Body political
This body-of-mine is political.
This body has been falling apart since 2005.
This body-of-mine remains immensely strong.
This body-of-mine remains & a beautiful 'chose'.
It is necessary to understand that the first experience of the body, for the poor, is political. By the neglect attached to it. By the force used against it.
For the poor, the body comes first, consciousness after, & it is the body which orders that consciousness.
Often, very often this means that the instinctual knowledge possessed by the poor is not only acute but has profound depth, the exact contrary qualities of the elites whose memory is either selective or nonexistent - in the elites that over time develops into malignancy.
What is learnt, very quickly by those who are oppressed, who are in struggle, that the body is a site of resistance, sometimes the final, I am very proud to have as friends, blanketmen/hunger strikers, Dixie Elliott, Sam Millar, Anthony McIntyre & Tommy McKearney who by being exemplary revealed an essential element of struggle.
It is said that the monster Thatcher, hated the word alienation because it was 'marxist' what the hunger strikers taught us was not metaphysical but material, we are indissolubly associated to each other & ourselves, that the victory of capital is disassociation until it becomes delirium, but that the victory over capital is the connectedness of all things, this knowledge is precious & terrible knowledge but it can only come at the cost of great risk, of the most intense struggle.
I am always in the debt of the blanketmen hungerstrikers, not as icons, but as human beings who revealed the actual constituents of our being, that a fool like Heidegger could only pretend to understand. Dixie understands in his skin.
In chronic sickness, that knowledge is not abstract but fundamental & in a very fundamental way i allow my chronic illnesses to understand i am both more cunning & more noble than they are.
I write repeatedly that my poetry all my life has been a polyphony because it is a result of my profound listening to others, always, so.
In a sense it is their poems. I instinct them, I write them, I direct them but if the voices of the other was not there, they would be empty. They are not. They are seething with the brothers & sisters of struggle.
In chronic sickness, you are living the fact that your body is the last site of resistance, you do not want to be too fascinated by it but you want to pay the most acute attention to it. You cannot be promiscuous about the layers of problems, you need to be precise, you need to have a sense of proportion & a way of discerning why is.
The most immediate problems to deal with, to struggle with & finally as a poet, you must allow the body permission to speak. asked in interviews if there is something automatic in the writing, nothing could be further from my practice, nothing is automatic, everything is thought & though & felt & felt & though & felt over & over again in a precise almost premeditated way.
In a life a death struggle, especially where you have communities & individuals depending on you, you need to be very very precise, very very premeditated, so you can prepare both your body & the community from attacks against them.
In prison, you become very hypersensible because your life depends on it, you act precisely, you listen precisely you become both cunning & noble.
Mostly you develop the most powerful connection between intimacy & distance, sometimes simultaneously, what I have learnt in that discipline has been shared in every atelier.
It is not metaphysical, it is material, it is consciousness class consciousness, if you will.
The elites do not know who they are from one moment to the other,
Class consciousness requires you to know who you are in each breath.
There is no mystification either with my work or with my relation to others but there is an intense mystery borne of consciousness & the polyphonies of that consciousness.
For Billy Che, who remembers everything
A LETTER FROM PUERTO RICO
It is not unusual for me to receive a snail-mail letter from my friend Dr. Vincent Jubilee, resident in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He is still resisting the Digital Revolution. Vincent is a family friend from Philadelphia. After decades, we had a reunion in Puerto Rico, where he was a professor of English at the University of Puerto Rico.
There was something unusual about this letter, however. It took years to convince him that my visual impairment precluded me from reading his furious, cursive writing. But, this particular missive was devoid even of his conciliatory, tight typing. Instead, there was a letter, written in Spanish, from the “Instituto de Cultura de Puerto Rico.”
Several years ago, I wrote a memoir, “Manzanero, Mexico, My Dear Old San Juan, Moi,” which is available at Amazon.com. It deals mainly with the experiences I had with major international artists – in Puerto Rico and Mexico – who were connected to the international music world. In the case of the mysterious snail-mail, apparently on a whim, Vince had submitted my memoir to the Puerto Rican Cultural Institute. The letter was a copy of their response to him, thanking him for the submission and assuring him that the book would be put to good use.
On second thought, not so much a whim, Vince’s action probably was induced by the fact that, after retiring from the university, he became a journalist with the island’s then-leading, daily, English-language newspaper, The San Juan Star, as well as the Caribbean Business Newspaper. Previously, I had written for the San Juan Diary, a weekly magazine that covered the island’s main entertainment venues. Also, I was editor of Leonardo’s People Magazine, a house-organ for the island’s leading disco.
The letter from the Culture Institute is printed below, in the original language. My English translation thereof follows.
***** ***** *****
Instituto de Cultura
Puerto Rico
31 de marzo de 2016
Estimado Dr. Jubilee,
Saludos:
Acuso recibo del libro titulado, “Manzanero, Mexico, My Dear Old San Juan, Moi,” de la autoría del Sr. Curtis W. Long, donado por usted.
