Renga Experiment

group effort poem
roughly 575/77
what forms in between:



Birds perching in trees
hot dogs to relish and eat
five plumes- barbecue

Refracting red/light/prisms
an apple kaleidoscope

Bumblebees arrive,
having ran out of honey
to eat our fruit pies

Gun powder rockets soon fly;
pink dandelion explodes

Our sucrose presence,
growing under mustard sun.
The sky on fire now

Sticky arms and ice cream jones
Heat stroke, or: heavy daydream

Smoking Marlboro,
Girls in best Sunday dresses,
Denim Levi jeans

A day off to honor work
Tomorrow: bleached pants are banned

Haiku Experiment

Haiku Experimentation

My brain is a bee
Always flying and buzzing
About the honey

Groaning and creaking
Like an old house in winter
My lungs collapse, open

Thoughts come like bullets
Gorge on my fleshy peach brain
An attempt to kill

Concrete drinks water
Transforming: black licorice
Green with mold, envy

Writing a haiku
Tough as nails and hard as stone
Picking words like apples

Nature coalesced
Florida orange blossoms
Roots, branch, shoots, leaves, bloom

Floating spider webs
Relentless creation, the sign
of a new morning

Baby powder snow
Dissolving ice on a road
Salt on everything

I am the ink pen
Convinced of my permanence
Writing a statue

Sticky mud on shoes
Retreated sun behind clouds
November morning

Trading sun for moon
Sunscreen and swim suits for scarves
Autumn evening

The moon hangs so low
Even insects are hiding
Autumn evening

Shakes leaves like a lab
Cardboard helicopters float
Daybreak in autumn

Spitting bluejay songs
My freckles soak up the sun
November morning

No more grass trimmings
Hanging scent of chlorophyll
The end of summer

Hearing my own breath
A mattress spring is stretching
I know I’m alive

Write about a person...

He was whistling like he always did. Half-whistling, that is, as his mouth was at a full half part. He was too gentle to whistle, which requires the forceful projection of air out of the all but closed mouth. The air came out of his mouth naturally, like breathing. The small red truck reeked of butterscotch, his breath perfuming the car with the dissolving Werther’s hard candy that sat atop his tongue. There was an endless supply of butterscotch, their home where cigarette butts usually lie.

We were on our way to the farm to feed the cows. A 45 minute trek with decreasing urbanism as the distance increased. The whistle was soothing, as was the warm sun on my face. I usually wrapped myself in a buttery blanket and slept like a kitten, but today I just listened to the song of mixed whistles, air being pulled in through the windows, and air being pushed out of his lungs. He bought my help that day with the promise of double cheeseburgers from McDonald’s, though I would have helped him either way. He pried open a coke can top with the nail on his dark thumb, as thick and callused as his hands and handed it to me.

I was his companion, the Sancho Panza to his Don Quixote. I followed him everywhere, even to early mass on Sundays where I was the only child. I would wake up to the familiar scratch of his hardened nail on my shoulder- this is how he always got someone’s attention. Still sleepy-eyed, he would slick my hair back with the same thin, greasy-toothed comb he used in his hair, still covered in pomade. Our hair would match: his jet black and shiny, mine a dark blonde. His dark skin, tanned from years of work in fields and his own natural color, was contained within a modest polo. My pale skin and thin figure was similarly clothed, in the same style polo and slacks as he. I was a miniature model of my grandfather, the yin to his yang, the white to his black.

I call him Tatay. Tatay (TAH-tie) is a Tagalog word for father, and all of his children called him this name during my childhood. The entire generation of grandchildren, learning from their own parents, attributed the same affectionate name to the same man. We knew no better- we thought this was his name. We were all his children, and he looked after us all with the same hardened hands and soft voice.

As I was his faithful companion, he was mine as well. It was he alone who took me to Boy Scout meetings in the fourth grade. His face was the only face I saw in the audience of the Clay County School District Elementary Spelling Bee. The language was his second, and he did not care for learning to spell or the fact that I comes before E, except after C. He sat in the crowd with the same beaming smile he always had on. He was watching his favorite, after all.

The truck he drives now is black and roaring. He climbs down from the mounted vehicle, the one with a ram as its logo, a more slender man. His hair is graying, no longer jet black. He moves more slowly now, and I wish more than ever that I could help him lift feed, eat cheeseburgers, and hear the constancy of his whistle once more.

Deadly Cupid Experiment

Thursdays are peach cobbler days. Most Thursdays, at least. My wife, Deborah, always made the most delicious peach cobbler for me on Thursdays, and on Tuesdays she made fresh cookies. On lucky Fridays I was greeted with my favorite dessert: vanilla pudding. She made it from scratch- not from the small JELL-O boxes of powder they sell at grocery stores. It was buttery and soft and cooled my tongue after a hot week of commuting.

Although my commute to work was only 15 minutes, it seemed like forever stood between me and my peach cobbler Thursday. I was swimming in an ocean of cars, navigating the busy boulevard like a salmon finding his spawning ground. I plan to eat a slice of cobbler for every minute I’m in the car, even if I’m completely stuffed with a rack of ribs and rosemary roasted potatoes. A glass of milk always helps it go down and tastes great competing with the hot baked treat.

I always thought Deborah would make a great mother. The kids would come home from school, throw their bags down in the kitchen and make a huge ruckus about their return from the torturous care of teachers at Grove Park Elementary. Deborah would appear from the kitchen with a tray of cookies, perfectly timed to be pulled out of the oven as the kids walked through the door. The most important element of cooking is timing, and Deborah had all the time in the world. It was me that was the problem.

We couldn’t have children for some reason. We’ve been trying for years now, ever since we married six years ago. A small ceremony near Jacksonville, Florida, in the Fall, when it was cheaper and we didn’t have to compete with the April shower lovers marrying under the rain in anticipation of blooming flowers. We wed when the leaves were falling and the trees were stretching to the sky, naked and exposed. The leaves in Florida aren’t as pretty as other states, though. When I rake the leaves in my yard, it’s the hard crunch of dead Sycamore leaves that I fear constantly. I sometimes wished we lived in upstate Georgia or Asheville, North Carolina, so the path to my car would have my walk a driveway paved with yellows and orange and cyan, but instead a drab path that no one would ever write a poem about. Her parents lived in Jacksonville, and I knew she would never want to leave them.

