The Blank Slate...

"Once upon a time, there was a troll king and a princess..."

2009-11-12T13:15:21Z

"Once upon a time, there was a troll king and a princess..."
-- Sean Rice

____________________________________________________

Evenscore
by sean rice

The Troll King sat with misery
that was written on his face
With the princess from the land nearby
busy shredding off her lace
The huntsmen could be heard
hunting all of the Troll King's Race
The Princess has been stolen!
said the criers of the case
The Troll King stole the Princess!
said the horsemen on the chase

"Silly shit," the Princess, said.
"I just don't understand!
why they cannot see it's red
like the blood of a common man"
The Troll King that all had wanted dead
that all had wanted from the land
he only smiled sadly with a heart made of lead
and took her by the hand

A troll is but a monster and a tale they only hear
he said it very gently with a heaving sigh to her
then caught into his fingertips a single falling tear
the princess shed it freely before he heard her saying, "Sure!
I can understand the awkwardness and even rage and fear
but I don't want to see the death of my only love, Dear Sir."
The horsemen on the farther hill were quickly drawing near
The troll considered carefully then made her climb a fir

Fashioning a mirror from the very rock that bred him
The Troll king shushed the Princess and ignored her every protest
The monster stood the shiny thing against a lower limb
and it was then that they all came upon the hilltop's crest
The Princesses stern sire then crossed forth (his beard was perfectly trim)
and in front of the quaking troll king his horse then came to rest

Neither spoke and neither moved and neither dared to breathe
Each strained against the angry words they wanted but to fling
The Sire gestured boldly to the princess with his empty sheath
The Troll King only lifted up the finger with the single wedding ring
to the magic seeing glass and invited but a look to the sire that merely seethed.
But then the gaze did fall and said the single Troll King:

See your face as it truly is for this mirror allows no mask
It's the king of monsters you're bound and oathed to kill
The problem is you've surpassed the object of your task
I'm but a Troll your daughter loved and the monster king until
another took his place so that there's only one to ask:
Are you ready, yet, my dear liege lord, your promise to fulfill?

Nothing to see here. I'm not saying anything you want to read.

2009-11-12T09:47:54Z

See! You wasted your time, but you didn't waste mine. Have a nice day, somewhere else. ;)

Day One.

2009-11-08T21:47:45Z

There's a wind that breezes through the attic and it sings a song of lonliness
There's a mask on the ground and it was painted in the air
A model posed the picture and I published it one day.
The mask is still lying there. The make still lies there.

There's a vision that three women turn to me in a cornfield row
I'm holding the camera tightly not to shake it.
The each wear the one mask and snap their heads toward as one,
"Why did you let that poor girl look back? Do you know what you did?"

They say it in chorus to the camera. Say it as one.

My dreams are art. They are a torture. They are vivid.
My dreams go onto paper when they can.
My dreams destroy the lives of all around me
and I fear to wake with my hands.

Once upon a time there was a Troll King grieving.
There was grief in the Troll King's eyes.
A princess came out to wipe the tears and cried.
It was the princess that cried and not the king.

The ugly troll, a monster, they say, rubbed her back.
Listened and wondered, "What is love" as she had asked
In a notebook full of thoughts and full of aspirations...
all scattered about the floor with her tears.

"Get up," The Troll King Said. "See how my life is?"
I get up every day despite this and to escape this:
Being the Troll. It sucks.
"Get Up. You're beautiful. You're brilliant. We'll make it."

She came back on a metro after having gone home.
She decided on that day to be with the Troll.
She decided that she could BE the person
If only the Troll King could escape being a troll.

Once upon a time, there was a life.
Two of them, in fact.
Once upon a time, two people started walking forward.
Once upon a time they slept.

There is a river through the land and it's called "James."
The Princess snored softly through the first freeze of the year.
Blankets. Huddled in the car. Finding the comfortable place for the hips.
Day One.

It's always Day One.

Unconditional, Stephanie Grant. Unconditional.

2009-11-08T20:45:07Z

Dear Stephanie Grant:

I'm sure the friendship will survive, but there are some things I will never tolerate and this is how I'm built. As much as I would never allow anybody to say bad, denigrating things about you when I was with you, I will NEVER tolerate a person saying bad things to me about Kelsey. This is called loyalty. Loyalty is a concept you don't seem to get and nobody around you really values you for that quality: Not Len, not Harun, Not Ezra Prior, not anybody.

I value you as a friend and support you as best I can. I appreciate the help you've given me. You may call ME anything you want including the "dumb ass" you called me for moving to Richmond in the first place. I'll accept that.

I told you once, though: Touch Kelsey and I'll come down on you like a ton of bricks.

I am visciously protective of her and will NOT tolerate your words.

She has never done anything wrong to you and has acted, 100% in good conscience at all times. While there was some question about the events on that one night about why she would call the police, I am satisfied that she acted out of concern and was playing it safe in a situation in which she could not now my state of mind. She did not have your 2 years of experience with me to know that I would never have harmed anyone and my anger was words, only.

She did the best she could with a guy that she had been in a 2 month relationship with. My actions were based on a mental break down that YOU know all to well and can understand, but you have FAR more information to work with than she did.

