revelation follows invitation

METATRON
BE ORIGINAL.

feb-mar/2013

Tell it slant: the blinding nature of truth Jeremy Pennington runs the race of a lifetime

Poetic Portraits haikus that make Chicago come alive Tidal A world retailed Yesssssssssssss

$4.50 $4.50

Light= Truth

here are many reasons to panic. Too bad we dont come across many in life, that would really make things interesting. People are always yelling, tell the truth! Or in the hood it is keep it real, or more recently keep it 100. These are all admonitions to be authentic and original, with no affronts. The sad thing is this may be a realm that many of us rarely delve into. First, it requires a large amount of trust that has to be built up over years and years. Then when one is convinced that nothing they can say will possible alienate their loved one, then maybe just maybe they can keep it real and tell the truth all the time. Tell All The Truth Tell all the truth but tell it slant, Success in circuit lies, Too bright for our infirm delight The truths superb surprise; As lightning to the children eased With explanation kind, The truth must dazzle gradually Or every man be blind. -Emily Dickinson Someone once told me when we are children we are afraid of the dark, but when we become adults we are afraid of the light. Inside us all resides the person weve always wanted to be. Our lives are too short to take that truth in short doses. We must press into the unknown with a resolve and resilience from God. Jesus put it like this in Matt 6:22: The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. Emily Dickinson spent most of her adulthood in one room; maybe the truth was too beautiful to face. We cannot let the fear of blindness cause us to cover our eyes.

Creative Director| Metatron magazine metatron@metatronmag.com

Nathan Bam Bam Stanton

Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

feb/13 Vol. 2, #1

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15

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7 8 5

in this issue: 17 one man and the leadville 100

Jeremy pushes his willpower to the brink

5 The Haiku of Community 7 The Tide comes in

Erica finds the succint expression of Chicago Finding what material man is made of Global goods produce local distaste

8 why we love * walmart

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Im(age)

I like a man who grins when he fights. -Winston Churchill

Miracleshout

11
Visual Art

17
Miracles

Departments
Golden Notes
Each month we profile artists, musicians and writers that rise into these medium categories. We hope you come away with inspiration and encouragement.

Ripe Fire

7
Music

5
Poetry/Prose

Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

How to Create a Portrait of a City One Person at a Time:

Humans Love Art Projects

Erica Henry February 2013

recently had the opportunity to hang out over chips and homemade mango salsa with a writer (Mike McNamara), an artist (Brian Kehoe), and a finance guy (Andrew Curry) in Logan Square. They are the creators of Poetic Portraits, a continuing multimedia community art project based in Chicago. Since December 2012, these three have spent their Saturdays going on blustery photo shoots during which they choose unknown passersby to model for them. Once the model agrees, they have him or her pose, usually in front of a graffiti background, holding a board with a haiku on it. The photos are then posted, one a day, to Instagram. Andrew, Mike, and Brian started out writing their own 5-7-5 syllable Japanese poems, but after opening the project up to submissions, public interest has taken off. It is art on top of art on top of art. The photos themselves are beautiful, interesting snapshots of urban Chicago life, and the poetry is quirky and fun, at times profound. Put together, the whole package hooks you. I was curious about the evolution of a concept that combines so many elements into one finished piece of workcommunity involvement (people saying yes to something they dont understand), chance encounters contingent upon the right moment in time and space, and several layers of creative expression. Finally, there is so much hope in the idea that three friends can formulate a brand new idea and then love doing it so much. It is, indeed, magical. EH: Where did you get the idea for the whole thing? Thats what I have been wanting to know. MM: The impetus for this idea came from Curry here. He was noticing that his sister AC: There is a guy on Instagram named Tyler Knott Gregson who is a poet. My sister really likes continued on page 10 Metatron Feb/Mar 2013 5

metatron
Editor-in-Chief Erica Henry Creative Director Nathan Bam Bam Stanton

Web Designer Jeremy Pennington

Account Manager Liz Stanton Contributors: Theresa Dedmon, Zaire Jordan, Ken Reif, Rachael Tanger, Trevor Parker, Cecie Wilson, Jamie Solorio Photography Terry Hogg, Josh Russell, Francesco Sideli, Kara Stewart Photography, Dream Chicago, Anthony Allen, Exodus Music, Dana Gioia, Beni Johnson, Johnny and the Beloveds, The entire GCC family, the entire Bethel family, the entire Stanton/Muse family, the entire Lex family Special Thanks The Trinity, all of our subscribers, the spouses and children of team members, most of all to the Creator who makes it all happen.

