August 5, 2008
Burning Man Documentary
This is a short segment that I helped shoot footage for in 2005. It aired on Current TV, a cable television station co-founded by Al Gore. Dustin and Dara were my friends who I took for the first time and camped with.
April 20, 2008
On a Path Darkly
...the following article was published in the Summer 2008 issue of Lilipoh Magazine. Four proceeding articles appeared in the magazine exploring this topic. (Click on the navigation category "Lilipoh" to the right and they will appear in order of most recent first.)
In this article, I continue to explore the spirit of our times and what popular culture might be revealing about the emergence of a new guiding myth for the task before humanity. I continue to assess the media landscape for hints that we might be shifting from deconstructing previously important mythic signposts to raising new ones. While any hard and fast answers still evade me, several recent works have caught my attention and seem to illuminate a larger trend that speaks to our increasingly urgent condition.
The brilliantly written novel by Cormac McCarthy,The Road (for which he won a Pulitzer Prize in 2005), follows the journey of a father and son struggling to survive and maintain hope in an inescapably bleak post-apocalyptic world. The novel is set in a not-too-distant and all-too-possible future landscape of environmental devastation and human barbarism. As I read, I found myself identifying with the young son who says simply "I'm scared" as they approached situation after situation with little chance of redemption. Like the boy totally dependent on his father, the reader is put in the role of trusting that the author has something important to show us against the backdrop of sustained tension and dread. The father works to protect the boy's faith that there is a core of ethics left somewhere in humanity - an assertion that looks increasingly unlikely as the novel unfolds.
This feeling is echoed in a recent adaptation of another McCarthy novel, the film No Country
for Old Men. Like The Road, we find ourselves in a brooding, harsh landscape; this time the southern U.S. border of 1980. The film explores the inherent imprisonment of a determined world, where a coin toss can determine if one lives or dies, and the frailty of our biological existence hits home like the thunk of a killer's cattle gun - as effective on humans as on any other animal primed for slaughter. The Village Voice describes the characters of No Country for Old Men as "members of some endangered species trying to forestall their extinction." Though it's not always easy to watch, but there is something beneath the surface that elevates this film beyond a traditional shoot 'em up or just another depressing art house meditation on human fallibility. Its redeeming element is its unusually masterful crafting. An astonishing job by the Coen brothers (who won an Oscar for their directing) made me look harder at the feelings this film invoked in me. What does its message (and popular success) reveal about our contemporary self-concept and the hopes and fears of where we may be headed?
I might have attributed whatever broader meaning these works revealed to novelist Cormac McCarthy alone, if, around the same time, I hadn't seen the film There Will be Blood. Like No Country for Old Men, it was nominated for 8 Oscars, winning Best Actor for Daniel Day Lewis' mesmerizing leading role. Set in the oil fields of the early twentieth century, There Will Be Blood shares an underlying dread with The Road and No Country for Old Men and a similarly unsentimental, near perfect artistic crafting that is hard to call anything other than beautiful.
A sense of impending doom fills all three works. It stalks each frame and page, whether
personified as an unstoppable bounty hunter, the relentlessly off-kilter and haunting score of There Will Be Blood (composed by Radiohead's Guitarist, Johnny Greenwood) or the ash falling with haunting regularity throughout The Road, fall-out from some never-explained man-made catastrophe. All three are soaked in a pitiless quality that captures the audience with a sense that "truth will be spoken here." We trust that we are going to receive something accurate even as we increasingly realize that it's not going to be a happy or even a clear outcome. We trust that there must be something important to see here, where the vultures swarm and where man goes horribly astray.
There is a shred of unsentimental hope in each work: the soot-covered purity of The Road's boy; There Will Be Blood's deaf, adopted son's escape from his father's mad clutches; and the aging country sheriff of No Country for Old Men who dreams of his own father carrying fire in a horn, "going on ahead, and fixin' to make a fire" in the surrounding dark and cold.
These three works felt to me like articulations of a larger realization happening within great swaths of our culture; like "Dead End" signs appearing along the road that we collectively race down. Things are bleak. Can anything be as depressing as knowing that you're headed for a brick wall, but, lacking visible alternatives, continue driving anyway?
As parables, they tell a story which news headlines and stark documentaries can only hint at. They tell me that there is something dark in the human character, of which the evils of the world are only symptoms. This darkness forms a hole in our lives and a sense of loss that is hard to address directly. Perhaps an unflinching mythic glimpse into our own darkest corners is an important first step? If we can just put our finger on the lingering dissatisfaction that pulls us toward self-destruction, we may be able to redirect our course. Giving image and name to our collective sense of doom might rob it of some of its power otherwise so subtle and pervasive as to seem inevitable. Visible, it can be seen, named, and rejected.
And here, for me, is where author Brian McLaren came in. While thinking over this dark picture of our shared mythic landscape, I read a couple of books by this leading proponents of the "emergent Christianity" movement. In The Secret Message of Jesus, Brian McLaren offers as hopeful a picture of the heights that human beings might attain as The Road and There Will be Blood show of our darkest depths.
By no means alone in his re-examination of the life and teaching of Jesus (the Da Vinci Code phenomenon was just the tip of the iceberg), McLaren's technique is a decidedly integral one. Post-modern and pluralistic, it doesn't seek to create another doctrine or set of beliefs but rather brings self-awareness to the process of how doctrines are established and interrupted in the first place. Different from some of the other authors in this booming genre though, Brian McLaren's perspective is not that of a distanced researcher but of a true believer.
A pastor of his own non-denominational church, McLaren is seeking to re-frame who we are
and what our role in society might look like, while honoring the religious tradition he finds great value in. His explorations shed light on a new articulation of "the kingdom of God" - a kingdom that is of this world but based on very different virtues than the predominant ones around us. An interruption that is at once both generous and orthodox, the message he delivers is both radically different and yet familiar to what one would recognize at a traditional neighborhood Sunday service. In his books McLaren deconstructs the Christian church, offering a history of the institutionalizing of this mystical message. He moves beyond denouncing the exclusionary, self-serving tendencies of organized religion, responsible for countless intolerances and atrocities, to find these tendencies within himself. He articulates the impulses behind the differing traditions and denominations and how they correlate to important elements within his own understanding of what Jesus' full message might look like. What he discovers might be a beacon of renewal not just for the Christian religion but for the whole world.
The message that he rediscovers for himself is as revolutionary today as at the time it was given, offering much more than just the foundation for the religion that followed. Heard again as if for the first time, this message offers an exciting present and future possibility of what could be; an unlikely secret that holds the power to divert us from the train wreck we seemed destined for. Perhaps a re-emergence of Jesus' original teaching, placed back into historical context and shown for the radical message it is, begins to articulate (or unearth) an alternative route running counter to our own personally engrained social, political, intellectual and spiritual beliefs. A message asking for as revolutionary a change to our daily lives as to those of any institution.
The message of Christ hints at a way of being that can overcome the most inevitable forces of darkness within our own humanity. Radical forgiveness, service to the poor and sick, a slow and steady aligning of our will with God's ("Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven") - stripped of the nauseating rhetoric and distorted lens that the Christian church has all too often applied - this message offers a revolutionary and unlikely promise. Just as the potential for growth of the tiny mustard seed is invisible to the physical eye, so the "kingdom of God" asks us not just to look again, but to transform the very way we see. Like Rudolf Steiner's Higher Worlds, this kingdom awaits those "with ears to hear."
