Livin w/ Joyce

Today's Raising

Mr. Brecht

does not know anything about us

& just nearly a kilometer after

but before the eight mile

& just after the seventh

there’s a road junction

& there are holes in the asphalt

it is not easy at all

thru these days of US

men dragging themselves on woodward

carts skin cloths on the street

gloves pierced hats, somethin'

barb wire for hundreds meters

bent wooden planks

pocked benches of cement

statues of saints from distant europe

they mourn with invoking arms

today’s raising

in black people's words

who did not have a steady job

for over forty years

a newspaper reports new operations

in the financial market

ceo men earn a large amount of money

from the new company.

The Beatles

Stevie Ray Vaughan

Fun & Rage

Right upon the trees

right upon the trees

with a caustic lady who tells

you’re not within

try a new life and see

drugs will not help

the heavy beast

searching out there

with a scrapbook all written

so who cares

you wrote tons

in your first life

you were a town lost

going out west

see the highway men

lean over the iron bend

another plastic family

eating all the slop

outside the refinery

*****


Fun & Rage

back in ol' days of '49

of 1949

I got lost in a swamp

in a swamp

all doctors told me

boy you’re weird 'n' insane

coz of I shot him

a bullet in the face

coz I shot him

for fun & rage

back in ol days of 49

of 1949

got a job near the coal mine

the soft coal mine

they got stuck and they died

little flaming pieces in da coal mine

owner so proud to live

in the golden house

with his cozy family

hard to believe

back in ol' day of 66

of 1966

we vote for democracy

red utopia of socialism

the president passed away

a bullet in the back

that was rage

of a terror attack

he was buried down the hill

with cannon balls rollin’

