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Eternal Shadows

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This Blog is hereby resurrected.
I'm still busy with my short story
portfoilo, but when I write, well
now, I write tons. Anything posted
here is a draft and the author retains
full ownership thereof...word to all
the "Vader haters" out there.

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10/30/2008 - Raven Red

Posted in Dark Muse

Raven-Red
(dictated to me by the Dark Muse)

Once upon a time there was a poisoned chalice, and it was set aside
so that no one might touch it.

Hidden behind great doors of black oak, the chalice was sealed away
by holy orders; under five basements it rested in long peace.

Strange seasons passed in the world as green sprigs wilted away to
autumn's decay, only to be buried under purifying snows.

And one summer's day, upon the solstice of the season, came
flooding in Raven-Red...her dress a flood of pestilent black.

Blood red was her mane, pale white her skin, and liking the small
cottage, bought it for the blood-red labor of a solitary kiss.

And in that cottage, the titian did dwell, mending soil, planting
grapes, and mark---all life did grow at her beck and call!

Fellfeast came, and then Dimming Day, and yet the blood red
raven did harvest mickle crops.

But after Dimming, came Grimfall, and forced inside was the blood-
red mane; by winter-fire she dwelt, writing and reading her soliatry call.

Falling on chrysanthemum wings, the first snow pecked on the cottage
ceiling, but woven straw did it wrestle with, and thus, to no avail

Was its grim call upon the blood-hair; and she scribbled and scribed,
ever set upon a history of her folk.

Cheery red did the fire blaze in her hearth, and long did it stoke into
the night until the center log fell, thumping in the murk.

Startled Raven-Red woke, and marveled that her home was reflected in an
ivy-green light.

Not from one place did it shine, but seemingly, from within, e'en from
without, e'en from the starry skies that ruled over the snow strewn night.

Getting an itch under back, she turned to the boards, ripped them rib
by rib by two until, there yawned a dusty stair.

Down and down she trod, her acrid black trails becoming one with the
shadows of the under-earth, her blood red mane redder, even as

Cellar one gave way to cellar two, three, and alas...to the blackest
earth of cellar five.

Dusk, the door that separated her from her hearts-call, beckoned in the
inky darkness. Reaching pale fingers to the hot knob, she blinked

As the dusk-door resolved to an inky dew"and within, buried down five
crown deep, was the unearthed chalice green.

"Flee from here," her Guardian-conscience did warn,
"go thee back e'en now afore the emerald-envy swallow thee whole!"

Shirking not, Raven-Red went on down, falling to earth's blackest bile,
shivering as she plummeted ever down to greener coldness.

Mortal laws could not hold the need within her heart; forsooth!--there
in the pit, Raven-Red stood--alack! Her blood locks glistening green as shame.

And with fingers out stretched, smiled even as she felt the poison enter
her blooded veins. Grasping the envy-green trophy, she marveled

That it was made of airy dew, insubstantial witchcraft, and voodoo-song;
and in a moment, yeh, even as Raven-Red struggled to consume...it became her.

Moral:
Ware thee the wolf that would eat the innocent,
for even in winter dire, new life"it doth dwell!

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6/30/2008 - To Erato With Love: "Epiphany (Todd)"

Posted in Dark Muse

Dear Self,
It didn't help today that your heart was frozen, that you were quaking under the Tyrant who came from Without. Where was your might then? Oh yes, I remember, your Lau Gar had the day off, and you thought that editing Chapter One of your little novel project would be a good thing. But the sands...they shift don't they? Rewriting sucks, so I gift you, Self, with some of your favorite words from one of your favorite musicals (hell, you only have two favorite musicals, LOL). Allow Sweeney Todd to be your family, for writing is a lonely profession, and it ought to be. There's only room for ONE ego in a novel.
Go thee now, take up Excalibur, and weed out the weak sentences.

This is an ad revenue sharing blog.

"Wipe out Vice Chancellor Gunray..."

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6/29/2008 - To Erato With Love: Grand Hotel

Posted in Dark Muse

Dear Self,
What with the strain of writing your novel, I think you need to absorb some archetypal representations of Erato. Drink it in, deconstruct, and let it flow on over to Mildred. Also, drink an extra martini, that's the stuff they'd drink in that forlorn lake mansion you dreamed up!