This unseen kingdom is present, not just despite our despair and bleakness but also because of it. Recognizing the truth of our current situation, and accepting our personal responsibility for it will necessitate a radical re-thinking (the original meaning of metanoia "to repent"). If enough of us glimpse such a kingdom and, in our glimpsing, re-think our lives, and in re-thinking our lives believe that the impossible is possible, things could change dramatically.
And given the reports on the condition of the road ahead, let's hope that we choose to shift trajectories soon.
McLaren, Brian. The Secret Message of Jesus, Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2006
McLaren, Brian. A Generous Orthodoxy, Grand Rapids: Zonderum, 2004
McCarthy, Cormac. The Road. New York: Vintage, 2006
No Country for Old Men. Dir., Writ., Prod.,Ethan and Joel Coen. Based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy. Miramax and Paramount Vantage, 2007.
There Will be Blood. Dir., Writ., Prod., Paul Thomas Anderson. Based on the novel by Upton Sinclair. Miramax and Paramount Vantage, 2007.
On A Path Darkly
...
Human Kingdoms advance by force and violence with falling bombs and flying bullets, but God's kingdom advances by stories, fictions, tales that are easily ignored and easily misunderstood. (p.49) The Secret Message of Jesus...
In this article, I continue to explore the spirit of our times and what popular culture might be revealing about the emergence of a new guiding myth for the task before humanity. I continue to assess the media landscape for hints that we might be shifting from deconstructing previously important mythic signposts to raising new ones. While any hard and fast answers still evade me, several recent works have caught my attention and seem to illuminate a larger trend that speaks to our increasingly urgent condition.
The brilliantly written novel by Cormac McCarthy,The Road (for which he won a Pulitzer Prize in 2005), follows the journey of a father and son struggling to survive and maintain hope in an inescapably bleak post-apocalyptic world. The novel is set in a not-too-distant and all-too-possible future landscape of environmental devastation and human barbarism. As I read, I found myself identifying with the young son who says simply "I'm scared" as they approached situation after situation with little chance of redemption. Like the boy totally dependent on his father, the reader is put in the role of trusting that the author has something important to show us against the backdrop of sustained tension and dread. The father works to protect the boy's faith that there is a core of ethics left somewhere in humanity - an assertion that looks increasingly unlikely as the novel unfolds.This feeling is echoed in a recent adaptation of another McCarthy novel, the film No Country
for Old Men. Like The Road, we find ourselves in a brooding, harsh landscape; this time the southern U.S. border of 1980. The film explores the inherent imprisonment of a determined world, where a coin toss can determine if one lives or dies, and the frailty of our biological existence hits home like the thunk of a killer's cattle gun - as effective on humans as on any other animal primed for slaughter. The Village Voice describes the characters of No Country for Old Men as "members of some endangered species trying to forestall their extinction." Though it's not always easy to watch, but there is something beneath the surface that elevates this film beyond a traditional shoot 'em up or just another depressing art house meditation on human fallibility. Its redeeming element is its unusually masterful crafting. An astonishing job by the Coen brothers (who won an Oscar for their directing) made me look harder at the feelings this film invoked in me. What does its message (and popular success) reveal about our contemporary self-concept and the hopes and fears of where we may be headed?I might have attributed whatever broader meaning these works revealed to novelist Cormac McCarthy alone, if, around the same time, I hadn't seen the film There Will be Blood. Like No Country for Old Men, it was nominated for 8 Oscars, winning Best Actor for Daniel Day Lewis' mesmerizing leading role. Set in the oil fields of the early twentieth century, There Will Be Blood shares an underlying dread with The Road and No Country for Old Men and a similarly unsentimental, near perfect artistic crafting that is hard to call anything other than beautiful.
A sense of impending doom fills all three works. It stalks each frame and page, whether
personified as an unstoppable bounty hunter, the relentlessly off-kilter and haunting score of There Will Be Blood (composed by Radiohead's Guitarist, Johnny Greenwood) or the ash falling with haunting regularity throughout The Road, fall-out from some never-explained man-made catastrophe. All three are soaked in a pitiless quality that captures the audience with a sense that "truth will be spoken here." We trust that we are going to receive something accurate even as we increasingly realize that it's not going to be a happy or even a clear outcome. We trust that there must be something important to see here, where the vultures swarm and where man goes horribly astray.There is a shred of unsentimental hope in each work: the soot-covered purity of The Road's boy; There Will Be Blood's deaf, adopted son's escape from his father's mad clutches; and the aging country sheriff of No Country for Old Men who dreams of his own father carrying fire in a horn, "going on ahead, and fixin' to make a fire" in the surrounding dark and cold.
These three works felt to me like articulations of a larger realization happening within great swaths of our culture; like "Dead End" signs appearing along the road that we collectively race down. Things are bleak. Can anything be as depressing as knowing that you're headed for a brick wall, but, lacking visible alternatives, continue driving anyway?
As parables, they tell a story which news headlines and stark documentaries can only hint at. They tell me that there is something dark in the human character, of which the evils of the world are only symptoms. This darkness forms a hole in our lives and a sense of loss that is hard to address directly. Perhaps an unflinching mythic glimpse into our own darkest corners is an important first step? If we can just put our finger on the lingering dissatisfaction that pulls us toward self-destruction, we may be able to redirect our course. Giving image and name to our collective sense of doom might rob it of some of its power otherwise so subtle and pervasive as to seem inevitable. Visible, it can be seen, named, and rejected.
And here, for me, is where author Brian McLaren came in. While thinking over this dark picture of our shared mythic landscape, I read a couple of books by this leading proponents of the "emergent Christianity" movement. In The Secret Message of Jesus, Brian McLaren offers as hopeful a picture of the heights that human beings might attain as The Road and There Will be Blood show of our darkest depths.
By no means alone in his re-examination of the life and teaching of Jesus (the Da Vinci Code phenomenon was just the tip of the iceberg), McLaren's technique is a decidedly integral one. Post-modern and pluralistic, it doesn't seek to create another doctrine or set of beliefs but rather brings self-awareness to the process of how doctrines are established and interrupted in the first place. Different from some of the other authors in this booming genre though, Brian McLaren's perspective is not that of a distanced researcher but of a true believer.
A pastor of his own non-denominational church, McLaren is seeking to re-frame who we are
and what our role in society might look like, while honoring the religious tradition he finds great value in. His explorations shed light on a new articulation of "the kingdom of God" - a kingdom that is of this world but based on very different virtues than the predominant ones around us. An interruption that is at once both generous and orthodox, the message he delivers is both radically different and yet familiar to what one would recognize at a traditional neighborhood Sunday service. In his books McLaren deconstructs the Christian church, offering a history of the institutionalizing of this mystical message. He moves beyond denouncing the exclusionary, self-serving tendencies of organized religion, responsible for countless intolerances and atrocities, to find these tendencies within himself. He articulates the impulses behind the differing traditions and denominations and how they correlate to important elements within his own understanding of what Jesus' full message might look like. What he discovers might be a beacon of renewal not just for the Christian religion but for the whole world.The message that he rediscovers for himself is as revolutionary today as at the time it was given, offering much more than just the foundation for the religion that followed. Heard again as if for the first time, this message offers an exciting present and future possibility of what could be; an unlikely secret that holds the power to divert us from the train wreck we seemed destined for. Perhaps a re-emergence of Jesus' original teaching, placed back into historical context and shown for the radical message it is, begins to articulate (or unearth) an alternative route running counter to our own personally engrained social, political, intellectual and spiritual beliefs. A message asking for as revolutionary a change to our daily lives as to those of any institution.
