Tonight I roped D & B into a skype dialogue. Most of it was us smiling happily into the screen and just saying, "ohhhhh." I miss them with a pain to the heart, but the good kind. My emotions are sitting so close to the surface. Never have I missed people so physically. Everything in me aches to be held on their couch while laughing to 30Rock ("my mindgrapes!") I had to take photos because I love photos these days. The poet I stopped by too. That's her with the badass fro.
Much to do but I'm still on Cali sleep time and wide awake at 3:30am. All of my responsibilities begin tomorrow, for those of you waiting. Give me the next few hours of sleep and I'm back to my normal follow through self.
So here we are. I'm home. I've missed the recounting of so many incredible experiences and am left to back track. The stories will come spotty and out of order, but so be it. I want to exist in them a bit longer anyway. I'm planning a chapbook of travel stories and poems so watch out! Reworked and revamped and mostly just for mumbles and the Dust, but you too, if you want to drop a couple bucks.
Anyway. I'm listening to Raashan's CD, which has been my soundtrack on BART and therefore will always have a special place in my heart as it's my Bay area hip hop symphony. He has a song that describes my experience so lovely that I have to share the hook. Thanks, Rashaan:
"Give thanks
when the sky turn red
and the day turns dusk
and what's said is said
I give thanks
for the pain and hardship
keep me focused and ready on target
give thanks
when the walls close in
I get love from my fam and friends
and then give thanks
put my hand over my heart
and let you know its from the very best part."
Now go cop the disc. It's really, really good.
http://www.myspace.com/raashanahmad
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So here is one story of many.
Saturday morning we woke sticky smelly glorious after a night spent spilling stories, laughs, love, kissing noises in the air like tiny crickets hand claps, their squeaks and smacks putting a little lightening into the dark. Love was everywhere, in the bottom of the bottles, ember on the end of a smoke, Aisha Heaven Pants Gigatino Kristina and of course, mumbles, the Dust and I. The later waking sleepy after staying awake with Baraka until six am, falling in love all over again, reminding him to go hold the beautiful Ms. Rose before she woke for work in just a half hour's time. The big us of the night before whittled down to just Pants, Baraka and I, watching silly television on DVD and keeping company as we relegated Pants to chef duty, partaking in a delicious breakfast. A slow rolling start to the day but by 3:30pm, out the door, Q-Tip and Phife Dog and Ali Shaheed leaking out the car window in dead bridge traffic, Baraka giving me that half-open smile in-love face as I got really into rapping along. We scooped up Tinkerbell and her kitten, who she holds close to her chest in a sweater and made way to Keroac Alley in North Beach.
Ok... go! Charmin' Charlie's idea, to meet in the legendary alley and read poems until the day turned night. The first round arrived awkward and forced until Dusty Rose showed up from work, which revives us. The poems came one after the next for four hours, each of us jumping in the air to rant our pieces, pulling out notebooks on the cool cobblestone, making moon eyes at the poems we've grown to know like a family member's bad habits. D & B read Pixie Dust, I followed with Dialogue with the Self and the Sky and Charlie spits a piece that fits perfectly in succession and there are a few of these brilliant threads of poems, on the spot curating into the air so the words and message create a river of sound and meaning. I grab D & B's hands and challenge them to a race, breaking into speed like a band of crazy horses, the others turning their heads plastered with huge "huh?" grins. They beat me badly despite my longer legs and run straight into a poem, breathless and amped up on adrenaline.
The crowd around us gathered and dispersed like the tide, coming in and leaving, hovering and stepping back into their normal day. The beret wearing old man who gave unsolicited commentary but also put us on to a Jack Keroac CD and tried to get us a gig at the neighboring restaurant. "Naw man, thanks, definitely for another time but tonight we're doing this for each other." The eldery couple walking by talking to themselves in quiet conversation until hearing "Deb gets fucked first," and stopping in their tracks, awe-struck and lingering for a good five poems. The man that video recorded us sneakily for what felt like hours, us all hugging and falling all over each other in true love.
This is how life should always be. (More of the story to come... check back!)
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