loose thoughts/blunted on reality

what is real? crystal clear images. digitally. so many pixels u can almost the atoms. lies. all lies. those tits are fake. that muscle was airbrushed. this one starve herself for that figure. that one smiles though inside a black hole threatens to suck her very life away. and yet we imitate them. look at them. on magazine racks. in movies. on television. talk about the latest gossip with that strange mixture of disgust and intruige.
where does reality begin? certainly not with ourselves. looking at a lot of blogs and myspaces and facebooks, and being a using of all three, i'm starting to feel as though we all feel the need to editorialize our own lives. something in my is critical of that desire. it feels to much to me like press. like a smaller imitiation of the media machine we find ourselves caught up in.
what's the point in broadcasting all of our friendships and interactions? i'm starting to feel like the world--ok, my world--is lacking real interaction. of course things like distance make that impossible. but even a phone call is better than the minimal myspace comment, or looking at a picture. because what's the first thing we do for cameras? act unnatural. pose. and even the pictures that catch us in the natural, i'm still posing. [i'll stop using the "we", cause i don't know u] i'm still making split second decisions about how my action will be recieved.
too often i find myself looking at myself. looking at pictures, words, clothes that i've chosen to respresent myself. and very slowly i've gotta confess that i let shit slip out of wack. clothes don't make the man. i'm cool because of the person i am. those representations will never do me justice. so i shouldn't give them that kind of wieght. confession is the first step to recovery.
and now i'm looking at myself looking at myself. lol. a nigga just can't win. but i can think myself free.--reallycalvin

view from the choir-loft

view from the choir-loft

ever since I can remember
black people been performing
we sung our blues out on the fields
and exulted them into jazz and
wrapped them up in rhythm
even made a gospel of them
but mind u
back in the fields
it wasn’t for them
it was always for us
now we perform for different reasons
slaves to ourselves
slaves to money and position and tradition
everything is so different now
can’t u tell how
the artist has to take all the truth out of a song
for it to make it to the radio
that’s why there are so many songs about sexing
and not many about loving
so many songs about living large
and not enough songs about plain honest living.
and so hear I sit
in the choir loft
we just got finished singing
and man it was awful
not all the parts were there,
but honestly, that didn’t bother me
today I feel something different
I stand up on the choir loft
swaying, smiling, trying to will
the tension out of my body
and mimic the glitter and glam
of Bobby Jones Gospel hour on BET
and while up there I begin
to situation begins to shift

we
your babies, your grandbabies, your nieces, nephews, cousins
you,
the congregation
our parents, aunties, uncles, and friends

so much between us is unspoken
as you clap and sway,
you become the choir
and we are the congregation
you want us to know that you like
what we look like up there
robes on, hair done, combed, looking presentable
you applaud and we love it
because everywhere a nuisance and a problem
and here we get to be your joy
but there is a deeper truth to us
but we can’t show you
cause we’re afraid you won’t applaud

we come to church cause u make us
and now you want to teach us
not how to be
but how to perform
so we can stay in your world
so we can act in your play
can’t say the word sex,
though many of us are already having it.
can’t cuss
though cursing would be the only way some of us have
to call our nameless demons
it doesn’t seem to matter, that
some of us are gay,
some of us can’t stop doing drugs,
some of us can’t stop selling them,
some of us don’t have Daddies
so we turn to strangers
for our identity, and love
none of that really seems to matter
as long as on the Sunday you assign
we all get up and sing and dance and smile
while you clap and holler
while you trade the truth of us
for the lie you are so anxious to believe

I want a song
that I can sing
full throated, and free
with a choir or without
in church or not

but right now
this is my story,
these are my blues.

