L0NG DR1V3S N0WH3R3, 4L0N3 W1TH...

long drives nowhere, alone with

my internal monologue -

a ridiculous debate

TH3 L0TT3RY 0F HVM4N...

the lottery of human

existence - to whom and where

you're born like pick six numbers

0TH3RS 4CC3PT B31NG B0X3D...

others accept being boxed

into bourgeoisie coffins

with pride - a learned behavior

S0M3 M4K3 M4RKS R3G4RD3D 4S...

some make marks regarded as

illegitimate because

they ain't stay within the lines

TH1N L1N3 B3TW33N Y3ST3RD4Y'S...

thin line between yesterday's

shine and tomorrow's decline;

today is only today

MYTH0L0G1C4L SYMB0LS...

mythological symbols

fade into obscurity,

having lost their relevance

N0TH1NG W3 BV1LD 1S G0NN4...

nothing we build is gonna

be permanent; don't pretend

you're more than just a human

SEVEN 'POSSUMS HAIKU JOURNAL

Over the past decade, at first inside my own heart, but then as it has spiraled out into a larger community, both at in real life physical events as well as online communities, I've enjoyed the expanding ripples of people embracing the haiku form. It's been such a constant and positive influence on my life, both as a personal practice as well as what others create and share with me and these communities.

I've contemplated in recent years launching a literary journal of some sort, based in the James River basin of Virginia, as that's the part of Earth where I've lived most all my life, so it the land and river there has had a profound influence on me, but also because it's where what we consider our current western American culture first laid its tendrils down four centuries ago. There's a lot about that I've seen many people I care about work hard to undo some of the bad parts, while holding up the good.

Poetry, and writing, or language, or however you want to describe it, has always been an important of life for me. It's a meditative practice that helps us be safe, and then okay. It can help us survive storms, and then hopefully heal and thrive when the emotional weather is calmer. And that has always been my creative philosophy. But the language of the land I've lived on most all my life - the Monacan - is mostly lost to that aforementioned history. There's a story of Thomas Jefferson collecting a dictionary of indigenous words at one point, and robber barons stole the trunk with that particular hand-written compendium, but saw it was just a book of writing with no value, and tossed the trunk into the river. I don't know how true that story is or not, but I often think how sad it is to have a language lost, but also how appropriate it would be that somebody saw no monetary value in it so it sunk back into the bottom of the river, literally.

We do, however have a few Powhatan words still with us, from further down the James at the mouth. One of those words is opossum, commonly known as 'possum (though I have re-inserted the colloquial apostrophe). Recently in thinking about what Sovthern Gothicc Fvtvrism means to me in a philosophical sense, some mythology about seven 'possums of Sovthern Gothicc Fvtvrism came to me. (This will be in issue six of my zine, which you get when you are a supporter of my patreon, or you can buy at haiku slams.) I chatted about all this with my brilliant painter/artist/philosopher friend Dave Moore about this recently, and asked him to maybe conjure up some 'possum imagery to be used for this. And he sent me this picture.

Thus, it is with great pride, but also apprehension at taking on another thing, I announce the launch of a print-version Sovthern Gothicc Fvtvrist haiku journal, called Seven 'Possums. This art will be the cover of the first issue, which has no deadline. If interested in submitting, contact me at sovtherngothiccfvtvrist@gmail.com, as we'll be setting up submission guidelines in the coming weeks.

