SONG OF THE DAY: Two of Hearts (12" version)

It apparently is 12 inch version week here at the old blog nobody reads that still writes about music as if people still download mp3s and want music recommendations and don’t just let spotify suggested playlists pour music down their throat. This song is great though, and me pushing these wonderful disco beats on you has nothing to do with Pride month. I like shit like this year round. I’m comfortable with that.

a freestyle sonnet about being born to lose

As a natural born loser, I know the deal 
don't always be coming from above the table, 
so you gotta balance your math with what you feel 
at intuitive level, while still unable 

to control the game. Ain't no shame in being born 
without wealth or fame, struggling to simply survive 
the hand dealt with a next day's ante not yet torn 
from our worn out pockets. But, to remain alive, 

talking shit to the dealer is a type of win, 
unapologetic in our born skin - well-scarred, 
scuffed, with ink-stained testaments to a life of sin. 
"If they sleeping on you, tuck 'em in," disregard 

for the approval odds of them fine folks gold seal; 
my human roots ain't ragged but raw, rugged, real.

SONG OF THE DAY: Life Keeps Happening

Life does keep happening, if you're lucky. Not much else to say about that because I was practicing cartomancy on my back but never finished laying out the spread - it's just a jack of diamonds by itself, hanging there, waiting to be paired or combined with other meaning. This has left me in a constant state of high potential but imbalance ever since. I need to fix that shit, but I'm stuck right now just being. At least I thought so, but the human body is connected to the universe in ways the mind won't ever understand, so since my right side has that jack of diamonds and my left side is still blank, awaiting further fate, my left ear died on me the end of last week, like an old car. It'll turn over, but it lacks power, missing a few cylinders. Went to the earhole specialists and they did a millions tests and said, "shrug, come back in two weeks, let's try it again." Universe telling me, finish the spread, don't stand pat when the cards ain't been finished dealing. And that's how life keeps happening, trying to teach you lessons, but you always think you're too fucking smart to listen.

SONG OF THE DAY: Drunkard's Hiccups

I am the spiritual grandchild of the Mothman, though my parents saw him as the Bat Monster. He appeared from the woods as they procreated in a station wagon, and this was when I was conceived. 273 days later, my parents were playing poker, and my father always had my mother sit to his right, because it made it easier to cheat when he dealt. But on this particular night, he noticed the Jack of Diamonds flowing her way, nearly every hand, regardless of who dealt. He started calling jacks wild when he dealt, and it seemed the Jack of Diamonds ended up dealt to my mother every hand. She was not the greatest poker player at this point, having just turned 17, and not fully ingrained in the ways of the lost, doomed, and delinquent like my father.
The deal came round the table again, back to my father, and he dealt a seven-card no-peek, boldly calling “Jack of Diamonds wild” to the table. The table gawked at this shit apparently, both recognizing that my mom had kept getting that card, but also the folly in calling a singular card as wild, in a slow moving seven-card no-peek hand, with seven people around the table (as it was that night, according to my dad’s retelling of this). The high hand grew, and it got back to my mom, who flipped a pair of queens with her first two cards – the hearts and clubs. My dad busted, flipping all seven cards, unable to beat a pair of queens, with only the one wild card floating. More people busted out, but one guy – Wolfie – flipped the queen of spades, which my mom would’ve needed as a pair. Tip, who ended up being like a second father to me later in life, hit a pair of kings to take the lead. Then another guy – Bozo (who actually used to live not far from where I live now, and I need to look him up, although the last time I went by there he almost shot me accidentally because he’s paranoid as fuck) – he flipped a pair of aces and took the lead. It came back round to my mom. She flipped her third, fourth and fifth card… nothing worthwhile. Her sixth card was the queen of diamonds, a natural three-of-a-kind of face cards, the queens running together, giving her the upper hand. They were playing a one dollar limit, and she picked up a quarter to bid a quarter, which to be honest at the time was a pretty high bet. My dad tapped at a dollar bill, somewhat indiscreetly, encouraging her to bet big. She looked at him like he was stupid (which repeated often through the years), but also listened to him halfway and bet two quarters (this pattern of my dad’s influence also repeated).
Tip flipped an ace, which Bozo would’ve wanted, and then on his last card, hit a third king. “Dollar!” he said emphatically dropping a crumpled bill into the kitty in the middle of the table. Bozo had three cards left still, but also had seen Tip flip one of the two remaining aces. But also, with seven people playing, that’s 49 cards out of 52, and that last Ace of Spades was still hiding, either in the three cards left undealt, in one of his last three, or my mom’s final card. The Jack of Diamonds was still floating too. Bozo looked down at his small pile of money, contemplating the odds of having three out of seven remaining cards, with another ace and that wild card floating.
He stacked eight quarters. “I call you, and I bump you a dollar.”
My mom looked nervous. She was pregnant as fuck, looked at my dad. She only had three dollars left in her stack, quarters and dimes. He had a few dollars too, but she’d had the good hands that night, and hadn’t bet them as cocksure as my dad would’ve, even if he was losing. So though the cards had ran her way, their combined money stack was still light. She was thinking about babies on the way, shit like that. My dad was just thinking about the fact he knew that Jack of Diamonds had gone to her all night long, and that she needed to call. And he told her this in his look, “DON’T FOLD” screaming from his eyeballs. She called, reluctantly, counting out her remaining quarters, and then her remaining dimes. All she had left was a few more dimes and a small pile of nickels.
Tip figured this was it for the night, and he saw her on the ropes, and he didn’t really think Bozo was going to beat his three kings. “I call, and raise you another dollar.” The pile in the middle grew bigger than most of their broke ass rural Virginia eyeballs could believe.
“You motherfucker,” Bozo said, but he still had the advantage of three cards, so he called. Then he pulled out ten dimes. “And I’ll raise you back.” All eyes looked at my mom.
“Two dollars to you, Dot,” said Tip. She didn’t have enough to cover the bet. She looked at my dad. “I’ll give you the money. You’ve got to call, to see it out at this point,” and he slide his change over to her. She counted out two dollars in change and added it to the pile, which must’ve been well up over $25 at this point, in 1973 dollars. Tip called, and he looked at his change for a second, dramatically contemplating raising again.
“You motherfucker,” said Bozo, and Tip laughed and said, “Call.”
Bozo flipped his first card… a five. Then his second… a nine. No help. One card left, his two aces sitting there like a promising foundation early on, but followed by mismatched garbage. He popped the corner of his last facedown card, and flipped it. Ace of Spades. “Goddammit!” Tip said, and flipped his busted hand over.
Bozo counted out four quarters, and confidently said, “Dolla!” My mom counted out dimes and nickels to call the dollar bet. He used to love to tell me this part, because he’d say, “Son, we didn’t have shit left by a handful of nickels, and the gas tank on the car we drove there was empty too. But she looked at me, and I just shot ‘bet it all’ into her head.” So according to the story, my mom counted out my parents’ last seven nickels, and raised Bozo 35 cents. Everybody saw that was the end of the combined stack of money for my folks, and that this was the last hand, and there was one card left, and she was pregnant as fuck, about to have a baby any day now, and that they were teens – not just my parents but all of them, all doomed to one extent or another, but riding the high times of another oblivious night a wide walk outside the margins of responsibility. Bozo still had change enough to raise further, but everything had been laid out, no need to add more drama. He counted out his own 35 cents, and called.
My mom lacked the dramatic pop of a car that the men could do, especially in a moment like that, no queens left to be had. But she flipped her last card, and sure enough, it was that Jack of Diamonds. Four queens beat Bozo’s three aces. And then her water broke, and I was born right there, literally beneath a poker table full of nickels and dimes, Valentine’s Day, 1973.
I still feel that Jack of Diamonds energy, and that Bat Monster/Mothman energy in me, when I'm living right, walking the allegedly wrong ways off the responsible path, where the mushrooms grow and coal trains rumble. Yesterday was just such a day, when I was wandering through the woods, and a beautiful piece of rose quartz was popping up out the ground, like that last wild Jack of Diamonds. And I knew that even though I was nobody, nowhere, I was beating anybody else's aces.

