“IDK IDGAF”: Editorial for Auxiliary Magazine

August/September 2010

✷ No, Dr. Hines: I have not forgotten how to utilize a semicolon; on the contrary,
the omission is a result of Auxiliary Magazine‘s ‘style guide.’ ✷

Otherwise,
† PLEASE  CLICK  IMAGE  TO ENLARGE  †

Goth Is Dead; Long Live Goth. Remembrances Of A New-Grave Past In San Francisco

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:: Please Click To Enlarge The Following Archived Text/Images ::

:: Con’t ✷ After The “Jump” ✷ With Scads Of Photographs & Flyers
To Incite The Smoke Rings Of Your Imagination ::

B U R N I N G , B U R N I N G

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She Ain’t Ugly; She’s My Shyla.

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Rifling through the ridiculous four-digit number of unanswered missives clogging my In-Box like a steady diet of deep-fried dill pickles, KFC and biscuits slathered in bacon fat does the arteries, it took but a cursory glance at the last sacrilegious e-card Ugly Shyla sent starring Scooter (R.I.P.), her three-legged cat, and I was transported back to April of 2003.  Convergence, an annual festival for those more shadowy in spirit, had booked me as a spoken word performer among that year’s roster.  Jared, ever the trooper in terms of road trips, had joined me on this excursion to Las Vegas: convention capitol of the world, tackiest city in the country, and home of the flamingo-themed Hilton hotel where for four days it was as if a black cloud descended upon its fuchsia presence.

That’s when I first “officially” met Shyla ♥—

Why the quotation marks?  A counter-culture periodical entitled  Swag had premiered around this time, and both Shyla and I graced its pages.  I’d read the feature on her and hence already knew about the ‘morbid fine art’ dolls she creates, her involvement with the performance art troupe (A-M-F), her wicked sense of personal style (fish-hooks through flesh used in lieu of garter belts), how her mom (known in the scene as ‘Goth Mom’) turned her on to the joys of John Waters, Satanism and transvestites.  All of that was fine and fascinating, but—more than anything—I was intrigued by the knowledge that this remarkable creature hailed from a tiny town called Jennings, Louisiana.

My own history composed of 18 years in Nowheresville, Arkansas—where I grew up not on a street, but a ‘Rural Route’ consisting of dirt and gravel—I can’t help but be drawn to other southern-fried freaks.  Not so much for the sake of sharing tear-stained stories of persecution, but rather because some of the most fascinating individuals I’ve ever met have sprouted from completely random spots among The Fly-Over States’ detritus.  While it sucked with sharp fangs during those days of puberty and pimples, I’m grateful to have developed as an individual without a clique to inform or guide me.  Said another way?  There was no “Check-List of Cool,” no tables in the caf polarized by those who fit within the parameters of Punk, Goth, Mod, Ska, etc.

When there’s no need to conform among the non-conformists?  That’s when the aberrant has an opportunity to define itself.

But I digress.  Ugly Shyla is aberrant, if anything—and sick, sick, siiiick in the best sense of the word.

::  A Sexy Shyla Pin-Up Print :: Available Through Her Web Shop ::

We clocked each other in the (ahem) “Bizarre Bazaar”: me in a custom Liz McGrath pinstripe suit adorned with gaping wounds and open sores oozing with red glitter; she in a pristine white baby doll dress that’d been ripped apart and re-stitched with thick black thread to match her full-eye black sclera contacts.

Sure, there’s the blue hair, the fishnets: this is familiar territory for most of us.

But once we made it past the “Don’t-I-Know-You-From…” social pleasantries?

That’s when I began to learn the good stuff.

:: artwork utilizing menstrual blood as a medium ::

Don’t just take my word for it, though.

Stop by her self-proclaimed “trailer park of the internet” ( Ugly Shyla Dot Com ); peruse her on-line gallery ( Ugly Art Dot Net ); give her Etsy marketplace a gander ( Ugly Art On Etsy ) and come to your own conclusions.

Rather than a welcome mat, you’ll be greeted by an image of your hostess bound in a warm, fuzzy straightjacket.  It might be hard to make out what she’s saying on account of the Hannibal Lecter-Lite safety guard that obscures her mouth…but if you look deep into those eyes eclipsed by contact lenses a ruptured shade of red, there’s an inherent sense that in Ugly Shyla’s world—complete with gauche magenta-on-pink animal-print wallpaper and the royal proclamation “Mental Illness With Style” scrawled in a gorgeous font rife with manic intensity—this is her version of an invitation to step inside.

Then, once you ease into the nascent stages of dementia via multi-sensory bombardment,

once you abandon all distinctions between what’s extreme and what’s extremely absurd,

it’s hard not to feel immediately welcomed…and at home.