The message of Christ hints at a way of being that can overcome the most inevitable forces of darkness within our own humanity. Radical forgiveness, service to the poor and sick, a slow and steady aligning of our will with God's ("Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven") - stripped of the nauseating rhetoric and distorted lens that the Christian church has all too often applied - this message offers a revolutionary and unlikely promise. Just as the potential for growth of the tiny mustard seed is invisible to the physical eye, so the "kingdom of God" asks us not just to look again, but to transform the very way we see. Like Rudolf Steiner's Higher Worlds, this kingdom awaits those "with ears to hear."
This unseen kingdom is present, not just despite our despair and bleakness but also because of it. Recognizing the truth of our current situation, and accepting our personal responsibility for it will necessitate a radical re-thinking (the original meaning of metanoia "to repent"). If enough of us glimpse such a kingdom and, in our glimpsing, re-think our lives, and in re-thinking our lives believe that the impossible is possible, things could change dramatically.
And given the reports on the condition of the road ahead, let's hope that we choose to shift trajectories soon.
Works Cited
McLaren, Brian. The Secret Message of Jesus, Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2006
McLaren, Brian. A Generous Orthodoxy, Grand Rapids: Zonderum, 2004
McCarthy, Cormac. The Road. New York: Vintage, 2006
No Country for Old Men. Dir., Writ., Prod.,Ethan and Joel Coen. Based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy. Miramax and Paramount Vantage, 2007.
There Will be Blood. Dir., Writ., Prod., Paul Thomas Anderson. Based on the novel by Upton Sinclair. Miramax and Paramount Vantage, 2007.
March 1, 2008
Welcome Home
Adapted from an essay by Rob Brezsny from his fantastic book Pronoia: How the Whole World is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
Let me remind you who you really are:
You're an immortal freedom fighter in service to divine love.
You have temporary taken on human form, forgetting your true origins, in order to liberate all sentient beings from suffering and the bondage of false belief.
You will accept nothing less than the miracle of bringing heaven all the way down to earth.
Your task may look impossible. Ignorance and inertia, partially camouflaged as time-honored morality, seem to surround you. Pessimism is enshrined as a hall mark of worldliness. Compulsive skepticism masquerades as wit and perceptiveness. Irony is hip. Stories about treachery and degradation provoke a visceral thrill in millions of people who think of themselves as reasonable and smart. Beautiful truths are suspect and ugly truth are readily believed.
To overcome these odds, we must be both a radical revolutionary and practice radical acceptance. We must be both a wrathful destroyer of falsehoods and a loving creator of true beauty. We must resist the temptation to be seduced by the thousands of delusions that have been carefully packaged to lull us into in-action. We must stay in a good mood as we overthrow the stressful hallucination that is mistakenly referred to as reality.
We are facing the extinction of our natural habitat and the possibility of endless war, but there is an even bigger threat to the long-term fate of the earth, of which all others are but symptoms: the death of the imagination.
But what can we do?
We can create safe houses to shelter those devoted to the incremental awakening of humanity. We can create sanctuaries of festivals and parties and cafes and workshops and homes, where we can ritually celebrate the evolving mysteries of positive co-creation.
We must facilitate the regular practice of trust, cooperation, innovation and love.
We can be patient with one another as we attempt the difficult and almost impossible. We can pull each other out of our comfort zones.
We can provide gentle encouragement and committed cooperation.
We can be inclusive.
We can offer the gift of our honesty.
We can resist the substitution of passive consumption for active participation.
We can discover, exercise and rely on our own inner resources, even as we move towards greater partnership.
We can seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves and the reality of those around us.
We can make contact with a natural world exceeding human powers.
We must conspire together to carry out an agenda that Barbara Marx Hubbard describes as: to hospice what's dying and midwife what's being born.
Welcome Home
Let me remind you who you really are:
You're an immortal freedom fighter in service to divine love.
You have temporary taken on human form, forgetting your true origins, in order to liberate all sentient beings from suffering and the bondage of false belief.
You will accept nothing less than the miracle of bringing heaven all the way down to earth.
Your task may look impossible. Ignorance and inertia, partially camouflaged as time-honored morality, seem to surround you. Pessimism is enshrined as a hall mark of worldliness. Compulsive skepticism masquerades as wit and perceptiveness. Irony is hip. Stories about treachery and degradation provoke a visceral thrill in millions of people who think of themselves as reasonable and smart. Beautiful truths are suspect and ugly truth are readily believed.
To overcome these odds, we must be both a radical revolutionary and practice radical acceptance. We must be both a wrathful destroyer of falsehoods and a loving creator of true beauty. We must resist the temptation to be seduced by the thousands of delusions that have been carefully packaged to lull us into in-action. We must stay in a good mood as we overthrow the stressful hallucination that is mistakenly referred to as reality.
We are facing the extinction of our natural habitat and the possibility of endless war, but there is an even bigger threat to the long-term fate of the earth, of which all others are but symptoms: the death of the imagination.
But what can we do?
We can create safe houses to shelter those devoted to the incremental awakening of humanity. We can create sanctuaries of festivals and parties and cafes and workshops and homes, where we can ritually celebrate the evolving mysteries of positive co-creation.
We must facilitate the regular practice of trust, cooperation, innovation and love.
We can be patient with one another as we attempt the difficult and almost impossible. We can pull each other out of our comfort zones.
We can provide gentle encouragement and committed cooperation.
We can be inclusive.
We can offer the gift of our honesty.
We can resist the substitution of passive consumption for active participation.
We can discover, exercise and rely on our own inner resources, even as we move towards greater partnership.
We can seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves and the reality of those around us.
We can make contact with a natural world exceeding human powers.
We must conspire together to carry out an agenda that Barbara Marx Hubbard describes as: to hospice what's dying and midwife what's being born.
February 13, 2008
The Creative Arts - Class Poem
My mother and I co-taught a class entitled "The Creative Arts" January and February of 2008.
This is a short video of us reciting a poem that we'd attempted to learn by heart.
This is a short video of us reciting a poem that we'd attempted to learn by heart.
February 2, 2008
Line Mountain Residency with Charlie DelMarcelle
This video documents a residency at Line Mountain High School by Charlie Delmarcelle, an Arts in Education artist. The residency was coordinated by Perry County Council of the Arts' Arts in Education program. For more information about the program, please visit: www.perrycountyarts.org
January 31, 2008
To Occur to Myself: A Poem
To Occur to Myself
To see myself, not as I use me but as I experience me.
A mirror for one brief second as the flapping stops and the waters still
a face is glimpsed
a shear face that dwarfs the reflecting ripples that play upon my surface.
To enter dreaming awake,
to digest what is known there in front of me
whole
and awake to life bigger than me at the breakfast nook with care and sorrow
and spoon and mouth
and lips that speak truth only when stumped by letters spelled in the mind of creation clutched in chubby cherub fingers,
flitting about the word I can't remember the meaning to...
but say anyway.
on these lips that move
directed by a life circumstance that offers up layers of petals around a seed as small as lifetimes of preparation and as vital as that breath I just
now
took.
Its all immensely important, surely you see that?
Isn't it more than egotism that places you and I together in the heart of the entire everything?
Gods drink from the pool that I don't know that I am.
Heavenly beings feast upon the life that I unconsciously lead,
now as a blind man,
now as a drunk falling asleep on the shoulder of a me that pretends to forget what I learned from me when I was that sorrow and care
and the breakfast nook was my home with the spoon that asked questions of my lips that supplied answers spoken of in me.
