Nuclear Rays From My Halogen Haze

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Coming up on April 28 – Rrose in a Prose: AUH! April 22, 2013

Filed under: Fiction,Folk,L.A. Record,Lit Events,Literature,Performers,Poetry,Songwriters — D. M. Collins @ 1:43 pm

This month’s Rrose in a Prose is coming up! Once again, it’s at the Hedgehog Coffee Shop in Echo Park, so you can wash the whole thing down with coffee and one helluva sandwich.



The line-up this time has some really great authors and poets, including a return visit from the wonderful Jessica Ceballos, who wowed us a few short months ago. But it also has my old band mate, Asa Ferry, one of the best songwriters I’ve ever worked with and a man who really captures reality in a way not all of us catch or perceive–even if he just reads a sentence, it’ll make you float away later, looking at cumulus clouds and wondering why you’ve never seen the little shimmers that cascade from puff-pocket to puff-pocket before.

We also have Ryan Fuller from Fort King, and … goddam, there are too many people to talk about! Just read the list and kick yourself if you’re unable to attend:

Jessica Ceballos (Bluebird Readings)
Roy Rogers Oldencamp (Bluefat)
Beverly M. Collins (Quiet Observations)
Daniel Austin Warren (Black Hand)
Asa Ferry (Kind Hearts & Coronets)
Ryan Fuller (Fort King)

As always, this event is “hosted” by the not-ready-for-print-time player, L.A. RECORD’s D. M. Collins. That’s me!

A Rrose in a Prose
@the Hedgehog
2201 W. Sunset Blvd
(same side o’ the street as Mohawk Bend)
in Echo Park
April 28th @ 3 p.m.

 

I sent a get-well card and wound up with a corpse… March 25, 2013

So, yesterday was A Rrose in a Prose, which was amazing and had wonderful performances by Ian MacKinnon, Drew Denny, Tom Neely, Flannery Lunsford, Justin Maurer, and myself.

But our guest of honor, Allison Anders, couldn’t be there–she had the sniffles and was a little under the weather.

I thought it would be fun to have the audience write her a get well letter, but not a conventional one–rather, we’d write it as an Exquisite Corpse, the dadaist game that if you don’t know by now, you must have had no fun in high school. Basically, you take a poem or story or drawing, one person starts it off, and the next person does the next little bit only getting to see where the connection is but not what the piece as a whole might be, not until it’s finished.

We opted for the prosaic Exquisite Corpse, where one person writes five lines, paragraph-style, and then passes it along to the next person, who only sees the fifth line and has to try and continue the thought. And it started off great, much like a get-well letter should be! But then very very quickly it descended into a place of madness, of darkness, sex, and depravity, so that I’m worried it will be like a Groundhog’s Day of health and scare Allison back into sickville! Truth be told, I think some of the people didn’t listen to my full instructions and thought they were writing a poem, not a get-well letter, which explains all the blood and cum. I still haven’t decided if I’m going to actually show this to Allison. Maybe she’ll stumble across it after she’s feeling a little better.

Here is the final piece we came up with. For the sake of clarity, I’m titling it:




SODA AND THE WOMB

Dear Allison,

My name is Mallison. I know, weird right? I’ve known many women named Allison (or Alison), and our relationships have been passionate and tempestuous. I hope my baby doesn’t wake up. Is that a non-sequitur? Perhaps, but I’m just being honest here.

We’re sitting here, relaxing, enjoying our coffee, and it’s the foremost thing on my mind. XXX. I want you to feel good! You have shared so much joy, inspired such creation. I’m closing my eyes & sending love and picturing you naked.

In the bathtub
drinking Coca-cola
and sending a fax to the
Skype.

A nice medium for virtual sex
will get you better
in body and soul
electric spirit electric sex

Crazy girls make the best nest
Salami bitch and brazen whore
Trickster meets a lackluster boar
La la la baking with flour
Staring down the craven hour

You can see things coming into focus, sharp, clear, bright—then fluffy, cottony, floaty again, but this time it’s totally fun.

And the demons will be on the run. So many hearts need to be won! The world catches up to you. True blue indigo womb.

You fascinate the fascination of my body up against yours. Smashed in blood mixed with sweat.

I reach for you
drawing you in
licking the blood off your stomach

I CHOKE ON YOUR DAD’S CUM
and all your mother’s insecurities

-Ryan Fuller, Drew Denny, Flannery Lunsford, Charles Mallison,  Greg Saunders, et al.

 

A Rrose in a Prose is tomorrow! March 24, 2013

The good news is, we’ve added Drew Denny to the bill! You may remember Drew from such media as print, film, and the fine art world–she’s exhibited ecology-minded art environments in multiple continents, has been an editor and frequent contributor to L.A. RECORD, and has recently been going around promoting her very amazing independent film, The Most Fun I Ever Had With My Pants On, which she wrote, directed, and starred in. Oh, and somehow she’s also in the band Bon Bon.

The bad news is, due to health concerns, Allison Anders will not be joining us. We should compose an Exquisite Corpse poem for her to help her feel better! As long as things go well, and they seem to be doing so, she’ll likely be on her feet for next month, or in the months to come. Luckily, we do have a representative from her camp, as Flannery Lunsford, the star of her film Strutter, will be reading with us.

