sweet trini's urban folk tales

edutainment [edited 24hours later]

2012-01-19T11:19:00.001-04:00

big tings a gwan, eating up my time, but i always need food for thought, so...
andrew sullivan on obama's long game outsmarting his critics.
plus, they say it safe to smoke green; if you do, once lifted, entertainment...
and more: pothound is a must-see trinbago-made short flick.
walk good.

ignorance is bliss, yes...

2012-01-15T11:18:00.000-04:00

thanks to my favourite gremlin for sharing; they title this madness right, somebody should tell this girl this cyah be done. enjoy the impossible. walk good.

share colbert

2012-01-07T02:59:00.001-04:00

probably done say this here 'cause it true long time: the only american tv programming i make sure i catch every single time i possibly can is jon stewart's daily show and the colbert report; stewart's my favourite, but the consistently maintained genius of stephen colbert's character and show and realworld manifestations, simply blowmind- love that they doing the superpac and, well, everything...read the new york times' charles mcgrath's how many stephen colberts are there?
walk good.

as doctor who pronounces?

2012-01-03T17:06:00.000-04:00

cyah wait to buss this on them gremlins i teach...read out loud:
dearest creature in creation,
study english pronunciation.
i will teach you in my verse
sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
i will keep you, suzy, busy,
make your head with heat grow dizzy.
tear in eye, your dress will tear.
so shall i! oh hear my prayer.
just compare heart, beard, and heard,
dies and diet, lord and word,
sword and sward, retain and britain.
(mind the latter, how it’s written.)
now i surely will not plague you
with such words as plaque and ague.
but be careful how you speak:
say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
cloven, oven, how and low,
script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.
hear me say, devoid of trickery,
daughter, laughter, and terpsichore,
typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
exiles, similes, and reviles;
scholar, vicar, and cigar,
solar, mica, war and far;
one, anemone, balmoral,
kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
gertrude, german, wind and mind,
scene, melpomene, mankind.
billet does not rhyme with ballet,
bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
blood and flood are not like food,
nor is mould like should and would.
viscous, viscount, load and broad,
toward, to forward, to reward.
and your pronunciation’s ok
when you correctly say croquet,
rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
friend and fiend, alive and live.
ivy, privy, famous; clamour
and enamour rhyme with hammer.
river, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
doll and roll and some and home.
stranger does not rhyme with anger,
neither does devour with clangour.
souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
shoes, goes, does. now first say finger,
and then singer, ginger, linger,
real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.
query does not rhyme with very,
nor does fury sound like bury.
dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
though the differences seem little,
we say actual but victual.
refer does not rhyme with deafer.
foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
mint, pint, senate and sedate;
dull, bull, and george ate late.
scenic, arabic, pacific,
science, conscience, scientific.
liberty, library, heave and heaven,
rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
we say hallowed, but allowed,
people, leopard, towed, but vowed.
mark the differences, moreover,
between mover, cover, clover;
leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
chalice, but police and lice;
camel, constable, unstable,
principle, disciple, label.
petal, panel, and canal,
wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
senator, spectator, mayor.
tour, but our and succour, four.
gas, alas, and arkansas.
sea, idea, korea, area,
psalm, maria, but malaria.
youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
doctrine, turpentine, marine.
compare alien with italian,
dandelion and battalion.
sally with ally, yea, ye,
eye, i, ay, aye, whey, and key.
say aver, but ever, fever,
neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.H
heron, granary, canary.
crevice and device and aerie.
face, but preface, not efface.
phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
large, but target, gin, give, verging,
ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
ear, but earn and wear and tear
do not rhyme with here but ere.
seven is right, but so is even,
hyphen, roughen, nephew stephen,
monkey, donkey, turk and jerk,
ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
pronunciation (think of psyche!)
is a paling stout and spikey?
won’t it make you lose your wits,
writing groats and saying grits?
it’s a dark abyss or tunnel:
strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
islington and isle of wight,
housewife, verdict and indict.
finally, which rhymes with enough,
though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
hiccough has the sound of cup.
my advice is to give up!!!

English Pronunciation by G. Nolst Trenité
walk good.
ps: more so i can find it again than anything to do with this post, cabletv.com's dr.who timeline infographic. gorgeous.

flash fiction friday #41

2011-12-30T11:59:00.000-04:00

experimenting with trigger, please tell me if it easier, harder, if you hate it and never want it like this again; insteada my usual inclusion list (send me starters+closers!) this is a few short groupings gathered into a longer list of easier words. we go see; i feel i'll be vex with meself, but the point of fff hadda be experimentation+challenge wherever i can find it.
with no further ado, flash fiction friday #41 (inclusion)trigger: dare, dear, deer, fair, fare, fear, hair, hare, hear, here.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!

walk good.

fff#40

2011-12-29T14:06:00.004-04:00

was feeling dramatic; tell me wha' you think, nah...
flash fiction friday #40 (inclusion)trigger: bare, beer, bier, bear.
i hated the bed in that room, like a bier, stiff platform on a bare bones frame bolstered with bedsheets instead of funeral flora. plus, growing up in the tropics i had no positive context for attics- places where eerily-resembling children were locked into creepy incestuous relationships, where crazily aging family members were kept away; the staircase warned at every step this was not for the faint of heart, and the feint of heart wouldn’t make the top.
i had been a secret in the attic.
the foreign cousin.
by then i was old enough to enjoy it somewhat. i decided to let them think me exotic and enjoy the perks. the attic wasn’t one. when i left that place, i left it far enough from my mind that i was shocked to recognise the faded, peeling wallpaper that was the most depressing thing about the cramped space- little yellow and pink and blue bears dancing, riding tricycles, juggling, bears wearing party hats, wearing tiaras, groucho-marx-noses+glasses, bears pretending to babies they aren’t in an attic.
thoughts of paleskinned inbred babies hidden away up there until they faded into those whispering walls haunted my sleepspace from approach, making me long for now less-terrifying jumbies of home, to trade some soucouyant sizzle or douens calling for those creaky stairs.
climbing them this time, opener in hand, my unopened bottle in the other clatters against the railings as a barrier to the sound clawing at me from a grave piled with small corpses. when i open the door and the room pulls me the need to breathe outside air drags me across it to open the tiny window. i slide to the ground, lean my head against the windowsill and crack the beer with a toast to bringing the right demons to face down this unexpected return to my crypt.

walk good.

flash fiction friday #40; prezzie-for-me

2011-12-23T12:00:00.000-04:00

at this time of year i remember the simple but valuable gift that is time with loved ones, so this flash fiction friday #40 (inclusion)trigger speaks, simply, to the crucial elements of community; scandal, celebration, morbidity, plus a wild animal: bare, beer, bier, bear.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!

walk good.

banana baby bjorn?

2011-12-22T11:42:00.002-04:00

before you read another word, far less watch the images below, you must see not-for-swimwear, or miss the hilarity of the fact that my mother sent me today's teehee, but the aforelinked is way more her usual style than these; thus, coming from her (trust, click that link above) these (below) are the batch that actually shocked me:

and speaking of warm+fuzzy: back by popular request and my own selfish desires, flash fiction friday returns tomorrow.

walk good.

pole envy

2011-11-30T12:06:00.027-04:00

[finally posted monday december12.2011]

i have a confession (and no, is not the backshots, get yuh mind out the gutta).

actually, no, i apologise, sans parentheses, 'cause that inside joke aside was so inside it was completely self-indulgent; entirely script-based.

apologies aside: i have pole envy.

this show was cast smart and i weirdly enjoy "aunty sam"s weirdness but lately, after playing on the pole to build choreography and realising how easy it come for me and what i capable of, now i wish i were cast as 1 of the 3girls who work gutta beautiful's public pussy project 'cause i should be on that pole. i wanna show off my skills that nobody will get to appreciate...sigh...so jealous...oh, speaking of which: dear universe, for christmas what i really want is u$600 to buy a freestanding portable pole...

*needle scratch on vinyl*this post interrupted- yesterday i pause writing to go do production stuff and tech; post-rehearsal, everyting change.

gutta's director threw a hissy fit and quit tonight. our last run was monday in the rehearsal space, we never run in the theatre yet, jes' basic tech; we have opening night audience friday. we have no director.

radio silence.

i readily admit i cyah write someting while it happening. only when a situation over/resolved can i speak on it, to it, about it, of it. so i started this post, came back to say the world was falling apart, and never came back since because it only now done. the las' time i was here it we didn' know if it still could, but gutta happened. it was a good show. we had a director but much more stress+difficulty than those words suggest. general feedback: acting was very good/strong/of a high calibre, the production was too long but looked good, choreography was good and sox rock the pole, not everybody understood all layers of the piece, certain directorial choices were questioned. i was happy with my work as choreographer+actor, and was complimented on delivery, clarity and intention.

jes needed to get the basics off my chest so i can create again (gyazette musical to write, 3canal carnival show to plot plus warrenman inveigling me to choreograph for it...)- full gutta story sooncome...walk good.

we have a show

2011-11-25T00:20:00.013-04:00

it happening.

fragments, pieces, motivations, inspirations coming together.

we seeing hearing feeling this gutta beautiful we in, creating it as we living it, our lives and our characters', scary and enervating and exhausting and glad. so much work being done, so much wuk to do...props creeping in, costumes in varying stages of assembly, posters+ads getting make, pole reach in rehearsal space, soundtrack almost completely in place, choreography getting nailed down and cleaned up, unnecessaries getting trimmed...we have a show, now is to tighten and sharpen, now is about moving the journey along.

walk good.

ps: randomly read+enjoyed and determined shareworthy after a simple edit: "i love you like a cupcake loves an overweight child, very similar to the mannerisms of a whole cake but personal, and minus the commitment issues, plus just the right amount of icing, and only a smidgen of the guilt."

and we say we want drama?

2011-11-09T13:29:00.017-04:00

well, we get.
we cyah say griot's gutta beautiful doh have drama.
first+foremost, we have no $. we sooo have no $ that we eh pay for nutting yet but still tens of thousands overbudget because we so doh have $ that (inevitable) basic production costs are pure debt. we so have no $ that even though the first $ we get wasn't even enough to pay a production-team-member or bring a single production element to stage-execution, a happy dance was in order.
then photographer ring night before las' week's scheduled photoshoot to say, death in the family, he cyah shoot us wednesday. he cyah do nutting for a whole week so we reschedule for the following wednesday (this week) which mean we behind with creating tickets and promotional material, plus now i missing because this week i in coco dance festival and tech+dress monday-wednesday and perform thursday-sunday, thus can only make griot for the 1st half of sunday's rehearsal before coco calltime.
then costume designer say, las' minute without enough pre-photoshoot notice, she cyah make at all, and following that news, photographer ringback+say he still dealing with family stuff and cyah shoot this week neither.
i might not be in the gutta with griot right now but still hadda be about griot+gutta: scrambling to think of a way to make it work without pre-production photoshoot (to no avail) then finding another photographer las' minute, figuring out how to source+afford costumes for photos+run, debating whether we can afford both scheduled performance weekends and a character we thought we were cutting from the piece, managing other little behind-the-scenes drama to maximise productivity, learning lines+accent backstage@coco; plus we behind rehearsal schedule because of everybody's conflicts- besides me in coco this week+rehearsals-past, we have/had sox juggling next top model and anime caribe, disa+nickolai's gyazette rehearsals+gigs, abeo's other gigs, marvin juggling school+job, and camille+danielle with school and random tings...making theatre is truly a wuk of love, yes, 'cause it facking hard and the $ sooo not worth it...
at least no-curfew is a few more hours/day to make/art/wuk...not staying productive provokes existential crisis, constant awareness of being less than human without rights makes the state of emergency life threatening...

walk good.

emergency stashes; a mishmash

2011-11-07T16:58:00.022-04:00

in my teens, dancing 5-7days a week, it was a squeeze bottle of chocolate syrup in the dance bag that i never made chocolate milk with; i keep tea in my smoke box for as long as i've had one, and sometimes dry milo. i seem to have settled on tea, catch(dark) and (patsy's split)channa as constants, with a rotating cast of tunnocks, jubjubs, red mango and roughtops, and tamarind balls when i lucky, for the munchies.
i met a stripper ('missy' from new zealand) who performed with a little velvety green+gold-trimmed bailey's cloth baggie tied to her garter to keep tips. i told her i had a similar soft purple+gold-trimmed crown royal bag i'd bring her from when we used to do shots in the dressingroom before every hedwig show; she was thrilled. i got home and realised (duh, had i thought of the bottle that came in it insteada studying cloth sliding up missy's thigh) my bag was way too big for the same purpose as her bailey's number, but never saw her @ the palace again anyway. now i keep sextoys in it, in her honour.
boys are gross and hilarious. a friend tell me how back in the day when one of his pardners bep in a lime, them boys would crack open a raw egg over his bumseecrack and leave it drying sticky for him to wake+find and think somebody violate his arse while he sleep. a few days later i telling another pardner how appalled i am and he bawl, "like them eh know yuh suppose to sprinkle a little peppersauce too, for the burn and to look like blood? steups!"
and as we hit a theatrical note, please help save our naparima bowl (online petition)- we cyah afford to give up what few performance spaces we have...

walk good.

public pussy project

2011-11-03T23:14:00.008-04:00

tonight we started wukkin the gutta [beautiful] girls' public pussy project choreography; thus far i been wukkin movement for transitions and group scenes, tonight was the 1st time we get down+dirty. and it was goood...
carpetburn, bruised knees, skinned shoulders+elbows, stretched groins, and a rehearsal video to prove it! (doh mind the chaotic opening moments, i was djing and still critiquing+choreographing in my head while tryna get me+phone in position, but i reach before disa, sox+abeo start, so enjoy...above is me+danielle, non-public-pussy-movement...)

walk good.

sticky inside my mind

2011-10-27T23:17:00.048-04:00

another "what's percolating" post; sometimes my inner archivist just won't let me complete anything more focused+articulate until i do this with the untethered pieces floating in my mental amniosac...too gross? i'm a bit of a science(-meets-art) nerd so i like the amnesiac-meets-archivist play...litter, debris, detritus, damage...anyway, gutta beautiful research is an entertaining diversion in+amongst the firing of port authority chairman for refusing bobol juxtaposed with this well-executed political historical theatre and state of the nation of the republic of the people of the world...all 7billion of us...
be impressed by pole control of ms. jenyne butterfly

and power of ms. felix cane

walk good.
ps: can it pleaseprettyplease be jouvay soon?
pps: all in 1day, more spam from myself, plus gaddafi (postmortem) and (methinks, stupidly) spam that says [spam] in its subject line...

the marijuana glove compartment...

2011-10-07T23:36:00.001-04:00

...talent all outta proportion, more than should swim in this tiny pool, yet we refuse to think for or help ourselves, no matter how representatives prove they not truly for we.
drowning ourselves in fantasy lifestyles rather than contemplate our reality, we never identify and run no risk of resolving our problems.
these dark days are one with cowering nights, these nights the silence squeezes tight, a veil of oppression staunching attempts at productivity already broken by sirens and hiding from the tramp of those government boots…
doh sleep to dream when nightmares stalk dreams to change the world.
still, live curfew music is made at a small gathering of guitars, minds and restless artistic spirits, softly but persistently defying the state because we cyah let them take this; new songs are voiced of these nights’ troubled debate.
small groups gather, and bigger ones, in spite of knowing we need profess no malice for trouble to come to the door, kick it in, ramfle our lives and leave us rummaging through rubble in this twilight zone; we gather knowing they say we shalt not and are prepared to stop us; we gather because we are, thus we must.
so music is made of this, bodies move to this, visions become visible through this, creation will come of this surviving the state of emergency. we will create question, create protest, create suggestion, create+recreate ourselves, re-evolve, become a new nation anew, become ourselves…
walk good.

wethepublic

2011-09-24T09:00:00.027-04:00

these nights the silence is a wall of oppression staunching my attempts at productivity;

doh sleep to dream when nightmares stalk dreams to change the world.

these are dark days, my love,

dark days, one with cowering nights, hiding from the tramp of those government boots...

republic(1979) of sweet trinbago, as strange as it is irresistible.

as a people we show talent all outta proportion, way more than should swim in our tiny pool, yet we refuse to think for or help ourselves, no matter how many times our representatives prove they not truly for we. we drown ourselves in fantasy lifestyles and religion rather than contemplate our reality, thus never identify and run no risk of resolving our problems.

republic [noun]: state or nation in which the supreme power rests in all the citizens entitled to vote (the electorate), and is exercised by representatives elected, directly or indirectly, by them, and responsible to them.

from res publica: a public affair.

the state of the nation is that the people, or some significant portion of the people, retain supreme control over the government, and offices of state are not granted through heritage. yet [i say again] our people and natural resources are put in harm’s way to fatten the pockets of the few we have given the power to put their own financial independence above the nation’s welfare. the value of this nation is in its people, underfed+underemployed, potential underresourced+undersupported, creativity squeezed into ever-tighter mental boxes to fit in the mainstream, a people represented by individuals independent of conscience, concern and responsibility toward we who give them authority.

fundamental rights and freedoms under the constitution of the republic of trinidad+tobago:
a. the right of the individual to life, liberty, security of the person and enjoyment of property and the right not to be deprived thereof except by due process of law;
b. the right of the individual to equality before the law and the protection of the law;
c. the right of the individual to respect for his private and family life;
d. the right of the individual to equality of treatment from any public authority in the exercise of any functions;
e. the right to join political parties and to express political views;
f. the right of a parent or guardian to provide a school of his own choice for the education of his child or ward;
g. freedom of movement;
h. freedom of conscience and religious belief and observance;
i. freedom of thought and expression;
j. freedom of association and assembly; and
k. freedom of the press.

with these in mind i offer 2 items percolating and waiting to be aired:

c.l.r.james on working democracy
and a reminder of the brutality of the denial of our rights.
walk good.

