Just got EJ's piece for next week's show...he did "last night". Hmmm. Never expected that one.

Feeling a little out of my space right now, but strong...just went through the current manuscript for THEOCRICIDE and am feeling my oats. You can condemn my track record in romance, my intelligence (actually my judgement, by intelligence is pretty well documented) and my physical attractiveness. But, the quality of some of my works in undeniable.

Not arrogant, just confident. A bird isn't bragging when it says it can fly.

So, what are my plans for the new year?

A few readings, a few books, spend some quality time with my kids, attend Peri's wedding (as practically a bystander...urk) and a major coast to coast tour.

All I am asking is that this be my best year ever.

Is that so much?

grumpy, but resolute...Happy New Year...almost...

grumpy this morning.

the leg cramps are gone, but now I have the whole update to my podcasts...the RADIO CITY OF LEGENDS page and the RSS for the show, FROM OUT OF THE CITY...as archive.org moved stuff around on their servers (their right, but inconvenient) I shall investigate finding a place to put my soundfiles more under my control.

Had a nice chat with Tag yesterday about an assortment of topics, from the concept behind THEOCRICIDE (the new book) to recent trends in Spider Man comics.

Hey, I said it was an assortment.

I have to watch myself for now...C.S, Lewis said, through Screwtape, that there is a marked tendency when others speak ill of you to take the attitude that, if I am going to be tarred by the label anyway, to resolve to become a ram instead of a lamb...but what lesson is that for my children and my readers if I break? What sustained me in the darkest days of Venice was my sense of obligation to higher purpose than myself...it sustains me now.

What do those without purpose do when the shadows lengthen? I have seen it all around me. Rather than building, you tear down. Rather than healing, you infect. Rather than embracing, you strike out. We are a reprobate species, to say the least. It has been suggested I change the title of my memoir from WINGS AS OFT LEATHERY AS FEATHERY to DREAMS OF THE DAMNED. More brutal, but it shifts the focus from me to others, and although I come off as a flawed and unheroic individual, just trying to discover and do the right thing while dealing with some incredible lapses of my own judgement, I stand by my twin notions that 1) An honest man cannot be the hero of his own memoir, and 2) People will believe anything, if it is in their own best interest to believe it... so all I can do is speak the truth, which invariably ticks off people a lot.

Sparks and flecks of a new series of erotic poems started coming to me last night. Some of them will undoubtably find their way into 101 GREAT EROTIC POEMS (later in 2006).

I got some of the updates cleared up for the 'City broadcasts, the Nordette Adams, Daniel S. McTaggart and main weekly show broadcasts are now properly updated...now maybe I can turn this into a blessing and clean out the excess soundfiles!

Thwarted!

I've condescended to be one of the readers for next week's show...I wanted to do "Diogenes".

But, Mr. Hey-Its-My-Show-And-My-Poetry said I can't do a twenty minute poem, so I'm going to do something shorter.

I just have to figure out what one. Any suggestions?

a seductive voice from the past

Wow...what a day...the stress was getting to me, so I wrote.

What an incredible year. Thanks to everyone who got me through it.

Speaking of one...here's the intro to one of the pieces to be featured in next week's Podcast. This is "the Selke"...the young woman who was the basis for "the selke cycles"...she kindly agreed to take part in the festival that will include herself, Nordette Adams, Dan McTaggart, South African author Tinka Boukes and others...

(and yes, I know some spell it "Selkie"...)

The Selke Introduces her reading

Yeah. She has a voice. Maybe I can get some of the others to contribute...that would be very thrilling.

So, how about it ladies? Ready to step out of legend for a moment?

I am all but debilitated with pain at the moment...but, you know, there are three ways to deal with pain.

You wither from it, you ignore it, or you learn from it. I earned my scars, all of them, and even have a little room for more.

I choose to learn. Cowards...feh!

poetic interlude

I dredged this one up, as it is greatly relevent to my day, it is also amongst those featured in "Wordslinger"...

My Life


My life. It is my life to make of it what I choose.
I will win, and lose
and smile more often than not.
Courage will give me hope. Hope will give me
strength. And strength
will give me the courage to seek new truths.

And I will never love without a sense
of wonder and awe at the
infinite possibilities within the human heart...
and the beauty of dreams, held iron and ironic
within even the most tragic
fall from grace and the dreams of the damned.

And I will not be given to despair, for I have stood
in fires I could not fathom
and held my breath until death seemed sibling
to the pain within my soul. For this experiment
of my life will have validity
within the scientific method of the universe.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

Let's get on with it.

morning rant

grumble

they moved around my files at archive.org...now almost all the older links for my podcasts have changed...which means I have to change links all over the darn place.

aigh.

I hate three things in this life: intermediaries, edits and broken links.

ah, well, that's for later tonight.

Tag came over and laid down his track for next week's show...we're getting there. I played him the selection recorded from the Selke Cycles...suitably impressed.

Tomorrow is New Year's Eve...pre-New Year's resolution: let the dead bury the dead. Leave the past in the past. Which also means my raw and strange memoir "With Wings as Oft Leathery as Feathery" is again on hold. sigh. the truth is never thwarted...only delayed. I feel sorry for those whose lives are so built on illusions and deceptions they fear the light.

ah well, I've a life to live. on with the show.

for my next miracle....

now That would be telling!

Wordslinger - Happy New Year!

Here it is...the FROM OUT OF THE CITY podcast for December 31, 2005...
a few days early...

Radio City of Legends

I'd take a listen if I were you.

Me, I'm going back in the studio this evening...excited at this fusion of music and poetry.

the savaging of the truth

There's the truth.

And there's what people would like to be true.

As such, I have been asked to rewrite my histories to reflect, not a restrained truth, but an edited one...one that ignores the truth, and all aspects of it, in favour of that which is palatable and user-friendly. To douse the lights, that darkness and shadows may prevail. That truth may be obscured.

We shall see what I do over the next several days. Out of an abiding sense of obligation I may acquiesce, not because I wish to, but because it protects the interests of someone I hold dear and have made solemn promise to, to protect, even at the cost of my own soul.

It is a shame that there are those who would depend on honor to rape reality. It is a shame that there are those who make their livings aiding in such perversions of honor. Shame is a cheap commodity in this graceless age.

In the end, lies win battles. Even wars. But truth endures and usually outs. Given a choice between an uncomfortable truth and a comfortable lie, I have always, I hope, chosen the former. But I am human and apologize for those times in past, where weakness placed other considerations about honesty.

So, if you see history being rewritten or obscured in the near term, do not think it is revisionism for any reason other than out of respect to do no harm and to keep a promise, however lopsided the world is made. My clear conscience is now made muddy.

I apologize to you, my readers, to God and to history.

the faceted blogosphere

Those of you who have spent considerable time in my writings have encountered a series of poems, written over a multi-year period. The "faceted sphere" works (or as one reviewer referred to them, "the multi-faceted sphere" poems.

The premise behind each was to invoke a relationship that never was...an image of someone I found intriguing, transformed to be what she would be to me in another "sphere", another world, another universe. Some are quite good. Most of them the woman in question knew of the works, a few were at a distance.

I was talking to someone the other day, and they suggested I post the ones that aren't commonly seen (there's a handful that are well-known...but...)

so here's one for you.

the faceted sphere: one

the comfort of your kiss. so innocent
that unicorns could watch without grief.
so tempting that, for a moment, a brief
aroma of brimstone flirted with my senses.
there is mystery here, mystery and madness
that begs me to hide from the call of questions
best left unanswered and unasked...veiled confessions
that carry within themselves passion and sadness.
an ending without a beginning...an embrace shared
by lovers in an alternate reality passes by.
and beyond.
the riddle smiles at us and we smile coyly at bonds
that cannot hold us in this sphere...
dreams and nightmares undared...


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

It was just a kiss. Just a kiss. But some kisses are better than a naked weekend in Cabo.

Anyway, I was reading an article about the explosion of communications caused by the "blogosphere" and the faceted sphere poems came to mind. Everyone is acting like they discovered the digital renaissance...a renaissance that started long before Blogs, more than a decade ago. Like any alternate culture devlopment, the mainstream is attempting to, and will with some success, absorb and usurp it.

Of course, that doesn't mean the mainstream wins...like Tommy Lee Jones in "Men in Black" we are most dangerous in the belly of the cockroach alien.

So, bon appetit, mainstream.

Crazy Kate kisses and sound files

Now we're cooking, campers...I am starting to slowly get the files I needed a few days ago to do the show...so it is still postponed until next week...but it will be bangin'.

Had a nice chat with a guy at work today...his name's Mike...terrific guy, used to be a cop in California, now he works in the trenches, like me...except his job involves him talking to almost everyone, he's a QA guy. Which also means he's plugged into who is available and who isn't...maybe I need to attach the giant alien space electrodes and see what he can tell me about a person or two who have caught my eye...

Nothing happening for New Years...I had hope the local First Night shindig they do for the United Way would tap into me, but aside from one oblique query...dead silence. I feel like a rifle in a fencing match...ill suited for the venue and all but illegal to put to use. Not to put down fencing, I knew my way around a foil in college. I miss the sport...

