​Follow the Topples (or how to find lost things)
 
Markers topple off a precarious pile
in haphazard sprawling style.
Colour sticks spread out --
I’ll pick them up; no need to shout!
 
Science says that atoms can’t be
where others already exist.
Thus, the box shifts tape off table
onto the floor it went.
 
I reached far back behind
to see what I might find.
Aha, the tape! And –
the coveted birthday present!
 
I wish I could say that this story was a rare occurrence,
Alas, it happens oft enough that I knew just what to do.
When trying to find a thing, just give up. Move on.
Oh, the things to find along the way, things long forgotten… like the cutest ghosty jammies discovered under bed – aw!
(I know!)
​
Edited after a TPS Workshop Nov. 9, 2024 by an Inchoate poet, Nicola Schneider 

​Soundtrack: The Tragically Hip “No Dress Rehearsal”, Ep. 3

Thank you, all, for some of these tips from workshop:

• Tighten up/get rid of non-vital words
• Replicate the movement of the first stanza through out
• Perhaps change to present tense could help (I think it did?)
  
• Sometimes you gotta just ditch the rhyme and focus more on the emotion
  
• You gotta work the rhyme so it doesn’t interrupt rhythm
  
• Show rather than tell 

​​I surveyed my mess - I mean my piles of ideas & art supplies & old sketchbooks - all wobbling precariously in the breeze… and I thought – nope! this summer, I will do neater art & I will put away the paints and the myriads of future art bits that most people (say, my hubby** might call crap). 

(Oh, my goodness… I was trying to type out the cliff hanger drum beat sound & autocorrect did this so I’m leaving it because I love it!)
 
Bom bomb om….

The story shall continue (whether or not I actually share it)...

​“It’s really, really tough to be honest with people without scaring the hell out of them.” 
 
Too much of our world in too much pain as we crawl out of pandemic hiding into an
Apoplectic wasteland, the speed with which fiction overtakes fact is astonishing;
but the speed at which fiction becomes fact is      unfortunately
even more astonishing     and dire.

2 degrees too many for too many years. Too many burning balls of fire rein
down on too many no-rain days; a million days too many.
Was this what happened to Mars?

Too many garbage piles. Too many rising oceans overturning too many lives.
Too many droughts inciting too many fires               and riots,
over too many injustices. Not enough water for too many every-bodies.
Good thing our Economy is healthy; Nothing is free.
Using the pool water to put out the forest fires as wildfires rage on                 
every continent.                 And there is not enough pool water,
or streams or rivers or lakes or puddles, and not enough                      space
or clean air or food.          Fuck Hope!

Let’s build more -- amidst a time of crisis                   &             environmental displacement;
Build more towers and parking lots and malls and condos,
and pack in the herd like tins of sardines.  Why haven’t we done something?
Too many people doing too many nothings –
until there is nothing left to save, and no reason left to bother.
2 degrees will cook our planet      will cook us all.
Too many             couldn’t be bothered to act         for too many reasons.
 
It’s time to be tough. It’s time to scare the hell out of people.
This is our only home. There is no Planet B.
 
I want to know nothing. I want to know everything.
And        Corporate’s getting nervous.
No more elephants and only 1 humpback whale.
Too many summer hearts from too many orange days.
If it turns yellow, you must mellow.
If it turns red, think happy things instead.                   Red means dead.
We’ve all became lost,   and we’ve fallen away                   off course;
We’re running out of time.
​
“And whenever you feel sad or lonely,
just imagine Gustav Mahler communicating with you from another
place and time before this one” she said                 once
when the Earth was vibrant & hopeful.
I’m sure you’d do the same for me             wouldn’t you?
Do we understand that we can die from a sunny day?
Broken heart days – The world makes us sick
because we made the world sick.
If you are receiving this, please respond                   please                   respond –
in this place         in this now.
We, who are us, share the world; when it becomes less, so do we.
1 for yes, 2 for no – Are you in heaven? Is there heaven? When Earth is hell?
 
It’s time to be tough. It’s time to scare the hell out of people.
This is our only home. There is no Planet B.
 