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Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

golden notes music Review

6 M-halos out of 7
Work/Columbia/July 1996

Fiona Apple

Tidal

have an umbrella and Fiona Apples words slowly plunge around me, the syrupy drops stretch thinner before notes from the piano snap them apart. They still land on the ground, but Im certain theyve landed in my heart as well. That is how I understand Slow Like Honey. Fionas uncluttered, soulful recipes on Tidal lead the listener back to themselves.

Her ballads are slow motion tidal waves, when the refrains drumming hits; we feel the waves crash in Sullen Girl. Articulating the shape of where your spirit dwells is what Tidal is about. The struggles of/for intimacy are riding up against the need to define self. Among the ten songs, She had her guard up in Shadowboxer, and in the very next song she needs a good defense/ Cause [shes] feeling like a criminal. That song shares musical genetics with 60s rollicking soul music made for gospel-bred singers testimony. The first eight bars of Criminal is a musky breakbeat befitting of hip-hop production. Seventeen years ago, when the music videos were on MTV, I took notice: they were visually stimulating and intriguing. Pondering the meaning of lyrics like, yield to me like a scent in the breeze, it was obvious Ms. Apple was deeper than your average. The First Taste is a sexy, clever samba in which she her voice sways to the music as she sings about her sexual appetite. She declares what she wants: she wants him, and she wants him to initiate. Rare is the modern album with so many strong songs that over half of the record (6/10!) were singles. Thats Thriller territory. Rarer is the album that strokes both pain and pleasure with poetry and patient beauty -Zaire Jordan

Fiona is sore from love. And when she submits, it is not weakness that drives her.

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Dear Board of Directors and Management of Walmart:

I was dismayed, this afternoon, to see your advertisement sponsoring PBS, the one in which an elderly African-American gentleman, also a manager at Walmart, quotes Martin Luther King, Jr. Its always the right time to do the right thing, he says. Indeed. I could not agree more with that sentiment. What leaves me incredulous is the brutal way that you have twisted these words to your own end. It is always the right time to do the right thing, Walmart. It is the right time to cease selling cheap plastic crap at prices that do not allow your employees, neither those constructing your merchandise nor those hawking it, to live. It is the right time to begin making recompense for all of the damage your goods have done to the planet, primarily in the form of carbon-dioxide emissions. It is the right time to begin paying attention to anti-trust legislation instead of using bribes and lobbyists to weasel your way out of the rules. It is the right time to begin to compete on a fair playing field, in the free market, rather than using intimidation to be the best-selling retailer, and most profitable corporation, on the planet. It is the right time to stop outsourcing production to the Bangladeshi and Chinese gulag, like the one where 100 workers died in a factory fire last year, a factory to which you were unaware that your supplier sent work. It is the right time to begin promoting women and people of color to positions of responsibility, where they, perhaps, will be wise enough to combat your corporate hedonism. Frankly, now is the right time to stop being crack dealer to the world. We know were hooked, hooked on your cheery yellow buttons and your lowest-pricesever pledge, hooked on your in-store ethos of post-nuclear apocalypsethat just means its even cheaper--hooked on those beautiful, extra-thick laminate plastic bags that are exactly the right size to fit in our garbage cans and carry our overnight clothes and bag up hairspray to take on the plane and, exactly, exactly the correct consistency to clog up the equatorial doldrums in the Pacific, making a plastic island bigger than Madagascar, although, to be fair, that comes not just from the plastic bags you give us freely but also from the plastic water bottles we purchase and guzzle by the 24-pack. If youre asking why me? What can I do? Im only a poor board member or middle manager at the worlds largest corporation and global employer. Yes, I do expect more from you as a representative of Walmart. Yes, I do hold you more responsible than I hold Target or Family Dollar or Lowes. If they were the biggest, Id blame them. But it is your duty, not just as a corporate entity, but as our de facto monarch, to treat your global subjects with compassion and respect. After 9/11, you, Walton family, holders of the chairmanship, built a fortified underground bunker in case of a apocalyptic attack, near your Arkansas home, with a razorwired helipad out back and atellite uplinks. And yet you claim climate change is not happening. Or at least you donate funding to the Heartland Institute, which compared people who believe in climate change to the Unabomber. I wonder, did you happen to buy your apocalyptic supplies at a Walmart? Or did you use your net worth of $102 billion to equip your apocalypse a little more upscale? 8 Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