I'm Proud of Hip-Hop

I grew up in the woods of Virginia on on a steady diet of grits, white people, and Viacom. The only ideas about blackness I got were from my home, of course, but then from television, and my wanttobe thug friends at school. Over the years I developed this hatred for hip-hop. An absolute disgust. And it had nothing to do with how the treated the women. It was more about how the men themselves were portrayed. The image of the thug as being hard and gangster. For me it was a prison, the standard by which my white and black friends, girls especially judged me. And since I wasn’t “hard” enough for them, I was considered, for lack of a better word, “soft”. And lets just say it affected me. Unfortunately. Moving on:
Hating hip-hop was also convenient being a church boy, and living in a God-fearing, middle-class house hold. If you haven’t noticed not all black people were created equal. Some have money, and some don’t. Some get their kids into decent school districts, some don’t. Some have money to support their kids dreams, some don’t. The two classes to not mix. I have seen my own family dissolve basically because of class. And it is so wrong. But honestly if I were to go talk to my cuzins right now, one of them would be speaking from a prison cell, the other would be talking about leaving prison. And it would probably be a good conversation, but just as well, it hasn’t happened yet.
The class division in the black division has a lot to do with hip-hop. For instance my parents and their friends say so many ignorant things about hip-hop without understanding it. Without even listening. From a spiritual aspect, they told me it was poision. They actually kept me from radio and television for as long as they could, I was like 12 before I got into my generations culture.
But now I am seeing the light. The [potential] beauty of hip-hop to me is that it is [can be] an BLACK SPACE FOR BLACK PEOPLE TO BE ARTISTICALLY AND ENTRUPRENUTIRALLY CREATIVE. A space for us to define our own astetics, write and live our own history.
If we call each other niggas, at last now we get to work our own fields. Eat the fruits of our own labor. Black people are making advances not just as artists but as businessmen. Diddy, Jay-Z all these cats are making it so that everthing can be done “in house” and potentially beneficial things can be done for the community, because unlike white people, these cats came from our communities. They understand us [hopefully].
I’m just honestly proud to be a part of this generation. Young. Gifted. Black.

jill scott resurfaces

i can tell u the exact night i fell in love with music. not the date, but i remember the night. 2001ish. jill scott live at the landmark theatre. she was pure magic. we made me feel things that were beyond me. the band was so inspiring. the way it wasn't just music but she acted, danced, joked, pondered, felt. all on stage. naked. the lights. the drama. the tension the release. i left with a feeling similar to the one i had the night i lost my virginity. just without the shame.
her new album, "The Real Thing" is due out [ ]. but she's currently on tour.

word on the street is she is going through a divorce from Lyzel. in E flat. .... it's just crazy to me. lets hope it ain't tru. how can she sing our favorite songs? but she did say
"if you have a nightmare, does it mean u stop dreaming."


well jill 4 real...i'm single....lol....

it's dangerous

being honest. my art is honest. it reflects me, good and bad. but when it's something that's too much i'ma give it a [ ]. fill in the blank type deal. i like when the reader has to infer things anyway. kinda like when u have u imagine what a intricate verbal description of something looks like. it becomes a collaborration. instead of just me saying everything. but yea, i'm scared. cause this is about it to get dangerous.

revolution always is. yours TRUELY-cb

remembering

yall aint ready...

clothes like memory

(for my Daddy)

I was folding clothes away
listening to music
pitch and idea and rhythm and memory
flying around in my head
friendly trajectory
the clothes like memories were full
of holes and stains and things I didn’t expect
I get to the tee-shirts
do the antiquated v-necks
then I get to the other kind
the sexy ones with no sleeves
the “beaters”. start thinking
remembering when We discovered these
together
it was a small gamble Ma took at Hecht’s
she bought a couple for me,
a couple for you
I remember you at home struttin round
in your drawers with your beater hugging
your big ole belly
smiling that beautiful perfect smile
there you go, absolutely hilarious
hilarious absolutely
walkin round with your arms up
talkin bout how good the air feels on your underarms
and as weird as it is I had to agree
you right
the cool air really do feel good
up under your arms
when they moist with sweat
from living this man life
you taught me so much about
we smiled a smile together
it glowed into this moment of clarity
we both crazy men. strong, tender men
with different smells, tastes, and experiences
and yet, in a very real way
I am you
and you are me

these moments exists in my forever
moments of goodfeeling i can take out when I need
put them on and feel them like
warm cotton hug on my skin
like cool air

that’s what Dads are for, yo

i wear you everyday under my clothes

everyday should b b-day

"it's very seldom that ur blessed to find ur equal."

