the sillada problem

16.5.05

WHY I CAN RALLY BEHIND THE PERSON OF J. J. JAMESON

A Reply to C.J. Laity’s

Why I Can’t Rally Behind J.J. Jameson

“Keep in mind Norman Porter is a liar. I don't think anyone can doubt this, after he lived for two decades under a stolen identity. This should put anything that comes out of his mouth in question.”
--C. J. Laity, ChicagoPoetry.com

Links:

e-poets.network: Norman Porter, alias "J.J. Jameson"

David Gecic, Publisher and Editor-In-Chief of The Puddin'head Press.

Should art suffer if the creator had been found a murderer? Should good deeds and good friendship deface if betrayed by the man who simply wants to live a second chance in his life?

Let anyone who has no hidden closet cast the first stone....

If I were an infallible man, I would declare my own vendetta in behalf of those aggrieved parties and make JJ Jameson/Norman Porter’s life miserable and see to it that he suffered the most despicable punishment that he deserves in his lifetime.

But I am just a man like Jameson/Porter who also masked the other side of his creative existence by making this ugly world a beautiful place to live.

Had the man been caught in the act of doing a criminal activity, my perception of Jameson/Porter would have been different. But J.J. Jameson was caught at the heights of his fame as a Chicago influential poet and as a man who dedicated his borrowed freedom to help the desolate and the destitute in his society.

The truth behind the person of J.J. Jameson had been revealed when he was arrested on March 22, 2005, known to be the fugitive Norman Porter who had been in prison more than twenty ago on a murder charge.

Before his arrest, within the span of two decades, the person with two faces reclaimed his life on a borrowed identity by assuming the role of a Good Samaritan to the impoverished and the homeless, and began to sing the lament of his soul through his poetry.

His art and good deeds liberate him when he sees the beauty and meaning of life rather than going back to his ugly past. He knew, from the beginning, that his borrowed identity would be taken away him, so he made the most out of it through his art and act of benevolence despite his fear and anxiety of being caught one day.

When that most dreaded time arrived, his struggle to wear the mask finally delivered him to accept who he is and who he was. The inner torment of hiding his true identity from his adoptive people is over, but he was stripped of his dignity and respect by the same people who adored and put him on a pedestal.

Behind the Mask by Danny Sillada, Acrylic on Canvas, 2005. Copyright © 2005.

The literary world hates him and loves him, some of his friends disowned him while others remained and stood by his side.

J.J. Jameson is beyond who he is and who he was, he simply touches the lives of those who knew him and changed the perception of society toward the criminals, that despite the savage act that they could inflict on humanity, they have the capability to change, to make amends, to care and to bandage the wounds that they created.

While a man who is supposed to live a righteous life is the same man who could be unforgiving, blinded by false belief, and most likely the man who would take pleasure at the misery of others and make other’s lives miserable. And if any man on this God’s forsaken earth claims and says he is pure and sinless, I would probably adore and worship that man more than a God.

However, like Jameson/Porter, we are all in the process of building and rebuilding our lives toward a greater good and along the way; we don different masks in the midst of our morally dissolute society so that our own decadent existence will find meaning and gain acceptance within the circles of liars and pretenders.

Jameson/Porter is now in prison, but no one can ever take away the intrinsic benefits that he had sown in the hearts of the people through his munificent act. Neither one could take away the sublime beauty of his poetry, his dignity and his inner freedom to live a meaningful life amid his hostile condition.

Now that we know the man J.J. Jameson the poet as Norman Porter the murderer, will it liberate?

© Danny C. Sillada

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

J.J. Jameson's Poems

My Life in a Cage, by Danny Sillada, Oil on Canvas, 1998. Copyright © 2005.

SOMEWHERE ELSE
(early poem by Norman Porter)

In my barred ringed room
I often dream of being somewhere else
where I could shed this shadow
I lean upon and act myself
without benefit of pretense
cowed under by degrees
to the man's psycho-whip
as I keep myself in good standing
even though sold out
what a need to escape all that
and take myself to the woods
on leaves of mental image
like someone feigning Napoleon
and trip across the fields
barefoot in flight on hoarfrost
gone quick in the morning light
like my thoughts
gone quick in hearing
the screw's whistle
up in evaporation
not at all like
the solid state
of my barred ringed room.

-J.J. Jameson

Searching by Danny Sillada, oil on Paper, 2001. Copyright © 2005.

THE PUTTERING PENIS

Las week, late last week,
I went to the theater to listen, raptly,
to the vagina monologuing.