I was watching the reruns of "Lost" tonight and resonated to the reaction Jack had to Kate's sudden kiss. It reminded me of how I felt, inside, when Alisha kissed me. I was turned on, yes, but also stunned, confused and suddenly my hands were nothing but thumbs and wet palms. Maybe every guy, sooner or later, gets a "Crazy Kate" kiss...

or should.

Maybe I'll write a poem about it.

A taste of the "Wordslinger"

Here's the opening bars of "Wordslinger"...up to the point that I speak...gotta save some mystery for the 'night.

WordslingerPrelude.mp3

Enjoi...

man plans, God laughs

Alea iacta est.

Almost all my volunteers missed their deadlines...kudos to those who made it...I will post the show next week...

this week...

well, you'll just have to tune in.

I'm taking advantage of the situation to kick it up a notch.

the fortune cookie I opened today

"Passionate new romance appears in your life when you least expect it."

Cybersquatters and entrepreneurs

Aeons ago, when I was leaving Earthlink to establish my own domain on the web, I considered using my monogram "WFDV" that had been so well known to my readers, particularly at AOL.

The problem was, someone already owned that domain name. No, not some radio station in Rome, Georgia, where there actually used to be a bluegrass radio station with those call leters, decades ago, but a speculator, who thought that maybe I'd want to buy it off of him.

I didn't, I set up CityOfLegends.com and the rest is history, so to speak.

A couple years later I was hanging out with Robert Davi, the actor, and he asked me about websites (Hanging out is an extended term here...we met theree or four times, usually because his wife and my wife hung out together. It seems he had been approached by a gentleman who had bought his name and was offering the then-star of "Profiler" his own custom website for only $1,500.00

Charming.

Custom being an interesting word in use here...it was probably actually going to be to a template, thrown up for pennies on the dollar at a nice margin and maintainable only if you uhad the exact tools used to create it or if you paid them to make changes. (He didn't go with it, and eventually the domain "RobertDavi.com" was bought up by an enterprising CPA with the same last name, thinking no doubt to drive and derive traffic through use of a better known name...there is actually a Robert Davi who works in the office there, but that's not the name on the masthead.)

I just hope, if he does put up a site eventually, it goes better than another actor's website...as that site has not been updated in over 5 years...but I won't name the actor, that would be

And so it goes in the world of the web speculation. My own last name, DeVault, when one of my brothers went to buy it to use for a business website, was found to have been bought by an email accumulator who would, for a reasonable fee, allow us to have an email account so that I could send my mail from "williamf@devault.com"...definitely a grey area of cybersquatting, but I understand the spirit in which it is offered.

When my second wife was working on her modelling career, we went to buy her name...it was unavailable...someone had bought it and put up baby pictures of their grandchild...or so they said. Within a year the site was down, and now the name is "parked"...sounds to me like someone took note when she was named to the "Top Net Models Hall of Fame" and wanted to cash in.

I was brought to this as I got a note the other day from a reader who wants to point out that "romanticpoet.com" is currently owned...has been for six years by the same person. No website...just keeps renewing the name, probably got it at a low annual renewal rate and is waiting for someone to come along and offer him a return on his investment. An unfortunate reality of the web is the fact that, like in "Highlander" - "There can be only one". Unless, of course, you want to make a sequel film or a TV series, but that's one of my own personal aggravations. But there can be only one website for a given address, although some accumulators have tried, with mixed results, to link multiple sites to a single name. You would think John Cusack and Joan Cusack would have bought up "Cusack.com" and shared it, but it is another site bought up by the same email squatters as "DeVault.com"...sigh.

As I mentioned several weeks back, I actually got an email the other day from a gentleman asking if I was interested in selling my domain. I wrote back and told him that, considering my longevity at this spot, I would need to find the offer "intriguing" and would need his assurance that it would not be used for porn or spam.

He never wrote back...probably speaking volumes in that (or not, how the heck should I know, he gave me no information about himself or his purpose, might have just been a crank fan for all I know...as many spammers as try to use my domain as a return address, wouldn't surprise me, either way...how gutless do you have to be to use a fake return address?)

So, at least for now, this domain is safe.

When Ann and I split, I got for her and set up a website for her forthcoming book (I presume it is still forthcoming)...but six months after I had last heard from her, I went ahead and let the domain drop...as usual I was paying into a woman's fortune long after sanity should have dictated. When and if she does launch the novel, I hope she has the smarts to put up a site for it...I'd like to say she can have the code and graphics I used for the one I had put up, it's pretty spiffy (yes, Ann, I still have all your modelling shots...I am a good steward of others' things...I even still have the folder of artwork my daughter, Peri, gave to me...it was the largest single Item, aside from my computer, that I took with me on the bus from Gulfport. Considering the fate of so much...)

Anyway, I digress...got to get back to work on the podcast. Still no more deliveries of additional readings...if I do not get a substantial number by 6:30 tonight (I need time to edit) EST, I will push back the concept show until January 7th...and go with the backup I have been labouring on for the past few days...

Later, folks. (oh, and E.J....interesting interview of sorts...)

no rest for the...er...restless

done....

if not enough people meet their deadlines for this week's podcast, I have in the can a suitable...even brilliant...replacement.

Damn, I am tired...

Hello, Miami.

Did I mention the other day that someone from Mishawaka dropped by?

Curiouser and curiouser.

A quick interview with the poet

I got the boss to answer a few questions that I submitted, half jokingly...I didn't expect answers, but after he did answer them he did give me permission to publish them, so...here goes.

E.J.: Okay, what's the thing you're proudest of?
WFDV: Wow. Tough one. Probably my children. There are days I wouldn't bother taking my first breath if they weren't in the world.

E.J.: Your greatest disappointment?
WFDV: More of a disillusionment - that the success of a relationship rarely has anything to do with the sacrifices you make for it. A hot and bitter drink that is to swallow.

E.J.: Living author you admire most?
WFDV: Aside from myself? Hmmm...you had to make it living? Cecil Adams, who does the "Straight Dope" columns. I learn from him and he amuses me. "Behold the snow. It fornicates" Still cracks me up every time I think of it.

E.J.: One thing you've read and said "I wish I'd written that?"
WFDV: "The Gitanjali" by Rabindranath Tagore. Yeats wrote a foreword. It won the Nobel for Literature. It is amazing.

E.J.: One thing you've written you wish you could unwrite?
WFDV: Ha! I knew this was a trap! Trying to get me in trouble again, hm? Well, Mr. Smarty Pants, let me tell you...I may not like the poem "Weaver"...I may find it lame, amateurish and insipid. But...it has got me laid. So, I can't count it anymore. Hmmmmm....er..."The Strings of Pearl" as it turned out that muse was a ruse. I hate wasting intellectual and emotional energy on a con.

E.J.: If you could control who or what your next muse would be like, what would you build?
WFDV: Wow, dangerous question. I guess I would love to fall in love with a woman who comes from a different culture than I, perhaps China or Japan, maybe Eastern Europe. Even Russian. It would add to the breadth of the relationship, it would make it more of a learning experience. I'd also like to see someone tackle translating some of my works into other languages. I know it is only a matter of time, but I'd love to see it now, so I can see how it goes.

E.J.: The three people you miss most, every day?
WFDV: Too easy. My daughter, Peri. Then Brigit. Then Alisha. I never learned the knack for making close friends with men, so my daughter, then my lovers, have always been my closest friends.

E.J.: If I gave you one wish, what would you wish for?
WFDV: A means to an end. For one of my books to take off like a rocket and be sold for a movie adaptation. The money from that could fix a lot of mistakes I've made.

E.J.: Which book?
WFDV: Well, at this time it would have to be THE COMPLEAT PANTHER CYCLES, as it tells a story...but give me a few months. I was actually working on a children's book a few months ago, but it got so depressing, owing to my estrangement from my daughter...I just couldn't do it. I was becoming suicidal just editing it.

E.J.: Whjo would you want to play you in the movie?
WFDV: William L. Petersen, been a huge admirer of his work since Manhunter and To Live and Die in LA. He's got the gravitas, although he is better looking than me. Don't ask about the other roles.

E.J.: Regrets?
WFDV: Not making things right with certain people in my life. Getting blindsided by duplicitous people...not for the pride, but because it then kept and keeps me from doing more than I can.

E.J.: Epitaph?
WFDV: He cared. He dared. He did.

There ya go, people...his next two books of poetry, to my knowledge, also do not have a story line...so I have little idea what he is intimating about another "concept" book. We shall see.

My guess is he is storing up a lot of emotional energy for his next muse and plans to make her the "breakwater" muse...the one that pushes the past back to where it belongs. He's ragged, but raging.

The Back-up Plan

I am reminded of Genesis' satirical song "I Can't Dance". Here I sit, in front of my computer, microphone live, Gragae Band running, recording and accompanying myself to prep a back-up show in case my volunteers fail me in large enough numbers.

I had been working on a revamped theme song for my show, so that laid down the base...now I'm roaming through my catalogue, picking and choosing what poems to read, trying them out...I've got ten minutes of material already recorded and synched...

We'll see, either this week or eventually, how this turns out.

I'm doing some of my better known works, and some of the more obscure pieces...from "the dragon woke last night" to "sacred smile" to "Bragi, awakening in his tomb"...a mixed bag.

Call for actors and readers

Now I'm getting wound up...all the build the last two weeks as been for my New Year's Eve podcast...and all my volunteers are either running to the edge of the cliff, or have forgotten they volunteered.

