t-shirts

I am doing my best to project white light
to cleanse myself of the poison and grime
but i am addicted to the things I hate
and sometimes the battle inside
it spills out a little...
but I am doing the best I can
to love us both as honestly as I know how
so excuse my moments of weakness
and know that I am using them
to make my white light stronger

THE PUSH & THE LIGHT

Starting immediately myself and my most main of main men, Leon Quest, will be collaborating together under the moniker The Push & The Light. If you're ever in the Vic area come check out BIG UPS! Spoken Word among other venues for a first hand look at what's up. chek Quest at leonquest.blogspot.com

Kaleidoscope Rising

(my half of a 'The Push & The Light' collab)

Ever since we never ever had a bonfire
I said a prayer every time a lighter went up
to stoke the cherry on one of them soulful dubs
where did the spirits go cous'? couldn't be lost in the
'verberation of the subs / 'cause ever since the heads hung
I've seen only broken picket fences and the windows shut
what happened to the strut in the grasp of all human's reach?
where is located the ravenous stalk in the spirit's talk?
what the fuck happened to the wobble in the rainbow's walk?

ever since we never ever ever ever had a bonfire
doused our sleeves in gasoline / sparked a lighter 'neath our cuffs
gave ourselves up to the glow of the moon / wax and wane of the sun
we danced all day / we danced all night
danced into the face of fear out of spite
deserted songs 'bout what's wrong rhyme on what's right
how the color spectrum of the skies has allowed us to thrive
nothing too trite / contrived never fed a soul or kept a body alive
derived / ain't the lsd gripping the best of me
no lies allied / aligned with a pillar of light
these are my eyes in the rainbowing sunshine
mandala on the back of my hand and a smile / never deprived
virile / all ways loved / never lacking of a percentile / explosions
of the chakras / connections selecting predestined directions
just follow the path / always loving waters birth new islands and isles
evolved remedies sativas sought by our salivas / sacred salves
no denials / no questions to be asked / stimulated foundries
just follow the path / refractions of light through the prism
just the oneness / no isms / just concrescence of love
the souls and blessed wavering hands / the mast above
the cymbals / the splash / sails full bloom / the dance and the laugh

ever since we never had a bonfire
I said a prayer every time a lighter went up
to stoke the cherry on one of them soulful dubs
what happened to the strut in the human's speech? in the spirits talk?
what the fuck happened to the wobble in the rainbows walk?
we traced it in chalk
channeled ourselves through it and the photographs
breathed life into the images and
listened to the voices of one other talk
each wave of sound crashed over the former
still we could decipher the difference between
the pieces because this is our dream and we built it together

ever since we never had a bonfire
I said a prayer every time a lighter went up
to stoke the cherry on one of them soulful dubs
why? because rainbows inspire and ever since
we never ever had a bonfire / I said a prayer every time a lighter
went up to stoke the cherry on one of them soulful dubs because...

(Memoirs of a first year tree planter)

(Memoirs of a first year tree planter) is just a tentative title while i work on this. youll know when its complete cuz the title will change.


so you want to go treeplanting you say?
let me spin you a yarn...or ya know, a dozen...

"There's a genuine, not love, but at least respect amongst tree planters. Not just because we all know what it's like to be in the shit. But because we all know what it's like to be in the shit, and we're still here." - Lukas Ryder

