dream song 28

"It was wet & white & swift and where I am
we don't know."

From:  Dream Song 28: Snow Line by John Berryman

10 things I know for sure

1. The expression “jumped the shark” has jumped the shark (ironic, isn’t it?)

2. There will never be real health care reform and its got nothing to do with President Obama. Its because big pharmacy is bigger than big government.

3. Children should never be prescribed drugs for behavioral issues. See number 2.

4. We are a bi-polar nation because we’ve allowed ourselves to be defined in this way. Pass the Ambien.

5. God is dead and he has been replaced by the cult of celebrity. We collectively worship at the altar of “Jersey Shore.” Amen, brother.

6. Oprah Winfrey should get up off her fat but and do the one thing that frightens her; run for political office. I’m just saying…

7. Sarah Palin is stupid and bigoted, and I’m not ashamed to say that about another woman. Let Camille Paglia fuck her if she wants, I don’t care--- she ought to be sedated. Pass the Prozac.

8. No mother should ever have to bury her child.

9. Education in the South Bronx sucks. I suspect it sucks in the rest of the four boroughs as well and for the same reason: politics trump children every time.

10. I’m real glad its not dark at 6:00 a.m. anymore.

Real New Yorkers

We are not thrilled when celebrities start to frequent our favorite coffee shop, bar or restaurant. We are not thrilled at all. In truth, the locals, the real New Yorkers--- we like to keep to ourselves. Celebrities bring in the outside world; the tourists, the trash and the folks from New Jersey which means the white stretch limos can’t be far behind and that ain’t never good.

Everyday, no matter how far we have travel, we always carry one if not two bags. The bag might be a tote, a backpack, a briefcase or a signature blue Tiffany shopping bag, but guaranteed this aforementioned bag contains some or all of these items: a water bottle, a pair of sneakers, a lap top, a book intellectual enough to impress the strangers on the train, but not a book we would actually enjoy, a snack maybe an apple or a box of raisins, an umbrella, a folded up newspaper, a pair of socks, a hat, spare change, a hair brush, a lipstick, hair spray, hair gel, and of course a Metro card.

We regard all night restaurants, bars, laundromats, grocery stores, pharmacies, bookstores, dry cleaners, salons, and coffee shops as our God given right.

We always have a subway strategy which evolves and refines itself the longer we live here. For example; I decided 15 years ago that I could improve the quality of my life by at least 35% by avoiding Penn Station, and I haven’t looked back. BTW: I avoid the big monster stations, like Times Square and Herald Square, and get on the first or last car.

Walking around the city in a torrential downpour or snow storm does not faze us . Every smart New Yorker (and there are no dumb New Yorkers) has all the appropriate foul weather gear. We all have warm hats, waterproof shit-kicking boots, a collection of umbrellas--- all black--- and if all fails, we tell magnificent lies when we call in sick because the weather is so bad.

Every New Yorker has an emotional connection to a building, a bridge or park that borders on the perverse. Said structure will bring tears to our eyes, inspire us to sing sad songs, and visit when we are drunk or lonely or both. For me, it’s the Brooklyn Bridge. I love it beyond all reason. When I am zooming along the FDR in a cab, heading south, as the Manhattan, then the Brooklyn Bridge come into view along the river, lit up by lights b/c of course its very late---- is a moment of the purest bliss.

Real New Yorkers NEVER stand in line to get into a nightclub or a restaurant. We NEVER wait months to get a reservation. The very idea is preposterous. We stand in ENOUGH lines--- we would rather go to the movies on Monday night or Wednesday morning just to avoid standing in line.

Let me repeat: Real New Yorkers NEVER stand in line unless they have to.  Got that?  Good.

The Vodka Party

Dear Diary:

On New Year’s Day I went to a vodka tasting party in Chelsea. Hosted by a high level executive in the insurance industry and a literary agent (mine), there were academics, artists, bankers, lawyers, editors--- gay, straight, married and otherwise. A real NYC mix of highbrow, middlebrow and even a couple of village idiots. I started off the evening with a vodka tonic and made my way over to the sushi station. While munching on raw tuna and yellow tail, I struck up a conversation with a man who is an English Professor at a well known university and also a member of the MLA (Modern Language Association).