"h" and other letters

2011-09-12T13:55:00.062-04:00

we start tech for h today, the dance show i been in rehearsal for (not the only ting i rehearsing recently, but other gig getting its own post so everybody could know carnival band "explosion" on shit and doh deserve your support/$). we@littlecarib this week, performing thursday-sunday, 6pm curtain to accommodate curfew- is the 1st time our director showing a collection of her choreography so we doing pieces created from 20years ago to 3weeks ago. i have a fun little stardust solo with a brolly, plus in the group winery piece and the drum piece (cyah call it a folk piece because is a folk-limon fusion and the limon technique makes it not at all what my brain conjures everytime folk rehearsal call, leading to repeated-tiny-disappointment syndrome). i have mixed feelings about the drum piece partly because of false advertising frustrating my dancing desires, and partly because of a solo-sharing arrangement that starting to feel unfair:

when this piece was cast i was told i was in the group sections plus understudying the soloist (also does duet). i wasn't told we were double-cast, but that i was understudying, as in, only going on if someting prevent the soloist from performing. rehearsals underway, and the soloist never rehearses the sections she in with us; i hear she cyah make any of our rehearsals and choreographer been working with her separately; i also start hearing she going new york for a month to return a week before opening. she rehearses once with us before going n.y. carrying tape of the piece, i have 2rehearsals for duet+solo each in addition to group rehearsals, live drummers join us, i dance the solo+duet plus sections i in but soloist not in @every rehearsal, but only get to work solo+duet once each with drums. 2weeks to show i hitting my stride with the solo+duet (choreographer done say i'm 1 of the strongest in group sections) and director/choreographer say i wukkin hard and wukkin it and will perform 2-of-4shows, pick 2 nights, my choice; i say lemme see when my people can come and i'll choose based on that, and a week before tech tell her none of my people making thursday night and some coming friday. couple days later she say she eh sure the soloist will be ready when she reach back so i should do opening(thursday) so we look good media night; i remind her none of my people can make thursday and ask how we'd accommodate that; no clear answer. a week before opening, soloist rejoins rehearsal uncertain of choreography in spite of watching tape, and marks everything the whole time; dancers saying she eh ready and i need to do all 4nights, i try to give the benefit of the doubt and put ego aside and put it down to 1st time back and absentee drums; hear her moms coming sunday and ask choreographer/director who doing which nights, to no avail. yesterday we did a run of show, stopping only to work soloist+duet with drums and work her into group and she mark again. choreographer keep saying she not gonna be ready and i hadda do thursday, i keep reminding her i already picked not-thursday. i start wondering why, if she telling me homegirl not ready plus homegirl now telling me the same, are we wukkin so hard to make sure homegirl gets 2nights even though me doing opening/media night would be a favour for the director/choreographer and screw me? it starting to feel like if they want me to do thursday as a favour and homegirl moms coming sunday, considering how much we each committed+wuk for this, i should just do thursday-saturday and she do sunday...

anyway, with that building on top of the (still unpaid) frustrations of dealing with "explosion" shittongs up to a week ago, when i found this forgotten note it felt like i need/deserve it for this show like never before:

this is the perfect example of why i need to fuck post-performance: at 4.52a.m. i was eating potato salad over my kitchen sink in a desperate attempt to silence the controllable 1 of the voices aiding+abetting my insomnia. no amount of smoke could quell the others, all critiquing my every moment onstage and even backstage, or bring sleep. i stopped the stomach growls and still had to masturbate. if i had somebody willing to bring me home and fuck me senseless post-show, i'd fall out immediately after with none of the shit i putting up with from my brain...
walk good.
ps: almost forgot, letters...jes get spam with subject line "this email is for the owner of this account"- not as imaginative as spam used to be...

fragments, exorcised

2011-09-02T09:24:00.001-04:00

bits+pieces i been meaning to say but never got around to crafting, but still wanna get out:

they say you don't remember pain, you remember it hurt bad but not how it actually felt, but i put on those pointe shoes for the 1st time in over 10years and before i even went up my toes screamed my betrayal of our agreement to never do that again. still i went up. or at least my left (i think) foot did; my right (the other, either way) refused pointe-blank. my feet have not yet forgiven me, and i understand.

these baby lizards need to get smarter+faster; is not like i tiptoe, i live alone. how i end up crushing 1 and de-tail-ing another in 1week?

woke up a morning this carnival with 2 small punctures on my thigh, spaced about 4 front teeth apart, black+blue around the holes; next evening a bat started flying through...i feel fine though...[months later, the bat is a regular; i almost worry if too many nights pass without the swift swoopy circling above my head]

walk good.

indepen-dance

2011-08-31T09:00:00.012-04:00

as we celebrate emancipation in the face of modern-day slavery, so we must ask on our 49th anniversary of independence, under a state of emergency and curfew: is trinidad+tobago truly independent? before we can even bemoan what local radio programming tells us of our national culture, we must start by asking: can a nation consider itself independent if it cannot or does not feed itself? can a place be independent if its priority is producing for somebody else, and its concerns of people who do not live there? should we believe ourselves emancipated from mental slavery when we needlessly sweat while we sweat, dressed in the suits of our colonisers, denying the daily reality of where we exist now? is any people independent when common sense and the national good are not applied to questions of social responsibility, and administrative accountability is nil?

independence: freedom from dependence on or control by another person, organisation or state; freedom from the influence or determination of another or others; an income sufficient for a livelihood.
is independence the true state of the nation?
ask yourself if our agriculture and related food production industries+standards are what they should be for an independent nation of our resources+capabilities. ask if our health+education institutions+standards are what they should be for an independent nation of our resources+potential? ask [simply]: are we self-sufficient?
instead of regional cooperation, we of the caribbean “independently” grovel at the feet of the so-called 1st world, giving them preferential treatment to our own disadvantage. our people and natural resources are put in harm’s way to fatten the pockets of the few we have given the power to put their own financial independence above the nation’s. we prostitute our culture, cheapening it for foreign dollars to feed the wine+jam mentality that is increasingly all we have to offer.
the value of this nation is in its people, underfed+underemployed, potential underresourced+undersupported, creativity squeezed into ever-tighter mental boxes to fit in the mainstream…is trinidad+tobago an independent nation, or a group of people dependent on individuals independent of conscience, concern and responsibility toward those who gave them authority? we the people don't even have the run of our own homeland as we commemorate this date in our history, our civil liberties dependent on those seemingly independent of rational reasoning about how to solve the problems we face in this country.
the battle for true independence is not yet won. we must be ourselves for ourselves, develop our resources to our own benefit, to take care of ourselves weself, become self-sustaining, an independent nation not only in title but in action and in the daily reality of all her people.
with freedom comes responsibility and we must all take responsibility for our independence.
walk good.

vote curfew party

2011-08-22T21:54:00.126-04:00

while i write, lockdown in my livingroom that i always tryna run back to until now they say i hadda stay in and it suddenly reeks of confinement, st.james quieter than i ever see+hear the place, except maybe the wee hours of ash wednesday morning. but this stillness different from the annual post-revelry hush.

prime minister announce state of emergency sunday evening before the president even sign off on it, no real details to guide people (maybe)needing alternate arrangements for monday, people go to wuk not knowing how reaching home wukkin until the powers that be deign to press conference@noon (except who have no work badge or jobletter to get a pass and hadda cancel wuk when news of public transport early lockoff buss later in the afternoon). we try to sleep sunday night knowing that the police and army empowered with special provisions we doh know enough about.
emergency power regulations state that we no longer have the right to meet, march or protest, just as labour disputes have public servants and police officers threatening strike. the prime minister issues a limited state of emergency that not so limited (sans presidential approval) and the acting commissioner of police sign a curfew order before actually appointed a.c.p. all while police commissioner gibbs and deputy ewaski out of the country without proper knowledge of the commission, the former detained for illegal entry into another country...as a pardner say on fasbook: the red house should be on the list of crime "hotspots" [thus far targeting predominantly black areas considered lower class] as tha's where most crimes against this country occur.
but i have long maintained: trinbagonians will take chain up, bobol and mamguy, and revolution will not come until they ban carnival; we riot when they threaten dance+drum. our democracy boasts an apathetic electorate, taking whaever they give us and obediently giving up as much as they choose to take- but remember benjamin franklin say, who "can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
they say the state of emergency is to take down (violent) crime and i for that but how, exactly, this supposed to wuk? we supposed to believe, with no longterm plan from the powers that be, that criminals not smart enough to take a 2weeks vacation and come back robbing+shooting + burning+looting come mid-september? when smaller criminals who cyah afford vacation get ketch doing their daily hustle, with the lack of opportunity our young men face we supposed to believe it doh have a nex' crew already jostlng to take their place? and a nex' crew rolling up to replace them? we supposed to believe little black boys on the block importing the drugs+weapons? laundering money on a streetcorner in neverdirty, morvant? local might be making a comeback but vincy still have the market, and who have more $ smoking arizona.

those behind the smuggling of drugs+weapons that fuel local crime are those behind our politics and industry, close enough and boldface enough to look we in we eye when they wining, groping hands deep in our taxpaying pockets, backed by our administration.
dialogue is necessary- sometimes we forget, because people around us understand and talking sense about the problems and dangers our nation faces, that others may be less informed- but we also need r/evolution. we cyah wait for coup d'etat mindset to start looking good; cyah wait until another generation must fight to the death to effect the change our humanity demands.
meanwhile, latenight doubles vendors will reset bodyclocks to sell breakfast or starve when current supplies run out; murray street and environs will feel like the disguised graveyard fares forget threatens the incautious; freelancers without passes will become hustlers as hustlers without options become pipers, and band launches will simply become curfew parties.
walk good.

others

2011-08-21T21:06:00.000-04:00

the problem with believing in mythical beings/creatures/others is there's so much more potentially out to get you. and jes 'cause you paranoid doh mean they not out to get you...walk good.

2011-08-18T11:18:00.004-04:00

thinking about how absolutely heart/gut/mind-wrenching being in love is and found myself wondering if that's the true root of my what-i-suddenly-wonder-is-fear-rather-than-unreadiness to make children...

walk good.

nonsense

2011-08-16T01:14:00.005-04:00

as if women getting dressed+undressed such that they always end up prancing around in bra+panties+heels when we all know high heels are last on and 1st off weren't bad enough, wha's the real scene with movie characters going to bathe with towel wrapped around them and dropping that shit on the floor while they fresh? who the fuck does that? who leaves the towel you wanna dry your clean self with on the floor, regardless of housekeeping standards? i call bullshit.

walk good.

patron needed; please apply

2011-08-09T05:20:00.001-04:00

the reality of my life is that some days, if it weren't for my mother i wouldn't eat. i call it the actor's/writer's diet: to do the work i desperately want to and do what keeps me most creatively productive, i make only barely enough $ to manage bare necessities so i have time to write furiously (which inevitably means that any emergency or unforeseen circumstance immediately renders me on the verge of eviction).

i see 2ways to write what calling me. i choose to freelance in the arts because it keeps me more creatively engaged and thus creatively productive and keeps my time flexible for the kinna ting that keeps me more creatively engaged+productive and writing. the problem with this way is how hard it is freelancing in the arts to make enough $ to afford the time to focus on the writing. the other way, which never wuk for me, is to get the day job, wuk mindlessly whole day everyday to come home tired to try+finish housekeeping to then try+write, exhausted and feeling uncreative. writing never makes any $ until it done and you find somebody who like it enough to back it, and bills hadda pay while writing still in process. i not saying it impossible. it's been done by millions and being done everyday and i technically doing it all now, at least until i fail, but i come closer more often than you know, so too often i despair. and it got me thinking: what would help my situation is a patron of the arts; a patron who understands that we not dealing in commissioned work, and what is created is what must be, giving them no creative control over what gets made while bills are paid; a patron only concerned with and trusting in my ability to make worthwhile contribution.

and as i realise this, i also realise this may be my only true fantasy.

walk good.

freedom.com6

2011-07-22T20:43:00.009-04:00

the purpose of human trafficking is always exploitation; nobody should be bound in servitude, treated as property, or denied their freedom.
with estimates of this hidden population at 10-30million, there are more enslaved now than at any other time in human history.
modern-day slavery, like modern racism, can be less obvious, more subtle than it used to be; but that doesn’t make it less real. we may not see workers whipped in fields and kitchens as we pass by plantation houses, but do we know anything about working conditions+arrangements for dishwashers in restaurants+bars we frequent, missing persons reported in the news every night; what happens to the “disappeared”?
our attorney general says there is no empirical evidence to show the existence of human trafficking in this country, while a sunday guardian investigative report claims: “…the clandestine local trade, which operates through a well-organised network and is supported by several powerful agencies, is linked to an international human trafficking ring…they are mostly used as sex slaves and sometimes for slave labour. sometimes, they are used to make payoffs in the drug trade…the lucrative human trafficking ring is operating in the cascade/st.anns area, between sangre grande and tunapuna, diego martin and in south…”
meanwhile, international reports state that the government of trinidad+tobago does not fully comply with minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, that child labour is rampant, from agriculture to loading+stocking goods to car washing+repair, construction, fishing, shop assistants, domestic servants, street vending, and sexual exploitation, and that for european and north american men interested in sex tourism, local tourist agencies and unlisted guesthouses offer package deals that include the cost of buying a woman.
all over the world: reports of people kidnapped, stripped of identification, violently violated to ensure fearful compliance, their families threatened to further terrorise them into obedience, and forced into servitude; “employers” keep all or most of what forced labourers earn, claiming for living expenses the enslaved must pay off to buy their freedom, at a rate higher than their wages.
trinidad+tobago is a regional hub for travel+transport of goods+services and we already know how this adds to local arms+ammunitions+drug trades; are we vigilant enough about being a destination, source and transit point for human trafficking? are we combating the internal trafficking of young girls from remote areas like guayaguayere, barrackpore, cedros, penal, drawn to “houses of ill repute” in our cities by ads promising to provide work or further education?
the purpose of human trafficking is always exploitation; nobody should be bound in servitude, treated as property, or denied their freedom.

walk good.

conscious

2011-07-16T16:37:00.006-04:00

never fails to amaze me, maxi/taxi drivers playing "conscious" music while perpetrating some of the nastiest bad drives on our roads...
lewwe bring a real consciousness:

slavery: the state of one bound in servitude as the property of a slaveowner or household; the practice of owning slaves; a mode of production in which slaves constitute the principal work force.
modern-day slaveholders call this debt bondage, bonded labour, attached labour, forced labour, indentured servitude, anything to avoid calling it what it is.
slavery and human trafficking is an international multibillion-dollar industry with the number of slaves worldwide estimated @10-30million. with slaves being a necessarily hidden demographic, these estimates may be lower than they are in actuality.
the current slave price of us$90 is a historic low, as compared with roughly $40,000 in today’s currency 200 years ago. 200years ago, slaves captured+traded each had a significant market value; it was good economic sense to keep them alive+functioning in spite of regularly horrific treatment. today’s market, especially in the sex trade, pushes a high rate of return in a short time, with the availability of people easy to make disappear aiding high turnover. the laws of supply+demand make modern-day slaves virtually disposable.
is slavery happening in our own backyard?
is china exporting their glut of men, the fallout from 30+ years under a 1child policy? chinese workers in trinbago live+work in substandard conditions, with no governmental concern for workers’ rights or their fundamental right to be treated like human beings.
are local businessmen tricking foreign workers into giving up their passports on arrival and working for barely-minimum wage with no means of return home due to paying off travel+living expenses?
why are so many young girls kidnapped in trinidad+tobago? what happens to the countless victims never found, dead or alive?
can the colombians, venezuelans or other south americans here leave establishments for workplaces not engaged in sexual exploitation?
can child soldiers in war-torn countries leave the servitude they are forced into when it so quickly becomes the only life they know in a world run by adults gone crazy?
the purpose of human trafficking is always exploitation: domestic+agricultural workers in our homes+fields, the sex industry, sweatshops, the black market sale of human organs…
the u.n. reports that 54% of recruiters+victims are strangers while 46% are known to each other, and a majority of suspects involved in the trafficking process are nationals of the country where the trafficking process is occurring.
u.n. trafficking protocol defines “human trafficking” as “the recruitment, transport, transfer, harbouring or receipt of a person by such means as threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, or fraud or deception for the purpose of exploitation…exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs…”
but what can we do?
each 1 of us can help, with students’ and educators’ research, making informed travel choices not supporting sex tourism, using purchasing power to influence companies’ ethical business practices in supply chains, choices regarding child labour, forced labour, and workers’ rights.
nobody should be bound in servitude, treated as property, or denied their freedom.
we can all work to end modern-day slavery now.

walk good.

dub plate #1; champions necessarily relinquish anonymity...

