WORD DIVERSITY COLLECTIVE: I cannot tell you how excited I am to be involved with the new organization Word Diversity Collective, which begins its inaugural season on Saturday, Aug. 20 with Art Amok: Alice on Trial. WDC has joined forces with the award-winning theatre company 7 Stages for a series of events in response to the 2005-06 slate of plays. Many of the area's most respected organizations, including The Chattahoochee Review, Southwest Arts Center, Java Monkey Speaks, House of Poets and many others will lend their support to this revolutionary series which will bring audiences poetry, literature, theatre, art installations, music, food and more.The mission of WDC (which has already been misconstrued by some of the more ignorant poets in Atlanta...you know who you are) is very simple:
Word Diversity Collective supports literary artists who work on the page and the stage to produce, publish, and perform a diversity of text through collaboration and cross-pollination with each other and with other creative artists.
This coming Saturday, Art Amok will begin at 6 p.m. with a 90 minute poetry workshop by Marc Fitten, editor of The Chattahoochee Review. This will be followed by a series of evening performances that will be a movable feast if you will. I will be hosting the open mic on the mainstage with the fab Phoenixyz and featuring the spoken word group, Athens Boys Choir. At the same time, in the backstage theatre, there will be a reading of the one-woman show Lena, about the only African-America woman to be executed in Georgia. In the 7 Stages Cafe, jazz musician Lillie Lewis will be performing. Five Spot is providing the goodies. After the open mic, there will be a performance by the Morgan Rowe Band followed by the first official slam competition, which will work to build a team to send to the 2006 National Slam in Austin, Texas next summer.
WDC events will continue each month through June 2006, including an open mic and slam along with other artistic events. I will be producing the New Year's Eve spectacular called "Naked, Pagan and Uncensored." I'm already lining up a diverse array of poets, theater, art and musicians for this night. It will feature nationally known poets and the premiere of a new play. Very exciting stuff.
It has been a pleasure working with Alice Lovelace, Melissa Foulger at 7 Stages, Amanda Kail, Theresa Davis, Karen G., and all the others who are committing time and energy to this new endeavor. WDC is about being inclusive, not exclusive. It's about working together in all forms and mediums, regardless of age, race, sexual orientation or any of those other barriers that some organizations claim they don't discriminate against, but do. If you are looking for an organization that needs your support and welcomes your ideas, WDC is for you. Join us!
BUSH APPROVAL RATINGS: I've mentioned a number of times that Dubya's approval ratings are in the toilet. The Seattle Times did a round up of the numbers - which range in the low to mid 40s. To put this in perspective, Clinton's numbers at this same time were at 61 percent and Regan at 57 percent. Dubya's approval is starting to sink into his daddy's numbers, which were at 32 percent when he was voted out. While Dubya panders to the base, he's going to find out that his base ain't enough to win elections. With a looming civil war in Iraq, the stagnant economy in America (how about those gas prices?!) and another imminent terrorist attack, Republicans are already fretting over congressional elections in 2006 and it moves the Democrats a step closer to taking back the White House in 2008.
Comments
I'll share part of a reply I gave in regard to a political poem I declined for the Tea. It was too narrow and very unsubtle and more of an anti-Bush rant than an artistic piece.
I slightly refer to Clinton's Arkansas crime days and its relation to the drug smuggling during Iran/Contra (Clinton got cuts for turning his head, etc.), just to be clear. Then he brought his mob-style games to the White House (Chinagate, Vince Foster's "suicide", Ron Brown's "plane crash death" and so on.
In other words, the "sides" are without much distinction when it comes to global government crime.
This really simplifies my basic lone-wolf status, my aversion to any set ideology/camp:
"My suspicion and disgust with
politicians and global puppetmasters extends beyond (while including) the
particular Bush administration. That goes for the creepy consolidation of
the European Union, Britain's greased rails for Big Brother, etc., etc.
Clintons and Bushes, for example, are cut from the same cloth: colluded,
filthy-handed whores."
TJ
i dunno what bubba has to do with all this, teamster.
I choose not to narrow my sight on a single or a few popularly disliked/hated leaders and participants, in other words.
I think both Clinton and Dubya have dipped into the same mud hole in the past, hence the untouchable status of both in some highly sensitive areas.
Why else would the stupid Republicans have settled for a farce like the Monica hearings? The REAL stuff was/is off-limits. Same with the current crap. The web protects its own.
The same folks who are ravenously suspicious these days were notably silent and content during the 1990s. I just want to keep suspicion boiling no matter what manager gets into the Oval Office - and not let it fade from former creeps' administrations.