(Lonesome Heart)


b r i a n s g o r e

The moon is a spotlight for the night, ripples lit in white. Waves carry lightly 'neath night-birds in flight and the quiet lullaby of collapsing crests sighs quite nicely.

There is passion. Follow it. Passion cannot be confined to one or any other thing. Love is not constrained to a single aspect of life. Romance, even, holds to more than sex. Sex can happen between any people for any reason, but romance is red wine - candle light - brooding alone. Love is helpless, selfless, selfish desire. I desire passion. Passion consumes. Passion is hopeless, but never hopelessness. It's desperate, but not grasping. It's a closed rose - any color.

I sit in a half-lit home with my wine and mind. The cold wind moans. Pinot Noir alone; nostalgia; pasta for one - dark chocolate - National Public Radio - glazed eyes through my cigarette's fog - sounds haunt the blind. Too much wine - too many cigarettes - how many times have I said this? I can't sleep, but I can dream drunken hallucinations of company. The windows howl, fog seeps through the door, and my sight's gone bent. Mountain-side, my pen and me, surrounded by phantasms. I can't look up, they won't let me look down, so I glance frantically around. Light on the patio; shadows inside. The half-moon is hidden. The clouds go west. Silence but for the single creaking door.

(More Than Just Italy)

I

To find a vacant hotel room took me seven hours. I arrived on the train from Aeropuerto Romano into Florence with my backpack and oversized duffel bag somehow bulging with excess. I certainly didn’t know how to pack light back then. I looked ridiculous. My torso leaned heavy right in a sort of crippled strut as I tried to keep balance and move the mass with each step. The strap went diagonal across my chest and diagonal the other way went the strap of my camera bag. So I was there, in hustling, bustling Florence; foreign, lost, alone, excruciatingly over-packed, and I had to discover where my class was.
Outside the terminal, I saw a policeman and asked, “Dove Via de Rustici?” He didn’t recognize the name of the street so looked at the map I had. He ran his finger over the glossy paper that showed landmarks and the paths that led to them. Finally, the officer found it and told me a bunch of directions in rapid Italian. I watched his hand and listened for key words, street names and left or right, unable to understand all the words between. I said “Grazie mille” and started my trek clear across to the other side of Florence, luggage hanging on me every place luggage could.
I walked around the corner out of the train station to the road which was a big circle with four inlets and a statue standing proud in the middle. The traffic ran similar to how it does in the States, that is, look left then right then left again when crossing the street, but Italian drivers are a bit more sporadic. They will turn from any lane. They will straddle the lines. Mopeds will trickle through traffic to the front of the queue. And pedestrians have a rule of “cross at your own risk,” even when there is a crosswalk. I made my first crossing safely as I followed the cue of another person a few yards away from me. Already the luggage was dragging but I kept going, determined to find the class and certainly not look like an outsider, although, I was carrying a bag I could have fit all my six foot self in, a backpack bulging like a tortoise shell, and a bag of camera equipment. I was absolutely a tourist. I had unruly long hair nearly to my shoulders held back with a blue bandana. I was wearing a thrift store t-shirt and long, thrift store pants, with black and white no-brand sneakers. Believe me when I say, Italians, for the most part, but especially in Florence, do not wear thrift store, no name clothes and, if their hair is long, it is certainly not held back with a bandana. It will be long, shining clean brilliance, brushed – not a nappy, dirty mess. Italians in the city are keen on trends and high-expense clothes. So no, I wasn’t quite fitting in, but I knew Italian, which boded well for me – very well.
I continued walking in the direction of Via de Rustici but was truly lost. I kept looking at my map but never saw street signs until I realized they were chiseled into the brick of tall buildings at intersections. This discovery helped tremendously, although it still took me forever to find where I was going. I went this way and that, through traffic, through crowds, along the Arno which was still foreign to me. I found a school, but it was not the one I was supposed to find. I asked the lady behind the desk where Via de Rustici was. It was just as foreign to her, but she asked the next lady who came in and she pointed me back the direction I’d come from and told me quick directions. I told them thanks and walked out to find this impossible destination.
At this point I had well-defined grooves in my shoulders, aching and throbbing. My legs were wobbly, ready to collapse. But alas! Via de Rustici! I found the number for my classroom and buzzed outside the gate. No answer. I buzzed again. Still no answer. I saw there was an office in the adjoined building and rang that buzzer. They answered in Italian. Now, on the spot, I had to remember all my lessons, decipher what they were saying, explain my situation, and be let in, with no hand gestures to articulate my flabby words. But I was let in. I went upstairs, set my bags down, and the guy working the desk tried to get in contact with the office next door but had the same difficulty. He told me I could leave my things with him and get them the next day, which I did with overwhelming gratitude. I left the enormous duffle bag and my camera and took my backpack so I could have a change of clothes with me, toothbrush, toothpaste, et cetera.
I left the building and went on my weary way to explore Florence. My first day there by myself, I finally had so much less on my shoulders, I put a bit of a swagger in my steps. I tried to fit in. I refused to look twice at a street sign and never opened my map. I wandered aimlessly and, for some reason, proud. I soaked in the Italian jabbering all around: the British English from men in shorts and Birkenstocks with pulled high crew socks; English from ostentatious groups of people who didn’t care; Germans who spoke in the most powerful yet collected and soft voices among themselves. I looked in awe at the things that became so familiar to me in the time I spent there: The Duomo, Piazza de Republica, street vendors who scurried to gather their things as two policemen sauntered behind them and, behind the policemen who never looked over their shoulders, street vendors setting down their items to sell. I always knew that I would see two cops moseying when I saw twenty or so hurrying men with bundled blankets thrown over their shoulders like a sack of gifts. And the gypsies, who looked in as much despair as the Holy Mother, who were pregnant with pillows stuffed under their dresses, with painful eyes and scraggly braided pony-tails, jingled their cups for change until they saw the police coming. Then they would simply turn their backs to them, cease the jingling, and meander about their selected spot until the police were gone. All this I saw with wondering eyes my first day but it became very familiar routine in my following weeks. The Duomo became a meeting spot, the gypsies became a nuisance, the street vendors became stories of how my friends got screwed out of fifteen Euros.

