GAS Featured Poet, Musician and Sound Engineer: JC Roden

 

RC Roden is a musician, poet and sound engineer.

BE:  You’re a bit of a mystery man to me. You suddenly seemed to appear on GAS with very good videos with music which you’ve created. You say your a sound engineer. Tell us about that. What does that entail?

JC: Sound engineers work in film, television and theatre. They record the sound, for example the individual instruments of a band, they mix it, they add effects and ensure a good

balance. Therefore you need a lot of technical knowledge and experience but - above all – a feeling for the music.

I started out in theatre, worked with musicians, went into film and finally back to theatre. Nowadays I produce my own music. I use software instruments, digital effects and a digital

audio work station, which also allows video insertion and editing. All this fits on a laptop. A lot has changed in this profession, but you still need the experience, the feeling - and much passion.

How I came to GAS is easy to tell.
I used to say “rather hell freezes over and becomes an ice rink before I go to Facebook”. But I was looking for an online platform for my videos and YouTube turned out to be too

unspecific. Then a musician friend of mine told me about the many art groups on Facebook. He specifically mentioned the GAS - group and I am happy he did. I have discovered many

wonderful artists from all over the world in this group and had the pleasure of working together with some of them. I appreciate that very much.

Killing Machine (Messiah) by RC Roden

BE:   When I first “met” you you were working in Germany but you live in Greece.  Do you travel to different countries for sound engineering jobs or just back and forth to Germany?

JC: As a young sound engineer, I traveled extensively on tour and had the pleasure of seeing many countries and meeting many interesting artists. For example, I was on the road with West Side Story, Jesus Christ Superstar and did technical support for various bands and theater productions. To be honest, that would be too exhausting for me today. Working on tour means 10-12 hours work a day plus the traveling (and the parties). That's great if you're 25 or 30, but I'm 60 now and prefer a slightly healthier life - and the romantic dinners with my wife..

By the way, it's the other way around (unfortunately). I live and work in Berlin, but I travel to Greece whenever I find the time.

BE:  Do you work with anyone who will hire you as a sound engineer or do you have a special area where you work?  I remember you mentioned working with a puppet theatre?

Heimathafen (c) Frederic Schweizer

JC:  Oh yes, the puppet theatre in Berlin Neukölln, it's in my neighborhood. Very charming and lovingly furnished. They do children's theater, but also a lot for adults. I attended a "Faust" show a few weeks ago and met the owners. Very nice people. We chatted over a bottle of wine and got to the topic of Dylan Thomas (of course). Then we (I..) started fantasizing about how Under Milkwood could be staged as a puppet show, with music and a good sound design. To cut a long story short: I'm thinking about it...  By the way, on the same street as the puppet theater is another theater where I worked for over 10 years, the Heimathafen Neukölln. It is over 100 years old and heritage listed, also very charming and beautiful. Concerts, readings and theater performances take place here.  If you ever visit Berlin, check out both, they are worth it..

BE: I think you said you were also a poet.  Would you like to share one of your poems with us?

JC: I wouldn´t consider myself as a poet. I write a lot of texts, whether they can be described as “poetic” in any way is up to the reader. But I´m happy to share the lyrics of my new video

 with you guys, and you´ll find out for yourself...

Paradise Lost or: The End Of The Line by RC Roden

The valleys passed by in the blink of an eye, the mountains touched the moon
and one with the mountains, the moon and the stone on which he walked, the merchant looked up to the sky, but - he found no solace in it

The many summers he had seen on his way to the sea, the clouds rising and the winds rushing down, the voices that had circled, the gazes that had embraced him,
All this led him now to the end of the line
 
Carefully he examined the withering fields of memory whose fruits he hoped to find in the water, like the light of the sun that multiplied and dissolved there,

that spoke of memory as of a woman in labour with wide open eyes

and of her child as of a ghost

 

One day, before the next life or after the last love, he would think again of the mountains, of the roots of the earth and the misty candles of imagination

where seconds ago a heart had beaten in his breast,

where a single imagined syllable had unleashed a torrent of words inside him

and a single step had led to a half-empty, half-finished paradise.

And he, who dreamed the world in flames,

and kept a double-tongued fairy tale between his lips,

which asked and answered,

at the same time, with the same voice,

which once exposed, twice took a new shape,
He, who incessantly mocked the song of birds, the fear of the blind on the

pavements, and the tales of day and night, of brotherhood and freedom..

