MORTAL WOMBAT WOUNDS

Dear Friends,

How have you been?

I will tell you I've been fine, though it's much more complicated than that. I tend to check in here when I am indeed feeling fine. But as you can tell from the sizable gaps between posts--I am often not fine. Or just very busy. And I will let you go on thinking I am "just very busy"…way too busy to trifle with a personal blog. Jeez--what am i? Twelve?

Yes. Sometimes I am 12. And that is not a terrible thing. 

The terrible thing is when I'm 112.

112 is a stifling attic. An indigo corner. A tragic nursery. A kitchen fire. A swimming pool choking on algae. A garden of sandspurs. A tool shed stocked by a sociopath. A bathroom w/ no hand sanitizer wall-papered with mirrors, floored in knee-high shag carpet and flooded in fluorescence.

It's not pretty. And still…I'm making it sound better than it is (with the shag carpet and all…)

The good thing is--I really have been busy with some pretty exciting stuff. But it's not introspective enough for me to just rattle off a list of shit I've been doing. That is not why I created this blog. 

FRIENDS, as you know I decided to get serious about writing in early 2012. That is when I started taking all my old (and new) Vogon poems---many of them written live right here in the Octo Diary---and crafting them into fine polished turds that "some editor somewhere would surely love." And I sent many of my beloved poems out into the world via Submittable.

I did the same with my short stories in 2014.

At first I got only rejections. Then I got some feedback that was encouraging. Then I had some success getting a few poems published online.

I actually got much better feedback on my fiction. Unfortunately when my mind crashed last year I was unable to handle fiction-writing so I concentrated on poetry, thinking "Why do I love poetry so much? It is such a useless, irrelevant thing. A dead art. But I will use it to keep my mind alive until I'm able to work on stories again." 

Well guess what? Poetry is NOT a dead art! There are exciting things going on in the poetry world that make politics look like a panda exhibit. There are more poetry journals than ever, and more talented writers than ever.  (I say "than ever" as if I've been alive forever & know exactly how many poets have always existed. Excuse my hyperbole.)

I am blown away by the "competition" out there. I don't like to think of fellow poets as competition, but unfortunately they are.

Young Ginsberg (drawn in 2012 when writing was a pure joy)

For awhile (since 2012 at least) I have been aware that publishers are making more of an effort to give voice to poets who were marginalized in times past. I have seen many requests for works by people of color, LGBTs, and yes, even women (as a minority group). This didn't phase me at all. Hell, I love to read good poems by anyone & everyone. And I have read many GREAT POEMS by all colors and genders and shapes of people in print and online.

Recently this "political correctness" in the publishing world---and no doubt the high visibility of writers & publications on the internet---has resulted in a sort of smack-down between 

a) people of color (black/brown/yellow/aubergine)

b) feminists (people of clitoris) 

c) white guys (people of pink penis) 

d) editors (people of red pen) 

e) people of faith (religious, ya know) 

f) others (people of opinion)

I won't get too detailed but let me say…it ain't pretty. Though it is exciting. Poetry Wars. World of Poetrycraft. Mortal Poembat. This is what I always dreamed of when I said I wanted to change the world with words!! Alas, I think I am no longer battle-ready. Would I be honored to fight in the war of the words if I needed to? If I was drafted by some Publisher-in-Chief and my nerves were as savvily sympathetic as they once were, and not the tangled string of Xmas lights they are now? Yes I would.  

Whose side would I fight on though? I was born female and will always be a feminist, but I was a 3rd wave feminist (ie, a fun feminist) and feminism is back to being deadly serious. I think. 

I was supposed to start HRT* today, so I'm now deadly serious about identifying as a trans man. And I'm white. But I'm not angry about others having a voice, so I probably would not be allowed in the special white guy forces unit. 

I don't think I could be included in any of the other 4 factions either. I'm definitely not an editor. I may just be f) a person of opinion. We all are, after all. And I'm happy to remain on the sidelines for now.

(I'd like to know where all the reclusive surrealists have gone? Away from the internet I guess.)

