[Air]
Ingest me like a chemical compound
I’m here to shatter ground and astound
But if my head could ever quit its pounding,
I could do with a little grounding
Cause my place is in space
Floating above an atomic rock,
I love God’s creation,
but we put it on lock
So I take a hammer to this clock
Crystal shards
To get cosmic lawyers disbarred
But give some regard
to what we discard
Inhale like a whale
And become eco-avant-garde
Here’s a charge to be on guard
When we discover the Alchemy of Air
Send a prayer to heaven
So ignorance can’t ensnare our brethren
Give progression some discretion
Cause when our dreams were torn asunder,
They thought bread would quell our hunger
But fertilization
for a temporary solution
Left the future generation
With a legacy of pollution
Through nitrogen destruction
We may have greater production
But it comes at the cost of natural disruption
There will be regulation
So take care with my air
Because no breath
is our death
[Earth]
I descend to the land
like rain
Barefoot on oil-slicked sand
I feel its pain
This is a chain of events
That will lead to our descent
Unless we prevent the extent
To which we circumvent the balance
For man, that’s the real challenge
So I cry,
looking up at my sky
We think life is about a fancy yacht
Or what we’ve bought
But I ask you now:
What’s the molecular makeup of my dripping snot?
Buck shot forming out of Astral Ash
Take your monatomic gold
and trade it in for cash
I’m bleeding hurricanes from a gash
And I wouldn’t bother to
lick your blood from the grass
Puff puff pass
And pass out
Don’t look down
Cause then you’ll hear a deafening sound
That’ll drown out His voice
This has always been a choice
So I choose to rejoice
with an active voice
This is our planet
So let’s try to understand it
What happens if our habits wreak havoc?
Food riots and savage madness
irreversible damage
So much waste
Maybe we’ve become the garbage
We are part of this Earth
Let’s not become Her curse
[Fire]
If we cleanse, my friends
Let’s look at the problem through this lens
Our forests are burning
but our consciousness is turning
We’re aching for some learning
And we pray to be discerning
Psyches start your churning
Think,
maybe returning to an earlier state
Death won’t be our fate
Don’t sedate, we need to update
If your soul is ablaze,
you can’t afford all these delays
So many ways to raise awareness
About a home that we all cherish
But if we’re garish,
then we perish
I wish that we could flourish
Only if we could nourish
Physical, Spiritual, Mental
I’m a Junkie Elemental
Fire mixed with Ice
we may be detrimental
My heat of desire,
tempted to be judgmental
I must remember to be gentle
Water can still burn
If the thorn is spilling oil
Tied to the stake and lit
Screaming for our mortal coil
Charred, there’s ashes in the soil
I bleed
But all we really need
Air, Earth, Fire, Water
So why then do we slaughter
Each other and destroy our Mother
We made Gaia a liar
And set her on fire
It’s no surprise we’re headed for the funeral pyre
So I choose to hoist
A moist tongue above a host
Speaking with the Holy Ghost
She’s the one I feel the most
I’m burning like a roast
And standing at the coast
A breeze felt with ease
[Water]
No more hailing tears
I want the music of the spheres
To me it’s finally clear
Negativity will never set us free
So this is a decree
to search for symmetry
We’ll never all agree
There’s a degree of ambivalence
Sometimes I feel like
a cut tree or a dead sea
But striving for equality,
individuality, and equilibrium
We’re in need of a baptism
We killed the fish,
so now we want Aquarius
Surrounded by the blue,
but most of it is poisonous
So float with us
But we’re splitting like a delta
And creating Helter Skelter
I’m a child of the water
But we’re in a schizophrenic schism
far from peace
Like the polytheistic gods of Greece
I’m at least under the belly of the Beast
I see its Marks
It ain’t a myth or a farce
It’s all so dark
I feel like a little boy left in a park
In need of Captain Planet
Cause I’m famished
Waste is rampant
We landed
In a beautiful Oasis
but still act like we’re all stranded
Granted, so now I light a candle
As humans, we’re like a virus
We strangle, hack, and mangle
Everything has already been created
So we think of ways to desecrate it
What we decided is not painless
My spirit is the waves of the river
and I shiver
Quiver
Some day we will deliver
Hopefully not a society like The Giver
Let’s make the world less bitter
Never let it whither
Transcend is what we must
Bring light and resurrection
To this nightmare opium den
So pardon our dust,
The systematic rust
Passed down through years of lust
I feel the manic gusts
As this frigid panic thrusts
Our epidemic must
Find a soluble end
Through visions we contend
Our soiled souls we mend
I hope the healing ain’t pretend
Now let’s repair the planet
And this time,
Let’s fuckin mean it
Sunday, May 5, 2013
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
The Scribbling Vagabond 1/23/13
The Scribbling Vagabond
by David Sherry
My name is David Sherry, but they call me Nilotic. This may be because I am one and a half parts masculine, one part feminine, and two parts pseudo-Egypt. However, if you want to get super factual about it, I was hatched just like everyone else; if you trace back far enough. On the day of Creation I was excreted from the vaginal prison at Hinsdale Hospital. It was October 24, 1989. I remember it vividly.
After my expulsion, Mother, Father, my sister, and I all lived in a little blue house in Lisle, IL until the age of six. My sister is two years older than me, so she would have been eight. Afterwhich we departed the burbs to go settle down closer to the heart of the city. The place agreed upon was a skinny brick house on LeMoyne street in Wicker Park. Now, you are missing a vital piece of information necessary for understanding this story. But have no fear for I will enlighten you.
After my mother gave birth to my sister and I, she decided that in order to fill the steadily growing hole in her soul, she must embark on a spiritual quest. This search led her to becoming a born again Christian, dedicating her life to doing the work of the Lord. My father went along for the sake of keeping the family together (or so he says in hindsight). That being said, the reason that we decided to move into the city in the first place was because my mother said she had been called to go into ‘urban ministry.’ They had already joined a church in the area. The congregation was called Freedom Church.
The first year we lived there, I had one of those moments in life where you know that that one single event altered the fabric of your entire existence. One of those cataclysmic events where you know it’s either the work of God or some devils. If absent, I may not have become the writer I am today; which is very well likely because it was while living in that house that I first put pen to paper.
The Gift of Writing runs in the Sherry blood. My father’s father is a published author himself. He started out as a journalist and also published fiction and nonfiction books. And my father is a lawyer, so I guess you could say it technically passed to him. Lord knows how many briefs he’s written in his life.
I changed schools five times before I turned twelve. By then I was in sixth grade at some private school called Catherine Cook. This was when my parents’ marriage started to dissolve. My mother had moved on from Lutheran, to Baptist, to Messianic Jewish; finding herself part of a little congregation called Temple Shalom. After a while I refused to go and just stayed home with my dad while my mom and sister went. My dad was also seeing another woman on the side (whom he later married).
So there was a divorce. Irrevocably splitting our family like a fault line in a desert. Each half ended up states away from the other. My mother and sister in Missouri, and my dad, his mistress, and I in Illinois. All these problems and turbulence sparked some sort of angst in me which I then transfered to my pen, spilling forth stories and poems I did not know were in me.
To make a long story short, we moved. Again. To Park Ridge at the beginning of eighth grade. I was the new kid again. That seemed to be the story of my life. But at the end of that year I shot my first short film. So I guess the year wasn’t a total waste.
There was a relatively traumatic summer before high school though. I had spinal fusion surgery to correct my scoliosis. There were thirteen vertebrae fused. That’s no small potatoes. Throw some physical pain into the mix with that emotional pain. Before I had the surgery, I was a little hunched, and for the first few months after the surgery, I had to wear a plastic brace. Both of these things contributed to the fact that all my classmates called me ‘turtle.’ All of this was fuel for the creative fire.