I was nearing the house now and I could already smell the cobbler on my plate. It was strong and familiar, even while passing the cheap burrito stand and Popeye’s chicken and biscuits that usually dominated the aroma of this street. There weren’t any bums out today, which was a huge relief. I always feel really panicked and anxious when a bum approaches my car. I try to look straight ahead at the road, or pretend I’m fiddling with the radio. I was never really fiddling with the radio, because my car had XM satellite radio, and it was always tuned to Octane, 80s rock for lameasses, and it was always at the same volume level. But I wouldn’t have to do that today, I could just drive straight to my wife and my pie and relax on the couch after a long day of data fields and cost benefit analysis of different cooling systems for buildings, which my company sold all over the southeast.

My car and house have great cooling systems. I can’t stand to sweat at all, and being a pretty big guy, almost anything will make me sweat. I always get the Freon in my car filled up at the start of every summer, when young couples are blooming like the wildflowers on Old Jennings Road, after a beautiful holy union at Sacred Heart Church. That’s where I would have my ceremony, if I could. If I were Catholic at least.

I was finally at my house, and all I had to do was traverse the difficult driveway. Whomever built my driveway decided to only use a third of the cement, maybe to cut costs or because they liked the challenge of driving over two narrow concrete ledges. The ledges were surrounded by a mote from last night’s two inch rainfall, and the five inch cliff was too much for my small Hyundai to climb over. I had to drive as straight as an arrow, and I would be home free.

I unlocked my door and opened it slowly, to try to let the aroma waft into my nose slowly. Sure enough it did, weak at first, but growing stronger and stronger as I opened the door wider and wider. I brushed my feet against the doormat that read “Got Dirt?”- a stupid birthday present from a cousin who obviously doesn’t know me. I just couldn’t risk Stephanie dropping by and going berserk over its absence.

Deborah looked great. Really great. It’s her smile, I think. It’s that motherly smile, the smile that makes the cookies taste softer and sweeter. It attracts your eyes, and it was all that you looked at when you talked to her. I asked her for a slice of cobbler before dinner. She knew I was home half an hour early, so she complied. She always does, even if I come home late. It’s that smile.

The cobbler was absolutely superb. I think she gets the peaches from upstate Georgia, where the driveways are littered with leaves the color of strawberries, tangerines, and pears. The state must be sweeter with so much fruit. She used cinnamon in her cobbler, and it made all the difference in the world. She was modest about her cobbler, but it was my favorite dessert. I think I liked it more than Friday pudding, because this tasted softer and sweeter with her smile, softer and sweeter than her vanilla pudding.

A rarely heard my house phone ring, so I was a bit startled by its ring. I hoped it wasn’t a telemarketer or someone from work. It was 8 minutes until 5, so there was a good chance. I wouldn’t answer the phone; I’d just go back to my cobbler. The name was unknown, but the number looked familiar. Not the bad familiar of your boss asking you to come in early, or the aunt who wants to ask you to fix her rain gutters. I answered the phone and heard a stern woman’s voice on the phone. She asked for me specifically, and I said this was he.

I listened intently. She had the test results from Dr. Jones, our family doctor. I was getting frustrated that Deborah didn’t have a bun in the oven, even though we’d been trying for six years. We began taking tests and giving out blood like we were O negative. She said a word I hadn’t heard recently, so I asked her to repeat it. “Diabetes,” she said.

“Diabetes?,” I asked.

“Yes.”

That was all she needed to say. There was a pause on the phone. I didn’t quite know what to say. I had to go in for more tests? I might have diabetes?

She didn’t have the answers I wanted. She couldn’t tell me why my body doesn’t control insulin properly. She wouldn’t tell me why my love was killing me.

Gingerly

Gingerly

First, match her hair with the color of rust
Or even the red clay in south Georgia.
Next, put her feet into a pair of tall boots
So I hear her coming a mile away,
Her heels talk talk talking to the ground.
What about her eyes?
Should they green like a tomboy’s,
Blue like a mermaid’s,
Or brown, like Sycamore leaves in Autumn?
After you wrap her shoulders in a thin green sweater,
So she looks like a Christmas present,
I will unravel her like a greedy child.
Will her skin will be soft
Like a stewed carrot that I crush with my tongue?
You should put a freckle on her face for each of her birthdays,
I guess she won’t get much sun.
Then paint her fingernails the same color as her fingertips
When I hold her hand too tight and it loses feeling.
Perfume her neck with strawberries or rose petals
But make sure her blood tastes like iron.

