NOT BEATNICKING OFF. DONE.

I stole this picture here:

Third rewrite is done, Programming Frank Singletary. Finished yesterday morning then drove into Portland to attend the monthly lunch with Humanist of Greater Portland men. All old timers, we talked about the various ways to maintain erections after prostate removal. Laughing, we said we were relieved no younger members were at the lunch. They'd be traumatized. 

I haven't mentioned that my novel, Angie's Choice, was rejected for publication in a contest I entered. It was 9 1/2 months in process. 

This morning I've tried to do some poetry rewriting to put another poetry ms. together. A practice run for self-publishing on Amazon, but I wasn't inspired. My heart wasn't in it. I must get busy on rewrite of Ghoul World. Think I'll take a course in screenplay writing at Northwest Film Center so I can turn the novel into a screen play too. It still needs work, I'm sure. Tighten up the tension.  

This morning I also gave myself permission to take it easy for a month or a couple of weeks, kick back and read. Can't seem to do it. Think I fear my mental powers further declining.

SIGH OF RELIEF BOOMS OUT

Still, I'm working on the final chapter of Programming Frank Singletary, but I'm over the hump, the anguish subsided, and happy to be saying what I want to say at the end of a pornographic novel about sexual obsession. Should wrap up this rewrite within a day or two. 

Also, reading with respect and affection the most recent FOURBYTWO, subtitled, elsewheres. The poetry of Klipschutz and translations of several German poets by Scott J. Thompson are inside. Thompson's translation skills from the German are beyond my talents to evaluate but reading the English versions is satisfaction enough for me. Below is one of Thompson's translations of Georg Trakl's (1887-1914) imagistic poems:

SLEEP
Be damned, you dark poisons,
White sleep!
This most eccentric garden
Of twilit trees
Full of snakes, night moths,
Spiders, bats.
Stranger! Your abandoned shadow
In the sunset,
A sinister corsair
In the salty sea of anguish.
White birds flutter up at night's edge
Over collapsing cities
Of steel.

THE WIFE OF A LIFETIME

Hopeful today even though I'm still  rewriting the last chapter of Programming Frank Singletary, the uncomfortable tale of a dysfunctional relationship between two badly damaged human beans.

Find these photos at following link.

I think I'm emerging from the anxiety that had me blocked in such a way I couldn't see my way clear to the end of this novel. I still don't see my way clearly to the ending, but hope that I will has returned.

The very act of writing is critical to my mental health because when I'm blocked, unable to go forward, I'm frantic and in pain. I believe this is a childhood thing when I felt so many things I was unable to articulate. I could only feel and twist in the wind. The act of communication is critical to my mental health. Which makes me feel grateful all over again for the wife with whom I can share most anything. I have not one secret from her. I've shared the most shameful things from my past with her. 

BEAT ME DADDY 8 TIMES TO THE HEAD

Find photo here:

AAAAARG! I'm still on rewrite of Programming Frank Singletary. Who would of thought it would take so long when I began? I'm wondering if my unconscious is heeding my oft spoken wish about writing something beautiful? Of course, a graphically precise novel about dysfunctional relationships in which things very close to rape happen is not the sort of novel that most people would call "beautiful". Still, if it's writ true enough, it might have a "truth is beauty" of its own. The past week has been terrible at times. I've nearly regressed mentally to the heavy drinking past when I'd experience weeks of anguish, thinking everything I wrote was garbage. I had days, back then, when I could not bear to read my own work without twisting in the wind. Everything I wrote, I was convinced, was garbage. However, currently, as I slave away at one or two paragraphs for a couple of hours, and I see they are becoming more closely related to reality as I know it...I continually see improvement. Only problem, now, is will I be able to rewrite my entire cannon of novels before I die. I awoke in the middle of the night last night with the awful knowledge that the novel, Ghoul World, I've put so much hope into is badly flawed. It's set too far into the future, but if I bring it toward the now, then many other problems present themselves. I already know I must improve the beginning or Angie's Choice. Oh, woe, is me—the plight of the aging novelist.

BEAT TOO BEAT TO BEAT THE KEYS

Yeah. Me again.

Today is no better than my last entry. I'm stuck in rewrite of last chapter and don't know why. The heat? Anxiety? Old age? Ejaculatory dysfunction? Maybe the original ending, deep in my subconscious, is making a play to remain unchanged?

SILENT BOOMER PLANS TO END IT ALL

Brief note about current writing project. I'm still trying to complete a third rewrite of Programming Frank Singletary once known as The Porn Writer. I imagined I'd be done in two shakes of a lamb's tail. Had two chapters left but have hung fire on them for weeks. In fact, I'm altering how the novel ends. The original ending [see below], I thought of as existential and clever. Now, I'm hoping to make it more realistic and positive, I suppose. 

"Jesus Christ, what a mystery I am to myself! Penetrated with shame and emptiness, I lower my head and stare at the floor. So this is how I live, who I really am, I think, as I bend to pick up a small square of paper which lies on the floor, half under the mattress. Some writing on it. In an odd mood, I tell myself, Pretend this is a message left by the great big bang evolutionary force of the universe specially for me. I begin to read...."   THE END 

Wow! Writing is so mysterious. After reworking this ending paragraph, I'm now leaning toward leaving the ending as is. Of course, it's obviously a way to start a novel. Guess, I'll stop now, go for a walk and ponder the imponderables.

DAVE HILL, RAINY KNIGHT, JOYCE COLSON, HURRAH!

photo source

The poet is doing better than the novelist. He's got two readings booked. Isn't that a nice word, booked? Thanks to moderators Poets Dave Hill and Rainy Knight, on August 25th, I'll be a featured reader at Barnes & Noble's "Last Tuesday" poetry group. Lots popping at the store this July month too. On the third Wednesday, September 16th, by invitation of moderator, Poet Joyce Colson, l'll be the featured poet at Tiger Talk Open Mic at the Paper Tiger Coffee Roasters on Grand. One of the nice parts of that venue is that for one month, I believe, my poetry will be on display and for sale at Paper Tiger Coffee Roasters. Hope to see a few people there.

I don't know if anyone is noticing what's happening here in the Pacific Northwest. Day after day of 90 plus degree temps. Maybe I'm in Arizona and don't know it. A pal of mine down there reports temps of 107 and higher. Whew! Good thing I like to write in coffee shops. Most usually have "conditioned air". Yesterday, Mertie and I ventured to the coast for the day. Cooler there by 10 degrees, but still warm in late afternoon.