I put my ear down close,
I mean really, really close,
I wanted to hear every spluttering syllable,
I wanted to bite very pulsating enunciation.

I put my other ear down,
I mean really, really down,
I did not wish to miss fondling, aurally,
any climatic sentence even a fragmented one,
preferably a compound one.

I strained so hard
I felt like Arnold Palmer
Aiming that dimpled ball
For that verdant pinhole
With an unsteady puttering penis.

Thence, it dawned, slowly on me.

I began to reflect:
How come it is that only
vagina's can monologue?
Is it because they have lips?
Or is it because they have a lot to say?

All that poor old puttering penis
can do is bang that dimpled ball,
tweak it towards
that petard flapping pinhole
get down on his knees
pray for just the right arc
to curve over that lush velvet pube.

Howsomuchever, most importantly,
to be able to ace that hole
without being monolgued
about missing that hole in one.

I was spent, exhausted, flaccid.
Recovery required I heave the theater early.

I did so deflatedly,
puffed up my lungs and lit up a ciagarette
took an eviscerating drag,
rolled over,
put out that partially smoked cigarette,
and fell asleep promptly.

The vagina, the vagina is still monologuing.

-J.J. Jameson

Labels: chicago poet, danny sillada, jj jameson, norman porter, poetry

16.5.05 | Permalink | | links to this post

1.2.05

FISHY ART & ITS CONTROVERSY...

The Controversial Jannis Kounellis' Fishbowl

Graphic design by Danny Sillada. Photo by BBC News (World Edition). Posted by Hello.

The Fishy Art & the Fishy Reaction of Animal Rights Group

A Review & Reaction by Danny Sillada

HeadLine: Row over use of fish in artwork

“Jannis Kounellis' Fishbowl has been criticized for the use of live fish,
an art exhibition which shows goldfish swimming around a six-inch knife which
is stuck into their bowl is "sick and pathetic", says an animal rights group.
The piece, by Greek artist Jannis Kounellis, is on show at Modern Art Oxford and
has attracted criticism for the use of animals in art.”
-BBC News (World Edition)

People can impulsively and irrationally react over animal rights being violated by humans even if the alleged act of violation is only used as a medium of art and no death or mutilations of animals were ever committed. What about the beef, the pork and the fried chicken, which the members of this animal rights group ate, do they have animal rights too?

What about thousands of human rights violations created by the powerful nations in their own egoistic war zones? What about the artist’s rights violations, ethnic rights violations, children’s rights violations, media rights violations, and so on and so forth...?

It is more pathetic to wage war against the violation of animal rights if this group of animals, I mean, animal rights group is only selective for the rights of animals and not of the humans. It is tantamount to say that, if given a chance, the group will also campaign for the alien’s rights from Mars or Jupiter rather than advocating human rights or artist's rights for that matter.

Have we seen these animal rights group rallying in the frontlines against the human rights being violated in Iraq, in Kosovo, or in any war-tormented countries?

Essentially, there is nothing wrong advocating any rights of everything that exist on this earth because it is inherent, based on natural law, that humans as the higher in the hierarchy of animals should promote self-preservations of any living and non-living things.

However, defying rationalities and singling out a particular right versus human rights is, unthinkably, an abused and a violation of right itself. Every member of the society, whether you belong to a group or not, has a moral responsibility to protect any right that is being violated, but the hierarchy of rights must always prevail in relation to the common good of the society.

The truth is, the artist’s statement in the exhibit of fishbowl with a knife is a poetic statement about the reality of society. He is allegorically drawing the big picture of metaphysical reality regarding the inalienable rights of human existence, and that image represents the rights of all living creatures to live within the harsh realities of our environment on this planet.

Human life is like a goldfish constantly struggling to live amid the harshness of our existence, our society, and our environment. Jannis Kounellis’ powerful imagery of fish and knife in a fishbowl irritates and disturbs in the same manner as it awakens and opens one’s eyes to the ugly reality of our environment and the world at large that we live in..

Conversely, the artist is trying to reveal something extraordinary that has not yet been revealed before to the historical group of men to which his art is bestowed. Martin Heidegger calls it the founding of truth in poetry, and since the very nature of art is poetry, in similar manner; the very nature of poetry is truth.

The truth is revealed through Jannis Kounellis’ art, the viewers of art embraced it with mixed feelings of disbelief and sensationalism, but the artwork, regardless of its cause and effect, brings forward the inescapable truth to the eyes of the viewers. The truth beckons and bestirs the seemingly complacent and insensitive members of the society to care for others, to be morally responsible and to make our neighborhood or environment a safe place to live in.