Home for the Holidays

My brother was cutting away at white construction paper with a pair of scissors too big for his hands. My parents never bought the sharpened plastic scissors that kindergarten teachers often require. “As long as you don’t run with them”, they would tell him.
He interrupted his work to look up at me with a closed mouth smile. I rarely saw kids his age with glasses, but they sat atop his nose like they had always been there, right out of the womb. The white products in front of him were supposed to be water crystal formations, as unique as his DNA. Instead, my brother had repeated a pattern for all the paper snowflakes we were going to hang on our windows. I rubbed his shaggy head with the knuckles on my fist and took a new batch to hang on our frosted windows.
Looking out of my winter retreat, my parent’s home in Florida, I saw nothing but dead grass and dirt, which even the fake snow encrusted on the panes could not hide. The snow smelled like burned Styrofoam cups or gasoline if gasoline was a convenience store sugar treat.
I hung the snowflakes with Scotch tape, tacking them onto the white windows of our red brick house. At night, when the lights outside that hung down like electric icicles, you couldn’t see the paper snowflakes, but I know they were there.
I wanted to go outside and breathe out smoke, but I couldn’t as long as my parents were around. They didn’t know I enjoyed an occasional cigarette, or that I loved winter because the water vapor in my exhale and the grey in my lungs commingle to form dragon’s breath. Even as a kid, walking to the bus stop on Laurel Lane, I would pretend to smoke a cigarette, amused by the plumes that would escape my tiny mouth. I felt older than my peers, who stuck chalk candy sticks into their mouths and pretended to exhale what their parents would never condone. I knew none of their parents smoked. Only my dad did, because my dad had to. What else would you do when driving a semi-truck for twelve hours a day? The Winston eagle on my dad’s pack was so familiar to me, even after he quit driving his truck, and stopped smoking a pack a day.
I would have to drive my car around the neighborhood, or pretend to get a chicken quesadilla and an order of nachos from Taco Bell, in order to smoke. My dad’s nose was strong, though. His olfactory once had a race with a bloodhound’s and won- how else could he always know? I would walk up to my dad, shorter than myself, and give him a big hug. He would always say the same thing to me, “you smell like cigarette.” My Filipino father and many other first-generation immigrants rarely used the plural, so I imagined the aroma to be a name brand fragrance. The newest scent by Calvin Klein: Cigarette. They already advertised in movies and television, so why not step it up and make a fragrance. Phillip Morris could be on par with Jessica Simpson, or any other trashy pop singer, and release an unoriginal scent for young girls and ignorant parents to scoop up during the holidays.
It was approaching late afternoon, and the sun was starting to go down. This time three months ago, before we fell back to save daylight, before Benjamin Franklin influenced our times yet again, it would have been bright. Brighter than Washington D.C., where it got dark too early and was cold year round from the hearts of the politicians. My brother used the approaching dusk as a reason to get an early present. “Christmas is only like, 7 hours away”, he would beg. “Please, just one”, he would bargain. He always picked the biggest present, a trick he learned from his older brother. If the biggest isn’t the best, then why bother?
I was jaunted from my thoughts by a red wrapped package landing on my lap. My father had tossed me a gift, too. This one definitely wasn’t the biggest of them all, so I assumed the worst. I told him I would open it later, that I didn’t need to open it now. I was in college after all- I could wait. I would wait. So I put the box in my room, on top of my dresser, to open later. Maybe I could open it later, when I wanted to go outside and play in the cocaine rain, the only white Christmas I can imagine in Florida.
Several hours were burned away watching re-runs of classic Christmas movies. My phone lay next to me, as dead as the grass outside my windows. No movements, noises, or signs of life came from the small, black accessory. I needed something to do, something to occupy myself with. Christmas was still three hours away, and my boredom only just began to seep in. There wasn’t even any beer in the fridge. My father liked to drink hard alcohol on holidays. Crown Royal was his favorite, and the whiskey kept his belly warm even though we didn’t have a fireplace.
I saw the red package on top of my dresser again. It looked like a book, so maybe it was a book. I rarely read anymore, not out of pleasure at least. I couldn’t imagine what kind of book my father would get me, as the only books he ever read were written by poker professionals. I pulled off the ribbon, and undid the Scotch tape that held the Christmas skin on. When I was done with the present, there was a neat pile of paper next to it. After years of scrap paper hurricanes at present time, and the wails and yells from my parents, I learned to unwrap presents with the grace of a hungry, poor child. I would slowly peel back what I was looking for, careful not to appear too excited or anxious. There was nothing but a plain brown box inside, thin cardboard that you couldn’t even ship with. I was disappointed there was no book, as if I would read it, but pressed on.
I pried open the book sized box less gracefully, missing a piece of tape entirely and ripping an entire flap off. I pulled out a plastic sleeve, and tried to see what was wrapped inside the thin layer of tissue and bubble wrap. It was a metallic box inside a box. I flicked the top of the silver box open and tried to ignite the wick with a spark of flint. It was a new Zippo lighter, fluidless and dry- as dead as my lawn. My father knew all along.

The Lesson

Look up a
meaning
for life

in a diction-
ary. Words fill
pages, but

understanding is
in life, not
arranging lines

from life
to death. We
learn that a

meaning
for life
involves

end of life
in order,
to appreciate.

Swim. Swim
against the current,
our bodies

tire and
slump. Death
defines life.


Prompted by Robert Creeley's "The Language".

District 9/10

District 9 is the newest popular science fiction release, and does a tremendous job in revitalizing a genre that is often lacking and hokey. The film employs legendary American director Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings) to produce the film with lesser-known directors, writers, and actors. Despite the lack of mainstream production factors, the end product is filled with clarity of purpose, dynamic social interactions and commentary, and of course action, action, action.
The introduction of the film is done in a mock documentary style, relying on a pastiche of news clippings, interviews, and television programming to create the backdrop for the sources of conflict in the film. The story’s main character, Wikus van de Merwe, is also introduced and discussed in this style, adding to the film’s verisimilitude. Members of Wikus’s family and friends are asked to give commentary about Wikus. The audience is given negative but mysterious comments about him, which are only understood at the end of the movie. The introduction, although very different from the rest of the movie, allows the audience to relax and suspend their disbelief. The usually ridiculous scenarios, weapons, and technology gaps from other science fiction movies like The Matrix or Star Trek do not seem as far-fetched after the strong, documentary-style introduction.
The intro explains that the government opened the ship’s hull to find 1.8 million malnourished aliens. The creatures, called “prawns” by humans (although not shrimp-like in stature), look like crustaceans- complete with thin waists, claw-like appendages, and thick shell skins. The film introduces violent civil overtones concerning the relocation of 1.8 million aliens into the city. Citizens of Johannesberg began to protest, eventually leading to civil clashes between humans and aliens. Videos and pictures of facilities with species-specific service remind the audience of the recent racist past, adding to the film’s believability. The entire film is rife with irony, but does not lose its class or seriousness.
We follow the adventure of flawed protagonist, Wikus van de Merwe, as he is assigned by his father-in-law and boss to lead a military operation to evict the prawns from their slums called District 9. With the help of MNU, a military weapons company, Wikus and his team go door to door to evict prawns, often times using coercion and threats to get the necessary signatures (inky claw streaks). While delivering eviction notices, Wikus luckily stumbles onto the house and laboratory of Christopher Johnson, a peculiarly intelligent prawn. Wikus confiscates a small cylinder from Johnson’s shack which explodes onto his face and begins turning him into an alien.
The rest of the film takes place during the first 74 hours of Wikus’s exposure to the substance. His left hand begins changing into the hand of a prawn’s, by some unknown and unexplained biological phenomenon. This lucky location for first growth is especially important given that the prawns have brought powerful alien weaponry that can only be used by DNA activation- alien DNA activation. Although the movie’s coincidences and improbable scenarios create a seemingly contrived plot, the movie’s style of direction and production, combined with the familiarity of subjugation make it entirely approachable and watchable.
Although the explosions and bloody, piecemeal bodies left in the wake of the weapons is amazing to watch, and at times slightly humorous, the true brilliance of the movie lies in its scope. By choosing South Africa as the setting for the film, the obvious allusions to apartheid need not be mentioned. The aliens are transformed into the new “other”. The class system of colonialism is changed into an “us against them” situation- where humans are united together against an alien race. The cause of this ambivalence, of wanting to discriminate the aliens but not destroy them, is never understood or explained. It can be attributed towards the xenophobic meditation on race that the film undertakes, or simply as a dramatic device to spur the plot along.
Although modern science fiction films are no stranger to social commentary, with films like Children of Men and Minority Report starring big named actors and grossing millions of dollars in profit, District 9 has a key difference: the social situations which develop in this film are a direct commentary on our past, and our present. The film manages to present a popular conflict device, conflicts in race, and engage the audience in a new way. The irony of a nation still in the aftermath of apartheid advocating a system of discrimination is powerful and thought-provoking. This movie will leave the audience wondering many things (like why the prawns love cat food so much or how the movie portrays human tendencies), but one question I often ask remains silent: “Why did I spend money to see this movie?”