We are on the northbound greyhound just south of williams lake, b.c. we are headed to prince george to begin our first season of tree planting with Celtic reforestation the skies are blue and the clouds thick and i still feel like i am just outside of victoria and still on the island. i drift into sleep thinking of family trying not to think too much about the plant to come cuz i know once we get there thats all that will consume us. when i awaken i dont know where we are but i know we are much farther north. the last trimmings of snow drifts of winters last gasp still line the road sides. the shutters to the sky have been closed. it is still mid evening but the skies are a black brown and paint the rivers a creamy diahrea color as if a dozen cocacola trucks had over turned in the current just out of sight around the bend. sheets of sleet batter the bus. i rub my eyes to confirm the startling change in my reality and laugh to myself as this seems to be a sign stating "you have no idea what youre getting into" we arrive at PG at 9:30pm. (Prince George was called "the northern capital of b.c." [what a shit hole. gummoesque kids loitered out front of pretty much any place they could from the library to the cinema. there was a skin shop on every second block and according to a guy we picked some weed off of he had been shot at with a shotgun the day prior over pretty much nothing. If boredom warms the devils hands this town was a fucking hottub]) pulled into the greyhound station 45 minutes late of when our foreman was to pick us up. luckily when we walk out of the front doors into the rain, a Crummy (a large modified pickup with enclosed canvas back to house planting / personal gear, trees, first aid equipment etc.) with the celtic logo on the side is waiting for us. we walk up to the front left side and knock on the window. A short, kind, blonde woman in her mid 20s rolls down the window introduces herself as Emma our foreman and tells us to throw our shit in the back and get the fuck in so we can get the fuck out. we walk around and pull back the hooked closed canvas flap to reveal other planters personal bags, planting bags, shovels, a wheel barrow, helmets, long pink cords i have no idea what are for and other misc. crap im soon to become well acquainted with. we get in the back of the crummy and introduce ourselves to a couple of the other planters on our crew (dont remember specifically who it was at the time) "we're staying at the Brothers Inn" emma tells us. "we'll probably be there another 3 or 4 days before we go out to camp on account of the ground is still too hard to plant." Brothers Inn was a shady motel 15 minutes North East of town. Ran by an asian couple who were pretty much ghosts unless you weren't paid up for the night. We had two rooms side by side each with two beds in them, stove, sink, tv, bathroom. It was here we met the majority of our crew. Our fucking family and eventual saviors of one another in some way or another through out the course of the next few months.
There was Cody and Rob Whynot. Two easterner brothers who were proud as anybody of their Nova Scotian home. "We're not fucking newfies we're Nova Scotians" they'd spit at anybody who used the term within earshot of them. This'd be their 3rd year in the shit. Spent their first year planting Ontario, 2nd Alberta, now here they were here in B.C. They were the alpha dogs of the crew but as helpful and caring as you would hope they'd be. Don't get me wrong though, sure they were decent enough. But they didnt give a fuck about anybody who wasnt on their crew. One evening a few us were sitting around drinking after dinner. Talking about motives and why we're all out here. Cody had this to say: "Sure the exercise is phenomenal, sure you meet alot of amazing people, and sure its a fucking blast in general. But we all know why we're really here. It's about the fucking benjamins! Us, we look out for eachother cuz we're on the same crew. We help each other out so that in the end we can all make a lot more money. But those other yahoos in the company? I dont give a fuck. they could get mauled by a bear or rolled over by a logging truck and I wouldn't think twice. Ya know why? cuz its about the motherfucking benjamins." and thats just the way he was. The two of them laughed and partied and had a good time with everybody as any. But they really knew what they were doing and why they were doing it. I guess thats what made them the high ballers they were.
There was Dawson. He was a different story from the Whynots all together. He didn't need the money at all and was just there for shits pretty much. He'd plug along enjoying the scenery. Stopping every once in a while to hollar into the trees or sock dingers on his cache breaks. While I planted around him he'd stop to ride giant logs like a cowboy. I remember one time on the bus back to camp he was talking and making everybody laugh 'til we cry like only Dawson knew how and in between laughing fits Warbsy said "Dawson I would love to have known you when you were eight" to which he shrugged and said "Yea I was pretty much the same."
There was Lauren "Warbsy" Warbs. This was her second year. What a friend, sister and mother she was to us all. Always cheerful and optimistic. She really recognised how important gestures of physical contact were for maintaining a good mentallity out there and would without being asked rub backs and feet or simply place her hand on your shoulder when she spoke to you. Supportive, loving and a gorgeous voice. A true blessing.

Terminology:
Bagged out: all trees from bags have been planted.
Bag up: fill your bags with trees.
Block: a chunk of land usually large enough for an entire crew to take an entire day or two to plant to specified density.
Cache: the spot along side the road where you stored your personals, boxes of trees, equipment etc. while you are out planting.
Cache break: any breaks are usually taken out by the cache as that is where personals such as food and extra clothing are kept as well as tree boxes for bagging up are. Cigarettes are not permitted to be smoked any where but on the road so a smoke break would also be called a cache break.
Cream: incredibly soft ground that's easy as hell to plant.
J Root: a tree planted in too shallow of a hole causing the bottom of the plug to bend to the side.
Piece: small sections of a block. ex. planters are designated their own piece of the block to plant.
Silvicool: a bright silver reflective tarp pulled over your cache to keep the trees cool and your shit dry.
Slut: to plant trees with no attention to quality. only concern being speed.
Plug: a sapling to be planted.
Pound: Quality planting done fast.
Low ball: to plant the least trees out of any number of group of people.
High ball: to plant the most trees out of any number of group of people.
Socking dingers: to bat small rocks with your shovel at a target, eachother, or just straight up into the air.

talk about the bus ride to and from the block.
Pat/Lukas/Cody/Rob/Dawson/Lauren aka "Warbsy"/Mara/Sarah/Ilana/Emma/Matt/Brian/Sim/Daniel/Reuben/Claire/Ruby/planting photos:see my facebook for four albums of planting photos.

Meditation at 23

the seed of life as a three dimensional object begins to spin creating a gyroscoping centrifuge around my half lotus positioned body
I am given myself and that is enough /
I am given myself and for now / that is enough

ps - remember that want and desire and lust; these are beautiful things also. one day you will be thirsty no more.

