I've been unable to update here for a while (even longer at www.kristofferdiaz.com).
I'll be diving back into the liner notes soon.
But there's a whole lot going on at myspace.
Friday, March 23, 2007
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Sunday, March 11, 2007
The Stories Behind The Fly Girls, VI.
I am well at work on the second book. The best way to send me suggestions for poems is to go to the myspace page, but you can also go ahead and e-mail me. Or leave a comment here.
And don't forget to buy the first book.
31. Prehensile Toes and Von Zipper Sunglasses -- Written for the amazing Angie (seriously, she's insanely amazing), this poem came to exist in about fifteen seconds. I fell back on the haiku, as I always do when in doubt. As for the back story, it's about prehensile toes and Von Zipper sunglasses. I'm not sure I even know what Von Zipper sunglasses are. Damn Los Angeles.
32. Office Tension: A Sketch -- Man, I'm not saying I know anything about inter-office romances. But somehow, someone decided that I was the right person to write about such a topic. Seeing as how I know nothing about the topic from personal experience--NOTHING, I SAY--I decided to handle it with a sketch. The hope was just to catch that moment after the initial attraction, after a late night of getting to know each other better, let's say, when you see each other and realize you'll see each other everyday. I'd imagine that's kind of exciting.
33. Bounce Bounce Swish -- This was written in an exercise conducted by the infamous (not really) Aya Ogawa, who happens to be a genius and way smarter than me and makes art in ways I wish I could. She had several of us (including Christina Anderson, our fellow Van Lier Fellow) create poems based out of a series of phrases and feelings and items that we all came up with collaboratively, and this is what came out. Then we gave each other massages, but I had a broken thumb at the time, so I think she got only half a massage, really. Anytime I get to work Derek Jeter into a poem or play, I take advantage of the opportunity, so that explains a lot of this, I think.
34. Fly Girls: Three Sketches -- This was written for wray, who gave me a bunch of answers to one of the questionnaires I made available to, well, Fly Girls. There was so much there in her responses that I couldn't settle on one approach, leading me to come up with three quick first-impression sketches that, I think, complement each other in terms of tone and rhythm, if not content.
35. Love Song -- The request was to write a love song. And man, I hate to hear that as a request. I'm generally anti-love songs, not because I'm anti-love (if anything, I'm anti-anti-love), but because it's so damn hard to write a love song that doesn't sound like so many other damn love songs. I don't think I accomplished quite what I wanted to with this--I'm not sure that the real story I'm trying to tell comes across--but the feel of it was tolerable enough that I didn't want to slap myself for cheesily trying to squeeze the feelings of love into an awkward little box. I hope that people who buy this book use the pages of love song to scribble notes, draw pictures, and do whatever else one does when one is in love. Make those pages sing.
Man, those last two sentences don't feel like me at all.
And don't forget to buy the first book.
31. Prehensile Toes and Von Zipper Sunglasses -- Written for the amazing Angie (seriously, she's insanely amazing), this poem came to exist in about fifteen seconds. I fell back on the haiku, as I always do when in doubt. As for the back story, it's about prehensile toes and Von Zipper sunglasses. I'm not sure I even know what Von Zipper sunglasses are. Damn Los Angeles.
32. Office Tension: A Sketch -- Man, I'm not saying I know anything about inter-office romances. But somehow, someone decided that I was the right person to write about such a topic. Seeing as how I know nothing about the topic from personal experience--NOTHING, I SAY--I decided to handle it with a sketch. The hope was just to catch that moment after the initial attraction, after a late night of getting to know each other better, let's say, when you see each other and realize you'll see each other everyday. I'd imagine that's kind of exciting.
33. Bounce Bounce Swish -- This was written in an exercise conducted by the infamous (not really) Aya Ogawa, who happens to be a genius and way smarter than me and makes art in ways I wish I could. She had several of us (including Christina Anderson, our fellow Van Lier Fellow) create poems based out of a series of phrases and feelings and items that we all came up with collaboratively, and this is what came out. Then we gave each other massages, but I had a broken thumb at the time, so I think she got only half a massage, really. Anytime I get to work Derek Jeter into a poem or play, I take advantage of the opportunity, so that explains a lot of this, I think.
