rootwork the rootsblog: a cyberhoodoo webspace

im rolling

THURSDAY

so i every year do honors orientation, where i basically hangout with 15 honors students
for a couple of months, whole 1st year cohort does this book/lecture thing, this year its

excellent sheep by wm deresiewiczs, so I'm skimming it to see what chaps worth assigning
& damn if it hasn't caught me - its all about how american society trains its elites, the ruthless

winnowing they caught up in as student achievers, my students, my best students, and i realize
I'm just another pit stop - they come roaring in, i change the tires, check the oil, tune em up, hold up

two fingers, ask them if they good, you good? and wave them back into the race,
hopefully a little faster, a little stronger, than whence they arrived -

as a mystic, writer and teacher of young writers, i instinctively try to illuminate & empower them (awaken
the sleeper, guide the strong) & i don't agree w/everything he saying but this book is giving me more
understanding of the process I'm trying to both subvert and improve - life is so damn complicated

 

 

WEDNESDAY

i was really feeling my oats yesterday, 1st day of class brought me
back to the real world i guess, the holybook has become another drudge
and im not comfortable not working on novel so i will have to do them both
and my schoolhouse obligations, & numerous manuscripts . . .

im tired, im weary, im dispirited . . .

 

 

TUESDAY

the hammer hath fallen, cant make the princeton afrofuturism/activism conference on 14th
i missed my class yesterday, read the time wrong, next monday is laborday, which

means i cant miss the 1st 3 classes, that just wont do, if i had made class yesterday
i coulda swung it, planned it, the gods are fucking with me, i got to use this hammer

constructively, interesting it comes as i am working on my holybook and finally
starting to see it come together and i am determined now that these afrofuture

folk wont ignore me any longer, was already unhappy having to go as a civilian
instead invited visionary, ima use this hammer to work harder on my holybook

and take off some of my online visionary gloves, was working on this passage this morning
posted it on FB, dont care who salutes/likes it, when you speaking to future generations

sometimes you bore this one, but if you explain then you will bore the future
im in an interesting phase of life, feeling pretty mortal these days

and working full court on this holybook and immersing

myself in that headset, its changing me
sending me back to my mystical roots:

the 9 afroam points of pilgrimage: The Door of No Return at Cape Coast Castle, the peak of Palmares,
Memphis in the Heart of the Delta, Dismal Swamp & the Hanging Tree, the Foot of Jebal Barkal, the Family
Stones, the Stone of Babajohn Killens, Sunrise at Timbuctu, . . oh I don't know, got to think this one thru, do
some research, or maybe you choose your own - this I do know, 3 more times will Memphis rise, a planet, a
solar system, and then a state of mind, the 9 points of pilgrimage go where we go

 

 

SUNDAY

okay, not only am i dug in but i am determined to get this off my plate now
at least the 1st take, so ima give it priority for rest of the year, its nonfiction

should be doable, its like working on a long article
will still try to work on the new material for novel but

this will be priority for rest of the year, too me damn near
a month to clean up brer rabbit and it was a clean text

tired of talking about this work, time to get it done
the real challenge is that it doesnt feel profound but

i just got to finish it since i started it and dont lt
anxieties have a say, let anxieties have a say &

no work will get done

rdoc

SATURDAY - DAY MINUS 2

still rolling, in the zone, clocking pages

interesting though, mr im gon share my work w/the world is balking
now that its starting to be something worthwhile, ie a book, will have

to see how this works, will put an abridged version and hope
it doesnt kill of the book, alexander chee raised question on FB

regarding mfa programs digitizing the student library and if it
had interfered with a student getting a pub deal

i dont want to kill the book as product, i will have to find th balance
just enough to tease, my other concern is that this will be received

as my other works have been received,
with a big cultural and professional yawn

im concerned its not nearly as profound as i need it to be
im wallowing in a pit of anxiety but i just got to ignore all that

and do it, once you commit to a project you cant let
the inevitable anxieties have any say, let me get

back to work, got 2 days left, will consider
whatever i have to be 1st draft, not really

i got about 10 days i can squeeze out of
b eginning of semester, do a redpen w/that

i will be good to go

problem right now i got some segments w/nothing in them
and then i got segments w/too much, 2 and 3 pages, basically

im bringing each segment in at about a page and a half
im trying to keep it tight, but a new segment ilke morality

i got nothing so far, just got to focus enuf to generate the
raw and finish incorporating about 5 pages of notes

that what i will be doing today, 1) working thru notes
2) filling in holes w/raw  3) disciplining overdone ones

do that and i will have a draft

all my love

 