He - suddenly stood by the sea

and spread his arms

The merchant opened his eyes, he was standing in the middle of the city

He stared at the neon lights in which the moon was fading

He listened to the sound of the surf dying away in the din of traffic,

and for a last time a wave rose,

high as a mountain,

and smashed on the pavement of the street.

“If you're running out of time”, said the merchant, “buy as much of it as you can....”

He heard himself laughing and time

gave answer.

***

I originally wrote this text in German, in 1992. The war in former Yugoslavia began and I got more and more the impression that madness rules the world. That's why I started writing, maybe to get rid of it.

100 years ago, after the first world war, William Butler Yeats wrote the line "The darkness drops again" in one of his poems. Many wars were to follow. Today it´s the one in Ukraine, nobody knows what tomorrow will bring. I'm still writing, but the new lyrics are similar to the old ones. 

More than 30 years after the first words I wrote, madness still reigns and darkness drops again. Still, I have hope.  I may not believe in humanity, but I believe in the love and the

power of the individual human being. I can see it, everywhere and every day.

I see it in the eyes of the noisy children on the playground in front of my house and in the smiles of their mothers. I see it in the old couple from the house next door still walking down the street hand in hand after 50 years of marriage. I see it in my wife's empathy when she talks about her social work and in my best friend's passion when he talks about his art.

So, the Darkness may drop, but we we are prepared.

In my Craft or Sullen Art by Dylan Thomas, art by Belinda, video and music by RC Roden.

GAS Featured Poet, Artist and Musician: Joan Borland

Meet Joan Borland, if you haven't already.  She's a most unique and unusual talent who has learned to survive through art. When life gave her lemons she made a kaleidoscope! 

In Joan's own words:

As far back as I can remember I was scared and tuned myself out of an angry noisy family life distracting myself by making things.

In the trauma my 4 yr old self was going through I turned to objects instead of people. 

I searched for found objects that 'spoke' to me.

Rarely did anyone speak to me without anger in my family. 

I found a stone shaped like a nose I kept in my pocket I rubbed for comfort. 

I found a big, round 60's button I talked into as if it were a telephone.

I felt so scared and alone. 

I improvised to stay alive. 

I did not know what 'improvised' meant at 4 yrs of age.

I only knew of an awful feeling that stopped me breathing  normally would stop if I distracted myself enough. 

I didn't know these awful feelings were panic attacks. 

I did not know my mind was under attack from emotional neglect. 

I did not know at 4 yrs of age I was keeping my emotional and spiritual life alive by seeking communion with found objects.

 

I was never told I was loved. 

I did not know what love was.

My love showed itself by rescuing animals, birds in distress; I know I now was rescuing myself. 

I did not know these actions were love. 

At school an art teacher asked the class to paint self portraits. 

I painted myself as Mr Spock. 

I identified with Mr Spock as I had no self identity. 

I was punished for this and didn't paint figuratively again. 

I stopped painting anything 'til I was 30 yrs of age.

I lost a baby. 

The pain was too deep to write about so I turned to painting although I had never painted since school. 

I painted the spirit of my lost baby in the art I was beginning to create.

I'm sure me painting specifically spiritually brought a baby to me that did not die. 

When my son was born I stopped painting. 

My accidental spell of beckoning a child to me had worked and I didn't need to paint anymore. 

I didn't paint again until I painted a painting for my son's 18th birthday.

The English teacher I had at school wasn't like the art tracher. 

I was unruly and cheeky and he spoke to me instead of berating me in front of the whole class. 

He asked the class to write either a piece of prose or poetry about fog. 

I had been writing poetry as soon as I learned to write and thought  everybody wrote poetry. 

Poetry for me was easy so I wrote a poem for the writing exercise. 

When the English teacher came back to hand the class their marks for their writing about fog he said he had never given a nine and a half out of ten to any pupils writing and would the pupil who he had given that high mark to stay behind as he wanted to talk to them about their writing.

I was a noisy member of a group of girls the English teacher called 'The Bridge Club', and I was totally embarrassed that it was me the teacher had given the highest mark in the class to. 

I was 13 years of age and the poem I wrote about fog was called 'Smog Claustrophobia'.

I stayed behind and was anxious and perplexed. 

I didn't know what I had hidden in the poem the English teacher would understand. 

He asked me if I had copied the poem from somewhere. 

I replied with an indignant 'No!'

He asked me to bring in other poems for him to look at. 

I did this and he went about marking all the poems I had brought in for him with a nine and a half out of ten.