34. Fly Girls: Three Sketches -- This was written for wray, who gave me a bunch of answers to one of the questionnaires I made available to, well, Fly Girls. There was so much there in her responses that I couldn't settle on one approach, leading me to come up with three quick first-impression sketches that, I think, complement each other in terms of tone and rhythm, if not content.
35. Love Song -- The request was to write a love song. And man, I hate to hear that as a request. I'm generally anti-love songs, not because I'm anti-love (if anything, I'm anti-anti-love), but because it's so damn hard to write a love song that doesn't sound like so many other damn love songs. I don't think I accomplished quite what I wanted to with this--I'm not sure that the real story I'm trying to tell comes across--but the feel of it was tolerable enough that I didn't want to slap myself for cheesily trying to squeeze the feelings of love into an awkward little box. I hope that people who buy this book use the pages of love song to scribble notes, draw pictures, and do whatever else one does when one is in love. Make those pages sing.
Man, those last two sentences don't feel like me at all.
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
myspace is crack.
And has little redeeming social value.
But still.
Come be my friend there.
You'll get special exclusive blog posts that might just end up in my next book.
www.myspace.com/kristofferdiaz
But still.
Come be my friend there.
You'll get special exclusive blog posts that might just end up in my next book.
www.myspace.com/kristofferdiaz
Saturday, March 03, 2007
The Stories Behind The Fly Girls, V.
No time to waste. These liner notes are the definition of urban sprawl.
26. For Babygirl -- So like I said in an earlier post, there are times in life when you think you've got everything all figured out, and then some time goes by, and you realize that you didn't have anything all figured out. Sometimes it takes finality to wrap your head around how wrong you'd been. Sometimes it takes someone to tell you exactly why you were wrong before you can see it. and even then, you sometimes aren't ready to sit down and put into words what you're feeling. And sometimes, later on, it all makes sense, and you wish you had had the words when you needed them. Times like that, all you can do is hope you've learned the lesson.
27. Redenbacher at the Strip Club -- The assignment for this piece was, well, Orville Redenbacher at the Strip Club. Orville Redenbacher looked like this, in case you don't remember:
And he sold popcorn on TV. And that's all I knew about him. The image of Orville making it rain probably could easily have been played for laughs, which is why I took it in another direction. Man, I actually don't even know if this was a real dude or not. Either way, there seemed to be something inherently sad about him. I also happen to feel like there's somethign inherently sad about strip clubs. So the end result was only natural.
27. Shadow Song -- Shadows are one of those topics that poets and photographers revel in -- I think it's not easy to do something with shadows that hasn't been done before. So I didn't really try. This feels pretty straightforward to me--a love story between the shadows of two lovers. And since I'm using go-to imagery, might as well go all out: hence the beaches, and the mangoes, and the waterfalls, and the sunsets. This to me is a typical poetry piece, which is something I'm not entirely comfortable with. I dig the way it came out though.
28. Fly Girls: You Got Me -- A lot of these poems wouldn't exist if it wasn't for The Roots. I won't necessarily explain that completely, but it's true. This piece was written specifically about The Roots for a young woman whose wildest dream was jumping onstage with The Legendary and singing the Erykah Badu part on You Got Me. (And yes, I know some of you nerds will call it the Jill Scott part, but you're NERDS.) I do have a regret or two when it comes to this piece: I don't think it really does justice to how amazing The Roots are in person, and I kind of wish I experimented a little more with rhythm and sound and style as I wrote it. Someday I'll do a more formal tribute piece for them.
29. Eulogy -- I fucking love Eulogy. I love it. I don't think anyone else does, but I do. So there. The assignment was to write about a box of unlabeled CDs. That was it. So I went sad with it. And I love it. It felt a lot like a play as I was writing it, but without any of the obligations I'd generally associate with writing a play, like, you know, finishing it. Or filling it out. Or making it all make sense. It's a sketch almost, and it's way more satisfying for me that way.