(April 28/29. 2023)

​ONCE UPON A TIME
     there was a world built out of hope & faith.
Dead crabs on beaches;
     Dead souls in streets;
Flooded churches falling over crumbling cliffs
into rising oceans from melting glaciers.
     Oh, do you know there’s a future?
Are you certain? Because I’ve not heard good things.
The sanctuary is a swimming pool;
Everyone’s leaving.
We’re good. Surely they aren’t going to let us disappear?
     Radioactive sun and poison mosquitoes;
It’s too hot out to hate people these days.
It’s better to be on the first boat out of town than on the one that never left.
     A spiritual first responder taking care of people who are drowning in a riptide of magma and great despair – Why is God doing this to us?
And, if it is not God, then what lies have we been fed to believe
by leaders who want us complacent and unknowing?
Look at how badly they’ve fucked everything up!
     There’s always hope…
But the sun has seared my skin.
I’m blistered and broken;
I’ve come undone.
     Politicians run amok; politics –
nothing you’d ever want to get involved in;
Nobody wins if we were to sink beneath the waves.
Why isn’t God stopping this? Or the better question is –
why aren’t we stopping any of this?
Maybe it’s because humans suck.
Who cares? – another shelter shut;
Not to be a dick, but the homeless where already homeless… can’t
they do that anywhere?
     Not everything can be saved.
For someone to win, another must lose, soooooo……?????
I did what needed to be done.
For all of you. (But not you or you or you.)
Our cities now float on the bodies of the poor.
Even the privatized rich bitches need to evacuate;
Hurricanes and floods don’t care
who has found higher ground and who is floundering
in the current that is stronger than faith & hope.
     Should we maybe just silently sink below the waves?
At this point, what more is there?
None of this makes any sense to me.
     But I’m glad I’m alive.
I’m glad you’re alive.

It’s up to us to choose to save our world.
There is no Planet B.

​(May 5/6, 2023)

​Imminent Danger/ The Face of God (from an Internet Café.)
There are decisions that we are asked to make in our lifetimes.
Decisions that in previous times, would have been left to the Gods.
Where are the Gods, now?
Population
Control
Oh
(It’s Father’s Day.
Can’t imagine why he isn’t here.
Because he’s a goofball.)               And, speaking of fuck ups…
 
They don’t know how badly we fucked it up.
Climate change is like a bear, and
we’ve all been in the ring               with the bear
for quite some time…
Oh, pssst, by the way… the bears certainly know how badly we fucked it up.
 
None of this makes any sense.
I’m erasing all of it.                            If only
If we could turn back time…
We’d probably do it all over again.             Oh         
 
Leafs are losing.                  Oh
yeah, they would be…
 
Oh, she’s not answering.
Oh, It’s hot outside.                           Let’s have a BBQ.
 
Could use a friendly face;
I know that if we work together, we can sort it all out.
There are better ways – even you must see that?                                                                  Oh, there are
And if the billionaires this century gave birth to would have focused on them             Instead
of proving their manhood by shooting (their) rockets into space,
then we would not be here now.                 Oh,
the problem is bigger than the weight of the sun.
 
We’ve treated this planet like an all-you-can-eat buffet for 250+ years and now we have T-250 to live before we implode in on our very own stupidity vomit.                               Oh.
“You alone – up there –  not going to solve the problem,” says the Problem…
Our trusty Leaders will simply set another goal & oh              sign another treaty &       then
move the goal/ignore the treaty. Oh. It’s fine.
The real reckless experiment is the one civilization is wrecking – and nobody can claim they didn’t know – many science fiction novels are as accurate as Nostradamus -- they have predicted our present wreck-full predicament.                                                                                                                  
Are we going to solve the problem or are we going to sit        IDLE       idling          until the problem solves us?

• BOOM! -- What was that?

Don’t know.
Maybe it was the sun and we’ll all be dead in 8 minutes?!
                It wasn’t us:
Russia’s blaming India, India’s blaming China, Iran’s blaming Pakistan, and everyone blames the U.S.
(O Canada says, “Sorry, eh!”)            It seems it’s all gone tits over peach baskets.
Oh             The world is a fine place &
worth fighting for.
 
But you can’t fight for the world if you’re not here.
And we’re not Gods.
We’re just parents & children.
 
What’s going to happen now?                     Oh, I don’t know.                 Nobody does.
               
