that i have some recording of. chord charts and lyrics. of course the real work is in re-learning the ones i've forgotten. something, jefferson, just do something.

and now i move. move. move. move. move. something else. done with blog. paint now. ride. guitar. etc. below is a link to a band i just discovered, which is reminiscent of the clash. inventive and smart and raw. just fucking great. makes me want to be in a rock band. down with the acoustic guitar, i want the fender and i want to jump around. feel young again. they just may save me from winter. oh thank god. oh yes, and they're called bloc party.

bloc party

feeding into ETERNAL winter

When I awoke today, it was 20 degrees below zero, Celsius. [4 below Fahrenheit.] amazingly, it did rise to about 30 [f] during the day. I have finally concluded, that these Canadians are playing a joke on me. That the snow remains until sometime in late June, and somehow, god only knows, they have managed to accept this, and keep some grip on their sanity. Keri keeps assuring me that spring is coming, as does everyone else I speak to. I am not fooled people. I know that spring is months off. And so, I do what I can. Spent the morning painting, and recording, which certainly helps. I have told myself that I must ride my bike BEFORE lunch, as it seems to increase the motivation and general sense of happiness. [Don't be confused of course, this bicycling happens inside of the garage, watching the snow fall.] And then, throughout the day, I follow the sun around the house, attempting to ALWAYS sit in the brightest places. I will defeat you dear winter, yes indeed.

Spent some time today, reading old journal writings. Stumbled across a post where I linked to a poem of Christian Kiefer’s. A poem that is really fucking good, and so I link it again. As a matter of fact, I also link a page of his site, as you should go and order a copy of his book of poetry. I mean it. What else are you going to do with six bucks? [titled “feeding into winter,” listed under books] I could write tomes about how confused I am as to why he is not lauded as both a great writer and musician. GREAT. Why the accolades do not flood his life. Then again, we live in a world where more people know who Dean Koontz is than Jim Harrison. Alas, I believe we’re doomed. Keri and I watched a documentary last night about Paul Bowles, which made me so happy that I am an artist, and happy to have the amazing friends that I do. Thankful. It sounds silly, but that was what the film left me.

Winter. The first photo is from the kitchen window. Top right is of what would effectively be defined as the front yard. Bottom left, a tree outside the dining room window. Bottom right, the garage/studio where I make things. Songs. Paintings. Stories. [all photos taken yesterday. good lord]

the mountain of ice, and the sea of sound.

The sun reigns king in the morning, but falls to the snow. A coup. Small flakes, that drift in and out of vision, and spray the window. I look out through the glass, iced with frost, and imagine that each of the flakes are small birds. Old women with wings, whose noses and clothes make them appear birdlike in their unraveling. The queens of a gray sky, on another cold day. I split wood and carry the smaller pieces. I shovel the drive. Feel the ice in my frozen beard. Tonight on CBC {the Canadian equivalent of NPR} k and I heard a man interviewed who lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, who has built, what by any definition would be an amazingly interesting, ableit insane?, brilliant, ice sculpture.

While difficult to explain, he has dug a hole in the ground where a well exists, into which he has sunk a telephone pole. On the top of said telephone pole, he has installed a sprinkler, which connects to the well at the bottom. He runs this sprinkler 24 hours a day, and the spraying water, immediately turns to ice. Each week, he, or someone else, climbs to the top of this ice mountain, and extends the sprinkler higher. At this point, the mountain of ice is 151 feet high; or fifteen stories, and last week he had to put homing lights on top, for the airplanes. Imagine that: "plane crashes into homemade mountain of ice." I suggest that you have a look.

One way I suppose, to embrace this seemingly endless winter.

Why I’m writing about this instead of the piece I heard on the radio the other night about Eric Satie and the rise of modern ambient music, including Stephen Reich and Brian Eno, is beyond me. I guess the diversion is meaningful. The music though, something I am tumbling further and further into. A sea of sound. A worthy read as well, likely moreso for those who don’t need to be reminded that this frozen world is still valid. Ice, endless ice.

the lack of circadian rhythm {or, time for spring please}

I sit inside looking out at the glorious sun, and nearly weep. As bright as any other day beneath the sun, and yet the frigid air keeps me here on this couch. I begin to contemplate {and research online} the effects of Seasonal Affective Disorder, and try everything I possibly can to ignore the telltale heart of my longing for spring. My circadian rhythm lying prone, unable to move. I imagine colors and smells and feelings on my skin that simply don’t exist here right now. I look about the room. The cold and wilted plants. The sleeping cat. The pale sun, on the pale yellow wall. The thick veil of ice, sheeting the outside of the storm-windows. The black and white world, beneath a blue sky. Shivering.

This morning there was ice in my beard; a hairy face, covered in white.

you own me dear winter, you own me.

Perhaps it is laziness; or winter. This endless, endless winter, a thing entirely unknown to me. Mike reports from Los Angeles that it is in the 70’s. People walking about in t-shirts and sandals. He rides his bike. My father, in northern California, waters the flowers and trees. I do not water the flowers or the trees, for they are still hidden beneath snow, or bare. Black skeletons on the white land. It is this winter, this oppressive lack of sun, this world of grey and black and white, this world bereft of blue, that keeps me from wishing to write here. I am amazed by the lack of drive that comes with the lack of sun for me. I suppose I would just sit on some couch drinking red wine if I lived in Portland, Oregon. Perhaps that is a good idea.

At first it is a gift, a blessing of the gods. This cold air, and the snow {or rain} and the nights by the fire. It fuels me and pushes me, and all I want to do is stay inside and create. But now, NOW, all I want is to step outside, and feel the warmth of the sun. I want to look at the sun. drink the sun. eat the sun and watch the sun and lie beneath the sun and drink wine in the sun and play guitar in the sun and……………..not to sound like I am complaining.

And so we return from New York. New York the beast and New York the beautiful gracious lover. New York the city that kills us and gives us life all in the same breath. I have so much to write, but my body, my brain, is so restless. Shaky-legs. I think, how can I lazily describe our time there, and my newfound understanding of that glorious city that I so love and so hate, in as few words as possible. I cannot.

The gates you ask? What struck me most, was the pilgrimage of humans. It was like the crusades without all of the murder and rape and social destruction. {How does that qualify for a dazzling description?} I refrain from posting photos, as I can only imagine you’ve all seen more than enough.

oh, alas, the laziness wins for the day. I surrender. I give in. you own me dear winter, you own me.

better yet, go read my wife's journal, as she wrote all about it. there.