What’s Happening?

There is a lot of stuff going on these days. Stuff. Can something actually happen? What does it mean to happen? If something happens what does it become, the thing that happened? An ongoing happening? A million consecutive and fluid happens? Anyway, I guess we’ll never really know whether or not something can happen. Anyway.

 

Okay, so people say “this is happening” as a joke. This is happening, Stephen… I get it now. Something that happens can take time. It must be some sort of strange sort of thing where time is mixed in with space and within that funnel is a happen, but it can be long, years maybe. Maybe there is a larger bit of space rather than just the moment that something happens. Maybe a happening can last thousands or even millions of years. It’s good to think of time like that…long. It releases you. The Hindus have calendars in the millions of years. Time. This too shall pass, they say, this too shall pass.

 

Mostly it’s darkness. Clouds whispering in winds cooly wrapping round vents in the waterless sea and falling. You see. You don’t see. You keep going. All that you can do is just survive. All that you can do to help yourself is stay alive. Rush.

 

But I know there is more than that. I know this. This world is not meant to be wasted and family should not fight and that goes for extended family which means everybody in America and the wider world. Everybody. Everybody love.

 

 

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Published in: on June 20, 2020 at 9:05 pm  Leave a Comment  
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Make America Love Again – Joey Kantor

 

 

 

My mother was born again in 1973, the same year she opened a Bible store in Las Vegas where I grew up.  When Jesus’ love walloped my mother, boy, did it hit hard. I grew up with a mother who praised Jesus all day long and quite openly.

 

Hence, being eight years old at the time, I was introduced to the Christian religion. I was immediately saved, of course, and Jesus took the place of my “word” which was a part of the practice of transcendental meditation that my mother had been involved with just the year before.

 

It became Jesus Jesus Jesus. Jesus loved everybody. I mean everybody. He loved His enemies even. When people got mad at him for telling the truth they actually put Him on a cross, hung Him there to die, and He still asked God to forgive them. He had a lot of patience, this Jesus. So I followed Him too.

 

When I became a teenager in the early 1980s I occasionally attended a non-denominational church, Calvary Chapel, at Rancho and the freeway. I remember one day an associate pastor telling us something that just didn’t jibe with what I thought I knew about Jesus. He said that unless you became a born-again Christian, you were going to go to hell.

 

Think about it. You’re going along -love love love- when suddenly, boom, hate. Jesus would throw you into an oven! Okay. Now, did Jesus condemn other religions of other cultures? If so I must have missed it what with all of the talk about love. What about the good Samaritan? It just didn’t make sense. I later took a two-year Masters degree in mythology, other people’s religions really, to find an answer.

 

What I discovered was interesting. Time after time the religions that I studied said the same things that Jesus said but in different ways. I saw the game clearly. The loving God I had known wouldn’t be so stupid as to condemn everyone other than Christians just because they spoke a different language, had a different mythic vocabulary if you will. The heart was what mattered.

 

Along came 9-11 and then Iraq. It was a mad rush to war, and who was cheering it on the most? The right wing evangelical Christians. The swiftness with which they abandoned the command not to kill, but love only, was breathtaking and very sad.

 

Now, of course, we have Donald Trump. Eighty-one percent of evangelicals voted for him even though his actions, even before the election, were blatantly vile. The evangelical Christians wanted to acquire the worldly power that Jesus Christ himself would have vehemently disagreed was worth having. Give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s…

 

Evangelicals have drunk the Trump Kool-Aid because it has been in Trump’s best interests to say and do whatever this sub-culture wants even if he has to lie.

 

I’ll stick with the loving God instead of this politically motivated facsimile of Christianity that feeds off of the notion of tough love. Love isn’t tough. Love is love.

 

Perhaps someday right wing evangelical Christians will once again embrace the idea that their worldly beings are nothing, that there is no greater thing to do than to give your very life for your brother, that you should give your enemy the shirt off of your back, that a real Christian cares for the “least of these,” that kindness is actually not weakness, as some would have you believe, that must be destroyed.

 

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could all just make America love again?

