{mal waldron} & {cold horizons}-{ten}

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japanese island - mal waldron
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atomic energy - mal waldron
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it would seem that mal is on the move here at !!crescere!! i hope you'll agree that this is a very good thing. he is fast becoming a new favorite of mine. many thanks to bacoso over at o.i.r. for this session as well as "reminicent suite" which reaped the beast that is "black forest." i posted that one back in february. on both of these recordings, mal is supported by a full on japanese backing band with no repeats of personnel from one session to the other. this one finds mal working in a trio, and like josh, i do love me a smokin' piano,drum & bass trio. these two tracks will tell you why.
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also included in this post is my last {cold horizon} poem for this season. i have thoroughly enjoyed this experiment and intend to pick it back up sometime early next winter. i hope you've enjoyed it also. this one was written days after the earthquake/tsunami struck japan's coast, and was definitely provoked by it. i had hoped to get it up sooner then this. all the same, enjoy:
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{cold horizons}-{nine}

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hum-dono - joe harriott/amancio d'silva quartet

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{nine}

all the noises in the world
have found there way in
become the noises in your head
and you seem all smothered
you’re surrounded you say
hemmed in by all the things
of the groping void
so that everything
just dulls into an all pervasive nothing
and there you lie
lost & stuck
in a hundred different ways
retreating inward
reaching out
for the slow-motion floating refuge
of the dark womb
of God’s love
to be unalone & silenced
dreaming the nothing dream
growing into the warm bliss
of the soft tissue embrace
entranced by nothing more
than the gentle hum
of the Holy Spirit
& the muffled world to come

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{cold horizons}-{eight}

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Pharoah Sanders - Upper Egypt & Lower Egypt

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{{{eight}}}

along with the world

i watched the protestors in Tahrir Square on the television set

as they bravely huddled together like pigeons

and began to rage against their diminishing cages & coops

they looked so unlike a crowded people all mashed together there

faces as free as a migratory flock

with their unrelenting wings beating in unison

against the current of their cold horizons

i sat there in my looking silence

i watched them fly a great distance

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{cold horizons}-{seven}

{utopia & visions} - {don cherry}

{{{seven}}}

when you rise up, quietly sing the humming wordless song that lights you - strum strum for the dancing curtains of the wintry morning - for if we’re to live for all of eternity - wheels that keep turning - pulling us further & further until they’re worn into nothing but a vanishing memory of time - than we should say so

go out - walk the treeline - feel the sun - cast your shadows – mutter afresh the story and listen – for if this day you can walk as you do - flannel flag flying free in the pink edges of an orange sky that is pink edgedly orange in just this way, never to be repeated - then you should say so

and if i – today - can tow with ease this chain of glinting thoughts & sounds as they unravel from me endlessly in just this way - churning & bobbing within my dome only - here & gone as quick as they came – than i should say so

for if we are immortal as we sleep in our tangled dreams & cotton sheets - if we are fixed in the sky of God’s good pleasure - a fixture of His golden gaze - set free to shine in ceaseless stardusting reverie - if we are loved - not merely tolerated beneath a pact of unspeakable bloodshed (holy & worthy of perpetual praise) but actually & truly befriended – invited – pursued – embraced – wanted – then strum strum - ring the bells - and let us say so!

<{cold horizons}-{six}>

{six}

reaching
for the solitary cloud
of the crystal morning

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wayfaring pilgrim - ola belle reed
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<{cold horizons}-{five}>

<{cold horizons}-{four}>

{four} such a fond short flash the way we kept the little birds warm all thru the night - new hampshire to virginia and back - if those birds knew just half the words that gave heat to their feet i reckon we’d both be flying by now

<{cold horizons}-{a mixtape}>

{three}

at the prospect of the coming months
i rub my feet together like two sticks
i should probably strip the tree of tinsel this afternoon
toss it’s dead, dry body into the shallow snow beyond the plow drifts
maybe clear a path to the barn
but it’s likely i won’t
i can feel the weight of that tree just looking at it
can feel the labor of it in my heart
once again the cold horizon calls to me thru the curtains
as the old furnace issues another cough
the house creaking

rattling from one end to the other like a shiver in the spine
man is wood tough!
oh God how i wish i was as tough as a tree
strong & upright
i feel like a bent birch
cold & heavy like a snow bank
dark as night
there’s time yet i suppose for me to take up my tree
it would likely do me good to get out
walk the length of the road to the mailbox
let my eyes tear up with wind
take in the cutting air like a winston
sure as sundown, it would do me good
and surely i’ve got a mind to do it
but i’ve minded these things before

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man climbs out of the winter - cotton jones

la chaleur - bertrand belin

january 4th - wixel

raisins & almonds - yusef lateef

migration - the innocence mission

mellow my mind (neil young) - j. tillman

i'm so depressed - abner jay

ramblin' man - hank williams sr.

high time - the grateful dead

young bride - midlake

snow - real estate

things in life - dennis brown

a message from the underground bunkers - psychedelic schafferson jetplane

texas 71 - magnolia electric co.

if i ever needed someone - van morrison

mykonos - fleet foxes

look out the window so they won't see you crying - bobb bruno

solitaire - wilco

Lord, i'm in Your care - the carter family

go down, moses - padang food tigers

<{cold horizons}-{two}>

{two}
abiding in the contemplative silence of what it means for me to love within my own reach – to walk beside the fearsome death loitering in the foreground of all our unspoken queries as we sense the gaze – to live & breathe alongside those who live & breathe in that long lonesome wait for the clapping praise that never seems to come - one good word can carry a woman thru fire – can raise a man above the treeline – how seldom we are free of it – keeping silence I hear it so loud in me – silence is for the brave or maybe the ignorant - i am neither

the static – when it settles - what fortress does He hold out for me that I’ve not yet reached for - not begun to grasp – what refuge reserved – what rest?

<{Cold Horizons}>

hope some folks are up for a bit of poetry during these long winter months. i've recently been inspired to begin a series of poems to get me thru this season. i have a bad habit of gettin' the blues, especially this time of the year. once the holidays have passed, it's a long haul here in the backwoods of new hampshire. perhaps a few of you know where i'm comin' from. adding to this, i've been feeling the need to push myself into a new place with my poetry lately. getting overly analytical & critical (conscious) of what you're writing can be pretty debilitating at times. i've been rereading kerouacs "mexico city blues" collection recently, and just read his mini philosophy on writing called "essentials of spontaneous prose" (here). i've loosely tried my hand at this before and always get stuck when it comes to editing (kerouac is anti-edit) and end up frustrated. for this collection of poetry, i'm goin' for it. if i don't edit - alright. if i do edit - it's cool baby, it's cool. if editing robs my poetry of the purity of essence, than put me down as non-essential. i'm in it to have a good time while attempting to purge myself of the winter blues. hope you guys enjoy looking in on the experiment. if you haven't figured it out yet, i'll be calling the collection "cold horizons." here goes:

{ONE}

taking me by the hand
she leads on to the smooth majestic elbow strokes
meandering knees
& God knows what else
creepy wonders marvelous & alive!
& all this awe purely from the outside
but in me
the shame - oh God
of the small shallow vision that I carry