of course i write about myself. its my fucking life.

the only topics i can begin to handle are my feelings, thoughts and emotions.

attempting to embrace a worldview or ideology or wierd esoteric abstract goal with my poetry would be absurd cause ive barely got a stable grasp on myself let alone the rest of the world and while i fill my time with lofty ideals of social justice im still just scrabbling at the edge, cobbling together a solid foundation to launch off of in hopes that no one, especially not any of the people in this room, see the rickety rusty wobbling composite of weakness, fear, gullibility, laziness, apathy, and ignorance that is who i am. demetrius, some dumb fucking white boy from the suburbs of nyc. and does it end there? no. have you looked outside recently? do you know why you're here? global justice ring any bells? fair trade coffee? miami? police state? FEAR?

but most importantly we are united with one feeling: hope.

moved by a desire to see a better world, not just for us, but for everyone. we realize this world is not a playtoy but a living breathing organism just like us, and if we let it sit infront of neo-liberal globalization tv any longer eating structural adjustment doodles, export driven economy pork rinds, and sipping on a tall neo-colonialist brewski, no amount of exercise will excise the imperialist cholesterol and we'll all end up head over heels dead as the ice caps melt, the air fills with chemical weapons, and a nuclear sun sets on our rotting corpses.

so shit, i know why im here.

why are you?

of course i write about myself. its my fucking life.

the only topics i can begin to handle are my feelings, thoughts and emotions.

attempting to embrace a worldview or ideology or wierd esoteric abstract goal with my poetry would be absurd cause ive barely got a stable grasp on myself let alone the rest of the world and while i fill my time with lofty ideals of social justice im still just scrabbling at the edge, cobbling together a solid foundation to launch off of in hopes that no one, especially not any of the people in this room, see the rickety rusty wobbling composite of weakness, fear, gullibility, laziness, apathy, and ignorance that is who i am. demetrius, some dumb fucking white boy from the suburbs of nyc. and does it end there? no. have you looked outside recently? do you know why you're here? global justice ring any bells? fair trade coffee? miami? police state? FEAR?

but most importantly we are united with one feeling: hope.

moved by a desire to see a better world, not just for us, but for everyone. we realize this world is not a playtoy but a living breathing organism just like us, and if we let it sit infront of neo-liberal globalization tv any longer eating structural adjustment doodles, export driven economy pork rinds, and sipping on a tall neo-colonialist brewski, no amount of exercise will excise the imperialist cholesterol and we'll all end up head over heels dead as the ice caps melt, the air fills with chemical weapons, and a nuclear sun sets on our rotting corpses.

so shit, i know why im here.

why are you?

a white male age 20
awakens one days and realizes that his life is a lie
that he is living on the backs of other people, his comfort killing them in the process
seeing that all he has is from others
that what he is is from others
that he is nothing
nothing to be proud of, nothing to honor, nothing to respect or enjoy
that his life is a joke, that these hard times are a crock of shit
that his angst and his anxiety and his suffering are insignificant specks in the scale of human emotion
and this white boy for all his revolutionary progressive thinking does not who he is
his realizations that his life is lie haunt him constantly and he struggles with understanding what direction to go in
this white boy feels a that every time he sees a black man, a brown woman, a yellow girl, a red boy. any of them, any age.
that they never had what he had, that what he has squandered could feed families that his waste is so extravagant you could wrap it and put it under the christmas tree.
that something so innocent as assumptions about other drivers on the road always consists of cocky white males, just like him.
and with these realizations the white boy is even more lost than before, now he knows what has happened, now he knows his assumptions are racist, but he knows naught what to do.

except think, and rethink and rethink again, constantly moving from question to answer back to question again, never letting his guard down, never letting the thoughts that he has gone far enough settle into his mind, never letting the oppurtunity to expose himself to the light to new angles or experiences be passed by. to never ever again assume that everything is ok, that the job is done, or equality exists. once white boy forgets his whiteness, her blackness, his browness then the job has been started but from there I have an even longer way to go.

