Maciunas Explains

Art that you can laugh at
is important
very important.
we’ve had too much of the exclusive
worldly artist who replicates
over and over, his limited
palate of ideas,
who knows how to shmooze at the openings
and get his two-dimensional paintings
on arcane gallery walls;
who bores with depth that isn't there.

What we need are paintings of the mind:
a painting that is one part piano
one part head in a bucket of ink
one part sound of wind on flying paper
one part grit from the cracks in the concrete
one part Buster Keaton pratfalls;
no paint or canvas needed.

What we need is art that looks like life
music that occur in silences
rubber boot concertos
creaking butterfly wings
and thoughts.

What we need is the poetry of juxtaposed
signs, words, meanings, sounds without letters
letters without words
jokes, vulgar puns
missing words
ad-libs
fragments from obsolete
dictionaries.

What we need is to market art en-mass
anonymous to the consumer
film-strips and cheap plastic boxes
instructions on how to
create your own
work of art
just by dreaming.

The Stars

Where would my madness take me tonight
but to this wild, open sky
where, ringing above
in fearful radiance
are the stars!
Watching me like implacable gods...
The stars! Crackling with exultation!

I must paint them to relieve the waves
breaking in wide pools above me.
She doesn't love me.
Jesus doesn't love me.
even the whores don't like me.
and I am alone with my pounding, whirling stars.

I gasp up at them as they mock me
in purity,
I, so defiled, so filthy, adorned with dirt
I'm a failure and no one knows me...
Still, I must paint! I must... I must!

I-I can't even hold a brush, it's too soft
too far from my hand, it won’t do.
I need to push it out from the tube
and stroke the canvas with my misery
push the color of my pain out,
wringing it out, I must, I must!
Oh, the stars are breaking my heart!

I must let them out
swirl their accusing innocence, I must show
how they taunt me with their waves
how they call me to go with them
to stand before God.
Oh, Theo, let me burn pure like they do!
Please, Please! I'm ready...
My eyes are aflame with the stars!

Black Diamond

1.
You were always my
black diamond,
reality preacher
deeper thinker.
Not for you the easy song
of love and longing,
selfish obsessions.

You sang,
'This is my country.'

You sang,
'if you could choose the color…'

2.
Black diamond in the rough
on the tagged and battered
avenue of midnight.
I celebrate your dark glitter.
In your quivering, wounded falsetto
you gave voice to the ghetto child
running wild, crying out of his soul,
'My God, my God,
why wouldn't they just let me be? '

Soaring like a black bird
over the power lines
hung with old shoes
blaring with poverty
heaving with trash and rusted cars
You sang,
'Freddie’s dead
on the corner, now…'
you sang his black mass
with a full heart
an angel’s breath.
And then,
with urban irony,
'If you wanna be a junkie, wow! '

3.
Urban trubador,
dark poet
black diamond!
how you glitter
even in the night’s despair;
nervous strings behind you
shivering in the howl of night.
You dared them:
look beyond
your heavy doors,
look me in the face!
See
reflected in my shine
yourselves,

so trapped and blind.

What do you mean
when you say 'nigger'
'jew', 'whitey'?
Don't you know? 'We're all gonna go! '
Turning that thought
into a whirlpool
swirling us out to a lonely road
to confront nakedly,
our own
toxic stupidity.

4.
Stand up, slight man
in the club’s spotlight
smile a little.
Sooth us down with your weeping axe
let us settle in...
draw the room into your mind
until we shine
shine!

Black Diamond,
my man Curtis,
loving poet
of the brilliant night

turn them towards the light
singing, 'Right on, right on
for the darkness.'

Jack's Song

 

 

We must now hark
To the slither of snakes
And the flitter of bats,
The twisting of minds,
Of the blood on the floor.

We make it dark!
Shake out black sheets!
Rise in night winds!
We spook it like demons,
Green in lurid red light!

We go down
Where the girl trod a loaf,
Where toads croak out love
And spiders spin madly,
Where vermin eyes glitter no pity.

Yes! Lovely shrieks
Claw at our throats,
While mechanical chains
Saw at false limbs.
Hollowly, glowgrins lick at the night!

Pound at the door,
Shout bloodcurdling cries!
The door slowly opens--
A shocking surprise!
  Evil intent on your pumpkin-lit porch.

Axes fall loudly

Webs wrap you tightly

Claws prick at your back

Sharp teeth at your throat

Luridly glowing, three thousand feet tall.

 

So, don’t give us Raisins,

We want the real loot!

Deadly sugars, dyed garish
To rev us up fully

And thus, fueled and sped-up

We’ll rip at the night!

 

 

Rabbit's Moon (Revised)

(Still from Kenneth Anger's "Rabbit's Moon")

Yea Perriot

Fallen in love with the moon

Over and over again

You reach

For the lover who isn’t there

Foolish Perriot.

 

 

 

The matte zooms in flat

The rabbit, the moon and thee

Over and over again

Hear the bells reveal the doo-wop tunes

Romance and fear

On this night

in the forest of flowers.

 

 

 

Here comes Harlequin

To beguile with tricks of air!

Walking tightrope across the ground

Juggling nothing, cavorting and tumbling

And leaping about!

 

Don’t look such a fool, sweet Perriot,

Look further than his wand and see!

For with his magic lantern. here

Behold!

He’ll conjure a star of sun

A mystery of woman

Of blithe, alluring illusion

The heartless institution

Sweet Columbine!

 

 

 

Ah, silly Perriot

Who spurns the mirror and the lute

Thrills instead to her lovely dances

Artful and mechanique

Oh what would you give

Naif Perriot

To be her one and only dream-

The moon?

But now you are the one who’s spurned

She dances now with Harlenique!

 

He leers and turns quite graceful

And charms her in his roguish way

The rabbit sniffs the air,

Winking blindly, casts his spell

Off they go to the endless show.

Leaving lonely, stupid Perriot.

 

 

And now the lantern shows a fear

The moon eclipses, dark and drear

Disaster for poor Perriot

Dimming all the hopes he’s known.

 

But soft! Your better angels come…

And show reflection and the tune

Again you hurry from your room?

Into the silver forest gloom…

 

And there’s the rabbit in the clearing

The moon a spotlight on his hearing

The bells and adenoidal crooning

Is something there that you are fearing?

 

To fall?

 

And Perriot

In the garden grasping,

Twisting, turning, flailing, yearning

Flying towards the everlasting;

He tumbles towards the magic light

To something hidden in the night

 

 And when the ragdoll hit the floor

Poor Perriot, he was no more.

 

 

 

 

 

Resistance

 

We sang

When midnight tore at our hearts

When fire was swallowed up in mud

When magic died

We sang

And from the singing

Though there were tears and pain

From the singing

A new day blossomed

From a song

Stronger than bullets

The jaws of dogs

Or slander

Life opened up

A little wider

Smiles opened up

A little brighter

And life got a little easier

All because

We sang.