Well. That’s over with. KEEP BLEEDING IN THE ANNO FINEM: 10 Years At Going For The Throat is in the can. I’m due for a proof-check at Minute Man Press by day’s end and with one more goddamn read-through I’ll kiss it and this wretched year goodbye. The creation of the book wasn’t kind, neither was the year, but I learned a lot and I did what I want.
Yesterday, setting up at the desk for a goddamn line-edit the internet went out. I paid my past due but they processed my payment to another account so, instead of being done with this thing forever, I was on the phone with Spectrum. Greg, in repair, had a nervous laugh, bless his heart.
“I’m saving you $20,” he snortled. “With a faster speed your new bill will only come to $290 a month!”
$290?!
Whoa Nelly. $290 is a couple weeks in the life of a book publisher in the Year of the Rat, if he lives on eggs and cigarette butts. I’ll spare you my anger—hell, I spared myself, and poor Greg, bless his heart. We sorted it out but I was too tired and sick to finish, so I closed the doc and cranked Neutral Milk Hotel until the sun went down.
And THAT mi querido is why we create Art. Books are cool. Poetry, too. But l learned more about myself in the last 3 weeks at the desk creating this thang than I have all year. My anger is misguided, and worse—it’s affecting my health. I’ll spare you the psychoanalysis and not just because I just read and re-read 10-years-worth compiling and editing the 62 posts from over 640 written at Going For the Throat. I thought I’d share with you some lightheartedness for a change, not the least of which because my only real trouble these days is that the people with real problems don’t have a voice. We’re not listening anyway, at least I wasn’t—working 13-hour days and losing my mind in InDesign. Unfortunately, while I was thinking of everything with my Editor’s cap on, I “failed” to do the research and legwork of quote attribution.
I use lyrics, poetry and quotes from the news. I make it part of the vernacular but, because the biggest lesson of 2020 is that shit rolls downhill, I should never expect anyone to “get” what I do—let alone some copyright lawyer in a heated office with healthcare out there in America. As such the final hours of my “final edits” of KEEP BLEEDING were spent on the phone with bill collectors and rewriting turns-of-phrase that could get me busted. It’s a small run of 100 but, again—you hear that brown boulder coming down and it won’t matter about your midlife, punkrock cred or your hopes and dreams. The truth is when you’re fucked in this country you won’t hear anything because you’re already dead. I’m sick and unemployed but I’ll survive. The stakes are high but they always were though, through my recent descent and bad brush with authority, I hit a net.
I’m still plenty angry bet your sweet bippy. But I’m thankful, too and all my enemies should do what they have to. The true enemy has been revealed and it ain’t you or me or Them. But the Art of War in the Year of the Ox will be another story, for another time, and so…here is a playlist of rewrites of copy-written material that could get me busted in Pig Nation on these end days of the Anthropocene.
this much madness is too much sorrow…
“…this much craziness is too much pain.”
the bid is closed and everybody knows how much they’re gonna pay.
“…this is America…the bid is closed and your parents lied to you.”
Meet the new boss.
“Mornin’ Boss.”
Same as the old boss.
“And good night!”
that I see a darkness
Singin’ for my supper down at 12th Street and Vine…
“…singin’ for my supper and robbing Peter to pay Paul.”
first we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin“—hell, even ol’ Leonard Cohen.”
running for the money and the flesh
Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?
“Living in America leaves you feeling like Johnny Rotten onstage at the Winterland in ’78.”
version of death we call life
“…this slip from the wild abyss we call life.”
boom swagger swagger boom boom swagger boom boom boom
“…boom-boom and swagger…”
Ain’t living long like this.
I’m dead but I don’t know it.
What a long, strange trip it’s been.
“How terrible and strange.”
warning sign on the road ahead…
“9/11 was a fire drill and even Osama Bin Laden couldn’t have predicted how far our Rome-with-cars would fall.”
I ain’t no fortunate one.
“I’m lucky but no aristocrat’s son.”
out of the blue and into the black
“…hurled into the none more black…”
The present paints the past with gold. The past paints the future with lead.—Henry Rollins
Just when you think you’re out they pull you back in.
In peaceful conditions, the warlike man will attack himself.
—from Beyond Good and Evil, 1886
Sharpen your machetes. It’s time to kill your neighbors.
—Rwandan Public Radio
Great quote! I kept it. (NPR, Fair Use)
To a mind that is still, the whole universe surrenders.
—written by Lao Tzu more than a century ago
…it’s way too early in the evening to get catty gentlemen.
Other than an ex of mine, I can’t find this attribution.
It don’t take much baby, to bring my love around...
The Legendary Shakey Lyman, hope you don’t mind Shakes!
And my favorite:
I’m looking California and feeling Minnesota…
“…looking paradise but feeling Philadelphia.”
Wherever is your heart I call home.
That oughta wrap it. I didn’t expect that Brandi Carlile song to end this in such a nice or positive way. That line didn’t even make it into the collection and I surely thought it might be Gun In Mouth Blues or the Sex Pistols, and my real money was on Brother Neil Young’s Hey Hey My My…Out of the blue and into the black?! Goddamn right that is such a great fucking song.
At Going For the Throat, I’ve always been a mercenary running for the dark side. My intentions were always to pull at the veneer and even slip the veil to get to what’s real. The problem with being an angry jerkoff isn’t old Bosses or bill collectors and cops. The real problem with being an angry jerkoff is you have to be one. The best thing I learned this year is that I love you and the thing about love is it only gets stronger. They can do what they do but without love they’re lost. We’re still right here, ain’t it, the same place but wiser. I made some discoveries about myself—aw hell, I really just mostly loathed myself but I learned about that, too. My hatred didn’t lessen my pain though and it certainly didn’t turn any tides. It’s all been stripped away Good Reader, praise be, and the rancid bulwark of predatory capitalism is rotting in the rain. But we’re still here, together, and isn’t that nice?
Deep cuts below. May the Year of the Ox bring you great fortune and happiness!
KEEP BLEEDING IN THE ANNO FINEM:
10 Years At Going For The Throat
Going for the Throat 