City of Legends

My poem "the philosophy of dreams" has taken on a life of its own, gradually, and now I have been the latest to open a can of something closer to worms than whup-ass over it.

Earlier this year the poem got some attention when it was revealed that a reading of mine of the piece had been sampled by Euro electronica wizard Ophidian.  After hearing what he did with it for his piece "Phoenix" I totally approve of what he did with it and it is cool and righteous to realize how many thousands of chemically altered young people have heard my voice booming out at them at raves across the continent.

Very cool.  Very righteous.

Now I find myself accused of a retcon (retroactive continuity, a phrase that emerged out of the comics industry for when you rewrite the backstory of a character or event without regards for inconsistencies that emerge).  It seems some people latched onto the muse breakdown I offered up for loveaddict and noticed that despite the fact the poem in question "the philosophy of dreams" appearing in the book, Brigit (aka the Crimson Panther) is not listed in the muse breakdown list.  There is a muse named "Crimson", but it was correctly surmised that she is not the majestic Titian-haired goddess christened Brigit.

The truth is, after time and tempest has passed, I had decided that, in reality, "the philosophy of dreams" was more in the "Abstra" column than the "Brigit" column, and identified it so in the new volume.  That simple.  Okay, not that simple, as it took a helluvalot of soul-searching to come to that. 

I stand by my decision and will continue to evaluate the source and force of my works as I deem proper and accurate and true to the spirit of my work.  Believe me, many elements of my life would play easier if I could delude myself and rewrite my histories, but that is not in my nature or my passions.

It has been coming in flickers and flashes (I know my creative personality all too well).  The desire to write something blood-fusion-hot in the way of some erotic poetry, to breathe out the solferino flames of the dragon.  There’s just one problem: No current muse.

Oh, yes, I could link to a memory and write something fiercely carnal and heated, that would melt keyboards and ignite screens.  That people would use to get laid.

But I’m over writing about the past in the present.  At least from that aspect.  Remembering a meal is not very nutritious.  And, make no mistake, I am hungry.  To the point of mad ferality. 

I could write of Abstra, the muse of the abstract lover.  But that would be disingenuous.  And, to be honest, to me, a bit boring.  I am considering retiring her.

I could write it of any of the lovely ladies who inhabit this constellation of my life, as friends and collaborators.  But that would elevate her to a place where she would rapidly become uncomfortable (as I know women, for the most part, regardless of what they say, want to control the temperature in the room) and off-balance.  Besides, it would be, at least in some vectors, a lie. While I may think of someone in that way (no names, please) I am doing my best to save the heat, the fire, the thermonuclear glory, for someone special, someone who might stick around and share their life.  You know, someone who wants more than a remote or weekend fling with verbal snapshots to remember in their old age.

I guess, for all the speculation to the contrary, I am sort of the anti-Joe Gideon.  I’m not looking for tourists in my love life, you know, the kind of person who has read the brochure and wants to know what it is like to dance with the man who has danced with the legends on the cliffs.  I want someone who is serious about moving in, taking up residence and giving me a reason to move the furniture around a bit. 

For all my chaos, my native state is as a domesticated animal.  Never been otherwise.  Stupid, on more than one occasion.  Gullible?  Certainly. 

I think I will just keep the fire in the belly of the dragon until it is the right time to breathe it out again.  Trust me, it’ll keep and when it does finally have cause to be released, you’ll know it.

And so will she.

I think this is the first time this has ever happened to me. A song is wedge in my head, playing soundtrack to the hours I am spending here, at the computer, editing some technical documents and writing a proposal for a client. Hairy-scary proposal, too. You don’t want to know which branch of the US Armed Forces it is for or what they do with our services if we win.

But back to the song. Wow. It is one of my own. One of the ones off of my CDs. I can’t recall it happening to me before. But the taste, which is the musical version of the taste of remembrance, is doing its thing in my brain, and I am enjoying it. I am rediscovering me.

Not a bad thing, I think. I am happy.

The poem, itself, is something of a miracle. Clearly an Abstra work (one written about not a single person, but an abstraction) I still called upon specific memories of specific women at different moments as I wrote it and later recorded it. The slow, malevolent and mournful guitar was my vision.

I conjoured the Leopard, the Selke, Brigit and Psyche to fuel the work.

Originally posted at Author’s Den, this examination of my greatest muse is as relevant today as ever.  Originally written in 2005, I haven’t changed a word.  I guess I’ve pretty much been on this wavelength for some time.

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I was down at my favourite hang out, the "Black Bear Burrito," working on a summary of my book "Love Gods of a Forgotten Religion" when a whim struck me.

And I shall, as is my duty to you, and to love.

Put this in your pipe and smoke it:

I am working on the manuscript for my next book of verse:

"As such…love poems of a new life"

and I started collecting together the best poems I have written of or for Candy since I first started actually writing of or to her (for you trivia buffs, the poem was "Above room temperature" written on September 1, 2007…and I don’t think the lady herself knew it was about her at the time. It was a complicated time and I ran a poor second for more than a lap or two.) and I encountered a problem.