Let’s call him Carlos. I asked Carlos about the troublesome hanging indent still required for all good bibliographies. I said--- is it true it’s about to become obsolete? Heading down the same lonely road as whom and thou and shall? In a lofty tone, he replied that he was on committees that didn’t deal with such matters. But surely I persisted this is important? He conceded that yes MLA style books are still their bread and butter, but clearly couldn’t be bothered with the fate of the hanging indent. Fair enough. Then I asked him what the MLA thought about texting--- is it changing the shape of language? Is it good or bad? More loftiness, more condescension. WTF?

I moved on. Sat next to a woman who could’ve been me, but with money. Pretty, blond, “of a certain age.” Boiled wool pants, cashmere sweater and scarf, gold jewelry, rust suede boots. Oh, a banker at JP Morgan. She lamented about how her and her colleagues were afraid to say the “B” word out in public. About how the whole industry was unfairly targeted. That it was a myth that the industry is rife with criminals. I asked if her bank received a bailout. She said, Yes, but along with other solvent banks such as Wells Fargo, they took it even though they didn’t need it. Why did you take it, I asked. Because it would’ve looked bad if we didn’t, she replied, we’ve already given the money back. When she began to complain about how friends of hers lost so much money, couldn’t send their kids to ivy league colleges, etc. etc. I bailed. That was something I just couldn’t listen to.

Besides, the main event was beginning. The vodka tasting! Waiters passed around trays containing shots of mystery vodka. We were to grade it according to clarity, bouquet, taste, and finish. Determined to remain sober and avoid a horrendous hangover, I took tiny sips in my assessment of all four vodkas. We all knew beforehand that one was made with soy, one was made with grain, and one was made with grapes. They hailed from Florida, Poland, Vienna and France. Not surprisingly, my favorite was from Poland (mother’s milk), but the over-all favorite was from France, P. Diddy’s vodka of choice, Ciroc Ultra Premium.

When the tasting was over, I switched over to a lovely pinot grigio. As I fixed my hair and my lipstick in a bathroom adorned with contrasting marble tile, a stainless steel shower and a towel warmer, I thought, I will never live like this. I will never buy a one bedroom apartment in Chelsea, buy the studio next door, knock down the walls, redo the floors and hang track lighting. Many people were interested in my career as a feminist writer, as someone who’s been produced on Broadway, Off Broadway, NPR, as a woman who writes erotica--- and at this gathering in Chelsea, on the first day of a new decade, the dividing line wasn’t class or money, but art versus commerce.

Clearly there were two camps. We admired each other. We each secretly envied each other. And I’m sure we were all glad to be going home to our own homes, and our own lives. I thought about the banker from JP Morgan who said, its entirely possible that one or two “bad” people making bad choices can bring down an entire economy and still wondered if this really could be true.

photo: SnowCrystals.com

A question

My friend Marc Travanti ,whose artwork is featured regularly on this blog, told me that unless feminism becomes more inclusive it will die out as a movement.  I asked him to review the website I am creating for my book project, Tales from the Velvet Chamber.  He said, You should invite male writers as well.   Part of me agrees with him.  I've never wanted to participate in a movement that shuns or belittles or sets itself off in an ivory tower.  I've never wanted to be a member of a group that is portrayed as strident, bitter or angry.  That's not the feminism I practice.  Or at least this is what I tell myself. 

But to be honest, the books I read are primarily by female authors.  There are exceptions; recently I've read books by Jose Saramago and Jonathan Lethem.  I tell myself that I am just tired of the male voice.  In my 20's and 30's, including my years as an undergraduate, the canon was strictly male: Blake, Shelley, T.S. Eliot, W.H. Auden, Tennyson, Dylan Thomas, Boccaccio, Chaucer, Aristotle--- well you know the drill.  Every once in awhile a female voice would explode like a rocket--- Woolf!  Plath!  Austen!  But these exceptions were few and far between.