shakeyourhipss: why hello there kind sir
kussmischnell: hello there young lady
kussmischnell: ;)
kussmischnell: how are you?
shakeyourhipss: splendid and yourself?
kussmischnell: rather fantastic.
kussmischnell: why are you so very splendid?
shakeyourhipss: oh my "outing" from my aunt and uncle was surprisingly nice and i just returned from a well spent night of dancing in a crowded basement where it smelled like feet (we were suppose to take off our
shoes) to very nice music and i saw zack too
shakeyourhipss: so explain this "rather fastastic" feeling?
(edit of non-related conversation)
kussmischnell: rather fantastic...hmmm...well, there are a few reasons, mostly cause today was filled with thought provoking adventure. At a forum i went to, on immigrant rights in a post and pre 9-11 world, this amazing activist, artie(F), drew comprehensive understandable connections between apartheid, institutionalized racism, immigrant rights, prisoner's rights, and foreign policy. then my friend lauren and i drank fair trade coffee and caught up, steady moving conversation which was light yet engaging. following that i acquired some vegan chocolate chips and made a double batch of cookies for tonights work party; which consisted of Matt, Saiya, Josh Park, Mike, James, and I playing music, eating veggies & rice, farting around, farting, making jokes, watching a slide show, and eventually writing a press release, a thank you note, a legal update, making slide show frames, and doing research to convince Scott Garrett, our representative in the house, to lead a congressional investigation. so yeah, rather fantastic, now its 2:01 am and ive got to finish my poetry set for tomorrow, gah!

love me. please.

mental order seems to reflect the order of my surroundings.

enjoy the moment right?

cherish in the pleasure that ive got for a couple of seconds and smile secretly to myself.

it can never last or can it?

tonight was insane. scott garret, rep for NJ fifth congressional district, or nazi, held a town hall meeting in paramus, mike and i ventured over and wowza! what a spin doctor. he is a maniac. i dont even know. some of the people in that meeting were wild, so wild and just loony tuny. mike was farting and i was trying to not explode.

its wierd, cause i want to call her. i know i know. wierd.

its like i almost have feelings!

oh no. this could be trouble. but there is more analyzing to be done, i wont let one night of unbridled passion lay me low. theres nothing my paranoid afraid mind cant overcome with irrational reasoning and conclusion drawing!

gawsh. i hope i impale my left lobe on a pick axe.

tonight. in the room with the yelling and the people and the insanity i was moved further down the road towards believing that representatives cannot properly represent. there were so many people with so many varied views and just one man to represent us amongst a nation of 270 million. like, gah. i feel bad for the guy cause his job must suck although i bet the perks are pretty great. tonight made me want to move up to the farm and just farm, grow potatoes and weed. and live off french fries and potato chips for the rest of my life, constantly stoned. constantly. and read lots of books. lots of them, oh yes, lots. mike said canada. maybe.

just thinking of the far reaching tentacles of the government makes me shiver and not in the conspiracy theory way, but just that the knowledge is availble for one to know everything about me. a person could find that stuff out. shivers.

sunday is poetry and meetings and montclair and food and people and insanity, like usual.

the sun is set and my bones are tired.


really, she kicked my ass. i fucking loved it.

-d

Bergen Action Network Presents:

Benefit Party for the B.A.N. Legal Defense Fund
and B.A.N. members arrest at FTAA protest in Miami

SATURDAY DECEMBER 20, 2003
AT THE GARAGE IN WESTWOOD!

FEATURING

Acoustic, hardcore and punk performances by:

Fiction Effect
Marc Giannotti
Rome Fell
Flowers & Cops

INCLUDING:

Fair Trade Coffee
Activist report back from FTAA protest in Miami
IndyMedia film footage from FTAA protest in Miami
Comic slideshow by Mike McLean


TIME: 6:30 PM

Donations will be accepted.

Email info@bergenaction.net for directions.

http://www.bergenaction.net



Background

During the demonstrations against the Free Trade Area of the Americas
(FTAA) on Thursday, November 20th in Miami, Florida, police engaged in
a campaign of intimidation and violence against peaceful protesters.
Among the victims of the police oppression were three student activists
from the Bergen Action Network, Mike McLean, James Chiappetta and Pete
Monte who were wrongfully attacked and arrested while attempting to
enter a rally sponsored by the AFL-CIO at the Bay Front Amphitheater.
Police in full riot gear aggressively pushed their way into the crowd
attacking with batons and electric tazers, injuring protesters and
arrestees. Bail was set as high as $10,000 for one activist and $5,000
for the others. All three are facing felony charges and are currently
struggling through the legal proceedings. To cover their bail, travel
to and from court appearances and any other legal costs the Bergen
Action Network is calling on people of conscience to show solidarity by
donating to the Bergen Action Network Legal Defense Fund and coming to
this fundraising event.