You have no right to judge Kelsey Thurber. Kelsey has ALWAYS done well by you and has treated you well. You, my ex-girlfriend, have always been treated well by Kelsey.

So have I.

Kelsey has been a solid source of support and love that is completely unmatched by anybody in my past including you. I KNOW she will be there, tomorrow. I KNOW I can trust her and that she ALWAYS tells the truth. I know that she ALWAYS tries to make the right decision and does not use people. She does not give merely to people that are useful to her.

Stephanie Grant, you told me never to contact you because I called you on an unfair thing that you said about my love. The one person I NEVER have problems saying, "I love you" to. You attacked her and I attacked you because you were unfair and without cause to say the things you said.

I'm sorry if that loses my friendship with you, but frankly, a "friend" is not somebody who demands the right to trash Kelsey to me. A friend is NOT somebody who is here today and gone tomorrow. A friend is NOT a person that dances in and out of a person's life on a whim and a desire and a need to be right and unjudged.

Your help with money does NOT make you a friend... it merely makes you a person that has helped me. If you want a friendship, you'll have to learn that there are some beliefs that I WILL hold to: Kelsey is NOT to be touched. Not by you. Not by anyone.

Your choice, my "friend."

random words

2009-11-07T19:33:25Z

Did I tell you about the mountains, yet?
We'll visit them, someday.
The sky makes a sound we call silence up there
and the water that's trapped in the valleys are ice
but looks like water as blue as your eyes
until something touches it and it snaps like a trap into solid
and the breathing is labored with the lack of air
and the moon when its full is as big as two pies
but wanders away when you call it.

Did I tell you about the cities we'll see?
where the languages are strange and the laughter is warm?
Where the children for pennies no longer have to swarm
around you with dirty hands because their hands are cleaner than ours
and they play futball when they're not working in factories we once saw in Jersey
And the hotels now let their own people visit
and English is getting harder and harder to find
We'll see them, someday.

CSS osCommerce, Seven Stone, DC Photo Hub and Richmond, VA

2009-11-07T15:31:33Z

There are a ton of businesses in Richmond, VA with osCommerce sites that are barely designed let alone modified and they're easy to find because several of them haven't even modified the title tag of their sites: "osCommerce" shows up in the browser window, so a Google search of "Richmond" and "osCommerce" provides an instant contact list. A search of their products, of course, doesn't list them at all.

CSS osCommerce v.2.0 is nearly ready for release and I'm spending the day, after bidding for contract jobs, just cleaning up the code and preparing it for download by anyone willing to pay the mere $600 for source. I need to also set up the Demo Store and write the promotion pages to my site with links leading to the demo.

Seven Stone eCommerce is going to be a far larger project and after planning the entire site out, I feel it's going to compete successfully with application superstars such as Magento, but... honestly, the Atria Proposal asking for $80,000 in development funding is looking more and more realistic if I hope to launch before the Internet has become obsolete. If there are any angels out there reading this... Sean Rice needs $80,000 in capital investments and is willing to offer terms.

The Open Source solution of developing the "Free Version" at SourceForge is an option, but I need a clear distinction between superstar core features that would be found in the paid Premium Version. *sigh*

DC Photo Hub is most of the way coded on the architecture level and I should be able to launch the full site by the end of the month. Again, I'm proud of the concept and the execution as it exists, currently, in pre-alpha. I'm also mindful of the server problems that www.modelmayhem.com suffered as a victim of their own success. I'm hoping that the fact that DC Photo Hub is a regional site will obviate a lot of the issues. The Studio Schedular is its own marketing operation, though. 50 Studios willing to sign up and pay, by itself, translates into a nice income for everyone involved. Really, it's a no-brainer for businesses since we're skimming such small amounts from each reservation.

Richmond, VA is a tough nut to crack, but a lot of the problem is that everybody is too nervous with the economy to move on anything. We'll see. I'll just keep pounding it out every day until I make it, here. I still believe that the Rasa Design Studio move to Richmond was a good idea and that the city is growing in the right direction after the loss of its industry.

Dear Richmond, VA: Your web site needs a redesign and the only reason I'm not talking to you personally about this is because I can't find you on Google. :) If you have an osCommerce web site and your browser still says "osCommerce" at the top of the screen on any of the pages, you KNOW that you have some serious design and marketing issues. Talk to Rasa Design Studio and we'll fix you right up!

There. Think it'll help? :)

OK. Back to work.

Happy Birthday To Me.