I grew up--- my consciousness and my culture--- framed primarily from a male point of view.  For many women this is not earth shattering news.  But bear with me.  When I became aware of this, I was already in my 40's.  For a long time, I've considered it my duty and my responsibility and my pleasure to shape my world-view and my politics and my dreams through another lens, one that is feminine, different.  My work as a writer has been shaped by this as well; what is the other version of this story?  Where is the female voice? I remember working on a series for National Public Radio--- Lost Voices.  I wrote and produced a piece called, The Trial of Agnes Gaudry. 

I reconstructed her voice from actual trial transcripts from the height of the witch craze in the 17th century. I collaborated with Anne Barstow Ph.D, a prominent and well known scholar in this field.  I can't begin to you tell you how how exciting and dangerous and forbidden this felt.  These ordinary women; some old, some young, some rich, some poor spoke to me from the grave.  These ordinary women were all convicted of sleeping with the devil and conspiring against the Catholic Church.  They all died horrible, brutal deaths.  I found their voices eloquent, passionate, articulate.  I found them beautiful. 

But now, I am considering including male voices for Tales from the Velvet Chamber because I think Marc might've been right when he said, "That would be totally post modern feminsism. That would be the next wave."  This also feels dangerous and exciting.  How would male voices respond to the platform for the anthology? However, I am not 100% convinced.  Part of me still feels like I have to make up for lost time--- all those years deep inside the male canon.  What do you think?

The Barn: Where form meets function and hallucinates

The exterior of the Barn is weathered hemlock and straddles the side of a hill and a narrow dirt road in the Catskills. Unassuming, it is almost like a shadow on the land, yet it is three stories tall. Built in 1900 for cows and tractors, it has assumed the air of the landscape around it. Porcupines, deer, bear and hummingbirds circle the perimeter. Walking down the hill, away from the structure, the forest is almost primeval; littered with beech and hemlock, violets, and evergreen, and small patches of sunlight. The silence at night is absolute. Except when the wolves howl.

This is the exterior; haunted, elegant, from another century. Abandoned.

The interior tells a far different story. Visual artists, Marc Travanti and Margaret Clark purchased the land in 1989. It had been abandoned for decades. The barn was part and parcel of the arrangement. This began a transformation of the interior and the surrounding grounds that continues to this day. In 1989, the interior was only a dirt floor, 20 feet by 40 feet, open to raccoons and other wild life. Margaret slept with a gun when she was alone.

Marc began his transformation of the space by building a stone table, down at the fire pit, held together with mortar--- which exists to this day. He also crafted a tree stump; upholstered the top of it with violently red fur. He calls it “Fur Nature.” It looks like it has been created for a hobgoblin or a wood sprite, or a drunken visitor from out-of-state. At one point, Marc and Margaret built a huge tree-house in the adjacent woods, large enough for dinner parties of 15. No longer used--- it has long since disappeared into the forest.

Over the years, they’ve built up two floors, adding staircase and skylight. They’ve completely insulated the first floor and installed stove, sink, and bookcases. Raccoons, bats and mice were forever banned, and Margaret no longer needed a hand gun for protection. Now there are windows (found on the streets of the East Village) on the back wall in sly geometrical patterns; elongated rectangles, deco-inspired circles, interspersed with squares. Sitting in the backyard at the original stone table, against a roaring fire, I’ve often looked up and admired their composition. Think of Mondrian married to a light sculpture.

Marc refurbished a large oak table for the kitchen by building out an extension from all four corners. This created a border for hand-pained tiles. One image is a hunter holding a chainsaw with a tree growing out of his head. Or a man at a computer screen with a woman watering his head. In the Surrealistic style of the “exquisite corpse,” different people painted the torsos, the limbs and the heads on one tile. Some of them are fired decals. Freida Kahlo lurks on the periphery. Another table is in the picassiette style; its surface a landscape of broken ceramic plates deeply embedded in grouting.