I went back to Via de Rustici to see if the class had arrived. It hadn’t, so I decided to find a place to stay. I finally found a hotel, went to my room, unloaded, and laid down all night long. I tried to stay awake to keep a normal sleep schedule, but couldn’t and I was asleep by 8:30. I leisured around the next morning: went to the toilet, drew a bath, sat for twenty or thirty minutes. I was terribly sore from all the walking the day before. I clothed and threw the sheets across the bed, then headed downstairs to my complimentary breakfast. I ate the freshest fruit and pastries and drank the freshest juices I’d ever had. Italians take great pride in serving something that keeps you. Doesn’t keep you coming back or wanting more, but lets you enjoy your time eating. There’s no rush. And I savored it. I ate fresh meats and drank smooth coffee. I gorged myself on as much as I could fit, partly because I was so hungry having eaten nothing the night before, but mostly because it was too good to quit eating, and have to pay for food.
I reluctantly submitted to my overstuffed belly and went to my room to get ready for the day. I gathered my things, went down the elevator to check out, and went on to find my class.
I took my time getting there, stopped here and there to look into shops in town and enjoy the sunny, cool of an early-Italian-summer.
Expecting class to start leisurely as I had the first day, I lazily strolled to the gate I’d seen the day before and someone let me in this time.
Quick, “Oh, you must be Brian. I was just sending you an email to see where you were. Great! Class is just starting,” and she rushed me into a room full of my friends going over the list of what to do, what not to do, how to stay safe, and I interrupted. In fact, I walked through the door and the class roared in unison, “Brian!” and clapped for my arrival – flattering. And my professor in the far corner dropped her face into her hands and shook her head in a kind of “You had me worried sick, but of course you got lost.” Thus my entrance made. I found my seat next to my professor still shaking her head and told her, “Sorry I’m late.” We left for a quick tour of Florence shortly and I got a tour-guide story for places I’d first met the night before. They were confusing labyrinths yesterday, now history. Later they were landmarks.

* * *

I met Robby three weeks before we left for Italy. In that time between introductions and flight across the Atlantic we realized we shared two classes, Italian and Philosophy of Social and Behavioral Sciences. (We were both desperately behind in Tolstoy’s War and Peace for that class but agreed that the professor was brilliant.) We hung out together quite often and he agreed to live with my roommates and me in the upcoming semester. When he got back from Italy, Robby had two days to move from his old apartment into his new one. But Robby would have waited that long to start moving even if he’d been in town.
The simplest yet most vague word to describe Robby is that he is an artist. A classical musician with a knack for all instruments with strings, Robby plays guitar, bass, piano, and, his favorite, viola. His strengths are found more in writing music than speaking words, although his Italian was always better than my own. If you ask Robby a question or suggest plans, his eyes will widen, the corners of his mouth will come to center creating a blank stare, he’ll tilt his head slightly to the right, turn his eyes upward as if to rummage his mess of thoughts and plans and potential plans and ideas and recent concerns and music theory and Beethoven and physics, one corner of his mouth will raise, his eyes will return to yours, the smile will grow ever better and more pleased with his decision, and he’ll say to you, “Yeah. Yeah, ok. Cool,” and you’ll have a new roommate. That’s how simply his “big,” “Life decisions” are made. If you want to go to the bar, he’ll probably meet you later because he was about to practice “this song” or watch “this movie.” And by “later,” Robby probably means he’ll be ready to hang out when the bars are closing. He stays awake through the night and sleeps when he gets around to it, busy most often with creating something. He made blinds out of branches, painted a vortex into the wall of his house, composes music, and in Italy, he kept a brilliant journal of his adventures.