these are some really recent and candits shots of b on a yachts anchored near Monte-Carlo, Monaco on June 15, 2007 and then later with Jay-Z in the South of France. utterly fly. utterly regal. but at the same time, very normal too. i think that's what makes b, b. the "Beyonce Experience" is coming to North America soon. i gotta get my tickets! i've seen some U'Tube clips, and she is nothing short of phenominal.

on the quote unquote real world

i live my life trying to stay afloat in this sea of absolute boredom. when u’ve lived long enough, not that I’ve lived that long, u begin to understand that people are basically self-seeking. and anything that seem like altruism or love is just incidental.

that’s why I dig kids so much. because they are so honest. honestly selfish. they want what they want. sooner rather then later. and they don’t tell lies. that, to me is the root innocence. not purity of intent, but honesty of intention.

last Friday I had the pleasure/chore of attending my cuzins Kendall’s graduation from preschool to kindergarden. or from kindergarden to first, I forget.

it was cute. i’ve got the most prettiest, coolist cuzin on the earf, mayne. everything about her is perfect. i want one just like her.

iv’e been thinking about graduation and what that means. i graduated from high school last year, and some of my friends and other cuzins are going to that process now. it’s just interesting to watch their excitement and optimism. life has this way of beating that shit out of u. maybe this was just me, but i was never excited about graduating. I distinctly remember everyone around me being excited, and I remember feeling this vauge kind of pressure to be excited, somehow because they were exciting. all it meant to me was that i was free of that system, those teachers, and those students. it wasn’t that I hated everyone in my highschool, it was just that I felt that I had so little control over who I hung out with. i was in these higher level classes, with no black people. ok, one black person. so my friends that I hung out with in the hallway, I didn’t get to chill in class with. i had to cut up and make class interesting all by myself, which I’m capable of, but it wasn’t as much fun.

but anyways, my first year out of college has stripped me of my ideals. well almost. i really used to believe i was meant to change the planet, to help people, ect ect. but reality is that u can’t do none of that when ur broke. it’s all a game. i don’t mean game as in trivial, i mean game as in the way slinging crack is a game, or the way the music industry is a game. we’re playing for money (in most cases). and just now i understand that loosing is not an option.

everything at this point is a hustle. everything. the way I look. my body. my speech. my handshake. my smile. my music. my writing.

and this is what i’ve learned so far about the real world. makes me want to go back. back to innocence. to kindergarden. with my cuz. and color. outside the lines

masculine feminine/kinda embarrassed

i love this song. and the video. but somehow i feel like i shouldn't. being a male. it's weird. i'm starting to feel like it's a womans world. women are so free. a women can be weak, and it's called being submissive, which is Biblically a admirable trait. they can be a bitch and it's called being progressive. malehood is so narrow. it's broadening some. but that's only when u stray into the realm of homosexuality. anything that doesn't fit into that box of "traditional maleness" is seen as being gay. i don't even like the term metrosexual, cause it sounds too much like homosexual. in this world it's like either u a thug or u gay. where is middle ground? y can't a nigga just be? y do we need all these labels? and then we wonder why everybody is so confused. am i this, am i that?

well as of today: calvin is. i am. simply.

brothers we have to free ourselves. no one will do that for us. not even our women. not even other brothers.

back to the video: so who is this girl? she sexy yo! i also feel bad for liking it cause it's so highschool. and i just got done with that shit. feels like a step backwards. talking bout her locker, and whatnot. YUCKY!

in closing: the dude in the blue was getting it!

we have to love ourselves enuff to be ourselves. to challenge and grow ourselves. regardless of how we are. regardless of this repressive society we live in. regardless of what we see as our mistakes and incapacities.

sometimes it's just hard to breath. i feel it too, yo.

[exhales]

Faith

it's so good to be breathing. life is such a gift. i know it's easy to loose that because life is life. an imperfect world with imperfect people. says my counselor. lol. this is just the firt time in a long time tha ti have felt like myself. and yo like,

it's worth it.

i just have to believe that. that it's worth it. why else would God put us here. i cannot believe someone that powerful would be that mean spirited. He is Holy. and now i kno he loved me regardless.

i am not what i do. i am who i am. says my counselor.