2009-11-03T16:11:51Z

I'm alive. I'm in love with a strong woman that loves me. I have friends that I can call friends and who call me friend. I have my health for the most part. I have my mind for now. I discovered that I have a dollar still in my pocket. I have cigs and coffee for the day. I have my education and skills and experience that I know set me a notch above many that are as stuck as I am. I have a heart. I have passion. I have a sense of humor even in the blackest times. I have my memories back and the perspective that losing them for a Summer gave me. I have a craft for words and a vision for images. I have 37 years of piano and songs in my head. I have a sense of justice and a sense of mercy and a sense of forgiveness. I have a sense that there might be a God and that he has a shit sense of wicked humor that I have no choice but to tip my hat to if he'd only allow me to get rich enough to afford a hat. I gave a homeless man all my change even though I'm homeless, too. I gave a man a cig even though I am counting how many I have left. I told a woman to smile as I passed by and she called from the end of the street, "Hey! Thank you! That just made my day." I can speak more than one language and I was able to smile at jokes told on a bus in Spanish. I have been blessed with beautiful people in my life from all over the world. Perri, Lucyna, Andrea, Burckaan, Ana Kamiar, Deepak, Josh Yaphe, Stephanie Grant, Elzbeta, Crystal, Mustafah, Creature (who has taken on a life of his own), Tony (who has given me my second chance at life even as he questions the need for his own), Trinity, Laura Duffy, Michele, Cindy Williams (who's cutting words often keep me real), Maria Sibiriak who humbled me and taught me shame, Brian (my brother who is perfectly real all the time), My father whose advice is invaluable even though he never followed any of it and whom I buried, Lisa (my step-sister who taught me that I could be accepted on my own terms and not to compromise and who taught me how to respect a woman and what a woman was, anyway).

I turn 41 and I have many things to be thankful for even as my life is at its darkest and also at its most brilliant. Kelsey has taught me a depth of love that I could have only dreamed existed. I hoped even as I dared not hope that a Kelsey could maybe exist in the world.

Today, a woman slept with her head in my lap and I dared not move but that I would destroy the moment. Today, a woman's arms held me close and my heat warmed her. Today, love was made long before the sun would rise. Today, I was kissed by a woman as she left. Today, I drank coffee. Today, I found Cohen's "Here It Is" and listened to it. Today, I got a web site finished. Today, I saw the sun rise after all of this.

Happy Birthday to me.

____________________

Stephanie dared me to try to write a poem without rhyme.

____________________

The wind in the willows were what woke me from my dreams
I couldn't figure out how they could still be screaming
with the voices of women and children and men
when they had been chopped down years ago
The thud as they landed went right through me
and the leaves in the street blowing past?
How could those damn trees still have leaves?
So I woke and listened to the rain with a cig in my hand

_____________

meh...

___________________

Look at this room that you wake in
and look at it hard through the smoke of the cig
that wafts up to paint the walls in yellow tar
The mattress on the floor and the chair of dirty laundry
The laptop fan whirs on the tv table you use as a desk
and sunlight streams in to show you how it is
Good Morning!
How you gonna get out of this?

Green flem hacked up from the depths of blackened lungs
the vestiges of a cold in a cold room warmed only by coffee
one cup at a time
It's time to empty the trash when the Ramon noodle wrappers
won't stay in, anymore
It's time to do laundry when you've decided to match the last clean sock with a dirty one.
It's time to rethink life when you have to choose between bus fare and a black and mild
because the Mavericks are just too expensive in this part of town

Lunch is.... lunch is... oh! Wait! I still have that half a sandwich in my bag.
Lunch is solved.
Thirty more letters go out begging for work in the guise of confidence
thirty more cigs are smoked waiting for a reply
thirty more days have gone buy without rent being paid
thirty more dollars I'll have to borrow for the chance to get out of this
thirty more kisses give me hope that I exist

Look at this room you wake in
look hard through the fog of your mind
as it paints a past and plans a future yet again:
Don't you ever learn, Sean?
Isn't the definition of insanity the expectation of different results
doing exactly what you're doing, now?

Look at this room you wake in.
Happy Birthday to me.

poem. Still rough.

2009-10-29T18:06:36Z

I.

I do not like this feeling I feel fear.
the emptiness that I can hear
in my own mind (healing slowly) leers
the laughing mask of memory

Pills that cloud the senses hide
the ugly truth and ugly side
of a man that to himself once lied
and couldn't bear the honest mirror

You're Evil that you're old! They cry
Pointing fingers and I sigh
when I realize the truth that fly
toward me like a juries' stones

What do I have to offer her?
What do you have to offer, sir?
You're home and hearth and money were
not on you when you died

You have nothing left to hide.

II.

Awake. The sound of breathing loud against the heartbeat pounding
Alive. My name is...
Terror. I know she'll turn and turn again each time and sounding
like a thud that has no sound, itself, she dies again and rounding
off the times I've dreamed this damn dark mare of the night
the numbers are astounding.
There she goes again. There she falls again. There I wake again.

III.

Cenel, ship island. That's her name.
Her voice is the surf of an ocean rolling in.
The creak of rigging and sail.
The depth of her can drown a man.
Her love is all that bouys this man.

IV.

Once upon a time there was a Troll King living
underneath a lonely bridge and giving
all that passed on by a scare, divining
the paths they'd walk down after there

Once upon a time a princess cried
her tears into the river side
and to her future the king was tied
despite his warning to beware

"Princesses cannot marry trolls."
That was the law.

Once upon a time a stone was thrown
to strike them down and break the bone
and tear the flesh and kill the flower they had sown
for surely he was a monster.

How dare that troll be in her heart
he must have used but guile and art
of the darkest sort that she'd be part
of such an unholy allience

lol!