The whole premise was an entire show without my voice...not my physical voice, but my poetic voice. I found several volunteers (always room for a few more...hint hint) to read works of mine, to get their feel through them for my poetry.

So far...I have two people's recordings. I start editng tonight, to wrap by Wednesday night.

Needless to say, I am a bit perplexed.

So, if you are one of those people who promised to record themselves reading one of my works for the show...get to it. If not, and you are interested...I am a big believer in "an unexpected quarter"...so hop aboard.

Otherwise, the scope and scale of the program may have to be changed for this week (don't worry I have a backup plan. Okay, I don't have one yet, but I've been working on one since...er...line before last...any ideas?)

If you're an old friend, an ex-lover or an aspiring actor-speaker-voice over artist looking to get featured on an internationally syndicated podcast, here's your shot.

Drop me a line today at williamfdevault@cityoflegends.com and start the new year with a hell of a breakthrough moment.

Ya never know who is listening.

I would have loved my dream cast...all former lovers, reading works I wrote about them. The irony (especially for the turncoats) would have made for a great tension.

oh...and the Wikipedia link

I also thought I'd go ahead and post the Wikipedia link about me...not great, not bad...but about 99% accurate, and that's good.

William F. DeVault

If you're not familiar with the Wikipedia, you should check it out...a recent study indicates that it is, remarkably, to be considered as accurate as the Encyclopedia Brittanica, despite the fact that just about anyone can wander in and edit articles...usually gross errors are identified and corrected pretty quickly (E.J. tells me he checks about once a week for vandals on the piece about me...and he even submitted a change to it once...don't recall what it was about, I try to stay away from my publicity).

I am a little concerned that many of the people who said they'd record readings for this coming weekend's show are going to drag in late with their works...some of the first to promise contributions I haven't heard from since then...

erk

uh oh, Top Ten List coming on...

TOP TEN PUBLIC MISPERCEPTIONS ABOUT ME

10. I prefer blondes. (Au contraire, I have only dated two blondes in my life, both were disasters in their own ways.)
9. I hate most modern poets. (Nope, I hate most modern POETRY. Most modern poets are just messengers of mediocrity.)
8. I'm a self-righteous, egotistical loon. (On the contrary. Er, come to think of it, no, that's right...)
7. I hate to travel. (Nope, love to travel, just can't afford to as much as I'd like.)
6. I'm a habitual adulterer. (No, again...seriously, even more than a year after our divorce I have yet to "cheat" on my second wife. I was a schmuck in my first marriage, althugh there was that 15 year stretch between stupid moments.)
5. I don't like country music. (No, I just don't hear much anymore...and putting steel guitar behind recycled second-string pop tunes does not make for country music.)
4. I'm a love addict. (Bingo, but I am in recovery...just keep me away from brilliant, beautiful women. What am I saying!!??)
3. I only drink Diet Dr. Pepper. (Nope...I am off the evil toxin known as Aspartame and the DDP people haven't yet switched over...I now do Diet Coke with Splenda and Pepsi One for my carbonated caffeine fix.)
2. My poems are my children. (No, my children are my greatest creations, my poems are a poor substitute.)

and the #1 public miscperception about me?

1. There are coded messages to my muses, buried in my poems. (Nonsense. pssst, Brigit, meet you at stanza two, opus 224, the usual time...)

later, peoples.

Christmas update

Made it most of the way through the day. Enjoyed my Quaker meeting this morning, did a little writing this afternoon. E.J. sent some suggestions my way just a bit ago...he suggests adding the following phrases t the metatags on my website:

Amerikanischer Dichter, Amerikanische Poesie, Amerikanischer Autor, Poèt américain, Poésie américaine, Auteur américain, Poeta americano, Poesía americana, Autor americano

These are the terms "American poet", "American poetry" and "American author", all translated into German, French and Spanish by Babelfish at Altavista.com. He is convinced it will help foreign language speaking individuals to find my pages...my logic argues that it will not, as they will probably be using the English-language equivalents, anyway. Of course, he still struts over the commercial success of "101 Great Love Poems" so what do I know?

sigh

need to go back and work on the edits for the new book, THEOCRICIDE, but am tired, emotionally.

I got you a pet for Christmas, Chief

Thought you'd appreciate him, I named him Lord Byron after the inspiration behind your poem "radiant tigers" (get it, he's a tiger!)

Yeah, I know.

Look, Bwana...time you got back into the stream of life. Pick up the damn phone and call one of your old friends, or find a new dance partner. I already have given you my research on several candidates of yore (some are available...some could become available if you weren't so standoffish) Quit mooning over what's unavailable and get with the program. Yes, it's a thankless and lonely job, but the Fortress of Solitude has a lousy social scene.

To quote, not the King of Kings, but the King..."A little less conversation, a little more action..."

Got a lot of last-minute Christmas emails...that was a nice surprise (of course, I sent out a lot of last-minute Christmas emails).

Things are very quiet today...I saw my boys last weekend, for Christmas, and haven't yet been able to reach them by phone today...but I am sure they are having a blast (they were getting a Robo-Raptor, each...I pity Jan...she'll be up to her armpits in battling biomechanical dinosaurs).

Answer to Yvonne: Nope. And that's my choice. I have trust issues now...and I think I've earned them. To quote Tom Sizemore in "Strange Days" - "The issue is not whether you're paranoid...the issue is whether you are paranoid enough." I spend enough of my time fighting the mental mutations caused by this system of stresses...to allow another random element in at this time could be foolish or disastrous. Yes, I am hungry, but I also know that to try to find someone or accept someone in with the same charitable aplomb as before (taking another scorpion across the waters on my back, to steal a fabled allegory) might result in a total loss of so many things. I'll be fine, I'm well along on my own healing curve. Watch me over the next 9-12 months. I may be broke, but I am not...broken.

Merry Christmas, All.

Christmas Wishes to All

Merry Christmas, all.

A special Merry Christmas to:

My daughter, Peri, and her fiance, Brian. Hope you get everything you want or need in the coming year.

My sons, Dante and Elric...so proud of you, both. Have a great season.

My ex wives, Jan and Ann. Who'd have thunk I'd have a better relationship with the one than the other, after all the smack that's been talked. I guess words, to some people, are just words. Sigh.

My Mother and Father, my brothers and sister. My nieces and nephews.

My Grandmother, Glada Hickman. Tough as they come and 93 years old.

To those I have loved. To those I will love. To everyone.

A joyous season of hope and faith.

I've had a good year. Lost a few people out of my life, but found a few, as well. Published three books (three books!), started my podcasts and was honored by the Appalachian Education Initiative.

I've had a year better than some people's lives. And...this is just the feeling out process for next year...and next decade.

Next year, I gain a new son. I fall in love. Two new books. Someone from my past re-enters my life. I learn a hundred new things. I move, I prosper. I write something that amazes me.

and the night blooming jasmine fills my sky again.

Wow...can't wait.

The Christmas we get we don't deserve

"So this is Christmas..."

or so goes John Lennon's Christmas song's opening line. I always considered it a touch cyncal until I ran face to face with what is my all-time favourite Christmas song:

Emerson, Lake & Palmer's "I Believe in Father Christmas" (okay, the incredible Pete Sinfield wrote the lyrics...but just as Elton John gets 99% of the glory for Bernie Taupin's lyrics, the performer, here, takes the stage).

If you're not familiar with it, dig it up. It's a beautiful piece of music and the lyrics have meaning today. I don't agree fully with the sentiments, but it does embrace the fact that we are somewhat hypocritical and dishonest in this season.

"They said there'll be snow for Christmas
they said there'll be peace on Earth
But instead it just kept on raining
a veil of tears for the virgin birth"

I once had an argument with an associate over the fact that I raised my children not to believe in Santa Claus. My first wife made the case, and rightly so, that when we lie to our children, even in fun, we are setting a dangerous precedent, one that allows them to ignore our later exhortations to stay away from dangerous things and to believe in the things we believe in, freely.

"They sold me a dream of christmas
They sold me a silent night
And they told me a fairy story
’till I believed in the Israelite"

That stanza sums up that note. How can we, straght-faced, lie to our Children about Santa Claus and then expect them to trust us regarding even something as important and essential as our very religious beliefs? The associate I was arguing with said that by teaching children to believe in Santa Claus at an early age, we were giving them the ability to believe in something they couldn't see, but that was real, like Jesus.

That is so wrong-minded in so many ways. Broken trust is broken trust. And I, for one, do not think Jesus and Santa Claus are, at the core, similar in terms of the nature of their existence.

"Hallelujah, Noel
Be it Heaven or Hell
The Christmas we get we deserve."

The final line of these lyrics is so jarring. I think we, at Christmas, usually get better than we deserve, just as we, in faith, get a better deal from God than we deserve.

Merry Christmas, everyone. May you get a better Christmas than you deserve and may the New Year bring you a clearer path and great peace.

the danger of random acts of fandom

I was over visiting a friend of mine earlier today. And he had a story for me. He told me of a friend of his, down in North Carolina, a friend of his I've met and whom he speaks of, often.

Anyway, this guy had a break-in at his house the other day. Initially, nothing seemed missing...

then he did a more thorough search of his house and found what was stolen. One thing.

An autographed copy of one of my books.

