Author: cobey

The Long and Short of It

the long and short of it is, I got the fear. the day will come, however. when I make the change, it will be across the board. I’m gonna dump everything and go underground. though you often call bullshit on me, I truly have no material desires, once I step away from the silly impulses of my body to procreate. what I want is revolution; I hate that what you have is more important than who you are. we are so advanced in civilization that those kinds of things should no longer matter, and I am sick of that kind of weakness. I am not free of it, as you are well aware, but I am truly tired of being a slave to it.

it is funny to me that you and I go round and round about this, without gaining any ground. and funnier that, though we seem to have our eyes on different horizons, we continue to tread the same path. I don’t think either of us is willing to really open our eyes to where it actually leads. this is my goal. I want to create a community where community is paramount, not competition. I truly believe that if we build it, they will come. in the end, it will like all things, destroy itself, but in doing so, like jesus on the cross, it will live forever in the souls of those who believe. I think that is my purpose in life, as self important as it may sound.

GAS WAR – an idea that WILL work

if you received the email GAS WAR – an idea that WILL work, consider this:
 
Saudi Arabia has 25% of the world’s oil. Iraq comes in second. 
 
While there are quite a few “oil companies” in the world, there are really only a handful of conglomerates who control distribution and pricing:  BP, Shell, Total, and ExxonMobil. All of the names you find on the pumps are subsidiaries of these umbrella companies. Of them, Shell is the most realistic about their role in the environment; their CEO admits that unless the world begins extracting carbon from the atmosphere and returning it to the subterrane, the outlook is grave.
 
CITGO is owned by the national oil company of Venezuela, who nationalized all oil related industry in 1977. Venezuela has the fifth largest reserves in the world, and is the fifth largest supplier of US oil, after Canada, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and Nigeria. They currently are in negotiations with China, the fastest growing consumer market.
 
At current rates of consumption, only 40 years of oil reserves remain. 
 
Brazil is on the verge of announcing energy independence. The country already satisfies nearly half of its domestic passenger vehicle fuel demand with ethanol from sugar cane. The refineries that produce the ethanol are powered by waste from the ethanol production process. 

Corn is the only source of raw material for ethanol production in the US, and most studies indicate it takes nearly as much energy to produce the corn ethanol as the fuel provides. Ethanol accounts for approximately 4% of US fuel consumption.

As far as pricing goes, brand-name boycotting is an ineffective mechanism. These are wealthiest companies on the planet controlling the most valuable commodity on earth. If you boycott one company, they will purchase the name of the company you are buying. Get a clue!
 
And lastly, STOP YOUR WHINING, you lazy, self-absorbed imbeciles! You cannot have your cake and eat it too. Your grandchildren will pay the price of your indolence. 
 
Quit driving. Buy local. Grow your own foodstuffs. Reduce.

You must be the change you want to see in the world – Mahatma Gandhi

Happy Earth Day – April 22, 2006

4/20 Story

went downtown Carbondale to look for a hip restaurant cuz I’m staying out in little california where there is nothing but applebees knockoffs, soy burgers, and taco hell. parked at the town square intent on wandering the streets towards Southern Illinois University in search of my kind. ah, ha! a dread headed couple walking south on the other side of the street. I pick up my pace. a few blocks and I can cut them off. they know the score for sure. perfect! I dash across the street and approach ’em with a kind smile. “hey dread, where’s the herb?” mind you this is an absolutely hippie looking little bugger right off the campus of UM. beard, cords, you know the drill. the expression on his face shows that he knows, but his lady looks rather dubious of my polo shirt. hey, not all of us have a trust fund. so I have a job, big deal. I’m part of the System. how do you think your parents are paying the bill on the credit card they gave you? what, do you think Haile Selassie is covering that? do you even know who Haile Selassie is? I was burning herb before you quit wetting the bed. I try to stay calm. his face sez yes, but the mouth sez, “uh . . . no.” shouldn’t rasta be rasta despite the ramifications of answering yes to this question, even if I am the law? better give him another chance. “are you sure?” the smell of patchouli lingers in the air as they slink off to his Land Cruiser, dreadlocks between their legs. damn them! its four fuckin’ twenty, for Bob’s sake. go join the Peace Corps or Hitler Youth or something, you worthless poseurs!

Dear Mr. Tanner Thomas

I recently read your article in Teen World News. After reading it, I felt compelled to redress several points.