2009-10-28T19:54:23Z

There's a someone lurking here
in shadows, silent, taking notes
to use as proof and spread a fear
with factless speculation coats
my face with snarl and leer
the lurker boasts
to know anything about me

a beast he thinks I am to her
and every word I post a truth
that shows me as a dog! A Cur!
A worthless man uncouth
But you're the one in the shadows, sir
you're the one that snuck under my roof

Learning too much from experience

2009-09-14T18:47:14Z

Learning too much from experience
-- Sean Rice

What did you learn in school, today?
What did you learn that you can't learn at play?
Am I going to hear about that fight you lost
to the boy who could find you despite streets you would cross
to avoid?
(the fight that you started, he wanted to say)
'cause your temper ran much faster than sneakers
And close your mouth when you're eating.
Close your mouth, period.

Never interrupt your enemy when he's making a mistake
never tell a lie because the truth you can fake
with a smile and a question and two compliments
and you sleep to forget all the dings and the dents
to what? Your conscience?
(I suspect you can have it and eat it, too, that cake)
When I look around I hear that everybody's doing it
I love you. I love you, too.
I love her. She loves you, too.

When you finely find it that truth that you sought
and its properly in the last place you look (and you thought,
"yeah, because then you stop looking!")
and the ragged edges of experience hooking
you back in to repeated performance
the encore
the applause in ova and in pride you are caught
What fine mastery of skill!
Are you happy now?
Smarter now?
Won't get bit the same way thrice?

What did you learn in school, today?
Did you scratch out a role model from dirt and from clay?
make an idol of a man that woke
knowing how to think before he spoke?
Knowing who he was only because he had forgotten everything
and that's all that was left was himself to flay
for the burden he decided to shoulder
someone else's burden to shoulder.
Why don't you answer?!?
But, dad, you told me to close my mouth!

Kid, you never learn.

Richmond

2009-09-14T10:16:03Z

I love this city. As a city, it's a step down, maybe, from Washington, DC. As a home, it's so many steps up that it's hard to put into words the feeling I get from even the simple act of walking from my place to Kelsey's.

I'm working and even though the money has down to pretty much nothing, I know that this is temporary and I'm starting to get the results from my work at getting work. It's the web site that's holding me back and that's almost up.

I feel it from Kelsey the stress she is feeling and how many eggs she feels are in the basket (case) called "Sean." May this week be the one that sets us both free from worry.

tabula_rasa @ 2009-09-09T02:09:00

2009-09-09T06:06:14Z

In my dreams I feel the heat
and dust is an irritation between clothes and skin
time is measured as a meet
between events and expectations
between the dead and all those left living.

aga

2009-09-06T18:41:32Z

I'm looking up at the clock and it's8:30 and I've been designing and writing and paying more attention toSpielberg's “Band of Brothers” than I should, but I feel itshould be excused.

It's almost 3 months? Is that right?

Everything that's happened and we stillapproach each other as if it is “first day new” to us... andthat's how it feels. Always fresh and always new. Always as if we'reunlocking little secrets in the other and we're always amazed and inawe of what gets revealed... and we both struggle to remember reallife and not to be TOO much caught up.

I love Kelsey. I'm so amazed to seethat feeling in her words and her eyes and her hands as she reachesfor me to stroke my skin, or examine my fingers or whatever sheallows herself to do.

I love that Kelsey loves me... wonderif she finds that same amazement when she discovers I love her and soon back and forth... it builds and builds.

I've walked through the city in my areaof it. I've seen shops offering to act as an agency for models. Seenprint shops. Seen businesses closed up and others struggling. I'mlooking at people with clean clothes hanging out during businesshours and... I hang to listen and they're out of work. I look at theblank page of my own web page design and can feel my mind clickinglike the tumblers of a bank safe: Bang. Bang. Bang..... Heavy metalslamming home as a new piece fits.

Wish I knew what pieces were fittingand making such a noise in my head. I've learned to wait, so I wait.

I look at the logo design and thecolumns... and feel Kelsey's fingers tracing with her fingers alongmy side and hips as I stare into her eyes... and measure the topnavigation and how many letters and spaces have to fit across therebefore it runs out of space... and remember looking down from thebridge at water cluttered with bolders and swans and there is thesmell of her hair with me all through that walk. It never leaves.

Models. Dc-photohub.com.

The eCommerce problem. Seven Stone.

Happiness.... I have only to look intoKelsey's eyes. Watch her expressions and try to imagine what she'sthinking and feeling and which is which.

There are images and they flow, now.I'm not sure how to make that part of the rest: Rasa and Kelsey. Ilook at Rasa and see the finances, there. I see Kelsey and I see purevision. She has her own work to do and I wonder.... What story doesshe have to tell?

Kelsey is strong. I feel all hermuscles and hear how she runs the mile and the five miles and sheruns and runs. She's strong as I see her not only make decisions, butmake decisive ones. Decide not YET to make others. She chooses herpath and goes at her pace and I watch her unfold and flower and liveand I know that it draws me too her. She is amazing. How much I push,she pushes. As much as I pull, she pulls. As much as I am able towait.... I find her eventually into my arms and know that it was MEthat had to have that strength: Wait. Be silent.

I find my strength in her. I find mystrength by having to accept her as she is with the silences beforefinally she reveals a thing. We lie on the pillows and our faces faceeach other. Her eyes look into mine and I cannot read them. Maybe Iread too much into them. I ask a question and she decides whether toanswer. Maybe yes. Maybe not yet. Maybe not at all.

Not homeless, but...