I coasted through high school, making a few films here and there and writing quite a bit. All the while living with a stepmother who I knew wanted to get rid of me. It was like a combination of every evil stepmother from every Fairy Tale by the brothers Grimm. She finally got her chance on Halloween my senior year of high school. What happened was that there was sort of this misunderstanding and my father caught information that he misinterpreted to mean that I was plotting to kill my stepmother--which consequently I wasn’t.
By this point in my life, my mother and sister had moved back to Illinois and were living in a one bedroom efficiency apartment in Crete, IL. That being said, my father dumped me off with my mother. I remained there until my father made me two appointments to get me psychoanalyzed by two different doctors. He tried to use my writing as proof that I was violent. That tactic failed miserably. Both doctors said I was not a threat to anyone and it was not a crisis situation. Nonetheless, my father refused to take me back unless I agreed to take medication. I flatly refused. Hence, I had to go live with my mother and sister.
After that I went through a period of almost three years where I didn’t speak at all to my father. My mother supported my wish to attend a two year film school after graduating from high school. Needless to say, my father didn’t. He had his heart set on me going to a four year university. To me, that seemed like the most dreaded prospect.
My mom and I decided to just say “Fuck it” and enroll me at Flashpoint Academy in the film department. The only kickback from that was a lawsuit between my mother and father that dragged out for years to come; all over who had to pay for my tuition.
I graduated from Tribeca Flashpoint in 2010 with an Associate’s Degree in Film, spending a brief two months over the summer of 2009 working as an intern at TriCoast Studios in California. They promised that there would be jobs for us when we graduated; but if you did not wish to go into corporate media, advertising, or reality television, then you are shit out of luck.
But I moved out anyway, getting a job at a movie theater in Chicago, and moving in with another filmmaker I met during my travels. We had a good run, shooting some music videos and documentaries, but his time in America was abruptly cut short. What I failed to mention is that he was an illegal Mexican immigrant. He finally got deported for too many arrests and DUIs.
Around this time I caught wind that my father was going through another divorce and finally coming to his senses after all these years. He wanted to see me to discuss some things. So I met with him. The impression I got was that he wanted to make up for some of the ways he had treated me and how he had made things worse in our family. So his proposition was to put me up in any city that I wanted to live in, for two years, all expenses paid, while I tried to get my freelance filmmaking business/record label up and running.
I humbly agreed, afterwhich I found myself in Providence, Rhode Island of all places. I drove straight there from Chicago in the dead of winter through blizzards and nor’easters. Believe it or not, I fell in love with the city and decided to stay.
To make a really long story really short, in that first year I lived there: I managed my own record label, recorded lots of music, worked with other artists, performed several shows, shot videos, and wrote a gratuitous amount. But good things must sometimes change or come to an end. A strange spiritual struggle descended on me at the end of that year. The outcome of this was an ordeal which left me frozen and hospitalized for two and a half weeks. The consequence of this was that my dad completely cut me off (he couldn’t pay me anyway since most of his money was being stolen by his ex-wife). He took my car back and left me with no way to pay for my apartment and my bills. Looking back on this, it was one of the best things that ever happened to me.
Eventually I found my way down to the Occupy movement in Providence during early 2012. I absorbed their struggles and their stories until I decided to take a bus back to Chicago in late May.
After a failed romance over that summer, I ended up moving back in with my mother in Crete, IL. My sister had already married and moved out. Even though I deliver pizza now and am taking a Journalism class at the local community college, I have no plans on slowing down. I will write, I will write, and I will write some more. And maybe perform some shows on the side until I am regularly read, listened to, and watched. Which is not far on the horizon.
I would venture to say that that’s me in a nutshell, but to be more accurate, I’d be in more like one of those Russian dolls. Layer upon layer upon layer upon layer... until you get to the moment of conception, and that’s where it ends.
or very well starts over again
by David Sherry
My name is David Sherry, but they call me Nilotic. This may be because I am one and a half parts masculine, one part feminine, and two parts pseudo-Egypt. However, if you want to get super factual about it, I was hatched just like everyone else; if you trace back far enough. On the day of Creation I was excreted from the vaginal prison at Hinsdale Hospital. It was October 24, 1989. I remember it vividly.
After my expulsion, Mother, Father, my sister, and I all lived in a little blue house in Lisle, IL until the age of six. My sister is two years older than me, so she would have been eight. Afterwhich we departed the burbs to go settle down closer to the heart of the city. The place agreed upon was a skinny brick house on LeMoyne street in Wicker Park. Now, you are missing a vital piece of information necessary for understanding this story. But have no fear for I will enlighten you.
After my mother gave birth to my sister and I, she decided that in order to fill the steadily growing hole in her soul, she must embark on a spiritual quest. This search led her to becoming a born again Christian, dedicating her life to doing the work of the Lord. My father went along for the sake of keeping the family together (or so he says in hindsight). That being said, the reason that we decided to move into the city in the first place was because my mother said she had been called to go into ‘urban ministry.’ They had already joined a church in the area. The congregation was called Freedom Church.
The first year we lived there, I had one of those moments in life where you know that that one single event altered the fabric of your entire existence. One of those cataclysmic events where you know it’s either the work of God or some devils. If absent, I may not have become the writer I am today; which is very well likely because it was while living in that house that I first put pen to paper.
The Gift of Writing runs in the Sherry blood. My father’s father is a published author himself. He started out as a journalist and also published fiction and nonfiction books. And my father is a lawyer, so I guess you could say it technically passed to him. Lord knows how many briefs he’s written in his life.
I changed schools five times before I turned twelve. By then I was in sixth grade at some private school called Catherine Cook. This was when my parents’ marriage started to dissolve. My mother had moved on from Lutheran, to Baptist, to Messianic Jewish; finding herself part of a little congregation called Temple Shalom. After a while I refused to go and just stayed home with my dad while my mom and sister went. My dad was also seeing another woman on the side (whom he later married).
So there was a divorce. Irrevocably splitting our family like a fault line in a desert. Each half ended up states away from the other. My mother and sister in Missouri, and my dad, his mistress, and I in Illinois. All these problems and turbulence sparked some sort of angst in me which I then transfered to my pen, spilling forth stories and poems I did not know were in me.
To make a long story short, we moved. Again. To Park Ridge at the beginning of eighth grade. I was the new kid again. That seemed to be the story of my life. But at the end of that year I shot my first short film. So I guess the year wasn’t a total waste.
There was a relatively traumatic summer before high school though. I had spinal fusion surgery to correct my scoliosis. There were thirteen vertebrae fused. That’s no small potatoes. Throw some physical pain into the mix with that emotional pain. Before I had the surgery, I was a little hunched, and for the first few months after the surgery, I had to wear a plastic brace. Both of these things contributed to the fact that all my classmates called me ‘turtle.’ All of this was fuel for the creative fire.
I coasted through high school, making a few films here and there and writing quite a bit. All the while living with a stepmother who I knew wanted to get rid of me. It was like a combination of every evil stepmother from every Fairy Tale by the brothers Grimm. She finally got her chance on Halloween my senior year of high school. What happened was that there was sort of this misunderstanding and my father caught information that he misinterpreted to mean that I was plotting to kill my stepmother--which consequently I wasn’t.
By this point in my life, my mother and sister had moved back to Illinois and were living in a one bedroom efficiency apartment in Crete, IL. That being said, my father dumped me off with my mother. I remained there until my father made me two appointments to get me psychoanalyzed by two different doctors. He tried to use my writing as proof that I was violent. That tactic failed miserably. Both doctors said I was not a threat to anyone and it was not a crisis situation. Nonetheless, my father refused to take me back unless I agreed to take medication. I flatly refused. Hence, I had to go live with my mother and sister.
After that I went through a period of almost three years where I didn’t speak at all to my father. My mother supported my wish to attend a two year film school after graduating from high school. Needless to say, my father didn’t. He had his heart set on me going to a four year university. To me, that seemed like the most dreaded prospect.