I feel like I'm just a little too ripe for perhaps the most interesting literary era since the Beats. And that makes me cry tears of GenX remorse.

Some kind of post-nuclear insect 

I've decided to retreat from writing-to-be-published for awhile, and return to just writing for me. For fun. For the love of fucking writing!!! I'm pretty saturated with the noise of writing now. I remember when writing brought me peace and it has become the exact opposite of that.

When I'm rested and ready i will join the fray again, and I'll work even harder to have my lonely, gender dysphoric hobbit voice heard. So… look forward to seeing more new (and old) Vogon poems here this Fall.

Speaking of old!!! Here are a few automatic verses written in the months before 9/11 ---

Birds fly 

As big as planes

To a glass nest

Secured from the public eye

[Jan 2001]

Airlines desperation throes

Crash landing into barbed-mesh-

Nail-split ruins

Fractures bone & metal & even glass

Then fills a colony ship

With metaphysic travelers

[Mar 2001]

The sky spoke

Meningitis megaphone blaring down streets

Hollow vertebra terror

We never made it to NYork that day

And the floor of the world

Opened like jaws below your feet

[May 2001]

I wanted to see everyone's face break

After optic nerves or ear canal witnessed truth

Hate. Prejudice. Violence.

Blinders always in place during

The most dangerous game

I see history distort &

Wonder what happened all along

Explosion

An ocean of wisdom

Universe graveyard

We're next

[Sept 4, 2001]

As it fades from the forefront of the media, I will never forget the man-made horror of that day. From each life lost, to the ongoing international crisis that ensued…it haunts.

*******

*I didn't start HRT today due to circumstances out of my control. I take it as a sign that it's not quite the right time.

A little cartoon I drew at the time of the flag fiasco

GOTH TODD

FRIENDS!

Hi...I'm back to thrill your neural receptors with my latest video & share some exciting neutral news.

Forget Goth Claudia, (j/k love ya, Claudia)

Here's Goth Todd:

Goth Todd

The 7th Sense (In The 21st Century)

Funny Little Friends,

How are ya all? I am fine. I mean, I'm not really fine…but I know that's what you expect me to say. That's all you can handle, because YOU'RE not fine & you don't even want to deal w/ how unfine I am.

So now that we got that formality out of the way, let's talk…about The Senses. There are 7 of them:

1. Sight

2. Hearing

3. Taste

4. Smell

5. Touch

6. The Sixth Sense (clairvoyance, ya know)

7. Sense of Humor

As I age I've noticed I'm losing ground with Sight & Hearing. That's to be expected. But I also think that I'm losing my Sense of Humor!

This scares me, because along with music, art & literature, Humor has always been a cherished survival tool for me. One of the things that scared me about "adulting" was that it seemed like to be a proper adult you had to stop laughing. And I was against that.

I always wanted to see the silly, the ironic, the cartoonish side of life. And I think I still do…but it doesn't seem as funny anymore.

But I also wonder, is it ME or is it THE WORLD? Has the world gotten so ugly, are there just so many people fighting to be heard & treated fairly that irony & cartoonishness have gone by the wayside?

I write this on the post-cusp of Robin Williams' suicide anniversary (& the pre-cusp of Joan Rivers' negligent plastic surgery death). I write this as Bill Cosby stands accused of drugging & raping women throughout the 60s, 70, 80s. I write this one week after John Stewart's retirement from The Daily Show. I write this at a time when comedians are refusing to perform on college campuses because students are so easily offended, especially by social issues & the jokes that may arise around those issues.

This is disturbing to me. First of all freedom of speech is important to me, and I believe in using that great gift to keep social justice alive and well, and I believe comedy is a great vehicle for keeping social issues in the ear-canals & brain centers of the Universe.

I realize that comedians sometimes cross the line or cut to the very edge of serious issues to make their points. And that is okay--I can usually take it. I usually understand where the zings & zaps are coming from & that they are meant to make us sting, think & evolve.

It is rumored (I wouldn't know for sure)-- that the generation called 'Millennials' are so coddled & padded & blindered from the jagged edges of this world that anything reeking of satire is perceived as taunting, mocking, bullying…

…thus the reluctance of comedians to perform on campuses.