Impact

A slack jawed symbiote of sorts
anxiety is a residual condition / overlooked
as it is often construed as the silence
between the valleys and peaks of
a heartbeat monitors beeps / and
the tight frowns stifled into the space
between cross walks blank stares
the weeping wall is so soft it absorbs
all traces of sound and nothing can be heard

tears permeate permanently into cheeks like tattoos
congestion I have accepted I'm never going to lose
people die all the time so where is the body
where is the snow drift / where is the snare
how not knot tightened enough are my hands
where are the claws my father taught me
when is my theifdom become my kingdom
where is the trap door / where is my noose
where are the lions / the mouth of the Jordon river
give me an ice skate blade and a deep rotted tooth
nothing but disappointment of the self as I separate the
leather cords / disassemble the steel / place down the tools

I hear rumors that the poison is airborne
thick / and black
that crevices and slip stream drafts exist
but ain't none of us one can see
it only comes to surface on the darkest of nights
(if it escapes the cities distances
it'll travel fastest on the old rail way tracks)
so give me my gas mask
give me oil and a fist full of dynamite
let's fuck for the fuck of it just one more fucking time
show me unkempt beds in forgotten hospitals
and I'll show you meditation well spent
the first sucking ounce of what's in me is virile
the last IV drip dons good riddance

all in good time
sometimes I wish I knew how to hate
sometimes I wish I knew how to die / for the moment
sometimes I wish I was never responsible to begin with
sometimes I wish I truly knew how to own a woman's onus

Tarot.

wrote this a few years ago and found it necessary to post it here.

I will burn like god
and never ask for forgiveness
I will depend entirely on myself
and never bother with penance
when I go out it will happen
*     *
in a matter of seconds
and when they sweep up my body
my mother will thank god that I am in heaven
and never know I never asked for forgiveness

at my funeral my friends
will all wish that they had a stiff drink
they'll pass out blue roses
bow their heads in silence
and say nothing.

Koli Pose

Too many cigarettes while all along never enough omskees / Jesus Christ what'll happen to the righteous might when the strong leaves / what ever happened to the tattoos? scrape the grill so I can get a fill on some of that burnt cheese / gel caps preferred / the pressed pills ya know I won't do / maintain variants in the mood / hold those sheets straight please / breeze off the bend in the bees knees / cause when the streets bleed / I see only thin bones among long sleeves / sprocket grease doc marten's pockets / misunderstood so we understand how to mock drop these / midi keys / sung seeds for trees / extract introduce interact liquid LSD / into the sockets of the botched rockets blasted four fold for thee / keep the lips loose / ass tight as industries cuz inside this peace / I keep my glock assembled and stocked free of the trembles hammer cocked on my piece / the chrome gleams in time with the blood on the screen / so much so that you can't see / thems the breaks that I deemed deace / residual quality you know me / and the product I sling sights gonna cost ya so the blindfolds are free / before the trail goes cold / before the water goes deep / don't go still as green tea / grenades that don't sleep / just bide their time under assumptions and alibis / a learning curve steep rolls of the tongue like soft meat off the mind's eye / unlearn instigate identify / engage strengthen exhume confide / say baby at least I got one thing right / I got nobody on my side and surely that ain't right / decide if that's your style / if the hues are too lewd construed notions butterflying planet earth's mysteries and curses / under the surface of the ocean's currents / what's all this commotion spread like wildfire / razor sharp lotion sped spike mild flower how many soils can sour when in the case of an hour moons full you know devours / leaving nothing but a crows aching skeleton in the reflection of the pavement / empty spaces where windows once took refuge in the top halves of towers / glass trap doors under the foundation of the basement / tremulants bred these plowers subservient but only when well meant / harvest the cream from the solvent / harvest the true drool icicling from dropped jaws encapsulated still mobile / trawling the deep blue like icebergs / determined to melt off isolation remains only a slip in the stacked clip a chip of a percentile / blown gaskets and castle roof tiles / merlin not noticed minor cracked rackets or crimped hinges / faults in positions the bending of what's with us / spells subjugated upon our enemies blown to cigarette ash over time eroded in a likeness to the cancer face of their children / there are no grimacing cringes / only blind eyes like medusa cries no silver shields helmets pulled back too high to hide / if this is the way I'm gonna go I'll be a feast of a meal / a riot ravenous too staccato for corruption to conceal us / no walls can contain us / dropping feet in the tides fine sand solid coordination hammered as fork tines as koli stance / lancing lattices like lemurs and rabbits / we can take this assault and grace it / folded steel splits where thick fog spit light shines convinced / nine lives folded themselves like steam / not a single cry
just a rush of the wall of sound /
linger weightless before the ground / calm before the storm /
a faint crook in the trees /
a soldier on his knees /
nothing left but these here three /
a single samurai survives /
civilizations are born of a mind that can thrive

