Tuesday, August 09, 2005

Marmojacks



These are the bloody super wormy balls that uplift our systems with little prodding, only with shelter and food, some breathing, some pills. I am feeling it is time to die and shed the outer layers of deadness and become more something - something new, something slithery on the rocks of slowness. I am perpetrating moves of fake improvisation on the relics. I figure it is like smiling - if you do it even without purpose you still benefit. I am hoping to benefit from surprises and licking of brush hairs in the goo of tomorrow. So far there is yellow and stinking rotten sunbursts, trees that over-articulate in the sordid breezes and clotted flesh forms that seek to become grotesquely up there in the strata of exciting subjects. I am ridiculous in my ambitions, they dwarf the real. Self-consciousness puts me at a supreme disadvantage when trying to tell a story.

The superlatives I am suckling from include:

1. Bloodiest
2. Merriest

I am girating, hoping to remove extra sags of blubber from the toothpick center, the wooden understructure that times all motion. My motions are haphazard and lacking in oneness. Yet still, yet still, there are reflections of idealized wonderment in the placid ripples of magnetic wanton surface tension. I am excited about tomorrow. I am excited about making less sense than today. Please help me.

76 comments:

Mountain Man said...

Pleasantries dissipate and stinking selfish blandness returns to the swamps from where it came. Goblins blight my eyeholes in the purest and most rambunctious way. I like it.

Anonymous said...

The onion popsicles are encroaching on my space now. They have left the freezer, they remain frozen and are coming to claim acres for which they have not traded in kind. This is a seasonal emergency that I will not tolerate...I am vomiting my lungs onto the linoleum as proof.

Anonymous said...

I am sorry to hear this, I thought the problem was containable.

Anonymous said...

I want to go back home into the cavity of chest. It is gelatinously chilly on the floor here. Please, take me back in.

Anonymous said...

Ditto, Jack. I am into it.

Anonymous said...

we are only allowed one metamorphesis every century... make sure you choose your new "new mm" transformation with bloodiest and merriest conviction.

Anonymous said...

Spittle lips, are you debased and into fogbound women who like to follow rules? You sound messy.

Mountain Man said...

Cockroach Orange - your name is fashionable in the highest order of nuns sense. Thank you for your reinforcements re: metamorphosing. It is a good aspirative practice even if it leads to empty eyeholes and a pock-marked liver.

Anonymous said...

I am a woman who likes to follow rules. However I am a might hairy and too small for most men to derive pleasure from (at least visually). However, I can perform a high-level escapist hand job. Prime quality hand job. Try me.

Anonymous said...

I am greying in the rotten breezes.

fairy butler said...

I am supremely interested in this concept - moves of fake improvisation. In fact, I LOVE this concept. MM, let us bring glory and prestige to smiling out of habit as it may provide a glimpse of the raw underside within.

cheers to you!

ps. I also love a rotten sunburst. anytime, any day.

Mountain Man said...

Hey thanks FB, times one hundred. Your comment gives me a sense of unity in the ether. I am giving you some kind of intense hand signal of support and agreement in return. I am not super familiar with many types of hand signals so you can just make one up and pretend that's it.

PS - I can't believe, and am embarrassed to admit, that I had never read The Night Studio, but thanks to your suggestion I am LOVING it. It is amazing. You are an excellent book source. I feel you should add mini book reviews to your mini record reviews. Maybe I will try it too someday. Good challenge.

Anonymous said...

the tiny machines are eating the life savers? i worry about my insides

fairy butler said...

cool, glad you are digging the guston book. After reading it I remember thinking he behaved like an asshole a lot of the time - art was always first first first. Dunno what to make of it. Is that the only way to be successful or was he just a "genius?" Did you read the Rilke yet?

sloth said...

I'm ready for my lunchtime oxycontini, Mr. DeMille.

Anonymous said...

i like rilke, letters to a young poet made me a little weepy though. made me wish i had a time machine

Anonymous said...

i think i'm in love with this dog!: http://samugliestdog.typepad.com/

Mountain Man said...

Levarak, that is a very lovely name. Is it your birthname or did you name yourself?

FB, my feeling is that the book is amazing on the one hand because it chronicles a daughter's honest attempt to understand what the life of her father meant, without romanticizing it, embracing all the strangeness and disappointments, acknowledging her own part in their alienated relationship. As for Guston, I love his quotes about studio life, about a rigorous relationship to both your work and art history - the idea of immense preparation in order to have a few moments of play (I am getting it wrong - will look up the exact quote later). In terms of his self-absorption, the negligence of his family, I don't think you need to be this selfish in order to be successful or a good artist. Certainly you have to be somewhat selfish...but I don't know, I hate the idea that you need to "sacrifice" greatly for your art. I think you just need to be somewhat nuts. More meditation on this topic is necessary.