buried down the hill

funny place to live

*****

Lost her

this is a story hard to tell

even to a sad priest

this is that kind of story

that has not an happy leave

it narrates how a lonely man

found his unexpected end

but the sun is shining

and it won’t remind me

how I lost her

this a really vain story

difficult to tell

this is an ancestral story

and no closing end

if you glad I could tell ya

for thousands maids

but the sun is shining

and it won’t remind me

how I lost her

I have to begin this story

or it will be too late

I don’t want this story anymore

down in my grave

a little far away just from here

there’s a blanket ban red sign

but the sun is shining

and it won’t remind me

how I lost her

*****


Steeltown

In Steeltown

there’s a road called

2 minutes hiring

in the past there were a lot of workers

fighting in downtown riots

when the town gets the dawn

the crowd get so excited

the unions were corrupted

the police beat ‘em to exhaust ‘em

out of the factories there are human needs

many people talk together about a new equal society

get more rights and balance the greed of plutocracy

but when they declare the town went bankrupt

people in the streets lost a lot

it was very hard to go forward without a loan

so I went every day to a pawn shop

to got the money for the raise of my honor

but when they declare the town went bankrupt

people in the streets lost a lot

now I see all this sad stories on tv

they interviewed a lathe turner who lost the job in the last spring

he got a triple mortgage and three kids

but when they declare the town went bankrupt

people in the streets lost a lot

*****

Blackened skull ring

taking off

now

plans to do

somehow

get to find that girl

barstool blues above

get a book

and see

reed a lot

a way to be

with your feet

right on the street

talk about politics

her brain is so sweet

married a woman

maybe

got a kid

no-way

see the homeless men

counting nickels

buy them coffee

respect 'em always

love that woman

with fancy hair

write a poem

on the dark age

try to understand

all this messy dirt

buy her flowers no gray

find an ashtray

all the employees

laughing at me

pay that blackened skull ring

*****

Thru SouthWest

the place closed very late

people crawled outside and waste

rusty mornings aside

you could say it won’t be nice

hauled down talks down the line

crazy women don’t share their wine

the churches are closed every time

the major had a new ticket for his wife

hey people I’ve got

two three words to share

the first one begun in a burning hell

the widow was cut & nuthin’ else

would you try ‘nother man

sitting up straight with the preacher man

sucking him with whole bare hands

and you know that it will not end soon

the child of a single mother, a child on the moon

ripped it out talking loud

eating what you have found

looking for sex looking for balloons

never trust a man who is drunk at noon

the main things I don’t care

money god sweet sis & dad

I grab the car in the alley

going thru southwest, thru southwest

*****

Ride on

They came to us

to have the lands

to steal our land

they were about

just a few men

but they were

so damned bad

they’ve been already

in the other town

they robbed a bank

they left deads

some bleeding heads

and a woman called

Rusty Heleine

me my mum & dad

we wore fine hats

we had the farm

but this was not

a good reason

to still believe

in it

I was so scared

when I saw ‘em

we were in the fall

of the lowlands

months passed

me my mum & dad

we worked for that people

we share food wine

believe or not

and some barrel

of gun powder

grandpa is not so proud

of this situation down

but it keep us alive

I’m not worried

in seem to be

a really good guy

of this ol’ town

I was so scared

when I saw ‘em

we were in the fall

of the lowlands

years go by

I have changed

a little my mind

I’ve got a pump

right off the road

but I keep on telling’ me

ride on

*****

The Distance

Out in the distance

animals ride

out in the distance

no flag to fight for

you can hold a gun

toward the sky

you can hold a shotgun

and do no harm

a warm applause

when you turn off

a warm applause

for your song

out in the distance

coyotes round the fire

out in the distance

borders are free

red hills & ground 

make you feel about

changing weather

and all it was ever

a warm applause

when you turn off

a warm applause

for your song

out in the distance

no nations across

out in the distance

you can’t find a white cross

walking with no doubt

the rise and fall of a dawn

chasing evil thoughts

going on and on and on

out in the fields

the distance is not

out in the fields

the distance is not

what I was thinking of

what I was thinking of

The NolaEastman Trailer

http://straight-faced-blues.blogspot.it/2014/05/the-nolaeastman-trailer.html

The NolaEastman Series

http://www.area35artfactory.com/pen/mostre_mostra.php?id=291&l=en

The NolaEastman Series

Almost every year I go to the U.S. & every time I land overseas I have a promise or if you prefer, a debt: I have to spend some time in New Orleans.

There is a word that gives a sense of all that New Orleans is: N.O.L.A.

This abbreviation, which is typical of a certain American practicality, is nothing more than the union of two acronyms: N.O. (New Orleans) & L.A. (Louisiana).

To a stranger these four pointed letters, maybe if he’s just a simple tourist who travels to New Orleans to paint the town red in the most famous Bourbon Street, they don’t mean much, for sure.

In the word N.O.L.A. there are the sense and the spirit of the town, the real town with its citizens who live & stay in the boundary lines of the small & hot-humid city of Louisiana.

In this series there are shots taken a year ago with a Nikon Fe 1978 camera body with a 20 mm fixed lens. The film is the Eastman Double-X 35 mm medium speed, 250 asa.

It differs from traditional films for general applications, such as 400 asa films of other well-known producers, that despite the fact that they have a large reliability but the result remains a substantial uniformity of the subject.

The film in this series, furthermore if used in a mode privileging the timing, provides, both in development phase of the negative & even more in the darkroom & then in the printing process, a significant differentiation of tonality of contrasts. These features are made possible by the fact that the Eastman Double-X has been conceived & used for the the cinema in order to obtain & maintain a wide depth of field, stability of the structural components of the image, making they stand out in the presence of contrasts.

Leaving aside the technical details, this series has been realized to narrate New Orleans: for this purpose, I chose the expressive vehicles of writing & photography.

You can find the life in the streets, in the endless bars in the french quarter & around the french quarter: they are places for meeting, sharing & conversation, where even a stranger can get in touch with the various souls of different communities & become what they define with an American-English term: a “local".

New Orleans is one of those towns, that with its history, its people - its strong influence of European extraction of people from France, Spain, England, Italy, Germany, Ireland, Scotland, Portugal etc. - with its traditions, its cults, with its ubiquitous overflowing music, with its contrasting colors, with the plagues over the centuries - from the battle of 1862 during the Civil War to the passage of greedy murderous mother known with the name of Katrina - with its story of ups & downs, becomes a place of the mind.

