First up is The Absurdity of Writing Poetry. It's a play about making art and not making art and how that can all be pretty challenging sometimes.
It is the unoffical follow-up to The Pursuit of Happiness and A Lonely Crowd. It has a lot of poetry in it, a little bit of hip hop (believe it or not), and I'm hoping it will be fulfulling artists and non-artists alike.
How about an excerpt? Let's see what I can pull-out for you.
It begins as a lump in the throat - like a homesickness. You go to a far, secluded place, mentally, ideally physically as well. Or you go to a coffee shop, to be surrounded by activity. You put on the familiar trapping - pajamas. For me, a black t-shirt, beaten-up pants and one of two button down shirts, which are exactly alike in every way except their color. Many people think these are the only clothes I own. The point is, to find a space and make a home for yourself and your work.That done, you can begin, as always, with the same question, "Where to begin?" The answer, as always, "Start as you mean to go on." Well, of course.
Here's one of my favorite parts. It's just a list, but it really gets me fired up. Pardon the strange caps in some places. I haven't really editted this yet.
Thus, in the name of:
bogart, picasso, HURSTON, kandinsky, LENNON, KHALO, warhol, WHITMAN, hemmingway, dylan, neruda, stein, BALDWIN, GINSBERG, eisenstein, parker, gillespie, fitzgerald, armstrong, HOLIDAY, DAVIS, COLTRANE, mingus, monk, JOPLIN, beckett, havel, elliot, kerouac, ferlinghetti, motherswell, styll, olivier, brando, dean, SHAKESPEARE, rushdie, keats, rakim, kweli, def, RACHMNINOV, ELLINGTON, GAYE, HENDRIX, PLATH, RUMI, FELLINI, truffaut, goddard, LA ROCK, MARLEY, SHAKUR, brook, lepage, joyce, kushner, kertesz, oe, coatzee, mossman, mcewan, foster wallace, barth, eco, crane, sandburg, rich, reed, cale, byrne, eno, ramone, strummer, mitchell, micheline, lerner, levy, baraka, pollock, waits, mailer, marquez, cassady, burroughs, gaines, estep, scott-heron, bruce, hicks, pryor, pinero, cohen, nabokov, evans, ellison, sim, mucha, cobain, kuti, copeland, bernstein, cage, gould, mahler, elling, sondheim, redding, simone, vaughn, cooke, wonder, charles, jagger, richards, kundera,woolf, rauschenberg, monet, manet, seurat, growtowski, boal, graham, balanchine, robbins, de mille, meisner, ailey, cunningham, oida, foreman, chaykin, winterson, cervantes, murakami, ishiguro, kurosawa, gilliam, herzog, foreman, bergman, bunuel, almodovaR, kobayashi, fugard, sontag, carver, pessoa, conroy, faulkner, woolf, plath, blake, rimbaud, proust, twain, bangs, Symborska, kafka, donne, blake, wordsworth, shelley, dickenson, yeats, marlowe, kafka, and pound
So, that's probably the first thing up for Al[t]. There will probably be a reading and maybe a workshop of that great Canadian play I've been telling everyone about as well. Probably this spring.
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