God loves us for who we are. that's deep. as he knew us when the world was dark, in our mother's wombs, as the hairs on our heads are numbered.

i just have to believe. because honstestly right now, it feels like that's all i got. that and a whole lot of hell.

but it's worth it. so begins the blog. officially.

a dream deferred pt. 1

Mel's Mood

she applies her eyeshadow
so skillfully it looks
like two sunrises
under her eyebrows
full of the pastels
that swim the sky
right before the sun arises
a wondrous mix of
blue purple and pink
all atop brown skin
that was good to look at
and even better to touch.

she was a singer
and being intelligent
she understood that image
was very much a part of it
so she got the job
at H&M
and the fly threads
for discount prices
for her and her family.

she was fine.
like butter.
in heels. in flats. in jeans. in skirts.
a distinctive style.
u couldn't buy that shit
in stores. not that way
she hooked it up
with the five dollar
sunglasses. the braclets and beads
from the vendors outside.

we met indoors.
at music. school.
what a paradox.
it was meant
to be
or not to be
that was never the question
but rather
was it beautiful? i say

yes.
beautiful like the colors
pregnant in the sky
as the sun births itself.

or later when the sun
dies it's daily suicide.
all good things must end.
even poetry.
love.

maybe God tryin
to tell me somethin.

just some simple questions

whatup fam. i can't wait to officially like, launch the blog. i plan to have daily updates, and to start another blog that's focused more on my music and making it in the industry. but i do have some questions.

1) how do you post a profile pic, son? i can post pics on my post, but nothing on full profile. wack.

2) if i have video content, how do u i post that?

i knooooo u c it

u ever sometimes just want to be scene? not so much understood. just looked at. not a glance but like, i good long stare. lol. wack i kno. hopefully i grow out of it.

but i knooooooooooooooooooooooooooow u c it.

Simple Struggle

Sometimes I just need to just speak plainly. Even though I am a writer. Perhaps especially because I am I writer. Sometimes I have to be my own best friend. my own father.

After one too many arguments, I now realize that I been trying to make Gods out of mere men. Mere women. Mere people--with emotions just as fragile as mine, with intellects just as meaningless as mines, with eyes just as clouded. I could not even be the friend I demand of my quote unquote friends.

It just came to me, real clear. People cannot give what they don’t have. Asking people who don’t know what love is to love me is like…asking Bush to speak intelligently, like asking me for patience, like Wynton trying to rap, like asking America for freedom. People cannot give you what they don’t have, what they don’t know. I struggle with the simple things in life, seriously.

So ima just stop asking folks, yo. I haven’t been just asking, I been begging. I play these really subtle games and things. I curse when I want to cry. I hurt because I want them to know exactly how that shit feels. Because a lot of the times, people don’t even know what they’re doing to me.

And I argue. I try to intellectualize legitimate, nonsensical emotions because people don’t respect feelings. They respect cause and effect. Logic and shit they can find in a book. But sometimes I’m like yo….even if u don’t understand, can u be there? I think this is the appeal of sex to me. And y I have so much of it. Just be there yo.

Fuck all that understanding foolishness. Because honestly, the same way u don’t understand you, I don’t get me. Anything else is a lie. And to touch is to be redeemed. And that is a lie. But a pretty one.

But I feel like I’m letting go of people by not arguing with them. Arguing is a manifestation of love. Because when you argue you’re saying that u value the other persons opinion. If u didn’t value their opinion, y would you argue? Sometimes I argue because I want them to be there. And so I think that some kind of intellectual understanding would make them act right. Make them love me.

But honestly, people use intellectual shit to tell lies. People intellectualize their fear, sadness. By intellectualize I mean try to justify themselves. I'm doing it now. Here's the honesty:

I’m soooo tired.

Of hurting.

So I’m not going to hurt anymore. And I’m going to fuck more often. Not because I’m shallow…but because sometimes that is the most u can ask from some people.