2011-07-10T23:31:00.055-04:00

listening to the gilles peterson danny rodigan special (rodigan inside the tardis??? whaaa!!! big tings a gwan...) with mar and the tenor saw plate ring the alarm (rodigan dub) made me must do it; anybody who know me for real know that queen's we are the champions is my theme song when i rule the world. every time i enter the space, it will play. [keep reading below while you listen...]

my dub plate lyrics, as-sung-in-my-head, still by queen:

she paid her dues

time after time

she earned the right

to say "this chune is mine"

made bad mistakes

maybe more than a few

she take her share of licks in this life

but bartels getting through

and she need to go on and on and on and on

she is a champion my friends

and she'll keep on fighting till the end

she is a champion

she is the champion

no time for losers

'cause bartels is champion

of the world

she took some bows

a few curtain calls

wasn't seeking fame and fortune and everyting that goes with it

but she thanks you all

it's been no bed of roses

no pleasure cruise

faced her challenges before the whole human race

and she not gonna lose

and she need to go on and on and on and on

she is a champion my friends

and she'll keep on fighting till the end

she is a champion

she is the champion

no time for losers

'cause bartels is champion

of the world

we are the champions my friends

and we'll keep on fighting till the end

oh we are the champions

we are the champions

no time for losers

bartels is champion...

walk good.

ps: how i's never remember how much i love dirtsman's hot dis year until i hear it start again, too few+far-between, and realise i actually miss it and then hadda go in mytunes to replay until i feel i get my fix? big chunes!

sweet trini wants to be a champion dub plate writer when she grows up...

more catch-up

2011-07-07T00:50:00.011-04:00

again, been sitting on this for too long, plus this repost is more for my own writerly purposes, but i figure we could all use some unexpected hilarity.

"the onion" january 12, 2010; karen robertson: kids, your mother is ready to start fucking again.

Jordan, Tyler, come here. Sit down. I wanted to speak to you today about something that's been on Mommy's mind a lot lately. As you know, it's been almost two whole years since your father passed away, and we all miss him very, very much. But after a long period of mourning, I think we've finally healed enough as a family to begin moving forward with our lives. So, after giving it a lot of thought, your mother has come to the decision that she is finally ready to start fucking again.

It's time, kids. Your mother can't go on grieving forever.

Now, I know you guys only want to think of me as just "Mom," and that's okay! Believe me, nothing brings me greater joy than being your Mom. But the truth is, I'm more than just the lady who tucks you in at night and used to kiss your boo-boos. I'm also a grown-up, and grown-ups have certain—how should I put this—needs that can only be met by other grown-ups. Very special needs. Like companionship. And affection. And the steady thrust of a man's engorged penis sliding ever so gently, deeper, deeper, inside of her.

What I'm trying to say is sometimes your mother gets lonely and feels like spending some time with a person her own age. A special friend, you might say. A special friend who will tenderly lick your mother's breasts, and her clitoris, and maybe pull her hair when she asks him to. But I want you to know that I am not trying to replace your father, okay? Your father will always be your father, and no one could ever replace him. This isn't about that.

This is about finding a well-hung fuck-stud to shove his manhood inside of Mommy and, with any luck, bring her to a shattering climax. A man—any man—who will fuck her hard and fuck her soft and fuck her however she wants it, whenever she desires.

Believe me, kids, if your father were still around to slam me silly, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. But he's not, and I know this is exactly what he would have wanted. You'll understand when you're older.

And please don't think that once I get a little deep dicking things won't be the same around here. You might worry that these new friends I'm inviting back to my bedroom at all hours of the night to turn me inside out will become more important to me than you. Well, let me tell you right now: Even an 18-year-old quarterback with a face like Johnny Depp's and the dong of a Clydesdale could never, ever make me forget that you are the most important things in my life. His perfect, smooth cock would still pale in comparison to you two. Even if it had a big thick throbbing head.

And no, you won't have to call this person daddy. I will, but you don't have to.

Oh, my perfect little angels. This must seem so unfair to you. Here we are, finally getting settled into our new lives, and now I go and throw another curveball at you. I'm sure this is all very confusing, and I know you guys must think it's too soon for your mother to get screwed so hard her fillings come loose. To get porked rotten. To have her sugar wall churned into cotton candy. To taste the sweaty tang of a man's thickening shaft. To have her ass ridden raw all the way to San Antonio. To break it off so nasty that the very angels in heaven have to avert their eyes. To be thrown around like a rag doll, back and forth, upside down, fucked, stuffed, and eaten out till she honks like a goose. To have her anus drilled like a well of West Texas crude. To get split in half by Dominicans twins with balls like grape melons. But trust me, Mommy is ready for all of these things, and I promise you that everything will turn out fine. Just remember: I'm your mother, and I love you more than anything in the whole wide world. Even multiple orgasms. Never forget that.

Now, who wants a grilled cheese?

and another bonus i been meaning to share: lcd soundsystem (who, of course, i only discover when they done).

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

LCD Soundsystem - I Can Change

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor & Satire Blog

Video Archive

walk good.

there is hope

2011-07-04T16:41:00.019-04:00

lovely visit today made me feel better about life, the universe and everything, so i hadda big-up the purveyors of these hope-coloured glasses i sporting. 2youths i know through their brilliant parents came to lime with me and the whole time i couldn't stop thinking: my friends are bes' parents raising youths ready to take on whaever this crazy life brings- yay! (confession: i totally did a happy dance afterwards...)

this brother+sister come from, even by today's standards, an unusually complicated family structure, yet are 2 of the most well-adjusted folks i know, adults included. lise+keif+vic doing an excellent job with legreat + the boychick (najaa wasn't with us today) and it made me so happy to feel for a change like the future might be in good hands. legreat and the boychick real tight, which is wonderful to see, especially as they didn't grow up together, from different countries and had no connection and didn't even know each other for the 1st half of their lives. but these 2 have clearly claimed each other as siblings and watching their interaction, catching kicks on them telling stories about each other, hearing them talk everything from art to politics to relationships, made my cynical soul glad; intelligence, independent thinking, commonsense, openness to the universe and its endless forms most beautiful...today was a love day; big-up my extended family...walk good.

dunno why i took so long to post this; been sitting on it since...

2011-06-29T13:10:00.010-04:00

makes me excited: enticingly-expressed praise of apparently beautifully-rendered homage to delicious writing. walk good.

And Another Thing... Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Part Six of Three by Eoin Colfer
Douglas Adams is re-born in Eoin Colfer's masterful prose, says Euan Ferguson, The Observer, Sunday 11 October 2009.
The Hitchhiker phenomenon has always, I suspect, been personal and subjective, not global. Depending on how you came to it – books, radio series, film – its legions of fans have always taken from it something slightly different. I always thought all the things that were meant to be "funny" – the towels and don't panic posters, the people who this weekend will wear dressing-gowns at a convention – were rubbish. The recent film didn't get the jokes at all, and even the TV series failed the instant it tried to transfer a written gag – Zaphod's second head – to the screen. No, the joy was in reading and rereading Adams's prose: the sly delight in word- and plot-play, the perfect ear, the serendipity of onomatopoeia in the English language and the careful fusion of apparently randomly loopy scenarios with insight and a Point.
Thus, when this comes along, the first book since Adams's untimely death in 2001, both excitement and trepidation are felt. Eoin Colfer, author of the hugely popular teen Artemis Fowl series, has been sanctioned in the project by Adams's widow, and there has been great expectation, but also a great many people going, quietly, good Lord, it would be so easy for him to get it wrong – one hint of a tin ear, one echo of a cracked bell and it's doomed.
Within pages, it's clear this is a triumph. Colfer has pulled off the near-impossible. It's faithful to Adams's humour and, more important, it's also got his rhythm, the cadences and the footfalls that made his style so often (badly) imitated. But Colfer doesn't shy from introducing his own brand of wit, his own complex logic confettis. It's the work of an author who can write anyway, with a beautiful, vaulting imagination, and who obviously loves Adams's style so much he can echo it without falsity or accidental parody. There is not a lazy sentence.
It is also, as it were, updated. It would have been wilful of Colfer not to acknowledge the changes that have taken place in our, the allegedly real, world since Adams's first book was published 30 years ago – the internet and, in general, our far greater sophistication with computers – so he's unafraid to bandy about talk of downstreaming and uploading.
There's not much, this time round, of Arthur Dent. This is perhaps inevitable, in that Arthur was, basically, in his mild grumpiness and faint air of confusion, Adams himself. There's a welcome return for Arthur's daughter, Random, who's busy raising teenage truculence to new levels and, what's more, getting to do so on a bewildering new array of planets.
It's picky to say the plot makes no sense. It makes as much sense as any plot would which involved the likes of warring gods, three or four alternative earths, a corrupt joke-Irish property developer, a complex battle involving a cheese-based deity and a young Vogon damned by the possession of aesthetic sense and, worse, a conscience.
If there's any downside to this mainly fabulous first effort, it's that there's just too much of it. The real Adams books were increasingly short, I think. So Long and Thanks for All the Fish, for instance was, I seem to remember, of such staggering slimness that you had to quickly read it three times in succession – not a problem – to get your money's worth. Here, for all its fitful brilliance, there's simply too much, even of the fitful brilliance. It's too long, the "Guide" footnotes are too comprehensive, the "further reading" gags too frequent.
But these quibbles were a struggle to find and even the sainted Adams wasn't above the occasional infuriatingly indulgent longueur, such as basing the whole of his least good book on an extended metaphor involving cricket. Colfer has given us a delight, and an eye-opener, and hope, and, close as this book does on the line "The end of one of the middles", the near-promise of more to come.

plus a metaphor i liked; bonus excerpt, from AN OPEN LETTER TO THE INANIMATE OBJECTS IN MY APARTMENT THAT JUST SAT THERE WHILE I WAS HEARTBROKEN. by stef willen; from timothy mcsweeney's:
"Allow me to give you all a brief lesson in the human condition. Humans are about 70% water, and the rest is guts, bone and minerals. But, because we are highly evolved animals, we tend to think of ourselves as fat, dull, empty and stupid. We are such a successful species that there are currently 6,792,256,639 of us on the planet—all of us frightened of being alone. We cannot be left on a shelf to sit, like you Wide Slot Toaster. When I leave you way up high on a shelf and forget about you and reach up and dust all around you but never touch you (not even once!!) you still have a purpose: making toast. When this happens to a human, that person forgets their purpose and goes around letting all the wrong people touch them."

2fer; oldies but goodies

2011-06-24T12:03:00.005-04:00

my boys from waaay baaack, i hadda share this image of all 4canals+chee (pulled from chee's fasbook archive); my favourites, only missing my lovely nico, but he inside this moment in spirit...
and below, some bruce lee action that made me feel like an inferior human being, but in that good make-me-push-myself way...walk good.

10 myths about introverts

2011-06-21T14:59:00.004-04:00

just a thought...read the whole article @ http://www.carlkingcreative.com/10-myths-about-introverts:
myth #1 – introverts don’t like to talk.
this is not true. introverts just don’t talk unless they have something to say. they hate small talk. get an introvert talking about something they are interested in, and they won’t shut up for days.
myth #2 – introverts are shy.
shyness has nothing to do with being an introvert. introverts are not necessarily afraid of people. what they need is a reason to interact. they don’t interact for the sake of interacting. if you want to talk to an introvert, just start talking. don’t worry about being polite.
myth #3 – introverts are rude.
introverts often don’t see a reason for beating around the bush with social pleasantries. they want everyone to just be real and honest. unfortunately, this is not acceptable in most settings, so introverts can feel a lot of pressure to fit in, which they find exhausting.
myth #4 – introverts don’t like people.
on the contrary, introverts intensely value the few friends they have. they can count their close friends on one hand. if you are lucky enough for an introvert to consider you a friend, you probably have a loyal ally for life. once you have earned their respect as being a person of substance, you’re in.
myth #5 – introverts don’t like to go out in public.
nonsense. introverts just don’t like to go out in public for as long. they also like to avoid the complications that are involved in public activities. they take in data and experiences very quickly, and as a result, don’t need to be there for long to “get it”. they’re ready to go home, recharge, and process it all. in fact, recharging is absolutely crucial for introverts.
myth #6 – introverts always want to be alone.
introverts are perfectly comfortable with their own thoughts. they think a lot. they daydream. they like to have problems to work on, puzzles to solve. but they can also get incredibly lonely if they don’t have anyone to share their discoveries with. they crave an authentic and sincere connection with one person at a time.
myth #7 – introverts are weird.
introverts are often individualists. they don’t follow the crowd. they’d prefer to be valued for their novel ways of living. they think for themselves and because of that, they often challenge the norm. they don’t make most decisions based on what is popular or trendy.
myth #8 – introverts are aloof nerds.
introverts are people who primarily look inward, paying close attention to their thoughts and emotions. it’s not that they are incapable of paying attention to what is going on around them, it’s just that their inner world is much more stimulating and rewarding to them.
myth #9 – introverts don’t know how to relax and have fun.
introverts typically relax at home or in nature, not in busy public places. introverts are not thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies. if there is too much talking and noise going on, they shut down. their brains are too sensitive to the neurotransmitter called dopamine. introverts and extroverts have different dominant neuro-pathways. just look it up.
myth #10 – introverts can fix themselves and become extroverts.
a world without introverts would be a world with few scientists, musicians, artists, poets, filmmakers, doctors, mathematicians, writers, and philosophers. Ttat being said, there are still plenty of techniques an extrovert can learn in order to interact with introverts. (yes, i[sic] reversed these two terms on purpose to show you how biased our society is.) introverts cannot “fix themselves” and deserve respect for their natural temperament and contributions to the human race. in fact, one study (Silverman, 1986) showed that the percentage of introverts increases with IQ.

walk good.

prison story

2011-06-17T13:14:00.004-04:00

when they came she was readying herself to go teach, wearing only a leotard pulled up to her waist, food warming on the stove, about to eat+dress+ride. when the unfamiliar voice call out, she ask who and the response come: “police”. figuring some friend playing the arse, she throw on a jersey and go to find 2officers on her gallery, guns drawn. she say she not dressed and run back for the 1st shorts she could grab, then come out onto the gallery to try to keep them out of her space.

they claim they see her plant from the road and come to investigate and while she and anybody who'd been there know you cyah see that from the road, they were already on the gallery, guns drawn, so later for figuring out that part.

the officers claim the illegal plant give them the right to search her person and the premises; the subordinate officer all about protocol, insisting on searching, while the superior officer mejias just want to take her to the station for her person to be searched by a female officer. the subordinate came inside alone with her following closely, terrified, remembering her stash sitting on her bedside table. he start at the furthest point, her bedroom, lifted the mattress but didn’t open the floor-to-ceiling wardrobe or move anything on the open bookshelf stuffed with clothes or look in either of the full laundry hampers or any bags, look straight past the ziplock containing her stash, and ask her to open the wooden box next to it. she open the box, explaining that it was a gift and came full, a care package, as and the lid fall open she mutter a surprised curse at the forgotten (untouched for over a year) small emergency stash sitting right on top.

she worrying about the room her landlord uses for storage and keeps locked because she know it must seem like a grow-room and didn't think they’d believe she have nutting in there, never seen the inside of it, have no key to it...but when the officer left the bedroom, after his cursory glance around her storage room where he open no bags or boxes or crates or filing cabinet, and his non-venture into the bathroom area, when they reach the spare room and he try the doorhandle to find it locked, she explains, expecting him to break the door down, but he simply nod, doh even ask who her landlord is or make any further attempt to get into the room. she realise these officers on shit.

he glance around the kitchen but doh open any cabinets or fridge/freezer. in the livingroom he move no furniture or cushions, pulls not 1book from the hundreds on the shelves, look straight past the small bag of seeds on the table, and pick up her bong and ask what she's smoke in it. she say, "loose tobacco", he put it down and leave it right there, no attempt to check her story even though he grab the big bag of stems from the table right next to the same bong.

they say they taking her to the area police station to be searched by a female officer and charged with cultivation+possession. she say she have 50students waiting on her to teach and could they pretty please come back and arrest her 1st thing in the morning, or even wait for her outside her class if they want and take her right after, but they insist on now. she ask to get dressed to go as she have barely anyting on, they concede, and she went inside and changed clothes, unwatched, not bothering to point out the uselessness of searching her person now.

they take her+plants+stash to the station in their vehicle; superior officer mejias ask how much she's pay in rent, which she doh see for what it is in the moment, and simply answers. the female officer pointlessly strip search her and lock her in a cell. she wait for ages with other officers with no connection to her case wandering in to ask if the plants+stash were hers, shocked+awed at the affirmative response, until mejias come to take her personal and identifying information. when she answer "soon-to-be-divorced" he ask if he could take her soon-to-be-ex-husband’s position, then put her mobile number in his phone right in front of her after writing it on the form. she ask, "what the fuck?" and he say how after all this, he want come and see her to "reason" about how she end up in this situation.

he ask if she have scars and she say “yes”, same question+answer about tattoos, and he enter both yesses on the form with no qualifying information or inspection and she realise why criminals never get caught in this place. he say they taking her to another station for criminal processing but waiting on the rain to stop to get back in the vehicle. eventually en route, she say she eh get her 1phonecall and ask to ring her friend who was supposed to be meeting her home to come get her. they hand her back her own mobile to make the call, saying that’s not actually allowed.

