City of Legends

If there is an honorary citizen of the City of Legends, it almost has to be Daniel S. McTaggart, the Mountain Poet I have collaborated with and read alongside of.  He has been a guest on my podcast show, I designed the cover for his 2007 book "Midnight Muse at the Convenience Store" and he is just a good guy and a capable poet.

His new book, "Diner Poems", has just come out ( ISBN# 978-0-578-04587-0 for those of you wishing to order from Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble, etc.)  Dan loves his Americana, and an entire book of poems about diners?  Natural for him.  I was supposed to write a piece for the book about "Plato’s Cave", which is the inspiration for one of the poems in the book based on a discussion we had on that philosophical construct in a diner near Fairmont, West Virginia, but he decided to go pure with his material (I can’t blame him) and I promise I’ll do my best to drop the word here.

But here is a sample from the new book, entitled "Plato’s Cave on a Diner Napkin".

Some exciting news from Daniel S. McTaggart (Dan the Man).  Seems a national magazine for convenience store insiders has picked up some of his poems from his book "Midnight Muse in the Convenience Store" for reprint.  Proud of him, I am (plus, it doesn’t hurt that I wrote the foreword and designed the cover for the book, so it’s all free publicity for me..).

Dude, you rock.  I’ll fill the rest of you in with the details (like the magazine name) when he gets them to me.

My occasional project partner, Dan "The Man" McTaggart, has come out with a new book that I did not design cover for, edit, write foreword to or in any other way contribute to or tamper with.

It’s called Six Days in Santa Fe and I, knowing the kind of heart and soul the man puts into his work and his talents, would recommend it without reservation.

Survived the reading.  Both Tag (Daniel S. McTaggart) and I cut out earlier, a bit disappointed by the turnout…but as I did no local media and the store did little (they had a big fish in Senator Robert C. Byrd coming in just a few days ahead of us and we were sort of pushed aside, which is understandable, but regrettable.

I did make my announcement at the reading:  I am stepping back from doing more public appearances for the next year.  I need some time to concentrate on writing, editing and healing up.  I could tell my stamina (and patience) was diminished and I don’t like putting anything less than everything out there.

Busy week, but I will be doing updates all over the place as time and sanity allows.  One of my favourite muses is back from holiday and so that will be a boost to my productivity.  I had a pleasant birthday weekend…a few surprises, but that is part of life, you know?

Some ideas for my next book are starting to take shape…but I am putting those off and promising myself to focus on my current catalog for now.  I have a tendency to start new project while the old ones aren’t even done twitching in their afterbirth.

There is a rumour that I would like to address.  Well, several, but this is the one I am addressing today.  There is talk that with the rise of williamfdevault.com I may be selling off cityoflegends.com.  Fair point.  I can say I have no immediate plans to do this.  For more than a decade people have been coming to the City to read my works and you’d be surprised, perhaps, to see how many come back again and again, off their favourites or bookmarks.

I don’t like leaving people stranded.

According to various sources, including myself, my web hosting company (web.com), my publisher, my friend Dan McTaggart, the remaining judges for the TVC2008 who have not yet gotten their votes in to me (harrumph), Barnes & Noble, my parents, my sibs, the media, my sons, one of my ex wives and two or three inspirationally-gifted friends, the next three days of my life should unfold with some of the following milestones.

Tomorrow we will announce the winner of the TVC2008. Mass hysteria will abound as we announce the TVC2009.

peacat.com will vanish, by midnight tonight. If no one with greater claim to the name asks for it before the registration runs out next year, it will go back on the open market.

I will give three two-hour readings at Barnes & Noble in Morgantown, WV, Sunday (10-12, 1-3, 4-6) with the assistance of the amazing Dan McTaggart, who co-authored Psalms of the Monster River Cult with me. I don’t think they could handle the intensity of the Long Beach reads, so I am trying to strike a balance.

Michael Phelps will win two more Olympic Gold Medals.

I will add ten more pieces to williamfdevault.com. Someone will blast me for the lovely nudity that is interspersed with the other artwork on the site. I will feel bad that I am being criticized, but will soldier on.

I will hear from someone out of an unexpected quarter.

I will write something inexplicably charming.