But I find I too have become over-sensitive to certain types of humor. There is much rancor between genders & races (particularly black & white) right now. So I am very sensitive to any humor that slams women (or men). And I have gotten a little bristly when I hear about how horrible white (or black) people are--even if presented in a comedic context. I kind of wish we were past such "obvious" joking-points.

But we aren't--there are still a lot of layers around gender & race to unpeel before we get to the real equality at the center of the onion.

One thing that does suck when social issues are too touchy to joke about is--we resort to the lowest forms of humor. NO I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT PUNS. I mean colon/bladder humor and of course, dick jokes.

I said it before, penis jokes are fine on occasion, fart jokes are definitely funny especially when well-timed. Penises & farts are pretty funny! Noises that come from your butt--hahahaha! Spongy, mushroomy flaps of flesh that harden up & look like Darth Vader made of liverwurst**? Hilarious.

OCCASIONALLY.

But…I really do get sick of old unattractive white guys (like John Oliver & Bill Maher & Ellen deGeneres) using their dicks as metaphor for all matters from corporate greed to invasions of privacy (& invasions of countries) to gun violence to dentists killing endangered lions in Africa… 

Ie, EVERYTHING. [Also, do you see what I did there? ^^^ I added Ellen to the list of dick-jokers because it's totally ridiculous on one level, yet makes sense on another level--Ellen does kinda look like an old white guy & she does make (non-political) dick-jokes on occasion]. I just learned that type of humor is called PARAPROSDOKIAN. And I like it.

[And I hope I have offended no lesbians born between 1987 & 2001].

So…what kind of humor DO I enjoy now???

When I'm not being slapped in the brain by bologna-dicks, or being fed boring stereotypes---"Black people be like this" "White people be like that" "Bitches be like…" "Dudes be like…" 

I always appreciate clever word-play and punnery (sorry I don't find that to be low-humor at all), 

I like good delivery better than raunchy content. Clean humor can be hilarious is if it is cleverly packaged (oh no--I said "package")

I love the twisted & the surreal--shit that's just outrageous & probably inspired by drug use : ))) Aqua Teen Hunger Force, TV Funhouse, Absolutely Fabulous, Uncle Grandpa….ADVENTURES IN REALITY!!!!!

I love animals-doing-human-things humor. My new favorite is BoJack Horseman, which features animals & humans co-existing as if they are all the same species. It is an animated satire on the very essence of Hollywood, the Bizness. It balances the crude & the intelligent with finesse. And …did I mention Animals Doing Human Stuff???

(And even though I do love Animals-as-People humor, I absolutely hate…HATE…that movie TED. Ughhh…that is a FAIL in my favorite genre. I would like to beat the stuffing out of that bear's head & then menstruate all over it.)

Oh! Speaking of menstruating --which I hardly ever do anymore-- Vagina Humor was fun for a moment (if only because it was a welcome relief from Penis Humor). But it really is difficult to make vaginas funny. They do all the hard work in this world & get little credit for it.

(Tee-hee…I said vaginas do all the "hard" work. That's ironic!!) But I do think vag's could be used in that metaphorical way that dicks are used by Oliver, Maher, et al…if any women hosted political satire shows on cable. Maybe someday…but, I'll admit I was getting pretty sick of vag humor too, before it went underground like a good little beaver.

OKAY. I'm tired & need to eat lunch. This has been a good discussion about humor & sensitivitiy & the Seven Senses. One of the things that made me laugh the longest this year was a line from Orange Is The New Black, when Pennsatucky was talking about her favorite ice cream flavor--Double Fudge Chocolate--and she said, "I don't get it. How can you take chocolate…and then fudge it…and then double it?"

ROTFLMAO.

?????????????? I don't know why. It was just too silly.