It’s not right, but it’s ok.

yo i'm a pianist! www.myspace.com/unlockthekeys

www.myspace.com/unlockthekeys enjoy the sounds! add me! give me a gig! or a straight financial donation. college ain't free! (and it's barely useful). "keep it movin" (my aunt pat):

i orginally wrote this for my myspace page. but someone thought it was unchristian, so i removed it. it's wierd but i feel like i'm going to have to edit and revise myself, in order for people to see what they need to see. i thought a pure calvin would be enuff. but obviously not. so henceforth everything will be "an image". you'll c.

anyway, this is back when i was trying to let people c me. foolishnes (or purity, innocence) is bound up in the heart of a child. here it goes: as unchristian as it gets:

i's my fathers son.he had a temper.sometimes he would hit me out of anger rather than discipline.impulsive.aggressive.as he is, so i am.with some exceptions.i didn't like football.he played in highschool and college.i didn't like the outdoors.i had allergies.and plus all the ( ) kids were skateboarding.and i tried skateboarding but it wasn't for me.nor were those kids.//i did gymnastics.i liked seeing dominique dawes at the '96 Olympics.her sexy behind.i like the idea of being graceful.of being limber.being fly.jazz.flying.on the fly.on a wall.crying.but i will also hit a mutherfucker.out of anger.as i am my father's...i hit hard.on the keys.not touch wise but i'm saying i be going for it.i be playing but not playing around.inside.outside.over.through.but never around.i like being fly.like ms. dawes. i do sound b(l)ack flips.handsprings.summersa(u)lts.no clogged arties.two my cuzins dead from over indulence...my cuzins talking bout where daddy at.where are our fathers?...Jesus Christ saved my life.and in the spirit of sonship i look to my father for a lot.last week for the first time, he talked to me like i was a man.//"if u want to stay in new york this summer, make it happen."//i hate college.i go to the new school for jazz and contemporary music.(i think jazz is contemporary music.maybe that's the problem.i definately know there is a problem.i got theories and shit.holler at me.)i love music because at the end of the day i'm not that smart.reality is a bitch and i head that she bites. i'm tryign to take a bite out this big apple, is hard.hard.paying rent for the first time.hard.insufficient funds. HARD. wanting those new kicks and having to wait.hard.that motherfucker shooting at Virgina Tech, right in my backyard.them not releasing those names soon enough.HARD.//music is a way for me to transcend my limitations as an intellectual.it is worship to me.when i can forget the circumstance say...God is.where i can feel beyond what i know.where faith and the joy of Lord are palpable.when i can nob my head in reverance.jazz is that vibe, in the moment.i'll take u to church the club.in Jesus's name.//i'm a writer sing (a little.of this little of that).but ma(i)nly.i'm my Father's son.they tell me i'm the spitting image.that would b nice.but sometimes i hit.hard.not out of discipline.but anger.young.black.male.stuntin like my Daddy.

www.myspace.com/unlockthekeys

and if u really want some more calvin, a be on facebook quite often. it's like myspace, only cleaner. like difference between sam'l club and walmart. i'll let u think about that one. alright.--calvin

Beautiful Things: Denny and The Revolutionary Every Day

It’s hard to eavesdrop. Polished wooden floorboards lie exposed down the middle of the rectangular room, and either side is lined with black leather seats. The room is generally neat and symmetrical, except for the area at the back of the shop where too many leather and poof jackets crowd the racks. But that’s the customers. Denny has nothing to do with that. It feels empty, with high ceilings and motionless fans, perfect for eavesdropping--but for the steady hum of clippers.
The shop is new, been open a year and some change. With 5 barber booths on each side, Denny Moe’s Superstar Barbershop is about three times the size of any of the other shops or salons on Harlem’s Frederick Douglass Blvd between 133rd and 134th streets. Despite the large capacity, there’s not that much talking going on. The 50% owner and manager of the shop Denny Moe explains that it’s because the shop is so big that conversations are usually confined to the barber and the client, instead of the philosophizing and banter bouncing around the entire place like it used to in older, smaller shops.
Speaking from 27 years of experience at 3 different barbershops, Denny says “most barbershops have an intimate setting. At the first shop I was at, we had no TV and radio was to a minimum. We had to entertain each other.” A middle-aged customer chimes in, gesturing and tapping his feet for emphasis with his head leaned back in a sink, hair being coerced back to youth. The men of the barbershop were “part barber, part psychologist, part fashion consultant. For years it’s been a therapy place for men, where we could congregate, talk, and chill.” The absence of women in most barbershops allows for black men to define themselves collectively. As such, in an era when blackness itself has become a brand, a commodity, and manhood is validated by mere things, the barbershop is a potent, vital place.

