compose love songs for the radical humans

i rode my bike to the midsummer music festival this year and camped. I stayed sunday night and helped take down on monday in order to get my ticket reimbursed. slam poet magpie ulysses caught my ear at a fireside gathering with her work about the wonders of the universe and aghast at the commonality of social ambivalence. she was not preforming formally in the festival but once the stagemusic was done, many artists such as her came out of woodworks to share their talents in more intimate settings. her words made me want to shout AMEN. I couldn't find the one commentary magipie did by the fire that gave me generationally-releveant goosebumps, but I found this which is still fantastically rad. Here's the transcription:

"coming undone"

take my heart from my throat and smash it

see I’m freakin out

cause the way things seem to want to be right now are all in a slight shift to the left

but I don’t really ever want to permanently return back right

so i drink from the indoor water feature of my favorite downtown hotel

I eat drug deals and dust and shade grown snail mail and I wait...

for what I have always wished upon a star for. which is this:

this moment for which I come undone in a quiet fury, ya see inside there is no silence in madness, but sometimes it creeps up on you as quietly as sheets too long a lines

as the tides wander of orcas and gravity, as her lips moving softly on her death bed wondering if she will ever play that grass between her two thumbs again. And sometimes, it’s as unknowing as hands that have never moved soil with shovels, as small breasts - and I know about this - as small breast in big bolsted dresses as the crows whispering sunset and I wait for daylight to come like the embalmed’s breath of open-caskets of children killed in car-accidents. I wait. To be marked by the passing of these days that feel like bricks to my teeth. I want nights spent reminiscing in a wine-soaked bathtub of that time I lost my shit. But I never want to smell that same sweat-stain again , and in the minutes that feel like years, this is the power of an unmarked passage of panic. In the prayer of those that will wield their boots to stone traceable pathways into night time mug, and all the places they will wander looking for dark places to hide, and the sounds they will seek to share lost lust secrets with. Because you see inside, the quiet fury is LOUD LOUD LOUD. Says “lady just do it”, c’mon, make plans with other people’s mouths, made yours, so they will never again know a kiss without words. Steal fruit from the orchards, fall in love six times a week, lady open your legs - so they can breath. Drink far too much whiskey, take bouquets to your favorite steel structures, kneel down and pray, don’t wait for that train though, run! Challenge strangers to races on the steepest of stairwells. Compose love songs for the radical humans, just take your ambivalence to these imbalances that prey on you like electric-convulsive therapy on your brain, strangle your indifference to death, and breathe, breathe, breathe. Because we can all spend this life pretending that we are just slow moving mississippi river made ____[?]___. But there are flowers still pressed to a butterfly screen, pressed, and they are hopeful for drydom to pour them, so please, let my flight of fury let it take its clothes off in the public fountain, and if I wait.

imagine that

Your brain cannot differentiate between what you imagine and what you experience. Therefore, you should daydream about things you want to do/accomplish and you will build neural networks conducive to that experience, thus making the likelihood of it actually happening much more real. Have you seen “what the bleep do we know?” you can watch it in ten minute increments on utube. Part one can be found here.

happy solstice!

squash ubc?

Ronin the cat likes the delicata squash shoop. Or at least he's interested in sniffing it. The squash are from the UBC farm, a wicked outdoor classroom for growing food in an urban setting. There's an aboriginal garden, an heritage orchard, chickens, kids gardens and experiential learning opportunities galore! The farm is under threat of development, sadly, shrouded with flashy logic about sustainability - the planners advocate they doing the best thing by reducing the farm to make way for condos. "It's more sustainable for the students to live on site" Bollux I say! Profits drive the bulldozers of development. The benefits of the farm are less measurable in an economic language. The eagles, and western red cedar forest buffer for animal habitat and soil restoration and water cleansing, and, and, and, are not on the money-makers priority list. David Suzuki says

"…today more than ever, society needs visible examples of productive food systems that retain habitat, biodiversity, steward the ecosystems in a responsible way, and do not impose a toxic burden on our air, waterways, and soils”.

UBC farm has all of these things and more, so not supporting it would be irresponsible, yes? There's gotta be another way to house students on land that is already developed.

Anyways, I have been bussing to UBC to load squash into my backpack to sell at the SFU market on Wednesdays. Their presence opens up a dialogue with SFU students about the importance of partnerships across institutions when it comes to mobilizing for things relevant to us all! local food and places to teach about it! Despite being rejected by the SFU newspaper, The Peak, with an article about the farm for the reason that "SFU students don't care about UBC" - I continue to move beyond the statement by spreading the word and making soup. What else can one do?

Vancouver eats emissions

I like to eat, and learning that seventy-five percent of our food is imported, and ninety percent of those imports are trucked up from California or Mexico, I am afraid. The annual CO2 emissions spewed into the atmosphere for the contents on my plate are the equivalent of a truck loaded with apples, oranges and iceberg lettuce making a trip to the moon and back ten times a year! I imagine a truck hopelessly chugging along and realise that that my food commute needs to be shortened, pronto! Food transportation as it stands today is not reliable. If the trucks quit running, Vancouver would be left with three days of food on the shelves. For every dollar received by a farmer, fisherman or rancher, three to four dollars is received by a shipper, processor, packager, retailer, and advertiser. A local farm, community garden or a backyard plot cuts out much of this excess, and you get more broccoli for your buck. When you pay less at the supermarket for imported foods, you are actually paying more, indirectly, through government subsidies, environmental degradation and by making it less viable to farm locally, increasing the need to be propped up by imported food. What can you do this week to shorten the distance your food travels? Visit your local community garden, seek out your farmers market, and see what grows!

urban dweller, imagine you are in nature

MEDITATION: Peace flourishes where there is balance। This week's meditation balances our mood and energy as we connect with the landscapes of the earth। Allow yourself a quiet place। Place both feet squarely on the floor.Allow your back to be long and relaxed.Remember to release your eyes and jaw by softening the muscles that attach them. Take a few deep breaths. Soften your ribs and your belly to allow more air flow. Think of a specific place in nature that you enjoy.It can be a place you have been or a picture you have seen. Imagine a beautiful place anywhere -- in the forest, by the ocean, in the mountains, in the desert, by a stream... anyplace that feels good to you. Remember it vividly. Make it real.Get into the details of your experience there. What do you smell? What does the air feel like? What colors do you see? What sounds do you hear? How does the temperature feel on your skin? Is there a breeze? Bring this beautiful place to you, where you are right now.Feel yourself held in nature's loving embrace. When you feel complete with the first one, pick another place. Feel free to use this meditation more than once a day

Join the World peace wave – meditate for world peace everyday at 12noon wherever you are in the world!

energies

I think I am sensitive to energy. whatever that means. words don't do it justice. it's ineffable, or cannot be expressed in words. The photo is from earthhour, lights out! red wine and living room floor picnics. encore, earthhour! more, please.

view from my apartment window

last post was about the crows.

well, here's a picture. The cloud resembles a bird itself, me thinks.