My mom and I decided to just say “Fuck it” and enroll me at Flashpoint Academy in the film department. The only kickback from that was a lawsuit between my mother and father that dragged out for years to come; all over who had to pay for my tuition.
I graduated from Tribeca Flashpoint in 2010 with an Associate’s Degree in Film, spending a brief two months over the summer of 2009 working as an intern at TriCoast Studios in California. They promised that there would be jobs for us when we graduated; but if you did not wish to go into corporate media, advertising, or reality television, then you are shit out of luck.
But I moved out anyway, getting a job at a movie theater in Chicago, and moving in with another filmmaker I met during my travels. We had a good run, shooting some music videos and documentaries, but his time in America was abruptly cut short. What I failed to mention is that he was an illegal Mexican immigrant. He finally got deported for too many arrests and DUIs.
Around this time I caught wind that my father was going through another divorce and finally coming to his senses after all these years. He wanted to see me to discuss some things. So I met with him. The impression I got was that he wanted to make up for some of the ways he had treated me and how he had made things worse in our family. So his proposition was to put me up in any city that I wanted to live in, for two years, all expenses paid, while I tried to get my freelance filmmaking business/record label up and running.
I humbly agreed, afterwhich I found myself in Providence, Rhode Island of all places. I drove straight there from Chicago in the dead of winter through blizzards and nor’easters. Believe it or not, I fell in love with the city and decided to stay.
To make a really long story really short, in that first year I lived there: I managed my own record label, recorded lots of music, worked with other artists, performed several shows, shot videos, and wrote a gratuitous amount. But good things must sometimes change or come to an end. A strange spiritual struggle descended on me at the end of that year. The outcome of this was an ordeal which left me frozen and hospitalized for two and a half weeks. The consequence of this was that my dad completely cut me off (he couldn’t pay me anyway since most of his money was being stolen by his ex-wife). He took my car back and left me with no way to pay for my apartment and my bills. Looking back on this, it was one of the best things that ever happened to me.
Eventually I found my way down to the Occupy movement in Providence during early 2012. I absorbed their struggles and their stories until I decided to take a bus back to Chicago in late May.
After a failed romance over that summer, I ended up moving back in with my mother in Crete, IL. My sister had already married and moved out. Even though I deliver pizza now and am taking a Journalism class at the local community college, I have no plans on slowing down. I will write, I will write, and I will write some more. And maybe perform some shows on the side until I am regularly read, listened to, and watched. Which is not far on the horizon.
I would venture to say that that’s me in a nutshell, but to be more accurate, I’d be in more like one of those Russian dolls. Layer upon layer upon layer upon layer... until you get to the moment of conception, and that’s where it ends.
or very well starts over again
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Christmas in Crete - 12/01/12
Christmas in Crete:
Red Blood and Fresh Meat
by David Sherry
It’s December 1st, and as I step out into the light, I realize that the coat I have chosen to wear is completely inappropriate for the weather. Taking into consideration that it is the first day of December, it is strangely warm; like a hot tub that’s located outside at a ski resort. The only way that anyone could possibly tell that Christmas is around the corner would be the bright lights and festive decorations hanging off of many houses and/or establishments. Immediately I begin to sweat profusely under my heavy duck down, coyote-fur-hooded mammoth. To say I am ill-prepared for this wintery desert climate is a statement that probably could use a bit of refining, if you know what I mean. Holy Hell! Is Christmas really only 25 days away? The only reason I left the house this early is because I need to get a fuse in my car replaced. And I guess it was supposed to happen that way.
As I pass the Masonic Temple, I head for the Crete Service Center. My attention is suddenly snared by a hustle and bustle usually absent in downtown Crete. The first thing that catches my attention are the ice sculptures. Kind of a shame since it’s a warm Fall day in December. The people walk about like gypsies, groups of nomads traveling from one sight to the next; never sticking to any one attraction for too long. From one angle you could say that the scene looked like an Attention Deficit Christmas Cluster. They look happy enough, I guess. There’s an over-compression of high schoolers, a disconcerting amount of adults, and the scattered bouncing children pointing at the ice sculptures and scrambling to meet Santa in the gazebo.
I pull around to the the other entrance to the service station since the one I usually drive into is blocked by a booth selling Crete-Monee Warriors merchandise. Banners and flags fly hailing the team as state champions. Now let me ask you this: why should we care? I’m not saying necessarily that we should not care, but why should we, if at all? All that aside, I pop into the office just in time because they are about to close up for the day. Rob quickly changes my fuse. He stands up from the side of my car.
“All done. It should be working fine now,” he says. I start to pull out my wallet to pay him for the work but he stops me. “Don’t worry about it,” he says to me. “It’s just a fuse.”
I’m kind of taken aback for a second. I had the money ready and everything. How often do you run into a mechanic nice enough to fix your car for free? I thank him graciously and then take off to park the car over at my house. The walk back into town is eerily quiet. But this only holds true until I reach Main Street.
There’s quite a few people traipsing through the streets, but it could hardly be called a crowd. They all have faces and stories of their own, all different yet eerily similar. It’s only 1:30 PM, and maybe more would make their way into the streets later tonight, but unfortunately I won’t be there to see it. Tonight’s a work night for me. I notice the booths set up next to the gazebo where Santa Claus resides. There’s also a smoldering fire pit in the middle of the street with a circle of empty benches set up around it. There isn’t much going on near the gazebo, so I decide to catwalk up and down the streets to survey the life-forms as well as the ice sculptures.
First I come upon ice chiseled into the form of a knight. This installment is sponsored by the Crete Chapter of the Order of St. John. Scampering around the back of the sculpture is a little four-eyed boy wearing a startling amount of blue. His hoodie reminds me of a cold pool that was subjected to a little too much dye and chlorine. The kid’s hood is pulled up over his red Santa cap, with a puffy white ball peeking out from under the blue cloth. He pokes at the ice curiously. Who knows, maybe he had dreamed of being a knight in shining armor at one point in his young life.
As I walk a little farther down the sidewalk amidst the Crete folk, another sculpture catches my eye. It takes the form of a small helicopter sitting atop what looks like a giant magnet and a heap of snow. This one is sponsored by Crete Steel. I guess that I failed to wake up early enough to see the sculptures being created. Oh well, at least I get to see them before they melt completely. As I stand and stare at the dripping helicopter, a heavy-set middle-aged man comes and stands next to me, studying the same ice that I am.
He looks at me and shakes his head. “Kind of a shame, isn’t it? Such a warm day that these sculptures won’t live for very long. It’s just ‘art of the moment,’ if you will.” I look him over without saying anything. The man gives me a nod and a salute, turns and goes on his way. After this I decide to investigate for more information. The booth near the fire pit looks like a good place to make enquiries.
So I shuffle over to the booth that’s covered in advertisements. A man and a woman sit within. The woman is probably late 20s or early 30s with long brown hair and a slim face. The man is bigger, overweight with thinning hair. He has a somewhat jolly air about him. They both acknowledge my presence.
“Can we help you?” The woman asks.
I pop my head in through the window of the booth. “Yeah, I was wondering what you can tell me about what’s going on today.”
The man gives out a big hearty belly laugh. “Oh, child,” he says with a smile. “It’s Christmas in Crete! Where all peoples come to be jolly and festive! These are the days when the streets run with red blood and fresh meat!”
I subtly raise an eyebrow. “I’ve been checking out the ice sculptures and noticed all the other booths set up.”
“Yes, sir,” he continues. “They came out to sculpt about, oh, maybe ten o’clock this morning. You missed that.” He winks at me with a toothy grin. “Santa Claus is across the way and there will be music playing in that setup later on tonight.” He points to an empty stage across the way. He hands me a piece of thick blue cardboard with snowflakes and text printed on it. “Here you can peruse over this. It tells you everything that’s happening this weekend.”