2009-09-01T18:09:35Z

The number one complaint that Stephanie had about me was that I never spent time with her. After everything I read about my life, I can see why. I worked. I woke, I worked, I slept. "Sorry, can't because I'm busy" was the theme of all of my relationship after the first year. Reading back further, I saw that I did that when I was alone, with other relationships... I even earned the nicknames, "Busy Bee" and then "Poor Bee" from certain Russians for that.

I know I tried so hard to succeed that I ended up killing everything in me that made me good at what I did in the first place.

I know I killed my "life" in the name of making a life.

I know that "too busy" lead eventually into such an untenable position that a thunderstorm was able to send me back to a time when everything had meaning. Big meanings. Everything was real.

Listening to Loreena McKennitt, I'm reminded of the dreams that resulted in images that resulted in a love for creating them.

I'm reminded of CD Covers. I'm reminded of IBM and Nikon and releasing stress through games of chess, ping-pong and long stares across the Charles River.

I'm reminded that "design" is to pay rent and I pay rent to afford "art."

I'm reminded that one has to live to have enough to say to create art in the first place.

I'm reminded by Kelsey that one, then, has "to do" the work...... but, it's the balance between those two things that I once lost and I'm not willing to lose again. I'm not willing to go down "that" path, again.

I've produced more, today, than in the entirety of all last week. More than anything, I'm producing the plan that gets me where I want.

"The Mystic's Dream" was a song that made me remember that I could imagine. In the hospital, I such a vivid image in my head that I KNOW that I have to produce it if only to get it OUT of my head. I know that this next 30 days is about finding success and ALSO balance.

Dare or Dare? We have 100 of them we haven't touched.... and a LOT of work to do. But, when you add up all the 5 and 10 and 30 minutes that we're NOT really doing what we planned..... sometimes you can find balance in there.

I want to make a movie that begins, "Once upon a time..." and I want to make damned sure I hug you once a day. If I have to meet you outside your class for that and walk you home, then... I'll do it.

I'm not Nathan, but I'm also not Nathan.

I want to get the work done and achieve the goals.
I want to achieve the balance. Every day.
I want to make it.

Opening scene....

2009-08-28T22:49:51Z

I remember this video and I know I created it.

A stone "table" which is a coffin. The sides of the table are created as as bas relief faces as are the heavy legs of the table. I know I created them in photoshop and..... some other program. A woman lies "in" the table and there are sides to the table that rise up and the "cover" is glass.

loreena mckennitt plays. From Mask and the Mirror. "The Mystics Dream."

As the opening stanzas voice, the "camera" pans across the faces of the table and alll the details. The faces. The structure of "faces" as part of a table. A nude woman, finally, encased in the table with the glass cover. She lays at rest and hands hold a rose. I remember that she is also showed holding a rose and a large stone. I remember taking pics of a woman named Jennifer to make this happen. She agreed to take off her clothes and lay on a counter top. I took a pic. Stood on a chair to take a pic. Stook on a ladder to take a pic.... a series of those.

As the men's chorus progresses, it is table. When Loreena adds her voice, it is the woman.

As men come back with Loreena, the camera pans back into the air as a soul would fly. Up and up and up....

It reveals that Woman and Table is located in the water of a black swamp. At the edge of the swamp, surrounded by cyprus trees and lit in the darkness with some mysterious light.... but up and up and up to see the table with encased woman down below.... in the water............ surrounded by trees.... alone.

Then the song.

--------------------------------------------------

I met Kelsey.

There's such this huge passion. There's such this huge passion that comes from her. From that... there is MORE passion that I give to her.... and so on until we are dying of it. When we meet in Richmond...

And .... then there are the images that FINALLY flow!!!

Music flows.

I hear.

I hear it that held chord..... strings. Oboe. There is the timpani. It rumbles in C.... and the chord is the minor. I HEAR the chorus coming up from that. Cm. The men down in a 2001 Space oddesy rumble. Everyone else coming up from the instruments.

A paintbrush paints on a mask. Details. It's a white, blank mask. The brush paints with slow and deliberate strokes. Sometimes quick and light. The eyes and cheeks and lips and...... camera moves away to reveal, eventually, a woman painting the mask into the air...

The mask does not exist except as she's painting it...... no canvas. Just mid-air.

Finished. she plucks the mask from the air and puts it to her face... not on, just... held a bit away.... she dances and it is ballet. And in one turn away from the camera.... it is HER face on the mask and the "painted" part is her face. She drops the mask which is now her face..... she leaves the scene with the "mask as her face... the mask with her "real" face is discarded on the ground.

Fade out.

That's it.

Love Letter....

2009-08-17T17:50:01Z

The Autumn in my home town is a riotous conflagration of fiery colors that ring the Valley. The locals who are able to find anything to hate end up hating it for the tourists it draws from all over the world and they will clog the narrow farm roads with their slow moving cars and cameras. The people who love the colors carry them in their hearts no matter how far from the Valley they stray and find themselves, in places where Autumn is ho-hum, strangely homesick for a home that most grew up hating.

Hadley was a farm town that consisted of small, mostly Polish farms of cigar tobacco, cucumbers, sugar-butter corn, peas, lettuce, potato, and Rout 9, which connected Amherst on the one side and Northampton across the river. The narrow, 2-lane bridge across the Connecticut River gets completely gridlocked between 7:00 am and 10 am, then between 4:30 pm and 6:00 pm. When they widened the bridge after 30 years of fighting about it with the state, it brought the gridlock down to 1980's levels, but it's still there.