Okay, guys...I know you love me...but if you want a copy of "PanthEon" with my handwriting in it, don't commit a felony.

I'm flattered, really...but...

systems change under stress

New rule No. 1:

No intermediaries.

Anyone who wants from me, talks to me (or emails me, etc., you know what I mean)...I'm tired of dealing with people, giving to people, caring for people who don't have the stones to speak to me directly. It's not an issue of my character anymore, it's an issue of those who take but do not give. It wastes my energy, it wastes my talents, it wastes my soul, it wastes me.

Too many of those in my life, in my past.

In my future? Yeah, I'm too much of a nice guy by instinct to completely eliminate that, but I'm going to try. When it gets to the point I have to ask someone to check to see if and where I can send a present to a family member for Christmas, it's past neurotic. It's wrong.

More new rules later. Now, the poetry:

Here's a new piece I wrote the other day. It's based on my own state of being, but was somewhat inspired by a line from "Apocalypse, Now!" in which Captain Willard exposits his vision of Colonel Kurtz' mental state:

"He broke from them, and then he broke from himself. I'd never seen a man so broken up and ripped apart. "

The work is called "torn from the flesh".

he spoke
he broke
and the pieces fell like leaves
in an autumn shower
the power unplugged
as the ground was hugged
by the air
seeking solace in the dirt

no more
he swore
still sore with the teething grief
of splintered mysteries
as the histories fell in place
like a puzzle of a stranger's face
finally
making sense of of the hurt

the pain
can't drain
and thus the pressure builds
beyond the predicted curve
where every nerve should rip
and a keystone shall slip
to let fall
the palace to a rubble, inert


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

I'm okay...it is in the furnace where I get my tempering. I'm in my element.

Open side note to the Almighty

somedays it all seems too much

but.

been there.

came back.

and carried others out with me.

will do so again,

as time and space allow.

chocolate covered lying in the name of God

I'm gonna get hate mail on this one. The kind of hate mail I only get when I bring up religion. Funny, I can't see Jesus sending hate mail, or approving of it. But I'm going to get hate mail.

So, a judge has overturned the presentation of "Intelligent Design" or, as so cutely referred to in the media, "ID", by schools in Dover, Pennsylvania.

Let me start with a clear statement of my view, which will be immediately forgotten by many reading beyond this paragraph - anger and hate cloud minds:

I, personally, believe that there probably was a motive intelligence behind the development of life on Earth. But, I can still believe in God, and Jesus, regardless of whether there was or how it worked its powers. My faith does not depend on a good lawyer or a debate on the merits of Darwin, Lamarck or megachurches. My faith is faith.

Victory, to the American psyche, has become like chocolate.

We'll eat anything as long as it is dipped in chocolate, right? Which means that, as long as our side wins, regardless of the cause, we will ignore all other considerations. As long as we can high-five our friends and rub our opponents' noses in the dirt, we don't care if we have to lie or steal or break a few promises to ourselves and to others. That creamy chocolate coating of victory takes away our awareness of the filling, what we are really ingesting and making a part of ourselves and our legacy. (Should a Christian own a radar detector? No. Never.)

I don't find it so troubling that a local school board, under pressure from national groups looking for a test case for their fund raising efforts and a law firm looking to make headlines, would bastardize science curriculums. Wasn't that many years ago that the State of Indiana tried to legislate "pi" as the number 3, for far less motive.

No, what perturbs me, and always will, is that there is ample evidence, cited in the judge's ruling, that school board members with religious agenda lied about their motives under oath. They placed their hand on a Bible, swore to tell the truth "so help me God" and then lied. Perjury. A crime and a sin. And then they thought they'd done the right thing. (I was working on a joke here, a play on words regarding the old Sunday School "sword drills" we used to have with our Bibles, but decided against it.)

As a Christian, that offends me. It perverts the message of Christ, who did not teach on the topic of "evolution versus creationism" or even school prayer, but did teach the keeping of the Commandments, which does include a little clause about "bearing false witness".

Does creationism deserve a place in public school curriculums? Perhaps. Of course, then, by the U.S. Constitution (Last time I checked everyone voting in that school board meeting is an American, also, right?) they have to respect the separation of church and state. If we can make a law requiring what is basically a Christian point (most Jews I know really don't give a hoot about ID) then we have to make equal time for the Muslims, the Buddhists, the Pagans, the Taoists and those people over in England who list "The Force" as their religion (one too many all-night "Star Wars" retrospectives).

We poison the faith when we'll do anything to present it. Jesus didn't have to lie. He didn't teach His followers to lie. We claim to be His followers. Anyone else seeing the logic problem here?

I have agendae. Lots of them. I think war is wrong, I am opposed to the death penalty. I think a business that takes on the label of a church to dodge taxes should not be tax exempt. I think our penal system is an international disgrace. I like "The West Wing". I prefer chicken livers to broccoli. My favourite Bowie album was "Station to Station".

But I am not going to lie to get my way. Once, perhaps, I was that sort of person. Maybe not to the extent some go, but I know of times where I told myself, at a point of conflict, that the winning, the ends, justified the lying, the means. In the 60's we called that "situation ethics" and it was blasted by the fundamentalist core of American churches. Guess that sort of has slipped by, hm?

Jesus said that what a man allows in does not defile him, but what comes out of him. A lie is a lie is a lie. And I don't need a lawyer, a vote, or a television ad campaign to tell me that.

And I can taste it, even through the chocolate.

The Convenience Store and the Poetry Tour

Finished the edits on Tag's episode of FROM OUT OF THE CITY to be released on the 24th.

It came out well, and I had a blast. We discuss everything from therapeutic catharsis via poetry to the influences of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby on our works, and Dan gets to read about a half dozen of his works.

Me? I get to do "the garden of souls" about the 1997 Southern Poets Reading Tour, where Cliabourne Schley Walsh hosted a dozen of the most gifted wordsmiths I will ever have the honor to share a stage with, including Loki, Ruth Solomon and Robin Travis (now Robin C. Travis-Murphree, the editor of Poetic Voices)...I slept in the upstairs hall, on a pallet of blankets, with my assistant...some girl named Ann who was going to play a role in my next few years of life.

And no, I did not sleep with all the women on the tour. Just a few. Actually, just the blondes. So sue me.

I gave one of the best reads of my life, at the Fairhope Arts Center...Loki had chewed my ass for an indifferent performance the previous day, so I brought it. Damn near killed me, turning myself inside out for the audience. But the troops were dazzled.

symbology 2.0

Looking for a facelift.

Not me, I'm content with the few worry lines I've earned in this life (If I never have to go through having cream smeared on my face by an age-obsessed lover, I shall be just fine, thank you very much)...but the site...and the muses.

I have considered making a paradigm shift in my private pantheon of muses (not to be confused with PanthEon, the book). Here is one possibility...taking a synthetic rose, a glass rose, if you will, and using it for a symbol for the city...any thoughts?

discussing 'glass roses'

The poem, "glass roses" is rapidly becoming one of my most popular pieces, ever. Originally written online in a moment of inspiration while talking with my editor emeritus, Jan Innes, I don't fully understand it, yet...I do know the following about it:

1) The phrase "a white fragrance" was inspired, in my mind's eye, through a melding of honeysuckle, jasmine and lilac. Why? I just don't know.

2) "Passion and pride put down and sacrificed" is a theme I use elsewhere...the whole notion being that, to love, one must surrender one's energies and dignity, or at least be willing to.

3) Yes, I love the word "photic".

4) "My brother, the night, takes me" is a throwback reference to "my electric lady"...this poem brings full circle the image of surrendering love to destiny, and, instead, offers surrendering destiny to love.

5) In the end, the poem is about surrender and the wonder of romantic love. It states firmly that even though I had not yet, and still haven't, and probably won't "in this incarnation" find it, I know it is out there, for others to find, to enjoy, to become part of.

glass roses

conceive of a flower.
like no other.
no colour,
but the curving clarity,
the photic charity
of crystalline silence.
past the rainbow's violence.
a white fragrance,
white as a virgin's first kiss,
or the lost heartbeat I gave over
to the universe when
first we met,
when first I set my sails
for a new horizon,
passion and pride put down
and sacrificed
to the gods of love.
to the holders of dreams.
to the bearers of my gift.
to wings that take their lift
from the winds of sorrow.
a meadow of perfect blossoms
refracting the light you give me
onto a page of history and hope.
my brother, the night, takes me,
and I am not tomorrow anymore.
but my words endure.
pure
as a field of glass roses.
row upon perfect chaotic row
not discovered in this incarnation.
but they are out there.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved. all wrongs righted. all songs yet unsung scheduled for sometime next year.

Tag and the sound of a spoon

Had a good recording session with Dan McTaggart, his show, this week, will be solid...he read some great pieces and we discussed both differences and similarities in our approaches to poetry. Tune in, if only to hear Dan read "Song of the Spoon".

I'm serious, stop laughing.

I've started adding links on the poetry site to connect poems that have been recorded, so people can hear what they're reading.

It is good.

Virtual makeover

Yeah, I can see a few thousand things about me, on the surface, to change...

Truth is, most of my life, I have been dependent on a woman to tell me what changes to make...intentionally isolating myself for a time has wreaked havoc on my style sense.