she's instantly abused by asshole female officer wpc#17159joseph-francis on arrival for processing because they weren’t supposed to let her keep personal effects and now everything hadda be inventoried and she vex with the prisoner for that. wpc#17159 rough her up while taking her phone and driver's licence and was loudly verbally abusive during inventory, shouting for whole station to hear, uninvolved civilians out front included, "where the rest of the shit for the drugs?!" when she find a single clean rolling paper and the prisoner say quietly that rolling papers not illegal and sold over the counter all over the country. wpc#17159 shout+cuss some more that the inmate is to say nutting unless asked, and continue abusing her about non-existent drug paraphernalia, saying there must be crack rocks among her belongings. she was physically manhandled the entire time; found a plethora of little cuts+bruises on her body the next day. wpc#17159 grab her by the scruff of her neck and manhandle her into the search room, make her strip again, and when she try to hand over the leotard, explaining she didn’t want to throw what had to clothe her vagina on the floor, she get abused some more and made to drop it on the floor, to then be picked up and “searched”. she had to squat+cough and get rough-up some more while naked, then dressed and was manhandled out the room and into the 1st cell, already occupied.

outside the cell, leaning on the wall in the corridor was a bite-up piece of foam her cellmate, deidre, inform her was the “mattress” that the cleaner took out the cell earlier and deidre’d been asking to have it put back in for hours, to no avail. on top of it were clothes deidre say belong to a dude they strip search in the cell-corridor right in front of her and apparently put in a cell naked. dudes in cells down the corridor complaining about not being allowed to bathe for days.

deidre takes a shit and the new prisoner learns the toilet is a porcelain bowl inset into the floor so they had to squat over it, then ask officers to flush it from outside the cell, which officers then take hours to do. deidre apparently had been asking for the necessary toilet paper for hours prior, which they grudgingly provided only after putting the new inmate inside.

the new prisoner was there for hours with nothing happening except cellmates shouting and screaming for baths, toiletpaper, water, the never-given 1phonecall, deidre tryna get her children who doh know where she is for 2days now because she get no phonecall to get her medication since stealing the chicken to feed them; an officer eventually make calls for her to organise the meds but she never get to make her 1call. a male officer come to take the new prisoner's info for the same form mejias already filled out. even though they inventory+itemise+holding her personal belongings, he ask if she have a driver's licence. he ask about her height+weight and eye+hair colour, and she, angry at the unwarranted abuse by wpc#17159, say she have no mirror and he looking at her and have her driver's licence in custody so he could tell her. he ask what kinna hairstyle she have, she say figure it out himself, but when he keep asking she state the obvious, "canerows". he say that not on the list and when she ask what her options are and he say “rasta”, she refuse because she not rastafarian, but the requested “dreadlocks” wasn’t an option. he show her the form, listing about 10choices, including: rasta, natty/picky, nappy, long, and straight/jhericurl. wondering in what universe "straight" and "jhericurl" the same, she choose natty, although she also suggested long, since her locks come down to her backside. he selected “cauliflower” to describe her ears, then ask if she have scars. she say yes and he actually ask where and she say, “all over; boy days” and he went no further; she said "yes, several" about tattoos and he went no further; still no pictures of identifying marks taken.

she wait hours then was dragged out by wpc-bitch to be fingerprinted by a different female officer, who apparently could do the intricate work of applying false eyelashes when donning in her uniform but cyah fingerprint worth a fuck: too much ink on the fingers to get a clear print, everything smudged, plus when this wpc fuck it up she redip the already-too-inky finger and try to line it up to reprint on the same spot already smudged, as though one could possibly hope to line up fingerprint whorls. 3copies of the form, each finger and whole hand printed on each and the prisoner done know she’ll have to redo all. thankfully the boss reach just before the 3rd copy and tell her what the prisoner coulda long time, and start them over. the whole process took more than a half-hour.

going to fingerprint she saw her friend there to post bail but wpc#17159 was clearly processing on go-slow on purpose. more time, then another dude come to take mugshots; still no pictures of tattoos or scars. even more time then wpc-bitch call her outside and tell her to sign off on a sheet of paper. she reading what she signing and get cuss for taking long, she explain she reading it and the information inaccurate (height+weight+hair+eyecolour all wrong) and wpc#17159 shout+cuss that she looking for an excuse to say the prisoner wouldn’t sign and could thus be denied bail. the prisoner try to say she not refusing, just doh know if she should correct the form then sign, or if officers hadda correct it. wpc#17159 cuss her again and shove her back in the cell without allowing her to sign. prisoner shouting from the cell that she didn’t refuse to sign is ignored. hours later they let her friend call a judge to sign off on her release and pay bail.

mejias had said she had to be in court for 9am, then later said 1pm; the judge who signed off on her going home for the night said 9am, and when she ask, he say it should be 1pm because charge cases get called@1pm but if they choose to call the case earlier and she not there she breaking terms of the bail agreement, her friend in jeopardy, $ already paid is forfeited and full bail would be $75,000.
mejias ring her mobile around midnight just after she finally reach home, saying he’d be in court for 1pm. he ask if she have to pay back her friend the bail$ and when she say, of course, he say, doh worry, "we" will take care of all these tings after trial.

next day, court make her friend tuck his shirt in his pants, case call in the afternoon; mejias message to say he in 1 of the courtrooms and where she? when police bring in her 2plants, the whole courtroom gasp, shocked+awed, and again when her stash was presented, lawyers+bailiffs turning around to ask if tha’s she own. judge call her case, she step up, heart in her mouth as they read the charges, but before her turn to speak, police request a delay because they eh do trace yet. her case called back next day; as she leaves, an old dude tell her: "you’s a boss!"

next day, en route to court, the same man see her in the road and stop to give her a bounce and tell her again, she’s a boss. different female judge; they buff her friend for sitting with his legs crossed once their pew empty enough for him to have room, and after hours of proceedings a bailiff finally notice an old man in an untucked dashiki and actually call him over to tell him leave and tuck in his shirt, as though he hadn’t been there, undisruptive, for hours.

same reaction when the evidence come in again; she tells the truth about her habits of biological recycling, admits stupidity in keeping the plant when it sprung up unexpected because of her turning all biological matter back into the soil, explains she knew she couldn’t do anything illegal with it and tha's why she thought it was ok to let it live, plant-lover that she is; the only untruth was saying she doh smoke anymore, supported by the obvious age of the stash and the officer's admittance that she was as surprised as he to see it in the box. she wisely didn’ bother to point out errors in the police report (they never showed badges or said anything about her rights like they claim) even though she wanted to, figuring she shouldn’t bring up their incompetence unless she needed to, to fight her case. she got off. the judge could tell she eh tryna make trouble, and made her promise to go through the flat and get rid of anything illegal left. she ask for her plant pots back and judge say she could collect them at the station.

mejias rang several times after the case cleared, sometimes from different digits to trick her into answering but she refuse to engage. a couple weeks later mejias followed her friend leaving her place after midnight and pulled him over a few blocks away; when mejias recognise him, he acknowledged, say he was checking who it was, and let him go. her friend circled back to warn her police still watching, and mejias came back behind him, put on the siren to call him outside, and after raised voices for maybe half-hour, they left separately. when he reach home her friend ring and say they basically harassed him about nothing and he said as much to them. since the night he tell mejias it seem he being unjustly harassed, she eh hear back from mejias, although he still drives by.
later talk with the downstairs neighbour reveal that the officers came to her downstairs door first, guns drawn, with talk of hearing about marijuana, confirming that they never saw the plant from the road like they claim- from the road, and definitely from the time you enter the yard, if you looking at plants on her upstairs gallery, the staircase to get to them is immediately obvious, so if they see the plant they woulda come straight to her gallery+door where it was. now she know the whole ting was a setup for mejias to get in her drawers and watching anxiously to see if he return.
this is the true story, to date. draw your own conclusions, make of it what you will: this is how police handling tings in sweet t+t...walk good.

classic

2011-06-11T18:53:00.002-04:00

courtesy ma: scrunter, the will.

walk good.

get by with a little help...

2011-06-06T14:25:00.003-04:00

recent tragic events make me reevaluate who my true friends are. i usually say i have very good judgement of character when it comes to choosing friends. is why i rarely break up with friends or lock off people who previously claimed importance in my life, is why all my exes are still pardners except for the 1 who turned out to be a pathological liar (and he was never actually my man, someting i thank aforementioned good judgement for), why i still/always have the same friends except for a (very)few happy additions over the las' 15years.

since grims, i find my judgement not quite as good, or at least, not as good at determining who has the strength to remain and retain the self i was drawn to, under pressure. and i say that in an effort to give the benefit of the doubt; i'd like to believe that without external pressures and/or the ones they create for themselves all by themselves, such offenders could continue being the person i fell for. i wish it weren't true, but it seems that too many men cyah manage their shit, while general society accuses women of being the crazy ones. too many cyah deal with the fucked-up situations they themselves create, even while being warned the entire time of wha' they doing.

so i done. i safe- i have a few very good people i been with for years, and literally 3 additions in the last 3years who done prove themselves, and i good dey. i have plenty. i very fortunate, and need no more, because allyuh's jes bring drama while denying doing it, then run away from the mess you make with that shit, jes like grims, and i not fucking having it. so thank you, but applications are closed off, and i'll stick with the good peoples i already lucky enough to have in my life. and in each aforementioned category, i know you know who you are, so thank you, where applicable, and i done, where applicable...

walk good.

what pi sounds like

2011-05-21T10:38:00.002-04:00

walk good.

beautiful+sad

2011-05-20T11:33:00.002-04:00

and with a positive outcome. when i read celebrating my father i felt compelled to say someting to lise, went to comment on the post, and didn' know what i even wanted to say, except that her writing moved me, and thank you, both for the writing of it and the content and its manifestation. so then i figured i should share; read that 1st link.

walk good.

phagwa fail

2011-04-26T08:18:00.071-04:00

phagwa within a month of jouvay too good to be true, ent?

without caption, this photo suggest something completely unlike what actually happen. this photo suggest that me+tillah+al+makeda reach phagwa in chaguanas as planned and had a wonderful, joyous time. what actually happen is al had a time and got gorgeous photos and end up with a pink+green head but missing the crew, me+tillah wanted to kill our so-called friends and only reach as ting done after an afternoon of trials enough to bring 2tough women to the verge of tears, and makeda never reach at all- not that i have any damn symapthy for she at this point.

why? wabbiness. and it wasn't even keshav, for once.

i know i going phagwa since jouvay, me+al done talk, me+tillah done talk. as the day reach, i tell al i go roll with tillah and find him in chaguanas as he coming from couva. i link tillah, she say meet her by kesh, makeda driving up from there; check wanki+ria for a drop 'cause they supposed to come by kesh too. safe.

i hail wanki+ria, no answer. no scene. i eh business to travel by kesh- and is a good ting, 'cause walking from the busroute to kesh+shyam flat is all the phagwa i get in the end.

aranguez savannah had ting, i watching+walking, listening to tassa cutting in over the gyazette in my ears, make it halfway 'round the savannah and somebody squirt me with abeer by accident, all apologies. i turn+smile, knowing wha' i expect to look like in a few hours, and like that give everybody permission- old indian man run up on me, paint my face and anoint my head with yellow and while my eyes still closed, buss a kiss on my mouth and run away giggling.

i reach kesh, glad. tillah call to check i reach, she coming now, makeda supposed to pass for 3pm. kesh talking 'bout coming and we even get him to bathe before makeda reach to cut back the wait. we on it. 3.30pm come+go, no makeda, no answer on her phone. but then wanki finally wake up and call kesh, he+ria on the way now, then going 'guanas, so we say we might as well wait for them and all ride 1time. 4pm come+go, no makeda, no answer, no wanki+ria. we wait. after 4pm we finally hear back from wanki+ria, they hungry and now going by ria mudda to eat (i.e. still in town, so much for "en route"). we sour. finally get makeda on the the phone, she say she now done cook(!) and leaving to come for us. so we on. we wait. 4.30pm come+go and makeda was coming from 10minutes away. we wait. we go downstairs+outside so we could pile in and ride out 1time. we wait. 5pm reach, no makeda, no answer, no wanki+ria, me+tillah know we coulda travel ages ago and still had a real phagwa. al say ting swinging. we upset.

after 5pm kesh remember otto in his building wukkin on an a.c. so we check otto to see wha' he saying, if he wanna make the run as he have the truck. timing! he wrapping up, he go go. yay! as we waiting downstairs we see otto almost all the way upstairs to kesh top-floor flat, we hail him loud, he come all the way down, everyting seem to be happening ridiculously slow. otto ask us wha' phagwa like then say he wanna change clothes because he like what he have on, doh wanna lose it to abeer. i grind my teeth while kesh give otto a detailed description of every single option in kesh closet for otto to try+remember, and send otto back up the stairs to the top floor to change. i intervene and make kesh go with him to make the search faster+easier. but is keshav and a wardrobe change opportunity. them girls was another 15minutes while i tryna not cry in public.

we finally get in the truck, loving otto now, drive out, excitement building even though we doh expect to catch more than a 15minutes+dregs, if that. but we liming, have drinks, and en route. breathing again.

we in 'guanas, turning onto the road taking us straight to the nagar when al bbm, ting wrapping up...nooo!!! we so close...we say we going for the dregs and to at least get food, because me+tillah move same way, we know we was going phagwa and save we belly for indian treats whole day and now is 6pm and we starving. so we still going. we wait too long to not go.

then we meet the post-phagwa traffic leaving the nagar. i coulda cry the whole las' 15minutes of the trip; i only seeing people passing me grinning slashes of white across purple, red, fuschia, green, blue faces...we cyah get close because of the hordes of painted people leaving taking up our lane, al saying the nagar ground emptying, i so depressed. but we finally reach, my aranguez savannah yellow dry+crumbling.

i immediately get a cup of channa as the sky darkens, otto pelt me with some pretty pink powder, me+al walk down the road a little to find a house+land with a gate but no fence, like my uncle keith's...minutes later my unquenchable love of the inappropriate make me tell ravi-ji and some older ladies chatting with tillah+kesh about the day we missed all about my exchange with a youth man who accused me of feeling up his channa...an ironically sweet ending to a frustrating day right down to my post-phagwa skirt not being nearly as colourful as i hoped, now not to be worn again until nex' phagwa make it right...we saw some lagniappe revellers splashing themselves purple out of the back of a van but in the dark i knew their abeer was too cold for me and stayed away, jealous...i cyah get no...

...satisfaction...

walk good.

endless rain into a paper cup...do it!

2011-04-20T03:26:00.006-04:00

click the squares...walk good.

trickle down aspirations; trickle up economics

2011-04-13T10:18:00.003-04:00

big-up mar for directing me to this article; thought it did a good job of illuminating connections too many pretend doh exist and/or doh affect us all. those at the top of the economic ladder only think they can indefinitely ignore the rest of us.

walk good.

erotica-in-progress

2011-04-07T12:44:00.003-04:00

her body is beauty finally revealed, every time
every time is a first time, first time in the history of firsts, of time itself
curves like lush hillsides, smooth brown skin almost green in homage, areolas are bursts of poui blossoms puckering in mouth-warmed winds, lips are kisses even without contact.

her body is its own world of softness and soft heat inviting and enticing, inciting and delighting, while eyes try to hide their warmth, try to hide their depth, hide behind hair, under hair, inside hair, inside my mind, eye in my mind building desire…
she is beauty revealed, finally
finally showing herself delicately wrapped in love and lights turned down low, cautiously venturing her heart, her all silently breathing at its heels, everything even more than possibly imagined, more beautiful, more eternal, this gift.
finally, beauty revealed to my mind and hand
palpable
sensible to feeling as to light
touch elevated, fingers become feathers become tongues, liquid limbs become leather straps gripping and groping, grabbing each others flesh, curves, flowering hillsides, sliding on skin lightly moistened with sweet sweat, neck arched impossibly fragile strong shoulders heaving jaw fighting biting air as she twists she bucks she comes for the first time, first time of many this time, first death, life, universe birthed into damp nothing pulsing with the potential of being, she mounts straddles rides climbs her way up into highest wildest jungle, tangling hands in hair, hair and hands everywhere like breath panting into hidden ears, onto thighs rising into heaven crashing pounding river flowing gushing rushing pushing up+outward ever rising spilling…

…crickets’+cocquis’ hallelujah chorus fade into silence with consciousness…

walk good.

fff#39

2011-03-31T20:02:00.013-04:00

again, inspiration (separately) courtesy salcedo+alooicious, another reimagining, griot's jestina's calypso; my flash fiction friday #39 (inclusion)trigger: rain, reign, rein, stair, stare, steer. walk good.