 

Luminos – Joey Kantor

Walk down here
forget about steps
a float down onto a cloud
you down here now
no there, no forward
come down here
and I will show you
where you are

All that no more
of course no more
how could it be
when your love is gone
and you, you, you
just you and you are
not enough

So where, what, how?
Now that love is gone?
Here, follow me
and I will show you
yes, that’s it, down now
float down, forget about
the step, no more steps

What space, huh?
What glorious white space
of the world of nothing
no wonder you can’t do
now you can only be
the ghost of the girl
somewhere out there
up there, but gone
definitely gone and so
you ask about what’s next

Next? What time now
that she’s gone and you
you you do not truly
believe in a next
but here now you are
alive, still you
look around and maybe
you’ll see something

Let’s do.
Let’s see. Look! Over there!
A cloud. A white cloud.
Let’s leap to it like it is love
come on, do do do
ah, feel that, down now
down we go on to this
cloud where we are
but there is no is

She entered the machine
and disappeared
she did not want your cloud
and your mind and your
thought and your you and
your you and your you

Ah mountains distant
perhaps there is ground there
let us go to them and see
ah, fly yes fly but where joy here
not here, at all, no joy in flight
until there, until on ground firm
ah here we are down down down
ah, a mirage, not a mountain
down down down on to another cloud

you thought you saw her there
but she was not there and you
you you must get used to her her her
not knowing you, seeing you, loving you
because otherwise you will disappear
move move move move move move

she holds all mystery
she talks into the ear of God
God loves her and you God
through her
all untrue, but true, no denying
the truth of untruth
when you believe it

let’s journey to the sea
ah krita, the rocky beach, the wind
her spirit flying amongst the other spirits
so full her heart, the sea and her home
no no no no no no no no
don’t fall away for fear
of your loss of God
she no more owns God than you

ah, but i see you don’t believe that
i can see. there! let’s go there.
another mountain. Athos!
there is the mystery.
There she runs like a wolf
free, untamable and you you you
no, let’s not go there
for you lose her there don’t you
or you think you do
but you don’t, well, only
if you think you do

Where else? Back up?
To the world again?
What are you there?
Are you not just a pair of eyes
and a flabby brain
with no understanding?
No not there.
There is no there for you
there anymore

We are together
seeking a happy ending
or just floating
yes, floating, wishing
never to come down
or go up again
wishing because even
our belief is waning

But there is her smile
And her limited promises
that she will see you again
but your heart is dead
because doubtful
because you think her heart
is dead, doubtful

Worship her then
Let her be what she is
Like a goddess
live with that until
she gives to you the right
to see her as she is
until then
take her as you see her
for she can be nothing else
and maybe God will whisper
into her ear.

Mortal mortal mortal you you you
The immortal whispers to her:
Do not turn away from him
Although blind and stupid
Do not turn away from him
For there is more to him than
you realize
The mortal carries a secret store
of mystery and knowledge
And he has seen you
Why not believe until you know?

There there there.
See? Her head turns slow.
An invisible power released
from between her honeyed lips
and she does not look away from
you you you
See? Is that what you came to see?
I think so.
We will take you back now.
Now, you must wait.

Published in: on October 22, 2016 at 3:19 pm  Leave a Comment  
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From 101 of the least asked questions of all times

Why do intellectuals often think they’re smarter than circus clowns?

 

While circus clowns do not necessarily pride themselves on their intellectual prowess, they cannot be said to know less than intellectuals, whose assumption of superiority in itself would be an intellectual mistake.  This makes the score from the beginning of the debate 1-0: circus clowns.

 

Whereas a circus clown may not have read The Nichomachean Ethics, the intellectual has most likely never reduced a sad child to happy tears through the flapping of their size 26 boot. In each case a catharsis may be the possible result, yet whereas the circus clown does not judge results or knowledge according to intellect, but rather, to emotion, he can be said to know more depending upon his dedication to his craft, natural abilities and even age.

 

 

Why are NRA guys so into law and order yet cops hate their guts?

 

While it is true that the right to bear arms is in our constitution, it is also true that the founding fathers had not considered the fact that thirteen-year-old psychopaths in the future could find myriad ways to exercise their right at twenty to one hundred bullets per minute. Cops are well aware of this fact and therefore believe there should be limits on the types of guns to be sold and also stricter regulations concerning the sale. The NRA guys are also aware of this situation, an awareness which, for them, points right back to the constitution in the form of desire for self-protection and law and order. Unfortunately, the NRA guys cannot see banning any weapons at all for fear of blighting the holy words “right to bear arms.” Cops say that because of this cops die. Unfortunately, criminals also readily admit their love of this constitutional right as well. However, criminals will most likely never attack the NRA guy, (who is ready for him, but unfortunately lives far from the criminal, on his ranch in Texas) but will instead kill small children playing on their front porches from L.A. to New York City. Ultimately, the entire debate comes down to one other question: Do children really matter?

 

 

Why does the media believe that it is important for me to know that the President enjoyed a golf game yesterday?

 

 

The media will usually use the President’s golf game as a lead-in to what it wants to say about current events. However, this does not sufficiently explain why the camera or the writer’s pen or the photographer’s lens naturally finds the president swinging a four foot pole at a two inch ball relevant and a good place to start.

 

Two concepts may help to explain this. The “reeling-in”  and the “give the public a break” Ideas.