Same

Summary- Chapter Two: The means of correct training, Foucault

 

 

            This chapter by Foucault focuses on describing his view of discipline as it has evolved in the 17^th and 18^th centuries into a social institution that has changed the individual’s place in society. Foucault seeks to correct the notion of power as having a repressive nature about it, positing that instead, disciplinary power creates new objects, rituals, and realities (194). Foucault defends this assertion by detailing the development of disciplinary power, the changes in technology and practice in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, and how this change in practice remodeled the individual into something to be controlled and manipulated not through brute force or physical maintenance, but through anonymity and coercion. As Foucault writes on page 170, “the chief function of disciplinary power is to ‘train’”, which contrasts with the often recanted belief that power and discipline work by removing an individual’s status. The new form of domination that Foucault is describing is an institution that both homogenizes and individualizes, and this new form of domination must be understood differently than previous forms of power.

            The first major point and clarification that Foucault seeks to make is about individualization. There is a misconception that power represses the individual, which Foucault wants to overturn. Foucault writes that disciplinary power has “methods of decomposition” that work to break down individuals that are both “objects and instruments of power” (170). An individual becomes a tool for creating power, and the application of the power. He acknowledges that this sort of disciplinary action requires a mechanism and practice that would allow coercion through observation (170).

            Observation is important because it “induces effects of power” (171). This is because the constant vision or threat of surveillance causes an individual to be trapped in his or her subjection, or modes of living (187). By creating a system of constant vision and surveillance, observation is used as a means of supreme control over the individual. The individual has the fear of imminent possible vision and discovery used against him or her, based solely on the idea that the individual may be watched at any given moment.

            Foucault constructs a hypothetical mechanism for allowing such surveillance and then cites historical precedents for similar practices. Surveillance and supervision proved to be a valuable resource for improving capital, through a hierarchy of supervisors and observers who would maintain utmost efficiency (176). After being integrated into the economy and proven on that front, many other institutions began to incorporate systems of surveillance to improve their purposes, with the military camp cited as the ideal model (176). The military camp works as an ideal model because of its architectural design and its intent. The structures and landscape of a military camp is arranged and oriented in such a manner as to allow surveillance and vision of all individuals in a hierarchical manner. A network of what Foucault calls “gazes” is set up and arranged so that general visibility is created, with no direct source doing the actual watching. This lack of central source would be the first instance of anonymity and invisibility being demonstrated by the systems of surveillance in disciplinary power. This same model would be applied to schools, hospitals, asylums, and any other area of society that required obedience, monitoring, and limited resources.

            Foucault, on page 172, summarizes the apparatus as architecture that operates to control individuals by changing them and housing them. The old conception of power and control, through physical confinement and physical walls is replaced by a system of gazes and vision, all calculated and exacted in a precise manner. Transparent, non-existent forces operate to discipline and control, which sharply contrasts to any other time period, where physical force alone was the mode of control. The end goal would be to create an apparatus where a single gaze could see everything constantly (173), thus ensuring an individual’s constant possible surveillance and the control of the individual. The apparatus works by illuminating everything. Old conceptions of power are characterized as a system that used deception, concealment, and deceit to control, while Foucault is asserting that openness and vision are the new tools of control.

            The distributed network of control bears resemblance to a pyramid. Power is distributed both vertically, from the top down and from the bottom upwards, and laterally, outwards, creating a multi-dimensional, rising system of power. The network works so efficiently because no one part is interrupted or weighed down with the surveillance of another part. Individuals on the same level can watch each other, and watch downwards, while seeing upwards. Those doing surveillance are watched, and those watching are also watched, until a hierarchical system is created where, ideally, one unit sits atop the rest in a single gaze to see every possible thing. This new type of surveillance is characterized by “intense, continuous supervision” (174). The effect is a network of uninterrupted relations of power, which allows the network to operate in silence and indiscreetly, no longer hiding itself or operating in concealment, but openly monitoring, with the individuals who are monitored also monitoring, thus perpetuating the system of control and making the system entirely anonymous and unknowable in an entirely new way.

            The physical arrangement of power and surveillance is accompanied by a deep understanding of the individuals being watched. Beginning on page 178, Foucault describes a penal system to enforce modes of conduct. These modes of conduct, such as one’s approach to time, to activities, to one’s behavior and speech and one’s own body are subjected to punishment. Controlling the individual on such fundamental bases allows the institution of power to distribute individuals based on different skills and needs, so as to use information both for the individual and against the individual. This practice of arranging individuals by their practices and habituations is known as normalizing (184). Foucault writes that “the Normal is established as a principle of coercion” (184). The process works by “measuring gaps, determining levels, fixing specialties”, etc. By reducing individuals to a collection of practices, and by forcing individuals to practice normalized actions, a form of homogeneity is achieved so as to allow ease of control for large numbers, while still gaining the benefits of individual aptitudes and abilities in an economic or utilitarian sense. In combination with surveillance, the normalizing function of apparatuses forms another instrument of power.

