In the Future Present Tense...

The Blue Elephant: At Sea Ranch (mid-winter 2015?)

The Blue Elephant: At Sea Ranch (mid-winter 2015?): https://youtu.be/OmK3EockdcU
For slide show, use the link above.

The Golden Dragons of Chinatown, Oakland

Click the following link to my YouTube slide show of The Golden Dragons of Chinatown, Oakland (the musical background is an accidental choice):
https://youtu.be/mUEhHq2YIPg

Indonesian author, Eka Kumiawan

https://youtu.be/WKhgA-ejYBE
At the link above is a YouTube side show of photos I took on 17 September 2015 of Indonesian author Eka Kumiawan, appearing with one of his translators, Annie Tucker, at an interview, with readings, arranged by the Center for the Art of Translation, San Francisco, at Green Apple Books on the Park, San Francisco.

The powerful attached review from the 22 October 2015 issue of The New York of Books touches on Mr. Kumiawan's first novel but does not have the benefit of what Mr. Kumiawan reported at Green Apple Books:  
<http://www.nybooks.com/shared/d8e268a70da2d511e728f32fc9aa76cc>   
The fragmented style in his first novel, Beauty is a Wound, becomes understandable if you were present at Green Apple Books and learned that literature was not available to him in the Sukarno era that ruled his early life  -- only violent comic books and sentimental Western romance novels and other odd inspirations as ways to write about the horrific world he was born into during a period of extreme political repression, including mass murder, rape, etc.  His later novel, Man Tiger (a man possessed by a female tiger), is far more linear and unified.  At a session about translation, one learned how difficult it would be to give an English counterpart to the much different language structure of the original. 

YouTube slide show of "Industrial Impressions"

For the other photos in this slide show, you may click on the title "Industrial Impressions," under this photo (or go the long way, to YouTube at https://youtu.be/M8wyo73lVsg)

Industrial Impressions

Mourning Sandra Bland, Oakland Women Speak of Racist Threats They Have Endured

When the crazy traffic cop threatened to taze 

Sandra Bland, he had a tricky metaphor,

“Would you like me to light you up?” 

Undoubtedly what hundreds of sadistic

executioners have said as they lit the pile of 

faggots around the stake where they were

about to burn another woman  alive — 

the punishment for speaking with

honesty and integrity, especially if you are a 

woman, especially if you are Black. 

 My slide show on YouTube of “Oakland
 Black Women Mourning Sandra Blank" and  
 relating their own fearful experiences with 
 racism:

https://youtu.be/mQNT7a4NPB8

J.M.W. Turner Paintings at the De Young Museum

My first efforts to photograph some of the works of British painter, Turner, in the large show currently at the De Young Museum -- Click on any you want to see larger:

  

Jeffrey Klas Sequence on Ataxia

I placed a brief slide show on YouTube of my friend and neighbor Jeffrey Klas, wearing his Ataxia T-shirt.   (You may have to press CANCEL at the end of it as someone else's YouTube entry begins -- cannot figure out yet how to stop that from happening).  For this one, CLICK on the title on the right, below:

JEFFREY KLAS SEQUENCE AND ATAXIA T-SHIRT

The Golden State Warrior's Victory Celebration in Oakland

Saving this spot for photos of the Warriors victory parade in Oakland

In Oakland's Fairyland

In truth, you cannot be admitted to the wonderful place in Oakland called Fairyland except in the company of a toddler, yet an adult may enjoy it ironically from the outside just for the name.  Jim Breeden photographed me there holding the magic feather of transformation as I reflected on my many personae -- James Thomas Eilers, James McColley Eilers, Blue Elephant, Elephant S/b, Sally, Sasha, Jimmy Indiana....

Reflecting on being in a hospital

HOSPITAL:  The First Few Days and Nights in April 2015

 [lilies thanks to Martha Hubert]

A male nurse pushed a hospital cart;

it squeaked and chattered.

The intravenous drip beside me

was a quickly beating clock.

Someone’s insistent cough,

without words, was talk.

Around the place of healing,

just beyond comprehension,

muffled voices, a laugh.

You become a sentinel

in the restful night

you are not having;

no peace in hospital.

What does a night guard do?

He stands and thinks.

He is the prisoner of thinking.

Or maybe he’s the patient

observing himself because

he senses that a patient

craves attention – or distraction.

Although he is captive

and flattened in a bed,

he watches over all

while his eyelids fall.

Purple danger

Death

Blood

palpa-patating heart

Night

beep beep beep

frost

pita-tapup eats me up

chew my heart

fang     ice      night

I slip under

cold waters

seals eye me

death eats my toes

blue wedding

of my soul, from the red

walls of my mama’s womb

to this cold good-bye

Then the nurse Corazon

comes and wakes me before dawn

and wipes my body clean

and gives me fresh blue pajamas

that I don for this April Fool’s Day,

It may be torture when they work

a hose through my nose down

to my stomach, but nothing like

those being force-fed on Guantanamo.

Liquid pumped in, then slowly

pumped out.  You know to say,

“If it must be done, it must be done.”

You are applique, sewn to your bed

with needles and hoses

by nurses and doctors and students

who come with questions

and testings.  You are the center

of attention, a zero, the empty

center, a depression on the bed.

No one knows how to turn off

the bed built to massage, little hills,

like trapped animals, moving

around inside the mattress.

You feel seasick,

caught in the bed’s backwash

beside the whirling stream

of sweet helpers with magical names,

from the Ukraine, the Phillipines,

and Spanish-speaking countries,

places with magical names.

The last morning, mi Corazon

drapes a chair with a white sheet,

and directs me to sit there

by the black window,

and the cold black block of night,

when I’m not looking, finally yields

to the wide generous hand of light.

The sun slides down to caress

the houses of the avenues

that lead to the ocean.

Purple light comes,

then white waves, made crisp

by the angle of morning light.

The expert sun delineates the parts

of the day.  The cones

on the pines outside the window

are enameled gold.

I am allowed to eat breakfast.

The intravenous needles and tubes

are hanging loose, disconnected,

and soon I may go home,

my body hair stripped away

by myself from many adhesive

strips and buttons, as the many sweet

helpers, loathe to do so,

make me inflict my own pain.

With Jim Breeden on Mt Tamalpais as he is finishing a painting

 

 

 

  
   

 

 

 

  
   

 

 

 

Some Photographs

 

You might enjoy the photo below if you clicked on it once to enlarge it.  But any might be more enjoyable if enlarged.