Hair: I need a trim...not to get rid of the ponytail, but to tidy it...I have great hair for a guy my age, and I'm not ashamed of it. Besides, having spent time as a drug counselor, I know the in-fashion of almost shaving your head originated in the drug culture...as hair tests for drug use have been used to catch habitual users.

Basically, my long is my proof I've not touched anything at least in the last few years (truth is, ever...but I can't prove that easily)...I did have someone once tell me my hair makes me look like a drug dealer. I told them all the drug dealers I've met have hair like Marines.

The beard...I'm forever making tweaks and twitches to it. Still am not 100% happy with it...don;t know what to do with it.

Weight. Yeah, I know...I am still about a 25 pounds down from when I bailed out of Mississippi...but that's not enough for me...I need to do more. More exercise, less carbs. And a distraction, a motive...ideally about 5'6" - 5'11" and energetic...as willing to take on a project as I have been over the years.

Mode of dress. Well, yes, I'd like to dress nicer...you going to buy me the clothes? All my leftover money goes to people with legal or moral claims to it that pre-date and prioritize over my need for a new black shirt. Besides, if I start losing weight, it will all just be overpriced donations to Goodwill in short order. At least I have the good sense to realize I have little taste in matching colours so I buy all black, down to my socks and underwear.

Mode of speech. Get real. The only people who have problems with my speech are those for whom English isn't quite a second language. Yes, I have a larger than average vocabulary...and yes, I use it. You know what? I'm not ashamed of it. God made me. But S/He made me smart. Not to hide it. If you can't keep up, don't curse me for your sloth...read a book. Ideally, one of mine.

Posture. Okay, I know...I tend to slouch...not as bad as when I was a teenager, but I can go all Silly Putty on you.

Attitude. You know, I don't get skewered for arrogance like I use to in my youth (people often mistook my shyness for a sense of superiority) but I am accused of being a bit brazen. I earned it. Too much of this life's troubles are cause by failures to communicate. Real failures. 90% of my conflict with my daughter would go away if she'd talk to me. Most lies are never verified (or the accused allowed to defend themselves...I hate it when someone believes something about me or someoneone else without anything more than conjecture...remind me to tell you a couple of whoppers I've had to deal with...)

So, all in all, a good starting point. Hmmm...if I win the lottery I could get new clothes, hire a trainer and get my hair done.

There ya go.

searching for tongues

dry rivers
running like memory
where eyes are dim
and every limb
has forgotten what comes next:
the subtext
of certainty
eroded away
by experiences
you have sworn
silence to
as veils torn
are patched
into
something else
you don't have words for.
yet.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

Historical Perspective

Sinclair Lewis once said that "When Facism comes to America it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross."

Are you listening, Mr. President? Really listening? Or are the big words beginning to befuddle you?

gorgeous blonde dance instructors of yore

an old friend from high school came by this afternoon.

correction:

it sounds better if I say "a gorgeous blonde dance instructor whom I happen to have known for years dropped by this afternoon" (Just as true, but far more intriguing...nah, don't go there, she recently got engaged to a very prominent doctor...I don't even think about that sort of trespassing anymore...besides, I've never messed with engaged women...only single and married ones...)

Yeah, that's the spirit.

Anyway, by the time she had left she had bought out my remaining pre-Christmas stock of books. Yeah! Now I don't have to worry about how to hustle those out...I hate selling books.

She did comment, nicely, I could use a make over. Hmmm...I'll do that as part of my New Year's move...

We also talked about high school and some of the people we knew "back when"...including her mystery as to why she had never been nominated for "Miss Mohigan". She was a knockout back then, and was one of the leaders of the modern dance club at Morgantown High, the Junior Orchesis. It seems she was not aware that she had that mystique that everyone assumed she was already unavailable. I knew of guys who wanted to ask her out, but figured someone like her already had a boyfriend, and he was probably a starting quarterback for a pro football team and rich.

So, guys, the next time you hesitate asking out a girl you figure has to be unavailable, just make sure before you pass up what might have been something good. God knows I should have, more than once.

Also, if you have not yet purchased a copy of the Appalachian Education Initiative's "Art&Soul"...you should, profiles and pictures of 50 creative artists who have roots in West Virginia...from Jennifer Garner to Don Knotts to Homer Hickam to me...

also, Kathey Mattea, Brad Paisley, Ted "Lurch" Cassidy, Chris Sperandio, Brad Dourif, Squire Parsons...and the list goes on and on and on.

My Christmas Wish List for 2005

Okay, to add my two cents worth of greed and avarice for the season...here's what I'd wish for if I felt it would do any good:

1. A good gig for New Years Eve for my readings.
2. A phone call from a beloved muse.
3. A glowing review of any of my books in a major publication.
4. Late delivery of a box of stuff of mine that is NOT at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.
5. A new muse (not necessary if I get #2, but...)
6. A job. In Los Angeles. Or, conversely, a substantial advance on a screenplay adaptation of "The Compleat Panther Cycles" - I hear she married a screenwriter...maybe he'd like to do the first draft.
7. A reconcilation with my daughter.
8. An avalanch of last-minute pre-Christmas orders of TCPC.

No, it's not a big of gold and a copy of Prince's latest CD...but it is the stuff of which a worthy life is made. Memories, love, validation, irony.

Life is good.

last minute gift ploy

E.J.'s idea...I give full credit.

Between now and Christmas, for those people who suddenly realize they are stuck for a gift idea...if you order a book (or several books) from my bookstore (my books, autographed, shipped for free)...I'll not only throw in a copy of my 1997 now out-of-print "PANTHEON" I will also give you the out for your forgetfulness via an email which reads:

"We apologize for the delay in shipping your order by Christmas. We were, frankly, overrun by last minute orders and are expected a new shipment of books in a few days. Rest assured that your order will got out promptly. Please accept this additional book as a token of our embarrassment, and look for your book(s) within the next 5-7 business days."

Good idea? This way last minute shoppers (whether truly last minute shoppers or people who forgot someone and need a last mnute gift idea) can save face and handle their orders, direct from the internet.

I saluter you, Mr. E (I was going to call you "Mister T" - but I pity the fool who calls you that)

tell me why I do like Mondays...

It's Monday...Moday...glorious Monday....(happy dance)

Okay, my view is different from most...Monday is the day when I am not scheduled for any "clock" work but that stores/offices are open.

One thing you have to understand about Morgantown. We're still boondocks in many ways. I know restaurants that do not open on Sunday. Imagine that...the #1 food day at many establishments, and you don't open on that day (I hear it is a combination of the difficulty in getting people to work and the fact that alcohol sales are restricted on Sunday in West Viriginia)...and since many of the local "restaurants" are really just bars using the food clause to get around zoning standards...well, you get the idea.

So, a day when everything is open is like Disney World for me.

Got a couple of hits the other day from someone looking up the keywords "Cinderella" and "Naked" on Google. It's normal. I got a nastygram a few years ago from a teenage boy who was upset that similar search to him to my poem "Even Cinderella Gets Naked". Stop scowling (or leering) it is not a dirty work, it merely makes the point that even fairytales romances have three dimensions. He was annoyed that there were no pictures. I wrote him back, explaining that if he turned off the computer, went outside, and spoke to people he'd find his own naked Cinderella one day. Three dimensional. Never heard back from him.

Maybe it worked for him.

Will be laying down the base tracks for this weekend's episode of FROM OUT OF THE CITY. I was very pleased with the results of last week's show, am looking forward to seeing what Tag has up his sleeves.

Looking to leave my link on more places where people might be looking for poetry podcasts.

home again, home again...

Back in this sphere...all is well. Got to spend some quality time with my boys, have a pleasant talk with my ex, and hear updates on my daughter's life and wedding plans. I am uncomfotable with the fact that I, of all people, am on the outside looking in, but that is her choice (Dr. Karen Horney would have a few choice observations to make on this one).

The roads were decent, but I am fatigued. Had some nice surprises in my mutant mailbox upon my return...some recordings made by South African author Tinka Boukes of some of my poems...very nice, and her accent gives the works a distinct flavour.

I'll be sharing her interpetation of one of my works, along with several other people's readings of some of my pieces, in an upcoming episode of my podcast "From Out of the City"...

The Church of Poetry

There is only one real God (and an infinite number of false ones...I myself have been guilty of idolatry towards many of them, usually the ones of long, soft limbs and sparkling laughs)...and poetry is nothing less, in its essence, than a revelation, a constant evolving liturgy in praise of both itself and the world around it. It is its own miracle.

Yes, Wallace Stevens was right, poets are the high priests of the invisible. But even the invisible of which we write is real. We reflect, refract and create, our lambent minds showing the world what is really there, if they have but the couer rage to reach out and embrace it. I never have loved without cause. The degree to which I was loved in return is a statement, not of my worthiness, but of the faith and vision of the one loving. All are worthy of love.

Like a priest earnestly sworn to celibacy, I am at times regretful of what I have left behind to step closer in to the center of the universe (read my old work "My Electric Lady") but cannot indulge the greatest cowardly whim, the lie that somehow it is not there, that God and truth and love are irrelevent.

I don't let others tell me what I know to be untrue and barter my allegience for my own gain. I have done this in the past, bowing before women in my past in expedience to their shallow affections. Not all women, not all men, love in a shallow form, where everyday requires new rituals, new sacrifices of love to be new proofs of our hearts.