            Alongside surveillance and normalizing, the process of examination is a final instrument of power that Foucault discusses. The examination is a hybrid of the two other forms of power, and works by classifying and punishing an individual based on a ritualistic exercise of power. By normalizing actions and habituations, and by using constant surveillance and informational gathering, “the examination transformed the economy of visibility into the exercise of power” (187). The examination created a “disciplinary individuality” which worked to homogenize and give individuality, which ultimately helps create anonymity and greater control. The examination changed the notion of power arising from physical control to power arising from homogenization of its subjects and “compulsory visibility” (187). This visibility, again, forces individuals into a specific subjection through fear of the possibility of being seen.

            Nearing the end of the chapter, Foucault writes on 192 that “the disciplines mark the moment when the reversal of the political axis of individualization […] takes place.” Individualization meant power in the past: nobility and those with truly individual status, through name, occupation, etc. had more power and ability in their lives than those without individual status. However, through disciplinary powers, individualization is used against the individual and is now another tool of power, rather than the savior from power. Thus the entire machine of “correct training” is described. The new institution of power is very different from the previous notion: a physical, visible, known entity. The new form of power and control is achieved through individualizing and watching, by creating visibility and extracting knowledge. The result is a dangerous form of control where individuals assist in their own fate. The individual is seen as the instrument of power, by having information to correlate to the norm, by providing surveillance on other individuals, and as the object and goal of power. Man is coerced into subjection unknowingly, and under the guise of empowerment through individualization- which appeases the dated desire of having through individuality.

For the roomies

The creation of this mash-up was centered on an exploration of Michel Foucault’s concepts from the chapter “The means of correct training” from the book Discipline and Punish. Foucault writes, critiques, and details disciplinary power in this chapter and its development from the 18^th century onwards. Contrasting with popular belief, Foucault begins the chapter by immediately arguing that the “chief function of disciplinary power is to train” (Foucault 170). The idea of power residing in a single, unified object that seeks to condense power and subjects into “a uniform mass” is misguided and inaccurate as a descriptor for actual practices. Rather, “power seeks to train” (Foucault 170). This is to say that the aim of power is to create individuals that operate in a system such that their individual powers and abilities are both the objects of control and the instruments of control. The distribution of forces, rather than the isolation and binding of forces works to multiply the overall effect and power of the entire system. By training and habituating individuals through discipline, the power is able to use the controlled individual against itself in a new and profound way.  The film trilogy Lord of the Rings serves as a media basis for the mash-up because of its repeated themes of power through vision and training. The Eye of Sauron is the symbolic culmination of a “mechanism that coerces through observation” (Foucault 170) which is necessary and prior to the exercise of discipline. This mash-up delves into images and scenes depicting the Eye of Sauron in the act of disciplining and habituating the people of Middle Earth. Foucault states that the “perfect disciplinary apparatus would make it possible for a single gaze to see everything constantly” (Foucault 173), which is precisely what the Eye of Sauron is able to do.

            To create the mash-up, the program Windows Movie Maker was used. This program is a basic, free program for Windows users that allows for the splitting of clips and minor editing and transitional effects. The program is less capable than other video editing programs such as Sony Vegas, however. Unlike Sony Vegas, Windows Movie Maker lacks the ability to edit the accompanying sound of a given clip or the length of a clip. Editing scenes can only be done by splitting larger clips into smaller clips, rather than precisely cutting at certain points or elongating or condensing a clip.

            The mash-up arranges nine total clips, three from each individual film to form an arching, generic narrative of the power of the Eye of Sauron. The first scenes intend to introduce the Eye of Sauron and show its power and intent, and the ending clips show a rebellion and war against the eye that eventually leads to its destruction. In order to transfer the video data of the film trilogy from DVD, another program called Magic DVD Ripper was used. This program extracted and converted the videos from DVDs to .avi files which could be read and manipulated by Windows Movie Maker.

Although unable to modify sound clips and layer or distort them, the program still allows for sound clips to be split and placed on top of other scenes. This was explored in the last clip of the mash-up, where the last 75 seconds of a song titled “Six Days at the Bottom of the Ocean” by Explosions in the Sky was layered over the final battle in the trilogy that concludes with the destruction of the eye. The clip features no words, and this worked well with the entirely instrumental sound clip to create a rhythm and emotional build-up, even without dialogue.

To assist in the video’s overall presentation, transitions and a title scene were added. Without the option of matching scenes precisely in sound and timing, crude transition effects were essential to make the gaps between clips less choppy and to flow into one another more smoothly.

            The end product is an exposition of the abilities and strengths of the Eye of Sauron that can be analyzed in the context of Foucault. Foucault writes that “disciplinary power is exercised through its invisibility; at the same time it imposes on those whom it subjects a principle of compulsory visibility” (187). It is the constant visibility of a disciplined subject that keeps him or her in subjection. The constant threat of possibly being seen or known changes the attitudes and decisions that are made by subjects, and this is training. Supporting the notion that in distributing power, overall control is increased is Frodo using the ring. Frodo, when using the ring, becomes entirely visible to the Eye of Sauron.

The replacement of walls and cells with visibility is a fundamental occurrence in both the film and the text, and the Eye of Sauron experiences increased power and domination as its subjects, in this case Frodo, increase their powers. The Eye of Sauron is described in the beginning of the mash-up by the wizards Sarumon and Gandalf as a lidless wreathe of fire, constantly gazing and observing. The Eye of Sauron exhibits the same power and intensity of gaze that an entire institution such as a military camp or hospital might display, but with more ferocity.

            With the amount of observation developed, the Eye of Sauron is able to understand and learn about its subjects and thus further manipulate them in a process Foucault describes as normalization. By knowing the intentions of individuals around the ring, the Eye gains knowledge of its weaknesses and can anticipate attack and rebellion. The understanding of its subjects through vision is critical for the system of power to maintain power in the face of opposition from subjects. The subjects and rebellious members plotting against the institution, in this case Frodo and the Fellowship, are left with few options. They admit that they cannot defeat Sauron through force, but must act as Sauron does. The Fellowship uses the same techniques of normalization with Sauron to eventually defeat him. By understanding Sauron’s tendencies, the Fellowship devises the plan to create a distraction which will draw the Eye away from Frodo. With the threat of constant visibility, and with their intentions and abilities studied, the subjects are normalized, which “imposes homogeneity” (184). Their course of action becomes predictable, calculable, and easier to control or counter. Foucault concludes that “like surveillance, normalization becomes one of the great instruments of power” (184).