* * *

This Life Needs Something

There is passion. Follow it.
But passion cannot be confined to one or any other thing.
When I think of love, I can't constrain it to any single asset of life.
Romance even holds to more than sex.
Sex can happen between any person for any number of reasons,
but romance is red wine - candle light - brooding over a page alone.
Love is helpless, selfless, selfish desire. I desire passion.

Passion consumes.
Passion is hopeless, but never hopelessness. It's desperate, but not grasping.
It's a closed rose - any color.

We Could Chalk This Up to a Rant

Sharon came into work, as she always did, with the headlines of the day. It was Black Friday. Thanksgiving was past, Christmas ahead; leftovers passed to the pigs. The single soul had shivered in the cold New York late autumn for her first place. She became three, and a line formed. The line became a mob. The mob pushed against the glass doors that were meant to hold them all back. The Greeter on the other side tried to explain, but they didn’t care. They burst through the doors as if sharks after a pint of fleshy blood. Stampeding like buffalo, the mob shoved over and trampled the Greeter, and nobody stopped until they had all passed and he was found, dead. “I was here first!” He wanted the best first sales! Everyone was on such a budget, afterall. And from the Grace-tables of Thanks-giving to the death of an employee, This is disgusting.
A driver of an SUV hit a pedestrian and drove off. Passers-by investigated the motionless body and walked off. A person on a scooter passed, turned around, looked closer at the person lying face down in the middle of the road, turned around again, and drove off.
A person waited in the clinic for assistance; she’d been there for nine hours. She began seizing. The two sitting across the room sat and stared. The nurse who walked in saw the crippled body and left. The doctor she returned with saw the breathless body and turned away.
Ronald McDonald smiles big. He’s hugging an old woman who smiles with him. There’s a smack of red make-up from Ronald’s kiss on her cheek. He wears his distinct yellow and red striped jump-suit.
Walmart’s Smile shines to bring in shoppers who are ignorant to what they themselves cause.

The death of an employee by a disgustingly ravenous appetite for cheap goods is an incredible point about who we are as a nation that boasts on “Pride.” (As long as the colors are right, afterall.) Yet, it’s brushed aside, off the news desk, to make room for
America’s First Black President!
“The audacity to dream of something better.”
As of right now, it’s a dream story. We’re bitter among ourselves and it seems a man will come along to mend the wounds we’ve scratched upon each other. All that could help him “help” us would be strings, collars. And all his predecessors seem to have enjoyed that.
You keep thinking things can be changed by a new face; the audacity to believe that a person in a place of power will in fact help the people he leads. His motives may even be good, but we need to help ourselves. Stop thrashing about each other as if you’re the only one in a particular situation. Take notice of what you have in common with your neighbor.
Where is our pride found? Flags shot up immediately Sept. 11. Flags stood proud when we invaded Afghanistan. They maintained at the beginning of the war in Iraq. They are erected for each day this country has to remember Veterans. When was a flag raised to celebrate well-funded education, low unemployment rate, negotiations? This is a foolish country proud of bloodshed that tramples its own people to consume consume consume. Afterall, consuming is what drives this nation. Pride in buying things, pride in battling other people. This is disgusting.
Where’s pride in what we as a people can do? Pride is found in the fact we now have a black president. “We’re progressive!” No, we still submit ourselves to the old ideas of government.
It’s patriotic to consume. It’s patriotic to fly your flag. It’s patriotic to vote. It’s patriotic to say the pledge. It’s patriotic to thank a veteran. It’s patriotic to support the president. It’s patriotic to protest, even. Yet, “patriots” are not “compatriots.” No one’s in this together. They fought at the doors with each other before they murdered an employee, then fought to the first things on their lists, then complained when no one was allowed to leave because the employee laid dead on the floor. They complained! PRIDE! “And I’m proud to be an American… I’ll gladly stand up, next to you,” unless you’re in my way. What a foolish, selfish, immature, naïve people – controlled by media that’s influenced by numbers rather than truth; hypnotized by the 2 and 4 year processes or otherwise disenfranchised, but equally a part; bound to everything by money; unable or unwilling to draw themselves out of what they agree is chaotic. And they say, “At least we’re free.” From what, I ask. We’re victims to the tyranny of the dollar, the dictatorship of jobs; You pledge to a finite nation, pray to a fictional god because you don’t find truth on your own. You watch the green screens of war. You follow the words in the book along the lines the preacher says. Simply, you don’t ask questions yet you never hesitate to tell me, “Get to reality.” You willingly submit yourself to all this nonsense. Yes, this is all nonsense. An untruthful governing body that people continue to take solace in, is nonsense. A monetary system that thrives on the lavishness of some and scavenging by others is nonsense. A God that continues to ask for money each week and spends it on bigger paychecks for the parish is nonsense. But I’m crazy, don’t listen to me.
I don’t have faith in this government. It’s citizens could do more for themselves if they’d lift their dumb eyes. Instead, like clockwork, they hold their daze to the footprints in front of them and say, “This is how it’s been done for so long.” I don’t need religion to find God. “But this is truth.” No, that’s truth for you. And I won’t tell you you’re wrong, but I’ll make a case why I’m right. Why am I right in this case? Because God is not trivial. The power-mad government, the divisive religions, the imaginary dollar is all trivial. I will not take part in those things; God is in none of that. So I’ll continue on my own way, on the outskirts of your “Real World.”