Travanti made lamps from found objects, mostly tin cans. The infamous “Brain Lamp” began with a century old rusted can, and a red light bulb. He added a round ceramic shape with holes punched out. Plug it in, turn it on, and its part Twilight Zone with a touch of Duchamp. My favorite however is “Dirty Girl.” She is a kitschy creation from the 1950’s or 1960’s; a ceramic doll dressed in pink, probably a ballerina, now permanently tarnished with the patina of a half century.

The entrance to the Barn is a huge wooden door that leads into a cavernous foyer; the ceiling is thirty feet tall. Light emanates from stained glass windows set into the second story. Light also emanates from two cylindrical church lights hung by heavy chains. The interior is raw plywood. Initially Travanti enhanced the knots with marbles. Then he began using biomorphic ceramic shapes; red, yellow, blue, orange. Bright primary colors glued into the wood; a thousand eyes. Finally, Marc wallpapered one wall with pages from an 18th century guide to flora and fauna.

Today, Margaret’s studio is on the first floor and overlooks the woods. Marc’s studio is on the second floor under a stained glass window. The environment is also their canvas. It is a place where every once in a while, form follows function and hallucinates:

A church window in a century year old barn, a tree stump with a red fur top, a night light that is a glow-in- the-dark-brain, a circular window embedded with broken bits of pottery, and finally a candelabra hanging from a tree branch in a clear patch of the forest.

This is the Barn of earthly delights.

note:  Marc asked me to write this for his website; http://www.marctravanti.com

Ghoulish glitter

Halloween night.  In Brooklyn.  It began with a walk to Bergen between Court and Smith to visit a new art gallery/performance space called Invisible Dog.  It used to be a factory that manufactured--- among other things--- the gag dog leash.  I interviewed the Producer/Art Director.  A French man by way of Marseilles and Paris, now in Cobble Hill.  Lucien Zayan.  The current exhibit on the main floor has several large abstract paintings, a soft sculpture that could be a mushroom except its about 100X bigger and multi-colored, a video installation playing against the far wall, and a light box sculpture.

 On the second floor Lucien showed me the artist studios.  Four thousand square feet that he configured for each artist after he found out what they needed.  On the third floor an absolutely exquisite performance space--- gorgeous b/c he kept the rawness of the room and added polish.  The walls are now pristine white with modern lighting.  But he kept the original windows, sanded down the columns and rebuilt the ceiling using recycled wood from the space.  Again, 4,000 square feet.  This is how he makes his money.  He rents this space out: weddings, exhibits, photographers, film companies.  Pretty smart.  Then does what he wants on the ground floor. 

Apres l'interview, I walked over to Smith and Pacific to Bar Tabac.  A great little French bistro that every once in  awhile features Brazilian jazz.  I've had some GOOD times there.  They have outside tables, so I could watch the spectacle of little children, their parents, and even their pets parade up and down the streets in search of treats.  I saw not one but two dogs in lobster costumes.  I saw a infant dressed up like a hot dog; the bun part of the sling holding the baby.  A family walked by dressed up in Nathan's Hot Dog Attire, the signature hats, and aprons.  A six or seven year old boy, sporting a sinister mask, was clearly enjoying his new persona.  Little girls in long silver gowns wearing tiaras.  An entire family of bumble bees.  The waitstaff all dressed up; Adam's family.  Ghoulish.  Glitter.  A great chicken cutlet and Sancerre. 

Walked up to Court, over to Atlantic to get to the heart of the Halloween celebration--- the mecca for all children, my neighborhood, State Street, Joralemon Street, and all the little streets in between.  Its like Woodstock, Disney World, street fair, and art installation; all rolled into one.  The elegant brownstones and townhouses are decorated with skeletons, ghosts, giant spiders, pumpkins, witches and monsters.  Add lights and music. The owners are in costume.  The kids are in costume.   I walked through the ghouls and goblins, coffee in hand, said hello to a few neighbors, even scammed some candy for myself.  Trick or treat!

Then home to watch the Yankees clobber the Phillies.  Perfect.

Image:  Woman who works at the dry cleaners on Hicks, sweeping the sidewalk, dressed up like a fairy.