Horrible Deal : A Poem
Horrible Deal
I'd like to tell you my story in the same assured voice that whispered Mica the prophesy of Justice and humble walks with thy Lord.
I yearn for the voice that speaks in sun-rays from cloud-cover and burning archetypes,
conversation purged of get-down anger and and lift-up righteousness.
Speak to me of eyes that see and ears that hear.
Worlds transformed by lens I see through.
What do you offer there in your outstretched hand,
all shaky and clammy and not perfect?
You offer me dissolution of a separation that exists, a line where once a wall stood.
You offer me the hopeful paradox of life lived short and sweetly.
I want practical assurances with the grace you humbly offer
I want practical respite from practical frenzy
practical absolution from practical prack...tick...cal...ness.
Theses negotiations always go the same way,
(the same poem again and again)
all devouring demons and blood thirsty bliss.
The compulsions are the same beneath the surface,
here behind the skin, behind those flawed outstretched hands and this blackened corpse grinning wildly and screaming truth in its fried hair and crispy wings.
This horribleness is in you.
The one who makes the tentative offers,
who negotiates the back-room deals,
who marries the ugly daughter and sticks the knife into the fleshy part of the only little thing you ever really cared about.
Yes, there is sunlit beauty and 9 year olds demanding answers and dogs dreaming of sticks and trains arriving with lovers kissing on foreheads and hot water in the kettle and tulips alive in the snow. Yes, there is gold magic markers and brilliance behind the microphone and eyeglasses on noses and incense in temples and needles on thread. Yes, there is candles on windowsills and homecomings and footsteps and homecomings and washing and laughing and tossing and napping and...
and....
and...
But it is still a horrible deal.
Its terrible terms that you offer.
Its an awful game that you designed.
The only way I could possibly stand it is to know that you are playing it too.
January 29, 2008
Exploring the Spirit of our Times
There is a shift happening across the contemporary cultural landscape. From new understandings of human's impact on our planet to greater insights in our biology, our universe, and our collective histories, the inner workings of our life together are being exposed at an unparalleled rate. What follows is an exploration of two cultural phenomena that I believe are examples of this revealing, one defined by the corruption, manipulation and violence that can be shaped by power and greed, and the other an illustration of the complexity and paradox of a common experience of sacredness.
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The film Loose Change has been called "the first Internet blockbuster." Produced for $2,000 by a 24 year old from upstate New York, Loose Change was viewed at least 10 million times within the first year of its release in April 2005. The film was my first introduction to what has since come to be called the "9/11 Truth Movement." Made up of innumerable films, organizations and websites, the basic tenants of this movement claim that the US government not only used the September 11th attacks to gain popular support for an aggressive and profitable foreign policy, but also (to varying degrees based on the particular theory or proponent) played a part in the attacks themselves.
As more time has elapsed since the 2001 attacks, the ideas of the 9/11 Truth Movement have grown from a fringe phenomenon to what Time magazine calls a "mainstream political reality." A large, independent poll conducted by Zogby International in 2004 found that 49 percent of New York City residents believed that individuals within the US government "knew in advance that the 911 attacks were planned...and failed to act." Two years later in a nation-wide poll, 53% of Americans believed that there had been at least a partial cover-up by the government about what really took place on Sept. 11th, with 67% saying that there had never been an adequate investigation of the attacks. Whether lying or not, doubt had crept in as to whether those who we normally look to for the facts had failed to bring them to us.
The aptly named film Zeitgeist, released online in June of 2007, shares many elements with Loose Change and it's countless spin-offs. Both films can be easily found with a Google search and feature the minimal, ominous tone and pseudo-journalistic use of information stripped of its original context which has become readily recognized as made-for-the-web production values. In Zeitgeist the skepticism of the 9/11 films finds its way into all the pillars of our society's institutions. The film deconstructs Christianity (Jesus as anthropomorphized astrological data), capitalism (a secret botherhood of bankers pulling the strings), and US foreign policy (as a quest by a select group for world domination). This is not presented as story or fabled warning, but as cited and researched fact. This material can be found (and no doubt, presented more compellingly) elsewhere, but never before to my knowledge has it been tailored for absorption by such a wide audience.
A certain unease begins to creep in as I view these films and follow links with associated websites. The questions go further than whether or not the "facts" being presented might indeed be true, to the motivation of the filmmakers and the raw nerve they touch in those who watch them. Is this just the latest level of sensationalism in pop culture's continual search for new thrills? Are New World Order conspiracy theories a symptom of a society hungry for answers to questions that it doesn't even admit that it has? Whatever the case, The 9/11 Truth Movement seems unaware that much like the evil (whether imagined or real) it purports to be exposing, its version of truth distorts the rest of the picture to fit its chosen narrative.
As the scope of our informational based culture and planetary awareness grows, so to it seems, do the scope of the questions that confront us. As we search for a context large enough to make sense of our rapidly changing world, our emerging questions might transcend the simple answers that our traditional institutions can provide. Leading me to wonder: do our current belief systems need to collapse before new forms will emerge? Or is a new infrastructure being developed right now all around us like a new skin forming beneath the old that is to be shed? While the questions seem too large and my perspective too close to arrive at any definitive answers, I am reassured by signs that others are developing ways of navigating such uncertain waters.
An impulse to transform the passive monologue of traditional media into active dialogue can be seen in The World Cafe (theworldcafe.com), Meetup.com and other social networks seeking to overcome technologies' tendency toward isolation and anonymity through real world connections and gatherings. Many artists and contemporary storytellers are working from a similar impulse when they portray human experiences with the beauty and nuance that inspires us to share our own stories and seek out other's with a renewed interest in the deepest experiences that we all share.
The Nation Public Radio program Speaking of Faith (speakingoffaith.org) is one of these shimmering bright spots of insight in our popular culture. A former journalist, diplomat and graduate of the Yale Divinity School, host Krista Tippet conducts each interview with a balanced grace that delights in life's diversity while never negating the suffering and complexities of the human condition. The show is both keenly intelligent and soaked in an appreciation for mystery. The weekly radio show and podcast features conversations with voices from the world of religion, ethics and ideas, with topics ranging from the biographies of Einstein and Darwin to explorations of faith based diplomacy in the world of politics, and money and moral balance in everyday life.
There is something very intimate and inclusive about the space that the show is able to create. Its tone far transcends what one would expect from a program covering religious issues and arrives at something familiar but all too rarely glimpsed in our mass culture. It is the feeling of a good conversations between people who care deeply for and respect one another. This feeling gives me hope in the ability to arrive at something much larger, but just as close as personal truth. It is the experience of the sacred. Through Speaking of Faith, Tippet models a public theology that doesn't yield firm and unwavering answers but instead offers a new meeting ground to explore the questions.
It seems that it is through conversation and vulnerable interactions that we begin to articulate answers for ourselves. As we commit ourselves with ever increasing self-awareness to an emerging dialogue, we arrive at a more contextual and participatory understanding than any that could ever be given to us by an outside authority. Rather than seeking a fixed truth with which to judge right or wrong, we are increasingly offered a chance to listen and interact with multiple perspectives. I feel in myself and perhaps in society at large, a subtle shift from a desire for voices of fact and solid truths, to dialogues that can sustain uncertainty and offer encouragement in the tough work of living an authentic and meaningful life.