It’s at the Hedgehog in Echo Park, 2201 W. Sunset Blvd, at 3 p.m. See you there!

P.S. More info at the Facebook invite HERE.

 

Coming up on March 24: A Rrose in a Prose: MAH! March 2, 2013

After taking a hiatus in February due to Zine Fest and utter exhaustion, we’re back with a vengeance for March.

March 24, we’re bringing a huge crew of awesome authors, poets, essays, and artists of the printed page, including graphic novelist/comic book genius Tom Neely, of The BlotThe Wolf, and of course, the famed fan-fiction erotica Henry & Glenn Forever.

We’re also having a poem/performance from Ian MacKinnon! If you haven’t heard him or heard of him (e.g. from Ian MacKinnon’s Gay Hist-Orgy), then you must not have eyes or ears.

And don’t forget Allison Anders, who will be reading from her tumblr blog about owning Greta Garbo’s record collection.

And we’ve got Flannery Lunsford from Allison and Kurt Voss’ film Strutter, and a return visit from Justin Maurer, author of Seventeen Television (and, oh, like about a thousand awesome bands including Maniac, Clorox Girls, and L.A. Drugz). Don’t miss this one!

A Rrose in a Prose: MAH!

 

DUM DUM Issue No. 3 party this Saturday … February 6, 2013

… and I am the DJ. Or, at least a DJ (there are a couple DJs, it seems, and 100 bands and 10,000 readers/performers).

You should come party, because if you don’t, it means you hate community and hate literature. It means you wish people would stop reading and start shooting each other with guns. It means you are flippant and vile. It means you’re a bigot. You’re a sad, petty, bourgeois blight upon the world, and the only value you have to anyone is as a dire warning, or maybe as future compost, a chunk of organic offal to insert into the ground to counteract the garbage you strew–though then again the chemicals you fill your mind and body with may very well poison our dwindling water supplies and make some poor crawdad somewhere die.

What a scumbag you are… but it’s not too late to change the course of your life and ATTEND this event!

ATTEND!

ATTEND! Make a last stand against the wretchedness and the filth that gurgles sick words of childish love to you when you look in the mirror.

ATTEND! Listen to readings by authors, real authors, people souls haven’t left their bodies and swum down the snaky pipe at the base of their own toilets rather than cling to the monster who birthed them.

ATTEND! Soyez présent!

DO IT IN FRENCH IF YOU HAVE TO! Take an Echinacea pill if you have to! For what better cure than a placebo for the world’s biggest lie?

ATTEND! ATTEND ATTEND ATTEND!

And stay until the end so you can dance!

 

David Markey – excerpts from We Got Power! at a Rrose in a Prose February 2, 2013

It was a busy month for me, not just with writing, but with a lot of life stuff. I’m just now getting around to posting about our most recent Rrose, which is sheer negligence on my part, because these were some of the best writers we’ve had yet.

It was particularly special to have David Markey, an acquaintance of mine I’ve known for a couple years and who’s made some of my favorite documentaries of all time, including The Reinactors from a few years back. Here he is, reading a chapter from his and Jordan Schwartz’s new book, We Got Power!, a collection of essays, photos, and xeroxed flyers from the days in the very early 80s when these two young kids were putting out the definitive punk fanzine that celebrated L.A.’s burgeoning hardcore scene and the golden greats of Quincy and Three’s Company with equal enthusiasm.

My favorite part here is when he just goes into a huge long list of all the bands that played at the time, name after name after name, making his memoir veer temporarily into a realm that, for me, evoked one of those “I’m just going to name a bunch of cool things I like, all in a row” braggadocios favored by MIKE the PoeT. That said, you can see in the clip how effective it was in getting the audience to perk up and listen. Mere lists, especially long ones, can sometimes have more overwhelming magic than thoughtfully arranged poetry. Perhaps that makes Dave a “lexicon devil?”

 

Rickie Wang at A Rrose in a Prose – December 16 December 27, 2012

Filed under: Lit Events,Literature — D. M. Collins @ 2:37 pm
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This clip is Rickie Wang in a nutshell–she’s smart and observant and a bit quiet, but well worth tuning in for to hear what she has to say. Thanks again to Jean-Paul Garnier for putting these clips together! As a host, even though I may look like a very attractive Keebler elf over in the corner there, I often get nervous and weird and have a hard time really absorbing some of the new works going on right in front of me–I’m glad to get a second chance with this one.

It reminds me quite a bit of the work of another old friend, Dave Roche, whose book On Subbing should be required reading for anyone who’s ever considered making fun of a substitute teacher.

 

Emily Maya Mills at A Rrose in a Prose October 10, 2012

 

Jean-Paul Garnier at A Rrose in a Prose October 7, 2012

Filed under: Lit Events,Performers — D. M. Collins @ 2:50 pm
Tags: ,

So many great authors read at last month’s A Rrose in a Prose. Here’s Jean-Paul Garnier, who also filmed these great performances:

 

Lina in L.A.: A Rrose in a Prose October 1, 2012

Filed under: Lit Events,Los Angeles,Performers,Poetry — D. M. Collins @ 10:12 pm
Tags: , , ,

Lina Lecaro put some sweet photos of A Rrose in a Prose up at the L.A. Weekly. Thanks, Lina!

 

 
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