Branch 1: Spoken Word Ballad

Rough Draft

Mississippi Trust Ballad

All I care about is money and the city that I’m from
Ima sip it till I fill it, Ima smoke it till I’m done.
                                                                   -Drake/ Trust Issues

Money running rythyms
As they passin through my mind
Whats the cost of living
And can I pay the rent of time?
Do you see, sometimes I don’t,
I stare down the Mississippi
Her lyricism my antidote
And I can’t, or shouldn't, or won’t
Smooth across her watertop and float.
My feet they are to heavy
And her waters all I know
Socks and shoes and skin run solid through
And from tip to bone I’m soaked

I think of the Mississippi kissing me, calmly
Her lips on me, under me, around me
Upon me all along me
Her water touch at dawn and dusk, a must
That draws this ballad in mindsightsee, have you
Seen her, on nights like this
She rises naked in the bridge light
Hips fog tight, her rapid effervescence
A sense of sex and yet a sense of death
Poseidon's daughter, and men like me
Underwater fodder, Aquarius or not
Water bearers can’t lockwalk blocks without caring for her
So    we do    what old men do
Care about what we can and through her land
We just walk thorugh            and grin

You see Esplanades a tradewind
I sail cross every daybreak
Past homeless Louisiana Dome kids
Walk through the coldness fast and brisk
Pass play until the way free
The freeway be then the bridge that separates
The me from the they
The woman underneath, Ive never talked to her once
And the two men on the corner
I give them menthols from lack of blunts
Its passing through a poor dream a weak and hungry one
I’m apparently a teacher in the ward of 7thdom
Many days I cannot see what it is i bring
Today we talked of Icarus
For I’m thier Daedalus building wings
I tell first period Do not fly low
for the water drags one down. And
Second period Do not fly to high
The sun seres silence into life and
I’ll have to watch you fall and drown
How do you save your children
From Mississippi dreams of bleeding
They do not want to listen to yet another
Preacher preaching

So i watch the inside mindfight
uptight downtight skytight groundtight
And I draw her heaven’s hell light
To cast a spell tight-- to lock and blast
But the bell to third period gridsplits
And before I’ve blessed they’ve passed
I want to slice and swear and water tear
What kind of river kiss is this the Mississippi bears
But finally it’s period prep
And down the stairs I slip trip fall
Past administration's offices and which ever securities on call
I walk into the neighborhood where the students cannot see
And look in the direction of the woman who is the Mississippi
I tear her in my heart and I tear her in my mind
Pop a smoke my daily antidote and fire light its spine
I breath in polluted stillness
Fill my lungs and heart with grime
Fill them with elliptic toxicity
Because the poison stills my mind
I spill my silent tears into the broken street
And though she tries to drown me
I stare with smokey fire and damn, I keep.

I’ll keep walking everyday
Up and down that city street
Devour me Mississippi
I hope I taste of undefeat.
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Mississippi Trust Ballad    -video link

Branch 1 Revision: Good Morning New Orleans

Original Draft

Good Morning New Orleans

A smoky baptism shirtless [and] in jeans.
Old dances on my feet, old songs in my head.
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

A rumble of vagrants tumble into the street,
Warm congregation looking to be lead
To a smoky baptism, shirtless[and] in jeans.

Church of dance, church of drink, church of city-scene
Doctrine of late nights, dogma of empty beds.
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

Awake to find yourself awoken to a sleezy-jazzy dream.
Sojourners seeking to be melody- fed
To a smoky baptism, shirtless[and] in jeans.

A place where the rusted trumpet is the one that gleams.
Where law, as skirt, is ripped and shed
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

Ambitions, like street lights, hang in streams
lighting a path for the city’s dead.
To a smoky baptism, shirtless[and] in jeans.

A boy caught flight when the angels teamed,
Landing softly with wings widespread
To a smoky baptism, shirtless and in jeans.
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

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Final Draft

Good Morning New Orleans

A smoky baptism shirtless and in jeans.
Old dances on my feet, old songs in my head.
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

A rumble of vagrants tumble into the street,
Warm congregation looking to be lead
To a smoky baptism, shirtless and in jeans.

Church of dance, church of drink, church of city-scene
Doctrine of late nights, dogma of empty beds.
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

Awake to find yourself awoken to a sleezy-jazzy dream.
Sojourners seeking to be melody- fed
To a smoky baptism, shirtless and in jeans.

A place where the rusted trumpet is the one that gleams.
Where law, as skirt, is ripped and shed
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

Ambitions, like street lights, hang in streams
Lighting a path for the city’s dead.
To a smoky baptism, shirtless and  in jeans.

A boy caught flight when the angels teamed,
Landing softly with wings widespread
To a smoky baptism, shirtless and in jeans.
Hello and good morning New Orleans.

Brach 1: Poetry Revision

Final Revision: Mass

Mass
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven...
    -Ophelia: act 1 scene 3

         I
Walking into weight,
Bread and blood
Leave a taste of wood and woods
On the palate of a patron tongue.

An organ, like drums,
Beats into the holy ground.
Raising the faithful to fall
To become dolls within the shape
Of a crossed cathedral--
Small, difficult to create, yet
Easy to break.

             II
Next to me a woman grows leaves
In homily.  A dryad of the cross,
Screening being seasons.

