Life spirals up

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mass suicide mass – (for jonestown and ourtown)

what is common to us all
a case of the jones
of keeping up with joneses
cult is the tip of the culture

ah this collective guilt
of knowing what is being
done to us
by us

where was their individuality
asked all the waving flags

and our grandfathers
who said, if not me
maybe my son
grandsons still waiting
hiding of clock cloak
of worker
dreaming
that their 10,000 year old class
will be abolished

slow death
mass suicide mass
for those who couldn't keep
track of themselves
without their main man
in the midst of a
subverted subverted future
which clouds our love

yes there is a crack
in the reality
going to war suicide
going to chemical plant suicide
going to revolutionary suicide
going to build nuke plant suicide
not making a new world suicide
not demystifying suicide

audy murphy, remember him
uncle sam's no.1 son
congressional medal of honor winner
who died alone
because he couldn't find community

sgt york
alvin york
who gary cooper made
us love gun
and sgt york dying of cancer

the same year the new anti war
movement shook d.c.
the i.r.s. danced around alvin's bed
chanting
you owe us taxes
from the movie of your life
humphrey bogart would say
"taxes is a protection racket"

dylan don't follow leaders echoes
earlier hip chants
of how in the original moment
the people copped for the king
instead of themselves, the self
suicide the denial of the self
succumbing to the man's plan
and believing it to death
watch out for disciples baby

the guns creep in
the guns creep out
shouts the explorer to the new world
still
how heavy to fall in the new world
yes dreams have cracks in the
rainbow on the way to becoming human
only forward never dies

hey wait nine months
next time baby
it took 10,000 years
to make you baby

from the bottom tip
of argentina chile death locks
to the top of guyana
not so strange deaths
some will say
it was the howls and screams
from nicaraguan
argentinean
guatemalan
chilean
and brazilian torture dungeons
that made them nuts
conspiracy fact
can wisdom come
from death jones jim
something alive must
life demands it

steve ben israel 1978

carnegiehall.org/textSite/box_office/events/evt_9602.html
robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=1294
allaboutjazz.com/php/news.php?id=17903
newmuseum.org/events/211
video.aol.com/video-detail/steve-ben-israel-taking-the-train/492672739
video.aol.com/video-detail/steve-ben-israel-nonviolent-executions/4153659306
youtube.com/watch?v=dtL3pjwZo4s
unlikelystories.org/benisrael0108.shtml
danaherbert.blogspot.com/2008/05/village-interviews-steve-ben-israel.html
blacklistedjournalist.com/column95k3.html
theaterlab.info/nonviolent.html
allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=41:80590~T3
ingridjungermann.wordpress.com/2008/10/08/the-death-of-poetry
humanbeatbox.com/forum/showthread.php?t=23747
timessquare.com/Theater/Theater_Stories/2007_Obie_Awards_Winners!
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Hazelwood resident hopes gardens are way to fight blight
by Adam Fleming
pittsburghcitypaper.ws/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A56756
hen Barbara Williams first planned to bring a vegetable garden to Ladora Way, she thought the produce would "support the area as well as bring Hazelwood out of the doldrums." She didn't know that she'd be one of the people in need of support.

In August, the work-from-home customer-service agency she worked for started cutting back her hours, eventually to zero.

"I'm one of the poor unfortunate Hazelwooders right now," she says with a laugh. "I'm laid off just like everybody else."

Fortunately for her, and her neighbors, the blow of a declining economy was tempered by the garden.

"We were feeding a lot of folks off this garden," Williams says. "We started late, [but] we produced a lot."

The herbs and vegetables were available to the community on a need basis. Williams has hopes of expanding to other lots and creating a nonprofit group to support the endeavor.

The garden -- which is on a plot of land about the size of two row houses -- is within sight of Williams' corner house.

The collard greens are still producing, but most everything else has been bedded down for the winter. Williams says they broke ground in mid-June and started harvesting in September.

There was an herb garden and a tomato patch growing on pieces of an old chain-link fence. Community members salvaged discarded items to build the garden's framework, even plucking materials from the remains of recently demolished homes in Hazelwood. But "we have to be careful what we're getting," Williams cautions, adding that they don't take from houses that were in a fire because of the potential for contamination.

Two rows of tires -- which the neighborhood kids painted -- serve as planters along the street. The city's Green Up team, which supports community efforts to transform vacant lots and other blighted zones into environmentally friendly areas, built seven raised beds. Behind them, four other beds are sectioned off by railroad ties. A couple of scarecrows sit on a donated bench.

Williams and her neighbors don't even own the land they're working.

"We don't have that kind of money ... yet," she says. "We're going to get there."

The lot is owned by the Urban Redevelopment Authority -- but some of the other vacant yards that Williams has her eye on are city-owned, which can be purchased relatively cheaply by adjacent property owners.

Still, even the city's side-yard program requires at minimum a $201 down payment, a $200 payment to cover closing costs, and possibly a bidding process with a $250 minimum bid -- which is why for now, Williams isn't looking to take ownership of the garden.

In addition to clearing debris and putting in topsoil, the Green Up Pittsburgh initiative provides horticulture experts from Penn State to help community stewards transform publicly owned vacant lots into gardens.

"If there are interested community stewards, we're willing to make a go of it," says Lauren Byrne, the city's Neighborhood Initiatives Coordinator.

In Hazelwood, Byrne adds, Williams "is our champion in the Green Up program."

Williams is coordinating an effort to create a sustainable nonprofit called Hazelwood Harvest. (Reed Smith is handling the legal work for incorporation pro bono.) There's an organizational meeting in the works for January.

"I was going to do it this month, but I got kind of sidetracked," Williams says, pointing to a hole in the floor that was caused by an electrical fire.

Unemployment and a house fire haven't caused her to lose sight of her goals, however. Next to her desk is a poster-sized map of Hazelwood properties, with color-coding for vacant lots that might offer room for expansion.

Byrne says the work Williams has already done is "amazing. ... In the same conversation that she was telling me that she lost her job, and [that] they were victims of this house fire, she said, 'What about those other URA lots?'"

Williams says she's just trying to grow a stronger community, and provide some good food to those who are hungry.

"Have you been to Whole Foods?" she asks. "It's expensive. We're producing squash where you can just come and pick it off the vine."
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change.org
milkriver.blogspot.com
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The Dry Composting Toilet:
An efficient, dignified and healthy system for everyone
by Lourdes Castillo Castillo, translated from Spanish by Michael Zap
zoomzap.org/techniques/SES-eng.php
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alvincurran.com
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