When we moved there, there was a single mall. The Mountain Farms Mall. So, Hadley had that. Then they built a new mall right next door, the Hampshire Mall and "the Old Mall" died. Was strangled. I started working at the age of 14 at the Hampshire Mall as a dishwasher for Figaro Restaraunt. I worked for Gai, Tony Furnari, Joey and Paul D'Alto. I became prep-cook at 15, cook at 15, sous chef at 16, manager at 17 and my first act as manager was to fire the entire waitressing staff and Pizza staff. All the blonde 40-year olds with their cigs and their attitude and 20-year old pizza cook boyfriends were gone. I already had a crew prepped to replace them: Students with restaurant experience and a uniform requirement. Of Pizza, I started introducing "new" pizzas: Semolina, white pizzas, pesto pizzas... I nearly got fired when I spent $9,000 on a pasta-making machine and started producing our own pasta... without permission.

Sales shot to 400% in 3 months.

High school girls didn't give me the time of day, I had long, blonde hair that was as thin as Tom Petty's. When I wasn't working, I was reading books. All the women I had crushes on were years older than the high school kid. ;)

I didn't even give notice on the day I graduated from high-school. I told "chuck" that he should just simply "claim" management when I left and apparently he did: Running the store until it closed 5 years later.

I left.

Travelled. Came back.. got "bored" with home... found Perri, grabbed her and left, again.

That's how I was.

The River.... maybe you read about it, maybe you didn't. This is what it was: I "fell in love with Andrea" and Lanie snesed it and tried to "dare" us together. We didn't. I was scared to death of losing her as a friend and, like Stephanie, I could see the pile of human wreckage. Cross the line and that was that. After Lanie left, Andrea and I had one more day, alone. I dared her to sunbathe nude on the deck and read a book. I was going to go for a walk in the woods. I did. I saw Coyote.

He was a young male and had mange. His fur sloughed off in patches. He sat in my path and stared at me. Then, he simply walked away with such this complete dignity.

I did not cross the path where he had sat. I went back to the cottage on stilts and, going in from the front, I went up into the kitchen and made a sandwich. I started to go out onto the porch with the sandwich and saw Andrea lying there..... reading. I backed into the house and just stood there for a long moment... then went to the bedroom with the window nearest her and sat down on the bed, watching her out the window until the sandwich was gone.

I'd seen her nude, before, but never actually really LOOKED at this woman who was Andrea... I knew EVERYTHING about her. We were buddies. Friends. Companions. I was seen more with her than my own wife.

I never told her until years later. It was a question she asked, randomly: When was the first time I had ever felt Passion?

What I felt with Elzbeta, for the first time, was adult love.... of a woman I could not touch, speak to, approach. I learned "love" and it was forbidden.

What I felt with Perri was companionship, a buddy, a constant.

What I felt with Andrea was a deep passion and desire.... for something else. NOT Andrea.

With Lucyna, I learned lust, physical passion, abandonment, "The Dare."

With Nino, Respect. Dignity.

With Stephanie, I felt needed.

With everybody.... there was only one thing that was ever fulfilled. One aspect.

Once upon a time, I met a very young woman named Kelsey. She cried... but WHAT she was crying about!! I knew those tears.

Once upon a time, I met a very young Kelsey that suddenly KNEW that what she was always content with, she no longer was. There was a passion and it had been dammed up for too long... and NOW it wanted OUT.

Once upon a time, I met a woman that was not washed away by me. I was scared to death as I slowly started to release the floods and found MYSELF nearly drowning when she started to release her own and they matched me! Drop for drop, torrent for torrent.... I was scared she would drown and run away. She almost did.... then came back.

The moment you came back to me on the Metro..... it changed me. Changed my life.

When I picked you up to set you on the wall and your legs wrapped around me...... when your skin first touched mine along all the length of our bodies.... when we made love in that sitting position and.... when you cried this last time.... after Stephanie's txt and the story of how you broke apart and you don't know -- I will never tell you!! -- the pure rage that somebody had hurt MY KELSEY!! MINE! This thing in my life was NOT to be touched! Not to be harmed!

Putting off what I need until you are back and with the smiles and easy laughter.... but, ..... there is the frustration and the one "hug" of words and I need that. I find myself needing it. The "touch" by you: Everything is ok. Will be ok.

Missing you. You missing me...... and realizing, Holy Shit! SHE MISSES ME AND FEELS IT LIKE I DO!!!!

22 years.

15 years from the time that I first felt that first stirring of "wanting" something and not being happy with anything less.

When I say that I love you...... I mean that I KNEW you had to exist and it has taken me a LONG time to find you. It has taken me such a long, long time.

I will NEVER leave you. If this relationship must one day end, I will give you my blessing to go, but..... it will NEVER be me. I fell in love with you. They will have to take this ring off my dead finger to remove it. I feel bound to you. I could not escape if I wanted to. That is it.

Now....... to make a life with that. "I just wasn't ready!" ... yeah. Now...... I'd like to have a big house. I'd like to have water on the property.... a stream or river. I'd like to watch a sunset with you.

tabula_rasa @ 2009-08-15T13:10:00

2009-08-15T17:07:26Z

It's too easy.