Maybe I shall start my own church, the church of the poets. King David was a poet. "The Song of Solomon", one of the books of the Holy Bible, is a long-form erotic poetry dialogue. Much of what is right and true and necessary is in the form of poetry...even politics has its rule that one campaigns in poetry and governs in prose. Perhaps we need to govern in poetry, as well.

Like any religion, poetry can be used to foul ends, but it is a way to tap into our most earnest and worthy essences, to free us from pain and doubt and isolation, to bring us closer to the warmth of the center of the universe, to make us understand and experience love.

Perhaps it is time I did what I was supposed to be doing, all along.

poem - To an Unknown Goddess

I wrote this poem over a year ago, realizing that the dangled reconciliations of a fallen relationship were merely attempts to get me to pledge additional financial support. It draws its essence from the sermon preached by St. Paul in which he spoke of seeing a statue erected "to an unknown god" by cautious polytheists who thought they might have missed someone...

I have, in time, learned that much of what I write is not to Ann or Lauri or Alisha, but to a deified, rarefied abstraction of womanhood. One that, while some have lived up to parts of, no one will live up to the all (although, if anyone wants to try, I reserve the right to be delighted to be proven wrong...)

to an unknown goddess

I will start spinning your veil, today,
even though we are probably yet unmet.

I will catch moments, like snowflakes that fall,
to remember them to you someday when we speak.

I will not offer to show you the scars
but speak only of the healing and hope.

I will prepare you a place to lay down
near the fire, near the window, in my heart.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved. wrongs to be ignored and forgiven.

I remain the romantique, the quixotic fool who firmly believes that love is possible, if not inevitable.

I've had moments of it. Nancy, once we had worked out out differences, but before I screwed things up. Jan, for all too short a season...largely my fault. The Panther? No. Shadows and incense. Brigit? I like to think so, maybe she can answer better than I. The Mad Gypsy? I would have said yes, once, but now am uncertain. Ann? It would be easier to forgive her trespasses if I thought not, and I am into forgiving people, not wishing that baggage. So I will consider what we had to be a ruse on her part so that, in the end, betrayal is not so much a colour of the palette she is painted in.

So, what is to be made of what is observed from a safe temporal distance? I wish I knew. Right now I am emotionally withdrawn. Capable fo touching those emotions within me, but not able to fully embrace them. There is too much pain in them, and though I have been healing at a good clip from my estrangement from some whom I have cherished, both lovers and family, I am far from yet myself.

Perhaps in this time of catharsis I will find a cure for my conditions. My willingness to allow myself to be reshaped so readily. I have seen in myself a tendency to do what I think is necessary to save a relartionship, even if I know it to be wrong. I have been asked so many times to lie for or about another's failings, taking them on myself, that I have been accused of showing a martyr complex. Actually, I think it has been more of a chameleon's disease.

I've had to live so many lies just to get through the day with past liaisons, is it any wonder that the rainbow became shuffled and confused? I sought out the Quaker faith because of their demand of truth, and found it placed me in precarous position with so many people in my life. How easily people, even some who have damned me for deception, ask me to lie for them, to cover for them, to help them maintain their facades and their deceits.

I have earned better treatment than that. Perhaps not from God, who is perfect, but certainly from the people whose asses I have hauled out of hell everytime they had the whim to do something stupid. Superman (another of my complexes?) is tried of saving the Lois of the week after she wanders into the alien hideout.

I have a friend, Thomas, who has been writing me massive letters explaining his view of my "probelm with women". He believes that my problem is I see women as good, divine and wondrous creatures, superior to men and worthy of respect...when in truth they are deceitful, petty tyrants. I don't embrace his worldview, which has undoubtably been shaped by his own discourse with women, but I understand it. If I had to base my worldview purely on the experiences I have been handed, I would have to concede much of his point.

But I don't...and I won't. So, to any out there who have taken the opportunity to, purposefully or inadvertently, bring me hurt or harm, or put me in the impossible situation of having to be your Wormtongue, I'm going to do two things.

1) I am going to promise to try harder to do better and
2) I am going to forgive you.

As of this moment, all past grievances are settled. Pick up your beds and walk. The other way, please. Forgiving is one thing - trusting again...not so much,

silverback feral poet in a box

Sometimes I look at the world through the eyes of the jogger in "Manhunter" - the one who was mistaken for the serial killer in an FBI ambush. As a small army surrounds him, his adrenaline pounding, he turns to a police officer and asks "Why are you moving in slow motion?"

So often the world seems exactly to be set on a slower clock than I, as if I vibrate at 120 cycles, while it is doing 40...it is frustrating. Part of this issue was resolved when I lived in LA...that city comes at you like rabid ferrets, constantly on the attack...maybe I wasn't this way before then and it shifted me into permanent overdrive. I just know that now the days, the hours, the moments drag by while I impatiently wait for the worms.

I feel like I am in a cage. I am not a housepet or a zoo animal by nature. Never have been, never will be. I don't pose well, or often. I am aggravated by inactivity, and that point of stagnation that most seem to confront by my age never seems to have arrived, at least not to my perception. That point where you give up, give out, give in to the inevitable. I smell the night on the wnd, everyday, I barter with death under my breath, but I am not ready or willing to cede my sentience to the next realm. Not yet (like I will ultimately have much say over this?)

Sigh. Just thought I heard a car door. Perhaps some unexpected (or expected) diversion. No such luck, it was down the block.

I feel like the silverback gorilla I saw at the great ape exhibit at the Natonal Zoo several years ago. Tourists were five deep up against the plexiglass, making faces, snapping pictures, hooting and howling as he sat, his back to them, as if shielding his family from the crowd's frightening antics. Once in a while he would turn and frown, a sad frown, as if uncomprehending as to why he would be in a box, and such creatures as we would be let to roam free.

It was a sorrowful sight, the sort that sometimes makes me wonder why, when we at the top of the pyramid here on Earth are such self-absorbed, self-destructive, self-involved jackasses, why we would expect an alien race that is more advanced than us to be anything more than emotionally retarded killing machines.

Maybe the speculative fiction writers of pre-E.T. had it right.

From time to time I grip the bars of my cage and test them, each time with more resolve, with greater will...as if uncertain that I really want out, but knowing that I will go mad if left to rot much longer. It's eaither that or eat myself to death...they seem to have food around here, at least.

Grunt.

Saturday in the rut

Not sure what is wrong, but not feeling well this morning...probably stress related.

That one bill-collector looking for my ex keeps calling. He's convinced I know where she is (I don't even know for sure she is alive, very well what state she is in) and can earnestly say so. I have requested he cease calling and have suggested I may have to take legal action.

Went to the office party last night...er. Typical office party. Many people got drunk, which is never my favourite environment to be in, being a lifelong teetotaler. I would have liked to have stayed home and worked on some edits, but office politics, y'know.

Well, I'll be back later. I hope.

John Spencer is dead.

I heard a few hours ago: John Spencer, Leo McGarry from "The West Wing" is dead.

Takes the edge off of a week of victories for me. I considered him the artistic center of that distinguished, brilliant ensemble cast...an actor whose portrayal of a noble, yet flawed, man was inspiring. I would have voted him in an instant.

The weird part was when I realized he was only eight years older than me. Ah well. I'm already more than two decades older than Shelley was when he passed. I only have one more thing left that I have promised I'd make it to.

But, regardless, there is a hole in the world tonight, to be filled by our memories and respect.

Sleep well, John. We'll miss you.

coming in 2006...the dirt

as soon as I got the permission email....I'm here!

can you tell I wanted to blab all. Consider me the "E!" of the City of Legends...just call me "E!J!"

Plans at this point:

"THEOCRICIDE" is still on track for the Spring of 2006. At the same time 'FROM AN UNEXPECTED QUARTER" and, most likely, LOVE GODS OF A FORGOTTEN RELIGION" will be pulled from his catalog. I'd suggest yout stock up now, they will be collector's items.

We all pretty much knew this, already.

BUT!

I finally won my case...this Summer, probably August, will see a companion book to his best-selling "101 GREAT LOVE POEMS"...the working title?

"101 GREAT EROTIC POEMS".

Yeah, that's right. Uh huh. He's getting with it. I had to argue down his idea for "101 GREAT METAPHYCIAL POEMS" though. Nt really seeing a market for it.

I heard the podcast that goes live tonight, the one for Nordette Adams. Nice. Very nice, I think he's finally got it.

some decisions about projects in 2006

I'll let E.J. spill the beans about my book plans, he gets off on that sort of thing.

Got the show put to bed for the week, it will be available on iTunes later tonight, Eastern Standard Time and on the Radio City of Legend site either late tonight or early tomorrow. It is worth it just to hear Nordette Adams reads her magnificent "Lady Pontchartrain Dreams She is Dying"...

No snow yet, just constant rain, do not know if it is ever planning to change at this point.

Plans are to see the boys this weekend...gonna have to be a one day trip, my accomodations have evaporated...dammit.

lambent eyes cast no shadows

new work, I wrote it spontaneously, early today, and posted it initially to authorsden.com.

open, you to me

open, you to me.
to my entry into your flesh.
your soul.
your life.
your memory.
as lambent eyes
cast no shadows
on the possibilties.
and the prayer spoken
in a sigh
as I melt into your light.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

Hump day at the camel farm

So far, no bad weather this morning...although they say a rain and snow mix is almost upon us. Ah well.