youth, you mightn’ know it watching me here now, but griot come like playboy of the west indies in meh day. back then, the ladies love to see me when i step out, cuttin’ it crips in meh bespoke suit.
but every sagaboy sweetman mus’ have one from he past that get away…
jestina…ah, boy, jestina…jestina was woman. you eh know woman until you meet this woman; this woman is woman mudda. when i tell you, no other woman like jestina.
she wasn’t pretty, eh. no. she wasn’ never dat. but she walk the road head high and never take no shit from nobody, never let the ole talk pull she down. and ugly for so. yes, fadda, i could say it- for a brief+blessed time i had the privilege to call jestina my woman, so i could say it: she ugly. ugly for spite, ugly until she beautiful; jestina face legendary. and you could always tell the rare one who eh know; when they see she, they cyah help it, trying all how not to get make out but they cyah help but stare. when it was me standing nex’ to she i watch back, boldface, hard hard to show them, yes, i know you think she ugly, but i know she bes’ and i proud to stand up nex’ to she as she man.
the boys used to real pong she, every day every day them fellas have something to tell me until after time pass they realise me eh taking them on and they start to respec’ we ting. they eh know wha’ it is, but they see i moving with she right through and taking talk and still happy like pappy and not leaving she alone. so the ole talk eventually stop. for me. but never for jestina. even if neighbours eventually get bored and leave she, the world’s endless supply of chirren tirelessly cruel.
a time we walking home in the rain. i have meh arm round she waist, liking how she feel, slightly damp, holding me tight in the cold drizzle to warm her, cyah wait to reach she inside. and when we pass these youths jumping up in they yard bathing in the rain start to chant behind we, “long reign jestina, queen of ugliness!”
i wanted to snatch up my jestina and run ‘way with she, rush straight back to the flat upstairs picton street, pack up nutting but she smallest bathing suit and take she off to some desert island where me+she could be alone, nobody around who cyah appreciate the woman she was. i did real love that woman. but she prince fly in from foreign and take she back. i mean, i mighta love she bad bad, but back then, wha’ i could offer a woman like that?
jestina had one sweet body, smooth and muscular, but curves, a real woman body. the face mightna’ be nutting, but the body…boooyyy…and she could cook! if you only taste this woman hand you put she in house one time. and like she making stew-chicken from thin air, because them days i never had a dollar self to let my woman buy something special for we for dinner every now+then. and still that woman throw down in the kitchen, no matter how little she had to wuk with. she real look after yuh boy. bes’ ting…all i had was a little small hustle. how i keeping a woman like that?
i try my bes’, eh. everyting else i coulda do, i do- stop checking other gyal, rein back in the liming with the boys little bit, pick up after meself in the flat, help she maintain the place, nah…i woulda do anyting i thought woulda keep she. but with no real prospects, when the man come for she, what i could say? i love you? nah man, love not enough, not enough to put food on she table and nice clothes on she back and jewellery+shoes to go with the frock…and jestina deserve all them ting, i wanted to gi’ she them ting, was wukkin on all them ting, but the man reach and my house eh in order yet, so…
i watch she go. she pack up the upstairs flat on picton street, i take my few tings back by my mudda, and that was that, although even after i move my tings i stay with she right up until the man come. every night i would try and go by my mudda house and instead find myself on jestina front step. and she was good to me even then, she let me in, feed me, let me sleep in she bed, and never make me feel like i was less man for not saying, “stay, and lemme take care of you…” i think she know i wanted to but know too she couldn’t wait on me to be ready, neither…she was older than me and used to talk ‘bout wanting a family, and he was taking she to a whole new life where she didn’ need to wuk in no parlour and could cock up she foot and let him mind she and all the chirren she wanted to make…
take wha’ i telling you and doh let yuh boys and they stupid talk steer you wrong: get your business in order. when the woman come along that make you want to be the bes’ man you could be, you bes’ had be ready, ‘cause no amounta pummpumm will make missing out on she less fuckup. trust me, that is the one sorrow you cyah drown in punani.

the unbearable sadness of jouvay and too-small mas

2011-03-14T11:14:00.061-04:00

walking up the avenue from cut+clear to the corner by the stadium where trucks await, where we meet the band, become the band, where music+bodies+vibes congregate to start the only orgy i ever been interested in, not for the sex but for self and the leggo of self and becoming more self than self in losing self, selfless...walking up the avenue to meet the band is the saddest moment. this is when i realise ting about to start and i excited but so sad because now is a matter of mere hours before the bes' part of the year, of life, perhaps, done with no more for a whole nother year. i almost cyah bear the moments before jouvay start because it already nearly done.

stop typing to clear tears enough to watch my heart take shape in black letters onscreen; i know i not ready to write this yet, this is why every year my carnival post ridiculously late, or never, like las' year, drafted but unpublished, unfinished, it makes me too sad. but i have tabs open on my screen days now, i somehow cyah read wha' anybody else say this year until i finally say wha' i wanna say every year. i trying to not let the tears wash away the words this year and ironically, it might be because of some photographs so wonderful they truly doh need my thousand-words, that make me wish i was there every time i see them even though i was, photos of a carnival season culminating is a bes' jouvay that show me myself so joyful+powerful i sometimes didn't recognise that girl when the photographer showed them to me. al*s gorgeous captures of the show+jouvay remind me that recording a response to these moments and experiences is wha' i here for, for those of us who aren't.

anybody who know me can tell you how i start vocalising my longing for jouvay jus' before christmas, when i feel i cyah keep it to myself no more, 9months long enough. then after ole years night i start asking in earnest: is time for jouvay yet? then once the 3canal show start rehearsing i feel like surely it mus' be tomorrow any day now, and when the show open i on the verge of exploding every time i realise i still have daaays to wait after waiting the longest year of my life for this nex' jouvay, the las' one always sooo looong agooo...my excitement builds, i feel i eh go make it, cyah stop asking if is time yet, i start walking in the middle of the road from canboulay carnival friday morning 5am, think i'ma die if the las' days doh pass right now in this breath, until walking up the avenue, all my excitement melts into sadness at the imminent end of the bes' time ever and i almost cry in the road. i keep it together though, put on my jouvay warrior face for the characters out there with me and know that once i hit the corner and paint and laventille riddim section hit me i will know nutting mostly, for the nex' brief eternity, except the few random moments when i look out of my joy long enough to see those sharing it with me and know we will not be together like this again for a whole nother year.

my sadness is similar when people ask if i play mas and i say: nah, jouvay is all i need, once i play jouvay, i good (especially if i in the 3canal show, tha's my mas for the season, stretched weeks-long). is true, jouvay and the canalshow is all i need, i doh even miss feteing, but i do miss (not enough to ruin jouvay, but still miss) mas with minsh. after seeing my mother play minshall mas every year my whole life plus eventually being in the mascamp making my own costume and others, i eh see any designer since bring anyting that make me want to play. i promise myself i will play the year i inspired to make my own mas, and know with paul kain incorriging, it go happen, but meanwhile, i saddened by the lack of design-variety in the current carnival market.

i eh ponging bikini+beads. i might not be playing it, but i have no problem with it either and doh see bikini bands as the death of carnival. my philosophy is always that everybody should have the carnival they want once it doh infringe on others, whether that be 500lb. women in 8oz. bikinis, old men in 9,000feathers, children beating crix pans covered in oil+blue, doctor wining low in the canalwater (big-up mar for a lyric beggin' to get tief)- everybody is somebody, doh 'fraid. play yuhself! wha' i take issue with is ropes and general exclusivity of certain arenas, anti-carnival; the death of mas is in the lack of options; bikini bands have as much a right to carnival as traditional mas, they provide a service for which there's apparent demand and their patrons deserve the carnival they want too. the problem is that there aren't enough bands offering alternatives.

we have macfarlane (doh ever appeal to me, but helps provide options) bringing a big-band alternative, skullduggery might be the start of someting new (didn't see it tuesday, boo me), folks like robert young and ashraph bring lovely small bands whose masqueraders help/create their own costumes, a few individuals like the inimitable paul kain doing their own ting, plus some communities still make their own mas, but where are the designers to fill the gaps between tribe and macfarlane, and between macfarlane and minshall? bikini bands doh need to trample carnival if a lack of re-evolution leaves a gaping hole where fully-conceptualised costumes used to dance, insteada the green section roped neatly between the red and yellow, followed by the blue+brown version.

bikini bands deliver exactly what they promise, give them that; wha' we need is the promise of more...

walk good.

*alvin k. henry's photographs (including top of this post) of the 2011 3canal show and jouvay, from rehearsal in bohemia through 1st night in the still-under-construction-carib, tech+run, plus jouvay; feast your eyes:

3 canal rehearsal

gritty

tech on friday

saturday @ little carib

children's show

3 canal gala

thursday @ canal reevolution

reevolution saturday

reevolution of j'ouvert

flash fiction friday #39

2011-03-11T11:59:00.007-04:00

been a hot minute since we flash fictioned, but once i finish fff#38 it was all about 3canal carnival show+jouvay, and me eh really check for allyuh until ash thursday. but timing was good- nobody else fff until this week anyway, so i right on time with flash fiction friday #39 (inclusion)trigger: rain, reign, rein, stair, stare, steer.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

my love/hate relationship with gayellethechannel

2011-02-18T13:59:00.006-04:00

actually wrote this weeks ago as part1 for a project i'll call gayelletheblog, that gayellethechannel completely lapsing on. that, in+of itself, shoulda change this piece slightly because it removes the hopeful feelings for gayelle i had @ time of writing and lowers my opinion of gayelle considerably, but i doh waste my words+time so i'll still start here and post about my subsequent disappointment and their bad business practices as followup later...

gayelle is my station of choice. i leave my tv on gayelle when i turn it off so that when i turn back on gayelle is my homestation. but this is as symbolic of what i hate about gayelle as how much i love gayelle: leaving the tv on gayellethechannel is the only way to know wha’ d ass showing on gayellethechannel. and i doh appreciate being held hostage.
i love what gayelle stands for, the mission of documenting and showing us weself; we own television bringing local programming. plus training young people who wouldn’t otherwise be afforded such opportunity…with the downside of that contributing to one of my gripes about my favourite station: too often gayelle executing the mission poorly; low production values, no apparent proofreading or quality control (audio, anybody?) and lewwe not forget, not even accurate information in the tv guide in any of the available media so we can choose to tune in! allyuh want we to watch or wha’? ‘cause i trying hard but allyuh making it too damn difficult, man. why we imitating everything about the packaging of foreign television programming except standards? community doh hadda be synonymous with low quality; why old episodes of gayelle [the programme] look+sound better than some recent content?
and still, ah love eeet!
love to turn on my tv and see those old gayelle episodes and who the c.a.p. fit (regular scheduling, please!- not that gayelle would say if they did), to see this year’s best village finals and the 3canal show from a few years back and flims and chutney videos and this week’s hard local countdown (in spite of the stupid choice to promote a self-proclaimed local countdown with the guitar chords from not just a foreign rock song, but the police’s roxanne, one of the most recognisable…sigh…so many issues, so little sense applied). taking in the new programming too, gayelle have an air of “big tings a gwan” lately, which, thankfully, seem to include higher production values, so we monitoring the situation.
but when they showing something i already see and i flip away, when i remember to check back if channel-flip into the middle of something i wish i catch from start, i frustrated it have no way to find out when it showing again. you know how many different times i hadda randomly catch bits+pieces before i “see” the documentary on astor johnson and repertory dance theatre? and i still doh know wha’ it titled or if i actually see the whole thing yet, still tryna catch alla the rig (which i till hadda thank gayelle for introducing me to in the 1st place) and any string of subsequent episodes of who the c.a.p. fit. (as you can tell, i covet gayellethechannel/banyan archives) and if i miss dotcom or the box in the daytime slot, forget tryna time the latenight rerun. then if i actually catch wha’ i tryna see, the audio drop out in the middle and nobody in d gayelle doh seem to notice!
and still, wit’ alla dat, ah love eeet!
contemporary local artists, documentaries on those who gone before, local+regional news and current affairs 24/7, brilliant! and as i say, we monitoring changes; gayellethechannel seem to be pushing new programming with tighter production, and i have a vested interest.
my mission similar to gayelle’s. when i left trinbago for university i knew i was coming straight back ‘cause it have wuk to do home: documenting and archiving our cultural history, creating infrastructure and resources, and raising the standard and profile of the arts. i come home to create the kinna work i wanna see on our local stages+media, facilitate public art, to teach, and to help document any way i can. but while wukkin on my input for our combined mission, the only thing stopping me from pelting down to gayelle (2blocks from my flat) several times a week to cuss ‘bout varied arseness, is having to get dressed and interrupt my own creative process.
so yuhknow i cyah wait to see how good they come, how they balance the original mission with the need for a new approach to sustainability, and community-based production with international industry standards…
how you feel ‘bout wha’ you watching on gayelle?

walk good.

often i feel like this

2011-02-16T14:24:00.003-04:00

the 1st somehow more engaging for me, but the 2nd has some watch-worthy moments with dog, etc.
walk good; forward, backwards, however you do...

writer/editor for hire

2011-02-15T10:57:00.001-04:00

i desperately need a regular gig.

i desperately need tings regularly paying reasonable sums so i can continue living alone because i cannot function in cohabitation. i cyah stay sane+productive with somebody sharing my livingspace+alonetime. and yet insteada pounding pavement looking for non-creative-but-paying wuk as soon as i met today's deadlines, i here, blogging, lifted in spite of the lung infection, because this is the only thing that makes me feel any better about the overwhelming state of my life. and because at least i writing.

walk good.

dansons, dansez! watch listen feel...

2011-02-09T14:43:00.001-04:00

‎
walk good.

old school cuteye, revisted

2011-02-04T15:42:00.003-04:00

‎old image, but when i bounce it up again the other day and buss out laughing like 1st time i couldn't resist a repost...she watching w. like she studying to duck out from under his arm if he only lean in any closer...hilarious!

walk good.

allow me to gush a moment; make sure and press play...bes' band!

2011-02-03T16:52:00.018-04:00

‎since the big bad band gyazette reach the portable playlist i eh listen to nutting else, love how powerful i feel cuttin' it on the main road with "little millionaire" or "down" in my ears, armed with tha' port-of-spain sound; and since salcedo gimme the rough mix of "captain" (big-up kesh/lazabeam!) i eh listen to nutting else in the house, fallen in love with it in a whole new way- always love the song, it's vibe+message and love it as band anthem/flagship-song, but is not the song i waiting, dying, crying to hear when the band play, until now- is like i finally hearing it as it intended to sound and i so in love with it that this morning, travelling to diego i listening to "captain" on repeat, which i never do 'cause i have "little millionaire" and "down" back-to-back, but i so loving it i never reach "little millionaire" before coming out the maxi, and it raining, pouring, and i nipplicious in a white vest (and we know i have no bras) lambasting myself 'cause if i hadna listen to "captain" 3extra times in the house and leave 10minutes earlier instead, ma woulda still be home so i could call and say it raining please pick me up by the stand, but then, i have gyazette so i eh business, i waiting out the rain happy and tryna remember not to wine too hard as i finally let the track switch to "little millionaire". i grooving, so caught up in bes' music i eh studying nutting else around until i go to walk and see some dude foot step off the curb same time as mine looking familiar. when i look up, is salcedo self, ketchin' kicks 'cause i eh even realise he by me whole time i wining on the pavement, so i put my earphones on him 1time and get the biggest grin ever when he realise wha' i jammin' to, pleasantly surprised at how good it sound...perfect timing...ah love eeet!

(i know i post the 1st 2minutes of this previously, abovelinked in this post too, but you hadda see the rest of the performance below and see them live for the full band...)

walk good.

fff#38

2011-02-01T08:43:00.012-04:00

big-up alooicious for always-willingness to play, keeping my mind entertained; so many ideas, so little timespace!
my flash fiction friday #38; pick-a-pronoun-trigger:

what they didn’t know was, jesus went for lunch. it had nobody there besides me and i wasn’ feeling the wuk. ah mean, who really need tha’ kinna responsibility, unless you’s jesus self and eh have no choice? and i done make out how he grindin’.
but the blasted phone keep ringing and as time passing i start to wonder, wha’ if some tortured soul desperately dialling+redialling? then i study how jesus leave me here, solo, i alone responsible for the hotline to hope…and then it hit me hard: wha’ jesus would do, dread?
the question shake me, listen, i even pull one of the heavenly smokes from he pack- you know he eh doin’ dat in public!- and smoke straight down to filter, i was so shake. but when the smoke clear, my mind clear too. nex’ time the phone ring, i walk over by the desk, siddong, make sure they want a answer, when i feel moved to help, i pick up.
“afternoon, young lady.”
“good afternoon…but…you know is nikisha?”
“miss nikisha…who it is you think you calling?”
now between me+you, i jes answer the phone so, not knowing who on the other end, jes being polite, as is jesus’ phone, nah…me eh know who tell me say “young lady” but as it wuk, i roll. so i talk to she.
and the nex’ time phone ring, i pick up 1 time.
“bredrin”
“ahm, yeah…right…wait, wha’? you know me?”
“i know you confuse ‘bout why you talkin’ to me, but doh study it; alla dem ting go wuk out…”
“wait, how you know…”
“wha’ i jes say, bredrin? dem ting go wuk out. jes pay attention and do wha’ yuh know yuh hadda do. right? right…”
“but how…”
“an’ is jesus’ phone yuh call?”
i put down with my words echoing in my ears. the second after i say them words i couldn’ believe i say them words. i back offa tha’ phone so fas’ and outta the room, jes praying for jesus to come back, after i disappear.
my eye squinge up tight tight, i scrambling, and when i reach out the door into wha’ i think is the yard and dare peep, i find meself in my own yard, home. home, hoss…
my mind cyah take this kinna stress.

i look round to make sure where i is, pelt inside my house and promptly swallow the 3quarter-bottle of johnny from on top the fridge. as that done and i wish i had supply plenty enough to erase the afternoon, i look up to find meself here, barman handing me a johnny+coconut like i had siddong and ask he for it, except i know i eh do no such ting; a moment ago i was in my kitchen staring down a empty bottle.
ever since then, is like everyting i think i want, jes happening…like i get a miracle touch…i feel i do right by nikisha and the bredrin.

is either that or i waking up in hell; i figure, either way, drinks on the i, ent?

walk good.

hilarious+squirm-worthy: dentist of jaipur

2011-01-24T23:32:00.001-04:00

walk good.