            The Eye of Sauron shows itself to be a masterful representation of an institution of power that derives its control through discipline and training of subjects to act in certain ways. It only further exemplifies the concepts put forth by Foucault when the Eye itself is destroyed by the very modes of control it uses. Despite having more visibility and power than its subjects, the Fellowship is able to abuse Sauron’s own habituations in order to lure the eye into constricting its own visibility by casting its gaze upon a trite, planned operation. The power of normalization and surveillance show themselves as they usurp the institution which has mastered these forms of control.

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

Explosions in the Sky. "Six Days at the Bottom of the Ocean." The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place. Temporary Residence, 2003.

 

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Dir. Peter Jackson. Perf. Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom. New Line Cinema, 2001.

 

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Dir. Peter Jackson. Perf. Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom. New Line Cinema,2002.

 

The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. Dir. Peter Jackson. Perf. Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom. New Line Cinema, 2003.

 

Foucault, Michel. "Discipline and Punish.” FSU Blackboard.  Florida State Univeristy. 29 April 2009 < bsession="94521601&bsession_str="session_id="94521601,user_id_pk1="468293,user_id_sos_id_pk2="1,one_time_token="">

Feast

In the doorway, sizzling onions
Punctuated by our half-open
Mouths, slowly staining purple from sauvignon
(The bottle with the forty-seven pound chicken mascot)
Moving down your neck, bruising your skin
Like a ripe, red, apple
Hearing your lungs collapse and open, faster and faster

My digits pull at your licorice hair,
Smelling the infusion of pomegranate and pears.
Fruits to overpower the permeated cumin seed and garlic
On my fingers, which move slowly down your vanilla back
Savoring each curve, lower and lower

Your eyelids part and your gaze travels the half foot to my own
Eyes that match March’s pale blue sky
Eyes that watch the browning piece of meat
We break away momentarily-
The steak needs to be turned over

An investigation of Benjamin

The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

The intention of this video was to analyze and question Walter Benjamin’s concepts of Fascism and aesthetics in his essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” Benjamin argued that Fascism resulted in the introduction of aesthetics into politics. Benjamin claims that by introducing artistic and aesthetic principles and influences into politics, the product was a situation where politics could use the benefits of aesthetics to pursue a particular goal: the controlling of property while re-arranging society so as to eliminate fundamental rights in order to strengthen the single party in power. The rendering of political images aesthetic, which is to arrange and construct the messages in a way so as to achieve a goal of evicting empathy and relating in an audience, would have two effects: the first effect is that the average citizen would feel expression in politics, through the use and practice of aestheticization; the second effect is that politics and messages have a forcefulness and convincing aura about them, using a given set of aesthetic principles to help strengthen a message and evoke more response, conviction, and empathy. This video mash-up seeks to take political messages from multiple contexts and time periods, and to re-arrange them in such a way that a new message is formed, completely different from the intended messages. This effect is achieved by removing aesthetically pleasing and rhetorically powerful words and images and forcing new connections to be made between the phrases, images, and how they relate to their intentions, to each other, and to the video as a whole.
To begin the project an assortment of digital video messages were collected. The website youtube.com was the search engine and database from which the cited materials were taken. The videos were downloaded from youtube.com through the use of a computer program called Free FLV Converter. This program downloaded the video clips from youtube and converted the files into .avi format. This format should have allowed for Quicktime Pro to play the files, but it was unable to do this. The files could be read on Windows Media Player, but the particular formulation of .avi from Free FLV Converter was incompatible with the codecs that Quicktime Pro had. To solve this problem DivX was downloaded, another video viewing platform, so that new codecs could be installed. This was unsuccessful. The final solution to view and edit the video clips was to use an entirely new, advanced, multi-platform program which could interpret many different .avi files. Ultimately, the program Vegas Pro 8 was used. This program could read the particular .avi files and also edit the clips to form a new video clip. The program renders the collection of altered sound and video clips to a particular format, which was chosen to be .wmv, because Windows is a very popular platform, and is easy to burn to DVD. Youtube.com was the intended host website, but the file types this site prefers is .mpeg, so a new program called A4 Video Converter was used to convert the .wmv file from Vegas Pro 8 to a .mpeg file which could then be uploaded to youtube, the original database, to be placed into the same system as the original clips.
The videos were chosen based on key features- powerful messages of terrorism, Nazism, and Communism. My method was arranging key phrases, references and figures, such as the American presidents Obama and Bush. Portions of speeches, propaganda films from the 1950s and 40s, and interviews were taken out of their contexts and placed into a new context. These contexts were essential for the appropriate interpretation of such phrases and words. By removing the words and images from their given context, aligning the words and images alongside similarly displaced clips, and using breaks and lulls in conversational speech to connect the videos on both a subjective level and a semantic, conversational, unified level the end product is a video that discusses and shows the possible fallacies and hypocritical associations that the American society and politic might engage in.
Bejamin writes in the Epilogue to his essay, “All efforts to render politics aesthetic culminate in one thing: war”. The result of the video is a collage highlighting the war-driven mentality of American society, and the possible connection between American politics and Fascism. Fascism is understood as a single-party system seeking to organize society around a uniting cause or front so as to have control under a single ruler. The single-party system referenced is not the Democratic or Republican parties, but the war-driven party maintained for Capitalism. The video sought to draw attention to the idea of a possibly hidden group. This party, which controls many aspects of the government, includes key figures such as Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld, alluded to in the mash-up when Donald Duck says “Heil” immediately before the new clip begins with the words “people like…”. This party is responsible and centrally involved in the recent wars on behalf of America, which the mash-up indicated America has been involved with since the Korean War. This is important to note because the purpose of introducing aesthetics into politics would be to introduce war. Benjamin writes that “War and war only can set a goal for mass movements on the largest scale while respecting the traditional property system.” The movements for which Fascism seeks to bring about, a single-party system under a single leader with the end goal of preserving the nation, is done through war. War, therefore, is the primary tool of social change, of moving and altering politics, laws, economics, and society in general. Despite all of these radical changes that war can bring about, Benjamin notes that “Only war makes it possible to mobilize all of today’s technical resources while maintaining the property system.” Despite resources and the general populace being malleable through war, the property system can be maintained and enforced. This property system can be seen as Capitalism, the privatization of endeavors for personal gain. Capitalism, the American form of economy, is the dominant, single party that rules the nation. Capitalism, which is a precise method of controlling property, is kept in place while society and politics change through the constancy of war. America exhibits characteristics of Fascism in numerous ways. The country is ruled under a single leader, a figurehead called the President, and is organized in such a way so as to preserve the “American way of life”, which is the Capitalist way of life. The preservation of the nation and the control of the masses through war are typical signs of Fascism. Benjamin’s conclusion, that “All efforts to render politics aesthetic culminate in one thing: war.” can be seen as correct on two levels concerning this video mash-up. To maintain war for over half a century, a means of convincing and controlling the masses must be in place. A system of propaganda and aestheticized politics must be in place. This would explain the control the government has had over the masses over the last half century and the country’s constant warring. If this is not true, if America does not exhibit signs of Fascism in its political and societal structure, then the video experiment still showed Benjamin’s premises as true. The result of the video, which is its own aestheticization of politics, is a video centered around and entirely about war. Whether this subject, war, is for the purpose of controlling society to maintain property control is debatable and inconclusive, however, the connections and comparisons to Fascism and Benjamin’s claims are maintained.