It’s a town of passage and of recovery too, also for people from Europe who want to start a new track or want to embrace the American way of life, bearing in mind that Nola is not any place on the territory of the United States: it’s more an exception, it’s an island that floats, something which stands with its own rules; it’s not comparable to the great metropolises of the East Coast, to those of the Midwest, to those of the West Coast and even less to small rural or industrial towns.

In fact it is a stratified conglomeration of those geographic parts of the United States that I just mentioned in the previous lines & of the migratory waves coming mostly from Europe.

New Orleans, Proud to call it home.

                                                                                              Nick

The NolaEastman Series

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The NolaEastman Series

http://straight-faced-blues.blogspot.it/2014/04/the-nolaeastman-series.html

Definition of Rock

Rock, in addition to being a definition of a certain lifestyle, it’s a term with a precise pronunciation : rɒk.

Rock is a heavy load that crosses your room on Saturday Afternoon.

Rock is Lou Reed with yellow hair, black sunglasses, dressed entirely in black, junkie-ways, who sings a song from Berlin in a concert somewhere in Denmark in a 1974 tour .

Rock is Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison (California, USA) who starts with: "Hello , I'm Johnny Cash".

Rock is a pretty damnation, a viral unleashing of the senses, do not give in, strong self-destruction, rebellion, abandon, fall ill, protest, dance, walk, jump, standing in the middle of a street and do not know what to do.

Rock is a dense and junkie travel within yourself and then you realize that you are the only person alive on earth at 4:32 in the morning and that the world out is ready for another day of total boredom: better burn out than slowly fade away Neil Young said - keep on rockin’ in the free world .

Rock is to take yourself and go far from home and say hello to Mom & Dad while pushing the car as much as possible on a bumpy road on the other side of the world and stop in a motel in the middle of a foreign country and put a chair and a table behind the door before going to sleep because the murderer of the room next to you is not making you a greeting in the middle of the night .

Rock are the gently deadheads and their beautiful secular religion made ​​of freedom, tolerance, open-mindedness, respect, civility, affection, love and so much.

Rock are the punks, stoned and bones and little flesh, towering on the end of the Seventies.

Rock are the arrows of Grace Slick in her dream-state and glacial vowels while she’s watching Janis Joplin with the three hundredth bottle of Jim Beam.

Rock is Jimi Hendrix who will never meet Miles Davis for a super jam session.

Rock is to take your Les Paul with big old strings and make it play in your acoustic Marshall.

Rock is every single day that you buy a record and when you put it on you're high and you read The Brothers Karamazov in a few hours and you think that it’s stuff nearly one hundred and fifty years ago. Terrible deal, Fedor .

Rock are thousands of black and white photographs made ​​on the road in the most unthinkable moments, not to respect the traffic light, to waste the fuel as quickly as possible, to have a caboose crammed till exhaustion with beers and whiskey crates ready to use.

Rock is ramble on for thousands of clubs to listen to your own blues and stand on the sidewalk outside the door, until they reopen, only for another round, one more round, please.

Rock is Woodstock with the rain and the mud and lot of peace and love, brothers and sisters.

Rock are the Beatles so opposed to the Stones and you know: the ones made ​​the music, the others are the greatest rock band in the world .

Rock are dozens of magazines with glossy covers discussing guitar heroes or of the best hundred albums of all time. Sgt Pepper's always wins (maybe The White Album).

Rock is a beard growing for three months at least and think of Creedence or Canned Heat.

Rock is The Last Waltz to not forget The Band Rock of Ages.

Rock is your stereo on for seven days a week, is an incredible amount of pills, doses, mixed stuff and so on.

Rock is the cover of Horses and a photo of Patti Smith with Robert Mapplethorpe.

Rock is wanting strongly a woman and then have another one in your bed.

Rock is a girl just came of age - or thereabouts, that you would like she visits you in your sacerdotal rooms .

Rock is Duane Allman fishing in singlet, Eric Clapton seated  in front of various bottles or Jimmy Page with dragons on the jacket and the Gibson at Madison Square Garden, 1973, year ab incarnatione domini nostri Jesu Christi.

Rock are The Who with Roger Daltrey throwing the microphone in the air while Pete Townshend rolls right arm on SG - Teenage waste land of rock desert.