**************

I hope you noticed the artwork I've included in this post. I force myself to draw something--anything--each day, even if I don't feel like it. This is kind of an experiment to see if I could actually "be an artist for a living" with assignments & deadlines & such. As you can see, some days I can't quite get inspired : )))

Hermaphrodite Skeleton wearing eye-phones & saying Orange

** If it is a white dick. Black dicks just look like Darth Vader. (oh no…I just made a too-obvious race/gender joke…sigh…I'm so offended)

Magenta Is The New Ivory

Carefully Curated Friends,

The ocean is strong & outgoing

But it's deep & murky & mysterious too...

I look up to the ocean

As if it were the sky

And know someday I will 

Kick & splash its cloudiness away

And find hidden treasure

To make better

Lives on dry land

***BREAKING NEWS***

CNN is a FOX in the middle of the road

It says "worst case scenario"

When it means "nothing at all"

It says emergency

When it means false alarm

If I ever hear Anderson Cooper proclaim

In a journalistic tone

To be a "person of faith, but…"  --(dot, dot, dot implying

The right side of the bird is flapping

Maniacally & making circles around its

Destination)--

I'll lose my mind in front of the whole, impartial human race

***********************************

Friend Art #1  -- This friend used to astound me in high school w/ her pencil drawings. Here is one she copied on gel photo paper. It kinda gives the pencil a purplish hue. I really dig that!

It was finally time to become an 

Adult

(or just "adult" as a verb, as the hipsters say)

So I unpacked my heart &

Put all my unlived dreams away & the funny thing is--

They all fit in one suitcase

I've seen adults with dreams pushing

On their closet doors, screaming

From behind all the high school whatnot &

College what for

It may seem to some observers 

I got a heavy 45-year long-playing

Childhood rotation

But I assure you in childhood

I was a rotten old soul 

Dropping from a skeletal family tree

A filthy overachieving teen

Once I hit the dirt and got some traction

With my seeds

But barely survived my 20s

As every sunrise tried to take away from me

What fantasies irrigated my soul

Then around 33, I got to choose 

How many regressions per minute

I wanted to spin counterclockward

The big universal tiger roar

Told me to have a happy middle-age

And I did

I did

I did

I hid…and knew laughter & the creative spark &

Ice cream for breakfast & building forts w/ bourbon bottles &

The goosebumps of my own family's ghost stories

Friend Art #2 -- Here is one by a friend whose whacky imagination and sense of humor w/ shape & line I have admired for a long time

I'm not narcissistic

Because I'm in love w/ myself

I'm narcissistic 

Because I am alive & a science project &

A playground.

I've looked at you &

You are narcissists too

That is not a crime.

We can be narcissists, altruists. activists &

Contributors to the great 

Science experiment on the 

Playground…

Good day.

Friend Art #3 -- Here is a sketch done by my fabulous Moonface while we were doing our radio show. He is a very talented artist, designer & architect. 

[I hope you enjoy my friends' artwork as much as you've always adored mine. I like to see what our minds can do--we can all draw from the inside out…good, bad, impressions, expressions, realism, phantasm…don't judge…just 'NnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnjOy!!!!

I'll have plenty more art for ya this summer. And I will do something new in the goth garage---singing alone. Guitaring solo. Because really…I am not so great at doing them both in the same moment.

I'm happy. I'm scared. I'm panicking. I'm a person, still.]

Slow Leak Of Consciousness

FRIENDS:

How are you? I am good…busy…but not using busy as an excuse not to check in with you & let you know

I'm still alive

And narcissistic.

Life is zooming by like a tortoise on a bullet train. The days drag, the years accelerate

And accumulate and leave me feeling irrelevant,

Though somehow, by some magical technicality, also feeling like the most

Relevant person alive at 8:13 a.m. on July 22, 2015

How does this work???? Seriously…it must happen in the temporal lobe.

New version of the 8 alter egos

******

BREAKING OCTOPUS DIARY NEWS

Armadillos carry leprosy, I repeat, ARMADILLOS

Carry LEPROSY [??????]

That news does indeed break me.

Into little centipede chunks. Segments, I guess you'd call them.

"They" say, 'Never trust a person who doesn't like a dog.'

"I" say, 'Never trust a person whom your cat does not like.'

"I" am "they" and we are both right.