flash fiction friday #38

2011-01-21T15:00:00.011-04:00

sorry i late, and lemme ease allyuh up little bit with a somewhat easier trigger this week, while enveigling you to still do fff#37 for the challenge...

flash fiction friday #38 (start+pick-a-pronoun)trigger: what i/you/he/she/it/we/they didn't know...
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!

walk good.

fff#37

2011-01-21T11:23:00.010-04:00

pushing the bounds of my griot, testing how poetic and how mystic he like to get, how much he could embellish with pretty talk while still sounding like man. hadda see if he could run the whole show or if empress diablesse hadda take some of the storytelling...

today's trigger coming a little later; ran outta time, hadda run an errand in a timing and will post new trigger when i get back this afternoon...talk soon; walk good.

my attempt @flash fiction friday #37 (inclusion)trigger: pair, pare, pear, peer, pere, pier.
walking out to the end of the bridge to nowhere, i watch the moon, hanging big+low in the sky like she tryna come closer to me. i know is she calling. she’s do that sometimes. i’s not a man who’s stroll out on the ends of piers in the middle of the night jes so. yuh dig? i feel the call and i respond. we familiar like dat.
i get comfortable on the 2x4s, dig in meh shoulderblades, feeling the structure under me, even waggle meh bambam little bit, feel like a lion stretching, enough that i actually stretch a little. whole time she watching. i stretch a little longer than i would in my bed, jes for she.
i settle, so fixated above i only realise i not alone when the shadow cross meh face. i come up on elbows slow, and wait- ah mean, who’s run up on a man lying down on the edge of a pier alone in the middle of the night, hoss?
“pere anansi say come…”
and with that, she stretch sideways and plunge into the sea jes so, splashless. ah tellin’ yuh, barely a ripple, no splash. silence again.
i sit up, looking for the fluffy ‘fro to crest the surface but when the ripple disappear, she doh reappear. i bounce up outta my haze, flip over and hang off the edge to look under the planks. nutting. i scramble back, lie flat on meh stomach and peer between the 2x4s. still nutting. she jes gone, like she never appear with her message from pere anansi.
i try to settle again, to recapture the vibes from before the visitation. make meh way back to the edge, lie down again face to face with the luminous lady but fluffy ‘fro voice stick deep in meh ears, smooth+creamy like the perfect zaboca- which, lewwe admit, is the king of pears; them light fruity ting is for girls, ent? her voice rich+thick, ripeness pushing skin off, no need to pare once flesh exposed.
i feel the shadow across meh face again but sit up to nutting but sweet echoes in meh ears. and then moon remind me: pere anansi say come.
i hang meh legs over the edge this time, slippers next to me, feet reaching toward the echo of the ripple from the fluffy ‘fro, studying to follow, and then, behind me, “guess i not the only one hearing the call tonight.”
i turn, and when i drag meh gaze up from a finer pair of legs than i seen in a minute, is the fluffy ‘fro, in a shorts+vest instead of the white dress from before. and i know this time real.
i drink in the sight of her, and hold out my hand for her to join me...

flash fiction friday #37

2011-01-14T12:00:00.002-04:00

flash fiction friday #37 (inclusion)trigger: pair, pare, pear, peer, pere, pier.

rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

berry funny

2011-01-13T13:14:00.002-04:00

walk good.

get creative for the cause

2011-01-12T08:44:00.007-04:00

i doh need to tell you the importance of this message, you knew it instantly, but i have to say that this poster illuminates that message brilliantly. i saw this and had to repost it because i doh say enough that we need to check ourselves and/or get checked, and i couldn't think of a better way to say so. when i went looking for the image to repost, i found this great little collection; go see the others.

spread the message.

walk good.

fff#36: griot's 1st ballad

2011-01-10T12:30:00.007-04:00

a little ditty from my main man, griot, for flash fiction friday #36 (inclusion)trigger: paw poor pore pour; if he gonna be in this musical, we need to see how many storytelling styles he have, ent?

big-up legreat for confirming my vibes re:poem, even if this not aiming for epic, per se...walk good.

gallifrey sports+rec. club,
we usual spot, a bes’ pub,
we limin’ straight from friday afternoon.
not 1-man-jack here scoring
so barman keep on pouring,
doh study it, none-a-we driving soon.
we talkin’ shit, we pongin’
normal scene, jes picongin’
frank face swell up with an infected pore;
he looking for a excuse
to get he gyal to still roaks
while he left jaw look like a open sore.
we know he eh go get none
but then, he have a reason
while none-a-we sitting here could say so...
now me eh no poor-me-one,
is jus’ that is dry season
for quality, and i doh deal in hos.
if tings was looking desperate,
i know where i could get dat,
ting is, dry season hit empress+whore;
times hard but if i paying,
take wha’ it is i saying:
i want to shake she hand and not a paw!

flash fiction friday #36

2011-01-07T11:58:00.004-04:00

flash fiction friday #36 (inclusion)trigger: paw, poor, pore, pour.

fff#35

2011-01-06T13:51:00.012-04:00

allyuh, i real screw meself with this flash fiction friday #35 (inclusion)trigger: spank, drank, thank, stank, rank. i always try to trigger without studying my vibes to make sure it equally random for me and stays a challenge for myself-as-writer too. but this rounds i was too damn good: i trigger with words that doh wuk with the male-trinbagonian voice i wukkin' on/with. i struggle weeks with this piece 'cause wha' i wukkin' on now need me to experiment with and perfect this male-trinbagonian voice, and the past tense "drank" jus' doh fit. it hadda be "drink" tense-regardless, tha's how we's talk, ent? so i try to get around it; see wha' you think...walk good.

be advised, eh: roughly 9minutes missing from this story-in-progress. maybe tha’ make me wha’ they’s call a “unreliable narrator”, but doh study it, griot does make it up in artistry. take wha’ i telling you. i’s paint- nah, nah, nah…airbrush…yeah, oui- i’s airbrush feelings with words; scene?

right.

handle some exposition ‘cause allyuh come in the dance late, and plus missing 9minutes to boot, so, backstory:

prior to your discovery of our intrepid heroes in this here infamous brooklyn bar, corner of carlos+roberts streets, woodbrook, trinidad, west indies, the earth, the universe revolve ‘round we here, y’know…prior to your discovery of our heroes, wha’ transpire is demetrius had decide was time he put maria in house.

now alla-we done know wha’ go go on: he go start good good, usual story, but when the itch scratch he, he go scratch it back; no matter how nice she making home, he go cyah not horn. and worser yet, alla-we know he go horn she stupid because he like ting too easy- being he gyal is a thankless wuk since keisha fuck it up for everybody; but tha’s a nex’ story…

‘bout 9months after he put maria in house, he make the mistake of agreeing out loud when frank lick the blood from the back of he teeth to say, “i could take on bullin’ dat again…pull dem locks, spank dat big, fat ass…” as maria sister pass on she way inside, a ole years ‘metrius had tell everybody bring ting to grill and we lime in the yard by them. he lucky maria eh hear, but alla-we make he out and from then was just a matter of time.

now, griot or no griot, me eh carryback tha’ particular story ‘cause me eh tryna muddy nobody waters, but i know tha’ talk too sweet to not reach maria ears. i even tell ‘metrius bes’ he+sistren get they story straight, but he head hot above+below he waist, he eh have me to study. when the mark buss, maria ride and clean out the man in a one. she eh even ask him nuttin’, he jus’ come home and find she and every single ting except a meat-tongs from the same sister gone. now ‘metrius in brooklyn every night drinking hard, under: he eh have no reason to go home, no woman, no comfort, jes’ a mattress on the floor; yuh overstand wha’ going on leading up to current events here now…

as is friday, the boys limin’ since wuk done; yuh done know ‘metrius well+properly drunk from the earlies.

we on the outside when who should come walking down the road but maria selfsame sister. frank make she out 1st and as she+’metrius eyes make 4, frank try to pull rank, under, he brush it first, but ‘metrius eh even hear, he done rush the gyal, rinsing out she ears. we eh hearing nutting until she stop by the corner and finally answer-back, louder with every word, “i do not care what you drank tonight or any other night; jus’ ‘cause you cyah stop talk doh mean people hadda listen! you need to learn to keep yuh blasted mouth close!” and she quick-turn and cross away from brooklyn and leave he right dey crying like a little bitch.

frank and them catching kicks on ‘metrius head and he jes’ crying, watching maria sister walk away, so i feel bad for the man and buy him a nex’ rounds. but as i stepping back out to the pavement with the beers here now, i find all the boys quiet quiet, nobody even heckling ‘metrius again, everybody staring out the road like douen call they name. when i watch wha’ they watching, who i should see walking towards brooklyn bar here now, but maria sheself!

men waiting to see wha’ go go on; she eh realise ‘metrius by the corner, and he eh see she neither ‘cause he busy tryna quick-wipe tears to show face with we again.

i studying to distract the man with beers until she pass but before i reach ‘metrius, cutters come from inside the bar behind me, see she, make out the scene in a one, and buss out one loud, long wajang laugh, bawling and holding he belly. and as he start to shake, nex’ ting he drunk ass turn+vomit all over my fuckin’ shoes, hoss! i cuss he arse and make for the bathroom one time- me eh tryna smell like somebody else vomit rest of the night. he follow me to the toilet to finish vomit, and me eh know wha’ cutters eat so but he stank up the damn place so much, after nearly 10minutes i cyah tell if the small-wash even help; is like he stench following me…

but, waaayyy…look…maria stop by demetrius on the corner, like we eh miss plenty…9minutes is nutting! look ting now start…

requiem

2010-12-29T11:03:00.016-04:00

my brother is dead. weeks. nearly a month now and i still unable to think of and focus on much else. it penetrates everything i think, say, do, every wine i have wound in an attempt at defiance of the fact and distraction from the unbearable loss. i have lost others valued enough to remember always: basil. john. shorty i. i am irreligious because is too obviously about controlling the masses and i have issues with authority and because i believe energy cannot be created or destroyed, only converted from 1 form into another. i do right by people and doh business if it have god(s) or not, doh care wha' religion or the religious think; i hold down my corner and leave them theirs, and keep doing right by people. but unnecessary suffering propels me from not caring to demanding: what the fuck kinna god(s) allyuh really supporting out here?

i told myself loss could not hold me anymore as i gladly filed divorce papers this week, and is true for impending loss in court, but not for darren. i still wearing chucks+boxers i took from him 15years ago when we were invincible. why his things here and we here? why his siblings here and he not here? why i here and he not getting ready to turn 30, wining on top the world?

only the good die young. my brother is dead. overs these bullshit gods and their petty, ridiculous ways.

walk good.

clearly not walkin' good...

2010-12-21T01:06:00.006-04:00

try allyuh bes'...walk good...

our pom videos

2010-12-19T10:15:00.022-04:00

went back-in-blog-times looking for something for a pardner the other day and now my inner archivist insist we hadda finally embed and postmortem this project; in post-just-linked the final link included is to the video-director's post, process+postmortem, storyboards-to-videos; at the time it seemed better to let him explain, but in rereading his post and realising i should also embed the videos here, i also discovered i agree with his notes and my clear favourite of the 2 has technical as well as creative+sentimental reasons.

the crazyfool brought the project as director approaching actor with concept+storyboard+resources+deadline. i inveigled my favourite then-local(d.c.) bassist to provide original score, which he did, beautifully (as he did in another collaboration with tap-dancing pardner i linked with him; if you ever in d.c. needing boss-bass, holla). i got to be part of the process of refining the sound and am still, years later, very pleased with the result and thrilled that glen let me play and guided us well.

i totally agree with the crazyfoolish director's verdict of where+why the originally conceived ad doh quite wuk, so much so that here's a direct quote about his original concept (renew. reuse. recycle) and intention to "fill the cabinet so much that the woman has no other choice but to recycle the glass. but the last four frames fail to read, leaving the concept lacking. maybe the cabinet needed more glasses, maybe the video needed more frames - or specifically cabinet frames. i haven't figured that part out, but i do know that if the recycle concept fails it's only because my other gripe is that the reuse concept doesn't read as i had hoped either. again, more glasses might've helped, but ideally i think i should have listened to advice to fill more of the glasses with greater variety than the existing glass of straws+glass of chopsticks. the now considered good advice was left behind because i wanted to believe that the viewer could see an empty glass and know without being shown that one can put things in it. i see now that had i listened to those smarter voices, the reuse concept would've hit harder and the ad would've been stronger..."

true, but is still 54seconds of worth-watching, so:
my favourite (below) was a random idea i had and inveigled the director and the ex(then-current) to create images+movement for as well, and our bassist to score, once again, brilliantly. i like it more because of sentimental reasons, because i genuinely love both the creative impulses behind it and finished product musically+visually, and partly because of the small failings of the 1st piece to fulfill intentions; enjoy:
walk good.

flash fiction friday #35

2010-12-17T11:59:00.005-04:00

flash fiction friday #35 (inclusion)trigger: spank, drank, thank, stank, rank.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

fff#34

2010-12-17T11:37:00.009-04:00

not wha' i intended; the end seems very un-me plus i hadda experiment with more dude-voices, but this wha' come for flash fiction #34 (inclusion)trigger: ghost, roast, boast, toast, host...walk good.

“i’m serving dinner for 9 to-night…” her favourite sesame street singalong plays on a loop inside her head as she readies herself, interrupted only occasionally by the mantra “all things are possible”.
“we’re going to dine by can-dle-light…” she hums+giggles through the hot wax then bites down on lyrics as she tears strips now forested with tiny hairs from her legs. real audio ends at her bikini line where true grit begins, happy little ditty reduced to wordless melody in her head. but the rewards will be handsome; she knows well this pain pays dividends. tonight brings no ghost of christmases past or future, just presents.
she inspects her work in the mirror, wishing again for better light, knowing she knows this routine intimately and leaves nothing ungroomed, unoiled, untended. she turns slowly, triple-checking.
“i hope that every-one brings their appetite…”
she briefly pouts over the dinner ruined, roasted beyond recognition while she fought with demetrius’ father on the phone when he tried to back out of keeping him, then shrugs it off. it won’t matter. hunger is tonight’s menu.
she blows a kiss over her shoulder at the self trapped on the closet door and smiles appreciatively at the sight of her ass, anticipating his spank of approval. she maintains herself well in spite of often rough use accepted as occupational hazard, prides herself on skin+physique that boast none of the marks of abuse so many others in the trade carry.
before donning panties she downs a miniature bottle of hennessy to warm her cockles, a silent toast to holiday-wish-fulfilment. silky black briefs with white lace trim whisper over thighs, then she dips a finger dipped in musk into her navel and is ready to host the nicest naughtiness of a working girl’s year.

tonight all things are possible. even love.

flash fiction friday #34

2010-12-10T11:57:00.008-04:00

flash fiction friday #34 (inclusion)trigger (literal, figurative or allusion; although literal uses the rhyme): ghost, roast, boast, toast, host.

fff#33

2010-12-09T23:47:00.002-04:00

i kinna cheated. when i started writing i was feeling miserable (trinbago sense, not sad) and decided to allude to trigger words, instead of literally using them; even the 1 instance of using the triggerword, the expression's not literal. i know tha's not the exercise, but i at least tried to do it well...still playing with voice of dude; bear with me...walk good.

flash fiction friday #33 (inclusion)trigger: wet, match, chain, trigger, rendezvous.
when phone ring late on a evening like now, is nutting good. nutting good, trust…is dismal drizzly evenings like this pardners does find out they getting horn from they woman, or getting leave by they woman, or both…
men does call- they know we winding down by brooklyn and they could tell us wait, wait to hear they sob story and buy more beers to drown sorrows alla-we know only going away as far as the las’ one, ‘cause men still hadda reach home, alone. empty house. no amount of consolation beers by brooklyn bar changing dat.
and too besides, men does get dotish.
demetrius find out keisha was hornin’ when she tell him the outside totie was better as she jump in the hornerman car outside she wuk a friday evening, and he come and pelt back a 5guinness quick-sharp…eh heh? nex’ ting i know, we on murray street- me, eh, crawling murray street, friday night, fadda- because why? ‘metrius need to break. somewhere in he heartbroken drunk-ass logic he figure he hadda break with somebody else to break keisha hold on him and restore he manhood or some shit so. i jus’ high enough to want to see this go down insteada rocking back and hear ‘bout it in a half-a-hour.
so, murray street here now, scoping out wha’ the park have and them gyal eh looking nice at all at all…i mean, i expecting, if you tryna make a money you tryna look bes’, ent? apparently not. belly! if you see guts! and cellulite, oh geed, man. they letting it all hang to fuck out. nastiness. wha’ men who like hos really for, dread?
anyway. i looking to tell demetrius this a waste-run but same time he grinning in my face like a jackass, talking ‘bout, look one for each a we, as we approaching the corner of the street with the police station- see wha’ fuckin’ woman plus alcohol does cause? one for each a fuckin’ we? mad or wha’? i tell he i only come to make sure nutting eh happen to him and he doh do anything too much more stupid, ‘cause i studying too, where he go go? the car back by brooklyn, not that he should be driving in his condition, or picking up hos in his mudda vehicle neither…i was thinking a speedy suck-prick behind the playground section and i stand guard as there closer to the police and fire station- i woulda handle soldier, eh- but i when make out 2vagrants playing chess in the main pathway i leggo tha’ idea one time. me eh tryna have no vagrant feeling they could have nutting to tell me when i pass in the road- scene?
as we reach the corner here now, 2 nex’ gyal crawl up same time, a straight-hair spanish with fake breasts and a thick dougla…eh heh? i done finish the stag i had walk with and crack the nex’ one i had stick in my pocket and chase it- jus’ high enough to take the chain-up now it have prospects. ‘metrius step to the spanish and i see he point at me and the thick ting. me eh know wha’ deal he make but nex’ ting we following them.
turning back onto roberts street toward brooklyn bar i put a hand on demetrius’ shoulder- me eh tryna have alla brooklyn bar in this- but he jus’ smile back and we cross roberts right after we rounds the corner from murray, into a dark abandoned-looking yard. the spanish take ‘metrius down in the back, dougla take me behind a bush and before i have time for second thoughts, she kneel, drop my pants and have my wood in she mouth.
i jus’ high enough to ‘llow she; i mean, we done here and i hadda wait on achy-breaky-heart, ent? eh heh? nex’ ting, outta no-fuckin’-where, pax-pax-pax! shots buss somewhere down the road, a setta parrots wake and fly out the pommerac tree screaming bloody murder, i jump back so fas’ i lucky i eh sandpaper meh wood on she teeth, and as i pull out i see ‘metrius pelting toward we, pants open and falling down. the las’ ting i want is to get ketch in this shit, so as i see he see me, buss out one time straight for the gateway, he behind me grumbling ‘bout how he prick still hard. shock wear off now he cyah overstand why we leaving without receiving. but me eh even watch back at he. not me+he again, fadda! nex’ time he gyal done him, he drinking+hoing alone as she leave he arse.
i showing you, doh answer, fadda; you go regret it. take wha’ i telling you: he calling back because he figure you eh hear the phone over bar noise first time…unless you want to find yuhself in some murray-street-esque intrigues tonight, let it ring right to fuck dey on the table…

flash fiction friday #33, plus empress diablesse

2010-12-03T13:50:00.025-04:00

sorry this trigger late, didn't realise legreat fffd; actually came to blog my choreographic debut and discovered i was late, so i giving you video+trigger...