There is NO PLANET B
(Fading image of Permanent Oh Face – Botox face - Hollywood actress on HD TV because I’m s-O watching too much Apple TV)
(Also, Oh, h-O-pe)

(May 12, 2023)

What is happening, right now?
     Something exploded in the sky.
     And crashed on the Queensway.
     The 403 is jumbled,
     and the Skyway is squelched.
     Can’t breath                       drive into oblivion;
     Not breathing is the new normal -- It’s just the way we are now.
 
                (At market in the not-so-distant future)
               “Come get your drought-resistant seeds…”
               “Pay for your clean air Hookah – only twenty-five dol-lar!”
               “Rice for you, for only 50!”
 
And it’s not even real rice; it’s that synthetic crap,
but you can eat it, so, it’s good.
Is it?                        Everyone I know has some kind of cancer
and half are dying.
 
People end up storing away parts of themselves
until they are non-existent.
Storage reduction. Lost Memories.
Don’t worry – you won’t even notice they’re gone.
                                                   That’s the beauty of forgetting.                    What?!
Nothing.

     Happily, ever after                            like the movies.
     It won’t go the way you want                       it never does.
     We’re each so insignificant that no one even knows that we exist;
     Except Karma          balance.              
     I aim to do more good; carrying on the mission.
 
                    “What? Why?”  
​                
                    Fuck you, man. I believe in things, alright?!
                    Rains could come back. It might snow.
                    The world isn’t necessarily going to end, okay?
                    You gotta believe in possibilities – I believe in a happy ending.
 
Magic Beans.

What if it’s not what you want?
It’s great.             
                    Is it?
It is a Great Mess.
 
Even if They don’t acknowledge it,
it’s still going to cost trillions of dollars;
And that will decimate Human Society
 
forever.
There is no Planet B.
 
There’s just no way to repair the loss of brain cells.

​(May 19/20, 2023)

Another prompt (from somewhere & sometime) — walk a mile in another's feet: an exploration of rhythm and nonsense... based on Poe's, "the Bells"...​

BASED UPON POE
 
fear the witches with the spells
evil spells!
what a thrill of detriment their remedy so smells!
how they, wrinkle, wrinkle, wrinkle,
in the mighty flare of light!
while guitars, that smoke and sprinkle
all the questions that dream to giggle
with a byzantine punchline:
feeling fine, fine, fine,
in a court of ironic time,
to the insubordination that so foolishly fells
from the spells, spells, spells, spells
Spells, spells, spells-
from the wiggling and the mingling of the spells.
 

Art is the answer to everything. Think about it… Feeling sad or mad? Make art! Want world peace? Make art not war! Bored? There’s always art! Okay, maybe art isn’t the answer to absolutely everything, but it’s pretty darn close!
 
I can hear you… “But I’m not an artist,” you might be saying, “I suck at art!”

“Phooey!” is what I say to you! If you can make a mark with something on anything, then you are an artist.
 
A dude called Joseph Beuys agrees. He said, “Everyone is an artist.” Wait? That’s what I said. But he also said it, so there.
 
Pablo Picasso said, “All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once one grows up.” This is what I will help you realize.

 
The first thing to know is that Art is actually pretty easy, and you can definitely do it.
 
Try this - anytime. No time like the present (or right after this speech)! Pick up a paint brush, get some paint, or a marker or pencil. Get paper and make a mark. 

Secondly, practice makes perfect. Nope. Nope! NOPE!! Wipe that word - perfect - from your brain. Perfect is unachievable. No one and nothing is perfect — perfectly imperfect, perhaps. In fact, I say we remove the word from existence altogether. Instead, we’ll say: “ Practice makes better.” This is a simple concept. The more you do something, the better you will get at that something.

Talent is great. If you got it, use it, but practise is what really makes artists awesome… or allows anyone to be good at anything. When you were a baby, you didn’t know how to walk. You had to practice, bit by bit - first, you lifted your head and discovered your arms and legs and tried crawling. Then, you stood up (and fell down), all before even taking your first step. You had to practice  — and fall — a lot! But you did it. Are you perfect at it?