Rock are the tattoos of Johnny Winter and his fifty records preciously kept in a quiet place in your home, the cut finger of Jerry Garcia, Bob Dylan who sizzles the harmonic in D, the patient voice of Leonard Cohen, the crackling thuds of Tom Waits, the schizoid-hieratic deeds of St. Nick Cave, the dark side of the moon Pink Floyd, Elton John singing Bennie and the Jets, the Doctor John get stuck in a cajun swamp, the intros of the Doors, the riffs of Deep Purple, David Bowie with his rock 'n' roll suicide, the fake darkness of Black Sabbath, whitewashed nostrils of Stevie Nicks, Jeff Beck’s vests, the monstrous roll of John Bonzo Bonham and the dreadful earthquake of Keith Moon, the “give peace a chance” of John Lennon.

Rock is a coherent, weird, overflowing vision that makes you get up in the morning and put on Stevie Ray Vaughn with Texas Flood or a Roy Buchanan’s forgotten album.

Rock is your woman that is gone with another woman and you hope she won’t be back.

Rock are shelves full of records to take and burn as a sacrifice to the mighty god of music.

Rock is the one thing that can change your life, that may be the way of salvation or escape.

Rock is physically a physical state, is human distraction, is violence in its purest form .

Rock is all the rest.

Clifton's

Of course I do not know
if it was the proper summer
or the summer that was coming

but only my father
that was back to write
after months, years

a long period
in which no one
couldn't see him

through those books
he read in the shelter
to which he had set on fire

after the absence from the scenes
what he wanted to tell us
what they wanted to say to him

after my mother
he asked
divorce & food

& decided to never come back
she had left him with a letter
abandoned on the cupboard

the last time I saw them
at a table, together
was at Clifton's.

You know, days divide nights

with apprehension the father
looked at her daughter's face
beyond the backlit glass

I am lonely on this road
& it is not a joyful sunday
it is not the peace of the lord

he says to her through the glass
& she will ignore him because of this inertia
& forget him & make of him an icon

he was bent on the ashtray
& he unloaded the wet & curled ash
of the cigarette & that tasted of tequila

nothing new
squeezing lemons in his mouth
pouring whiskey, before it was [...]

sao paulo do brazil
east chicago
downtown detroit

he was talking to himself & he was repeating
that they recommended, with frequency on television
& of this he was absolutely sure

that after several hours
the important was only:
keep your hands on the wheel

at 5.00 a.m. behind a glass
that once went up in flames
while she was counting

she was telling herself, while calculating,
that she just needed
another stroll around

a sign, huge for those times
the square of tar was bleached
by the low light of the neon

& not of that the stuff on the radio
jazz, that reminded her
so obstinately her mother

& their part-time factotum
who washed the cars of those who passed
or of those got one (the soft parade)

the following year
his brother
published four books

but he failed
to become a writer
under indefinite time contract

he became a bloody nose
on the acropolis of a shopping center
with disinfectant into nostrils

she saw his brother
only as a debt
cost without end

he was a number
that she could not put in a column
exact words

a decapitated budget item
without beginning or an end
an unrelated sign to the accounting

but he remained
one of the attractions of the place
he was the man who was washing cars

he was the man who knew
about engines, transmission, steering, tires
he was their part-time worker

it came naturally
tell the patrons
it's very nice to know you're here

we are at your complete service
although this would involve allusions
in the state of intuition of the people who are here

it would have led to inevitable consequences, they
in their beds where they were hardly fucking
in the showers where they rinsed, touching, all the way down

she took care
also
of personnel management

people who came
from disparate parts of the world
crossing the border illegally

& this excited her
almost as much as
his brother

when his brother
got chicks
she went into adjoining rooms

she heard & while drinking
she made to herself not bad services
lasting some hours

she felt that wilderness
his father was a fuck
a fucking dying paralytic

but he was still a good man
& she was always close to him
after the mother had gone

he did not,
his brother followed her mother
up in the city, in various cities

until she died of cancer
age 45
& he began to roam

then when
for various reasons
he seriously risked life & limb

he showed up
in front of her sister
50 pounds lighter

she bent down & put his head
pressing between the stomach & pubis of him
& she began to smell & she told him

we will do anything you want
you only have to wash cars
occasionally .