Got an email from one of my readers for the "other voices" project...she's going to record five of the works and let me select which one I like the best. That's fine...Tinka (the writer/reader) is from South Africa and will add a touch of the international to the project...plus, I have heard her read, so I know I don't have to worry.

Tomorrow night is the company party...today is my interview for the Supervisor's slot...looking forward to a busy next few days.

Heard back from Nordette, I sent her the edit for the show, she approved...this is good.

Last night, TV was boring, reruns for "Lost" and "Drawn Together". Television as ambient noise.

Well, off to shower...going to try and beat the storm.

edits are in...show is go...

busy, busy day.

I completed the edits for this weekend's show (OUT OF THE CITY podcast, available on Apple iTunes Music Store and from my own CITY OF LEGENDS RADIO site)...argh. ran so ling I had to cut a poem by Nordette Adams...ack!

But at least I now know the upper end duration limit for Garage Band...about 35 minutes. I learned.

I'm working on a new theme for the show...maybe in time for New Years.

Made my plans to visit the boys this weekend...so glad to get to see them again. Still missing Peri (holidays are painful) but I have no control over that, so I just have to soldier on.

Have made progress on my Christmas Page...will have it up next week.

It is supposed to be wicked, weather-wise, tomorrow. We shall see what happens with that.

I've made a big decision for the new year...I'll unveil that, then.

A Living Legend

For more than a decade the poetry and writings of William F. DeVault have been synonymous with neo-romanticism and neo-metaphysics.

His ability to cast spells with words of love have given rise to his title, Amomancer, while the passionate and prolific nature of his poetry has seen Yahoo! officially naming him the Romantic Poet of the Internet.

"William F. DeVault, known as the 'amomancer' is a living legend
who will live beyond time... his words forever captured by his prolific pen." - Lupi Basil, editor/publisher, Emotions Magazine

With webcasts broadcast regularly on live365, podcasts available from Apple's iTunes Music Store and videos available for download on YouTube, DeVault's spoken word poetry has been equally popular.

Having published 9 books and 5 cds, DeVault's work has captured the attention of a worldwide audience, earning him a reputation as a living legend.

Nordette Adams and Lady Pontchartrain

masssive headache...some mornings I get these. it's not stress or diet or disease. it's sleeping in a room that gets into the 50's and the air is too dry. it goes away after a few hours...a hot shower helps, but while it is here, I resent it.

If the weather doesn't block me, I'm going to go see my boys this weekend, and take in their presents for Christmas, as well as Peri's gift...would love to get something for her fiance, Brian, but the lack of contact makes it hard to shop for him. One of the side effects of exile, not a lot of communication. I'll pump Jan for some ideas.

Almost done on my edits for the show. My target: get it in to the servers tonight for review. Nordette Adams really steps up for this, and I am pleased by both her readings and our interview . Her piece "Lady Pontchartrain Dreams She's Dying" is incredible...

I'm not revealing what piece I'm doing to complement her readings.

damn headache.

Dreams, Goblins and Intimacies

Three people have already signed on to be alternate readers for my special podcst show later this month, where some of my poems will be read by other writers and readers...volunteers are still welcome...drop me a line if you like.

I was gratified when I swung by the Internet Archive at www.archive.org, which is where I stow my soundfiles...the response has been nice and downloads of my poetry are starting to increase...

I was interested to note the big movers, those that have a high "batting average" wherein it is the ratio of downloads to listens that is used to track popularity.

Current big dogs:

The Philosophy of Dreams ( 25%)

Goblins in My Attic (12%)

Mood Erotique (6%)

My guess on #3 is that by the time you are through listening to me do "Aside, Astride the Phoenix", "Gibbous" and "Intimacies", you have better things to do than download.

Just my thoughts.

I have a chunk of work to do this evening, trying to juggle the flaming cats in zero gravity required to assemble this week's show of FROM AN UNEXPECTED QUARTER, featuring Nordette Adams.

If you haven't yet subscribed to the show...go now to Apple's iTunes Music Store, hit the podcast area and join for free! If you're too lazy to click that much, just
Click here to suscribe to THE ROMANTIC POET OF THE INTERNET.

Thus endeth the sermon

Okay, he's dead. You've proven that we can, as a society, thumb our noses at the rest of the world and basic Christian theology.

I'm going to drop the topic after this posting. I always hated to hear from people about what I've done wrong after I've done it...

I do promise that I will not again vote for a politician who supports capital punishment. Despite my affection for certain office holders and office seekers, I will stay at home and sit on my hands rather than have blood on them, for we are all guilty...the Bible says "Even those that take pleasure them that do so" are as guilty of the sin. I've got enough on my conscience already in this life.

Murder isn't on the list. And I'm not going to add it for the purposes of political expediency.

Amen

follow with your legs

This minor seduction is somewhat erotic and straightforward. I originally posted it on AuthorsDen, where it got a moaning ovation. Poetry as monologue to a lover to be.

follow with your legs

wrap your arms around me, lover,
follow with your legs,
I'm not the sort to coit for sport
and not the sort who begs.
I would give good for bartered kiss,
I would give all and more
and would not count you less for this,
a soul is not a score.

wrap your arms around me, lover,
let me smell your skin
let me hear, as you draw near,
your sweet release begin.
I would hide what is inside
though in your flesh I'd be,
to make complete, atop the sheet,
a passioned symphony.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

Losing faith in redemption

Well, the movie actor playing Governor of California has shown us his character. Choosing political expediency over moral leadership, he has denied clemency to Stanley Tookie Williams.

Sorry, future. Arnie doesn't want to alienate the right-wing when he's thinking of running for a job he has proven himself woefully unsuited to. So we play into the hands of our enemies at home and abroad and again demonstrate to the world our seeming lack of moral character as a nation.

So short sighted. There was a time when leaders led.

I'm going to have to consider delaying moving back to California until after Arnie gets the boot.

Note to those behind latest phishing scam

eBay at least knows how to punctuate a business letter, dunderheads.

If you are going to go phishing, at least learn to use basic English...oh, and Macs display the actual address on your clickable links (another excellent reason to use a Mac)...so I know you're not with eBay, PayPal or any of the half-dozen banks you're tried to claim to be (besides, I have never banked with any of those...nice try, though, morons)

I'd post the link you sent me, here, but some poor soul might actually get suckered in by you leeches, and I don't want that to be on my conscience.

The rest of you, be careful out there...you never know who is using your email address...I knew a guy who a couple of years ago voted for me in the Preditors and Editors online readers poll...no problem. But he actually gave himself a new email address just for the vote, to hide his real name. Within a few months he was on half a dozen mailing lists, mostly cheap watch knockoffs and stock scams. He finally shut it down.

Be careful how you use your email address, who you give it to and what you respond to. Even organizations and businesses that don't sell or share lists sometimes get plundered.

A Review of the Radio...so far (part one)

I slipped over into the page the poet calls "Radio City of Legends" and listened, as dispassionately as I could, to the contents.

Here's my breakdown:

The Show:
So far, he has two sessions: Dec 3 with Dave Taub and Dec 10 with Larry Jaffe. The former is a bit longer, and has some nice touches, including the poet deconstructing his poem "from out of the city" from whence these programs (available not only at City of Legends Radio, but also at the iTunes musci store under Podcasts) got their name. It, unfortunately, lacks interactivity, and I would've liked a clearer recording of Dave Taub. The latter show, with Larry Jaffe, is a bit shorter, with some interaction between the poets, and features some great works by Jaffe, as well as a single, short reading from DeVault.

The Books:
He talks about the evolution of five of his eight books, notably absent are "PanthEon", "from out of the city" and "101 Great Love Poems". For the others he gives us insight and some nice readings of selected works from each. My favorite? "Love Gods of a Forgotten Religion" just to hear him read "Reborn" without tripping over his tongue. That poem is laced with so many verbal runs and alliterative monsters I am amazed it can be spoken aloud without one's head exploding.

The Muses:
So far he has only profiled three: Psyche, The Goldenheart and Alisha. Despite the gravitas of the myth that is the Goldenheart, I preferred his session about Alisha. It is obvious he still has a bad case of her.

I'll check back in later and talk about his singles, including "Glass Roses" and "Diogenes" and also the contributions made so far by Dan McTaggart and Nordette Adams.

An open letter to the Governor of California

Dear Governor Swarzenegger,

I worked for some time as a counselor in your state, with young people involved with gangs and drugs.

Right now you are wrestling with the issue of the execution of Stanley Tookie Williams.

I understand the issues involved, both concrete and political, both pragmatic and philosophical.

I would urge you to grant this clemency.

Justice is not vengeance. Vengeance is not a virtue. We will be telling the tens of thousands of young people who are in gangs that this is a war between them and the State, the Country, the People. We will be serving them up as next year's suicide bomber volunteers for our foreign enemies. We will be making America less safe for her people, and more barbaric in the eyes of the world. We can afford neither.

I was told in my youth that the more powerful a man is, the more gracious he can be. We claim to be the only superpower left in the world. Let's prove it today. Let's prove that we are a nation of second chances, where using the words redemption and rehabilitation is not just a lip-service mockery of those concepts.

The one time Jesus was asked to judge a death penalty case, he saved the woman's life. The next time He was involved in a death penalty case, it was His own. He was executed.