The flatscreen is usually tuned to Maury, Jerry Springer, Judge Mathis and his cohorts, or The True Crime Channel. Alternately barber and client alike criticize and revel in the outrageous, perhaps to normalize their mundane but underrepresented struggles. Today on Maury, a plump, oily-faced, weave-laden former prostitute is loudly admonishing promiscuous 14 year-olds girls, punctuating each sermonette with an angry “Nah hug yo mama!” And while we smile and shake our heads, it is understood that baby/mama drama is real.
Aaric, younger than some of the other barbers, is 34 but he could be 21. Clean-shaven with generous wide smile, he moved to New York to be with his former girlfriend and their daughter. He has another daughter in Ohio, “I hate it because I don’t see my daughter as much as I want.” Luckily he only has to pay child support for one child, which is 22% of ones income after taxes. “Child support is Uncle Sam’s sister.” As if to typify his story, a couple comes into the shop, the woman looking to use the restroom. While the she is gone, the brother hears our conversation and says “There go my daughter mother right there.” I think he said they were just coming from court.
Aaric: “And y’all can still walk down the street together? That’s a beautiful thing.”
“It is what it is.”

That single parent homes are a staple of the black community makes it unlikely that family could be created in a place of commerce. Aaric says “You live with these people. I feel closer to these dudes than I do my own blood.” Speaking of Denny Aaric says “You have to have a strong head of the table. Most owners don’t actually cut hair. They just come and collect the money.” That fact that Denny is a barber makes him a effective and empathetic leader.
Denny’s entrepreneurship is mirrored by that of his barbers. Each barber pays booth rent, sets his own prices, and deals individually with their own clientele. In this business model, individual and collective success is oftentimes one and the same. Denny mediated monthly meetings where the barbers set standards for dealing with customers, and settle internal disputes.
He also made sure that all of his barbers were licensed. Aaric says “To find a shop owner who has a masters who won’t charge $500 to $1,000 dollars is a feat.” Denny did it for free. The certificates are all neatly framed with taped in pictures of the respective barber.

Denny grew up Frederick Douglas Boulevard which he, like most Harlemites, still calls “8th Ave”. Walking down the streets now, you can see into Harlem. The flesh is torn. Newly completed apartments are still wrapped in metal structures, tall condos just in the beginning stages are bare skeletons of metal. Even the leafless trees seem naked, at the mercy of winter wind that pushes discarded artifacts down the Boulevard.
As his neighborhood is changing to accommodate people who aren’t from Harlem, Denny is expanding on the paradigm of the barbershop as community center. Denny tells his son that “he doesn’t need the hood, the hood needs him.” Activism through the shop is appearent in the little things. The counter beside the window is replete with advertising for other local black owned businesses, but also with flyers for financial and tax services, credit score recall and home ownership, cultural events around town, and barbershop events funding and coordinated by Denny. Last week’s was Networking 101, and this week it’s a poetry reading in honor of Women’s History Month.
Dressed in a Sean John shirt, Rocawear sweats, and clean white sneakers, Denny says he’s not too much into hip-hop—the deceased Gerald Levert provides the bumpin musical supplement to the shop’s Myspace page. But when asked he has plenty to say about our cultures obsession with consumerism rather than investment, the way promiscuity is glorified and how it undermines they family. But all of this consciousness he says, is rooted in a love for cutting hair, and compassion for people.
A big man who is quietly impacting, effortlessly authoritative, Denny was a bodyguard for 12 years. He used to work for Keith Sweat. “I love people smiling, b. I been doing security for a lot of years and my biggest thing is just seeing people happy. Sitting back and watching over them, making sure that they are safe…It’s a beautiful thing.”

facebook is amazing. he just wanted an answer. dot.dot.dot.

so it's like facebook Q&A:

Q: 9:51pm Wednesday, Apr 25
Alright, family. Get your Bibles out and take a look at Luke 9:23-25.
(I rock the King James Version)

"And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, or be cast away?"