 

The former uses the golf game as backdrop because it does not expect the general public to pay attention to the intricate details of the story without first having a mental pacifier handed to them.

 

This “reeling in” leads the viewer by the hand to la la land where the under-lying message is coyly announced, for example, that the president is calm, cool, and collected, so “don’t worry when I tell you that he is on his way to prison for fraud, etc…”

 

This “give the public a break” technique is a sort of buffer between the story and what it really means, a public service to us from the media.

 

Combined, these two tricks of the trade lead to an intriguing story whereas there was previously only the possibility of a slightly different take on the never changing and endless stream of beaureaucratic red tape run amok that the journalist must call news or else lose his job.

Published in: on September 28, 2016 at 12:26 am  Leave a Comment  
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Let the Angels Reign

 

A deep deep sound gravity awakens night tickles day lays upon her night and leaves. Corrosion explosion notions of nought cannot doom reality or her graces final musings.

 

A ticket to space is not the same as being there. When we wake we realize our dream has left us, but we do not wonder where it has gone. Why?

 

If our motions considered us we would never be able to move. If our sounds sought us after we made them we would be harried and run from city to city like some Cain unable to forget Abel.

 

I would make my world a centerpiece rather then give to it a stone that may or may not bring it luck. Give it a reason to make glitter from the passing moon and the stationary stars.

 

If love could visit me tonight I would sit down first for tea with it. If it could not make itself known to me completely I would go to sleep with the one that I love and dream it to me and it would lie upon my breath afloat for hours.

 

The star’s son has been commmitted to knowing less tonight. The boys and girls who dreamed they would someday know how to dream have fallen asleep again, put off play for something higher again only to wake up wondering again.

 

If music were my master I would bow down forever upon an altar of moon. I would not consider myself less if a smile were given to me by a friend. I would die if it were taken away, but usually I need not fear either and that is a sadness that I bear.

 

If women could only understand men they would know that our hearts too have pulse. I’m tired of being called unknowing by those who think that they know. I would choose no battles there however for no curve of cheek or hue of skin can predict from where love can arise. Not even mine.

 

I love to love and fear losing the love I have known. What valleys have been riveted into my being by my experiences with love. What sounds have coursed through my skull because I have wondered at the loss of love. To have loved even for a moment is enough to make you restless for a lifetime until you know such a moment again.

 

I give nothing to you tonight. I take all for me. The world is mine if I am to understand the concept of the scope of reality. I cannot think less than within that sphere whose boundaries I defy anybody to make in front of me. I confuse light with dark and sound with silence only because I refuse not to be open to the experiences of all or none.

 

Fourteen years have passed since I last looked into the circle. Two thousand years went by before I realized that nobody cared anymore. Who am I to say what is being done is not proper? Nobody. I say it anyway. What is not proper. I do not know. That is the mystery of my pursued quandary.

 

I will sell the dust on my shoes for a million. Take a beanie baby and hang it by a tree and snare a citizen as they come and steal in the night that which cannot be taken except under the eye of God. Adam and Eve. Well, it’s not as though they’re dead, you know.

 

I take my liberty now, but accept the price tomorrow. I, by knowing I do not know and yet exclaiming anyway, will pay the price in looks of knowing that I do not know that you will all give. For if I know, how then can you know if what you know is different from what I do. I laugh and then hide, knowing the argument silly.

 

John Emmons was shot in the shoulder because he thought a conversation silly. Was it an angel that made him jump away at the last moment that extra inch further that mattered? An angel is song, known in body and soul, and therefore let the angels reign…

 

Published in: on May 27, 2016 at 6:57 am  Leave a Comment  
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new

hello,
this is the world of the new. there is old and there is new and new is you and you are you and

welcome,
there isn’t much point in being here today,
but you are
and I am
and we
together,
although we don’t see
each other
we do exist you know
do we?
oh yeah
we do.
you?
me?
yes,
we do.
all in all and all in all
the world is alright today
so you say
and we all must learn
to love it.

There was a girl who touched my heart
but lived very far away
it wasn’t that she lived for me
she hardly knew my way
but she lived for something
a little something
something far and wee and her
nothing more than what she was
and that was enough for me

Published in: on January 20, 2014 at 9:42 pm  Leave a Comment  
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Love