How is This Redundancy all so Constantly New?

Stove tops atop buildings of red brick, brown brick, yellow brick; brick-oven pizzarias; marble slab ice cream parlors; taxis, taxis, taxis; people: singles, groups, children, dogs, strollers; pigeons, so many pigeons; grey skies, chilled breeze; rest stop for pedestrians, Father Demo park across from Father Demo Hall, a fountain with foliage instead of constantly trickling water - serene. I'm at Bleeker St. Fire escapes, fire escapes; delis, trattorias, wine shops; park bench park bench park bench in groups of three, four, five; businessmen on cellphones; students on cellphones; after-shool snacks in shivering hands. White-light pedestrian at crosswalk - blinking orange palm holds foot traffic to the curb until those standing realize no passing cars and go.

26 December

Do you ever wake up, gung-ho for the day, but you have to spend it doing something other than what you’re so excited for? Well, I feel this today, but I’m not bothered by it. I don’t think it will leave. Maybe temporarily, but not for good. I’m ready to explode.
Life, for me, now, as in, currently and recently, is about finding a free place to crash temporarily and work before moving on. I don’t know how long this will go on, but I love it right now.
Christmas is over, Papa is buried, New Year’s is in five days or so, which lends me the days between yesterday and next year to make money, money I desperately need, so that I can keep going, doing what is right. Right for me.
My life is: chaotic, random, planned, normal, exotic, exciting, uncertain, dangerous, safe (I’m in the US, things aren’t so bad here), finite, going to end, my own, what I make of it, my experiences translated for my own understanding based on my past experiences that have made who I am, dirty, beautiful, true, a search for purity, outside of resumes, bound within a sinking monetary system yet minimally participating, changing, developing, growing in experience, wonderful, pleasant, unpleasant, mixed-media artwork, continuing…
From life I want purity, honesty, truth, peace of mind and heart and soul, certainty in myself without the assurance of others…
BREATHE – Friday Saturday Sunday Monday Tuesday New Year’s Eve 1January
Work earn money work work drive-party rest -> then, find work, write book, live.
Looks like I’ve only got a few things I gotta do!
I get nervous of telling people what I’m going to do because then they expect me to do that. NONSENSE! on my part. Let them define. It doesn’t matter what I do. I’m going to create. So, I can say, “I’m gonna write a book.” And then get bored with that idea and build a shopping cart out of branches. And they’ll say, “What about the book?” and I’ll say, “I’m building a shopping cart now.” And they may be confused, but that’s not my problem. If they’re confused, they can ask if they truly care. And if they don’t truly care, why should I about their response to me? I want them to care? I shouldn’t care about that. All I want to do is create. Express. I’m going to. And it will be difficult, but that’s exciting. I’m gung-ho, afterall. I’m looking forward to this. I’ve always liked a challenge. Dad’s always called me “extreme.” Whatever that means, I’m looking forward to everything.
Everyone’s caught up in the diminishing economy! The tumultuous political and economic situation we find ourselves. THEY NEED SOMETHING NEW! I’m something new. No I’m not. But I’m pure to myself. People need to be pure to themselves. The world needs purity and honesty. I need purity and honesty. I want to find those others who are seeking purity and honesty and together, we’ll thrive and others can either join us or deny our mission, but it’s not a mission! It’s just living. It’s a decision regarding how we want to live! My friends who are my inspiration. We will do what we want to do and we will make it work for us and disregard what others say we should do because that wouldn’t be our own truth, it’d be someone else's view toward the world and all anyone can have is their own view regarding life and it’s good they have theirs and it’s good for you to have your own but it’s good for us to have ours and you should be excited that we do and I’m excited for you, as long as you come to your mindset by your own avenue. Find truth! Live for truth! Demand truth, but don’t wait for someone else to hand it to you. Demand it from yourself and find it in your own way. I’ll do the same. And I’m excited about it. Let’s do. Let’s grow. Like the seedling buried beneath concrete, let’s press through and thrive despite the heaviness of construction, “progress,” industry. I am a seedling, and I got a root going deep and it’s going to support me as I press through the middle of the street and all those god-forsaking automobiles WILL go around me. I will be watered by torrents of creativity, rainstorms of experience outside society’s normalcy. Watch me grow or don’t, but prepare to swerve.