I take the schedule from him and briefly skim it over. There is going to be bands playing later tonight, but I’d have to be headed to work by then. Everything else was definitely merriment, but didn’t seem very fun. The kind of “Christmas Dull” you get once you hit a certain age. Sometimes Hanukkah can be more interesting than the ever-merchandised Christmas season. I hand the schedule back to the jolly man and thank him.
It’s about that time to fill the stomach, so I pass by the rest of the sculptures and people, some silent, some boisterous. I make my way to The Edge, a little cafe on Main Street. They have their own ice sculpture outside of a rhino sitting on a small stool; he’s holding a coffee cup which is being filled with the drips falling from his nose. So I enter The Edge to get a sandwich and some soup. The tiny cafe is somewhat cramped today since there are way more people out on the streets of Crete than there normally is. It’s encouraging to see that The Edge is getting some good business since it’s a smaller establishment, but what they serve is actually very tasty. After I sit down with my food, I notice a young man, maybe about twenty-one, performing card tricks for people around the restaurant. I eye him for a while, as any writer would do, until he comes over to my table. He’s a bit short, probably about 5’8”, thin build with short cut brown hair. Looks a little like a college kid type to me.
“You want to see a card trick?” He asks me.
“Sure,” I say, putting my spoon down into the soup.
He fans the cards out in front of me. “Pick a card,” he says. I pick one and look at it, it’s an eight of spades. He cuts the deck in half and tells me to put my card in the middle without showing it to him. I do this then he places the top half back on the deck, covering my card. He taps the top of the deck then snaps his fingers and picks up the top card. It’s a three of hearts. “This obviously isn’t your card, right?” I shake my head then he cuts the deck a couple times. “Well,” he says. “You’ve tainted that card you touched just enough for the rest of the deck to want to reject it.” He waves his right hand over the deck then snaps his fingers. A card shoots out from the middle of the deck and he catches it in his right hand. Flipping it over, I can see that it’s the eight of spades. “Is this your card?”
I hold my fist up to my mouth in disbelief and burst out laughing. “That’s pretty impressive.” He thanks me and we end up having a conversation about filmmaking, writing, school, etc. Before I leave he gives me his card. His name is John Heide, a sleight of hand/card artist. And a talented one at that.
Back outside there is a little bit more going on, but I decide that I’ve seen about enough of Christmas in Crete. There are crossing guards stationed at the crosswalk near the fire pit and the gazebo, which seem to me to be a little unnecessary because there is barely any traffic on that street as it is.
“How are you doing today?” One of them asks me as we wait to cross.
“Pretty good,” I say. “How about you? Enjoying helping people across the street?”
“Safety first!” He says with a smile. “It’s important to make sure that everyone gets across the street safely.”
“Yeah,” I say. “But if a planet or a meteor were to collide with the earth right now, it wouldn’t really matter if you got everyone across the road safely. They’d all be dead anyway.”
He is silent for a second then responds. “That’s true. No one knows when that time is coming.” He walks out into the street with his stop sign above his head. The cars stop and I cross toward the booths and the fire pit.
I nod to the crossing guards and bid them a good day. That’s when I notice that there are people sitting around the fire pit now listening to a strange looking Santa. I walk over and stand behind one of the benches to hear what he’s talking about. He’s wearing a green tunic with a long red robe over it. Around his head is a wreath made of evergreen branches. He’s explaining the origins of Saint Nicholas. Most of what comes out of his mouth seems like a load of hogwash and glamorized myth so I decide to depart.
As I walk home, satisfied that I have seen all I needed to see, a hawk swoops down over head and lands in a tree a few feet in front of me. Not a huge bird, but a majestic one nonetheless. It surveys the landscape with its razor-sharp eyesight. I think of Horus as his striped tail feathers ruffle in the breeze. To me, this singe occurance has been by far more inspiring than anything I have seen today in the streets of downtown Crete.
Red Blood and Fresh Meat
by David Sherry
It’s December 1st, and as I step out into the light, I realize that the coat I have chosen to wear is completely inappropriate for the weather. Taking into consideration that it is the first day of December, it is strangely warm; like a hot tub that’s located outside at a ski resort. The only way that anyone could possibly tell that Christmas is around the corner would be the bright lights and festive decorations hanging off of many houses and/or establishments. Immediately I begin to sweat profusely under my heavy duck down, coyote-fur-hooded mammoth. To say I am ill-prepared for this wintery desert climate is a statement that probably could use a bit of refining, if you know what I mean. Holy Hell! Is Christmas really only 25 days away? The only reason I left the house this early is because I need to get a fuse in my car replaced. And I guess it was supposed to happen that way.
I pull around to the the other entrance to the service station since the one I usually drive into is blocked by a booth selling Crete-Monee Warriors merchandise. Banners and flags fly hailing the team as state champions. Now let me ask you this: why should we care? I’m not saying necessarily that we should not care, but why should we, if at all? All that aside, I pop into the office just in time because they are about to close up for the day. Rob quickly changes my fuse. He stands up from the side of my car.
“All done. It should be working fine now,” he says. I start to pull out my wallet to pay him for the work but he stops me. “Don’t worry about it,” he says to me. “It’s just a fuse.”
I’m kind of taken aback for a second. I had the money ready and everything. How often do you run into a mechanic nice enough to fix your car for free? I thank him graciously and then take off to park the car over at my house. The walk back into town is eerily quiet. But this only holds true until I reach Main Street.
There’s quite a few people traipsing through the streets, but it could hardly be called a crowd. They all have faces and stories of their own, all different yet eerily similar. It’s only 1:30 PM, and maybe more would make their way into the streets later tonight, but unfortunately I won’t be there to see it. Tonight’s a work night for me. I notice the booths set up next to the gazebo where Santa Claus resides. There’s also a smoldering fire pit in the middle of the street with a circle of empty benches set up around it. There isn’t much going on near the gazebo, so I decide to catwalk up and down the streets to survey the life-forms as well as the ice sculptures.
First I come upon ice chiseled into the form of a knight. This installment is sponsored by the Crete Chapter of the Order of St. John. Scampering around the back of the sculpture is a little four-eyed boy wearing a startling amount of blue. His hoodie reminds me of a cold pool that was subjected to a little too much dye and chlorine. The kid’s hood is pulled up over his red Santa cap, with a puffy white ball peeking out from under the blue cloth. He pokes at the ice curiously. Who knows, maybe he had dreamed of being a knight in shining armor at one point in his young life.
As I walk a little farther down the sidewalk amidst the Crete folk, another sculpture catches my eye. It takes the form of a small helicopter sitting atop what looks like a giant magnet and a heap of snow. This one is sponsored by Crete Steel. I guess that I failed to wake up early enough to see the sculptures being created. Oh well, at least I get to see them before they melt completely. As I stand and stare at the dripping helicopter, a heavy-set middle-aged man comes and stands next to me, studying the same ice that I am.
He looks at me and shakes his head. “Kind of a shame, isn’t it? Such a warm day that these sculptures won’t live for very long. It’s just ‘art of the moment,’ if you will.” I look him over without saying anything. The man gives me a nod and a salute, turns and goes on his way. After this I decide to investigate for more information. The booth near the fire pit looks like a good place to make enquiries.
So I shuffle over to the booth that’s covered in advertisements. A man and a woman sit within. The woman is probably late 20s or early 30s with long brown hair and a slim face. The man is bigger, overweight with thinning hair. He has a somewhat jolly air about him. They both acknowledge my presence.
“Can we help you?” The woman asks.
I pop my head in through the window of the booth. “Yeah, I was wondering what you can tell me about what’s going on today.”
The man gives out a big hearty belly laugh. “Oh, child,” he says with a smile. “It’s Christmas in Crete! Where all peoples come to be jolly and festive! These are the days when the streets run with red blood and fresh meat!”
I subtly raise an eyebrow. “I’ve been checking out the ice sculptures and noticed all the other booths set up.”