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The film Loose Change has been called "the first Internet blockbuster." Produced for $2,000 by a 24 year old from upstate New York, Loose Change was viewed at least 10 million times within the first year of its release in April 2005. The film was my first introduction to what has since come to be called the "9/11 Truth Movement." Made up of innumerable films, organizations and websites, the basic tenants of this movement claim that the US government not only used the September 11th attacks to gain popular support for an aggressive and profitable foreign policy, but also (to varying degrees based on the particular theory or proponent) played a part in the attacks themselves. As more time has elapsed since the 2001 attacks, the ideas of the 9/11 Truth Movement have grown from a fringe phenomenon to what Time magazine calls a "mainstream political reality." A large, independent poll conducted by Zogby International in 2004 found that 49 percent of New York City residents believed that individuals within the US government "knew in advance that the 911 attacks were planned...and failed to act." Two years later in a nation-wide poll, 53% of Americans believed that there had been at least a partial cover-up by the government about what really took place on Sept. 11th, with 67% saying that there had never been an adequate investigation of the attacks. Whether lying or not, doubt had crept in as to whether those who we normally look to for the facts had failed to bring them to us.
The aptly named film Zeitgeist, released online in June of 2007, shares many elements with Loose Change and it's countless spin-offs. Both films can be easily found with a Google search and feature the minimal, ominous tone and pseudo-journalistic use of information stripped of its original context which has become readily recognized as made-for-the-web production values. In Zeitgeist the skepticism of the 9/11 films finds its way into all the pillars of our society's institutions. The film deconstructs Christianity (Jesus as anthropomorphized astrological data), capitalism (a secret botherhood of bankers pulling the strings), and US foreign policy (as a quest by a select group for world domination). This is not presented as story or fabled warning, but as cited and researched fact. This material can be found (and no doubt, presented more compellingly) elsewhere, but never before to my knowledge has it been tailored for absorption by such a wide audience.
A certain unease begins to creep in as I view these films and follow links with associated websites. The questions go further than whether or not the "facts" being presented might indeed be true, to the motivation of the filmmakers and the raw nerve they touch in those who watch them. Is this just the latest level of sensationalism in pop culture's continual search for new thrills? Are New World Order conspiracy theories a symptom of a society hungry for answers to questions that it doesn't even admit that it has? Whatever the case, The 9/11 Truth Movement seems unaware that much like the evil (whether imagined or real) it purports to be exposing, its version of truth distorts the rest of the picture to fit its chosen narrative.
As the scope of our informational based culture and planetary awareness grows, so to it seems, do the scope of the questions that confront us. As we search for a context large enough to make sense of our rapidly changing world, our emerging questions might transcend the simple answers that our traditional institutions can provide. Leading me to wonder: do our current belief systems need to collapse before new forms will emerge? Or is a new infrastructure being developed right now all around us like a new skin forming beneath the old that is to be shed? While the questions seem too large and my perspective too close to arrive at any definitive answers, I am reassured by signs that others are developing ways of navigating such uncertain waters.
An impulse to transform the passive monologue of traditional media into active dialogue can be seen in The World Cafe (theworldcafe.com), Meetup.com and other social networks seeking to overcome technologies' tendency toward isolation and anonymity through real world connections and gatherings. Many artists and contemporary storytellers are working from a similar impulse when they portray human experiences with the beauty and nuance that inspires us to share our own stories and seek out other's with a renewed interest in the deepest experiences that we all share.
The Nation Public Radio program Speaking of Faith (speakingoffaith.org) is one of these shimmering bright spots of insight in our popular culture. A former journalist, diplomat and graduate of the Yale Divinity School, host Krista Tippet conducts each interview with a balanced grace that delights in life's diversity while never negating the suffering and complexities of the human condition. The show is both keenly intelligent and soaked in an appreciation for mystery. The weekly radio show and podcast features conversations with voices from the world of religion, ethics and ideas, with topics ranging from the biographies of Einstein and Darwin to explorations of faith based diplomacy in the world of politics, and money and moral balance in everyday life.
There is something very intimate and inclusive about the space that the show is able to create. Its tone far transcends what one would expect from a program covering religious issues and arrives at something familiar but all too rarely glimpsed in our mass culture. It is the feeling of a good conversations between people who care deeply for and respect one another. This feeling gives me hope in the ability to arrive at something much larger, but just as close as personal truth. It is the experience of the sacred. Through Speaking of Faith, Tippet models a public theology that doesn't yield firm and unwavering answers but instead offers a new meeting ground to explore the questions.
It seems that it is through conversation and vulnerable interactions that we begin to articulate answers for ourselves. As we commit ourselves with ever increasing self-awareness to an emerging dialogue, we arrive at a more contextual and participatory understanding than any that could ever be given to us by an outside authority. Rather than seeking a fixed truth with which to judge right or wrong, we are increasingly offered a chance to listen and interact with multiple perspectives. I feel in myself and perhaps in society at large, a subtle shift from a desire for voices of fact and solid truths, to dialogues that can sustain uncertainty and offer encouragement in the tough work of living an authentic and meaningful life.
October 26, 2007
October 15, 2007
Documenting An Emerging Myth
...Essay from the Winter 2007 issue of Lilipoh Magazine...
Documenting An Emerging Myth by Jordan Walker
Documenting An Emerging Myth by Jordan Walker
Looking back through history we see the long arc of our evolution, our journey from unity toward individuation. Before his passing this past April, Norman Davidson, master Waldorf teacher and beloved Sunbridge College professor, wondered where a new guiding myth that spoke of humanity's future would come from. The story of the fall from spirit into the material world has versions in almost every culture. This imaginative picture is a type of reality, he said, and while this story is still the guiding myth of our world it increasingly feels incomplete in describing the challenges facing us. What new narrative describes our involution, the counter arc that sees us consciously rise up out of materialism, individualism intact, to join in a new community of co-creators?
As I study our current cultural landscape, I ask myself what new mythology puts our current lives into the context of the evolution of consciousness? What stories will document our rise as maturing beings, outgrowing a reliance on power structures based on dominance and black or white thinking? What guiding frameworks give us the tools to understand a path of conscious initiation that takes place both in the cosmic but also in the everyday?
Where is this emerging myth of personal responsibility being articulated in the world?
Einstein's famous quote states that the problems facing humanity and the planet can not be solved on the same level on which they were created. My thought is that this next emerging level is so broad in its scope and outsized in its scale by the cultures surrounding it, that it goes largely unnoticed and often under-appreciated by those struggling in their own arena for such innovation.
I believe this myth is taking shape beneath the radar of a mainstream culture that is wary of earnest searchers striving towards deeper meaning in life. Lives led without a dose of post-modern irony, apathy and skepticism can feel threatening. There are of course alternative stories, vantage points where the problems facing the world are seen from a new perspective. There are contemporary myth makers that sense a disconnect between their own experience of life and the narratives that we have been collectively living under. This living awareness of inaccuracy can then be paired with the imagination to arrive at new structures, new stories and pictures that more closely relate to actual felt experience.
In future issues of Lilipoh I hope to explore new cultural phenomenon in greater depth, highlighting diverse places within our cultural landscape that are adding to a new collective guiding principle. Here are three such sources that I would encourage readers to explore.
...
Daniel Pinchbeck's latest book 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl (2006, NY: Harpers Collins) fearlessly (and at time perhaps even recklessly) hops from Mayan calendar prophesies to crop circles, global shamanism and visionary states. What makes this book unusual is not just the subject matter, but the methodology that Pinchbeck applies to both these unexplained phenomena and to his own inner processes as he journeys to meet them. Pinchbeck, attempting to unravel the mysteries of what is being asked of contemporary humanity, is a scientist who knowingly includes himself in his observable data. He displays a hesitant but powerful faith in a cohesive logical reality that must include the mystery of spiritual worlds. Pinchbeck's web-based magazine, Reality Sandwich (www.realitysandwich.org) is likewise filled with clear and forward thinking essays and interviews covering everything from urban homesteading and visionary art to the latest finding of quantum physics.