First, a war cannot be stupid. Ridiculous, yes. Absurd, certainly. But stupid describes a trait of the mind, and a war cannot be stupid any more than it could be boisterous or happy or intelligent. I grant that in modern English, stupid and meaningless are often utilized interchangeably, but I must note that a promising young writer such as yourself ought to get in the habit of using the words that truly capture the essence of what it is they are trying to express. As I am confident that you believe the war does have meaning, or at least some point, be it good or bad, I feel that a quick visit to the thesaurus would better allow me to grasp what it was you actually wanted me to comprehend.

Second, I must state that the reason we went to Iraq, and continue to remain in Iraq, is because you and I both want us there. Regardless of how you perceive your feelings over the matter to be, the facts of your actions, and the actions of all Americans, dictate that we invade and conquer Iraq. The deaths of Marines and Iraqi civilians to which you allude in your article are the direct result of your own daily choices, and mine. Every time I pull up to the gas pump and fill my tank with gasoline shipped here from Iraqi oil fields secured by American troops, I am stating explicitly that I want to be in Iraq. Every time you drive anywhere, you are supporting the foreign policy that provides the cheap oil products that get you there.   

I wholeheartedly agree that we should not be in Iraq. But I am tired of the hypocrisy of those who cry for peace while they continue to demand the lifestyle only war can ensure.

If you want to change the world, change yourself.

Thank you for the excellent article.

Sincerely,

Cobey Williamson

The Ballad of Orchard Drive

Just up the line from Orchard Drive
By the concrete factory
Sam Walton’s own is displacing homes
From the Bitterroot Valley
See all the folks who ain’t lost hope
Are moving far away
So that at night the halide lights
Don’t drive ‘em plumb insane

Now all Ravalli County’s
Had the chance to cast their vote
And those opposed weren’t even close
To sinking Wally’s boat
Because it seems that when convenience
And integrity collide
What’s good for me doth supersede
And sweep the rest aside

They leased the land from some old man
Who’d forgot what it's worth
To occupy the country side
And homestead of your birth
They done plowed the prairie under
And they paved it wall to wall
So in trade for self sufficience
The ‘Roots now got a shopping mall

Well I propose to them who chose
To bring that beast around
They trade their place and open space
For Wal-Mart’s neighbors’ ground
But somehow I doubt I got the clout
To make these poor fools understand
Sometimes the reason not to
Is just simply ‘cause you can

Poem (Untitled)

can’t find the source can’t find the sea closed system nothing gained nothing lost everything is constant just bounce along a stream is static and dynamic a single entity and a zillion individual molecules of hydrogen and oxygen all at once is it measured in an instant or over time why why not a crocodile in the kootenai but how does that relate to a billion people all concerned with immediate deliberations there’s no figuring it out it’s a circle or maybe a down around route coming back to a same beginning about food, status, reproduction, deduction of construction of this thing we call what is if I does for I and self for self what is love and why does it exist or does it exist at all do we know anything beyond words and chemical reactions refractions of light bend time and if a blind deaf dumb man with no sense of smell was floating in space would he even know if he existed and if he knew of self would he love is self-love innate if I don’t know what any word means how can I know what any other word means so do I know anything at all of course I do I don’t but how can a chinaman and I both know a rock will fall to the earth if neither of us has ever seen one another or a rock fall or would it even fall at all lofty goals are they really lofty and does lofty truly mean self-sacrificing?

Poem (Untitled)

You ever fasted
Outlasted
Physiological demands
Become the master of the outcome
Of any given span
Planned the future in a vision
Brought to fruition with the will
Focus your intention and faith can turn a hill
Into a mountain
Or a mountain to the sea
Remove all reservation
And the truth will simply be

29 April, 1992

The brothers got mad
they had a right to
having seen years of struggle
nullified in twenty-three minutes
of brutality
and nineteen minutes
of deliberation

Suddenly Rosa Parks' sacrifice
was rendered inconsequential
for segregation was self-imposed
and they stood together
a tight mob, monochrome
exhaling an air of violence
poised, guarded
and whereas before
they would beckon me to join them
to laugh and stomp
today there would be no revelry

And when I approached
they shifted uneasily in their places
averting their eyes from the Devil's gaze
as Perseus from Medusa
and only after I lingered on
at the edge of that seething mass
did the one best known to me
step forward and say
"we cannot speak to you today"
and although I had known I was white
every day of my life
I had never before then realized
what that looked like
through the eyes of someone who wasn't