Growing Tired, Growing Anxious

... and this ain't the half of it......

Driving through the city last night I realized the dull dust of Dallas is so much sadder than the brown and white sands of the desert, NM. Smoke rises from office thermostats and the roads sway back and forth and grab car-tires. At 5 a.m. a wreck headed westbound was being picked up before the heavy flow of rush-hour traffic. The wind was heavy on and the trailer rocked between the narrow lanes, guided by white lines, but I made it through the sad purgatory of highway between city and suburbs, made it home and went to sleep.

I drove, December 3, to the airport in El Paso and flew to NYC. I arrived, walked across the city to Amanda’s, stayed the week exploring, went back to the airport in Long Island, flew back to El Paso, drove to Cruces w/ Chad and stayed the night. Bed by 2, awake by 7:45, we drove to Alamogordo, packed the car, drove to Denton, arrived. We spent the week in Denton and, on the last day, I drove to Waxahachie to see Papa. He was dieing. I left there, swapped car for truck with Dad, drove back to Denton, gathered Chad, Ryan, Chris, and all our things, and hit the road that night for Alamogordo. We arrived at 7:30 in the morning, slept, woke, coffee, went back and packed, packed the next day, and packed, loaded, and left the last day, last night. Ryan, Chris, and I got back on the road at 4:30 in the early evening and drove all night back to Denton, arrived at 5:00 a.m. I dropped Chris off in Denton, Ryan in Corinth, and drove the last hour and a half to Gun Barrel City, Dad’s place. I napped, then got ready at Dad’s, helped him unload the trailer of Grandma’s things, then drove to Waxahachie for Papa’s viewing. After, we went to Granny’s, then home and bed. The next morning we woke, got ready, and left for the funeral by 7:15, went to the burial, then memorial, lunch, Granny’s, and back to Mom’s.

Papa has died, but Papa has not passed. We can mourn that his life now continues without us, but he’s never gone.
Papa has always been more than his breaths. He is the grandfather who taught me how to use a bow-saw, slow pulling back, quick and heavy pushing through the wood. Have you ever wondered how a horse eats versus how a cow eats? Well, neither have I, but Papa told me one day at the kitchen table while visiting the lake-house. He said a horse bites grass with its top teeth, a cow pulls up with his bottom. In this short lesson I learned where Papa came from. A boy who swam in the swimming-hole when he wasn’t working the farm. He told me his family killed their own meat. He taught me how to tie a square-knot. He showed me how to play Gin Rummy. He taught us all what it means to be loved.
Old Brownie, the truck, 1980 Chevy Silverado. It played eight track tapes and towed the camper if it wasn’t towing the boat. I fished from the boat. We stored our catch in the water-well. Did you catch the first, the biggest, or the most? Who saw the lake first when we went over the last hill, sunup? I learned how to ski behind the boat. Remember the old, dirty-orange life-vests?
Papa was with us with his bright-white hair, his true eyes behind broad-rimmed glasses, his southern-boy ears pointing out, attentively awaiting our next concern, and he’s with us still in his lessons, his love, and the memories we share. What do you remember?

My family’s eyes look so tired, sad, yet warm and inviting.


Soon.