Mean faces
Bad Faces
and MacGregor leprechaun green faces
all mad and tough
(Don't worry my son,
You'll find out soon enough.)
They flop their big butts
all over your back
and make it bend
and then crack.
and when you want Love
they tell you to wack.
Greedy, beady Corporate eyes
lizard and snake eyes
that mesmerize me
and make me want to beat off in the bathroom
after watching The Girls Next Door.
And Donald Trump Kewpie Doll faces
with pursy, poochy mouths
mouths like a asshole
all wealthy with treasons
and stratagems and spoils.
Sly grinning ghoul faces
that push me around.
And when my heart screams
there's never a sound.
Evil faces that make people crawl
and at the end of the song
the ump cries
"Play Ball!"
And all white and blue faces,
and mushy, in between faces
All having fun
And screaming as one
at nothing.
JD Painter
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* This is just a poem. The last two words you are supposed to guess at ("at all") but I figure leaving it this was works better. Maybe this is my reply to the bathos ridden documentary by Ken Burns about baseball,and the ridiculously exalted sports writing style of Frank Deford over a trivial topic. (It is only a game)
It is just an artistic expression, and even my comments are artistic expressions and supposed to be satirical. No different than an upside down cross in urine. It's Art.
So don't nobody go gettin' offended OK? It is just a poem and they are just words.
It is only a poem.
Again: Your guide to reading this blog is here:
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Prepare Ye The Way For The Preacher
(Quietly and lowly) Ladies and Gentlemen, the Chairman of the board has retired, from life....and woe be unto him little ones, for damnation is now his just recompense for a million sins. Sins that were scrawled a million years ago by the Devil's own hand, across the filthy and degraded parchment that now bears the indelible record of his soul.
(Volume Increases) In life, the Chairman of the Board, with unrepentant will, quenched the fire of his thirst for GOLD, and slated the lust that was within his wicked heart for the sins of the flesh. For he chose not the cup of the Word, and the path of the righteous. Nay little ones! He partook, and most grievously, of that other cup. The cup of EVIL. It was the cup of DEGREDATION that he chose, and of his own free will. Degredation and SHAME!
(The Reverend Shouts) HARKEN to the WORD my flock! And witness! For so saith the ancient parchment, at the trial for the final disposition of the soul of the Chairman of The Board. And the trial is well nigh drawing to a close.
(Pause and More quietly and repeats) Drawing to a close.
(Shouts again) THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD HAS RETIRED! FROM LIFE! WITH SIN AS HIS EQUITY! AND DAMNATION AS HIS......JUST.......... RECOMPENSE!
Ellie sat up straight, and rigid. She grew pale, and stared at The Reverend Edwards in wonderment. Ellie had never seen the reverend speak so earnestly before.
All was deathly quiet and still within the auditorium, save for the ever increasing wind outside, which whistled eerily as it tried to gnaw its way into the crevices of the upper eaves and sophets, and rattled the panes of its 19th century, lead- pane windows.
And,like I said before, this song is central to this story. Only me and one other person know how it is going to turn out.
And here. Just fooling around. (I'm laughing, because I notice that, unlike 3 finger style, I flare my nostrils sometimes when I play clawhammer). I have lots more clawhammer stuff. And original and new.
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*Added today, 5-19-11:
I had a nice day today that somehow made me feel better on a few different levels. Excuse me.......
Damn I burned the Frozen pizza again. Call it bachelor food. But my ex-wife was an outstanding Italian Cook. I mean really outstanding, and I weighed at least 10 pounds more as a result than what you see int these film clips. And I agree with Mario Puzo when he wrote in his Novel, The Last Don" that the French ain't got nothin on the Italians when it comes to cooking, or baking bread.
Answay, I was able to take a long beach walk with Shane, and introduce him for the second time and without a leash to the beach walks that I love so much, and which I used to take with Star and Henry as well. Such walks give me time to sort out all that is in my head, past present, future.
Shane never wants to leave my side, and he even sleeps on top of me in such a way that prevents me from being able to change positions. So I sort of slide him around at night, and then he ends up again later on with all his weight on my hips or legs or wherever, like a wrestler trying to pin me down.
But it is nice to be needed, and everyone needs that I think.
Shane is a Cocker Spaniel, and Cockers are very people oriented, and need lots of attention. And I give that to him, and he gives that to me. He is my only child and son, and he has saved me from some very dark areas of the mind that I might have gone into without him.
Anyway, I had my fishing pole as well, and threw out a few casts as we walked. On the way, we met a very nice old fellow who was in hip waders and fly fishing (salt water fly fishing).
We struck up a very nice conversation, and he filled me in on what he knew about the ten thousand sq ft house on the bluff behind us, and about the 50 plus K per year prop. taxes.
And I filled him in on what I knew about the Tuttles, Talmages, and Townsends, and also the Horton's , Hubbards and Hallocks. (Said names being dominant in LI East End Song and Story for eons Jeeves, and incessantly mentioned in the respective East end House Organ papers once one crosses the mason dixon line that starts somewhere around the shinnecock canal.