The film The Fountain (2006, Warner Brothers) written and directed by Darren Aronofsky (Director of π and Requiem for a Dream) stands for me as a good indication of where an emerging "New Edge" movement currently lies within the larger culture. Released last year to poor box office sales and critics who just didn't get it, The Fountain is a beautiful film with layered meaning and powerful indications for life, death and time. There are many esoteric touches throughout the film for viewers who make the effort to find them. Aronofsky's high level of respect for the viewer puts him at odds with an industry and audience much more accustomed to easily digestible entertainment. To me, The Fountain is a good example of a new field of partnership media, created by an artist seeking sophisticated engagement from their audience and not afraid of mediums and artistic channels that can reach audiences who will be challenged by such requests for engagement. A visual website created for the launch of the movie (http://thefountainmovie.warnerbros.com) and an audio remix project (www.thefountainremixed.com), are interesting examples of the possibility for similar experimentation on the internet.
This past summer confirmed for me that perhaps the most promising real-world laboratory for new guiding myths to be shared and refined is the arts festival known as Burning Man. The yearly week-long event offers a glimpse of what Rudolf Steiner called the "communing society"* of our collective future. A gathering built around the support and promotion of each individual's right and ability to create, Burning Man is a radically participatory event. Attended every year by a growing group of culture makers including the founders of Google and many other internet companies, movie stars and musicians, countless authors and scientists and even the occasional government official. Burning Man is increasingly having a measurable, if yet still largely unnoticed, effect on mainstream society.
I would love to continue the dialogue about where and how this emerging culture is forming. Please feel free to email me at Jordan@education-of-the-imagintion.org.
As I study our current cultural landscape, I ask myself what new mythology puts our current lives into the context of the evolution of consciousness? What stories will document our rise as maturing beings, outgrowing a reliance on power structures based on dominance and black or white thinking? What guiding frameworks give us the tools to understand a path of conscious initiation that takes place both in the cosmic but also in the everyday?
Where is this emerging myth of personal responsibility being articulated in the world?
Einstein's famous quote states that the problems facing humanity and the planet can not be solved on the same level on which they were created. My thought is that this next emerging level is so broad in its scope and outsized in its scale by the cultures surrounding it, that it goes largely unnoticed and often under-appreciated by those struggling in their own arena for such innovation.
I believe this myth is taking shape beneath the radar of a mainstream culture that is wary of earnest searchers striving towards deeper meaning in life. Lives led without a dose of post-modern irony, apathy and skepticism can feel threatening. There are of course alternative stories, vantage points where the problems facing the world are seen from a new perspective. There are contemporary myth makers that sense a disconnect between their own experience of life and the narratives that we have been collectively living under. This living awareness of inaccuracy can then be paired with the imagination to arrive at new structures, new stories and pictures that more closely relate to actual felt experience.
In future issues of Lilipoh I hope to explore new cultural phenomenon in greater depth, highlighting diverse places within our cultural landscape that are adding to a new collective guiding principle. Here are three such sources that I would encourage readers to explore.
...
Daniel Pinchbeck's latest book 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl (2006, NY: Harpers Collins) fearlessly (and at time perhaps even recklessly) hops from Mayan calendar prophesies to crop circles, global shamanism and visionary states. What makes this book unusual is not just the subject matter, but the methodology that Pinchbeck applies to both these unexplained phenomena and to his own inner processes as he journeys to meet them. Pinchbeck, attempting to unravel the mysteries of what is being asked of contemporary humanity, is a scientist who knowingly includes himself in his observable data. He displays a hesitant but powerful faith in a cohesive logical reality that must include the mystery of spiritual worlds. Pinchbeck's web-based magazine, Reality Sandwich (www.realitysandwich.org) is likewise filled with clear and forward thinking essays and interviews covering everything from urban homesteading and visionary art to the latest finding of quantum physics.
The film The Fountain (2006, Warner Brothers) written and directed by Darren Aronofsky (Director of π and Requiem for a Dream) stands for me as a good indication of where an emerging "New Edge" movement currently lies within the larger culture. Released last year to poor box office sales and critics who just didn't get it, The Fountain is a beautiful film with layered meaning and powerful indications for life, death and time. There are many esoteric touches throughout the film for viewers who make the effort to find them. Aronofsky's high level of respect for the viewer puts him at odds with an industry and audience much more accustomed to easily digestible entertainment. To me, The Fountain is a good example of a new field of partnership media, created by an artist seeking sophisticated engagement from their audience and not afraid of mediums and artistic channels that can reach audiences who will be challenged by such requests for engagement. A visual website created for the launch of the movie (http://thefountainmovie.warnerbros.com) and an audio remix project (www.thefountainremixed.com), are interesting examples of the possibility for similar experimentation on the internet.
This past summer confirmed for me that perhaps the most promising real-world laboratory for new guiding myths to be shared and refined is the arts festival known as Burning Man. The yearly week-long event offers a glimpse of what Rudolf Steiner called the "communing society"* of our collective future. A gathering built around the support and promotion of each individual's right and ability to create, Burning Man is a radically participatory event. Attended every year by a growing group of culture makers including the founders of Google and many other internet companies, movie stars and musicians, countless authors and scientists and even the occasional government official. Burning Man is increasingly having a measurable, if yet still largely unnoticed, effect on mainstream society. I would love to continue the dialogue about where and how this emerging culture is forming. Please feel free to email me at Jordan@education-of-the-imagintion.org.
*Steiner suggests this "communing society" is the third of three stages to Humanity's evolution. The first is the "Power Society" ruled by those who spoke for Divine will. The second, of which we are nearing the end, is the "Bargaining Society" which is a chaotic jumble of individual's selfish wills. In the third, unity is not achieved by returning to a singular common society, but by each mature individual's higher will being held in a universal harmony.
April 27, 2007
Burning (Ahi)Man
...This essay appeared in the Summer 2007 Issue of Lilipoh Magazine...
Burning Ahriman
Burning Ahriman
"We in Europe develop anthroposophy out of the spirit. Over in America, they develop something that is like a kind of wooden doll of anthroposophy. Everything turns materialistic. But for one who is not a fanatic, America has something that resembles what anthroposophical science is in Europe. The only thing is that everything is ‘wooden’ there... The time will come eventually when this American 'wooden man'- and everybody is such a 'wooden being' at this point- will begin to speak. Then it will have something to say similar to this European Anthroposophy(1)." -R. Steiner 1924
For the last sixteen years, an ever increasing number of participants from around the world have been making a pilgrimage to the Black Rock Desert north of Reno, Nevada for an event that is unique in the history of all mankind. A city is built purely from the imagination and will of the event’s participants, explored for a week, and is then dismantled and removed from the desert, leaving absolutely no trace of its existence. It is called Black Rock City and the event is most commonly referred to as ‘Burning Man,’ named for the annual burning of a forty-foot-tall wooden effigy that is shaped like a man and sits in the center of the city, serving as the primary reference point for Black Rock’s citizens throughout the week.This unique event had modest beginnings when, in 1991, two hundred or so artists, anarchists, and hedonists moved their yearly party from a San Francisco beach to a massive dried-out lake bed in the Nevada desert to prevent the police and local spectators from disrupting the spontaneity and good-will of the gathering. The pilgrimage quickly became a rite of passage to participate in the event. But despite the difficult journey and almost no formal advertising, growth in attendance to the desert utopia has been exponential and the event now hosts some 40,000-plus participants and possesses a largely self-organized community ethos that seekers of a creative resistance to materialism may find intriguing.