➡ C L I C K — for —  ➡ Read more

Dita Von Teese: When Fantasy Comes To Fruition

Here’s one from the vaults, though
timeless, all the same—

from the (defunct) LA Alternative Press,
an interview with an individual who
exemplifies the art of transformation,
an art of poise & refinement pitched
in a pronouncement as seismic as an earthquake:
one in which dreams are alchemized through
no mastery other than “being herself”… a mastery
of person/persona.  ☆ Her Own Creation ☆

Oh, & re: the bleach-blond nod to Billy Idol
in the original doc’s title?

No. I didn’t, bitches.
Don’t. Try. Me…

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From The Archives, By Special Request—Beth Ditto’s Introductory Taste Of The Luxe Life

A brisk re-wind to the lead singer of [The] Gossip ‘s first time

(…getting “dolled-up” for a glamour shoot, that is!)

The magic that resulted was a team effort, for which serious “propers” are in order:

Photography by Albert Sanchez (www.albertsanchez.com)
Makeup by Cherie Combs (www.margaretmaldonado.com)
Hair by Tony Chavez (www.tonychavez.net) for Kérastase Paris
Propmaster/Art Direction: Pedro Zalba

On Beth (COVER SHOT):
Minidress with Matching Cuffs by Abigail Adams (www.abigailadamsdesign.com)
Necklace by Tarina Tarantino (www.tarinatarantino.com)
Shoes by Abaeté for Payless
Switchblade Comb: “Bartering” Scam by Yours Truly

So ~Miss Thing~ Is A “Style Icon” Now, Huh?!

Mmm-hrmm, yeah:

Well, “I Knew Her When…” & “I was there, grrrl!”

:: ET CETERA ::

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New Short Story/Anthology Exclusive Out Now!

In the premiere release from Little Episodes, an international collaborative art project:

(Click Image Above To Order)

:: information about ::

“Depression, addiction and mental illness are common problems in the modern world, with one in four people likely to experience a mental health problem every year. Established in 2009, Little Episodes is a not-for-profit organization consisting of professional writers, artists, musicians and actors with two prongs to its mission statement. The first, to destigmatize depression, addiction and mental illness, whilst raising awareness and providing empathy. The second is to provide a platform for talented, emerging and established writers/artists to find community and recognition. We combine the two by giving our participating writers and artists the first statement as their theme.”

Founded in the U.K., Little Episodes also curates ‘Late Night Episodes,’ a recurring event featuring spoken word, performance, music and visual art.  Late Night Episodes is held at the Novas Contemporary Urban Centre (London) on the last Saturday of every month.

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The Visual/The Verbal: Speaking In Hieroglyphics (Grabbing Language By The Throat)

Though your MySpace page tells us “all we need to know,” Mia—your photography exposes a vulnerable intensity. The beauty inherent is that which remains unspoken: those subtle nuances, the vocabulary of the heart that extends beyond logic & its parameters. It’s none of what a viewer “need[s] to know,” yet it’s everything.

The ability to send the blood rushing—to thaw hearts as impenetrable and cold as marble—through a glacial striptease?

This is what it is to cast spells: not of the premeditated chanting from a back-room magick book, none of the hackneyed “add this herb; follow these directions; do it THIS WAY, no THIS WAY, no THIS WAY.” There is no guide book for psyche-penetration, no recipe by which one can be taught how to affect the human condition effectively.

It just it what it is: a medium that for some, is a camera lens; for others, a paint brush & a canvas stretched to its limits; others still, a pen hungry for pages on which it can conduct, gather all the energy from the soil on which we stand to mustering up the truth tucked deep inside us, an honesty of whom we really are versus how we present ourselves or what others perceive us to be—and it’s in the marrowbones, the core of our beings.

And what it is?

Something raw and real and imperfect.  Something greater than I can assign nomenclature—let alone fully comprehend. It’s a force that travels through us yet belongs not to us; it’s those “accidents” that happen when we don’t set out To Create but seem to create themselves for us all the same…those inexplicable pieces of perfection for which we somehow feel we weren’t responsible, or perhaps can’t pinpoint with specificity. Can’t name a technique or place in this space, a state of being I won’t pretend to understand though have heard referred to as La Duende, the spirit of evocation, a state of possession : vox popula. Vox populi—a sense of I can’t tell you ‘How I Did It’ when it feels as if I wasn’t even at the wheel

yet

what we see, what we discover is credited as ‘ours,’ what we feel equal parts distant from as well as intimately involved—it’s when our limbs jangle and that four-chambered metronome pounds against our sternum, and the eyes and voices and fingertips of others respond, pounding sentences out in a quicksilver frenzy.  It’s when an image you took has the power to peel back the ribs of a stranger, or near-stranger, or incite the syllables and consonants that come rushing out at 1:31 a.m. to be ‘strange’ enough, strange enough;