30. Mabey -- I knew a girl in high school who always spelled "maybe" wrong. This might not have been such a huge problem if she wasn't always writing me notes about she and I and us, and trying to seriously address our dating situation while butchering the English language. It irked me, and it stayed with me, and when it came time to write this poem (for the amazing Angie) about that strange feeling of being really annoyed by someone you care about, this approach was a natural. I'm not sure where the microfiche came from, but who doesn't love microfiche?
More soon.
26. For Babygirl -- So like I said in an earlier post, there are times in life when you think you've got everything all figured out, and then some time goes by, and you realize that you didn't have anything all figured out. Sometimes it takes finality to wrap your head around how wrong you'd been. Sometimes it takes someone to tell you exactly why you were wrong before you can see it. and even then, you sometimes aren't ready to sit down and put into words what you're feeling. And sometimes, later on, it all makes sense, and you wish you had had the words when you needed them. Times like that, all you can do is hope you've learned the lesson.
27. Redenbacher at the Strip Club -- The assignment for this piece was, well, Orville Redenbacher at the Strip Club. Orville Redenbacher looked like this, in case you don't remember:
And he sold popcorn on TV. And that's all I knew about him. The image of Orville making it rain probably could easily have been played for laughs, which is why I took it in another direction. Man, I actually don't even know if this was a real dude or not. Either way, there seemed to be something inherently sad about him. I also happen to feel like there's somethign inherently sad about strip clubs. So the end result was only natural.
27. Shadow Song -- Shadows are one of those topics that poets and photographers revel in -- I think it's not easy to do something with shadows that hasn't been done before. So I didn't really try. This feels pretty straightforward to me--a love story between the shadows of two lovers. And since I'm using go-to imagery, might as well go all out: hence the beaches, and the mangoes, and the waterfalls, and the sunsets. This to me is a typical poetry piece, which is something I'm not entirely comfortable with. I dig the way it came out though.
28. Fly Girls: You Got Me -- A lot of these poems wouldn't exist if it wasn't for The Roots. I won't necessarily explain that completely, but it's true. This piece was written specifically about The Roots for a young woman whose wildest dream was jumping onstage with The Legendary and singing the Erykah Badu part on You Got Me. (And yes, I know some of you nerds will call it the Jill Scott part, but you're NERDS.) I do have a regret or two when it comes to this piece: I don't think it really does justice to how amazing The Roots are in person, and I kind of wish I experimented a little more with rhythm and sound and style as I wrote it. Someday I'll do a more formal tribute piece for them.
29. Eulogy -- I fucking love Eulogy. I love it. I don't think anyone else does, but I do. So there. The assignment was to write about a box of unlabeled CDs. That was it. So I went sad with it. And I love it. It felt a lot like a play as I was writing it, but without any of the obligations I'd generally associate with writing a play, like, you know, finishing it. Or filling it out. Or making it all make sense. It's a sketch almost, and it's way more satisfying for me that way.
30. Mabey -- I knew a girl in high school who always spelled "maybe" wrong. This might not have been such a huge problem if she wasn't always writing me notes about she and I and us, and trying to seriously address our dating situation while butchering the English language. It irked me, and it stayed with me, and when it came time to write this poem (for the amazing Angie) about that strange feeling of being really annoyed by someone you care about, this approach was a natural. I'm not sure where the microfiche came from, but who doesn't love microfiche?
More soon.
Friday, March 02, 2007
website update
I'm having trouble getting access to www.kristofferdiaz.com to update it. I'm hoping it's just a problem with my hosting company. Should be updating over there this weekend.
Should be updating here this weekend as well. Ten more liner notes.
The majority of this weekend will be spent locked in my apartment, trying to finish a screenplay. Or two.
Should be updating here this weekend as well. Ten more liner notes.
The majority of this weekend will be spent locked in my apartment, trying to finish a screenplay. Or two.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
