It's Over!*

That's it for now. Left wanting more? Start again from the beginning. Or the very beginning.

More new stuff coming sometime soon...

Before next April, let's hope.

*The reference

April 30th - Stars Without Makeup

Four of Diamonds - Stars Without Makeup
13 - Hip-Hopera (detail)

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Drum and bass lines built from: 

Burial - Near Dark
DJ Assault - Ass N Titties (NSFW, obvi)

Samples from:

Reggie and the Full Effect - Getting By With It's (at 15:08)
David Bowie - Young Americans
Garbage - Special
The Kinks - Celluloid Heroes

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This would be part of a larger piece (the full Hopera) about double standards and media saturation - most likely a playful interlude therein. An examination of a TMZ-style publication's feature on "Stars Without Makeup", this track would be a rundown of those maligned celebrities. Samples from Garbage's "Special" would put said song in an even more bitter context. "Celluloid Heroes" would provide a juxtaposition between new and old Hollywood...blahblahblah.

All you really need is this couplet.


Tila Tequila shed her carapace
Julianne Hough spent Halloween without blackface

April 29th - Sleeper Cells

Seven of Diamonds - Sleeper Cells
15 - Free Verse


The Clandestine Inhabitant

It doesn't have to be dark
Even in the daylight you won't notice
At home among your dearest friends
Reading to your child
Drawing your evening bath
Something is always beyond view
Behind each line and act
Hidden there almost evading detection

Disquieted you feel its breath
Dampen the hairs on the back of your neck:
Death

April 28th - Espresso Royale Caffe (sic)

Ten of Hearts - Espresso Royale Caffe (sic)
2 - Shakespearean Sonnet


You were the one I loved most for a time
I looked towards our daily rendezvous
I kept your values and your heart with mine
And found euphoria inside of you
Your humble features pleasing to my eye
I stood completely rapt beneath your spell
But when the time was right to say goodbye
With joyful tears I bid you fond farewell

Your fortunes promised to another man
He made you change your body and your face -
While I grew older in another land -
Resulting in this unfamiliar place

Alas you have become a different store
Where drip-brewed coffee costs a dollar more

April 27th - The Western Wall

Ten of Diamonds - The Western Wall
5 - Writer's Choice - Tweet Length!

April 26th - Palate Cleansers

Two of Spades - Palate Cleansers
3 - Tweet Length

Ok, not quite Tweet Length

Palate Cleansers II

After the meal
Once real food is gone
Feeling bloated and queasy
I take you in my mouth
Rolling you up and under my tongue
I savor your sweetness

You make me clean again
I spit you in the dirt

April 25th - The War On Christmas

Six of Spades - The War on Christmas
10 - Acrostic

Western Front, Christmas 1916

Trench-bound I raise my standard issue
Remembering last Christmas
Unbelievably long ago when
Carols were shared among
Enemies now disunited blindly
Shooting together towards the line

April 24th - Lotus Eaters

Eight of Diamonds - Lotus Eaters
19 - Alexandrine Couplets

Somewhere a hidden hollow lotus land exists
That's peopled solely with sunny somnambulists
Who isolate themselves from nature's harshest truths
Absconding toward the blissful shadows of their youth
Ingesting opiates and dozing through the day
Yes - we run and hide and lie and sleep the same way

April 23rd - Being Older Than James Dean

Jack of Spades - Being Older Than James Dean
20 - Writer's Choice - Free Verse

Riding with James Dean

We both toss our hair
Fearlessly flying
Smiling back at
Some girl or boy
Instantly forgotten

Our engines screaming
To combustion
With passion for
Our parallel worlds
Separated by hours and eras
Places and people
But the same road
The same speed
Too fast for time
Which folds on itself

We see each other in our mirrors
And at twenty-four and twenty-four
We both look back

He crashes
And somehow
I keep moving
Slower and
Slower still

April 22nd - Saffron

Eight of Clubs - Saffron
13 - Hip-Hopera (detail)

Samples from:

Donovan* - "Mellow Yellow"
Conershop - "Who Fingered Rock and Roll"

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A little yellow flower
With power unequaled
Tastes like honey
More than money
The world's just mad about saffron
Or it was
For medicine or makeup
Salves and sacrifice
Cleopatra put it in her bath
To make her lips divine
Alexander liked it on his rice or in his wine
Persian merchants pushed it
Sand worn faces hid
The kings in England planted it
At least their slaves' slaves did
People warred for it
Whored for it
Some gave even more for it
Caught diluting for their take
They burned them at the stake
And most of the coveters
Had nothing to show for it
When the black plague came
There were none left to grow for it
Those who truly tasted it
Dropped caste for it
Found a decent place to hide
But most who could just wasted it
A yellow mark of pride
Landed Brahmin gentlemen would just dump it in the street
Whenever Nero entered Rome they spread saffron at his feet

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Quite rightly