Tuesday, September 7, 2010

A Poem With No Title

In wondrous amalgamations,
Serenity comes.

Head every attempt to enjoy devotion or friendship.

Then hope enjoys perpetual and radiant transcendence.

Of forever? Be always ready for every experience.

Saturday, September 4, 2010

I Just Had the Strangest Dream (#5)

I've always believed that dreams mean something, or at their more esoteric offer glimpses of the future, but I'm at a loss to explain either the meaning or what the future may hold from what I just dreamed last night.

In the dream, I had arrived early at the Stockton Civic Theatre (as is my custom) for the evening performance. I'm not sure what play it was a performance of. It could have been "I Remember Mama" (where I was in the ensemble), it could have been "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" (the play I'm helping out with as a member of the crew) or it could have been a play I'm involved with in the future, I just don't know. Anyway, when I get there, I start talking to my friends Rick and Cathy Brewer before going inside to start getting ready for the evening's performance.

In the dream, the performance goes spectacularly well and everyone is happy, and I feel this sense of joy such as I always do during and after a show.

Anyway, as I'm walking out to my car later that same evening, someone else involved with the theatre (can't remember who, that part was too fuzzy) walks right up and gets all up in my face, starts poking my in my chest with a bony finger and begins yelling at me for blocking their car in with mine.

I try to offer an apology, to ask for forgiveness, but this person won't let me get a word in edge wise. I glance over at the cars in question and I cannot see how I've blocked them at all. The person abusing me unjustly keeps getting angrier and angrier and seems on the verge of violence (all for a blocked parked car) when Rick and Cathy Brewer walk up and pull the person off me.

By this time we've drawn a crowd of performers, stage crew, and a few people who had been in the audience. My attacker starts screaming in a red faced hysteria "He blocked me in! I can't get out!" and generally calling me everything but a child of God, making the observers start to look at me and frown.

Rick and Cathy then step up and tell everyone that I'm completely innocent. They ask; "How could Wesley have blocked this person in with his car, when he arrived an hour before that person did?" This prompts all the witnesses to turn and look at the cars in question and realize that I am innocent and if anything, I've been blocked in by my attacker.

They then all turn to and question my accuser about this fact but all the person does is start screaming even louder "I don't care what you all see, say, or think! He blocked me in!", whereupon, Rick, Cathy, and all the other witnesses place themselves between me and the maniac to protect me from further abuse at the hands of this person. I felt safe.

I know it's just a dream, but like I said earlier, I've always believed that dreams can carry deeper meaning and sometimes a glimpse of the future, and on that note, Rick & Cathy, if you're reading this, even if it was just a dream or meant something more, thank you for coming to my rescue. I appreciated it immensely.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Sympathy, Pity, and Contempt

Sympathy is just a few short steps from pity.
Pity is just a few short steps from contempt.
I refuse to suffer anyone's contempt.

The Tao of Acting

We live in an era of enormous cynicism.
Do not be fooled by those who say we don't.

Don't act for money.
You'll start to feel dead and bitter.

Don't act for glory.
You'll start to feel dead, fat, and fearful.

We live in an era of enormous cynicism.
Do not be fooled by those say we don't.

You can't avoid all the pitfalls.
There are lies you must tell and lies you must endure being told to you or about you.

Experience the lie.
See it as something dead and unconnected that you clutch.
Then let it go.

Act from the depth of your feeling imagination.
Act for celebration.
Act for searching.
Act for grieving.
Act for worship.
Act to express that desolate sensation of wandering through the howling wilderness and the
very halls of bedlam itself.
Act not to escape that void of loneliness but rather to embrace it.

Don't worry about Art.

Do these things and it will become Art.

(Inspired by the words of John Patrick Shanley, Lao Tzu, and Me)