I will announce sometime today…oops, already did, that some of the Fields of Arbol pieces appearing on Amomancer will find their way onto williamfdevault.com.

Some doucebag will leave a stupid (definition: willfully ignorant), presumptive and irrelevant comment on one of my blogs.

I will drive over 500 miles in the next three days. I will still be alive Monday morning.

I will have dinner with my family on Saturday, and visit with my Grandmother, who is 96…bearing down on 97 next month.

I will discover a fantastic new muse.

Which means, while an alcoholic can drink you under a table, and a sexaholic will fondle you under the table…I built the damn table and it’s mine, mine, mine.

But I digress.

I just got done with the business plan for peacat press and, subject to change, wanted to get our next several months’ worth of releases charted and noted.  Dates, titles and madness subject to change.

October 1, 2008:  Best Man in Albuquerque, a collection of fiction and poetry by Daniel S. McTaggart

November 15, 2008:  The Tales of the Amomancer, a collection of fantasy fiction and poetry by William F. DeVault

January 15, 2009:  yet unnamed manuscript of poetry by Huerta

February 20, 2009:  Aubergine, a collection of romantic and erotic poetry by William F. DeVault

Get it?  Got it?  Good.

Very tired, going to take a break from recording, engineering, planning, writing, editing and rearranging furniture (I’m not kidding) to drink a six pack of Diet Coke with Splenda and see what’s on the tube.  Whatcha want to bet I’ll be back within an hour?

Not the poem, TRIUMPH, but the sense of victory I have and had enjoyed so much over the past months.  A part of me is still in shock, a part of me still writhes in pain, but a part of me is intent on locking in t mountaintop moments and feeding me the morsels and mould of those times.

I don’t claim to know anything about anything, I just feel that, I know that, as sure as God is in the rain, love is more than a transient state.  There is much I would do to heal the wounds, much I would do to make things right, much I would do to acknowledge that I have lived, not an illusion, but something so powerful that every atom of my existence is changed for all eternity.

I may feel this alone.  But I feel this.

And by this awareness, I am humbled and exalted.  I am broken and purified.  I understand a depth of emotion I had not known and probably a sane man should never touch.

I had a good working session with Tag yesterday.  One question came down to the name of the press.  I told him I was uncertain, as I had no indication, no sense, of how keeping the peacat name would be received and whether I would be doing more harm than good for and to people I honestly care about the feelings of.  His response?  (He’s getting cheeky in his old age.)  He told me that every time I work on a project to for or with the press I would be reminded of something, of someone, and I have to ask myself if that’s what I want for the rest of my life and legacy.

My answer, after a moment’s pause, was "Yes".

A look to the heavens, a gesture followed by my now familiar cry of defiance:

"If you want me dead, you have to come for me in person."

Now that is triumph.

Barring a specific request to not use the name by the one person who I would listen to on the topic (and not some asshole who thinks they are speaking for another, I can talk directly to God (the priesthood of the individual is a cornerstone of the Protestant faith, for those of you who didn’t stay awake in Sunday School), no human is too good for my countenance), which I would accept, without question or rancor, peacat press lives.

We have two projects in the hopper, I am awaiting manuscripts on both, including a very exciting combination short story and poetry collection from Dan McTaggart entitled Best Man in Albuquerque. 

I visited my Grandmother this afternoon, and will be seeing her again tomorrow.

I am skipping the party I was invited to tonight.  Why?  Because when push comes to shove, I am a loyal sonuvabitch.  Those who had "give in to temptation within 90 days" just lost your bets.  Sorry.

I think I shall run out to Barnes & Noble with Tag, have some of their iced tea and read some science magazines.  Yeah, I’m a geek.  But an epic geek.

And still working on being the best person that I can be.

 The drive to see my parents (I am in to actually see my 95 year old Grandmother, who is in failing health) is always an interesting time, as it allows me buffered time to think out loud.  Usually I get a lot of thinking and writing and sonic experimentation on the 3-1/2 hour trip.

This morning was no exception.  It started as a ramble, dealing with lyrical issues on the new Evangelist CD, but then segued into an examination of my life over the last year.  A lot has happened, many events and elements I could not have foreseen.  Some gentle, some brutal.

All in all, I have come to a conclusion.  This is one of the best years of my life.  