“Yes, sir,” he continues. “They came out to sculpt about, oh, maybe ten o’clock this morning. You missed that.” He winks at me with a toothy grin. “Santa Claus is across the way and there will be music playing in that setup later on tonight.” He points to an empty stage across the way. He hands me a piece of thick blue cardboard with snowflakes and text printed on it. “Here you can peruse over this. It tells you everything that’s happening this weekend.”
I take the schedule from him and briefly skim it over. There is going to be bands playing later tonight, but I’d have to be headed to work by then. Everything else was definitely merriment, but didn’t seem very fun. The kind of “Christmas Dull” you get once you hit a certain age. Sometimes Hanukkah can be more interesting than the ever-merchandised Christmas season. I hand the schedule back to the jolly man and thank him.
It’s about that time to fill the stomach, so I pass by the rest of the sculptures and people, some silent, some boisterous. I make my way to The Edge, a little cafe on Main Street. They have their own ice sculpture outside of a rhino sitting on a small stool; he’s holding a coffee cup which is being filled with the drips falling from his nose. So I enter The Edge to get a sandwich and some soup. The tiny cafe is somewhat cramped today since there are way more people out on the streets of Crete than there normally is. It’s encouraging to see that The Edge is getting some good business since it’s a smaller establishment, but what they serve is actually very tasty. After I sit down with my food, I notice a young man, maybe about twenty-one, performing card tricks for people around the restaurant. I eye him for a while, as any writer would do, until he comes over to my table. He’s a bit short, probably about 5’8”, thin build with short cut brown hair. Looks a little like a college kid type to me.
“You want to see a card trick?” He asks me.
“Sure,” I say, putting my spoon down into the soup.
He fans the cards out in front of me. “Pick a card,” he says. I pick one and look at it, it’s an eight of spades. He cuts the deck in half and tells me to put my card in the middle without showing it to him. I do this then he places the top half back on the deck, covering my card. He taps the top of the deck then snaps his fingers and picks up the top card. It’s a three of hearts. “This obviously isn’t your card, right?” I shake my head then he cuts the deck a couple times. “Well,” he says. “You’ve tainted that card you touched just enough for the rest of the deck to want to reject it.” He waves his right hand over the deck then snaps his fingers. A card shoots out from the middle of the deck and he catches it in his right hand. Flipping it over, I can see that it’s the eight of spades. “Is this your card?”
I hold my fist up to my mouth in disbelief and burst out laughing. “That’s pretty impressive.” He thanks me and we end up having a conversation about filmmaking, writing, school, etc. Before I leave he gives me his card. His name is John Heide, a sleight of hand/card artist. And a talented one at that.
Back outside there is a little bit more going on, but I decide that I’ve seen about enough of Christmas in Crete. There are crossing guards stationed at the crosswalk near the fire pit and the gazebo, which seem to me to be a little unnecessary because there is barely any traffic on that street as it is.
“How are you doing today?” One of them asks me as we wait to cross.
“Pretty good,” I say. “How about you? Enjoying helping people across the street?”
“Safety first!” He says with a smile. “It’s important to make sure that everyone gets across the street safely.”
“Yeah,” I say. “But if a planet or a meteor were to collide with the earth right now, it wouldn’t really matter if you got everyone across the road safely. They’d all be dead anyway.”
He is silent for a second then responds. “That’s true. No one knows when that time is coming.” He walks out into the street with his stop sign above his head. The cars stop and I cross toward the booths and the fire pit.
I nod to the crossing guards and bid them a good day. That’s when I notice that there are people sitting around the fire pit now listening to a strange looking Santa. I walk over and stand behind one of the benches to hear what he’s talking about. He’s wearing a green tunic with a long red robe over it. Around his head is a wreath made of evergreen branches. He’s explaining the origins of Saint Nicholas. Most of what comes out of his mouth seems like a load of hogwash and glamorized myth so I decide to depart.
As I walk home, satisfied that I have seen all I needed to see, a hawk swoops down over head and lands in a tree a few feet in front of me. Not a huge bird, but a majestic one nonetheless. It surveys the landscape with its razor-sharp eyesight. I think of Horus as his striped tail feathers ruffle in the breeze. To me, this singe occurance has been by far more inspiring than anything I have seen today in the streets of downtown Crete.
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
"Begotten" by David Sherry
“Like a flame burning away the darkness,
Life is flesh on bone convulsing above the ground.”
Innocence is lost when it is destroyed by the rough bark of dead trees. I can see what is not yet left in this forest of nothingness. Coming into focus of harsh blacks and whites is a cabin that does not decide anything even in flowing robes of clouds. God sits and he is nothing here. He is discontent as drip drip he feels it fall to the ground in pools of black. Why is he gushing what he has created to spawn life? His hands are wet and he gropes the cracked walls, smearing what is left of heaven. No longer white, all that is now is streaks of black. Worms of forgotten prayers wallow in discarded sand. He is deaf and all He knows is being ripped from his open emptiness. The foot is dead and the second flood slips down and covers the flesh that is on the bone. Wet, damp, and soiled, he knows nothing. But from the ashes and the drippingness of mortality rises a beating heart. A Mother Earth that is blinded by her father’s image. Wet black on flowing white releases her to the sun. She strokes the Father’s dead manhood, becoming the woman: fertile and pure. White spray tendrils waterfall and cover her with steam. In the life of dead anything makes what virgins keep. She has become the mover as she spreads the seed over her being, impregnating her once disregarded womb.
A field of desolate expanse with sliding coffin, wooden and hollow. Stand up, I say, and it becomes me as Mother Earth strokes her distended belly. She is big with him, the Son. Arteries, veins, sky of endless clouds and He is born. Son of Earth is purged from the womb as a full grown son. Ropes of infidelity in the land of Nod, he is taken by nomads and dashed against the stones. He gives them gifts of flesh from his mouth and they eat of his abundance.
But raped once more by nomads of old, Mother Earth cannot fight as her body is entered and impaled repeatedly by the wordless mouths of utterance. We known not from whence they came as their violence speaks of days of old. Pulling apart the bodies of the weak. Limb torn from socket and pounded to the earth with withered sticks. Mother and son are destroyed. Destructed into the ground of Creation. But forthwith flowers spring forth into life on the ground of the dead.
Life is flesh on bone convulsing above the ground.”
Innocence is lost when it is destroyed by the rough bark of dead trees. I can see what is not yet left in this forest of nothingness. Coming into focus of harsh blacks and whites is a cabin that does not decide anything even in flowing robes of clouds. God sits and he is nothing here. He is discontent as drip drip he feels it fall to the ground in pools of black. Why is he gushing what he has created to spawn life? His hands are wet and he gropes the cracked walls, smearing what is left of heaven. No longer white, all that is now is streaks of black. Worms of forgotten prayers wallow in discarded sand. He is deaf and all He knows is being ripped from his open emptiness. The foot is dead and the second flood slips down and covers the flesh that is on the bone. Wet, damp, and soiled, he knows nothing. But from the ashes and the drippingness of mortality rises a beating heart. A Mother Earth that is blinded by her father’s image. Wet black on flowing white releases her to the sun. She strokes the Father’s dead manhood, becoming the woman: fertile and pure. White spray tendrils waterfall and cover her with steam. In the life of dead anything makes what virgins keep. She has become the mover as she spreads the seed over her being, impregnating her once disregarded womb.
A field of desolate expanse with sliding coffin, wooden and hollow. Stand up, I say, and it becomes me as Mother Earth strokes her distended belly. She is big with him, the Son. Arteries, veins, sky of endless clouds and He is born. Son of Earth is purged from the womb as a full grown son. Ropes of infidelity in the land of Nod, he is taken by nomads and dashed against the stones. He gives them gifts of flesh from his mouth and they eat of his abundance.