WORKS CITED

“Donald Duck - Der Fuehrer's Face”. 04 March 2009. Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“Leftist Propaganda”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“History of Oil Propaganda”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“Catapult Propaganda”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“Bush threatens Obama & America with New Terror Attack (Larry King Live The Last Interview)”. 04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“Catapult Propaganda”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“1941 Nazi Propaganda Film - The Siege of Tobruk”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“1950's Cold War Propaganda - Communism Vs Capitalism”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“1950's Cold War Propaganda - Fallout shelter”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“Barack Obama On Meet The Press, Discusses 'War On Terror'”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. Youtube. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“State of the Union 2007”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. C-Span. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

“State of the Union 2008”.04 March 2009 . Online video clip. C-Span. Accessed on 04 March 2009.

Valentine's Day

Today we celebrate with a feast to honor the martyrdom of our beloved Saint Valentine. We gorge ourselves on chocolate, candies, and cum. I, however, will not participate in this commodification. I wish it were because of some noble character trait or a true reluctance to participate in the capitalist phenomena, but it’s because I will just be alone another year.

I’ve never had a real date for Valentine’s Day. A real “Valentine”. Getting cards with cookie-cutter words of love and stuffing my backpack full of duck, rabbit, pigs, even hearts, all the cartoon characters of my childhood in the centers of loaded love symbols. In high school it evolved into exchanges with close female friends and sometimes a girl I liked. I’ve only had a real girlfriend for one Valentine’s Day though, but she was in another town and I was still alone. I was looking forward to the last holiday from the other side with her. This year she’ll see it with my once best friend.

It’s in the middle of the night that my loneliness is really felt, not on holidays like this one. Waking from dream and feeling nothing in the darkness beside you. No one’s warmth to absorb or breaths to fall asleep to. What is to be alone? I desire this connection with someone, physical and emotional. I see a beautiful girl and I want to talk to her. More accurately, I want to have sex with her. Do I relish my mind with images of a romantic dinner, walking on the beach, or a sappy movie? No, I imagine her bent and begging. I wonder what she sounds like, what she moans like, she tastes like. I have a drive, an impulse, a response to stimuli. The more intense the stimuli, the greater the response. This works for both sexes, as I consistently see girls fawning and feigning over a title, or money, or power- just as men salivate over thighs or breasts. My desire to make her laugh, to cook for, to protect are just to consummate my love.

So it seems to be that I need to acquire that which is desirable- a title, money, or power. I know what I want, but why do I want it? What motivates this? My entire purpose to accumulate power and wealth so that I can impress a better looking woman?

My desire to ejaculate is the motivation of my DNA to propagate. I often ask myself why I want to do a certain thing. I feel compelled by society, culture, some unknown hand to go out, drink, and try to find a slut to use. I feel like I have to be social, to be involved, to see people. I also feel the desire to learn. To read, to watch films, to learn about subjects, to see and delve and revise and critique. To triumph and topple, destroy and demolish, crush and kill. All of these things are just motivations of my DNA to better myself and ultimately appear more desirable to a female.

It is not as shallow as simply being impulsed to party and fuck that makes me a slave to a chemical staircase; it is that any desire to improve is merely a desire to appear better for a female. If I radically decided to become celibate for the rest of my life, to avoid sex and think of nothing but philosophy, God or the devil in mankind, it would only be so that I could appear to be more resilient to my urges and more steadfast for my convictions. It would make me appear better and thus be for the purpose of finding a better female. If I wanted to avoid females, it would only be so that I could find a better female. I see no way out of this cycle.

I’m damned if I do; fucked if I don’t. I know my motivations, my desires to do anything are ultimately not my own, so my life is not my own. Anything I want to do or feel, any real emotion, real desire, real want or need or thought or action or concept or culmination or breakthrough or eureka is just to find a better mate. It’s not to give value to my own life. They are not to benefit anyone. It leads me to pollinate, spread, inject, infect with seed. It is the hardwired whisper. We are no different than a coconut tree or sea urchin or zebra. We have a purpose to spread our genes, and to seek improving features, through mutation or self-help books, so that we can spread our genes better and spread better genes. It is all we have and all we are. We are machines at heart, and serve it rightly so.

I’m left with absolutely nothing. In the face of death, or the thought of not existing, I have nothing to offer myself. Combating loneliness is impossible. I can’t console or cope. I am nothing but a slave with no heart or mind of my own. I have no soul. Where is my assurance against death? While my aunts believe in God, that some mighty Father in the Sky will give them life everlasting, I believe in absolute nothingness. It is not to say I don’t believe in anything. I believe in nothing. We will not exist when we die. It will be as good as if we did not exist. Our bodies will rot in the ground and plump worms will burrow into our brains. And eventually, the universe will be destroyed, our sun will burn out, we will ravage our planet with pollution and war and disease. The bottom line is that the end of the line is non-existence. No matter how high we build our towers, and how long we get to live, we will inevitably die, and we will be grinded into the sands of time.

