I will be playing some music and reading a short anecdote at frank theatre’s upcoming fundraiser for their Telling It Bent workshop, Amy Lives. It’s happening tomorrow, Friday January 23rd at The Junction Pub (1138 Davie Street); doors at 7:30pm, show starts at 8:00pm. Other performers include Amber Dawn (How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler’s Memoir), Daniel Zomparelli aka DJ That’s So Raven, trans poet and activist Antonette Rea, singer/songwriter Oliver O’Dea and poet Amal Rana.
In the meantime, check out this video for the event. Hope to see you there!
Wanted to post this one. It’s from my reading at thrilLITERATE last week, the last one I read.
A friend didn’t understand the poem and although I could attribute it to his innocence and general naiviety about the world outside of his farm, perhaps there are others who don’t get it. To understand it, you have to know about stereotypes, mainly that lesbians fall in love and get together VERY quickly. I make fun of it but I also explain how I, as a gay man, am like that too.
Alright, now that I’ve told you how to interpret the poem, here it is:
Here’s one of the three new poems I read at last night’s thrilLITERATE reading. The video of my reading it is at the bottom.
Half-life
When they say a heart breaks,
they speak as if it breaks once:
a glass,
floating in slow motion,
pulled down by the fingers of gravity.
Shards scatter,
run away on little feet, like repellent magnets.
And as the last screams die,
so begins the gluing back of parts.
But my heart is a half-life heart:
decaying and dividing again, and again.
It folds onto itself, like a supernova.
At every corner, lurks a ghost or demon,
snickering to themselves,
ready with daggers to slit the rubble upon glance.
Every time Shakira’s voice sounds out like a siren’s,
it easily undoes the sutures until I’m a leaky roof. O cada vez oigo la lengua, pierdo la mia
y las palabras solia hablar, amargo en mi boca.
Walking in hallways becomes an inkblot test:
How many faces look like his?
Why must you turn and walk to a corner, gasping for oxygen at the sight of a stranger?
When I see a red sweater in the crowd,
or an imposter with the same wig,
the effect is the same:
following the earthquake, it’s all aftershocks–
from the epicentre of my chest, trembling me,
knocking me down time and time again when I’ve barely risen to my flesh-ripped knees.
I can never see the aquarium the same way without drowning a little.
Looking at a husky rewards me with enduring another paper-cut.
Can you blame me for always drinking from the half-empty cup?
You would rather be with someone halfway around the world,
giving you filtered, sour placebos by the teaspoons,
than I, fully here,
I, pouring out the purest of me in gallons,
I, whose tears dot the page like bullet holes,
I, who has pored over the pages of our histories,
devising stratagems and formulae from words,
mixing compounds and chemicals, needs and wants.
I, who have been a scientist,
not just searching for the cure to my half-life heart,
but to earn yours back.
I, losing the bold experiment to cold fact,
that you no longer desire dusty, expired goods,
while my heart continues to tick away.
I wish I could take back half the times I said, “I love you”,
so the other half shone brighter in your eyes and ears.
When they say a heart breaks,
they speak as if it breaks once.
Although I’ve only read poetry in public a grand total of three times, I’ve forgotten what a great, cathartic experience it can be. Before going to thrilLITERATE tonight, I was pretty nervous, so much so that I found it difficult to have dinner (even though it was brimming with what I assumed to be delicious MSG). When I got to the Rhizome Cafe, though, I felt fine. I knew the worst thing that would happen would be that my mouth would dry up when I read– as if always annoyingly does– but other than that, it really was simple.
Thanks so much to Amber Dawn to always being so supportive. I know I am very clumsy, inarticulate, and probably have some condition that renders me inept at talking to people (but not writing about/to them), but I really do owe her for constantly getting me involved in the community and inspired to do so many wonderful things. It may seem like an easy thing to do, to be supportive, but I never feel like she is just saying things, the way some friends do. She is genuinely supportive, and coming from an atmosphere and culture that doesn’t support artist endeavours, it truly means a lot. She keeps me going in and pursuing what I love in ways she probably doesn’t even know. I’ll write more about her sometime.
I know I only attended twice ever, but I love you, thrilLITERATE!
Every once in a while, I’ll see or hear something that makes me step back from reality, something that reminds me of my purpose in this world. It happened again tonight while watching the newest episode of Glee. Surprised? Rolling your eyes at me?
Perhaps I should clarify that it really was only one short part in the episode that made me re-think things (ie. not when Rachel is singing at Regionals. Meh). *Spoilers!* Blaine sings a cover of “Cough Syrup” by Young the Giant to Kurt on stage. While he’s doing so, Dave Karofsky, now outed to his school and online, contemplates, then prepares to kill himself in his bedroom. Of course, this made me tear up and cry a little, as I’m sure it did for a lot of people. But moreover, it reminded me that I have a responsibility in this world to ensure that gay teens, even if in this case it is a fictional character, don’t have to do what Karofsky did. It reminded me of my documentary project idea about gay teen suicides across North America. It reminded me that maybe doing this project is more important than school or work or watching TV shows; this is about getting an important message out there– one that I have the potential to tell and show everyone.