Tales from a hot city: Summer 1995

Peformance Space 122.  The year is 1995 or it might be 1996.  I was the Box Office Manager, then Director of Communications.  One warm summer night, Min Tanaka, a Butoh inspired dance company from Japan was scheduled to perform. As the Box Office Manager, I stood right in the doorway over looking dirty, filthy, sublime 1st Avenue.  Elizabeth, the 40 year old marijuana dealer waltzed up and down the avenue; she specialized in dime bags of mediocre weed.  She was someone you could always depend on.  The usual suspects began to arrive; East Village boys and girls with mohawks, black shit-kickers, tattered T-shirts, red lipstick, the occasional gray hair, the occasional straight couple.  When out of the blue, a long stretch limousine appeared, framed by the red doorway.  Out popped Sean Lennon and his mom Yoko.  That's Ono.

Sean took the lead, bounding ahead of his mother and another man (bodyguard? boyfriend?).  He said, We have reservations.  And handed me a hundred dollar bill for $20 in tickets.  His mom hung back, eyes downcast.  She wanted so desperately to not be recognized.  As if.  Her son, however, was a big aggressive.  A bit entitled.  I waved them in.  As if they would pay.  We all knew they were coming.  We were all agog but b/c we were also jaded New Yorkers, we didn't say a word.  They glided up the steps of the hundred year old school house--- definitely leaving the luxury of the stretch limo, incongruously parked--- waiting---- alongside Elizabeth, the drunks, the trash and the stink of the city.

Image: Chinese Malaysian dancer, Lee Swee Keong.  Xinhua Photo, 2008

County of Kings at The Public Theater

Check out my post on County of Kings,

Lemon Andersen's hip hop 

coming of age story

that explodes onstage at The Public Theater:

Brooklyn Heights Blog

The snake swallows its own tail

Just finished A.S. Byatt's Babel Tower. It's a story inside a story, inside more stories. At times it felt the novel was just a vehicle for deep analysis on how we use language--- which in part is the spine of its Biblical counterpart. The snake swallows its own tail. She quotes Nietzsche, Blake, Freud, R.D. Laing, Rilke, Simone de Beauvoir.

The dominant narrative is Frederica's story: A young woman, a young mother, highly educated at Cambridge University, is trying to unravel the knot of an abusive marriage in the late 1960's. For her, there has been no revolution. Educated women are trouble. The judge tells her this in the courtroom during her divorce proceedings.

The other major narrative is an allegory set in the Middle Ages--- there are echoes of Chaucer's dispossessed pilgrims fleeing the plague. The world has become too violent, too brutal and so these gentle patricians, these educated souls set out to create their own world. A new world with new rules. Their ultimate decline towards total sexual anarchy is both erotic and disturbing.

We find that the author of the above story, Jude Mason, is a friend of Frederica's. That she in fact recommended the book to the publisher and it is now on trial for obscenity. Much is made of D.H. Lawrence's trial for Lady Chatterley's Lover. Through all of this then is a constant examination of language--- how to manipulate it, parse it--- how its used in education, in law, in poetry, in philosophy, and last but not least, how it tells stories. The snake swallows its own tail.

And now for something completely different--- a glimpse inside the male psyche

Yesterday, at the movies in the middle of the day, I saw Hurt Locker, directed by Kathryn Bigelow. I was one of two or three women in the audience. Everyone else was male. I was a stranger in this demographic. I was the minority. The men were in their late 20's to mid 30's. All these men could be soldiers. I'd never experienced anything like this before. In fact, I kept looking around me, and saying, Yes, there is only one other woman. I am sitting in a sea of men. Furthermore, mostly everyone had come alone. It was definitely not a date movie.

When I first walked in, the movie had already started, and the theater was deserted. It was dark and I had a bucket of popcorn, a soda, a Village Voice and an umbrella. So I wasn't about to turn back and start over. I thought, well, I've just missed the first 20 or 30 minutes. I knew exactly what was going on. Two American soldiers in Baghdad, tattooed with shrapnel, talk about life and death.