Are we the Christians or the Romans, here in the West? Is "In God We Trust" on our money, "Under God" in our Pledge of Allegiance and the oath you swore upon a Holy Bible going to mean something other than political expediency in the face of the voters? In the end, they aren't the ones who will judge you, you know. Not in the end.

Yes, you can wash your hands of this entire matter. I understand the forces pressing you to do so. But you will be making the greatest single mistake you have made in this life. You will, by a passive act, allowed a man to die who may yet be an inspiration for those on our streets looking for something other than death and violence, those who may yet be returned to their families before they are turned to acts of war against our country.

You will be giving aid and ammunition, not only to our critics, but to our enemies. You can mobilize the National Guard, order the State Police to high alert, but can you keep them there until every poor disenfranchised child in the cities of our nation has forgotten? How long will that take? A decade? A lifetime? Ten lifetimes?

Do the smart thing. Do the wise thing. Do the right thing.

Regards

William F. DeVault
The Romantic Poet of the Internet

something I previously posted at Authors Den

Alas, the flowers wilted


when you were lost
I found you,
when did the dark
surround you,
and shared my light
as long as you did ask.

not for your love,
or glory,
but to love
with nothing for me,
I held at bay the night
as purposed task.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

tongues, unafraid

when you're bleeding, it is hard not to get it all over the place...here's a new eruption.


final words chosen in haste are too honest for the funeral.
we seek the politic, the polite, the light sauce on undercooked game
that masks the bitter edge where truth has already been buried,
married to walls inside the mausoleum, a museum for the blind.

find me in between the words surrendered, pretended to
by the few who would even notice the travestied earth,
forced to play comforter to that which is already fled,
dead against the sky and, yet, now ethereal and immortal.

blind the eyes. break the bones. still the heart
and you will at length find that the truth never even bent,
it went someplace where your handprints on it will eventually fade
as the taste of jasmine returns to tongues unafraid.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

Virtual bar girls

Being one who trusts the internet as much as any other means for encountering someone of interest, I sometimes fish the waters of internet dating sites.

For what it is worth, if I was dependent on these sites as a source of food, I'd be looking rather skeletal by now.

It's not so much the pickings, you have a broad cross section of people on these sites (I helped my ex find a girlfriend on my way out of Mississippi...long and strange story, but suffice it to say that the woman she got involved with was expecting a different person than the one she got (how many hours did I spend ghost-writing personal letters or standing by to assist in online chats to explain cultural references? don't ask...I felt like Cyrano...trying to do the right thing for someone oblivious to what it was doing to me...))

But the disingenuousness of some sites...I partially filled out a profile on a site called "Mate1" a long time ago, never actually paid up to join up...but over the last few months, I've started getting a lot of notifications of emails I've received on that site(but to read my emails there, I would have to pay and join)

After about fifteen emails from some interestingly enough named women (I hoped) I took advantage of a three-day trial for $1.95, just so I could see what emails I had been getting...

I had fifteen emails. Fourteen were form letters from "Online Ambassadors"...an interesting concept where members may be given a free membership as long as they email enough suckers so that they sign up to see who these women are who have been emailing them...sort of like the girls at the local bar who ask you to buy them a drink but really have no intention of actually sitting down and talking with you, they're just there to help move booze.

I realize such bait-and-date operations are probably fairly common in the competitive world of online dating, but I am so glad I took the buck ninety five route to find out (and cancelled before the end of the 72 hour tour)...I would've felt like an idiot had I bought the memberhip.

Not all sites have that lack of integrity, but you should watch what you say and do, and what information you give out. Me, I'm not afraid to give out my real-world information, as my life is pretty much an open book, but you should be careful...and watch out for people who say they've never done something like this, then order the usual.

Virtual bar girls

Being one who trusts the internet as much as any other means for encountering someone of interest, I sometimes fish the waters of internet dating sites.

For what it is worth, if I was dependent on these sites as a source of food, I'd be looking rather skeletal by now.

It's not so much the pickings, you have a broad cross section of people on these sites (I helped my ex find a girlfriend on my way out of Mississippi...long and strange story, but suffice it to say that the woman she got involved with was expecting a different person than the one she got (how many hours did I spend ghost-writing personal letters or standing by to assist in online chats to explain cultural references? don't ask...I felt like Cyrano...trying to do the right thing for someone oblivious to what it was doing to me...))

But the disingenuousness of some sites...I partially filled out a profile on a site called "Mate1" a long time ago, never actually paid up to join up...but over the last few months, I've started getting a lot of notifications of emails I've received on that site(but to read my emails there, I would have to pay and join)

After about fifteen emails from some interestingly enough named women (I hoped) I took advantage of a three-day trial for $1.95, just so I could see what emails I had been getting...

I had fifteen emails. Fourteen were form letters from "Online Ambassadors"...an interesting concept where members may be given a free membership as long as they email enough suckers so that they sign up to see who these women are who have been emailing them...sort of like the girls at the local bar who ask you to buy them a drink but really have no intention of actually sitting down and talking with you, they're just there to help move booze.

I realize such bait-and-date operations are probably fairly common in the competitive world of online dating, but I am so glad I took the buck ninety five route to find out (and cancelled before the end of the 72 hour tour)...I would've felt like an idiot had I bought the memberhip.

Not all sites have that lack of integrity, but you should watch what you say and do, and what information you give out. Me, I'm not afraid to give out my real-world information, as my life is pretty much an open book, but you should be careful...and watch out for people who say they've never done something like this, then order the usual.

hollowed out

I am hollowed out.

this bundle of sticks and pretence has finally clattered
to the stones of the street,
making a sound
like despair
as the air is sucked away
by the need.

the need.
for that which I have let slip away.

grey is the sun.
grey
and grim and unforgiving

like conscience.
like truth.
like a rumour or a lie
told
until you begin
to believe
that there is more to it than petty mischief
of a chronic, ironic evil.

black is the moon.
black
and low and evocative

like pictures.
like music.
like a memory that rises
choking
you on your own bile
before a smile
can rise to be thrown down like an idol
made of glass and soapstone.

red is the sky.
red
and loud and chaotic

like my thoughts.
like my dreams.
like words that pour
painful
as blood from a wound
self-inflicted
and left to fester and finally decay
like joy, in the silence of your absence.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.

Farewell, Richard Pryor

I just heard that Richard Pryor has passed away. He will be missed and mourned.

An artist in the purest sense, he understood the power of words. He popularized the use of the "N" word, a word so powerful that now days people are afraid to use it, so fearful of confronting the past in which is was forged. So fearful of the rage it summons in those who have built their own cells from it, empowering it and the ignorance it once stood for.

Pryor's sketch on Saturday Night Live - "Word Association" with Chevy Chase has to rate on all lists exccept those compiled by the most craven of buffoons (hear me, "E!"?) as the greatest sketch in the history of that institution (how bloodless we have become in our middle years, eh?)

He co-wrote "Blazing Saddles" with Mel Brooks, and was set to play the sheriff "Bart" until the studio decided he was too edgy for that role, giving the talented Cleavon Little his greatest taste of success.

The last time I saw him was a cameo in "Mad Dog Time"...a film too sophisticated for most tastes in its clever mockery of the Rat Pack. That he played a gravedigger was a statement as to the path he knew he was already upon, wasting away from Multiple Sclerosis.

Richard, man.

No, that's it. Man.

Not perfect, but a man who made the world understand, if only too short a while, the power of words. He wasn't the black Lenny Bruce. Lenny was the white Richard Pryor.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Today is International Human Rights Day. No, there are no sales on at WalMart for it, no parade sponsored by a department store...but since the United States was one of the authors of this declaration 57 years ago, I though we might want to reflect upon it and see how we're doing. If you'd rather follow along in another language, the UN has a nice page where you can access this document in any of over 200 translations, from Russian to French Creole to Maori - here.

Otherwise follow along and see how well your country has done living up to its word after 57 years:

--------------------------------------------------------------------
(On December 10, 1948 the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the full text of which appears in this following page. Following this historic act the Assembly called upon all Member countries to publicize the text of the Declaration and "to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of countries or territories.")

PREAMBLE

Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,

Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,

Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,

Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,

Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,

Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,

Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,

Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.

Article 1.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2.

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

Article 3.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.

Article 4.

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Article 6.

Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.

Article 7.

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.

Article 8.

Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

Article 9.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 10.

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

Article 11.

(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.

(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.

Article 12.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article 13.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.

(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Article 14.

(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.

(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Article 15.

(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.

(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

Article 16.

(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.

(2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.

(3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

Article 17.

(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.

(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

Article 19.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Article 20.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.

(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.


Article 21.

(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.

(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.

(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.

Article 22.

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.

Article 23.

(1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

(2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.

(3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.

(4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

Article 24.

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.

Article 25.

(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.

(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.

Article 26.

(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.

(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.

(3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.

Article 27.

(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

Article 28.

Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

Article 29.

(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.

(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.

(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Article 30.

Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
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(I know no nation that fully lives up to these marks, but we're trying...)

Oh, and the read last night went well (I can never tell...but the audience seemed appreciative and wants me back...a cmera crew from WBOY TV showed up during the act that followed me...I did my best to hide in the corner, I'm not a big fan of cameras (you hadn't noticed? How many pictures of me have you seen? Right...)