The elements of this ethos can be found distilled into ten principles listed on the event’s web site: “Radical Inclusion, Gifting, Decommodification, Radical Self-Reliance, Communal Effort, Civic Responsibility, Leaving No Trace, Participation, and Immediacy”. The reader is referred to www.Burningman.com for a detailed explication of these, as this article is too brief to cover them. But from the list alone, one can see that the move away from a modern-day city and into the harsh desert environment was not merely physical, but rather the ritualization of a conscious effort to thwart the monolithic forces that overwhelm contemporary life in America and constrict the potential for creative freedom and organic community.
These materialistic forces are rapidly spreading throughout the globe. They include, but are not
limited to: an instinctive gravitation towards comfort and convenience, the suppression of individuality and creativity through market forces and corporate entities, the centralized bureaucracies of our government and mainstream media outlets, the prevailing faith in what science is and what it can do, a dreamy reliance on technology, and, sadly, this list could go on. Burning Man participants respond to these forces with a creative defiance.“If people do not comprehend that they must place the domain of rights and the cultural-spiritual structure over against the economic order…then the triumph of his
By maintaining a purely gift and barter economy, with no vending or sponsorship, encouraging a conscious relationship with the land and community, and demanding the creative ‘participation’ of each and every individual in a physically harsh environment, Burning Man’s organizers and attendees create a sacred space where post-industrial life can escape the imbedded habits of an artificial existence—just long enough to re-imagine itself through the experience of art. In Black Rock City, Joseph Beuy’s maxim, “Everyone an artist,” has become a reality.
Participants go to the ends of the Earth to create extravagant costumes, elaborate bicycles (a Burner’s primary means of transportation on the playa), inventive themed camps for dwelling and gathering, exotic dance floors, innumerable sculptures that dot the desert landscape, multi-story temples that create an opportunity for reflection in a non-dogmatic setting, and perhaps most sensational- art cars. The latter are quintessentially post-modern creations that must be seen to be believed; at any moment in Black Rock City, you might catch a ride on a full-scale pirate ship, a mock Starship Enterprise, a three-stories-tall blooming flower, a thirty-foot-long glowing Cheshire cat, an electric cup-cake, and the list goes on upwards to some two hundred of these beautiful machines of the imagination
As students of anthroposophy and repeat participants at Burning Man, we believe that this event makes possible spiritual renewal from a secular context, personal transformation through participation and a gradual working to establish a proper relationship with materialistic forces. What’s more, this young spiritual movement needs your conscious co-participation. There is no ‘Three-fold’ theme camp, no ‘Goethe art-car,’ and no ‘rose-cross’ art installation. These things, and whatever you can imagine, are waiting to be brought out to the desert and shared with an international community of idealists. As Rudolf Steiner said, “Through what we ourselves do, we erect what has to be present, namely that for the good of the world we erect the site of the consuming fire of sacrifice, the site where the horror of darkness rays over the destructive Ahrimanic element.” (4)”
We welcome you to join us for the burning of the wooden man at the end of this summer, Aug 27th-Sep 3, and leave you with the formal mission statement of the Burning Man Organization as stated on the web site mentioned above. Please do not hesitate to contact the authors of this article via e-mail for specific questions or if you would like to attend the event and camp with us:
Jordan Walker- expandedspectrum (@) gmail.com
Mitch Mignano- Mitch_mignano (@) yahoo.com
Our mission is to produce the annual event known as "Burning Man" and to guide, nurture and protect the more permanent community created by its culture. Our intention is to generate society that connects each individual to his or her creative powers, to participation in community, to the larger realm of civic life, and to the even greater world of nature that exists beyond society. We believe that the experience of Burning Man can produce positive spiritual change in the world. To this end, it is equally important that we communicate with one another, with the citizens of Black Rock City and with the community of Burning Man wherever it may arise. Burning Man is radically inclusive, and its meaning is potentially accessible to anyone. The touchstone of value in our culture will always be immediacy: experience before theory, moral relationships before politics, survival before services, roles before jobs, embodied ritual before symbolism, work before vested interest, participant support before sponsorship. Finally, in order to accomplish these ends, Burning Man must endure as a self-supporting enterprise that is capable of sustaining the lives of those who dedicate themselves to its work. From this devotion spring those duties that we owe to one another. We will always burn the Man.
1. Stegmann, Carl. The Other America. Fair Oaks, CA: Rudolf Steiner College Press, 1997, pp 191.
2. Ibid 146
3. Gilmore, Lee and Mark Van Proyen, eds. Afterburn: Reflections on Burning Man. University of New Mexico Press, 2005.
August 12, 2006
March 12, 2006
The Only Temple We Have Ever Known
The Only Temple We Have Ever Known
I have you breathe down on me like an experience gone beyond mine
to ours
to cosmic universal
to starlight on a soft, soft summer night when rain drops fall from a cloudless sky and we gather in fields
exalted and humbled
and filthy
and grandly,
magnificently
soaking...
wet.
It pours down the base of my neck
over spine tingling particles that respond to touch
and breath
and me sensing you
long dead and gone
standing there just beyond a naked shoulder.
We've gather here to honor all time and place
to spread the message that has been whispered in ears
since ears were baby soft
We gather to groom the trails that form the circling crops
communicating the secrets that have yet to belong to more than the code broken
just now
when you said to me
"This...is...all...there...ever...was."
And we whirl together,
spinning on a field that has been created backwards
backwards from backwards
backwards from wholeness
backwards from truth
backwards from time spins
backwards from rocks crumble.
Backwards, the destination gives birth to the path.
Perhaps we whirl here together, alone
writing this journey into the only temple we have ever known.
December 1, 2004
Pre-history: an Allegory to the Way Things Were
Pre-history: an Allegory to the Way Things Were
(black and white short film with select colorizing. high definition video and high resolution stills)
Black. rumbling sound slowly becomes articulated as a human scream as we zoom out of an open mouth. still image of full screen face. His eyes are wild and hysterical, his mouth gaping open. ragged stubble. dried blood matted to one side of his head, dirt on both. Moving image jerks back as the man's guttural scream ends and he begins to yell in some long forgotten language, brutish and ugly. The fluid, choreographed camera movement continues back showing the man in smeared armored chest plate, gripping a banged up shield and heavy sword. He stands on a castle top, battlements visible behind him, impossibly blue sky overhead. He is shaking his hands as he screams, veins visible in neck, forehead. He screams again, horrible and insane, tongue visible from his snarling mouth as he turns his face to the battlements.