Mountain Man said...

Rilke is next on my list. Then I have a whole pile of other stuff and hopefully a reading list will make itself. 3 1/2 more weeks until my first class. ughers.

Anonymous said...

i overheard my name in a conversation mountain man. I like what you think, being crazy over creating a huge burden of sacrifice. I still want to enjoy good sex, veg out with TV and bake black bird pie everynow and then. still be commited to making of art. it's a fear in the back of my artschool mind, of how much self sacrifice is enough to make art . in all your insanity you have moments of great clarity.

Anonymous said...

What class MM?
I got my reading list from McFarland.

Mountain Man said...

levarak: please provide us with a recipe for your black bird pie. it sounds delicious. are they still alive when you bite in? or have they been plucked and cooked through? curious.

and pd pd pd pd pd, i am teaching a "professional" seminar and would like to get recommendations from people about what readings on being an artist have inspired and/or frightened them. any thoughts my dear? i am bathing in buttermilk this a.m. it is smooth.

Anonymous said...

MM, I was thinking about the idea of the tortured creative soul and how much about that stereotype is myth and how much is reality. I know that crazy creative bursts can spring from oneself in times of stress but I don't think it has to be that way all the time, does it? silly question, I know.

Mountain Man said...

Ok, I like this topic, Krix! For me, I have to say that stress-induced creativity bursts have been absolutely priceless in my life. This is why I became an artist, really - it gave me a way to channel and forget about my unbearable anxieties. I am aware of the cliche of this. However, this type of work - the stress burst - does not necessarily end up being good. The best work I have made has come from long continuous periods of focused, concentrated efforts. Forcing self to get back into studio no matter how hateful the effort, no matter how heinous the relic. So it becomes much more about a work ethic. The "tortured soul" is always there, but it is miles and miles away from the finished product - bears little relation and is not necessarily the propelling force behind getting into the studio. I am going off on a tangent here a little. There is no doubt that I am consumed by anxiety and insanity a good deal of the time, but the route from that feeling to a decent finished product is very meandering...it is like a twisted roller coaster path from a stinking pile of dung to a lovely pile of glistening donuts.

Anonymous said...

At a summer residency I was at once, a severely depressed photographer gave a lecture and said all artists are miserable, and all art comes from pain. She then said: "I mean really, who here is a happy painter?" I stood up and identified myself. She didn't know what to say...
I think it places too much pressure on an artist to make such generalizations. Of course it is difficult to be an artist...but...

Anonymous said...

..it is also amazing and can be fun. I think the two extremes are what makes it possible.

Anonymous said...

And when I am hating everything I do...it usually leads me to a new place in my work.
I know I sound idealistic....but I rely so much on my studio life.

Anonymous said...

Okay, I feel like drinking turpentine right now.

Mountain Man said...

I completely agree PD! The struggle and difficulty ALWAYS leads to something new if you just see it through. I feel so much healthier in my studio life than I do in my real life. I love smooshing goo around more than anything.

Mountain Man said...

I don't agree with the turpentine drinking though. Yuck. Why don't you have some limoncello instead? Don't you think it's time to get drunk?

Anonymous said...

I love smooshing goo too. In my pants.

Anonymous said...

Yes! Goo. I LOVE goo!!! And I love you too. I would actually be nutz with a z if I weren't a painter.
What is more fun than making stuff??

So Pacey is getting lucky with his teacher right now.

Mountain Man said...

That sounds hot. I always had a large man crush on Pacey, but I considered it pedophilia and was ashamed. Not anymore.

Anonymous said...

But Pacey is such the man here...his teacher even said it, as she rammed her tongue in his mouth.

Mountain Man said...

The only thing as fun as making stuff is playing with my back member in my parent's bed.

I grody.

Anonymous said...

I think, a long time ago, when I was in school, I had this romanticized vision of this writerly life that was passionate and topsy turvy and well. . .crazy. I was of course reading too much beat literature at the time, like any good college lit student. History provides so many examples of the insane but brilliant artist, working through their pain.

Later on, I came to see writing as an endeavor that is best served through perserverence rather than Pernod.

Anonymous said...

eeeeuuuuuwwwww MM. Sick.