But raped once more by nomads of old, Mother Earth cannot fight as her body is entered and impaled repeatedly by the wordless mouths of utterance. We known not from whence they came as their violence speaks of days of old. Pulling apart the bodies of the weak. Limb torn from socket and pounded to the earth with withered sticks. Mother and son are destroyed. Destructed into the ground of Creation. But forthwith flowers spring forth into life on the ground of the dead.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Hellion (version 1)
I run off God’s own ethanol
A stench with gall
So who’s got the ball
And who’s court is this
Which elite can I dis
Dismiss it with a fist
Oh, I insist
That you finally enlist
In the army
That’ll help us coexist
But I missed the sign-up sheet
Cause she couldn’t be discreet
And I lost my hand within the sheets
So I was unable to write
Even to utter my name at night
The pencil picked a fight
Between the lines hidden from sight
Is it strength to show our might
But that doesn’t make it right
I’m riding that beam of light
It doesn’t touch the sun
It’s just a rainbow for fun
Words that’ll never be outdone
Word
Who’s the leader of this herd?
Is a phoenix a spirit or a bird?
A question so absurd
I wouldn’t expect it to be fulfilled more
I write above blood and gore
So much more than a seeping sore
Bleeding on the floor
With cuts, I’m loosing breath
Inching toward my death
Shadows bring the Thoth
Foaming mouth full of froth
Like the head of a beer
LSD to see clear
Listen, can you hear
A suicide of peers
You lack empathetic tears
At the River’s Edge
We built a callous hedge
To hear a killer bragging
So I’m lagging behind
Any feeling for the body that we find
This flesh is just rind
To slice our own kind
Inside, defined pulp
Like a blood orange
step back and gulp
Behold your Wizard of Gore
You’re begging for more
Simon Says to sever the core
Dead bodies melted down to Iron Ore
Drop Dead Sexy
Lifeless like Ellie
Hellion
What Is It? we sellin’ ’em
A stench with gall
So who’s got the ball
And who’s court is this
Which elite can I dis
Dismiss it with a fist
Oh, I insist
That you finally enlist
In the army
That’ll help us coexist
But I missed the sign-up sheet
Cause she couldn’t be discreet
And I lost my hand within the sheets
So I was unable to write
Even to utter my name at night
The pencil picked a fight
Between the lines hidden from sight
Is it strength to show our might
But that doesn’t make it right
I’m riding that beam of light
It doesn’t touch the sun
It’s just a rainbow for fun
Words that’ll never be outdone
Word
Who’s the leader of this herd?
Is a phoenix a spirit or a bird?
A question so absurd
I wouldn’t expect it to be fulfilled more
I write above blood and gore
So much more than a seeping sore
Bleeding on the floor
With cuts, I’m loosing breath
Inching toward my death
Shadows bring the Thoth
Foaming mouth full of froth
Like the head of a beer
LSD to see clear
Listen, can you hear
A suicide of peers
You lack empathetic tears
At the River’s Edge
We built a callous hedge
To hear a killer bragging
So I’m lagging behind
Any feeling for the body that we find
This flesh is just rind
To slice our own kind
Inside, defined pulp
Like a blood orange
step back and gulp
Behold your Wizard of Gore
You’re begging for more
Simon Says to sever the core
Dead bodies melted down to Iron Ore
Drop Dead Sexy
Lifeless like Ellie
Hellion
What Is It? we sellin’ ’em
Friday, November 23, 2012
Elemental Junkie
Ingest me like a chemical compound
I’m here to shatter ground and astound
But if my head could ever quit its pounding,
I could do with a little grounding
Cause my place is in space
Fuck an atomic rock
I love God’s creation,
but we put it on lock
So I take a hammer to this clock
Crystal shards
To get cosmic lawyers disbarred
Which card you got?
Does it thicken this plot
Or stir the concoction in the pot
What’s the molecular makeup
of my dripping snot
Buck shot forming out of astral ash
Take your monatomic gold
and trade it in for cash
I’m bleeding hurricanes from a gash
And I wouldn’t bother to
lick your blood from the grass
Puff puff pass
And pass out
Don’t look down
Cause then you’ll hear a deafening sound
That’ll drown out His voice
This has always been a choice
So I choose to hoist
A moist tongue above a host
Speaking with the Holy Ghost
She’s the one I feel the most
I’m burning like a roast
And standing at the coast
A breeze felt with ease
We’re in a schizophrenic schism
far from peace
Like the polytheistic gods of Greece
I’m at least under the belly of the Beast
I see its Marks
It ain’t a myth or a farce
It’s all so dark
Like a nightmare opium den
Or a crack whore garden
Pardon our dust
And systematic rust
Passed down through years of lust
I feel the manic gusts
As this frigid panic thrusts
Our epidemic must
Find a soluble end
Through visions we contend
Our soiled souls we mend
Hope the healing ain’t pretend
I’m here to shatter ground and astound
But if my head could ever quit its pounding,
I could do with a little grounding
Cause my place is in space
Fuck an atomic rock
I love God’s creation,
but we put it on lock
So I take a hammer to this clock
Crystal shards
To get cosmic lawyers disbarred
Which card you got?
Does it thicken this plot
Or stir the concoction in the pot
What’s the molecular makeup
of my dripping snot
Buck shot forming out of astral ash
Take your monatomic gold
and trade it in for cash
I’m bleeding hurricanes from a gash
And I wouldn’t bother to
lick your blood from the grass
Puff puff pass
And pass out
Don’t look down
Cause then you’ll hear a deafening sound
That’ll drown out His voice
This has always been a choice
So I choose to hoist
A moist tongue above a host
Speaking with the Holy Ghost
She’s the one I feel the most
I’m burning like a roast
And standing at the coast
A breeze felt with ease
We’re in a schizophrenic schism
far from peace
Like the polytheistic gods of Greece
I’m at least under the belly of the Beast
I see its Marks
It ain’t a myth or a farce
It’s all so dark
Like a nightmare opium den
Or a crack whore garden
Pardon our dust
And systematic rust
Passed down through years of lust
I feel the manic gusts
As this frigid panic thrusts
Our epidemic must
Find a soluble end
Through visions we contend
Our soiled souls we mend
Hope the healing ain’t pretend
Monday, May 10, 2010
"Messiah Complex" - Track by Track Descriptions
A NOTE ON THE CONCEPT:
The concept of this album is pretty simple actually. Track by track it describes the journey of a man who believes he will single handedly bring about the destruction of mankind and the world. It is similar to the concept for Manson’s Antichrist Superstar; however, where his character destroys himself at the end, mine decides to go another way.
This is an exploration of my darkest and most destructive nature...
1) SEVEN
Seven is the last poem in my first poetry anthology Shackled to Creation. Each piece of writing or collection of writing describes a certain step in my journey, all of them follow a certain path or arc. So this poem was to end the anthology and lead into the Messiah Complex album. It is really the introduction to the album, describing the character whom I was going to explore. The piece describes a very destructive being who feels like his sole mission is to bring about the end of mankind as we know it. It is an end and a beginning. An end to the first era of my evolution, which was my older writing, and the beginning of “The Destroyer.”
2) SKIN LIKE YOU
Skin Like You is a very odd song not just for the way that it sounds. It was created from an older piece of writing that I never finished. I dug my old scribblings for this up and decided it would be good for this album. The other reason it’s an odd song is that the other half of the song was inproved while I recorded it, that’s why some of the spoken lyrics are not in the written lyrics. This song is second in the album because it is the next logical step in the evolution of The Destroyer. This track is him coming out of his shell (kind of a birth) and discovering who he is and what his mission is in life. He looks at himself and other people around him and questions how they are similar and how they are different.
3) THE ANTICHRIST SCENARIO
I think this one’s pretty self explanatory. This is actually a poem I wrote two years ago for a creative writing class, but my teacher wouldn’t let me share it with the class. Now I’m sharing it with the world. It is my take on the Antichrist, what or whoever that may be.