The same fluid shot begins to hook around the man, capturing him look back (to the army?) behind him and swing his arm forward (in the universal "charge" motion). the tracking camera passes him on the side as he begins to run toward the battlements. arrows zip over the wall, past the camera and one strikes him in the chest. He snarls, staggers, keeps his eyes on the horizon. two more arrows fly at him, puncture the metal and spurt into the flesh beneath. He falls to his knees. blood gurgles from his mouth as he continues his guttural diatribe and the camera continues its trajectory over the edge of the rooftop.
the camera slides over the battlement wall revealing a modern day brooklyn street, glimpsing a [bright green] tree-lined sidewalk. cars. the warrior's yell fades as the camera slides across the street and through the wall of a building across from the castle.
the camera slides to a stop inside. high resolution still close up of a different man's profile. motion as he twitches. mutters. sweat drips down his face and a fly buzzes overhead. fluorescent bulb overhead hums and flickers.
a door, visible in the extreme background snaps into focus as it bursts open. The camera zooms (sped up "Romeo and Juliet" shoot-out style) to a grotesque woman standing in the doorway. shopping bags in raised hands, impossibly wide plastic surgery smile fixed onto her face. [Blue] eye-shadow, beehive hairdo, [pink] rouge and fake eyelashes (tammy fay in shopping mall bliss).
cut to twitching man, full frame dropping into runners pose. extreme slow motion as we watch his khakis and dress shirt wrinkle and arms assume their sprinter-at-the-block position. Noise (scream?) as he moves, every muscle rippling. slow motion legs and arms pumping as he leans into each step - perfect runners form.
cut to Point of View as he crashes into the large window in front of him. glass shatters and breaks apart ( CG fractals grow out from the center and explode as slow motion becomes real time).
silence. the camera soars peacefully. [blue] sky, white fluffy clouds. the sound of rippling clothing takes hold as the sidewalk rushes up to meet the falling camera.
bone-crushing, organ splatting blackness.
The camera rises straight up from sidewalk to medium close-up of a male profile and begins to track with his walking. He is young. laid-back hip, cool. He flows accapella as he walks. the camera tracks steadily with him. His words are poetry but they make no sense. He is spitting a long string of profanities, mismatched degrading words and bits of negative phrases. The filth coming from his mouth is in direct contradiction to his elegant style.
cut to a still of a stairwell across the street. the rapping is still audible but faint. There is a beautiful Arab girl speaking in a whisper. devotion in her words too low to make out. She raises her head skyward as the sound of the rapping grows louder (the young man approaches on the sidewalk). their voices mix for a moment beautifully and the sun peaks out from her profile and starbursts the camera. the girl looks down at the object in her hand. click.
an explosion envelopes the entryway in bright light and flames.
the rapping boy's face is torn away by the force of the explosion. a few frames of skin tearing back to reveal skull.
cut to static low shot of the street. crack in the pavement. [green] willow tree on the left. sidewalk. grey buildings and a white car on the right. rubble rains down onto the pavement. silence.
peace.
the camera remains fixed. 20 seconds. 30. wind rustles leaves on the willow tree. clouds move across the sky. a blade of bright green grass slowly begins to inch its way up through the crack in the street. grass begins to grow up under the car and along the building as the car settles forward onto one flat tire. 10 seconds. 20. green ivy begins to take over the buildings walls. climbs over the car's hood and begins to take over the sidewalk. the car is overcome with green life, the grey wall peaks out beneath plants and the crack in the grey street has sprouted bright wild flowers.
A figure slowly approaches down the center of the road. The camera remains fixed as the figure grows closer, color illuminates out from around them so brightly that the core details of the person are obscured in the brilliance of the dancing, living aura surrounding them. They continue toward the camera and the frame becomes alive with the swirling color of now visible energy.
...
(black and white short film with select colorizing. high definition video and high resolution stills)
Black. rumbling sound slowly becomes articulated as a human scream as we zoom out of an open mouth. still image of full screen face. His eyes are wild and hysterical, his mouth gaping open. ragged stubble. dried blood matted to one side of his head, dirt on both. Moving image jerks back as the man's guttural scream ends and he begins to yell in some long forgotten language, brutish and ugly. The fluid, choreographed camera movement continues back showing the man in smeared armored chest plate, gripping a banged up shield and heavy sword. He stands on a castle top, battlements visible behind him, impossibly blue sky overhead. He is shaking his hands as he screams, veins visible in neck, forehead. He screams again, horrible and insane, tongue visible from his snarling mouth as he turns his face to the battlements.
The same fluid shot begins to hook around the man, capturing him look back (to the army?) behind him and swing his arm forward (in the universal "charge" motion). the tracking camera passes him on the side as he begins to run toward the battlements. arrows zip over the wall, past the camera and one strikes him in the chest. He snarls, staggers, keeps his eyes on the horizon. two more arrows fly at him, puncture the metal and spurt into the flesh beneath. He falls to his knees. blood gurgles from his mouth as he continues his guttural diatribe and the camera continues its trajectory over the edge of the rooftop.
the camera slides over the battlement wall revealing a modern day brooklyn street, glimpsing a [bright green] tree-lined sidewalk. cars. the warrior's yell fades as the camera slides across the street and through the wall of a building across from the castle.
the camera slides to a stop inside. high resolution still close up of a different man's profile. motion as he twitches. mutters. sweat drips down his face and a fly buzzes overhead. fluorescent bulb overhead hums and flickers.
a door, visible in the extreme background snaps into focus as it bursts open. The camera zooms (sped up "Romeo and Juliet" shoot-out style) to a grotesque woman standing in the doorway. shopping bags in raised hands, impossibly wide plastic surgery smile fixed onto her face. [Blue] eye-shadow, beehive hairdo, [pink] rouge and fake eyelashes (tammy fay in shopping mall bliss).
cut to twitching man, full frame dropping into runners pose. extreme slow motion as we watch his khakis and dress shirt wrinkle and arms assume their sprinter-at-the-block position. Noise (scream?) as he moves, every muscle rippling. slow motion legs and arms pumping as he leans into each step - perfect runners form.
cut to Point of View as he crashes into the large window in front of him. glass shatters and breaks apart ( CG fractals grow out from the center and explode as slow motion becomes real time).
silence. the camera soars peacefully. [blue] sky, white fluffy clouds. the sound of rippling clothing takes hold as the sidewalk rushes up to meet the falling camera.
bone-crushing, organ splatting blackness.
The camera rises straight up from sidewalk to medium close-up of a male profile and begins to track with his walking. He is young. laid-back hip, cool. He flows accapella as he walks. the camera tracks steadily with him. His words are poetry but they make no sense. He is spitting a long string of profanities, mismatched degrading words and bits of negative phrases. The filth coming from his mouth is in direct contradiction to his elegant style.
cut to a still of a stairwell across the street. the rapping is still audible but faint. There is a beautiful Arab girl speaking in a whisper. devotion in her words too low to make out. She raises her head skyward as the sound of the rapping grows louder (the young man approaches on the sidewalk). their voices mix for a moment beautifully and the sun peaks out from her profile and starbursts the camera. the girl looks down at the object in her hand. click.
an explosion envelopes the entryway in bright light and flames.
the rapping boy's face is torn away by the force of the explosion. a few frames of skin tearing back to reveal skull.
cut to static low shot of the street. crack in the pavement. [green] willow tree on the left. sidewalk. grey buildings and a white car on the right. rubble rains down onto the pavement. silence.
peace.
the camera remains fixed. 20 seconds. 30. wind rustles leaves on the willow tree. clouds move across the sky. a blade of bright green grass slowly begins to inch its way up through the crack in the street. grass begins to grow up under the car and along the building as the car settles forward onto one flat tire. 10 seconds. 20. green ivy begins to take over the buildings walls. climbs over the car's hood and begins to take over the sidewalk. the car is overcome with green life, the grey wall peaks out beneath plants and the crack in the grey street has sprouted bright wild flowers.
A figure slowly approaches down the center of the road. The camera remains fixed as the figure grows closer, color illuminates out from around them so brightly that the core details of the person are obscured in the brilliance of the dancing, living aura surrounding them. They continue toward the camera and the frame becomes alive with the swirling color of now visible energy.
...
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