Mountain Man said...

Krix, make no mistake, my life is very topsy turvy.

Anonymous said...

who is Pacey, PD. Is it someone who lives at Dawson's Creek?

Anonymous said...

That's why I can't watch movies about artists!! So much drama and people drinking turps.
I had a great class in grad. school about representations of artists in novels. A very critical look taught by a funny and sarcastic teacher.

Mountain Man said...

I know I am having the caffeine crazies right now. Right now, I wish you and me could roll down a hill in a large cookie bag. We would crumble up the cookies as we rolled and we would roll right into a lovely swimming pool. Quickly we would emerge from the bag, no injuries to anyone, and perform a synchronized zombie swimming routine. There would be matching outfits of course.

Anonymous said...

Yes, I like to play with my tail in my uncle's bed.

Pacey, Krix, is the saving grace at Dawson's Creek. Passionate and baby-faced. So teen dream.

Mountain Man said...

PD, I would like to know more about your class. I am wanting to convey realistic views of being an artist, examining and arguing with what perceptions and expectations might be. As well as teaching powerpoint! Which I still don't know yet! Oopsy.

Anonymous said...

YES mm, let's roll with the cookies. May we eat them in the water? And dive to the lower depths and eat some bottom feeders?
Oh, we're just in the pool right?
I don't wanna wait for my life to be over.....

Mountain Man said...

Krix and PD, maybe all 3 of us could get in that cookie bag? Or are you nixing this.

Anonymous said...

WHere is this class?

Mountain Man said...

Oh Good, PD you are on board. I can't believe you are so into Dawson's Creek. How come they didn't change it to Pacey's Creek?

Mountain Man said...

My class? Uarts in Phil.

Anonymous said...

We read novels like THE MOON AND SIXPENCE, and THE TRUTH ABOUT LOREN JONES and others... and talked about the stereotypes and such. I loved it!

Mountain Man said...

Some people might ask how a 7 foot tall lumbering tard from the weeds could teach a professional seminar in the big city of Philthy. I have no answer.

Anonymous said...

I also brought in a tape of King Missle's song "I am a sensitive artist" for all to enjoy.

Mountain Man said...

I will look at these books. That could be a fun way to approach things at a certain point. hmmmmmm

Mountain Man said...

You funny.

Anonymous said...

Philfthy loves such a creature. Have you been to Kensington?

Mountain Man said...

Not for many years, PD. But I was in Fishtown recently. Aren't they near each other?

Anonymous said...

Yes. Kensington is the worst.

You will kick ass in our home town. It will be so fun.

Anonymous said...

Van Gogh's letters would also be good to pull from. Especially all the requests he sent for more paint!!! Emerald green, please!

Mountain Man said...

I hope so. I am thinking of getting them to blog. They probably are already, but instead of writing papers or whatever, they write their spew on the blogs. Maybe.

Mountain Man said...

Ooooh, that's a good idea. I haven't looked at them in a long time, I remember loving them in undergrad.

Mountain Man said...

I have to go do some worky now. Thanks PD!

Anonymous said...

the blogging idea is pretty cool MM.

Anonymous said...

I like the cookie bag. I would like it better if we could all roll into a swimming pool of milk.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the tip anaonymous. You are swell.

Anonymous said...

did someone mention scientology? I have crusty goo in my panty

Mountain Man said...

Katie, you sound grody. Krix, how bout we tumble from the cookie bag into a vat of White Russian. Devilish.

Anonymous said...

i have just alienated myself from friends with a porcupine dog. can i hide in here?

Anonymous said...

Hey, hey, hey, RaJ.

Anonymous said...

Hey Katie, I know what you mean.

sloth said...

lupin, you will have to check with Mountain Man on that. Security at the shack is usually outstanding, but PD will be away, so the key line of defense (i.e., deli-slicer) will be lacking, and your former friends might come gunning for ya.

sloth said...

brain is inverted today.

Anonymous said...

thanks sloth, good advice makes good fornication. I have a heavy napsack and will be on my way shortly

Anonymous said...

Lupin, may I grind against you?

Anonymous said...

Of coarse you can, my lef tside still has scales, might help for getting behind the ears

Anonymous said...

Lupin, my slicer will be locked up for 12 days--sorry. I can call Luigi DiGiorno and see if his slicer is available.

Anonymous said...

Oh PD that would be wonderfull, you are very considerate. I imagine you in full bloom.

Anonymous said...

Lupin, are you lupine?