The sun will set and the light will march across my room and over my bed, under my blinds and up to the moon, leaving me to swim in the ocean midnight. No matter how hard I try to stay awake, my eyes will still close. The false sense of permanence, a monument that will stand through time, this is what my nucleic acids try to build. Erecting a lasting structure on a microscopic scale. I need an illusion. I want to hear a woman’s falsetto. I want to feel the energy between our clasped hands. I want to fall asleep with someone.

Africa

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.

We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."¹



I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.

---
EDITOR'S NOTE:

Quote:

Originally Posted by http://politibits.tuscaloosanews.com/default.asp?item=2318013 Clarence Jones, who helped King draft the speech the night before in the Willard Hotel was interviewed by CNN after they showed the speech and he said that at some point the great gospel singer Mahalia Jackson, who was on the podium with King, yelled out to King to "tell them about the dream!," a theme that he had used in other speeches, but had not planned to incorporate in that day's oration. Jones said he saw King turn his prepared notes over and told someone nearby, "These people don't know it, but they are fixing to go to church."

---
And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."2

This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.

With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,

From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that:

Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

Free at last! Free at last!

Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

I can't even begin to go over how beautiful and perfect this speech was. The man didn't even live to see forty, and was brutally murdered for his ideas of spreading equality and extinguishing the flames of injustice perpetuated by the cultural elitism and ethnocentrism that breeds the racist scorns and acts of violence. Even this, the denial of food and means of living can be seen as an act of violence. We are gorging ourselves on food, the Western world growing fat and obese, while a large number of the world's population gets thinner and thinner, dying of starvation. The shift and classist gap that has emerged is absolutely staggering to me. We have a Western world with obesity and heart disease and cancer to fear, and I look at the "dark continent" and see starvation, disease, and AIDS wreaking havoc. Our problems are a result of excess, and their problems are a result of lacking- and we continue to stuff ourselves to overfill.

If the United States wants to be a true beacon of hope, of prosperity, of democracy, of freedom- the freedom to live, to not die when innocent. To not starve to death before seeing your fifth birthday. Not being kidnapped, raped, killed, infected, or left to die in some other way. If we wish to truly support these fundamental ideas which drive the purpose for our country's existence, we must be able to extend our hand and help those around us, even if it means the sacrifice of luxury.

We can act as we did in World War II, shrug off the wars and destruction on another continent, and eventually act as we know we will inevitably have to, or we can prevent the further killing of innocent human lives.

There are very few things which many cultures agree upon. One thing which stands pretty firmly, however, is the Golden Rule. It has been said and re-said many ways. Here is Kant's wording:

Quote:

Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.

I want to express the idea that we cannot turn a blind eye to problems that we know exist. In our own law, the witnessing of a crime or an injustice and doing nothing is criminal activity itself. If we, as the West, as America, as whatever responsible global, emerging entity who will speak for the well-being of not just the US, but of the entire human race, wants to be the beacon of freedom, then we must help our fellow man right now.

I know it's a sad say when I have to argue for the idea that people needlessly dying horrible ways despite our having the resources to prevent it is a bad thing. The very nature of this suffering and how horrible is reason enough to prevent it, even if it means the sacrificing of a few luxuries so that others may not have to die.

I will repeat a section of Dr. King's speech:

Quote:

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

We must realize that our destiny is tied up with the destiny of our world. We have begun to modernize our energy, we have realized our effect on the environment, but what about truly realizing our effect and possible affect on each other? Our freedom, our democracy, how bright and shining and beautiful these ideals may seem, they can never be as beautiful when they do not live up to their purposes as beacons. To be a beacon, something must exude light. It must be filled with a luminosity that spreads out onto the darker areas. We do not have to infect as we have done in the past to bring light. We can help end chronic malnutrition, diseases, and wars all around the world, as well as Africa.

We do not have to colonize to help. We do not have to push our culture onto their own. We can help them, as it inevitably will help us. What good is it to prosper and to know of wealth when the world around us becomes wretched and diseased and withers into dust? How bright and shining can our world be when surrounded with the stench of rotting corpses and haunted by the cries of starving children? Will we let innocents die until our own innocence is dead?

A sonnet for my love, the bomb

Atom Autumn


Japan's great empire fell with Little Boy
What seemed like years of power struggle might
Be nothing more than playing with our toys

When Truman laid the plans out for our fight,
Their radiated limbs weren't on his mind
And so he slept quite softly through the night

The toll had reached five hundred thousand killed
The bombs, he claimed, had saved more lives than lost
I'm just relieved they didn't help in kind

I wonder what it was we wanted most
To usher in a new atomic age
Or to create a new half million ghosts

I cannot seem to bring up any rage-
He was as confident as I am on this page.



A Terza Rima written in Iambic Pentameter. I know it's a bit rough and loose, but it's not easy writing in the same form that Dante wrote his Divine Comedies in while also using an old English meter style with the subject matter and perspective of a modern individual.

"Fool," said my Muse to me, "look in thy heart and write."

Snow Angel


Young ones wrapped in 90s green, pink, and blue
Parachutes can tell you how easy it is
To become one

Fall backwards, arms out, and watch
The descending world
Of cocaine rain, Douglas or fox furs
And a sky to match that shirt you keep
In the back of the closet. Hypothermic blue
With a few holes to let the sun seep in-
Jumping jacks in snow

I could peel my skin back, revealing the mushroom stem
Pieces of my bone. A sharpness of the mind helps
To carve away excess sinew and ligaments
Which are nothing like a chicken’s
Muscle strings. Gutting out the marrow
With a screwdriver, my Phillips-head
Feels lighter already

My brother’s white construction paper
Used in the fabrication of water crystals
Unique as his DNA
Will be pasted onto two hockey sticks
Responsible for three and a half neighborhood championship titles
And numerous dents in cars

Screws and nails, collected and arranged by length and level of rust
Bind toe to back, splinters to shoulders
And rebellion to soul
I will fly to Venus or fall to Earth
Whichever God sees fit