Too many poems. Way too many for the modest volume I had envisioned.

So…tough luck. This will not be the juggernaut that was "The Compleat Panther Cycles" but many of those poems were not to the Panther but to an ideal and an abstraction, and they were written over a year and a half, not 4 months. We are looking at about 170-200 poems at this time (a very thick volume). Thicker than "from an unexpected quarter", thrice the thickness of "Ronin in the Temple of Aphrodite".

Candy, thank you for the inspiration, really…but sheesh! A guy has to sleep and eat. How bad is it going to be when we’re together in the same room?

Heh. Heh. Heh. That’s a different kind of poetry.

The title line is a poetic fragment.

It is driving me crazy. The fragments of poetry flitting in and out of my awareness as my preconscious processes and propagates the phrase "she shines".

Who is "she"? What does it mean "shines"? Is she an abstraction, an amalgam, a prophecy or a singular woman from my past or present? Elements of the poems that are whispering themselves to me bear elements of any of several ex-lovers: Nancy’s brilliance and grace, Jan’s intellect and sense of humour, Ann’s beauty and fragility, Brigit’s charisma and cunning, Karla’s vulnerability and talent. All goddesses, all. All shone (shined? did shine?) and shine on.

Perhaps I am just flashing on the whole. Or perhaps, perhaps I am extracting an archetypal menu for my next all-consuming passion.

Perhaps. Perhaps. But, regardless of what it means or how well I express it, she shines.

Whoever the hell "she" is.

I wrote this poem over a year ago, realizing that the dangled reconciliations of a fallen relationship were merely attempts to get me to pledge additional financial support. It draws its essence from the sermon preached by St. Paul in which he spoke of seeing a statue erected "to an unknown god" by cautious polytheists who thought they might have missed someone…

I have, in time, learned that much of what I write is not to Ann or Lauri or Alisha, but to a deified, rarefied abstraction of womanhood. One that, while some have lived up to parts of, no one will live up to the all (although, if anyone wants to try, I reserve the right to be delighted to be proven wrong…)

to an unknown goddess

I will start spinning your veil, today,
even though we are probably yet unmet.

I will catch moments, like snowflakes that fall,
to remember them to you someday when we speak.

I will not offer to show you the scars
but speak only of the healing and hope.

I will prepare you a place to lay down
near the fire, near the window, in my heart.

William F. DeVault. all rights reserved. wrongs to be ignored and forgiven.

I remain the romantique, the quixotic fool who firmly believes that love is possible, if not inevitable.

I’ve had moments of it. Nancy, once we had worked out out differences, but before I screwed things up. Jan, for all too short a season…largely my fault. The Panther? No. Shadows and incense. Brigit? I like to think so, maybe she can answer better than I. The Mad Gypsy? I would have said yes, once, but now am uncertain. Ann? It would be easier to forgive her trespasses if I thought not, and I am into forgiving people, not wishing that baggage. So I will consider what we had to be a ruse on her part so that, in the end, betrayal is not so much a colour of the palette she is painted in.

So, what is to be made of what is observed from a safe temporal distance? I wish I knew. Right now I am emotionally withdrawn. Capable fo touching those emotions within me, but not able to fully embrace them. There is too much pain in them, and though I have been healing at a good clip from my estrangement from some whom I have cherished, both lovers and family, I am far from yet myself.

Perhaps in this time of catharsis I will find a cure for my conditions. My willingness to allow myself to be reshaped so readily. I have seen in myself a tendency to do what I think is necessary to save a relartionship, even if I know it to be wrong. I have been asked so many times to lie for or about another’s failings, taking them on myself, that I have been accused of showing a martyr complex. Actually, I think it has been more of a chameleon’s disease.

I’ve had to live so many lies just to get through the day with past liaisons, is it any wonder that the rainbow became shuffled and confused? I sought out the Quaker faith because of their demand of truth, and found it placed me in precarous position with so many people in my life. How easily people, even some who have damned me for deception, ask me to lie for them, to cover for them, to help them maintain their facades and their deceits.

I have earned better treatment than that. Perhaps not from God, who is perfect, but certainly from the people whose asses I have hauled out of hell everytime they had the whim to do something stupid. Superman (another of my complexes?) is tired of saving the Lois of the week after she wanders into the alien hideout.

I have a friend, Thomas, who has been writing me massive letters explaining his view of my "problem with women". He believes that my problem is I see women as good, divine and wondrous creatures, superior to men and worthy of respect…when in truth they are deceitful, petty tyrants. I don’t embrace his worldview, which has undoubtably been shaped by his own discourse with women, but I understand it. If I had to base my worldview purely on the experiences I have been handed, I would have to concede much of his point.

But I don’t…and I won’t. So, to any out there who have taken the opportunity to, purposefully or inadvertently, bring me hurt or harm, or put me in the impossible situation of having to be your Wormtongue, I’m going to do two things.

1) I am going to promise to try harder to do better and
2) I am going to forgive you.

As of this moment, all past grievances are settled. Pick up your beds and walk. The other way, please. Forgiving is one thing - trusting again…not so much,