Dearest other board members and management: do you think that the Walton children will allow you to sleep in their bunker, when drought, hurricanes, and melted ice swallow all of the rest of us? Meanwhile, 46% of children belonging to company employees have no health insurance or rely on Medicaid. You keep applications for welfare and food stamps in your employee break rooms. You pay your average associate--an Orwellian term if ever there was-an annual salary of $15,000 a year, about even with federal poverty level. Youve had to pay $1 billion in damageswhile contesting the lawsuits--for unpaid overtime work since 2005. You destroy three American jobs for every two you create. Most of your employees spend their entire paycheck, plus rack up credit-card debt, at the very same store where theyre kept in virtual slavery. This, while the greedy Walton children have as much wealth as the bottom 49 million families combined, 42 percent of us. And give one percent of it to charity. Bill Gates have you heard of him?--gives 58%. This while you, CEO Duke, make $8,653 an hour. While the cost of your jet fleet is $125,350,000. While you make $15.7 billion in profits a year. Not revenueprofits. While your revenue, last year, was $464 billion, thanks to the booming business of recession, $1 billion in corporate subsidies, and the aforementioned Medicaid taking care of your companys children. While you immediately shut down the one store, in Montreal, that managed to vote in a union, despite the best effort of your army of high-paid lawyers. Im aware that comparing your opponent to Hitler is the lowest possible way to win a fight. But I could not help but be reminded of Goebbels droopy-nosed Jew propaganda when I saw how you are using our national heroes and patriotic symbols to pretend like you actually care anything about Martin Luther King or his legacy or philosophy. Although I appreciate your support of PBS, and its funding for projects like Frontline, which actually put your practices and climate-change science into the public eye, I cant help but call you out for what this ad is--a big screw-you to all of us. If you must support PBS, at least be honest about your attempt to buy the support of those brave and educated enough to criticize you. Yes, Im sure that many of your board members are right-wing survivalists and simultaneous climate-change deniers, like the anarchist-libertarian Walton descendants, who believe that capitalist Darwinism is the only way to run a societyas long as theyre on top. But Im also sure that many of you are secret doubters, who hold those precious board-member checks to your chests, thinking that at least youre able to do some good, and at least those checks will pay for your childrens college and your Florida vacation home. Cant you stand up for us? What about you, Aida Alvarez, former administrator at the Small Business Administration? Or you, James Cash, professor of business at Harvard? It is indeed always the right time to do the right thing. Do it. Sincerely, Melissa Jenks Political Commentator Metatron

photo credit: Bloomberg BusinessWeek

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poetry, and she wanted something he made for Christmas. So I looked at it. At the time he had 250 poems on his site, and I went through and read them. There were a few pretty good ones. He sold prints. At the time he had 12,000 followers. Now he has 25,000. That was around Thanksgiving when I saw this. So I started looking at it, but I didnt really think it was all that good. It was cool looking, but-MM: All he does is type it out with a typewriter, and you can buy prints of that. AC: I thought it was okay, but I have been telling Mike for years that he needs to be a writer. I have known him since high school, and he has been gifted in writing for forever, and I have been trying to tell him for years that he needs to do this. And he has never really done anything with it. So I think I know why Tyler is successful. This guy, he chose a theme. He does everything on his typewriter with scrap pieces of paper. I think the market on Instagram is people just starved for art. Everyone on there is trying to make art. Everyone on there is liking things. People are just starved for creative art. I told him, come up with an idea. The key to being successful is to choose a theme. Keep it short so people dont have to spend a lot of time reading it.

And I dont know, be creative. And so he took it from there. MM: So Curry calls me up, and he knows I am kind of looking around for jobs right now. He calls me up, and he is like, Hey, I have a business idea for you. I said, Okay, Im on board. And he tells me about this idea. And I think to myself, Well, yeah, we can do better poetry than this. We started out, and the project kind of evolved. At first I was just using haikus that I had written. But I thought it would be more interesting if we took photos of people holding this poetry, and the idea of Poetic Portraits came from that. And then I saw all the great backgrounds in our neighborhood, and it just kind of developed from there. The biggest development was deciding to open it up for submissions because that has made it really gain some steam. AC: We talked about it beginning of December on a Wednesday night. The next day, he took a picture of this thing. Hes like, I just got back from Staples. I bought a board and a bunch of letters. MM: I was trying to think of different media to display it. I experimented with mini chalkboards. Going back to the original little formula that Curry came up with, its about branding ourselves. And this has become a little trademark for the project, an integral partthat board. There has to be something tying all the different pictures together, and thats the board. The board is always there, but everything else is changing. There are three components to every picture: one is the poem on that 10 Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