I’ve sat on this for a long time, the lost days, the moments of wanting what I had and no longer being able to feel the entering place. It really is like wandering dark hallways. All memory is lost because it cannot be seen. It can only be felt. There is nothing not askew. If color could be placed upon my mind, enough to outline those forms still brewing in my soul I would be a happy man, but it is only the acts of others that seem to be able to place me there. Those acts seem to be unimportant anymore. I could trace anything in my day. I don’t mean draw, but trace the outlines of feelings enough to be able to look back at it and proclaim its verity.
And I was proud. That was a good feeling. Although when you are at any particular place in your life you doubt that it is real and verifiable.
There was a time when final results occurred, final notions, things that made you breathe out and walk on sturdy in your step like a man who knows where he is going and determined to get there. Too many people have placed me aside or, to be more truthful, I have set myself aside for other people to shine. I have always been one who steps aside for the new and whole in others. I surround myself with those who do not consider these questions, those with minds that put forth what they know as if it were true and all that there is to know. This has caused me some despair over the years because my altruism overrides my selfishness and it is only in selfishness that you can assert yourself as those who are also asserting themselves mindlessly do.
I am working on this. It is my weakness, this capitulation to all who appear and assert themselves. If you listen enough to others you will forget that your truth must be gathered for yourself. What is this truth? It is a million footed thing. A monster or a saint that asks for less discussion, asks for an end to discussion so that it may be felt deeply. Study, something formerly sought after in my youth, in its disappearance leaves me hollow for then there is no more pondering. There is only scattershot thought, winged solutions, uncolored wandering darkened rooms. At least I lost my ego. But that was not what I truly wanted. There is the selfishness. This selfishness, this healthy selfishness, asks for more color, more light, assertion and proclamation all the while knowing that it may be shot down by another’s proclamation and yet, if so, this should be considered a good thing, for the lion, at least, has been let out of its cage. No place for a lion to be.
I believe that the mind, in forsaking knowing, retracts, becomes emaciated and if left too long in an unattended state, dies. I have attempted this soulical suicide. It has been what I have wanted, to find truth in an unadorned state. But truth unadorned is not truth for it cannot be seen. Vision is desired because it streaks across the mind in a flash, with flash, and does so because life is proud and viable and seeks beauty in every step of it’s formation. We cannot be a dunce, asking for nothing for hatred of human pride which we may believe lurks around the next corner ready to devour us. We are meant to shine. Our proclamations are meant to be daring and our lives so fulfilled proclaim back to ourselves our goodness. We become beacons of light that move us forward because it has taken away our choice. When you see an open path you must take it. When you do you bump once again against darkness, but beside you are visions of truth that edify. It is this picking of the fruit right where we are that allows us to grow. Growth is our ability to feel secure in our knowledge. Knowledge allows us to feel secure in our steps. Darkness is only darkness and can be penetrated by simple light until we finally reach the reality that we seek be it what we expected or not. We seek knowledge of ourselves. If we become too wrapped up in mind games of others concerning us we will become stilted, but once we awaken again we are more than able to continue the fight, to pick up the sword and cut once again at those black chimera’s just ahead. We kill fear.

To have true victory over fear we must have true acceptance of love. Love is the result of our having tried. Our having tried reminds us that we are worthy. Success is that which allows us room to stand back and smell the flower, to love the flower and all those around us. It is and is not the opposite of hate. Hate makes us want to hurt. Love, it’s opposite, makes us want to continue the path in which we are on. It is our payment for we do nothing for free. We all must be paid and when we play in the garden of such thought it is nothing but this love that reminds us that we are good and right and worthy.        Love goes hand in hand also with change. If we are to love we must embrace the entry into the realm of love. Without this entering into the darkness with bright flame we are nothing. Fear, the first thing we encounter on our journey, is only fear. We must not back from it. We must edify ourselves with that which will remind us of this. Some would call this positive thinking, but I hate such terms. It is more poetic than that. This beauty, this senseful beauty which occurs when we dare to love, is all and all ultimately, for if we are to give our lives over to the process, a process which may at times decapacitate us, we must reach for the lifeline and love is the lifeline. In it is beauty and joy and delicate artistry. This goes for thought and spreads into things that thought produces: art, literature and such. We are meant to explore the good and great things in our lives and in other people’s lives. It is not our responsibility to hold it down as the greatest of thoughts, for all things die as well as the opportune moment for the release of a beautiful thought, but while we are with it we should be with it completely. In this way the love spreads through you and you are able to share the thought poetically, shiningly, daringly and lovingly and the end result is that whatever kernel of existence was hiding inside of you is now released into the wider world, injected into other souls who can use it for their own sustenance. If it falls flat then we must remember that the process is true, but not always true for others. Opportunity knocks to those who can hear it. For those who can’t it doesn’t mean it won’t. It may just mean that it is not time.
I have gathered a hatred of poetry over the last few years because of hatred for myself. This must change or else I will die. Literally die. The body cannot live in a world where love is kept out voluntarily because you feel unworthy. I am worthy.

Published in: on June 2, 2010 at 10:35 pm  Leave a Comment  
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