First fall and prayer.
Second spring, as eyes
Become the color of perennial seeds.
Next summer, warmth becoming a leaking heat.
Finally winter, as she dream sleeps
Her pillow a stone.

She, like Ophelia,
falls to rock.

Revision: Dreamscape

Final Draft::

Dreamscape

Que sueñes con los angelitos.
As I slip to sleep upon a pillow of stones
Waking in a dream to an ocean sounding,
I hover only toe-tips beyond the crests of waves.
Each set of dreamwater sending
Information and images in parallel.

The sister-side of waking whispers in voices parallel,
Que sueñes con los angelitos.
Milkwater  minds calciumate a sending.
Each time, the voice is heard-- tumbling stones
and dropping them into the waves.
It is a mixture of weight and relief sounding.

It is a mixture of muted garbled horn-voices sounding.
The sleep sent ocean playing in parallel
A harmony of horns and sea-strings waves
Which whisper,que sueñes con los angelitos.
But ascension is steep for those whose mindmake is stones.
The ocean seeks to pull and sink weight from one seeking sending.

Sea froth between toes tickle-takes me from a sending.
Her tongue is a tentacle and I taste of trumpets sounding.
I do not want to contaminate her with the consumptions of stones,
For they raise the water, ruin the sky, and we should stay in parallel.
Still she whispers, que sueñes con los angelitos,
And it is Daedalus' lament, as he apparates among the waves.

But how does one change the sea? What would replace the waves?
What would push water into air and onto land in sending?
Who would whisper so well as mother water, que sueñes con los angelitos?
So much of the unwoken earth would be empty without the ocean sounding.
The dreamscape sea, like the angels hierarchies, are a beauty and terrifying parallel.
The rough human soul dropped from sky, tumbled by sea, and smoothed by stone.

One among many, all the same of something else, are stones.
One among many, all the same of something else, are waves.
                                                                                           a parallel
                                                                                         in sending
                                                                            is heard sounding
From the lips of water to the ears of stones, que sueñes con los angelitos.

On a beach, inside the water, lie parallel stones
Across them, que sueñes con los angelitos coasts and waves
Sending and sounding    sending and sounding    sending and sounding.

Branch 3: A Teacher, Dancer, Poet New Year

Branch 3: New Year's Eve         

           My Holiday was the most wonderful I can remember having in such a long time.  When I l think back to everything I have experienced since moving to New Orleans, my struggles have been deep and bearing--yet my life has been lived high and hard and the balance equal.  As an extremest, i suppose, my struggles are mighty: near death, lost heart, the failing of the educational system.  Still, my beauties have been legendary as well.  Living in a powerful, spiritual, and historical city filled with powerful and spiritual people: musicians, dancers, writers, teachers, students, family, lovers, and experiences.  I know myself well through the pleasures and the pains of this last year and a half.

No great art has ever been made without the artist having known danger.

-rilke

          My holiday was so much, it takes a past look in this tired moment to briefly understand how blessed I am.  I spent a week filled with the people of my past who helped guide, build and love me into being the man I find and have chosen to be  I spent a week with a family who has loved me, supported me, fought me, yet always welcomed me back to home I know that I always have.
           And I spent my New Year's Eve with the most decadent group of people I could have: My brother, Leslie, Josephine, and Michelle.

Girls, you made my eve most wonderful.

     thank you so very much.

           Cid Galicia

Revision #3:Original Draft

(This is an old piece)

Sister Willows

You each, can alone, touch me and through that

give me clear veins for thought to travel through.

On a floor, or on a bed, of leaves, I will trust you;

hang my armor upon your willow tree branches.

But together you are a forest, a dark place.

A canopy I cannot see within, but still must cross.

So I eat metal, grind copper and steel with broken teeth

[and bleeding] gums and grind my skin upon the stone until my soul is sharp.

So that I can pierce you, break you, each of you, only a piece though, to carve a space,

for myself; through which I am protected from your united touch.

For there are times when it, your touch, sends phoenix-fire through those veins [and they burn through tearing and snapping] them--

spilling unsegregated blood into regions that cannot bear its burden,

cannot force it through the system.

And I am left in a place that reminds me of thorns; reminds-- me of dry

half- living things that refuse to die.

Things I should far transcend and remain unaffected by. 

For I will see you, tomorrow, each of you, and chose to have to let you touch me.

======================================================================================

Revised Draft
I would have like to keep couplets 4-8 the same size as 1-3, but I cannot seem to find to do it in a desirable way.  For the last should I find a way to make it two lines as all the others or is it good to end it with a singular line?

Sister Willows

You each, can alone, touch me and through that
Give me clear veins for thought to travel through.

On a floor, or on a bed, of leaves, I will trust you
Hang my armor upon your willow tree branches.

But together you are a forest, a dark place.
A canopy I cannot see within, but still must cross.


So I eat metal, grind copper and steel with broken teeth and
Bleeding gums, grind my skin upon the stone until my soul is sharp.

So that I can pierce you, break you, each of you, only a piece though, 
To carve a space for myself. Through which I am protected from your united touch.


For there are times when it, your touch, sends phoenix-fire through those veins.
And they burn through tearing and snapping them.

Spilling unsegregated blood into regions that cannot bear its burden,
Cannot force it through the  system.

And I am left in a place that reminds me of thorns, reminds me of dry,
half- living things that refuse to die.

For I will see you, tomorrow, each of you and chose to have to let you touch me.