This is an ad revenue sharing blog.

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6/13/2008 - To Erato With Love: Bonus Feature!

Posted in Dark Muse

Erato bonus material for your 6-13 enjoyment. I won't spoil it with too many words, but it's a Ginger Snaps3 montage set to Switchblade Symphony! Need I say more? Werewolf epic+legendary gothic band=Friday the 13th Goodness!

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6/13/2008 - To Erato With Love: Blue

Posted in Dark Muse

Ahhh, "Blue" by the Birthday Massacre. What else would be better for the 6-13 edition of Erato? It's not the video I imagine in my head, but it's not bad at all. The thing we get with "Blue" is a dual role on Chibi's vocals: 1. The sweet innocent girl, the lover of tea parties, dolls, and cupcakes. 2. The diabolical demon seed (oohhh, I love that one..*shivers*).

Version one of the song was issued as a demo back when the group sold out their first CD and didn't know what the hell to do next. Can you blame them? It's going fishing with your best tackle and latching on to Moby Dick in seconds. But the band got a handle on success, wrote some really great songs, and published two more CDs.

As a creative force, they are now worried about being type casted on MTV because MTV doesn't understand their music and doesn't know what to do with them. I worry about them to. The music industry has a way of whoring everything (take the alternative movement as an example;
it was doing just fine until Nirvana was "discovered" and then....someone turns on the whore machine, they milk Kurt, and boom, suicide).

The Birthday Massacre is a great example of self-publishing. Three years ago, I could mention the band to friends and get blank stares; today, same thing. But that's not the point, the point is I haved stupid RLFs that live in a cultural cave. But seriously, TBM are fine examples of poets who believed in themselves, their vision, their sound and went with it. Self-publishing is the only answer, and the only prayer for weird dreamers like me and for TBM. Therefore, TBM, wherever you are, I thank you for being the example!

Lyrics to die for in "Blue"

1. Plastic blue
invitations in my room
i've been waiting here for you
reservations made for two"

That's so damned sweet. I want to be there, I want to get invitations, who doesn't? Who the fuck sends invites these days anymore? I think as a culture, my generation missed something. I don't think any of my friends know what RSVP means. But anyway, "reservations made for two" has true love written all over it.

2. sunlight fading

I love you for this TBM. A fading sunlight is so damned romantic, so damned charming because the sun's dying rays matches the maremalade I see on Chibi's table next to the flowered tea pot. But, wait, this is TBM land we are dealing with. "Sunlight Fading" is the opening of the door to twilight, and twilight as a plane of existence within the TBM land is a scarey, often chaotic place of pain, murder, deceit.

3. black tongues speak faster than the car can crash
you supply the rumours and i'll provide the wrath
romance is breaking every heart in two casting shadows
in the pale shade of blue

The smart listener realizes that the fading sunlight has brought forth an accident, an accident that has probably killed Chibi's love interest, the one who received those delightful invitations (I wish I knew what those things looked like). Dying in TBM massacre is a plunge into the phantom zone of the afterlife, and need I say it? The afterlife is a scarey place in terms of TBM's vision. "Casting shadows in the pale shade of blue" is just a stunning turn around of the intened use of the word "blue." The invitations were "plastice blue", and now "blue" is the color of a haunting presence, a shadowy thing that defies description. It's felt more than seen, dreaded more than ignored. That's high hat horror folks.

4. plastic blue
conversations in my room
saving every tear for you
trusting every word untrue
twilight fading

You have to hand it to Chibi's character, a lover who saves tears, trusting every rumor said about her lover to be false, there's a lot to love about her heart--it's impossibly big for we post-moderns to bear; and that's the strength of Romanticism, sentiment is charged with idolatry so it becomes a dimension unto itself. I don't know about you, but "conversations in my room" brings me images of Chibi chatting it up with a shadow, a stain on her wallpaper that turns out to the "presence" of her dead lover. I respect haunts, though I think I could take one on, and I do believe these conversations are possible. But still, there's something harrowing about it, and I don't know why. Ghosts have rights too! At least, I think....wait, no, they don't.