 

 

WHO KNOWS WHEN THIS WAS

im averaging about 3 - 5 movements a day, im shocked, o its rough
stuff, im not trying to do a good draft, im just trying to do a draft

so ima full court press this weekend then put up whatever i
have, by mid sept ima have a full draft up, then i can put it down

catchup schoolhouse and rest for the weary and work on
the new draft intermittently, the advantage of having a draft

online is i can get a feel for cultural feedback and make adjustments
my big fear of course is that it will be like my other works and get no play

ohwell, such is life in the longgame  -  all my love

rdoc

 

 

me and god got an understanding

hope I don't offend too many folk w/this one but I been thinking about god, folk know me know I aspire to be a prophet of the hoodoo way - this is problematic on many levels, one of which is my complex relationship w/god, consider myself the/a voice of god but I cant believe in god like the prophets of old, that archaic divine sensibility just don't work for me, its like, you know, archaic - when the plane dip im still liable to go o jesus but I also understand jesus was not jesus because of any spurious miracles, but because of what he had to say about our ever evolving relationship with god and each other - humanity has long deciphered the formative dynamics of religion and myths we understand should no longer have power over us - except to the degree that we choose to let them - we don't know what god is but we do know what god aint, no bearded patriarch, no earth mother, no 40 virgins, no bodhi tree, no quarreling pantheons, to name god is to try to encompass god, make god manageable, every culture does it, I do it - im comfortable with god the universe (or multiverse) that's the one I choose to believe, the one work for me, I don't need god to be a person, somebody I can talk to, beg, cajole and praise, I man comfortable cosmic – other day I was watching neil degrasse explain that the molecules of our bodies are the detritus of stars that exploded aeons ago and that while we are all part of the universe the universe is also part of us, its all like this one big whole, and I have not yet been able to totally wrap my head around the implications of that but in my meditational practice, when im doing what I call godwork, attempting to be one w/god, one with the universe, I call myself aligning my spiritual center, my mojo, with the center of the universe, with the godhead, where every thought changes things, where . . . well, let me not go into esoterics by rickydoc on you, I envy organized religion the peace of mind it bring, the power it deliver when its right, both spiritual and in the world, I envy the fellowship, the pastoral - but i man playing the role god intend me to play, and in this I firmly believe, as any other would-be prophet, that I am doing gods will - illumination of the human condition, making real into the world that which was not, shaping generations in our ongoing quest to be greater than we are – me and god got an understanding

under water

THUR 8/20

hello world, i am so buried in this end of woodshed moment
so im working the novel right and im generating all this new text

which is incredibly frustrating cause its bad text and i feel like im spinning my wheels
but im trudging thru when i realize i got about 2, 3 weeks left in woodshed so i think at

least get a draft of the hoodoo book of flowers done, my wouldbe african american holybook
so im thinking about a week or two i turn those notes i got now into rough text, count it as a win

i do not have to tell you how this turned out, im dug in now, i want my draft, so its going to
complicate the beginning of my schoolhouse year cause i want my draft and also im

putting a truncated early draft version online, ima basically use rootwork.com to do that
ive had that url for almost 2 decades, from earliest years of the net and i copped it and

have refused to let it go, now i got use for it, ima put the hoodoo book of flowers online
even though i know whatever you put online you just giving it away and folk will steal et al

but such is life of the intellect in the digital world, i want it to be part of the dialogue, so out you go
still working on the book version as work of art so this will also be like marketing

right now trying to establish a collaboration with charles bibb for imagery like the piece above
hopefully that will pan out, its become an integral part of the vision but if

not, one takes the punch and keeps pushing, it will be a lesser work but such is life
i feel good though because this draft will be a working draft, still will have a lot of

work to get done but these days the point is to leave a viable work for when the
clock strike done on you, something i can die on, my days are no longer given

 

hello world

ima try to get some energy over here on rootsblog
i been in the woodshed and all my social media

energy been given to facebook, trolling for 'likes'
instant gratification, been dug in on novel, going

for epic this time, compacting it, making progress, i feel it
but its a grind im in an amadeus grind, where he

worked himself to death, the zone, when real work get done,
a mortal contest, do i finish the project or do i collapse 1st

im burning up my years

the creative process is the only
god before which i bow