las' weekend @ coco dance festival i premiered my 1st real attempt @choreography, set to my empress diablesse burlesque fff. my solo's a different incarnation of the empress diablesse character i wukkin' with lately, also still work-in-progress, and as such, i called the piece that instead of directly referencing diablesse in the title yet. i voiced my text (prerecorded, big-up kesh) and with the idea of recycling plastic bottles from sonja dumas (who i try to chain-up to choreograph the solo based on my empress, and instead she make me do it, thanks, eh) paul kain design+build me this stunning costume so i had was to choreograph...work-in-progress currently about 2minutes long, but since i dunno how to edit, after you watch the opening 15seconds, skip to 1minute in and watch the rest (tech rehearsal mobilephone video; long wait for sound cue). for performance there's no leotard under the bustier, jus' skin+plastic and thin strips of velcro across my open back. when it done it will be a proper empress diablesse burlesque...sooncome...video under...

flash fiction friday #33 (inclusion) trigger: wet, match, chain, trigger, rendezvous.

fff#32

2010-11-18T21:21:00.005-04:00

testdrivin' a very un-me voice with this flash fiction friday; another new character for the show, so tell me someting, nah...walk good.

fff#32 (pick-a-pronoun)trigger: i/he/she/it/we/they took everything…

she took everything. including the kitchen sink, and tha' just for spite. i mean, who’s take curtainrods? friggin’ curtainrods, hoss?!
i reach home from the people wuk, tu’n my key, push my door, same like every evening 7o’clock after my 2stag with the boys by brooklyn bar. i reach home, tu’n key, push door, step inside…and it dark. you listenin’ me? dark, eh, fadda. i mean, daaark. not a light in any part of the whole house. daaark…
so i click on the lights here now…i click on the lights, studying where the ass she is and wha’ the fuck really goin’ on here and one time throwing an eye round the room for a note. or something. but it have no note. no fuckin’ note, no card, not a fuckin’ ting. not! one! muddacunt! ting leave in the room! floor fuckin’ shining back at me. empty, shinin’, fuckin’ floors, hoss! and hoss, i walk through my whole muddacunt house, i walk through my whole-mudda-cunt-house, and all the bitch eh take is the meat tongs she sister had buy for me after she come by us a day when i cook on the grill out in the yard…meat tongs sitting on the kitchen counter and not a fuckin’ ting else but open cupboard doors watching me with empty shelves…she and she bruddas wuk fast fast…
so with all that, wha’ i really callin’ you for, hoss, is this:
who the fuck you tell i bull maria sister the other day?!

flash fiction friday #32

2010-11-12T11:58:00.004-04:00

flash fiction friday #32 trigger(your-choice-pronoun): i/he/she/it/we/they took everything...
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

fff#31: empress diablesse burlesque

2010-11-09T17:21:00.007-04:00

didn't post a new trigger las' friday 'cause i took divali off; will have one up this week. my fff#31 is a little bit of a cheat but i wukkin' on this piece for a performance monthend and needed to build the text so i can choreograph. still used flash fiction friday #31 (indirect inclusion) trigger, jus' also incorporated slightly-revised pre-existing txt (although, from an other fff, so 'low me, nah...walk good): egg(s), witch, cave.

she wraps her locks. her lush oiled perfumed hair is for his consumption, his nostrils alone. he will bury his face in her oiled perfumed hair as she consumes him. he will want to be eaten…
she carefully lifts the right side of her skirt hem to manoeuvre the muddy track. he offers her a jockeyback when he sees the delicate foot so dangerously close to wet sinking earth, and she smiles directly into his eyes this time, his reward for being easily coaxed. he still grinning back foolishly when her cheek brushes his, leaning over his shoulder close enough for a whiff of perfumed locks through the cloth keeping her hair tantalisingly from him. he doesn’t carry her far enough to notice the steadily increasing weight on his back.
she slides off as nimbly as she got on, by the time he turn she already settling her skirt around her. all he ever see is smooth brown arms+face+neck and up to the arch of her right foot, but he cyah stop thinking ‘bout long long legs under the volume of material swirling round her every step. he wonders if she wears these clothes on purpose, jus’ to make him wonder, imagine wha’ hiding underneath...
later he dreams her, long long legs and perfumed locks spread for him alone…sees her in his bed, his life, his home, sees her bear and raise his son before they even spend a night, so bewitched he cyah see himself falling into the grave she diggin’, so bedevilled he cyah smell the ram goat under the perfume, he will follow her into the emptiness.
he tells his mother about this empress, wife, soulmate, and she intuits danger, but even her suspicions underestimate the darkness.

cosmic conundrum

2010-11-03T23:38:00.003-04:00

as i write salcedo starting a new piece on another wall in my flat, to prodigy's fat of the land this time.

he finish my gorgeous cosmic conundrum saturday night into sunday morning, sign his name and the wrong date a little after midnight, toasted with some stone's green ginger wine and call it done while admitting he already planning "fixes".

woke up later sunday to the bestest bes' pee ever as the perfect setup for ataklan+mistah shak @ the museum later. mistah shak was so good he make me wine and make me sad all at the same time; klanny open with who god bless, freestyle requests before he leave stage, plus sing bim (yay!) 1st time i ever hear it live, and soca gyal for me too, and a lovely ole lady tell me she like how i wine and next time she dressing up and coming to wine with me...danced with muwakil on the pavement outside the museum in the drizzle and drank orangepassionfruit juice...sweet sunday...

salcedo came back to contemplate the cosmic egg+serpent sunday, then monday afternoon he took the paint away; was almost sad, but then i have the mural to pleasure my eyes...(plus, apparently, new piece sooncome!)

the conundrum: he created a brilliant mural ultimately designed (technique-wise) to be seen from a distance, and we'll never get more than 9feet away; but being close is it's own brilliance...

walk good.

mural phase2: serpent show thyself...

2010-11-01T09:21:00.005-04:00

yay! see photos. walk good.

flash fiction friday #31

2010-10-29T11:59:00.004-04:00

flash fiction friday #31 trigger (inclusion, but lewwe try again for the less-direct, as las' week was a 1st): egg(s), witch, cave.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

bes' pee ever! + my fff#30

2010-10-27T09:49:00.016-04:00

finally posting this days after i start composing 'cause is time for the new flash fiction friday trigger and i want my fff#30 up 1st; so take your mind back to the other day...
since i fell in love with my flat on sight, i offer salcedo (of my favourite local band the big bad gyazette)

wallspace to muralise and otherwise experiment artistically (chee, i doubt you read this, but sending vibes to remind you your space waiting...); salcedo sketch on a wall since the other day and me+family enjoying the wild women ever since. this week he call and bawl he feelin' to paint, i say come through, he reach 1time and gone clear: women gone, whole new piece, still changing after 2sessions, he know he nowhere near done...
the wall he sketched+painting is in my main corridor, opposite my bathroom, and since i live alone doors stay open. the morning after he sketch was the bes' pee ever 'cause i woke, stumbled in + sat, then as i started that glorious 1st pee, opened my eyes to art. this morning was the bes' pee ever!
photos.

video of gyazette frontman nickolai salcedo muralising my flat (more on fasbook):

and my flash fiction friday #30 (inclusion, kinna): snakecharmer, citrus, book(s).

he plucks+plays and in his chords she hears+feels and almost sees the snake rise through the smoke billowing from the unattended hookah. she wonders if he saw through her machinations to get him here or if he just that oblivious- he is a man, after all. talented, but just a man.

he plucks+plays+prays she feeling him. he wonders if she saw through his machinations to get invited here or if her refusal to trust insists his attention platonic. he inclines his chin toward the hookah, tiny sweeteye, and she tears herself out of his melody to guide his long drag while his hands continue charming the strings of his instrument and her self.
she takes a pull too, resettles the hookah and is suddenly on her feet, lifted by smoke and abandon. she finds her body finding its way through music as her eyes find his again.
he knows his power now as she wines+winds around him in the corridor. his dancing fingers pull his marionette closer until the warmth of her left bumsee cheek brushing his strumming arm momentarily distracts him. his breathing stops as she turns to him, leaning down to throw her arms around him+guitar, giggling apologies for reckless backing-back.
her hair smells like oranges when he can finally inhale and he’s instantly distracted all over again until she releases him, whispering the song she wants to hear next in his ear as the scent recedes. his pounding chest is the rhythm he uses now, playing what she wants but not the way she expected. her hips respond instinctively.
she turns to him again, face serious this time as she says, “let me be your scribe…let me write this story. i want to bring you and your work to the whole world…”

walk good.

r.i.p.

2010-10-25T15:08:00.003-04:00

i love you, gregory isaacs.

still and always yuh night nurse, wherever you are...walk good.

flash fiction friday #30

2010-10-22T11:56:00.002-04:00

flash fiction friday #30: testdriving a different kinna inclusion trigger, so tell me how you feel 'bout this one when you write (in general, doh forget to submit triggers and give feedback on those as much as wha' fellow fffers write); this not about including the actual words, but incorporating the item/idea into the piece (comment if you need clarification and i'll check 'cause i know i eh do it this way here before). so this week's fff#30 (inclusion) trigger: snakecharmer, citrus, book(s).
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

fff#29

2010-10-21T22:32:00.007-04:00

my flash fiction friday #29 (trigger: as much/little as...) is another surprise story for me; didn't expect this piece; hope you enjoy, i gone to read allyuh fffs; new trigger tomorrow...walk good.

as much as he loved her was as little as she cared. there was a certain twisted pleasure in turning on her.
it came after the constant phonecalling in denial of rejection, after misery of acceptance, after turning on self.
it came after a week of torturing himself into despising her by smoking a cigarette every time he thought of her, after he spent the whole week’s pay on a habit he had never cultivated and couldn’t stomach the first three times she danced through his memory. there was a nasty joy in wounding his lungs, his throat, his voice, his instrument, and by the end of the week he was joining band members in cancer corner on every break without thoughts of her propelling him.
it came after sunday night practice when he sang his new song and they said it was wicked and jammed it whole night and agreed to put it on the album, and he went up to the roof to breathe now that the smoke had finally cleared from his mind. he stood on the roof looking at the sky and saw how insignificant she was, how she couldn’t control him; his name was man and his destiny in his hands, not hers.
he stretched his arms wide reaching to take in the world, and when he felt himself flying he let the soaring of his soul take him from the pain she left.
when the band finally recorded too little too late, the chalk outline of where his body hit the ground became the album cover that sold millions.

flash fiction friday #29

2010-10-15T11:56:00.003-04:00

as requested, a starter, literally triggering fff#29: as much/little as...
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

fff#28

2010-10-14T15:09:00.012-04:00

my flash fiction friday #28; (inclusion) trigger: rebellion, fox, strange, mirror, pleasure. testdriving new character again but promising that if these explorations wuk we'll meet these folks again, maybe even gathering together...so how this one do? walk good.

i bubblewrap myself before i go to the parlour. is the pleasure of the fellas on the corner to say all kinna ting as i pass and i never know if it will stay polite or cross into graphic or otherwise distasteful so i prepare my defences, starting with the shot.
one shot of granny’s crown royal just before i put on clothes does wonders for courage, warmth spreading through my flesh and organs and penetrating bones (this discovered a night she kept all of us by her while all the grownups went some fete ‘cause aunty bunny was home for the first carnival in donkey-years; me and my cousin dared to kiss by a relentless gang of teenage siblings and assorted relatives while gran snored like the garbage truck rumbling up the lane an early morning).
i swallow the shot and find music; sometimes talib, sometimes shadow or machel, a protective layer of feelgood or militant to armour myself.
a quick look in the mirror to see if i need a small fresh or already have on anything functional; is only the corner, easy-on-easy-off, but doh make the mistake of home-shortpants ‘cause them fellas on the corner watching and your bumsee will draw more attention than you expect, especially with that thin house vest; doh look like you tryin’ to look good ‘cause tha’s talk, but doh look sloppy either ‘cause tha’s a nex’ kinna talk…readying for this excursion always strange, vibesin’ from far, trying to feel the road from inside the house to put on the right mask to face it.
the guilty cat coming over the wall from the neighbour yard as i step outside just in time to catch her already leaping, back legs barely anchored on top the wall, forepaws stretching, reaching into space, but as we eyes make four she mash brakes in mid-air and scramble back, claws snatching the vines holding the wall together to pull herself to equilibrium and still smirk at me, a mere mortal trying to maco the manoeuvring of cats.
she suspect she eh outfox me ‘cause i smile back like i know her secret buried in our yard under the guava tree, and with that she freeze, staring, glaring ‘cause i make out her shady cat business.
how she watch me as i leave is the last little push the growing rebellion in my chest need to send me to the parlour head high this time: fyah bun them fellas ole talk, i taking down tigers today.

flash fiction friday #28

2010-10-08T11:55:00.007-04:00

feeling weird and suspect this flash fiction friday trigger reflects such; doh know wha' else to say but look fff#28 (inclusion) trigger: rebellion, fox, strange, mirror, pleasure.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

wha gwan

2010-10-07T04:01:00.027-04:00

in no particular order:

discovered in gyazette rehearsal/jam (big-up my headspace house band) that pointe shoes make sweet percussion.

over the parents' diningroom table today (yesterday, for nitpickers; eh sleep yet) the gremlin+kb uncover a bes' lie i thought i was taking to my grave- we cyah even remember (by dinner, mere hours later) wha' ma say that make zed unintentionally buss the file, but we talkin' asset management for when fred dead, i say we sendin' kb 'bago with a live-in nurse 'cause neither ah we mindin' she, and something make zed tell her something like, "i know, you went to get your tubes tied and they told you you were pregnant with me..." so ma jus' watch her, blank+confused, and as zed slowly making the "hellooo?!" face @ kb in the silence i cyah stop the laughter- i told the gremlin she was a mistake so long ago i doh even remember when; apparently she was convinced enough to tell other people that story. later yesterday @ hakka (lovely dinner, yay!) with uncle vic + auntys gail+v, fred was thoroughly pleased with my initiative when zed told the story, plus tell the table 'bout walking on water like jesus and the haircombing-brain-eroding lie...we had a time. with family. hmmm...

it seems georgia tech (birthplace of the robot that can play+improvise jazz music) pushing for destruction of the human race; these jackasses teaching robots to lie! i jus' cyah understand how anybody smart enough to teach a robot to lie cyah see the inherent foolishness of teaching robots to lie- did they not see i, robot? never read anything by asimov or dick? lacking basic commonsense? they really need to be told that once robots can deceive is they indestructible? plus, as colbert point out the other day, robot skin now makes them self-aware...only a matter of time...

and speaking of armageddon, the now-officially undead dick cheney has no pulse.

differently undead, the immortal henrietta lacks, whose cells save the lives of so many, while her family lacks the means to save their own.

ending positive; sorry i couldn't embed: mos def + black thought + eminem + dj premier...chune!

walk good.

fff#27

2010-09-27T15:45:00.011-04:00

using my flash fiction friday #27 (inclusion: lush, plush, brush, hush, gush) to introduce characters i playin' with, like fff#19's gunta nerds. please tell me if/how this voice wukkin' for you; thanks...walk good.

she dresses thoughtfully for the shashamane dance. long, flowing skirt camouflages physical inconsistencies, delicately unassuming leather sandal on her foot, simple top fitted close to display attributes but modest enough to stand out from the groupies as a different league, different genre of woman.

she wraps her locks. her lush oiled perfumed hair is for his consumption, his nostrils alone. he will bury his face in her oiled perfumed hair as she consumes him. he will want to be eaten.

she step to the corner carrying nothing, knowing she not paying for this ride, no driver charging no empress of this calibre to go up shashamane this celebration night. no damage by the door and she will not buy her black bottle tonight.

she relishes the impersonal comfort of good upholstery and rockers on the radio as old as the ride, sinking into plush seat, letting eyelids close against the red interior light as scenes of the night to come play out behind them.

she sees him see her enter the dance, sees him register a woman worthy of his time and attention, sees him pulled to her, unable to talk himself down from unfolding attraction, unable to wait until he at least see her again before approaching. and once he approach…

her perfumed locks for him alone…

the car follows the sounds of garnett silk up the hill to shashamane now and she brushes the driver gently with her elbow, pushes imperceptibly with the barely-visible corner of her smile as she reach into her skirt-pocket for funds she not holding.