Now the way i see it, Jesus is telling us that to we need to submit to God, because a life w/o Him means nothing and an eternity with God means everything.
But is it cool if being scared of Hell becomes are reason for loving God? I don't really believe love can be true based on fear...

I asked this question at a Bible study thing and the man continued to try and brainwash me with little anecdotes. And it wasn't even cute! So i propose the question to you all.
Hit me back

i'm curious to see what madison's gonna say...


A: (this is (was) me) i don't understand what the contention is. u have this way of complicating very simple issues. but at that same time, i appreciate u cause it's not a lot of people our age willing to ask questions like this. but i will say this to you. God does not require deepness. he requires obediance. to take up your cross and walk means just that. we are to be like christ. and obedience for him, just as for us, means sacrafice.

and i fuck this up EVERYDAY man. esp. at the place i'm week at. u kno me man. like last night i was at an amazing party, but i felt INCREDIBLY lonely. robert glasper, bilal, all my idols there and i know them, we cool peoples. but like......inside man. u can be in a room full of freinds and be lonely....and i've always been a bit prone to that phenomenon ANYWAY.

but the way i delt with it was to get and drunk as possible. i had one long island ice tea. and this fat, funny, but very very unattractive gay man bought me a second one.
Delete

Calvin Brown wrote
at 8:40am
and that was my way of coping. knowing that niggas just don't be buying other niggas drinks, i was just going for it. the life of the party. superstar status. but at the end of the line, drunk, and very alone.

to deny myself would have been to just be lonely, and to try to engage those people and build relationships with them. but i get tired of that shit man. people suck. i've had my fill of people

and that's how i know only Christ can fill me.

on fear vs. love: perfect love casts out all fear. obedience is better than sacrafice. meaning that we should just walk simply in life, with integrity. i'm finding that life is MAD simple yo. it is us who complicate it. but yea, i LOVE Christ because he first LOVED me. beucase i'm in my right mind. because i am alive. because because. just because. just it's pretty outside.

my obedience comes out of that yo. i want to be a living breathing thanks you to God. a writing, playing, love letter to GOD.
Delete

Calvin Brown wrote
at 8:41am
in all my ways, i'll acknowledge him, and he will direct my path.

and i won't have to want 4 nuffin!

aight my dude! peace--calvin

yo ima poet!

How we love

She say I make her tiahd
And I understand
I’m tired two and
And she and me are becoming one

She say she feels like a rat
Running on a wheel
And I understand
We young
We black
We got love

Unfortunately they
Are old
Dull
White
And in power

I dig she we i
Want to make or movents
Count
For us
Know freedom beyond the glass
No the taste of real cheese
Not shit they give us in college
That don’t smell or taste like knowledge
We feel ourself
Running around in these white peoples circle
Feel our black dieties
Like rats

She/we/I
So beautiful
I want to sing
Like she do
When I’m there
Behind her
Supporting her
Weithgt.
Pushing her
Deeper
Into our
Love/music

Aint’ nobody talking bout fuckin

Don’t need none of this college
This weed, this alchol, this drugs
Thse niggas these broads.
These men these women, this academia

Things they say will dull the pain
Or at least explain it

All I want(ed)
Was is her

Me

Us

In my inner ear

Cause I’m tired.



Folgers


I told him soandso I’d wake up
And he’d be gone
It wouldn’t be as it was
Last nite when I was awake
When I was with soandso
Beyond touch. Beyond cellular connections.
Beyond the fone dying. Beyond sounds and fontier.
Soandso so pushed me to the outmost skirts of being a man.
Soandso made me strong and weak and vulnerable.

and then it was time to hang up.

In time with the litlting ryhtm of
The last couple weeks
I sleep for about to hours.
Then rise to work.

Just like before.

But a morning
A miracle happened again
On my phone

This time a text.

I love you.

I remember it was raining outside.
It was a hard day with an ominous beginning.

But the best part of waking up
Was you.

In my thoughts and whatnot.

I’ll always love u for loving me,
the next morning.

My nigga.