5. fate changes faster than the death of light
you supply the envy and i'll provide the spite

But the relationship isn't two sided, if I'm reading the intent right. Chibi's love and long suffering patience isn't rewarded by the shadow. "You supply the envy and I'll provide the spite" is simply a horrible rule for any relationship, and we've all been there, we've all had those loves, those crushes where you envy the person so much, that in return, all you get is spite back because...they're evil. But of course, I've no evidence my reading is correct. And that's the thing I truly love about TBM. All the usual rules simply do not apply. It's a Looking Glass group, peer into the mirror of lyrics, and you behold what you want to behold. Every experience is different per listener (the video above is a prime example).

This will probably be my last post until next weeked (going away). So, don't miss me too much you little
bleeders.

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6/12/2008 - To Erato With Love: Freak

Posted in Dark Muse

Introduction to the "Erato With Love" Journal:

1. The muse moves in mysterious ways. She leaves her texts where she will. This is me reading the text in an egocentric fashion. Mayhap it will be so universal that others will always get it...but probably not.

2. Texts, all texts, have wisdom hidden within (or if it's negative wisdom, this too points toward postivie wisdom just as -1 invites the possibility of +1).

3. There will be no schedule. As I am "touched" I chatter to myself. Simple. I might go a month in between entries--who cares!?

Rules for those who listen in:

You're eavesdropping on a conversation, stay if you want, leave if you get weirded out easily. The door's right behind you, no one is asking you to be here. The rules are simple, comment only if you have been struck by a video and have some insight to share. This isn't the place for debate, so if you are offended, go masterbate somewhere else.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Erato 1: Silverchair/"Freak"

Reaction:
There's a lot to love about Silverchair. I think the only people who "get them" are the open minded fans of Nirvana (there are closed minded fans, believe me). As a creative project, Silverchair reminds me of myself. I see the band as a group of artists who were fans of Nirvana, so much so, that the performance style, the insistance on occasioanl non-sense metaphor (to show that language itself is a circus with meaning only autorized by a lion tamer--thus nonsense is rebellion), the notion that the male ego is weak and nothing compared to what feminist propagand says it is, the look...is done in tribute. And creating in tribute is what we all do when we try to create masterful works by following a pattern. There's nothing wrong with it. As a dreamer (no, I didn't say writer, that's a term for an earlier generation and the meaning sickens me) I dream within the boundaries of others. But like Silverchair, I rage to be different. And as long as that rage builds, as long as I aim to kill the father that blinds me, the path to originality will be open. Like Prince Hamlet, we must kill the false father to satisfy the orignal father's hunger.

Lyrics to die for from the video:
1. "Try to be different, well get a different disease"
    Ahhhh, theme, theme, theme. I hear thee Silverchair, I know thy struggle. Getting that "different disease" is what it all boils down to.

2. "Body and soul I'm a freak, I'm a freak"
      I've always felt that way about myself, my sexuality, my everything. Sing on brother! You're not afraid to reveal the truth.

3. "If only I could be as cool as you...As cool as you"
     Once the false father is eradicated, we are stuck with the original father. The keys to the door of final originality are hidden on his body. Tactic: "If you see the Buddha on the road, kill him." (Old school Ch'an insight...those bastards knew what they were      talking about).

4. "I don't really know How to put on a "cool" show, as boring as they come Just tell me where to go"
     I love you Silverchair! Self-effacement is the path toward eradication of the ego, yeah, I got it! Or do I? Seriously, this is a great lyric that leads to the genesis of the song itself. Faced with criticism from close-mined Nirvana fans ("You guys suck! You're not original! You're clones!"), the band openly admits their connection and their dependence on the original father. I admire this self-effacement. Only those who have been truly burned by the Promethean fire will understand the path. The path is choked with briars, wild beasts, and priests of the father. But the wise artist uses this....everything is Muse, every insult, every bruise, every compliment. And if there ever was a philsophy of the Alternative movement, it has to be that self-effacement is anger, and anger
becomes art once released via the Muses Nine.