Suddenly it was over. I'd walked in on the last five minutes. Now I opened my paper, now I sat back, good, I'm going to see the whole thing. Little by little, the audience trickled in, little by little, I saw the aforementioned phenomenon. Men. Young men. Arriving alone. Some eating popcorn, some wearing Mohawks, Brooklyn hipsters, and telecom cowboys, in suits, in jeans and T's.

Stunning.

The movie began again. The narrative carries us through the last two months of their rotation. They are part of a team of demolition experts. Some are high on the adrenaline. We see that this can be a beautiful thing. After a dangerous day out in the field, we see them bonding with alcohol and wrestling--- a scene with a strong undercurrent of homoeroticism, which can also be beautiful.

This unexpected, poignant and powerful perspective of the male psyche is courtesy of a female director. The New York Times said this:

Ms. Bigelow, practicing a kind of hyperbolic realism, distills the psychological essence and moral complications of modern warfare into a series of brilliant, agonizing set pieces.

When I walked out into the heat of a 90 degree day in the East Village, I ordered a Margarita (this is the fun part of being on vacation). I applauded the brilliance of the film and my own changed perspective on men, and on war.

Bucket of flowers on State Street

Bucket of flowers on State Street. I admire its tenacity despite the heat and humidity, despite the traffic, the people, and all the dogs who pee on it. A bit bedraggled around the edges, the center blooms are still beautiful. If you see this as a metaphor for my state of mind, you are correct, sir. But seriously the greenery here in Brooklyn is at its apotheosis. High summer, as I like to call it. Already it's a tiny bit darker at twilight and at dawn. I long for cowboy boots and blue jeans, a sweater and a scarf. In the meantime, I keep it cool, and chill out at the local pool, my blue paradise.

Teach, teacher man!

Frank McCourt at Stuyvesant High School. Photo: John Sotomayor/NYTimes.

A brief tribute to Frank McCourt

One Sunday afternoon, I was on Metro North with my niece. I was reading the New York Times--- an excerpt of Teacher Man. I was laughing like a hyena the whole time. When I first read Angela's Ashes, I was in D.C., alone, having dinner, also laughing--- snorting is more like it. People looked at me funny, but I just couldn't stop. I could never re-read the latter, way too painful. He used to live on Atlantic Avenue, over Montero's Bar and Grill, one block from my home. Once I saw him on Henry Street, and I thought, Oh my God, there goes Frank McCourt! He is one of my favorite writers. Rest in peace, teacher man.

Stories from the Velvet Chamber or A Poisonous Apple Never Tasted So Good

The first story is about the Wicked Stepmother in Snow White. I want her to a charming and sexy beast. Angela Carter--- who wrote The Bloody Chamber--- is of course my muse. Her revisions of classical fairy tales are baroque, gorgeous, hallucinatory, coldly beautiful. Mine will be erotically charged, hot.

So the Wicked Stepmother, Dominique, marries the Duke of Lexington because her second husband pissed away her fortune, then promptly died. But what she doesn't know is that her third husband, the Duke of Lexington, has just killed his fourth wife. Her ghost roams the castle seeking sexual gratification and revenge. Not only that, when she arrives, she realizes that his young daughter, Snow White, is quite mad. Suicidal.

Dominique has to live with the Duke for 1,000 days to insure a private income from his vast fortune. She has no choice. Watch how she outsmarts her once charming spouse who becomes homicidal after 39 nights in the marriage bed (read: fucking). See how she keeps Snow White from drowning herself in the river with the help of 7 dwarfs. Thrill to the hot passionate romance with a devil who lives inside the chapel mirror.

A poisonous apple never tasted so good. Photo by: Marc Travanti

The myth of the mad housewife

In Revolutionary Road, adapted from a book by Richard Yates, the 1950's housewife goes crazy and kills herself. Up until the moment when the blood is staining her skirt from a self-induced abortion, I was loving the rich psychological life of the husband and wife. But when she punctures her womb in her suburban CT bathroom, I thought here we go--- yet another suicidal heroine.

