Drawing: Faces 1814 — at the mall

Drawing: faces 1813 — pine wine box

by Jack Brummet

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Shorts: tiny poems

by Jack Brummet

Resurrection

He was ready to live again
Even if living just meant running
To keep ahead of the ghosts.

___________________________

It’s so still and calm
In the mosque,
You could hear a fly expire.

___________________________

Stealth

You think one thing,

Say another,

And do a third.

___________________________

A roiling thunderstorm clears the air
Like Wyatt Earp's peacekeeper                    

___________________________

When you strip away the stage flats, makeup, and costumes,

It’s all one story starring our private heroes and dreams.

___________________________

The Marriage

Two tattered mannequins
Prop each other up
In the Salvation Army Store window

___________________________

Tragedy

Take the worst that could happen
And add two zeros.

___________________________

High fidelity clouds gather over 
The tattered stage flats of a world on fire.

___________________________

It's Getting Crowded

We cover the earth with Venn Diagrams

As our steps bisect old steps.

___________________________

Weather Report

Life is a raindrop
Sizzling as it skitters
Across the universal griddle.

___________________________

Waiting

There is no tomorrow

until we get through

the day after yesterday

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Willie's Reserve hits the market

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Poem: snow day

by Jack Brummet

In silhouette

against bisque skies,

crows bounce

on snow-humped branches,

shaking snow to the ground

and survey the valley

for prey

in dark relief

on the cold white fields.

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The famous letter the FBI sent to MLK (trying to push him to suicide)

The letter was deliberately scattered with bad grammar and typos. It is believed to have been composed an mailed to King by William Sullivan with J.Edgar Hoover's specific approval.

 

"Damn it, pass the bread!"

The Baltimore Sun - July 17, 1930

drawing: 1812 — 84 people waiting for SRO tickets

By Jack Brummet

Detail:

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The Grateful Dead play a free show in my neighborhood in 1967

From Historylink.org:

July 16, 1967 — The Grateful Dead performed at Golden Gardens Park in Seattle. Five other local bands perform at the "Be-In." Admission was free.

The Golden Road

Located in Ballard, Golden Gardens was typically a place where the “straights” hung out, far away from the usual hippie hangouts near the University District and Capitol Hill. The crowd of 2,000 people who gathered at the park for the Be-In was a mix of all folks who just wanted to enjoy some rock music in the hot summer sun.

The bands performed on a flatbed truck with electricity provided by a small portable generator. Brick went on first, followed by Karma, The Daily Flash, The Time Machine, and Pappa Bear's Medicine Show. The Grateful Dead came on last.

The Dead were in Seattle for a show that evening at the Eagles Hall, and since they were veterans of many Be-Ins in San Francisco, the band and their manager, Rock Scully, decided to take part in the gathering at Ballard. The Be-In was arranged by Tim Harvey of Overall Cooperative Structure and Jerry Mathews of United Front Productions.

Unlimited Devotion

In an interview with the Helix, a Seattle-based underground newspaper, Grateful Dead lead guitarist Jerry Garcia (1942-1995) talked about the band’s background, noting that he started playing guitar at 15, that vocalist Ron “Pigpen” McKernan was heavily into country blues, and that bass player Phil Lesh was classically trained on the violin and trumpet. He described the band’s music as mostly blues.

Garcia also talked about the influence of psychedelic drugs on their music, noting that these drugs were just another part of their lifestyle. “The thing that happens when you get high and play,” said Garcia, “is like new ideas present themselves, new possibilities ... . If you’re a little stoned, you’re less into yourself, less into demonstrating your ability, less into your own thing and more into the total thing. Playing itself is a high, playing is in fact the best high I know. There’s no comparable experience in drugs. Nothing like it.”
When asked about the kind of people who came to their shows, the interviewer pointed out that not all people in the Golden Gardens audience were hippies. “No, but they’re all people,” responded Garcia. “Like the more straight people that come to these kind of scenes, the easier it’ll be for them to see that the hippies aren’t going to hurt them. The whole scene is ... good natured.”

Poster for The Grateful Dead at the Seattle Eagles Hall, July 16, 1967 later that night (a paying gig):




Sources: “The Cool Brave Heat for 'Gentle Sunday,'" Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 17, 1967, p. 3; Interview with Jerry Garcia, Helix, August 16, 1967, p. 11.
This essay was corrected on July 16, 2015.

Fifty years of the Crisis Clinic (video)

A nice video about the Crisis Clinic, where I work two days a week.  Check it out, and if you can, donate. . .or volunteer.  /jack

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Irregular roundup of celebrity and other middle fingers

By Mona Goldwater, Signs and Gestures Ed.

Every few months, we publish the various images of middle fingers our readers have sent to us, along with any choice ones we find along the internet. 

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Victor Lundy's sketchbooks

By Jack Brummet

Victor Lundy, born in NYC in 1923, was an art and architecture student who later enlisted during World War II. Throughout training and when he was deployed in Europe, he kept a set of sketchbooks of the people and scenes around him. After the war, he became a famous/successful architect. You can find selections from the sketchbooks here, on Retronaut.

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