New Poetry

Or new-old poetry. anyways, here it isss....

~Sunday Afternoon~

Idle longingly before the setting sun, alive with murderous orange angles,

lean shadows that linger on your figure, I caught a glimmer of possibility

on the west wind blowing cold, arctic air down from the mountains,

that knows not of loss nor regret, only change, Monday is tomorrow, but what does that

really mean, idleness and order we create to satisfy our own chaos.

humanities trivial struggles, but of love and loss eternal, I see a dimension

faded in your smile, a singularity amidst all this quiet unrest, don't mark the presence 

of the earth on you, but yours on this earth, your footsteps I followed over obstacles

and misunderstandings.  I know nothing of this unrest, only of Monday and the heavy

trodding steps of time they ebb and flow on the tide of austere aestheticism

and wayward ambition. Sunday afternoon.

~Chalk~

Grit my hands bare and raw against rough sandstone monoliths, channeling all my energy

into liquid, flowing movement across a stone canvas, lit with the obscenity of gravity,

the meek effort not to conquer but merely to climb, to for a moment escape the dull concerns of the world, to be conscious of the fleeting moments that comprise true life, gratitude for breathing, for reaching into a chalkbag for friction but also for inspiration, the sinew of my body held spellbound by the deafening silence of the rock, to ascend the edges of an ancient sea petrified and thrust skyward from the depths of the earth only to be set amongst calm junipers and crash pads, cool commitment to exhale a breath of contemplation of what this stone means, your signature is but a vagabond chalk mark smeared on another hold, reflect my being.

~Send it~

Rough, crooked lines up steadfast, monolithic stone, granite tugs at my frame, a thin figure at odds with the nagging downward insistence of gravity, as I shoot a deft, hopeful hand sideways into a slight weakness in the ocean of rock, the edge of a crashing wave of granite, myself a speck in the widening maw, the curving wall launching itself headfirst into the abyss,

the unknown wears thin the shallow facade of cautious reservation I met this problem with a few fleeting frames ago, and suddenly I see it, how, for an absurd moment, I'll trick gravity into granting upward passage, and there, then, in the fantastically tangible impulse of the moment, I leap back, and I am liquid being hurled high towards a deep, hidden jug, which my fingers graze, and I magnetically latch on, my feet swing wildly and then suddenly there is

nowhere no go but down, down to towns and homework and and people and the wilderness of society until the next time we meet, somewhere on the jagged horizon.

Great Photo-Article in today's NYT

Dinner tonight: Grilled pepper/lime juice marinated Mahi Mahi Steak with French cut green beans and an anchovy/Roma Tomato Salad with balsamic. Drinks: Grapefruit Negroni. [Grapefruit juice, seltzer, bombay sapphire gin, campari, lime.] Total cost: ~$6.00. Yes, you read that right. I was pretty excited today at King Soopers [yes, I shop the Colorado equivalent of shop and stop or safeway, I could go to Whole Foods or Ideal Market and pay twice as much for the same food, but prefer not to.] Amyways, they had FRESH, unfrozen Mahi Mahi and Yellowfin Tuna steaks at a great price, like really quite reasonable, so I stocked up on a few of each, dinner for the next week! The greens of course are cheap and available all year round in many varieties. so there you have it. just plan ahead a bit, don't be afraid to get creative with seasoning [as a rule of thumb, I try to group like flavors together, but everything else is open game.]. Seasoning for the fish is lime juice [1 lime, squeezed], dash of fresh-group pepper, a little pre-mixed lemon-pepper seasoning [any will do], and a few tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, marinate for 2 hours in fridge while I go to the climbing gym and, voila! sear in an open skillet on medium high 10-12 minutes or until medium-rare and there you go. The Negroni is very easy to make and is a classic Italian dinner drink, which can be modified with grapefruit or pomegranate juice quite easily to make a more robust cocktail. yum!!!

dinner last Friday night... Wild Salmon Chipotle burgers on Sourdough with dijon and mixed green, and a glass of Stumpjumper 2006 Chardonnay, a great inexpensive white wine that goes excellently with fish. You can buy the salmon burgers already-made at Whole Foods or Ideal Market, rather reasonably too I feel for the quality, roughly $6 for 2. Delish.

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/10/19/world/20091006SWEDEN_index.html

Stumbled on this fantastic little photo-article in the New York Times this morning. The premise is that Sweden, along with other European countries, has begun to label foods with the approximate Carbon footprint of a food item, using a government-monitored system to "carbon declare" foods, say, a an oatmeal box that reads ".87 Kg. of CO2 produced per kg. product." A fascinating and superb idea, and something I would love to see the U.S follow suite on!

On A similar note, here's another great link for local readers:

A new Tesla Motors dealership has just opened in Boulder; my roommate Alex was present for the opening fanfare this past Friday evening [which I'm sad I missed, not becuase I know much about cars but becuase it was catered by The Kitchen, one of Boulder's best resteraunts!]