Beauty Antique

Born under eternal armageddon
I am where from fights are won
that's right / where the nights
are bright as kites as they are long
where from under the mother's raining sun
where I'm from has not been done
unlike any crystal stone or rock
my earth remains ever steadyin'
a levy readyin' all bets are on
a none triage I scorn / portage
details my location / sabotage
in the circumstance of my waking dream
my realities bedded courtesan tales
substantiate my blazing corsage
alleviate my facade caching stock
ready aim sock an animal's rashing barrage
slashing newer lands nor morgue lodge
vantages hashings sinners strings / carcasses
singeing brandished and ringing damages
that shit ain't the blunts I blaze
gimme trees bare / no stems no leaves
the stones I won't do / I'm talkin' smokin'
heavy as buddha in the monkey trees
hands on branches latches stacked
from limbs to thick leaves forming hatches
where a single sharp ray of sunlight catches
your shadow like bullet holes and matches
deep end coves cover full tobacco pouches
black then second white slight as a milado
glancing sideways invisible hunckbacked slouches
comfortable as couches
I inhabit at dawn in the chesterfields
laid back as a sauna
time appreciated as a yawn above the mindfields
days spent with molten metal forging stain glass
shapes to collapse into forms of a madonna
my daughter / whats offered / a betterment
every cycle a purer extract / sentience of what's
natural / substantial / organic and mystically proper
mandalas lining the fine wines
coating our spines and virtuoso coffers
more than enough to cover law suits
the cost of fine linens adorning your torso
you're worthy of the expenditure
words cannot describe how soulviant / how so more so
we can learn to live off off our humble hands bravado
gives us knowledge on the regs energies like americanos
never sleeping lest we miss the am oasis / can't test this grace
stay the mace off the purple space the visible ripples trace
auras tangible enough they appear as edible panties laces
of a painted corset / women's beautiful faces I could never forget
a dripping song we can taste / schooning as my lips
lisp bouncing sounds cool breeze upon your nape
the shimmy of sitars / trounce of the bass
reverberates 'til there is nothing left / 'til we are erased
and the sound is all that is left
that is where I am
residence in the bass and in the treble clef
vertebrae knees bent minds eye open occulant
not a single word cuz my state is bliss
dropping pads transient / ya get my jist
swam in oceans of the sound and of sweat
confess undeserving and blessed
blasting soul dance / never unrest
I don't need to speak / I don't need to stress
when the move is on
we don't exist

Crocodiles

I had a cat tails slink for turn tables / home brew jamming with you the dope pro on the dobro and a nose hankering for hashish stew ya know / just kicking the shit like we know how to do
but then
I walked in the door
and to my chameleon chagrin stood shoulders turned in a single eye protruded mouth cracked and drooling for where I had before seen beer bottles paint markers and strewn clothing reminiscent of parties gone by and clairvoyant of art to come I now found only desolation / you at the counter with flour on your hands and pasta sauce on your feet from when the jar shattered on the floor as you turned startled by my entrance that slit the sucking silence I felt a breeze of depression rushing over my skin as I said ola and removed my shoes trying vainly not to notice that though it wasn't that bad the house seemed filthier than it ever had before / the same wine bottles wall hangings cardboard canvases and cold chamomiles coated with a grim cringing grime I swear I could see the sheen of sickness on everything / I stood in the middle of the kitchen thinking about any place else I could go / anywhere besides here / besides my home / I would sit and read but I didn't want the shit from the walls and pages getting on me / I would stand blast the speakers and spin but I feared the sound would disgrace the present disgust of silence that the music that moves would not be welcomed in / so I sat on edge of the ledge and smiled / tried to give you the love I could without falling face down in the current of the Nile
under extreme circumstances crocodiles are not picky eaters
and will pick a rotting corpse clean
no movement is necessary to draw their attention
you were a walking coma drowning in the
poltergeist you didn't know how to tell to leave
it was just you and me and a room full of ghosts
frustration and loneliness / an atmosphere that grieves
drawing away emotions in walls that hollered
"you don't know!" / humidity and the harbinger
it's one hundred degrees in here but there might as well be snow
unconscious tongues mouthing lip service ventriloquism
intent on voices drawing communication away
from the very thing that made us feel the most

reminder for the day

though do not let this negatively effect present and future relationships you should remember that the only person who will be with you forever is yourself. learn to love solitude because in the end EVERYONE else goes away.
ps - live the beauty and love inside yourself first
pps - ask for everything expect nothing

Mandate

My words will be strong and sharp as folded steel
penetrating quickly and cleanly leaving no residue
I will reside in the wound for no more time than it took to create it
a thin scar will remain and you will know me by the traces I leave