board, the other is person, and the third is the background. AC: Every week we do this, we learn, we get ideas for how to tweak it, how to change it. EH: Do you ever dread doing it? AC: You should see it. There is a group text message between the three of us. It has become this We are always excited about it, always exchanging ideas. Every time I see graffiti, I think thats a good background; weve got to come back here. MM: We have only been in Wicker Park so far, pretty much walking distance from my apartment. BK: I would say its easily within a half mile radius. MM: The idea initially was, if you look at the hashtags on the photos, all of them are tagged Wicker Park series. I was thinking of making different series for different neighborhoods. So you have all these individual portraits of people with individual poems and compile them together. It becomes a portrait of the entire neighborhood as a whole. AC: One of the things thats most shocking to me is peoples willingness to participate. The first day we decided to do it, I was expecting a lot of rejection. No, I dont want you to take my picture. 80-90% of people are happy to do it. Well be taking cont on pg 20

painful Truth of abduction in Mexico

painting by artist Gabriel Garza this is a painting i worked on this year and i have not published it. i was painted people that have suffered (lived through, some people hate it when i say suffer) an abduction, a problem which has spun out of control in recent years in mexico, in the north of mexico, in my state, in my city. so this guy is a guy that lived an abduction. and the project was always to show the body after the abduction. i have not finished another project like that because most people would not agree to the nude. i changed my project months ago, built a pond inside my home, cut off a part of the roof to let the light in, and now i am making scenes of people in the water. the word for pond in spanish has the same sense as being stuck which is what i think a lot of people have to do today in order to avoid violence and danger in the street. especially at night.

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wish I could say I only use local, seasonal, hormone-free, environmentally-friendly ingredients in my cooking. My ideal dinner would also be inexpensive, easy, healthy, low-carb, and of course, delicious. Im sure there are cooks who manage to check all of those boxes with every meal. Im not one of them, but Im happy when I can check a few. Here in Taiwan, as you might expect, the best and cheapest places to buy fresh produce are the local markets. The one pictured is a small evening market, where people stop on the way home from work to buy fruit, vegetables, seafood, meat, handmade noodles, eggs, or prepared dishes. The chickens are plucked and chopped on counters above the cages holding their live cousins. The shrimp jump around in their basins, and the sea cucumbers occasionally squirt. The pork is butchered and weighed to order. Between the language barrier and my, shall we say, Western sensibilities, I find the meat counters a little intimidating. In fact, as much as I love markets, I have to admit that I actually do more of my grocery shopping in supermarkets and Costco. (Yes, we have Costco here, though the shelves are stocked with some different items than your Costco has, Im sure.) For this particular meal, however, I decided to give myself the extra challenge of buying everything I neededeven the meatfrom the market. That doesnt mean that everything I got there is local, however. Some fruit has stickers indicating that its from New Zealand or Thailand or elsewhere. A few things, like Romaine lettuce and certain kinds of potatoes actually come in American packaging. I assume most other things are local, though probably not fully organic. There are specialty stores that sell certified organic goods and produce, but in the market I dont see the official sticker on anything. The easiest dishes to find ingredients for in Asia arewait for itAsian dishes. So I decided to make pork cabbage wraps (my own take on a recipe I saw online: http:// catesworldkitchen.com/2009/07/ginger-pork-cabbage-wraps/). I also made and Asian-style coleslaw, which I served with a salmon steak. The dishes are not authentic or traditional to any specific culture, but they are inspired by Asian flavors and ingredients. I sauted diced onion, bell pepper, garlic, mild chili peppers, and ginger in a pan, then added the ground pork. I also added some cilantro stalks, but kept the leaves for garnish. While that was browning, I prepared the cabbage leaves and lime wedges. I added some soy sauce to the pork and cooked most of the liquid off. Then, I scooped some onto each cabbage leaf. I like it topped with cilantro and a squeeze of lime to cut though the grease and saltiness. For the next course, Asian slaw and salmon, I made a dressing of wasabi, sesame oil, rice vinegar, lime, and sweet chili sauce and tossed in some sliced cabbage, grated carrot, thinly sliced purple onion, and cilantro. I pan fried the salmon steak simply 12 Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