4) DESTROYER
The first line of this song was inspired by a part of the Sage Francis song The Time of My Life: “The year made me a dragon, the month made me a scorpio.” This made me think of my own signs. I am a scorpio, however the year made me a snake, so I have to live with the fact that I’m a snake and not a dragon. Then the rest of the song evolved from there. This was really the first “real” attempt at writing a rap song for the album, and it’s kinda obvious compared to the other rap on the album. Anyways, to the concept... This is the real defining track for the character in the album. It’s when he decides that he wants to be destructive instead of creative. He’s angry and people better get ready to die.
5) HANGING ON A TWISTED CROSS
This is one of my favorite tracks on the album and I think this is because it has a distinctively different sound than all the other tracks. It was also created from bits of unfinished lyrics that I had scribbled in notebooks. And it’s definitely got a Manson-ish feel to it, at least to me. This track is really where the “Messiah” reference starts to come into play. He’s portraying himself as sort of an evil Jesus, angry that he’s being crucified or martyred. Even though “Messiah” means savior, I use this as the title despite the fact it is obvious the main character wants to destroy humanity. But in his head he feels like he’s really saving them through their destruction. Saving them from themselves.
6) VISIONLAND
Visionland was song I actually wrote a while back. It was intended to be a “sung” song not a “hip-hop” song. But I think it works the way I sort-of rap it. Eyes are the big theme in this track. It’s the first time this theme has popped up in this record, but it is a very prominent theme in my first poetry anthology: references to people only being able to see once they lose their eyes. What can you see with those empty eye sockets?
8) FEVER DREAM
Fever Dream is the first single off of the album, which inspired the B-side REM is Masturbation which is not on the album. It’s a new song I wrote and is the first hip-hop-y sounding track on the album. The song doesn’t directly relate to the concept of the album, however it is deeply personal and describes actual dreams that I have had. And when you think about it, the whole album can be described as one long fever dream.
The first verse of the song describes one of the weirdest dreams I have ever had. It takes place in a one room apartment that’s almost completely bare. The apartment is very old looking with a dirty, cracked wooden floor. The walls are dirty white and there are no windows. In the middle of the room is a “christmas tree” (pine tree) with no ornaments on it. Hiding inside the branches is a naked girl about nine years old. An old man that walks with a cane appears in the room and approaches the tree. He grabs the girls wrist and pulls her hand out into the air. The old man produces a straight razor from his pocket and proceeds to skin the girl’s hand with it. Then the dream ends.
The first part of verse two describes another strange dream I had. In this dream I am held captive in an abandoned factory. This factory has been deserted for a long time do to it is crumbling and broken up inside. All four sides are surrounded by high corn fields and is guarded by wolves in case I try to escape. I remember thinking in the dream that they locked me up in here because they knew I was going to destroy the world. Then I break out of the window of the factory and sprint over the tops of the corn stalks until I am overtaken by the wolves.
And then I started thinking about the girl I was with at the time... And yeah... The fetus infected my relationship again and I decided to write about that in verse three. And the last two lines before the last line of verse three were inspired by something that was said to me by the girl I was with the summer of 2009. She said (paraphrased): I know you think you’re suffering makes you a better artist. So I felt angry and basically as a fuck you to her said (in the song) that I don’t give a shit if she kills herself, it would just make me a better artist. And the last line is a reference to “Vision Forum” which is a Christian organization that does a lot of different things, but there is a speaker that’s part of vision forum that talks a lot about filmmaking and how he thinks most filmmakers have a “Marxist agenda.” So that’s where the last line comes from.
9) I KILL WITH MY CUNT
I do not own any part of this track. It’s completely sampled from the film Liquid Sky, which I was watching a lot while I wrote this album. I thought it was appropriate to use it since it explored androgyny, the rock star mentality (which goes along with the Messiah Complex), and a destructive nature.
10) KILLER OF LAST THINGS
I wanted to have a track on this album that explained The Nilotic. This track is a complete adaptation of the character from the book Sacrament by Clive Barker. Jacob Steep refers to himself as the killer of last things and that’s why I titled the track that, going along with the theme of destruction.
11) GODDAMNIT
This is another poem I wrote for my creative writing class but my teacher wouldn’t let me share. This track is supposed to be the turning point of the album, where The Destroyer begins to change again. He is still holding on to his idea of destroying the world, but he’s beginning to see that it is destroying himself as well.
12) HUMANIMAL
Another completely new hip-hop song I wrote for the album. This track is when The Destroyer begins to realize that he is just an angry immature child and in turn gets more pissed off, and for a brief moment becomes more self-destructive and resigned to the fact that he’s this less-than-human evil thing. The intro is sampled from the film Liquid Sky. However, at the end of the song there is a brief glimpse of something new, The Destroyer may still want to do something with his life even if it isn’t as catastrophic. He still feels like he has something to teach.
13) OPPOSITE MAN
Opposite Man is my favorite song on the album and also the most personal. Most of the tracks on this album are rather angry, but this one is sad and reflective. This is when I decide to try and give up the whole “destruction of mankind” mentality but still continue on my journey and see where it takes me.
This song was inspired by a classmate of mine who has a lot of different opinions than I do. One day he called me the “opposite man” and this song grew out of that. I reference Voltaire in the first verse and the line after that is just reiterating that I think you should have the right to say those things even if I don’t agree with it. And the line before The Sound is very tongue-in-cheek and ironic. :)
The line “Who’s the enemy if the whole world is my home?” is a little taste of things to come. The more creative/spiritual side of me. The one that’s connected with nature and the universe, the one who doesn’t want to be destructive, who doesn’t want to be separate, who wants to love. After that I mention Mysterious Skin which is my favorite movie. My taste in movies is very different than a lot of people’s because most of my favorites are very depressing. And the majority of my top movies explore child abuse in some way, which I relate to in many ways.
The chorus is pretty much just all of the different titles I have referred to myself as in my writing (Destroyer isn’t in there because I never really referred to myself as that until these song descriptions).
In the second verse I describe myself as being four years behind; this isn’t the first time I have said this in my writing. After that I explore communication breakdowns a bit. I have a really hard time reading people sometimes, especially girls. And more often than not I interpret unspoken communication in the wrong way.
Verse three shows that I still feel like I have a purpose and I will still strive for it. I will still shake the world, but not through killing everyone. A lot of people underestimate me, but I’ll show you more than you’re willing to comprehend or foresee.
14) OUTBOUND TRAIN
Outbound Train is the final track and the only song that could have ended this record. It shows that there may be hope for something different; something not so destructive. This is when I come to terms with the fact that some of these visions may be just delusions and I don’t have enough power to destroy the world. Then maybe there’s another way, maybe helping or saving might be the key. But then again I question why would I want to save a world that rejects me?
Believing that I am the sole destroyer of the world, the angry killer, is not productive. There must be another way.
This is an end, but it’s also definitely a beginning...
The concept of this album is pretty simple actually. Track by track it describes the journey of a man who believes he will single handedly bring about the destruction of mankind and the world. It is similar to the concept for Manson’s Antichrist Superstar; however, where his character destroys himself at the end, mine decides to go another way.
This is an exploration of my darkest and most destructive nature...
1) SEVEN
Seven is the last poem in my first poetry anthology Shackled to Creation. Each piece of writing or collection of writing describes a certain step in my journey, all of them follow a certain path or arc. So this poem was to end the anthology and lead into the Messiah Complex album. It is really the introduction to the album, describing the character whom I was going to explore. The piece describes a very destructive being who feels like his sole mission is to bring about the end of mankind as we know it. It is an end and a beginning. An end to the first era of my evolution, which was my older writing, and the beginning of “The Destroyer.”
I haven’t even begun,
But this is your finale.
My overture will start momentarily.
But for now,
Wait for me, my darlings.
You won’t live for much longer.
But this is your finale.
My overture will start momentarily.