And all married or interrelated in one way or another, and dominating the seats in the local offices.
Well that' senough.
But I do want to talk about the old Irish fellow I met from county Cork. He seemed gratified to learn that I had given Shane a good Irish name.
He taught me a lesson about the diving birds.
More tomorrow.
But for now, Josephine:
May 20, 2:18AM:
Like I say the house or mansion is a veritable fortress, and I used to walk past it with Star and Henry during 05 and 06. The Latino stone masons (the mansion has much stonework) would always watch us go by, and sometimes I would raise my hand a little as a quick hello, and they might respond the same way.
During that time, there were other construction or rennovation projects going on all along that 2 mile stretch of beach. Today, there is no sign, or at least not too much construction going on anywhere on that shoreline, and on the North Fork of Long Island in general, and that is because of the bursting of the housing bubble of course.
But in the midst of that growing bubble, I used to marvel over the number of McMansions that were continually rising up from the ground, and if one were to traverse Long Island in general by car, one would see, and just about everywhere it sometimes seemed, the typical cleared and sandy real esate lot with new wooden framework, a large (20 yard perhaps) steel garbage dumpster, and the port a john off to the side. Henry David thoreau used to be on my mind a lot back then, and I would ponder,while painting, what he said about the very simple notion of having a home as compared to seeing it as an investment and means of making a profit or monet etc. (but I'll save that for later)
How different today though because, as I say, the construction has well nigh come to a halt.
Anyway, to return to the beach walk, I had noticed the terns diving offshore. I used to think that that sort of diving always meant that bluefish were swimming under them, and so I kept trying to cast my shiny Hopkins lure close enough to what I thought was a school.
But the old Irish fellow told me not to waste my time, and that there were no bluefish. He said that what the terns were diving for was actually sand eels, and that it was still a bit early, and the water still a little too cool for the migration of the bluefish into the Little Peconic Bay.
And so that was the little lesson, and I would not have learned it had I not paused to chat with him.
But walking a dog usually leads to meeting people in general and striking up conversations; especially if that person has a dog as well.
The old Irish fellow showed me a couple of pictures of himself proudly holding a couple of very large striped bass, in the 30 to40 pound range, that he had caught in the past when surfcasting on different Long Island (ocean) beaches.
His hands trembled a little, and I asked him why. He shook his head and gave the name of some diagnoses a Dr. had made, and said that it was not Parkinson's disease, in response to my starting to ask if it was.
He also said that sometimes the medications are worse than the disease, and, like a true Irishman, he said with an Irish twinkle, to make sure I get all my drinking in before the onset of old age and disease.
We both laughed.
I was glad for that little bit of human interaction, and felt sort of wistful and thought that under different circumstancs he might be a neighbor or friend of a family member, or dsomeone at work, that I would get to know and have many such a friendly converdsation with.
Shane liked him too, although Shane had barked at the sight of his hip waders when he first saw him. But after a little while Shane ran around and around trying to show off, and as the old man teased him a little.
I told the old man about how I recalled when the mansion on the bluff behind us wasn't even there, and that a modest ranch house was in the place where it stood. In fact, I told him, I had gone to an estate sale with my ex-wife at that former house, which had belonged to an older couple, both of which had finally passed away.
I bought an old zippo lighter, and my wife bought a lamp I think.
At some point after that tag sale, the property was sold, the house demolished and carted away, and up rose the Mansion, which I would not call a McMansion, because this friggin place is absolutely stunning architecturally, and materials wise, being of stone and with genuine slate shingles on its steeply pitched gables. (Forgive me, my knowledge of architecture is not sufficient to allow me to give a better description) And the square footage, according to the old man, is asll of ten thousand.
Anyway, we walked and talked until we reached the parking lot, and I said goodbye. I felt a little wistful over having hit it off with someone in such an immediate and friendly way, and I thought about his trembling hands, and knowing that I would never see him again. It made me a little sad, but Shane and I got in the car and I gave a last wave goodbye as we drove away.
As I drove, I thought about the mansion, and the home that had been there before the mansion, and of the old couple, gone for almost a decade now, and of what they would have remarked if someone had told them about how their house would be razed one day, and the Mansion would rise up etc ertc. and I grew somewhat more wistful. Quick thought of HG Wells and the time Machine, and of people that were in my life once. And of people that are gone now. A little sad, but maybe just a sort of nice and reflective sadness all the same.
I reached over and rubbed Shane behind his ears. He likes it when I do that.
*Here is an example of the way I yammer. If someone has the misfortune to meet me, I might bend his or her ear with a tale like this. Maybe it is a bad habit of mine. What I need to do is make a little coffee and try to get some sleep. It is 3:04AM now. I'll be going back out there for the next few days to do a job, and might be away from my PC. It depends.