Anyways, Tesla has actually been around for quite some time, dating back to famous electrical engineer and physicist Nikola Telsa, who , in addition to his revolutionary work on electromagnetism, is credited with being the first to point out to absurdity of the gasoline engine compared to the AC engine for motor vehicles. some hundred years later, the fruits of his ingenuity have finally blossomed in the form of these sleek, climate-conscious vehicles, which are the first serial-produced EV road-ready vehicles in the world.

I suppose if I wanted to be the cynical earth scientist that I am, I could point out the inherent flaws in the logic that electrical vehicles are vastly 'cleaner' than their gasonline-powered counterparts, given the uncertainly of the source of the electricity you draw off the grid when you plug-in your new Tesla Roadster, and the high probability it is coming from fossil fuel sources, such as coal or natural gas powered plants. It is, however, a definite step in the right direction. Just don't get too high and mighty with me bwefore you prove that the electricity your powering your swanky new EV with comes soly from solar or wind power. Or nuclear. Which is a seperate issue entirely. [and one I would love to argue the merits/pitfalls of some other time.]

http://www.teslamotors.com/teslastore/detail.php?s=Boulder

For those with $100k to spend, I'd say an new roadster is a fine investment, though.

On a seperate and less optimistic note, it is really upsetting to still see headlines like this on a regular basis:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/world/middleeast/27iraq.html?ref=world

While the media focus in Obama's adminstration may have shifted to Afghanistan, Iraq is still very much an active war zone, and the insurgency, as the American militiary prescence choses to call them, has come to mean an ill-defined mix of religious extremists, former Hussein supporters, and everyday people who are fed up and angry at a forced occupation of their country that seems to be producing more bad than good.

Two resounding themes seem to be present in all this violence: religion and goodwill misplaced by greed. I suppose that's the story of most of the war in the history of the world, but it seems this situation is doubly-compounded the fact that while Iraqi's are fueling the religous issues, it is laregely the American presence that is catalyzing the outlash of insurgent violence, to the point that "insurgent" has just come to mean any Iraqi who doesn't agree with the American occupation and the puppet goverment we have installed.

Real peace will come to Iraq, first we have to respect and trust the Iraqi people, and allow them back their dignity which was been stripped by both Saddaam and a conflicted, uncertain war of the past 5 years.

DJ Vajra/Kraack & Smack/Fort Knox Five

was epic. Ok, maybe not quite epic, I hate the overuse and "bro-i-ness" [is that a word?] of that word, which I prefer to use for really long, scary days out climbing, or skiing knee-deep pow for 8 hours. Anyways....

So yah, DJ Vajra is a cat to watch. Fellow heads/indie nerds.... do not sleep on this! in addition to being a D-town native and having spun at everything from Nuggets half-time shows to top indie hop hop acts, he is the real deal. when He came on stage and immediately kicked into a mix of Headnodic's "Vallejo", I was like damnnn.... quite impressed. Honestly, in the turntablism/hip hop DJ game right now, I think he might only be equalled by Thes One, Cut Chemist, DJ Shadow, and maybe Mark Farina. That's right, I favorably compared him to "the man" in live DJ'ing. He recently released a single with Othello, which is pretty awesome. Has also worked with heavyweights like Ohmega Watts, Lightheaded, Headnodic, and Eyedea and Abilities. Have a feeling he is going to be big.

Anyways, next up was D.C's 'Fort Knox Five', who also rocked a killer set, which, while not quite as quality-consistent as Vajra's set, had some pretty impressive funk cuts and superb breakbeats. Their penchant for mixing old jazz/funk samples into tight breakbeats is reminiscent of Mark Farina or Kraack & Smaack.

Speaking of Kraack & Smack, their set delivered a force and pleasure suggested by their name, with the classic old-school live turntablism and mixing skills they are known for. The only unfortunate aspect to the whole show was the utter lack of people. Weak sauce! I love how MSTRKRFT will doubtlessly sell out for their Thursday show at the Fox, while equally-talented DJ's [THREE of them nonetheless] attract maybe 40 people topz. What it really is, the way I'm seeing it, is that MSTRKRFT has made it's way onto the indie/college 'cool kids' radar as an "it" band, thus attracting the dreaded "bro" crowd. I don't mean to be so down on "bros" all the time, I suppose I'm just another bro really, what I hating on is their passive, complacent attitude towards real creativity and sincerity in music and culture.

For the record, I thought MSTRKRFT's first album was superb. The best thing that could have come out of Death From Above 1979's breakup. Which is why I had such high expectations of "fist of god' and was so disappointed by the reduction to cheesy vocal collaborations with washed-up hip hop artists, and weak beats that sounded more like noise than music. Ah well, I'll just keep listening to "The Looks" until they make a return to their old style.