I have reconnected with old friends I had no expectation of ever hearing from again.  I have taken public stands on the issues of the day, been recognized for these stands, and made connections with people who have the power to affect things.  I have loved openly and with abandon a woman who loved me in the same manner.  I have broken some bad habits, written some great poetry, recorded some interesting material to posterity, helped a few friends get elements of their lives in order, saved at least two lives (according to the individuals) and published a remarkable book.  I’ve learned new words and concepts, examined my own failings and picked splinters from my metaphorical ass.

There have been some downer days and strange pains, but when the scales are weighed, I have to say that if every year was as remarkable as this one, I would be the luckiest man alive.  Most people do not live as much and as well in an entire lifetime as I have lived this past year.

I thank all of you who have shared this voyage with me, from the most vocal of friends to the saddest stalkers.  From the constant to the mercurial, from the inspiring to the oppressive.  From those who will still be a part of my life next year and for years and decades to come, to those who have now passed back into the grey.  

I thank you all with profound and spiritual gratitude and wish only to say that, while I compiled a massive list of names to include here, I shall not.  Some secrets are best kept.  While I won’t lie to you, I will withhold that which would force others harm or pain.

I have some great ideas now to finish up those damn final tracks on Evangelist, and am looking forward to tomorrow with great hope, joy and peace.

I have no quarrel with any of you.  If you have with me, that is a measure of you, not me.  Being loved and respected is not a measure of a person, loving and respecting others is.

Namaste.

I stayed up way too late last night, working on the final tracks to Evangelist. Every time I thought I had one finished, I’d suddenly get another idea, changing the instrumentation, the attitude, something about the piece in my mind. It’s a little insane right now. I feel like I’ve lit the fuse on the rocket but am having problems getting comfortable in the pilot’s seat. This will probably end up being one of those projects where I hate everything about it before I am done with it.

We were working with the guitar for one particularly upbeat piece (which I shall not name at this time) when I realized we needed a good bass line. So we turned what we working with on the guitar into a bass line. Better. But now, the drums sounded wrong. Too fast, too shaky. Maybe slow them down a bit and…hold it. Now we have a problem with the tone of the vocals. Sheesh. This reminds me of why I gave up painting. I would tweak things until they were a mess. Maybe I just need to timebox the process and deal with it.

A name for the publishing house is driving me nuts. The original name, peacat, is off the table as far as I am concerned. I could use it, but that would be disrespectful and a little odd. As such… will have to go down through history as the one publication of that imprint. An amazing book, if now a bit….ironic.

McTaggart wants Monster River Press. No. Too regional (we dubbed the Monongahela River the Monster River for our collaboration Psalms of the Monster River Cult.

City of Legends Press is in play, but too self-referential. Likewise any variation on my name or various sobriquets. I will give myself until mid-July to work it out, I have authors waiting on me and I am so fucking tired of waiting on other people. Patience was the last virtue I learned and the first one I lose, it is not in my nature to wait, I pace a hole in the rug.

I am going to see my Grandmother this weekend, and I have an invite to a party. I know why I was invited, and although there is a part of me that always knows I am cunning enough to dodge flagrant temptation, for at least three good reasons I don’t even want to see me have to. So we shall see if my curiosity and arrogance beat out my virtue and common sense.

Place your bets.

My good friend and sometime collaborator, "Mountain Poet" Daniel S. McTaggart, has accepted my invite to be part of the festivities for the kickoff of the Evangelist Tour, on August 17, 2008. I would encourage (en couer rage) any and all within driving distance of the Barnes & Noble in Morgantown, West Virginia, to attend. You are in for some surprises.

I am soliciting some local musical talent. Whether this means some local bands will perform and/or there will be an Amomancer performance, I leave it to the fates. But in a perfect world, if I had my druthers, you’ll get both. All the hours I have been spending in the studio of late are paying off…I no longer think I sound like a dying, diseased bullfrog with a hernia. And I am learning how to work a microphone! (It is tougher than you might think!)

I am also tracking down other local authors to take part in the readings. Books and CDs galore (all of them, including Dan’s) will be on sale (if you guys sell me out of them on day one of the tour…ah well…), with the Evangelist CD and As such being the official CD and book for the tour.

77 days. Sheesh. Gotta get back on the treadmill.