“empress, doh study it. is celebration night; enjoy the dance.”

she smiles directly into his eyes this time, his reward for being easily coaxed, and leave him feeling he do something positive tonight, make a deposit in karma’s account, gain himself a credit.

she carefully lifts just the right side of her skirt hem to manoeuvre the muddy track, then smile the same smile at the bouncer that she give the ph driver. he grinning back foolishly as she brush past him close enough for a whiff of perfumed locks through the cloth keeping her hair tantalisingly from reach.

she mark his scent before she see her mark, sense his musk in a dark corner barely skankin’ as bob say he feel it in the one drop, watching her slowly sway across the floor to the bar where she know she not buying no drinks. she draws him to her while waiting for the barman; might as well take him one time, she playing the long game with this one.

she ask for the black bottle and when he bring it, ask “how much?” with her powerful smile. before he respond with a flirtatious one of his own, before he could show his favour with empty, upturned palms and a shrug, the voice she call to her cut in, “woman like you so not to know the price of wha’ she want, it mus’ jus’ be given her.”

inside the tiny hush of the barman’s surprise, she shift her weight to her left hip and turn her smile to her little millionaire.

the next morning he would gush to his mother- empress, wife, soulmate- and she would intuit danger, but even her suspicions would underestimate the darkness.

flash fiction friday #27

2010-08-27T11:57:00.004-04:00

i like this flash fiction friday #27 (inclusion) trigger: lush, plush, brush, hush, gush.

rules of engagement:

if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.

you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.

you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).

you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*

you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).

you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*

write fresh!

walk good.

fff#26

2010-08-24T17:18:00.010-04:00

shoulda triggered flash fiction friday #27 friday gone as mystie wrote not 1 but 2(!) fff#26 by then, but went balandra for the weekend and didn't take the internet (not that i wanted to, beyond phone for potential emergency) which luckily let me attempt #26 before triggering #27; so, flash fiction friday #26 (inclusion): rack, pack, track, crack, slack

this night the voices rest; singularity of purpose make them cancel each other out, seem like…

me, i just glad for the quiet…go sleep like the dead after the hunt…doh know why i thought t’ings woulda change, like menopause, maybe some kinna mental blood-moon connection ‘cause nobody never tell me anything so, i just come up with the idea somewhere underneath my mind and it stick…some cycles i wish i was right…it would be easier to not need to follow the singing of arteries, easier to not play god…not that god bothering to come out again these nights, any one of we could play god nowadays; wasn’t so slack long time though, god had come like a god it was so omnipresent, but then, every dyslexic dog have they day, eh? as anansi had he time, so god had it own…if this cycle of lunar rebirth would wane like a woman’s…ent i not truly woman again? maybe before the thirst become all, but them days done. now i take my prey when the universe say, drink life as i must…

this quiet inside me tonight make me feel the static in the air building to streaks of lightning, heralding each crack of thunder. nights like this i used to love the hunt, love selecting a healthy meal to follow home and devour as the sky explode, just not the way he expect…i used to use womanly wiles back in times, used to pick the juiciest man to track, separate him from the pack, la diablesse teach me that, make he feel he’s the one who find desire...

these stormy nights with the quiet inside me guiding, a man could rack he whole body with screams when he see my blazing, glorious form release, could call for any god or devil or woman to save he…once i leave my skin and fiery flesh feel the electricity, the current in the air, none shall escape…

walk good.

a little funny

2010-08-19T08:31:00.003-04:00

language-lover in me had to repost this, courtesy meh mudda in a rare occasion of safe-for-public-email. lemme take in front and say: is not really the joke, yuh know, is the extra @ the end...

on his 74th birthday, a man got a gift certificate from his wife for a visit to a medicine man rumoured to have a wonderful cure for erectile dysfunction. after being persuaded, he drove to the reservation, handed his ticket to the medicine man, and wondered what he was in for. the old man slowly produced a potion, handed it to him, and with a grip on his shoulder, warned, "this is a powerful medicine, and it must be respected. you take only a teaspoonful, and then say '1-2-3'. when you do that, you will become more manly than you have ever been in your life, and you can perform as long as you want."

the man was encouraged, but as he walked away he turned and asked, "how do i stop the medicine from working?"

"your partner must say '1-2-3-4', but when she does, the medicine will not work again until the next full moon."

eager to see if it worked, he went home, showered+shaved, took a spoonful of the medicine, and invited his wife to join him in the bedroom. when she came in, he took off his clothes and said, "1-2-3!"

immediately, he was the manliest of men. his wife got excited and began throwing off her clothes, and then she asked, "what was the 1-2-3 for?"

and that, boys and girls, is why we should never end our sentences with a preposition: we could end up with a dangling participle...

walk good.

flash fiction friday #26

2010-08-13T11:59:00.004-04:00

happy flash fiction friday #26 (inclusion) trigger: rack, pack, track, crack, slack.

rules of engagement:

if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.

you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.

you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).

you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*

write fresh!

walk good.

robyn a trois

2010-08-11T16:37:00.005-04:00

big-up shyamal, wan-ki and mar-from-afar for letting me crash kin sibling rivalry rehearsal for some acoustic+developmental vibes (aye: $ clothes+shoes; tha's all i sayin' allyuh) plus an intro to robyn:

and here's konichiwa bitches, which they wouldn't lemme embed but you should absolutely click+watch, yuh dig?

walk good.

finally, fff#25!

2010-08-09T11:45:00.008-04:00

officially the longest i ever take to fff, and truthfully, my sense of competition prompted, somewhat, when i saw somebody else finally wrote this one; not to be outdone...but i also wanted to do right, cause i figure if somebody new wash foot + jump in, the least i could do is have a new fff ready for them friday coming, and i always like to finish the previous one before triggering next, so i pushed myself.

for a variety of reasons,the last becoming apparent to me literally while finishing this draft, this one's a big experiment with voice; wanted to see if i could make a major adjustment over the course of a relatively short piece, for reasons to do with the movement of the piece, and make it not jar, so lewwe see...

my entry for flash fiction friday #25: those who mind don’t matter; those who matter don’t mind:

the double ten recede further into past tense, rainy-day details now. forward into consciousness from the soup of memory you pace, first only in one direction belying divided intentions, until, enough distance gained, you transition to the recognisable back+forth of a restless mind seeking quiet.

think with your own mind, not the one they lend back to you, stripped of its natural imaginatory resources. pull reason from further back than the double ten, before you accepted the mining of minds as a screensaver for the insidious percolating in the background.

those who mind don’t matter; those who matter don’t mind.

think in your own language, in your natural voice, ‘cause you know the old woman right. you know she right since them words fire from the red-lipstick-cannon of she wrinkled old mouth, cyah stop ricochet between your ears, you cyah squash them like how you do yourself in this place trying to fit in with people who doh know about anything that make you you.

“them that mind doh matter; them that matter doh mind…”

you know she right but the double ten is how you reach this far, the double ten show you how to talk and move and act like somebody who doh get ask no question in this place, somebody who could disappear into the background…ent tha’s wha you want?

you finally face the question you using the double ten to hide from all this time. you watch yourself in your mind and you know the truth and the words stop jockeying inside your head. you coming home to yourself.

you give up the mask to play a mas, to play yuhself.

walk good.

fff representative and miscellany

2010-07-30T10:10:00.010-04:00

illustrating churnings of the mind while i take the longest ever to finish a flash fiction friday (#25) and become deeply involved elsewhere. plenty happening but been too busy to post and so much so that i forgetting as fast as life marching, trying to keep up...

cool-ass-animation:

Record Makers Promo from CreativeApplications.Net on Vimeo.

and dj qbert drums:

walk good.

for the gremlin, whose talent is largely wasted in lion king, for artists and lovers of the extraordinary machine

2010-07-07T16:12:00.011-04:00

pilobolus, 2005, part of ted talks, finally posted in joyous cumulation of turtle-watching with continuum and weekend in sans souci by eddie bowen inclusive of gorgeous driving to+from gran riviere twice in a 2days and wining down in a neighbourhood bar until well after sun-up, the 12 gig i almost didn't go to until inveigled by lovely people only to then have shelly finally play the song i used in trinidad noir and been waiting years to hear live for the 1st time, beautiful morning of plotting+scheming art projects and the beginning of the 1st mural in my flat by my love nickolai salcedo, sheldon blackman comes home today and i'll see zed+nico...just when i had almost given up hope, so i give something back to the universe by sharing:

walk good.

hilarious...

2010-07-02T11:47:00.005-04:00

and more so for using a bes' movie to such excellent effect. great hitler monologue on trinbago election; sorry it not embeddable: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EM2dwv2pDI

walk good.

duuude...

2010-06-29T17:04:00.004-04:00

know how spy game shows brad pitt looks just like redford? less so, but will smith might be sesame street jesse jackson...

and does anybody else think the "w" cookie monster eats into an "n" and then a "v" when kermit trying to give a talk about "w" must be the stuff doozers build from that fraggles eat? doh like the thought of cookie eating styrofoam...

walk good.

flash fiction friday #25

2010-06-25T13:32:00.010-04:00

flash fiction friday #25, and/or-inclusion trigger (ie. use either half or all of the phrase): those who mind don't matter; those who matter don't mind.

rules of engagement:

if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.

you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.

you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).

you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*

write fresh!

walk good.

fff #24

2010-06-18T18:52:00.007-04:00

again, not at all what i expected to write.

flash fiction friday #24 (inclusion): earlobe, wrist, lip, knuckle, eye.

she bit her lip. that supposed to be sexy, right? she tried smiling with her eyes and promptly felt like a jackass when their crinkling corners crunched with dry yampee. hoping her optic crustiness was less visible than it felt, she provided (hopefully) distraction with a long, languorous stretch, arching her back, pushing her hips out suggestively, toes pointed, eyes closed dreamily in total enjoyment…at least, that’s what she tried to project...

this was harder than she remembered.

she opened her eyes and found herself looking directly into his, his study more intent than she could stand. after only a moment she had to break her gaze from his, unwilling to show but unable to contain the prickles dangerously warming her unwashed mask of casualness. she couldn’t remember the last time a blush overtook so fully, threatening to dissolve her into helpless, hapless giggles. she looked up to find him still drinking her in, and resorted to fixing her sightline firmly on his left earlobe and beyond it, into the safety of empty space where nothing provoked further eruption.

she had no idea what to do with herself, it had been so long since her last morning-after-the-first-time.

gradually, she allowed herself to relax. she allowed herself to look at his face again, reminded herself that intimacy was good and that she liked this person, and suddenly she realised how beautiful he was. she trailed her knuckles gently along his cheek to his jaw and down the side of his neck, traced the curve of his shoulder and down his arm until she tickled the outside of his thigh lacing her fingers into and through his.

she lifted his hand to her lips and kissed the inside of his wrist, its outside, each of his fingers, the centre of the palm of his hand. she put the palm of his hand against her cheek and smiled, with her whole face, her whole self, her whole, warm being. she leaned in and lightly kissed his mouth, leaned her head down to snuggle against his shoulder, closed her eyes, and sighed deeply, finally releasing the tension of these last years.

walk good.

fff#23 + flash fiction friday #24 trigger

2010-06-11T23:59:00.007-04:00

gettin' too slack, now i not just posting the fff#24 trigger late, i barely making it on friday. but it reach, nonetheless, followed by my attempt @ fff#23: wrinkle, heavy, space, light, time.

flash fiction friday #24 trigger (inclusion): earlobe, wrist, lip, knuckle, eye.

rules of engagement:

if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.

you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.

you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).

you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*

write fresh!

and fff#23 (not at all what i expected): wrinkle, heavy, space, light, time.

mango season’s flies buzz incessantly past, close and plentiful enough to keep you disturbed and swatting; as if the mosquitos not enough while you work. you nearly tear open a thigh with a thoughtless, irritated swing of the hand holding the chisel you use to engrave the lid, and are gently scratching yourself with the blade of the handsaw from time to time by the time you finish, light disappearing almost too fast for you to choose a spot while the space under the trees still visible.

later, after you put away your carpentry kit and wash away the sawdust+sweat, and tears, you gather the tools for the next part of the ritual. less, but heavy, and in spite of your bath, you are too. you leave what you need by your galoshes by the door, not by the box you kept in the bedroom after putting your sadness inside it.

later still, moon high, providing enough light that you unable to deny this act, you put on the galoshes, and shovel in one hand, box hugged tight to your other hip, step into the night.

you dig for what feels like hours; too shallow a grave allows secrets to escape. you hear the sadness inside the box and know it will stay with you forever even with its body locked in a coffin. when you can’t listen to the box anymore you stop digging.

the first wrinkle in a life otherwise blessed, you now know you strong enough to do what you must; you can birth your babies, dirty your hands, and bury your dead. you will survive.

walk good.

fff#22 + trigger flash fiction friday #23

2010-06-04T17:26:00.021-04:00

selfishness made the flash fiction friday trigger late this week: i was so close to being done with my fff#22 (below #23-trigger, this post) that i had to finish it before i posted the next trigger.

so, with apologies delivered in story-form under this flash fiction friday #23 (inclusion) trigger: wrinkle, heavy, space, light, time.

rules of engagement:

you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!

flash fiction friday #22:

when i drink i start telling stories and before i even realise i overdid it i struggling to remember which is reality and which is the lie, which is my life and which my possible death.

i keep expecting to get used to being somebody else, to stop having to remind myself of my name, to turn around the 1^st time an unfamiliar voice calls. getting used to being somewhere new was easier, by then i’d done it before albeit for different reasons, though now it never happened since that me doesn’t exist…

the aftermath of drinking: nostalgia for the future i’ll never have, copious vomiting, bitterness over the loss of lives+loves, headache…but what else is there?

when the drinking starts it does its job; i forget myself the way i intend, my current and given names equally less important than the handle of my poison. in the attempt to feel less i drink more and more than i should.

when i drink i fantasise about returning to myself, revisiting my old life to see if i left a hole. i have a list of items to bring back, as if reacquiring these things i miss will bring my 2 lives closer together.

when i drink i remember what never had the chance to happen.

walk good.

flash fiction friday #22

2010-05-28T11:57:00.008-04:00

courtesy sterling henderson, flash fiction friday #22 (starter) trigger: when i drink...
please reread recently revised rules of engagement, below.
rules of engagement:
you will send in your suggestions for flash fiction friday triggers (starter sentences/phrases, closers, titles, inclusions, etc.) anytime during the week up to 11.55a.m. friday, trinbago timezone; i will post the new fff trigger by noon friday trinbago timezone.*
if your trigger is not chosen and you think it is too brilliant not to be chosen, you will send it in again the next week.
you will write an anecdote, short story, or novel length prose poem using the trigger provided.
you will add comments and appropriate linkage to my trigger-post indicating your desire to participate and the completion of your piece (don't need a blogger/gmail account to comment on my blog).
you may join in at any time prior to the deadline.*
you will display your piece as a post on your own blog (or as a comment on my trigger-post or fasbook note or whatever, once we can all read it- please make sure we can all access the link to read it, not just those who are your friends on fasbook; there's a way to create public links for that, right?).
you will be done by monday noon trinbago timezone.*[in light of collective busyness and my general mentality, i not pressed about these deadlines 'cause i'd rather have fun reading late than never, so if you want to fff past deadline, go through hard, just make sure you comment on the appropriate trigger-post so we know which it belongs to, and if is a real old trigger, comment on the most recent post as well so we know something new to back-back+read...if nobody fffs i'll leave the same trigger up until at least 1person other than myself writes a piece]*
write fresh!
walk good.

short but linkalicious: mosdub

2010-05-20T12:38:00.011-04:00

courtesy pardner + recent guest for 2 awful, awful, awful weeks (yeah, that's right, 3 awfuls and still eh find time to blog it; barely fffing), liking this so much i thought i'd share+archive; listen+enjoy: dub reggae + mos def = mosdub (produced by max tannone)
walk good.

fff#21: when people wore pyjamas and lived life slow...

2010-05-16T18:46:00.008-04:00

hasn't come to me this fast in awhile, and i wasn't expecting these words...i credit dj thz with unexpected inspiration.
flash fiction friday #21 (starter trigger):
it wasn’t how fresh the smell of mangos made the air.
it wasn’t how fresh the haze of just-cut grass and recent rain felt against my skin.
it wasn’t even how fresh the boy next door was, not pretending he wasn’t eyeing my ass in my shorts as i bent over snatching up nearly-ripe julies.
it was how fresh the intro to slick rick’s children’s story was and the realisation that he knew all the words that made me fall in love with him forever in that moment...

walk good.