with some salt, pepper, lime, and a Japanese spice blend called shichimi togarashi, or seven-flavor chili spice. To my mind, the meal was a success. I got past my fear of market meat and got everything from the local market. My ingredients may or may not have all been locally grown, but at least they were fresh and cheap. The salmon was the most expensive component, but I still spent less than US$12 in total. It was quick, easy, and even fun to prepare. It was low carb and somewhat healthy. And best of all, it was delicious.

My ingredients may or may not have all been locally grown, but at least they were fresh and cheap.

Yessssssssssssssssssssssssss, 60x40 2013

We have way more freedom and way less obstacles than we realize.

2013 13

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Verse from Melissa Jenks

Its another psalm about grace and peace From a king busy smashing pagan gods To fragmentary stone. Did he release Their spirits into the rivers flow? Pause For moments or hours and watch atoms Tumble, electrical charges rumble Across each other as the homeless, dumb, Stood apart and prayed to broken idols? Maybe he stayed by the water for days. Spoke to whatever thundered in his head. Whatever soul it was that smeared oiled grease On his crown when he was still a shepherd. Till all the pagans had melted away. Till the river spoke. Said, Nothing but clay.

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Editorial

Delivered by Erica

Henry

ris, my 4-year-old daughter: Mom, can we go out of town? Because there are so many places. There is China. But we cant go out of town, because there are so many places. Thats because Jesus made so many. This question causes me pain. The only thing I ever want to really write about is pain and loss and separation and what it feels like not to live in the place you love. When I write my Great American Novel, that is what it will be about. But that is beside the point. The question in front of me today is, Why are you so liberal? The short answer is that I am not sure. I dont know. It doesnt make sense. My parents moved to Thailand when I was threemonths-old to be missionaries for an organization called Advancing the Ministries of the Gospel. They intended to preach the good news to Thai people. We lived there for fifteen years and then moved back the summer before I began my sophomore year of high school. I then went through a traumatic period of anorexia, OCD behavior, type-A anal-retentiveness, and general friendlessness and uncoolness. We went to church every Sunday and Wednesday. I had no close friends for at least the first year. And I was a very strong Republican. Our first year back was the year Clinton was elected for his second term, and I remember how passionately I watched those election results. I know you cant really watch something passionately, but I cared a heck of a lot. I wanted him to lose. I wanted Bob Dole, or maybe even Ross Perot, to win. I would now put myself in the camp of very liberal. I dont know if this is a shift that occurred due to growing up overseas, but I do know that I feel very strongly about some key issues. Immigrants should be able to come here the way they always have. This land, for which we soullessly slaughtered native peoples, is not ours. It was never ours, and since we have demanded the right to govern it, that is now our serious responsibility. That means it is our duty to treat everyone with the love and peace that we are told Squanto offered to the pilgrims, for example. Furthermore, I believe we have a right as the wealthiest, most powerful nation in the world, not to be the worlds police but to own and seek to rectify what our enormous wealth and consumptionour perpetuation of the American Dream and its underbellycosts other people around the planet. In many ways, I do not think my liberal stances are a response to my upbringing as much as they are a continuation of it. I grew up believing we were in Thailand to help poor children and teach people about the love of Jesus, which we were. Those are the things I still believe in. I still believe we need to love the unloved and take care of the poor. And for me, that means being a flaming liberal.

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One mans battle with the improbable

And what there is to conquer By strength and submission, has already been discovered Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot hope To emulate - but there is no competition There is only the fight to recover what has been lost And found and lost again and again: and now, under conditions That seem unpropitious. But perhaps neither gain nor loss. For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business. -ts eliot, east coker