But for now,
Wait for me, my darlings.
You won’t live for much longer.
2) SKIN LIKE YOU
Skin Like You is a very odd song not just for the way that it sounds. It was created from an older piece of writing that I never finished. I dug my old scribblings for this up and decided it would be good for this album. The other reason it’s an odd song is that the other half of the song was inproved while I recorded it, that’s why some of the spoken lyrics are not in the written lyrics. This song is second in the album because it is the next logical step in the evolution of The Destroyer. This track is him coming out of his shell (kind of a birth) and discovering who he is and what his mission is in life. He looks at himself and other people around him and questions how they are similar and how they are different.
3) THE ANTICHRIST SCENARIO
I think this one’s pretty self explanatory. This is actually a poem I wrote two years ago for a creative writing class, but my teacher wouldn’t let me share it with the class. Now I’m sharing it with the world. It is my take on the Antichrist, what or whoever that may be.
4) DESTROYER
The first line of this song was inspired by a part of the Sage Francis song The Time of My Life: “The year made me a dragon, the month made me a scorpio.” This made me think of my own signs. I am a scorpio, however the year made me a snake, so I have to live with the fact that I’m a snake and not a dragon. Then the rest of the song evolved from there. This was really the first “real” attempt at writing a rap song for the album, and it’s kinda obvious compared to the other rap on the album. Anyways, to the concept... This is the real defining track for the character in the album. It’s when he decides that he wants to be destructive instead of creative. He’s angry and people better get ready to die.
5) HANGING ON A TWISTED CROSS
This is one of my favorite tracks on the album and I think this is because it has a distinctively different sound than all the other tracks. It was also created from bits of unfinished lyrics that I had scribbled in notebooks. And it’s definitely got a Manson-ish feel to it, at least to me. This track is really where the “Messiah” reference starts to come into play. He’s portraying himself as sort of an evil Jesus, angry that he’s being crucified or martyred. Even though “Messiah” means savior, I use this as the title despite the fact it is obvious the main character wants to destroy humanity. But in his head he feels like he’s really saving them through their destruction. Saving them from themselves.
6) VISIONLAND
Visionland was song I actually wrote a while back. It was intended to be a “sung” song not a “hip-hop” song. But I think it works the way I sort-of rap it. Eyes are the big theme in this track. It’s the first time this theme has popped up in this record, but it is a very prominent theme in my first poetry anthology: references to people only being able to see once they lose their eyes. What can you see with those empty eye sockets?
8) FEVER DREAM
Fever Dream is the first single off of the album, which inspired the B-side REM is Masturbation which is not on the album. It’s a new song I wrote and is the first hip-hop-y sounding track on the album. The song doesn’t directly relate to the concept of the album, however it is deeply personal and describes actual dreams that I have had. And when you think about it, the whole album can be described as one long fever dream.
The first verse of the song describes one of the weirdest dreams I have ever had. It takes place in a one room apartment that’s almost completely bare. The apartment is very old looking with a dirty, cracked wooden floor. The walls are dirty white and there are no windows. In the middle of the room is a “christmas tree” (pine tree) with no ornaments on it. Hiding inside the branches is a naked girl about nine years old. An old man that walks with a cane appears in the room and approaches the tree. He grabs the girls wrist and pulls her hand out into the air. The old man produces a straight razor from his pocket and proceeds to skin the girl’s hand with it. Then the dream ends.
The first part of verse two describes another strange dream I had. In this dream I am held captive in an abandoned factory. This factory has been deserted for a long time do to it is crumbling and broken up inside. All four sides are surrounded by high corn fields and is guarded by wolves in case I try to escape. I remember thinking in the dream that they locked me up in here because they knew I was going to destroy the world. Then I break out of the window of the factory and sprint over the tops of the corn stalks until I am overtaken by the wolves.
And then I started thinking about the girl I was with at the time... And yeah... The fetus infected my relationship again and I decided to write about that in verse three. And the last two lines before the last line of verse three were inspired by something that was said to me by the girl I was with the summer of 2009. She said (paraphrased): I know you think you’re suffering makes you a better artist. So I felt angry and basically as a fuck you to her said (in the song) that I don’t give a shit if she kills herself, it would just make me a better artist. And the last line is a reference to “Vision Forum” which is a Christian organization that does a lot of different things, but there is a speaker that’s part of vision forum that talks a lot about filmmaking and how he thinks most filmmakers have a “Marxist agenda.” So that’s where the last line comes from.
9) I KILL WITH MY CUNT
I do not own any part of this track. It’s completely sampled from the film Liquid Sky, which I was watching a lot while I wrote this album. I thought it was appropriate to use it since it explored androgyny, the rock star mentality (which goes along with the Messiah Complex), and a destructive nature.
10) KILLER OF LAST THINGS
I wanted to have a track on this album that explained The Nilotic. This track is a complete adaptation of the character from the book Sacrament by Clive Barker. Jacob Steep refers to himself as the killer of last things and that’s why I titled the track that, going along with the theme of destruction.
11) GODDAMNIT
This is another poem I wrote for my creative writing class but my teacher wouldn’t let me share. This track is supposed to be the turning point of the album, where The Destroyer begins to change again. He is still holding on to his idea of destroying the world, but he’s beginning to see that it is destroying himself as well.
12) HUMANIMAL
Another completely new hip-hop song I wrote for the album. This track is when The Destroyer begins to realize that he is just an angry immature child and in turn gets more pissed off, and for a brief moment becomes more self-destructive and resigned to the fact that he’s this less-than-human evil thing. The intro is sampled from the film Liquid Sky. However, at the end of the song there is a brief glimpse of something new, The Destroyer may still want to do something with his life even if it isn’t as catastrophic. He still feels like he has something to teach.
13) OPPOSITE MAN
Opposite Man is my favorite song on the album and also the most personal. Most of the tracks on this album are rather angry, but this one is sad and reflective. This is when I decide to try and give up the whole “destruction of mankind” mentality but still continue on my journey and see where it takes me.
This song was inspired by a classmate of mine who has a lot of different opinions than I do. One day he called me the “opposite man” and this song grew out of that. I reference Voltaire in the first verse and the line after that is just reiterating that I think you should have the right to say those things even if I don’t agree with it. And the line before The Sound is very tongue-in-cheek and ironic. :)
The line “Who’s the enemy if the whole world is my home?” is a little taste of things to come. The more creative/spiritual side of me. The one that’s connected with nature and the universe, the one who doesn’t want to be destructive, who doesn’t want to be separate, who wants to love. After that I mention Mysterious Skin which is my favorite movie. My taste in movies is very different than a lot of people’s because most of my favorites are very depressing. And the majority of my top movies explore child abuse in some way, which I relate to in many ways.
The chorus is pretty much just all of the different titles I have referred to myself as in my writing (Destroyer isn’t in there because I never really referred to myself as that until these song descriptions).
In the second verse I describe myself as being four years behind; this isn’t the first time I have said this in my writing. After that I explore communication breakdowns a bit. I have a really hard time reading people sometimes, especially girls. And more often than not I interpret unspoken communication in the wrong way.
Verse three shows that I still feel like I have a purpose and I will still strive for it. I will still shake the world, but not through killing everyone. A lot of people underestimate me, but I’ll show you more than you’re willing to comprehend or foresee.
14) OUTBOUND TRAIN
Outbound Train is the final track and the only song that could have ended this record. It shows that there may be hope for something different; something not so destructive. This is when I come to terms with the fact that some of these visions may be just delusions and I don’t have enough power to destroy the world. Then maybe there’s another way, maybe helping or saving might be the key. But then again I question why would I want to save a world that rejects me?
Believing that I am the sole destroyer of the world, the angry killer, is not productive. There must be another way.
Sex isn’t everything but everything is sex
Please help me discard this messiah complex
Please help me discard this messiah complex
This is an end, but it’s also definitely a beginning...
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