It's too easy to fall into it. If we allow ourselves to do it, it gets easier and easier to do just that.

The pushing away and retreating. "He/She won't understand! Better to say nothing."

As soon as we hung up the phone, I felt it that she and I had made the wrong choice. I made the choice, yesterday. She made it, today (and I even encouraged it!! Suggested it!!).

I sit here with a sick feeling as I work. A new set of paths open up that weren't there, before. Silence. Frustration. Arguments... and retreats and "Truth, or truth" that stalls with the impossibility of things that got left unsaid for far too long.

I close my eyes and remember The River. "You broke through" about the disconnect. She came back to me on the Metro. Standing up to her parents. Choosing the sandwich that she hadn't had before....

... and when it was my turn, I could claim that I was trying to protect her, but that's exactly what she's been trying to explain to me: When I try to protect, I end up pushing away. We're partners. Lovers. Ruth and Naomi, with both of us sometimes playing the part of the other.

The silence. SMS messages that aren't responded to. The ticking of the clock as I hope hope hope that she realizes what I realized: "No! This is NOT what I want!"

I wait a bit more, then call... and hope she is not upset that I break the silence before she is ready to.

No. Fuck that! The silence is no good. It's the wrong silence. Not the silence of reading a book in the same room.... this is reading a book with the other far away.

Onion skins.

2009-08-13T18:17:32Z

There's a rage in the machine
and it's growing and it's mean
and the question that we're asking is
the direction of the fleeing
of the masses, but we mean
to be survivors and the keen
that movies always write about.

There's a story in the passing
of the old man and it's lasting
and the question that we're asking is
the purpose of mask he's wearing
on his face that we can't see but
it's okay because he seems to
always need it and we trace
the mask and not the man.

There's a woman over forty
and she tells of all the movies that she's never made
There's a girl that has a fake ID
She tells of movies that she always seems to dream on up
There's a man that sports two blonds and one brunette
A boy that knows the sex that he has read.
A bouncer at the bar he has to shoo them all away.

The care and feeding of intimacy and love.

2009-08-08T14:52:02Z

Ever have those days when you feel you should write and the life has been so full and interesting that you know you have something to write about, but the stare at the blank page provides you only with the blank page?

There's such a relief in the divergence of old and new. It is not such a sharp, dramatic division as I would have imagined. No slamming of doors, but rather a fading away of footsteps down the walkway and away. When the guest leaves and one turns around to find and slip easily into the embrace of the one that is "supposed" to be there and is.

Today begins a countdown until August 20, 2009. A race. 12 Days.

The objective: Apartment and $5,000 cash in Richmond -- AFTER apartment is paid for. Another $7,500 in active projects to be paid upon completion.

Ready? Set? Go!

__________________________

Kelsey has been amazing and every day reveals her more and more to have a depth and character and beauty that makes me almost stunned into speechlessness every time I think on it; every time I see her; every time I hear the soft, calm, patient, considering voice that she uses to comunicate with an outside world that she always had stood apart from. I know myself as being part of that outside world for her and that she's come out just to the entrance of some cave only because I was unable to go in too far to meet her.

At the same time, I know -- I feel -- that we sit together at the entrance to (and still sheltered by) each others' caves. It's a hearth created by the heat and light of the others' presence and it is enough... enough to start finally thinking that it is NOT enough and to wish for more for ourselves.

__________________________

There is a passion that runs like a current between us. Sometimes it has exploded up to the surface and we have, more than once, woken up together from deep sleep already deep into passionate kisses and love-making. After, we are shaken and try to recount the events: "At what point were we actually awake?" There is a pain when we are apart from each other and both of us dislike such bondage; distrust it to be that much tied to another person that we find it hard to function without: We push against such tethers and force ourselves away from the other for a time... at least enough to get things done.

We find in that intentional separation that there is none: The hearts are tightly bound and we find, coming back to each other, that the other person's heart was just as tightly bound and painful for the distance and we are both amazed that this could be true also for the other and we are both, and both, and both...

12 days.

Now, I work.

Magnus Opus?

Harun Mehmedinovic

2009-08-05T12:10:00Z

IN THE NAME OF THE SON DVD available for purchase on AMAZON.COM! Click on the "BUY FROM AMAZON" link at http://www.nameoftheson.com!

But, I Hope You Don't

2009-07-19T15:00:34Z

But, I Hope You Don't
by Sean Rice

[notes: Cm key. First stanza played with single notes in the third octave above middle c (lower G, E flat, C? G, E flat, C? G, E flat, D ... D, D, E flat, B, C. ) with the idea of "Where Are you?" if were said plaintively. The rest of the song goes off on it's own with only a nod to that. Left hand starts walking after the first stanza walking with simple chords every quarter note; a waltz in 4/4... SOFTLY! Softly! softly....]
[notes 2: "We'll take this one day at a time. Maybe one day, you'll have to tell me, 'it's time for me to go' and that's all you'll have to say. Maybe you won't. I hope you won't"]

Where are you...?
Where are you...?
The sun sets...
The Moon bids adieu.