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6/1/2008 - The Cure: A Study of "Lullaby"

Posted in Dark Muse

(Robert Smith of The Cure)

i. Forward

What better way to revive my dead blog than to bow to one of the seminal forces in the history of Gothic rock, Robert Smith.

A new Cure release is eminent, and as Smith and his band are a big, big part of how I write and why I write, I challenged myself
to analyze one of my favorite songs via the usage of mythological critique. Let’s hope I don’t “murder to dissect.”

In general, I’m using a new template, so this means other parts of the blog will be...hmm...messy until I either delete or fix
old articles. Thanks goes out to the Pagan Bard for brining me back “to the Force.”

ii. The Cure: A Study of "Lullaby"

I hate it when people profess to have cornered the market on a subject, therefore, when you read my title, know that this is homage and not a hostile take over of a group that has been around almost as long as I have.

"Lullaby" or as it is known around my house by my five year son, "The Spiderman song," is a preamble to the orgasmic, uplifting beats of "Fascination Street." As the song unwinds, I am always taken aback by the craft that goes into the production of the story. When "Lullaby" begins, we are forced in medias res into the perspective of the observer (who I presume is a side of Smith that we all think we know"I call him Everyman Smith) in his vivid world of peril and threat. While it would seem right to call this an "epic" song, that would be a disservice. Smith's song is about acceptance, not isolation of the abnormal; therefore, novel would best summarize the song's spirit.

"On Candy-stripe legs the spiderman comes " is the opening line, and its an economical brew house of description. I am moved to think of the festive air of carnivals, clowns, and midnight circuses, of places darker than the hum-drum that so politely dominates us. Travelers through the song find, if they look closer at the carnival, both the carn of carnivore and the carn in carnal, two themes that hide within the song's velvety black depths. And Smith's "spiderman" is a proudly carnivalesque figure (both fleshy and topsy-turvy), a shadowy presence whose mere existence overturns the rules of "reality" (and that word is one for the smug realist out there who that no definition of the word is every needed) upside down. It's just as well, that's what carnivalesque figures do best anyway. Also for the overturn, but never for the petrification of the experience.

Nightmare figures (our cultural bogeymen) serve fairy tales well, especially if they are found creeping and crawling after child protagonists (child here meaning those innocent of the world's carnal system). We have Hansel and Gretel and their introduction to the murderous world with the hag in hut; the horror of world-as-Other terrorizes Little Red Riding Hood in the form of the wolf; and who can forget the perilous Three Bears story? That'll teach us to eat porridge in the forest in the home of the "animal." The shadow-creature serves often as a warning of the carnal hijinks the world-as-it-is can get up to if we are naive, unwary, or just downright oblivious. We are forced to remember in the fairy tale universe that sometimes the world's primary role is that of vampyre, or as The Smashing Pumpkins once warned, a vampiric machine that's "set to drain."

Smith's "spiderman" hails of course from the fairy tale past of Occidental culture, but through the candy-crackle lens of The Cure, he's only half nightmare. There's a transcendental quality in Smith's nightmare creature, a quality that forces us toward a dependency upon death-as-friend, voyeur, and psychopomp. Only in The Cure can we find death sexy, alluring, and downright...natural. (end of Part I).

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7/29/2007 - Dark Muse Jukebox

Posted in Dark Muse

Greetings O ye of Dreamland,

I've been looking for a way to embed this playlist
on my blog; I'm at a loss as of now as to how to go
about it, but I thought just posting it would be good
enough for the present.

What we have here is a list of songs I find inspiring
in dreaming the "Ilyana" story. Maybe others will like
the themes, maybe not. At any case, enjoy at your own
risk *smiles*.

Still working on TBM part II...it's coming along.
And the last chapter of the Malice portion of the
saga, hopefully posted by mid-week. I'm moving my fertile
earth this weekend to a safer location, a place with
an actual yard (vampire joke embedded).

I shall thee all later.

DT

P.S.,
I also have the playlist on my Myspace account...
tune in there at http://www.myspace.com/ilyanatomb.
Bascially, the Myspace is based around a rp char of mine from way back, but
I'll be making it an imperial base there soon.

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