asotoshi Izumi is a Japanese sculptor whose art is to crack open rocks, boulders really, in just such a way as to expose the life and power that lives inside the stone. When I signed up for the Leadville Trail 100 I expected it to be like any other challenge which we prepare for, meet and conquer; running 100 miles would just be a bit bigger. Any activity at 10,200 feet above sea-level (above sanity) is difficult, but this is no ordinary activity. A 100 mile foot race through the mountains with over 15,000 vertical feet of climbing and 15,000 feet again to descend, every starter knows well that his chances of finishing are well below 50% and that likely reasons for not finishing include exhaustion induced hallucinations, vomiting and hypothermia. I say his chances because women historically have a better completion rate than men, but that is a different story. With these and other numbers in mind I figured this would amount to a monumental challenge, but I had no category for what it would actually be: something that would crack through me in just such a way as to expose to me and the world and to God parts of me that were unknowably interior. If you were to divide the race into 2 parts, the first might end around mile 60. For me the first half of the day was difficult to be sure. I had lost over 6 lbs in 9 hours Metatron Feb/Mar 2013 17

which brought me close to the edge getting pulled out of the race by medical officials due to extreme weight loss. I had already climbed 3 mountain passes and broken through the wall several times. But the effort so far was still only in the realm of difficult; it was physical, but my body was still strong enough to protect my interior mind and soul. The long climb out of the Twin Lakes aid station at mile 60 is where the fissures started to show, in my mind first, then my soul. The hardened exterior of my body - my physical and exterior person - started to show their first signs of failure. Having never experienced a breakdown on this level I had no idea what it could possibly mean or portend. The phenomenology of this experience - how exactly it happened - seems impossible for me to pin down, but I can say that it happened at the intersection of physical, psychological and spiritual breakdown; or, my legs hurt, I cant do this any more and I dont even care anymore. One of the many mottos of the race is that you can do more than you think you can which I found easy to dismiss for its triteness until I found myself so deep in that it seemed simultaneously impossible to continue but absurd to stop. Having been running for 16 hours, having seen the sunrise and sunset, and having felt temperatures double from freezing to searing and begin to halve again, with hands dripping blood from a few tumbles on the trail, I was broken physically and quickly moving into psychological and spiritual breakdown. By this point, around mile 65, I had already crossed the pinnacle of the course, 13,000 foot Hope Pass, twice but ahead of me was Sugarloaf Pass which I would have to climb in the dark. With so

little energy and spirit left I felt a psychological vulnerability approaching panic as I considered the loneliness of spending the next several hours alone in the dark woods. I cant do this anymore - that is what I started thinking, saying and even breathing in and out of my mouth, that and variations on the theme of why I could not continue. It was the achingly beautiful violet hour of the Rockies but cant was all that I could think, at least all that I could think with my head. Looking back, I can see now that there was, and always is, a level of thinking that takes place in my head, but often a sort of knowing that is much deeper. Although my mantra for miles had been that I could not keep going, I actually never considered stopping; I was conscious of a confidence deep within me that ensured my ability to continue. This contradiction between a deep and unquestioning motivation to continue juxtaposed with superficial despair soon took on a curious dimension in the form of me scanning the shadowed woods almost hopefully for a bear or mountain lion that might improbably emerge and end this race for me. But alas, no such luck, so I continued quietly along the base of Mt Massive doing more than I thought I could do. Leadville spares no one and very few runners make it past mile 60 without suffering a soul-deep crack that starts with the body, cuts through the mind and ultimately goes through ones soul. This was evidenced by the fact that the awkward competitive silence that defined the first half of the race was replaced with a collegiality I have never known. No longer competitors, we were there for eachother, offering food, drink, friendship and endless moral support. We had all cracked and seen the desperation of our own condition as runners but also as people. For we like sheep had gone astray but being cracked exposed those things that seem to lead me astray as fraudulent, decoys luring me away from the 18 Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

satisfaction of true desires. I brought into the race a litany of lies that are my daily breath used to define myself and motivate many of my actions in life. But not unlike the I cant that I was still repeating to myself, they are lies without substance and ultimately without meaning, as perhaps most lies are. These were dissolving from my consciousness so thoroughly that I could scarcely remember what they were. For in my unravelling I felt clearly the sum of my desires distilled into 2 things: my sleeping bag and my wife, which might be better categorized as desires for rest and intimacy. Finishing the race, getting the big belt buckle for finishing in less than 25 hours, being well-regarded by people I meet, achieving fortune and fame, these constructs mattered not a whit now. Those were idols of a distant life now. The essence of my life was reduced to 2 simple goals, neither of which required any posturing, reaching or striving to attain. They were already at hand. I may have looked like one of the living dead, but I was walking in the presence of truth - revealed truth even, and it was before me, in me, around me; I knew it and I was free. It would still take several months for any of this to begin to take form in words, but I knew then I was profoundly changing.

mile race!