L4Y1NG 1N B3D 4T G1RLFR13ND'S...

laying in bed at girlfriend's

cabin, freight train rumbling wild

promises across the ridge

SVN S3TT1NG 0N 3SC4P3 R0VT3S...

sun setting on escape routes;

guess I'll rest here for the rest

of my life, and try to sleep

HAIKU SLAMS 2020

I guess some people actually still come to this site instead of just social media, so let me let you know that the first Sovthern Gothicc Fvtvrist Haiku Slam of 2020 happens later this month, in fact next week, at the Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar in Charlottesville, VA. Like all haiku slams, all you need is 15-20 haiku and the desire to share to come sign up, and take a shot at winning the main haiku slam. There's also always a battle royal, for both those eliminated early as well as folks who just wanna give it a tiptoe tryout the first time, where all you need is a couple haiku maximum. We've got sponsorship from our friends at Market Street Wine, so we'll have cash prizes for the winners. And in the main event, it's gonna be 2019 Champion Hawktalon J Crowfighter vs. dirtgod raven mack. He beat me in the quarterfinals of the championship tournament, and I'm looking to get some revenge. Not really, mostly we're just looking to exorcise the demons of existing in this fucked up world. Come build community with your cousins in Sovthern Gothicc Fvtvrism.

I do keep a fairly updated schedule at my namesake website too though.

CH4NN3L3D T0 S3LF-D3STRVCT1V3...

channeled to self-destructive

behavior, then blame myself

for never seeing the signs

T00 M4NY H34RTS 4B4ND0N3D...

too many hearts abandoned

for the pursuit of metrics

justified by our fool brains

S0 4FR41D 0F 0VR 1NN3R...

so afraid of our inner

darkness because we never

sit with it, adjust ourselves

L1GHT BVLB 0V3R H34D VS3D 4S...

light bulb over head used as

metaphor for creation -

I prefer fucking outside

4LL 0VR 4CC0MPL1SHM3NTS 4S...

all our accomplishments as

most intelligent primates

will be reclaimed by the Earth

SONG OF THE DAY: Head Over Wheels II (An Ode to G Dep)

Your Old Droog is like an overpriced indoor flea market that’s probably more borderline thinking of itself as an antique spot, in that there’s a ton of cool shit going on, I really enjoy walking around and enjoying the vibe, but I ain’t buying shit.

1NST1TVT10NS BV1LT VP0N...

institutions built upon

overlooking obvious

innate natural-born truths

SONG OF THE DAY: I Heard a Voice, Pt. 1

what a blessing

to hear a voice

of spiritual

significance

inside your own head

all the poisons and

pollutions and

toxicities put

into your own head

by this culture

which apparently

you accepted the terms of agreement

by being born

what a blessing

to still have a morality

your heart can throb with

not compromised by

the brain’s misalignment

by the poisons

injected from all angles

the blessing of

hearing a voice

that makes far more sense

than all these

fucking

rabbit

holes 

1S 1T M1S1NF0RM4T10N...

is it misinformation

if nobody realizes

we all think the same, wrongly?

SONG OF THE DAY: Shake

I am magnetically drawn by the specific composure of my human atomic build being composed of stardust derived from Epsilon Aquarii, Zeta Aquarii, and Gliese 876, to love the natural born artists upon this Earth ball who work constantly and consistently and without doubtedly all the while mostly in obscurity, because most of our civilized world is moth-brained attracted to the neon flames or iphone glare, and can’t see all the amazing human creation all around them. Today, that means Count Bass D.

T0X1C PSYCH0L0G13S L1K3...

toxic psychologies like

roosters in a chicken pen

flapping their colorful wings

M4N'S 3G0 S3P4R4T1NG...

man's ego separating

himself from nature's only

led to disconnected stress

SONG OF THE DAY: Baldwin

It’s too bad you can’t read through memes because there seemed to be a sudden explosion in James Baldwin memes the past couple years. I really love the notion of people absorbing some James Baldwin philosophy, but I don’t know, memes feel hollow in the long run. Being meme woke is not much better than being red-pilled, which is not much better than being a grandma who believes Nigerian prince emails. Maybe I should just recreate Going to Meet the Man in full through memes, which I post on a dedicated twitter account. That’d be wonderful – spend hours upon hours upon hours to create an elaborate workaround to just reading a book for an audience that likely won’t ever pay attention to it. The internet really is a Rube Goldberg machine for intelligence.