It’s when all the odds are stacked against your viewer, yet he throws every ounce of his being down along with his better judgment. All bets are off in moments like these, in a moment like this, when your brow is furrowed & mouth hangs open in disbelief and the little voice nestled in your skull asserts “This is insane!” in a whisper, the words scalpels…

And yeah: insane it is. Would you opt for the blandular instead, the khaki-clad with lips pursed for air kisses and ass kissing? Would you rather have the safe-yet-soggy response that’s the verbal equivalent of a microwave pizza box lining?  Because in three minutes I may splash faucet water on my face, feel the shock as I regain physicality and shrug off this rant of a reaction.  In three minutes I may very well glance back with a deep-throated laugh and ask myself “Seriously, What. The. Fuck?”

But three minutes is a long time. Don’t believe me?  Set your alarm; then hold your breath.

What the fuck?  Seriously: because I live for this madness, I live for the spine-snap urgency to bound down the staircase and haunt my neighborhood streets—Micheltorena, Sunset Blvd., Alvarado—to dig my fingernails into the raw evening, to tear down the sky and polish the stars. I live. I live for.

I live for these unforeseen moments of inspiration in which I feel alive alive alive…

They’re how I know I exist: the flames lapping at the backside of my corneas like the backlash of a furnace blast.  The sensory overload.  The feral fervor. I live for this severity that destroys any sense of severity, no matter if when or how much I feel it siphoning the life force out of me.

While you may not be poisoned with the same ‘unnamed ‘which wears me down to an angry frazzle, I’m drawn to some irrational spirit of artistry  I intuit is chambertombed to you, to your need to search and to see and to leave something lasting, some body of work that no longer has to be searched for, as it’s already found; as it’s already found you; it’s found you,

found it’s you.

The Description Of An Absence

It was during that moment when my chest turns into an open space, an interminable length of time when it seems like a panel of chain-link fence gets peeled back, lies in wait for a surge of emotions to slip inside.

Then.  Just as my mouth rearranged itself around the poem’s final words— “A wad/of cold sheets/on my bed”—it was then, when I no longer recognized my voice but rather the blink of silence following.  That’s when I noticed him.

I’m sure I stood frozen in some exaggerated pose, arms akimbo or even more likely, right hand extended with a copy of Cottonmouth Kisses still perched in the air, armor to shield me from what would or wouldn’t happen next. Applause.  The immediacy of approval every performer yearns for, even and especially those who claim they don’t.

Then came the clamor of acclamation, the sounds of hands clapping, of slurred hurrahs and a high-pitched whistle.  My cue to step from the stage not really a stage in this home not exactly a “home” as I knew it, but a geodesic dome.

For a hot second, our eyes met.  His: dark, with a sparkle that followed when I looked away.  Not as in “tracers,” the stuff of flash-backs, symptoms from drugs with consonants for names.

More like: as I navigated my way to Pedro, Wash and Richard—the few people I knew at this hormone-charged salon with “Boys” as its motif—the text of my body was besieged with active verbs and question marks.

Would I dare to venture upstairs with him?

Despite its cred as the white-hot center of Where Art Lives, I recognized this dome from another context. Recently I’d seen The Hole, a skin flick in which the final scene culminates in a luscious free-for-all on the top floor.

I’d heard whispers of a similar scenario happening in medias res, and as much as I tried to listen to the performer who followed me, it was.  I was. Hard. With that beautiful boy, little more than an arm’s reach away.

My imagination is active; though my physique at the time?  Puffy, post-speed flab that rendered me uncomfortable in the flesh I inhabited.

And my skin?  Remained clothed, not “ho”ed out, as I wish it would’ve been.

I didn’t even introduce myself to that spiky-haired little number, let alone coax him into my own take on the Triple-X.

Thin and long-limbed: same as the memory I have of him, stretched-out. Three? Four? Has it been five years since then?

All this time, and I still see his caramel-hued complexion screened in my mind.  A story of me, a beautiful boy, and what might have been. Really not so much a story, as it is.

The description of an absence.

—Clint Catalyst

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It’s National Poetry Month…and I, Uhh, Invented My Own ‘Poetic Form’

Nerd-a-riffic, yes.

As in: it’s now “registered” as a new literary artistic form, the whole bit.

However, with ‘free verse’ being the norm these days rather than the exception,

it seems the most radical thing a poet can do is conform to a rigid structure.

I created one with regard to meter, stanza—the title, even.

The first piece I wrote within this form is published here:

The Battered Suitcase: April, 2009

And I expound upon the form in an interview here:

Q/A With Kim Acrylic

As usual, I’m wordy as Sweet F.A…

so feel free to scan down to where I explain the “Millennial Haiku,” if you’re interested.

Tongue/Cheek?

Fiercely wriggled, please.&.thanks

Stories

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