Now go out & get yourself a parrot. Or a drone. They don't need anyone's trust or approval.

Experimental nursery school art

************

BREAKING CENTIPEDE NEWS SEGMENT

How much hate can live in Donald Trump's head nest?

Since he stores all his eggs in towers across the country, 

I'm guessing LOTS OF HATE.

Last summer was a scary fire to walk through…Last year planes were falling from the sky…

This is the year of the shark-bite, the Republican-clusterfuck, the If-I-die-in-police-custody

Hashtag-hashbrown-skintag-price-to-pay-for-being-black-and-having-American-hyphenate-blood-and

Freedom-type-boundaries & limitations-far-from-the-sky-on-roads-less-traveled-now-that-they-are

So-treacherous

This is the year your car could be hacked instead of hijacked

This is beyond the future--it is a dystopian backlash caused by too many people existing @ once

Dot commune. Dot botched fantasy. Dot shoot!

[No filter]

Vivian Boy w/ Balanced Chakras. My phone works better than our scanner, dammit

*************

This summer I am in waiting mode. This is okay---waiting is better than breaking down.

Last summer was terrifying…but I forgot to mention how scary winter was too --- the 14/15 border

Patrolled by earthquake forces.

But now I wait.

I am the patient.

I is good at patiency. Most of times.

As long as times don't end & the clock keeps horsing around like a heartbeat…

I will race toward the borders of my new voice…I will look for new floors

To dance on…Search for a new garage to be goth in…Find new rooms to fill with

Presence…and never cut the ribbon of the past so drastically wrestled to the mat,

But not denied or forgotten…

The tears of salt water/jet fuel cleared a path for take-off!

Oh, and I have some art for you…..

The 8 again--our scanner scans cool & cooler tones only

[taking inspiration from a friend, I'm doing a drawing-a-day for July/Aug. The sad thing is--I don't feel very arty right now. I am so immersed in writing that the art part of my brain is numbed significantly. I guess it's best to keep it on life support by forcing creativity daily….the results aren't always pretty, but it's the effort that counts right now : )) 

And I've decided in my next blog I will share some art by my friends…'mmmmmkay]

See you soon, friends, in the Octopus's Garden Variety Centipeep Talent Show!

WHY I DON'T WANT A WOMAN PRESIDENT

BECAUSE WE'RE NOT READY FOR ONE.

Friendly-Americans,

Remember how ready most of us were for a half-black President? We were really stoked about it & not only because he promised hope & change, he WAS hope & change! He was young & eloquent & historical & confident & the fact that he was half-white didn't seem to make him any less black to us. In 2008, we were ready for him!!!!

I'm not sure why, or how, or exactly when it happened but we have entered an era of severe backlash. The racial divide is a deadly chasm filled with bodies and spent shell casings. I can't help but think this backlash is somehow tied to having a blackish President who stands as the figurehead of all American power.

There are more people than I realized in America who are not comfortable with this. I've seen it more with each passing year of Obama's office. I'm pretty depressed about how our Congress and our citizens have responded to having a blackish President, but I can't say I didn't see it on the horizon even in '08.

So racial tension is taut as a slingshot aimed at a beehive.

And there is also, in the last year, an increased rancor between genders. Even as gay and transgender rights have their day in the courts & minds of America, the perceptions & definitions of male & female have been reduced to their crass anatomical parts. 

Even as rainbow flags fly and transwomen grace magazine covers, I've seen so many old gender stereotypes reborn & promoted & celebrated in all realms of media. [And of course this means pro-male/anti-female.]

That's right. The Man is back. White is in. Girl Power is out. People-of-color are fucked (at least for now) Dicks are symbols of supremacy; vag's are once again objects of scorn.

I knew we would be back here one day, but I didn't expect it to be so ugly. There are more people in the world than ever before. And we are connected by the festering filaments of social media like a big syphilitic worm. (yum) So things happen faster…trends, ideas, jokes, memes bubble to the surface and lead the collective conversation, and the collective conversation becomes The Word and then it metastasizes quickly into the Next Big Thing. And on & on….