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age to retrace my steps from that day I find that it almost still hurts - aches - deep inside my body. As if something in me that was not exposed before is now and it is so sensitive that even to look causes an ache. God called me out to meet him in those mountains, of this I am certain. I could not bear even to see his back so he met me with such subtlety that I only knew his presence once it was gone. But there is no doubt that the profundity of this experience was of a different realm the realm of true being unencumbered by my interpretations of myself. Was God in the mountains, Elijah might At no time during the race did I see God or believe ask? Was God in the woods or the that I was experiencing his presence. And yet in sun? Or was he, perhaps, in me? retrospect I can see that the breakdown of my body, mind and spirit cracked me in such a way that there was space for God to enter, silently or maybe it was the crack that allowed something like Gods life within me to emerge and reveal itself. That revelation is not knowledge and it is not power but is the experience of a knowing of a power so great that it can be felt but not known unknowable. Was this experience so powerful because I experienced knowledge of good and evil: the goodness of my core self with its kernel of truth and ability in conflict with my contradictions, fear and doubt? Whatever it was, it hurt then and when I can manMetatron Feb/Mar 2013 19

Haikus cont. from pg 11 a picture of someone, and the next person will say, Take a picture of me too. BK: Weve taken a lot of pictures out of politeness too. Well stop a group of three people, but we will really only want just one person. Ah, you jump in too. Click, okay, go. Its interesting what people respond to. We kind of figured out that just the words art project perks peoples interest. I think it was the guy with the sawthe saw background. I remember him walking by, but before we said could even say, Could we get your help? he was already brushing us off. When we said, Can we get your help with an art project? He was like, Art project, yeah. MM: It goes back to what Curry was saying that people are starved for art. They want to participate. They want to be a part of that. I think a lot of people feel like they cant or that they need some sort of special training to create art, and you dont. Everyone can create art. EH: I think thats whats magical; that is what works. BK: Even in my class, I get so many volunteers up at Misericordia. Theyll come in like, I dont know anything about art. I dont want to ruin anything. You cant ruin anything. People are nervous about that stuff. A lot of art is intimidating by whatever the scene is or the techniques involved, because a lot of stuff is really complicated. But when it is an art project that is welcoming you in, it shows too We pick out people who look interesting, who more or less have put some thought into what they are wearing or what their look is, whether its functional, someone getting off their bike who has tons of bike gear and a face shield on or just somebody who has some elaborate style. Its the idea that you might not be a big old artist but you do have creativity. You put thought into what you are doing. There is value in that, and theres an aesthetic to what you do whether you know it or not, and I think that is a big element. EH: Do you think about what you are wearing when you go out? BK: We have talked about wondering whether we would get stopped if we saw us. Weve said more often than not, we would not stop ourselves. EH: Other than thinking about their clothing or seeming interesting, are there any other definable traits that you look for? MM: Color. Colors in their hair, colors in clothing The main factor is finding a good background. Thats the first thing we have to do. We find a good background, we take some test shots to find where this person should stand, and then we wait for someone interesting to come by. EH: Right now, do you know where your next backgrounds are going to be today? AC: We drove by some interesting stuff. We need to go somewhere where people are going to be walking by. We havent really done the downtown Logan Square area, so it will be kind of different. Were going to go check that out.

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AC: Were not that good of photographers. EH: But they look good. Is that just the power of Instagram? MM: We use Camera plus, so we can do a little more tweaking. AC: In the city, there are so many street lights, even at night. MM: It almost looks cooler with the ambient light. AC: The only problem we run into is the board has a glare. BK: Sometimes we have to tilt it. EH: How do you decide on the persons pose? MM: We usually let them do what they are naturally going to do. We sometimes give direction. Why dont you try looking to the side, or why dont you try looking up? Why dont you not smile? The best is when they naturally do something awesome, but we do give them direction sometime. EH: Have you had any bad responses? BK: Yeah, the book store guy. MM: Usually people just say, No, not interested. But that hardly ever happens. BK: We get a couple, Im going to work. MM: Somehow we have run into a lot of people who are going to work. AK: On their work break or something. MM: I wanted to do some shots inside a used book store by my house, Myopic, and we thought the guy it would be cool to have the guy behind the counter holding it. We were like, Could you help us out with an art project? which is usually the best approach. And he was like, Nope, they dont pay me to help out with your school projects. Its against policy. I cant help you out with your school project. They dont pay me for that. AC: That wasnt even that bad. And that was the worst one. BK: DoNskI asked if it was going to be racial. MM: And its kind of funny that the poem we asked him to hold was about a rebel. It was kind of a confederate poem written by a guy I work with who is from Georgia. AC: Rebel of the North. Cold clings tight to virgin bones. Dreams of summers past. Metatron Feb/Mar 2013