The Sun says good-bye... and the river's cott'n can-dy.
The fish they want to fly... There's a girl that wants to be.
She sits upon the bank... and her silence...
and her silence is a thought without the words
Her smile...
She smiles when she's coming back to me.

Hands, I feel them held... her wings I feel are spreading
she look up past the hills... and the oceans aren't so wide
sleeping near the sounds of water... the grass against our backs
"I think," I know she'll say, one day
(today?)
"I think it's time to go." I wonder if she'll go.

Where are you?
Where does this have to lead?
Are there last days to every summer?
Will the Autumn ever be the fall
of our cotton candy river?

The lullaby is sweet and "I love yous" spent like water
The lazy days of lives... come together one more time
The crossroads in the woods... it lays before us far away
Not today she does not say to me... not today she has to say
Breathing deep and dreams and sleep...
Maybe for this short little while... Maybe it's time to stay.

Is this you?
Is this where you want to lead?
Are the last days not for any summer?
Will the Autumn never be the fall
of our cotton candy river?

The Sun keeps passing by... and the river's cott'n can-dy.
The fish they learned to fly... There's a girl that learned to be.
We sit upon the bank... and our silence...
and our silence is one thought without the words
Her smile...
She smiles... maybe never leaving me.

Visions of Johanna

2009-07-14T01:05:42Z

Visions of Jahanna
By Sean Rice

Eyes like a lighthouse guiding ships to slip on by
A sigh.
The questions gathered in to lie like broken souls
The Blues shutter inward to invite me in
to crash among the shoals
Such a siren she can be
in silent misery
I do not move a muscle, now;
Gaze through the dirty glass
And then she's back with smiles
thanks my patience for the while
as the moment is allowed to pass.

Her neck against my nose is a warm perfume.
Hairs tickle against my cheek in the room
breasts press against me and I...
I do not move a muscle, now.
Let this moment go away some other day
not now not now not again I want to say
Parting is such sweet misery this way
My fingers stray to graze upon unseen fruit and arms and side and then reach up to grab a strand of hair or two and

"until" her lips mouth to me and the motion is a mistake.
It's the mistake that prey always make: To move
And there I am: Hungry against and burning -- with my beard. With a fire.

I wake without a motion and see her lying
I'm dying
not to move a muscle lest the spell is broken
with my eyes to trace the length of her
the open blouse a token
of soft feminity my hands remember
gifts not time yet to tender.
I am the child on christmas eve to peek
but it is the strand of hair my hand finally seeks
From her face I brush it away
the tiredness from the day
I love you, I finally say
and then fall back asleep

Walking under the sun, sweaty palms glued together
I look over as she gazes both ahead and at her thoughts
I see now the pictures there.
Her eyes flick over them and not over the cars that pass
Her mouth work over some problem

A fierce stance. I love her poise.
Balanced tension for flight at a noise
the boys
they'd never see the beauty there.
Right before their eyes she bears
the wear of a daily fight
The courage of non-flight
the love of life an ember barely burning in the light
the smile slight
as she recognizes my unconcious stare

Hips sway upon the steps and I walk behind
the shape of her motion I want to find
I wish to reach out and lay my hands upon her ass as she walks
just to feel the muscles move
just to feel the realness of it soothe
Just to end the hunger of my eyes.
A painting for the louvre
I don't mind

I don't mind at all.
Visions of Johanna play before my eyes
Summer will turn to Fall
Tomorrow maybe this is it and then the long good-byes.

The Morning After Pill

2009-07-10T01:00:26Z

The river had so many colors and I saw them only as one normally sees a river in the setting sun with colors that were merely "pleasant" to look at. Under the touch of her soft voice, the water became transformed before my very eyes: I learned and saw cotton candy. The blacks became the green of trees. The blues. I became, because of her presence, a man that could see the very river I had already thought beautiful.

It was the very river and spot along the river that she, too, knew and loved. Learning that she and I shared yet another thing in common became just one more chip that could not stack up among big, single difference? Maybe. I don't know.

For the first time since I woke up, I experienced a night that was one of the most beautiful that I can imagine. The kind of night you don't want to end... and it didn't. For one night, I know that she had the courage to shed her "Fear of Walking Forward." For one night, everything snapped into place for me and I knew exactly what and who I wanted, what had to happen, what I valued, what compromises I would NEVER make.

Leviathon and stonehenge dreams

2009-07-08T17:46:37Z

Leviathon and stonehenge dreams
by Sean Rice

There's a power in the tower newly crowned and robed in gray.
There's a flower growing upside down. it's petals have all blown away.
A teardrop sinks forgotten, now, in soil parched and starved.
The footsteps in the garden from a ghost that cannot say

Why you dream in color when your world is black and white?
Why your love has endings with the Summer's fading light?
When you hold a hand... do you feel lonely in the night?
It is only morning yet and evenings are still bright!

Leviathon and stonehenge dreams and murals on a church wall.
"what is love?" is written in a notebook where you stall
the question will be answered when you dare to fear the fall
Your questions will be answered when you dare not fear to fall

So near and far...

2009-07-08T17:12:12Z

So near and so far. You work inside and I work out. You blush when our eyes meet. You worried when I didn't show all morning. All day, I felt far away from you as I plowed through my morning errands as quickly as I could. I felt myself rushing to see you.

I love you.