No! Trick question. There is no such thing as perfect, remember?! Are you better at walking than when you were a baby? Of course! I know sometimes I trip, even fall, and I most definitely walk into loads of things, and that’s okay. I try not to be a klutz because I just want to do better than before. And it’s the same with art.


“You were born an Original. Don’t die a copy.” John Mason

Incidentally, this is the third important thing to remember… when I say better, I mean better than YOU did before. Not better than anyone else. Be YOU. Do art that YOU love; how you LOVE to do it. (Okay, maybe at school you must do some art you don’t love, and you may have to do it a certain way in order to get marks, but you can still learn from it, even if you are learning what you DON’T like.) Learning what you don’t like is just as important as knowing what you DO like. Then, it’s simple. If you like something, do more of it and do it often. Try changing it a bit. If you don’t like a mark, cover it up. Try again. No big deal.

So back to that that Joseph Beuys dude, who said, “Everyone is an artist,” he meant that being an artist means being creative in whatever way is available to you and feels natural to YOU.


We’re on a roll, here, so now you are ready to Embrace Ugly. What?! I repeat embrace UGLY! In fact, make ugly art on purpose. What?! Why?! Note how it makes you feel. Has the world ended? Nope. Did you learn something. Yep. You learned what you don’t like. Now, cover it up and keep going. Guess what? You might even like what happened. That happens a lot in art. I’m a gonna tell you a little secret… ssshhhh…. Listen up and tell absolutely everyone: a lot, if not most great artists and stunning art happens by mistake. 

Don’t be afraid to make mistakes and make them often. If you aren’t failing, you are doing the Art wrong (which is essentially the only way to do Art wrong). It’s how we learn new things and make great art even better each time.

And, if you are loving your ugly art and happy to make mistakes, then you will not be afraid to take risks in you’re art. Ask, “what if…?” Try the thing. If you don’t like it, cover it up and try a different thing.

“But art materials are expensive, and we should not waste them.” That can be true, indeed. Use materials you don’t worry about using up. Think dollar store. There are so many excellent art-making items that are affordable… you can buy ‘fancy smancy’ art-shop materials when you have built your confidence and reframed your beliefs about making art.


Finally, and this last guideline is by far the most important one… Have fun. Art IS fun. Play. Experiment. As Gord Downie sings, “Looking for a place to happen, making stops along the way.” Enjoy the process. Don’t worry so much about the outcome. As Picasso and I say,“Learn rules like a pro, so you can break them like a champ.” 

“The artist is not a special kind of person; rather each person is a special kind of artist,” says Ananda Coomaraswamy. And the best news is “ You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have, said Maya Angelou.

In summary, let’s review: To be an artist, do art. Easy peasy. Everybody is an artist.

Go! Make art, Human!

(February 2023)

Quote Sources: 1. Joseph Beuys; 2. Pablo Picasso - bit.ly/3KFksUNg; 3. John Mason - book cover; 4. Gord Downie - N. Schneider original photography; 5. Pablo Picasso - https://artjournalist.com/acrylic-paint-brushes/; 6. Ananda Coomaraswamy - bit.ly/3m6CRzF; 7. Maya Angelou - Flickr: York College ISLGP

At the start of Pandemic Times, I started watching “Dickinson” on AppleTV… and was inspired to delve deeper…. I read poems watched the series and was inspired to write this poem after seeing this random picture...
 
SHE & ME
                (Honouring Emily Dickinson)
 
Notions niggle and needle at the edges 
of restlessness — nibbling.  
She, in her white gown, gazing out, 
absently rubbing the silky-smooth surface
of her newest stone
that only earlier she’d seen surfaced 
amongst the sprouts, 
sparkling in the sunlight --
beckoning like her words,
trickling and dripping down, 
tickling the paper,
shiny as the diamonds that dot 
the midnight skies.
 
Truly awake now, she relents.
The poem gushes forth, flowing 
from her soul made of stars --
And of dirt from the Earth and 
of all the spirits that stir in the night.
There was no rest for the poet — 
Until she closed her eyes for good.

** Published in 2 poetry publications, some time in the last 2 years (Tower Poetry Society and The Ontario Poetry Society - but I suck at record-keeping, remembering stuff, and finding stuff, so ...)

I found a journal from way before... talk about a time machine!