MM: We havent really walked around that area seriously, so it will be kind of a treasure hunt to find a good spot and camp out for a little bit. EH: So you find the right spot, you figure out where the person is going to be, and then you wait. AC: We have two haikus ready, both sides of the board, so each person will pose with two and we will choose the best match. MM: Sometimes well go out, and lately this has been happening as we are getting more efficientWell have two people come along, well have both of them hold poems, and well look at each other and think both of those people were fantastic. Thats the best when that happens. EH: Do you worry about lighting?

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EH: It is true that people like things short, when you are reading through a poetry book, you dont for the ones that are numerous pages, you go for the half a page. AC: I used this tyler guy as my premise for everything in this. Looking through his stuff, I noticed that the shorter ones have a lot more likes. He has these really long narrative ones that are overwhelming. MM: I feel like theres a certain liberation when you try to be creative within a set form. That brings people in too. If nothing else, if they dont feel like they are creative, they have these guidelines. Its a real challenge for someone who does consider themself creative to be creative within those restrictions. EH: So you sell them AC: This is a first. So this Tyler guy, leading up to Christmas, would post once a week, $20 a print, here is how you get them. I couldnt believe how many people would like that. In a conversation of 50 comments, people would say, I just bought seven. HE takes a picture of a piece of paper and sends you that. EH: So you are going to start selling picture prints. BK: Thats the plan. EH: I didnt know there was so much money to be made. AC: Thats initially what I came to the idea for, and then it turned out to be so much fun.. That was the original philosophy but we ended up having so much fun every Saturday. It would be nice if we could sell it. MM: It is something thats super fun. Whether we make money off of it or not, its something we are all willing to sacrifice our entire Saturdays for. BK: Its not really a question too. People are like what are you doing this weekend. Well, I have haikus all day Saturday. MM: Even this morning, we never discussed, So are we going to meet and do haikus today. I just get a Curry text, When and Where? AC: The girl I am dating doesnt ever expect to ever hang out with me on Saturdays, from here until infinity. EH: Did you say infinity? What is the next thing that you guys see? MM: We are thinking about branching into different neighborhoods. I am sure the project will change again at some point.

Finally, there is so much hope in the idea that three friends can formulate a brand new idea and then love doing it so much. It is, indeed, magical.-EH

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AC: We talked about changing the poem structure, maybe doing limericks. MM: The problem is fitting things on the board. Maybe if we did limericks, if we changed the form, we could change the board. If we are moving to different neighborhoods, this will be hard to do on the go. BK: Even in regard to how long it takes, we have talked about investing in more boards so we can bring more. We can only do two at a time. MM: Weve been thinking about Chinatown for a while. And Pilsen would obviously be a cool series too. EH: I wonder what it would be like to do the Gold Coast or a really different setting. BK: Downtown would be cool. AC: It would be a lot of different backgrounds, but there wouldnt be much graffiti down there. EH: So you really go for graffiti? AC: We like doorways. MM: Interesting archways or architecture features are cool too. EH: It is cool to have art on top of art on top of art. MM: Its a sandwich. One of my favorite ones is not graffiti. Its an archway one. He looks like some guy from the seventh seal. He is holding a poem about death. BC: We have talked about in the spring or summer trying to get a gallery show. MM: The gallery show would be great too because well be able to put up all these print outs of the pictures we have, but then we could have boards set up and letters, so people can create their own. And then maybe well have Polaroid cameras. BK: You know what I thought of that would be good would be magnet boards with magnet letters. The whole thing is community interactive, and I think this project would lend itself so readily to a really cool, interactive, fun gallery show with a really fun opening. EH: Are you thinking of venues? BK: I have a couple in mind. I have a friend who knows people in galleries We have a couple avenues that we could branch out to. Should we go do this? On that note, we headed out into the 20 degree waning afternoon to set up shot and locate some good models to hold haiku.-Erica Henry Photos courtesy Poetic Portraits

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