In literature and film, the woman, the wife, who rebels against her role in society is in deep trouble; Emma Bovary, Anna Karenina are the most famous. And Kate Winslet's character, brilliantly played, is not happy. Obviously not happy about the pregnancy, not happy with her husband--- she wants OUT. The role of suburban wife is suffocating her, and why wouldn't it? Now, she has only two choices; she can go crazy or she can kill herself or do both.

So, I loved the wife in Revolutionary Road, but the cliche of her suicide was disappointing. Actually its worse than a cliche, its a stereotype. And I am so sick of it. Now, in contrast, I watched A Woman Under the Influence; directed and written by John Cassavetes. 1974. This time Gena Rowlands is the "mad housewife." She too is a lovable and compelling character--- but her insanity is right on the surface.

The story allows her to be wise and crazy. Her husband is forced by well-intentioned doctors and family to institutionalize her, but when he brings her home its like a fairy-tale. He tells her, I'm on your side! I want you to go back to who you were. At first this seems unlikely--- electro shock seems to have sapped her soul. But all he has to do is sock her in the jaw and before you know it, she's back. Body and soul. Still fragile, but still kicking it.

Of the two housewives, I'd pick the latter. At least, the 1974 housewife gets to go home, make love to her husband, and kiss her children good night.

RIP Michael Jackson

It's all over the news, it's in the streets, its online, there's no escaping it. Walking home from the gym, on Atlantic, almost every car stereo was blasting a song from the King of Pop. During his infamous child abuse trial, I thought, uncharitably perhaps, he should just kill himself. In my view, he was guilty. And now perhaps he has--- killed himself.

Yet, I loved his music. The Jackson Five was the sound track of my youth on the banks of Lake Michigan; Rocking Robin, Never Can Say Good Bye, I'll Be There, Ben. And then later, Thriller, Billy Jean--- and its hard for me to ignore his claims of a violent childhood, his real fear of his father. The mother who apparently did nothing. He was the goose who laid the golden egg. The little boy ticket out of the south side of Chicago--- Gary, Indiana. A real cesspool of a city.

How do you reconcile these things, the brilliant music, the shattered childhood, his own pedophilia? Do we stop reading Anne Sexton's poetry because she allegedly abused her own child? Do we stop reading Ezra Pound because he was virulently anti-Semitic? Do we stop listening to R. Kelly? Chris Brown? For the longest time, after he married his step-daughter, I boycotted Woody Allen's films. But recently I watched Annie Hall and wept.

There seems to be no easy reconciliation, and maybe there doesn't have to be--- in the words of Walt Whitman:

Do I contradict myself? Very well, I contradict myself. I am large. I contain multitudes.

Michael Jackson contained multitudes. For me, my love for his music, remains fixed in the late 1960's and early 1970's. The little boy, with the perfect Afro, and the voice of an angel.

A real housewife on Hicks Street

I saw Alex McCord today on Hicks Street. She was the only woman wearing four inch black platforms. I said, Are you Alex. She said, Why, yes, I am. I said, You rock. She replied, Thank you. She was kind, gracious. She does rock. She's the classiest one out of all of them. Plus she lives in Brooklyn.

The boys in the band

Last Sunday night, I went to Smoke, a jazz club on the Upper West Side to hear Chris Washburne's Latin Jazz Ensemble, SYOTOS. I wrote a review of this for Examiner.com. Jazz is in many ways a coded and secret world--- one of my long time loves was a jazz musician. I love their camaraderie. These boys are bonded, they genuinely like each other. They don't just play music together, they have deep, intense conversations that span the chromatic scale. The leader of the group, Chris, tells an interesting story:

He was diagnosed with a rare form of nerve cancer around his mouth. Terrible irony for a trombone player! He was told he had a 50/50 chance of surviving the operation. That he might never play again. As he went in for surgery, he told his bandmates, See You On The Other Side or SYOTOS. He survived and went on to become an even better musician than he was before. The best song of the night was a bolero, Passion, by Pedro Flores. I swear, at times, the piano, the drums and the conga were speaking the same language as the sea.

Desire

I WANT YOU.

I NEED YOU.

I'VE GOT TO HAVE YOU.