4.19.5

i'm in prescott az updating this thing thanks to my father's neighbors katy and patrick. i arrived last monday (i think). my mom's funeral was last thursday; it was a roman catholic service - mom converted last year - first time i have been in a roman catholic church in 30 years or so. service was very nice, preacher was great (i guess i should call him a "priest", southern roots showing).


i'm staying awhile with my dad who is doing really well under the circumstances. i'll be here until last week in april, maybe first week in may. i need to be back in chapel hill nc by the 6th of may for a trial my daughter nicole is testifying in; she needs moral support.


been trying to paint the western mountain landscape, very different than smoky mountain green. will visit some relatives in phoenix i don't see often enough before i leave. after that "the future is uncertain, the end is always near" (jim morrison). reading "the crackup" by f. scott fitzgerald. a couple of chapters in it are the best thing he ever wrote in my opinion. aftermath stuff, after it's all (almost) over. here's a sample:

"i felt; therefore i was"


not as negative in it's context, but something to think about. i'll post more about it later. gotta go now and catch a coyote.

4.7.2

Modern Peasant on Hiatus
back april 29th.

going to arizona to attend mom's funeral and spend some time with my dad. meanwhile, here's the word on my week.

i don't speak astrology, but this guy seems to hit the nail on the head quite often. rob brezsney:"free will astrokogy". i believe that dealing with the realities is a good thing to do, depending... but maybe all at the same time is not such a good idea. i also believe this is the artist's delimma.

4.4.2

Winona Parsons
my mother passed away last night. she was a unique lady. she fought cumulative heart problems right up to the end. she knew what she was up against but never gave up. may she rest in peace.

"I rise above the crescent moon to the seven stars, beyond the history of man, beyond numbers and words that bind us. From the earth I rise like a falcon of gold released from a blue egg. I fly above and below the great worlds. I take the shape of a young girl working. In my belly I carry the seed that becomes me. Praise the corn that rots and the sedge that rises. Praise the emerald heart of earth. Praise the coming and going of creatures, the constancy of the world and the word.

I come from light and to light I return. My talons grasp the ring of colors: the gold beak of dawn, the blue eye of day , the deep red blood of dusk . I rise . In truth I burst on the world like an arrow flung from darkness, sparks of fire from my forehead like burning stars streak the sky. I gather myself, thought and bone, and burst again into flight. I soar and know the god who speaks with the voice of flame.

I am one of the great ones sitting in a field of corn. I eat and I am nourished. In turn I offer myself, the bread of air, the white spirit of fire. I am a falcon of gold. I burn with a passion and lie still . I flare and smolder, live and die in a breath. I sail on gold wings that fan the blaze. I am consumed by fire. This is what I was born to do: to live, to love, to know, to change and embrace the infinite. I shall not forget my becoming."

from "awakening osiris: the egyptian book of the dead" translated by Normandi Ellis.

4.3.2

about the middle east today i'm speechless. about the citizens of the usa and israel i'm stunned. so much doublespeak. we're paying for the distruction of a people.

yesterday when i noted that bush was "a jingle a day" man, i meant that in this time of disintegrating public discourse when we could use someone like charles barkley to stand up and talk sense, we have instead president bush who seems to get programmed each day to say one snippet, slogan, glib alliterative phrase over and over and over until the next day. i'm sure his handlers are from the ad world where the same principle has been gradually eroding the minds of "the consumer" for some time now. hitler used the Big Lie. today the powers that be in the usa (and believe me, they do be) use the little, short, catchy lie repeated endlessly for a heartbeat until the next one is churned out.

have a nice day.

4.2.2

maybe i'm not seeing what is happening in the middle east clearly. to me the problem seems simple, though not the answer. a people from far away dispossess another people, takes their land, fields, and homes, and puts the inhabitants in refugee camps. they do this on the on the authority of god. the victims and fair-minded onlookers see it as unfair.

the initial dispossession is done with the help of a few powerful nation states, and the invaders are continually financed and assisted by the world's most powerful nation state.

it might be worth mentioning here something from tom friedman's book "the lexus and the olive tree":

"if you planted a tree between jerusalem and tel aviv, visit it soon. it may not be there much longer because by 2020 the area from haifa to tel aviv to jerusalem is likely to become one big, seamless urban megalopolis. israelis are building as if they lived in australia-more is better, bigger is better, wider is better. if current population trends continue, israeli, outside the negev desert, will soon be one of the most densely populated countries in the world." (p.309)

and now they finish off the refugee camps, shutting down (or worse) arafat while blaming him and his people for the whole rout. and this from the people who invented the mossad and the stern gang.

so what is absolutely the worst thing about this horrible mess? there are a lot of candidates but my vote goes to the american citizen who seems to listen to "a jingle a day" bush and beam at the atrocities being committed right now. you've heard of the "good germans" during WWII, the stable, conventional citizens who went about their business while the jews were being exterminated? the "good americans" who ignore the sordid, prolonged, and vicious treatment of a people being eradicated are much worse. the germans could not see the warsaw ghetto destruction while it was happening

enough. i'm going to go watch disneyland.

4.1.2

i'm back home and glad to be. heard via electronic grapevine that there was concern for my health because my recent posts have been so short. i'm fine. the reason posts have lacked customery incisive commentary is that i've been camped out in 4 cylinder yurt for 6 of the last 11 days (where i sketched the scene above). also engaged in a lot of projects all of a sudden:

• paint watercolor landscapes, print via giclee, sell, pay bills.
• kludging together some kind of digital recording/mixing setup, operating out of my hip pocket
• programming various little utitlities and applets using realbasic. definite challange for dyslexic like myself
• edit and print book of 150 ditties i have accumulated, later add color a la "illustrated rumi"
• finish image archive links

so tommorrow back to the digital grindstone with the question "how is rumala 2002 different from warsaw ghetto whatever year that was?"