SONG OF THE DAY: Loser

my back tattoo is only half a back 

the purity of natural born loser's poor choices 

was gonna get outlaw Jack of Diamonds 

representing myself - outlaw jack of all words 

and then Suicide King to signify 

paternal blood lines - reckless king of all dives 

then at the top in garishly beautiful script 

STANDING PAT - a blackjack hand not destined 

to win automatically but 

fuck it, still pretty good 

got the jack done, third eye activated 

small side street in Scottsville tattoo parlor 

operated by a dude from down the road 

but then he was gone, to Germany or Arizona 

and his style was too unique plus affordable 

being a small town and shit 

so never got the suicide king 

just half a back tattoo, holding a jack of diamonds 

waiting for life to deal me the other card 

every now and then my youngest child 

walks by as I'm shirtless (naturally) 

and she slaps my back, yelling 

SLAPJACK! and runs off laughing 

one of my blessings to remember since it feels like 

some folks lose so hard 

they never even finish getting their hand dealt 

before life folds up on top of them 

like metaphysical tangle of blackberry bushes 

fruitless to fight 

ST00D 4T H3R W1ND0W 34CH D4Y...

stood at her window each day,

praying for her outlaw prince

of diamonds to return safe

J4D3D J4CK 0F D14M0NDS - W0RN...

jaded jack of diamonds - worn,

weathered, weary - still finds way

to be wild and wonderful

Y0N1 BVDDH4 TH1CK-F4T W1TH...

yoni buddha thick-fat with

fertile philosophies of

pro-creation - crescent smile

TH4T 0VTL4W J4CK 0F D14M0NDS...

that outlaw jack of diamonds 

hard card to play when dealt as 

metaphysical hole card 

J4CK 0F D14M0ND 4ND BVDDH4...

jack of diamond and buddha

occupy red oracle

in rooftown of gibberish

R4V3N 4SK3D: D0VBL3 D0WN 0R...

Raven asked: double down or

stand pat?; Buddha answered: find

you’re a man who can do both

0VTL4W J4CK 0F D14M0NDS T4T...

outlaw jack of diamonds tat

splattered across right center

back (defender in soccer)

Rooftown oracle where pink...

Rooftown oracle where pink

buddha sits with outlaw jack

of diamonds watching his fat back

pink buddha jack of diamonds

campertop temple, little

town of birdhouses and scrap