He told me I had a gift

He told me to keep writing. 

I would have kept writing anyway as writing is a part of me I need to function every day as much as an ear or a tooth.

I have becoming my writing which I rarely draft and is as natural to me as breathing. 

The same thing happened when I began to paint again. 

I've never written or painted with any idea of how things will turn out.

With writing I just start off with a word or line that has come to me and go from there. 

With painting I just make a mark and everything flows from there.

I can write songs, but I prefer to freestyle to let the words find me. 

I have never attempted to get any of my work published. 

I don't really know why this is. 

When I was a working artist exhibitions came to me; I did not chase them.

I've had to think about this as Belinda is going to put my work forward for publication. 

I had no family I could relate to. 

My family didn't try to relate to me. 

I was viewed as an outsider. 

I didn't know I was developing into an artist. 

My poetry, art, music, and songs are my family now. 

I cannot be separated from any of them. 

I did not draft this piece of writing either. 

The alchemy that turns feeling into poetry, art, and song elevates you from your insanity. 

The world sees me as mad, sad, bad; my art shows I am not of that world of judgement. 

I am my art and my world is art; the rest is gravy.

 

GAS Featured Poet: Craig Kirchner

"I have been writing all my life and think of poetry as hobo art. I love story-telling and the aesthetics of the paper and pen, I’ve been 

nominated twice for a Pushcart Prize. After a writing hiatus I was recently published in Decadent Review and have a book of poetry –Roomful of Navels."

George Clooney

Driving west from the beach,

it could have been George Clooney,

head and shoulders draped 

backwards over a chaise,

napping and sunning at the pool – 

 

if it weren’t for the bus stop bench 

identifying itself as Bus Stop

and the Winn-Dixie cart

full of worldly possessions

sitting along-side – 

 

instead of the coaster glass top table, 

the morning bloody-Mary

and the designer umbrella.

 

George could most certainly 

look this content,

snoring, feet up, as though 

he had a Golden Globe

and owed himself this decadence,

 

if it weren’t for the holes 

in the muddied boots, 

the grease stains on the cargo shorts 

and the distinct need for a shave.

 

It seemed poignant that

the high-end condos just behind George 

most assuredly had the same sun, 

clouds and blue sky, 

as well as the same choreographed 

‘v’ of geese flying north overhead 

as his siesta stopover.

GAS Featured Poet: William Waters

William Waters is an associate professor, in the Department of English at the University of Houston Downtown. Along with Sonja Foss, he is coauthor of Destination Dissertation: A Traveler’s Guide to a Done Dissertation. His research and teaching interests are in writing theory and modern grammar.

 

Ezra

For Burt Hatlen

After all that thunder,

You remained

Still:

A room after

Mozart ceased;

A room still

Without distraction;

A space

Filled

With shadows.

I think of you

I think of you

though this hasn’t happened--

thirty-five,

alcoholic, and alone.

I think of you

closed

in a room

in the

city

--tugging hard

a beer. -- turning

back again

to your father,

too drunk to get out

of the flames.  Identified

by teeth.  Your mother, 

a picture taken

before you learned

to walk. -- your

past.

I think of you, 

almost empty,

pushing hard

the typewriter

keys...

your last effort

an explanation.

GAS Featured Poet: Jim Murdoch

Jim Murdoch grew up in the heart of Burns Country in Scotland. Poetry, for him, was about irrelevance—daffodils, vagabonds and babbling brooks—until one day in 1973 he read Larkin's 'Mr Bleaney' and felt as if the scales had fallen from his eyes. How could something so... so seemingly unpoetic be poetry? He aimed to find out. 

Now Then 

We say things aren't as bad as 

we remember but mostly it's 

the other way round because 

no one recalls hurt or pain with 

any degree of accuracy and why 

would they want to? 

We're fighting a losing battle 

on two fronts from an 

untenable present. 

Wondering what we'll 

misremember tomorrow is the 

least of our problems. 

Expectation is the Mother of Disappointment 

"A poem is a small (or large) machine made of words." - William Carlos Williams

Williams was right, half-right at least, 

although a poem is less of a machine 

and more of a tool: 

closer to a backscratcher 

than a two-stroke engine. 

True, there are simpler machines— 

pulleys and screws, 

wedges, wheels and axles— 

but no one thinks of them. 

We expect too much from our poets. 

Poems, most poems, are a 

means to scratch an itch 

and little more 

and it's never even the reader's itch.