It’s difficult because it’s not like I can just go out and make this documentary. If I was only working and not in school, things would be so much easier. Or if I had help, since it takes more than one person to make a documentary… and it takes a lot of planning. In some ways, I feel like I’m too late to cover this topic. The big news stories about the string of suicides happened almost a year and a half ago. I should’ve gotten footage of things going on then. Who’s to say there aren’t filmmakers doing it right now? But I want to do this, I really do. It’s got me thinking, it’s got me thinking.
One of the pieces that inspired me to write “Elvin’s Waltz”, “Piano Fantasy” is a ridiculously hard one to play, mainly because of the fast tempo + lots and lots of octaves which tire out your arm and make it feel like it’s going to fall off. I’m learning this piece right now and playing it slowly but even at a slower tempo, it still kills me. Nonetheless, I think it’s pretty damn impressive, especially considering Joseph was in his early twenties when he wrote it. Kudos to him.
[posted from my myspace blog page since I’m too lazy and uninspired to write anything new today]
This weekend is Pride in Vancouver. I’m going to be helping out with some filming of queer events and performers for a documentary a friend of mine is putting together about local queer performers in the city. Of course, interviewing bands and musicians who are playing shows when I myself am a queer musician and have a hard time even getting a show kinda makes me jealous. But there’s something else that I’ve been thinking about as well.
When I think of “gay” coupled with “music”, I–and I think most people–tend to think of dance-y, trance-y, electronic stuff that simply makes people want to dance. And who better dances than the gays? (The correct answer is no one, in case you didn’t get that) Then there are also bands that can put on a good show because well, frankly, they’re noisy and during a celebration like Pride, noise = good.
But then there’s me. My music/style isn’t particularly upbeat, both in a tempo sense as well as an uplifting way, and it’s not really loud either. I thought about it a lot over the last few days and I realized my music isn’t… very gay. Not that that’s a bad thing or that I feel like I should change my sound. No way. But it’s just difficult sometimes to try and get people, especially the gay community, to listen and enjoy my music when I’m so much different than what they typically listen to.
My music can be brooding, pensive, and sad, and a lot of people don’t want to listen to that, which is fine, whatever. But then to see other musicians making it because they’re more… accessible or have a more popular sound and have more fans is kind of disappointing, especially when I feel like my music and my songs are a lot more meaningful than stuff that’s already out there.
I sent an e-mail to the Pride organizers with a link to my music several months ago when I saw an ad for acts in the upcoming Pride. I never got a response from them so I can only say that my music wasn’t what they were looking for.
It’s not that I don’t have any happy songs, but that I don’t feel the need to write happy songs when I’m happy because I’m out there being happy! It’s only when I’m utterly depressed and unwilling to do anything else that I write. And if that gets me fewer gigs, than what am I supposed to do?
Anyhoo, I’ll try not to be a downer for Pride. Just a reminder that my short film, Stay, will be screening on August 16th at 9:30 at Tinseltown. Happy Pride, tout le monde,
7. I had managed to snag my friend to come along with me to this coffee shop in Burnaby I had never been to. I phoned earlier to ask about signup times and was told that it started at 8:00. We both got there at around 7:30, in awe of the small setting and the music equipment on stage. My friend saw this chalkboard of times and told me to sign up for a time. I wrote my name down for 8:20, the first act after the host played at 8:00. The waiting and anticipation was incredibly hard to handle. My friend was extremely nervous, for both of us, as we didn’t know what would happen. Finally, when my time rolled around, I was called to the stage. Because the café already had a piano there, and most people that performed were guitarists, the host asked me, “Are you doing spoken word?” to which I shook my head and pointed to the wooden piano. After I played my 20 minutes, I received positive comments by a few audience members and I was filled with such humility and I genuinely felt like a real musician, despite always being told from my family that I sucked at everything.
Back in 2007, I took part in Project Stitch, a project organized by local youth in preparation for World AIDS Day on December 1st. There were different activities divided amongst us and since I was into creative writing, I joined the Slam Poetry folks (which really consisted of me and two other girls). During my time there, I wrote this poem to express how I felt about people.
Untitled
My bones remain broken,
My bruises visible.
The damage of deception, betrayal, and blistering words have cut
these canyons in my heart.
So I feebly kneel before the pieces, attempting to begin building these shards
But
Here comes an invited guest,
Loading up on trust,
Before walking away.
Followed by a mother,
And a lover,
Several others,
All taking a bite of what I’ve too freely handed out.
It’s not long till I’m left with my heart,
Stale as a rubber tire.
Without question, I leave my heart in the cold,
Until it is coated with frost and suspicion.
Without doubt, I construct and fortify layers of walls,
Of stone and insecurity.
Without hesitation, I put up frigid, heavy chains,
Melded from iron and isolation.
Every ending has its lessons:
My bones still remain broken,
But my bruises lay unseen,
Beneath this vast, desolate, empty entity
That I used to call “me”.
aaron's random musings 