Después de darle una rápida mirada, pude ver que se trata de una serie de felices encuentros y descubrimientos a través de las vivencias musicales del Sr. Long.
El libro será fichado y colocado en la briblioteca de la sala de studio y referencia, de modo que esté disponible al público visitante y a los investigadores.
Le expreso las gracias de parte del Archivo General de Puerto Rico, por su donación.
Atentamente,
Leida Ordaz Santiago
Especialista Asuntos Culturales
Archivo General de Puerto Rico
Translation:
Culture Institute
Puerto Rico
March 31, 2016
Dear Dr. Jubilee:
I hereby acknowledge receipt of the book entitled, “Manzanero, Mexico, My Dear Old San Juan, Moi,” written by Mr. Curtis W. Long, which was donated by you.
After giving it a quick review, I was able to determine that it concerns a series of pleasant encounters and discoveries by way of Mr. Long’s musical life experiences.
The book will be indexed and located in the study and reference room library, where it will be available to the visiting public and researchers.
On behalf of the General Archives of Puerto Rico, I would like to thank you for your donation.
Yours truly,
Leida Ordaz Santiago
Sspecialist in Cultural Affairs
General Archives of Puerto Rico
Feed Me Dammit
SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES: Feed Me Dammit
When my son is hungry, he will eat the fastest most convenient thing he can find. He will not wait for a piece of toast if he can eat the bread now. Butter? Jelly? Who needs it. He would just as soon eat at Whataburger as Brennan’s. Ordinary American food has always had its place in the movies. Harold and Kumar do eventually find the White Castle, Jake and Elwood order their fried chickens and dry white toast and many of us recall the beans in Blazing Saddles.
But every once in a while, Hollywood pops out a movie about food and the people who make it. Good food, very good food, the kind of food most of us are lucky to enjoy a couple times a year. Food presented as experience, not sustenance.
In these movies, food is one of the central characters, the places where it is prepared the principle setting and at least one of the main characters is in love with food.
The food here is special. It is sometimes exotic. It is beautiful. It is cared for. It is selected with care, handled with care and finally consumed, bite by delectable bite, with care.
The preparation does not just make the food ready to eat. The chef is in love with the food as an artist loves his canvass or a sculptor his stone. It is this artistry, this love that sets the truly good cook apart from the rest of us.
Adam Jones (Bradley Cooper) is a great chef and a crappy person. After serving a self imposed penance for his last screw up, he embarks on a quest for his third Michelin star. The food may just be the star of this movie. It is beautiful.
Adam Jones: I don't want my restaurant to be a place where people sit and eat. I want people to sit at that table and be sick with longing.
Renowned chef Carl Casper (Jon Favreau) is fired after an argument with a food critic goes viral on You Tube. At one point he makes his son a grilled cheese sandwich. This is not just any grilled cheese. It is a labor of love; love for the food, love for his art and love for his son. I would watch this again just for this scene.
Carl Casper: I may not do everything great in my life, but I'm good at this. I manage to touch people's lives with what I do and I want to share this with you.
JAmy Adams and Merle Streep come together in this biopic which should be enough to make you want to watch this movie. Food, particularly butter, is the common thread that ties these women together. Forty years ago Julia child taught me to cook pasta on television. I still do it her way.
Julie Powell: [voiceover, blogging] Last night, our sleep machine, the one we have by our bed to drown out the noise of freight trucks rumbling past our apartment, was speaking to me. And it was saying, lobster killer. Lobster killer, lobster killer, lobster killer.
Today’s SpecialDaily Show alumni, Aasif Mandvi, stars as Samir, a sous chef out of a job. He is about to head to Paris to up his game when his father, proprietor of the family’s Indian restaurant is sidelined by a heart attack. Samir must trade in his French cooking skills and learn ethnic Indian cooking. This is a fun, feel good film.
Akbar: Eating with utensils is like making love with an interpreter.
So what is your favorite food movie. I’m hungry.
QUINTET at CROCE’S – ECLECTIC DEBUTING ERIC -- ELECTRIC!
Eric Wesling, a confident, 15-year-old guitarist – as a fifth of the Julian Esparza Quintet -- graced the stage of San Diego’s perennial jazz venue, Croce’s. It was a recent Wednesday night, which Croce’s reserves for its Young Lions program, an opportunity for worthy, musical yutes to show off their stuff. Thus it was with Eric. For a young man still facing two more years of high school, Eric’s performance on the jazz stage defies his youth and experience.
Despite Croce’s Wednesday night designation -- and as an indication of the universality of jazz – Eric was part of a group motley in age and nationality. While Eric Wesling held forth in his Paul McCartney-like, lefty stance on lead guitar, the other stars in his orbit were:
- Leader Julian Esparza -- Bass
- Jarien Jamanila -- Alto Sax
- Pete Bogle -- Drums
- Alan Zundelevich -- Piano
Gilbert Castellanos was a sit-in on the trumpet. Additionally, Castellanos is the shepherd of Croce’s well-conceived, Young Lions series.