Can’t make the party? You can send well-concealed cash or checks
payable to BAN Legal Defense Fund to the Bergen Action Network, P.O.
Box 5202, Englewood, NJ 07631. Or donate online at
www.bergenaction.net.

http://www.bergenaction.net/legal_defense.html

For more info. on the FTAA or the Miami protests go to
http://www.stopftaa.org.

class is
sitting in a circle, sipping cognac, drinking red wine from the bottle, swigging local beer, discussing intellectual activity in europe before world war 1, on the banks of seine in early autumn

class is hugue pitchers of beer, review sheets and notebooks, beer halls in munich with putchses galore, intellectual survival dhuring world war 11 and people running off to the alps while my teacher orders another round

class is english pubs in madrid, guiness, tequilla, sewing, the lives of viennese jews, and electoral politics vs. individual ideals.

class is accordions and real peach schnapps on the decks of night boats to oslo discussing how the crusades fueled the growth of dutch stock markets, scrap booking and staring at stars above and windmills on either side of me.

class is sitting among ruins of ancient greece disscussing demagogues and imagining wearing a toga and trying to sell figs at the agora while worshipping hephastus and paying homage to my ancestors in the necropolis

class is climbing 286 stairs to the top of st.peters basillica at the vatican and looking out at ancient west, medevial west, and modern west all at once, staring into the popes bedroom window and charting the growth christianity. thank you saint helena!

class is 50 minute walks along the cliffs of santorini with muffin and cookie while the wind whips at my face and i learn that soil erosion is the hoved animals fault as a volcano mocks us in the background.

class is perched atop an abandoned hospitalers fortress over looking a horizion without a vanishing line cause the blue of the meditteranean matches the blue of the sky.

class is in the gardens of peterhof, with elaborate fountains, the peoples will, bolsheviks, hot tea body heat and warm kartofala from a womans plaid vendor bag.

class is in luggage cars on trains from salzburg to munich and i cant concentrate because i just discovered and infoshop after an afternoon of laying in leaf piles staring at the sky and playing on jungle gyms over looking the inn river

and now, class is dry erase boards, projectors, computers, and desks, 4 walls, locked doors windows, lectures and tile.

life is good at home. but the sidewalks in bergen county cant compare to the streets of venice or stockholm. And no amount of push pins in the map on my ceiling will do justice to the past four months, i think im only realizing that now.

whoggggggggggh


i feel disassociated.

i just had a unmatchable throw down rough make out session with lilliane, thats been building for months and i feel disassociated. like the whole thing did not just happen. or that it happened and means nothing. i dont want that. it was good, it was forceful, strong, moving, flowing. sloppy, oh so sexily sloppy. it was painful, exciting. passionate, sexy, fleshy, warm, cold. it was a makeout session to rival all makeout sessions, it easily tops anything ive done in at least a year and yet im siting here not at all excited or pumped or jazzed, just eh.

maybe its the tired, maybe the sour stomach, maybe the brain is dampening it. maybe.

i wish i knew what was wrong with me.

i want to be excited for what just happened. she pushed me around and had me so turned on i was going to explode, there wasnt a hint of reservation in her and she made that claer, she moaned and groaned and smiled giggled, ran her fingers through my hair, marked me, marked her territory, played by her rules, there was such a powerful drive pushing her hips and her lips into mine i just dived right into the current and let her move me. she had control and i loved it. i want more. she is so beautiful.

d.

im home. in one piece after a not so bad plane ride, mountains and fields of clouds above and below with happy greek people talking in the background, it was a smooth ride.

for the first time in many months i ate a substantial protein rich cruelty free breakfast coupled with a good sleep in my bed, man this day is going to rule.

i better be going, but im home, so love love love me

d

athens. finally.

yet, resentment.

fuck. i hate cities, i love cities. fuck.

today, after all the hassle with both the airlines and STA my ticket got changed without a problem, for 50 us dollars and im going home tomorrow.

game over.

back to new jersey.

time to start walking.

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

IM GOING HOME!!!

love -
d

hm.

the boat didnt go out today. sea is too rough. last final tomorrow. then a quick paper and im home free. leave for turkey night of the 11th. 3 days, one day in turkey then home.

im drifting. no big shock. no big thoughts. apphrension and fear. going home.

do i want to go home?

it got cold today, that was wierd. two days ago i was swimming in a mud bath and now i bust out the warm socks and extra layer. the rain was cold, the dogs followed me around, cara fell down the stairs, and the horizon is dark gray. fast moving clouds and a group meeting at five.

this island has good falafel and heart pumping walks.

istanbul, turkey.
mahwah, new jersey.

oh, and a show, the 20th at the garage, flowers and cops, revolution summer, and all my friends. im fucking pumped, its to raise funds for mike, james, and pete who all were wrongly arrested at the FTAA demo.

4:28pm, my day looks a little brighter.

lil mentioned me in her journal. smiles.

time to go study for poli sci.

whoopty shit.

with love.

demetrius