In my riotous drunk youth, I feel I did my part to create a progressive path for humanity in general ( and females in particular, because as a biological female, I was told lots of horrible things about myself and asked to behave in really self-debasing ways that were called "normal" in our society). 

I fought as a child against valuing prettiness over intelligence. I fought as a teenager against hundreds & thousands of "girls don't do this" or "girls aren't good artists" or "girls can't rock" or "you will probably fail this Chemistry class." It blew my mind that seemingly well-meaning people (teachers, parents, boyfriends) would discourage me from even trying to reach my full potential. So I fought.

In my 20s, when I realized that all the misogyny in the world was based in anatomical fear, I fought against that too. Against being an inorganic, disingenuous object who didn't burp, fart, speak, or masturbate. In the '90s, before vaginas were mentionable and every party I vaguely attended devolved into a chorus of dick jokes & pissing contests, I was the girl who would respond with anecdotes about my lady parts and I had no qualms about pissing anywhere (with or without foliage nearby).

[Oh, those were fun days & drunken nights…Guys who were accustomed to silencing ladies with their dick jokes looking at each other & asking 'Did she just say 'vagina'??? Sometimes it made them angry and more dickish, but a lot of times it made them shut up and move along. 

And honestly, I don't mind a good dick joke if it's just that. But most dick jokes aren't about penises--they are about keeping women subordinate. Period.]

Period. I mentioned that a lot too. There was too much silencing & shame & taboo around it. A lot of people were not happy about me bringing menstruation out of the closet. Too bad. It needed to be a much less shameful subject. And there came a point when it wasn't such a big deal. [Now it is again. And we need to Get. The Fuck. Over it. Period.]

Anyway…around the time I was fighting my good fight against anatomical misogyny there emerged a slew of female comics who were doing the same. They were much more adept than I at bringing female anatomy out of the repressive cave and letting the world know that being a vagina-ed human was not erroneous, shameful or restrictive. It was just an alternative to being male. And that was just fucking great. [Y2K would've been a great time for a female President!]

Somewhere between Riot Grrl & the Vagina Monologues I felt that we had all come to terms with there being separate but equal genders which could complement each other or exist independently. End of issue. 

Or was it?  I am beyond thrilled that gender has moved away from the binary in our collective conversation, but I noticed that the feminist movement that made it all possible has disappeared.

While there is a spectrum of genders visible all around us, FEMALE has devolved again to mean something inorganic, objectifiable and looks-based. Girl Power has been replaced by Overbearing Materialistic Diva.

That is not something I would ever want to align myself with. But it is the new Femme.

Just as I am disgusted by the racial divide magnified by having a blackish man in power, I am jaggedly, adamantly against women who take their hard-won power to mean entitlement to be a Diva. That is not what I was fighting for. 

The Riot Grrl in me is old & tired. I am ready to embark on the latter part of my life and it will be quite a journey. I really want it to be a lot more about BEING than FIGHTING. But I want to know that someone somewhere has picked up where I left off, because we aren't done yet.

I think more people are perceiving themselves as genderqueer or trans or agender because the binary scales are still swaying. Women gained much foothold in the world between 1990 -- 2010, but many proved they would abuse their power in insidious ways. Different ways than men abuse power, but still dangerous & contemptible ways. We need that balance to quit its vertiginous lurch.

So, that is why I don't want a woman President right now. It would be a disaster. Even if---especially if---there were any good, sincere, capable female candidates to choose from, I think they'd all be quite ineffectual at this moment in time. 

We are not ready. PERIOD.

So…what I really want to say is 'Go Trump!' You are just the Donkeynine Sub-chimpanzeerific candidate America is hard for right now!

**********

I've started on a 60-day art project, but it's unraveling slowly. When something shareworthy arises, well…I'll share it!

In the meantime, enjoy all this vintage art I scrounged up for you ^^^^

GOTH GARAGE: EEYORE INTERVIEW

Here is a video from the Goth Garage. Please pardon the sound quality (it sounded great live, but recording sucks!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX512KJeBy8&feature=em-upload_owner