Alan Zundelevich, the agile-fingered pianist, was the only group-member this writer was able to interview. Despite his tongue-twisting, Slavic patronymic, Alan hails from Mexico. It was revealed that he and this writer are acquainted with another brilliant, Mexican pianist, Irving Flores, also pursuing his jazz interests in San Diego. Alan was amazed to learn that – although separated by several decades --- both Flores and this writer had been colleagues with Mexico’s world-renowned composer/performer, the formidible Armando Manzanero.
Although this was Eric Wesling’s big-time debut, it was not his first time on a San Diego stage. He and other cohorts of his age have taken every opportunity to hone their skills by jamming with the big boys in other of San Diego’s jazz and blues clubs. That Wednesday night at Croce’s was another step upward on that long and competitive trail, leading to wherever one’s talent, dreams and determination might take him. Eric’s performance is indicative of the fact that he is aware of those challenges, and that he devotes his time to meeting them.
Witnessing a young man’s announced emergence within a prestigious cathedral of jazz was a mélange of Eric Wesling’s proud family, friends and educators – as well as admirers of the other members of that magnificent jazz ensemble. This writer mentioned to Eric’s accomplished grandfather that, in channeling that embryonic age of jazz -- of both our memories -- his energetic grandson seemed to traverse the path enshrined in that very Lincolnian phrase, “…the mystic chords of memory.”
The enterprising widow of the incomparable Jim Croce, early-on, adeptly established her husband’s name as a staple of San Diego’s fledgling Gaslamp District. Currently, Croce’s is located in Bankers Hill, between downtown and Hillcrest. The quality of its musical and cuisine offerings remains gold standard. That says a lot for Croce’s, the Young Lions, the Julian Esparza Quintet and now-initiated Eric Wesling.
To review a videotape of the above-described performance, merely click on the indicated link.
I'm In Love With Salsa Dancing
My love with Salsa dancing started during summer of my Junior year in high school, the summer of 1999, the summer of the Latin Explosion! Across the Top 40 airwaves you could tune in any day and time to enjoy in heavy rotation 'Living La Vida Loca' by Ricky Martin, 'I Need To Know' by Marc Anthony, the hypnotic guitar riffs of the legendary Carlos Santana in 'Smooth'. These songs were a breath of fresh air on the radio, and I couldn't get enough of them! They all seem to call to me like how the Sirens called to the Argonauts. I found a new genre of music to appreciate but as a gringo (Spanish for a non-Latino) I was miserably uninformed regarding the various kinds of Latino musica and dance, but all that changed one faithful day.
A local celebrity in town hosted his annual benefit dinner and Stevie Wonder was the entertainment for the evening, STEVIE FREAKING WONDER!!! I was so glad I was able to attend this dinner with about twelve other minors and for free at that. You could feel the buzz in the air as Stevie come onto the stage. Women screamed, men clapped and howled in a deep voice STEVIE! Then he began the show, and I must admit it totally caught me by surprise. Stevie and his band put on a Latino musica show! Now I've been listening to this stuff on the radio and I was there privileged to witness a show like this live and person? Dreams do come true.
From the first note of Stevie's piano the crowd was moving! The crowd mind you is the well- to-do-citizens in my home town, dressed up in the slickest tuxedos and the most elegant dresses; but, that didn't stop them from getting down to that Latin beat. I spent the first ten minutes or so just watching the every one dancing up a storm. I am thinking to myself "Who knew there is Latin dance lovers in Toledo?" "Who knew Stevie plays Latin music and well at that?" Little did I know that back in the 1970s Stevie at the height of his popularity was a surprised guest star at a Fania All Stars show, the founders and creators of Salsa music.
Finally I mustered up the courage to step onto the dance floor. Oh my feet were taping for a while but I hadn't venture out there just yet. I haven't taken a single dance lesson just yet, but I only dreamed about dancing like that. I couldn't keep my butt on the seat, from the drums, horns, the clave, bass, piano those instruments pulled me onto my feet. All I remember is that I danced so hard, moving my body as if I had no control of it. I felt like a puppet and the Latino musica by Stevie was the puppeteer! But it wasn't just me friends were all dancing just as hard. We had a blast!
As the minutes turned into hours there were no sign of the party stopping. Stevie kept pumping out that Salsa music and the crowd kept up boogieing as well to it. I watch and attempted to copy the moves by many of those dancing couples; but, of course I didn't measure up, that would be a goal I decided to achieve in the future. One point of the night someone started a Conga line , grooving throughout the convention center like a dancing snake.
Sadly the show came to a close. Every one there gave Stevie and his band a thunderous round of applause thanking him for a fantastic show. My friends and I left the place still on a high from the performance. When I arrived back at home I told my folks what happened and they were just a shocked as I was. This is the beginning of my love affair with Salsa music and I haven't looked back since. Now years later from then as am I teaching dance classes, hosting Latin dancing events via my small business Michal T. Promotions LLC and competing I find myself reminiscing about this performance by Stevie Wonder and how it solidified my love affair with Salsa musica and dancing.