Portrait of the artist Jannis Kounellis

Photo taken from Modern at Oxford. Posted by Hello

Whether the artist is, consciously or unconsciously, aware about the sensational effect that his art would evoke, it is irrelevant. The relevance of his work in our society is what matters and how it opens the viewers of art and how it elicits judgment and opinion on their part. The poetic truth of the artist’s work is finally revealed and it is up to the public or the society whether the particular work of art liberates their quest for truth or hunger for sensationalism?

In the end, it is a question that a member of animal rights group and the society in general must ask: “am I a fish or a knife in the fishbowl of society where I belong?”

1.2.05 | Permalink | | links to this post

15.1.05

The Philosophy of Waiting by Danny Sillada

THE ESSENCE OF WAITING
An excerpt from unpublished manuscript on "The Philosophy of Waiting"
By Danny Sillada © 2004.

"What does waiting mean in our life and what is life without waiting?"

SoulMate II, Photo by Danny Sillada

"I don't know why I'm waiting
I used to think I knew
But now it's so ingrained in me
It's all I know to do."
-JulieZerbe, Waiting from Songs of Life

Blessed are those who wait because they have something to wait for...

A five-year old Mandayan child would climb on a steep and rocky hill everyday to visit his mother's grave. He would sit there in silence for hours beside the pile of rocks where his mother was buried. Every now and then the passersby from the village would take a detour from a long trail leading to the barrio and, instead, climb to the same steep hill where the child's mother was buried.

For years, the bizarre ritual became an ordinary routine for the passersby to drop by at the burial ground. They would sit beside the grown-up boy for a few moments of silence before they continue their journey toward the plain or low land.

One day, a stranger who visited the place for days, noticed the uncanny behavior of the natives in the village and asked what they were doing there everyday with the boy on a steep and rocky hill. An old woman politely responded, "We are waiting for his mother to come back..."

What does waiting mean in our life and what is life without waiting?

A lover, for instance, is patiently waiting for his beloved at their secret rendezvous, an expectant mother is waiting for the birth of her child, an old man is waiting for his estranged son to come home, a daughter is waiting for her mother to wake up from a coma, or a cancer patient is waiting for his borrowed existence to linger a little longer. All these waiting are characterized with emotional tensions and anxieties, of hopes and dreams, of joys and sorrows, of excitements and disappointments.

Basically, waiting is the anticipation of something or someone to come within the expected time. There are three essential elements of waiting: the one who is waiting (the subject), the occurrence of action, and the arrival of the expected.

The condition of waiting can be analogically described between the two points: the waiter and the waited. The distance between the waiter and the waited is the duration of time where the action is expected to occur. The time between the two points of waiting is crucially indispensable because it is where the expected action occurs.

Time is the most essential element of waiting because it is where the other two elements converge to complete the waiting. However, the essence of waiting is not dependent on the waited because the latter is just a representation of a thing or a person or an abstract thought and desire as object of waiting.

In the same manner, the waiter as the subject of waiting is the real and tangible actor of waiting. The object of waiting, although it is the waited, does not possess the material presence unless it occurs within time between the distances of two points where the action is expected to occur.

The material quality of the object (e.g., a person or a thing) does not possess certainty as the object of waiting because it may or may not occur within the expected time. That is why waiting is the anticipation of something or someone to come within the particular duration of time.

It is possible, however, that the expected time will occur but the object of waiting may not, or it may arrive later out of the expected time and, thus, complete the waiting. On the other hand, the completion of waiting is not totally dependent on the waited or the object of waiting because it is an open-ended condition.

In waiting, time is indefinite and not fixable because it is immutable. No one can hold time at the palm of one's hand or fix it to suit one's needs. Essentially, human existence is dependent on space and time because without these elements there can be no existence, in the same manner, as waiting exists because of space and time where the waiter and the waited occupy and exist.

Waiting in itself is an emotional and mental condition, which is preordained to look forward and anticipate for something or someone to come. In strict sense of the word, the object of anticipation is the future. Whether the waited is a person or a thing, a wish or a dream, a plan or a chance, the waited as the object of waiting is precariously uncertain, remote, and immaterial because it has yet to happen. It belongs to the future of uncertainty even if the waited tangibly exists within space and time.

The completion of waiting can only occur in reality if the three essential elements converge at a particular time at a given situation. So long as the waited does not arrive between the two points of waiting, the latter remains in a state of anticipation, and that anticipation becomes an obsessive desire toward the future – toward the object of desire, which is, the waited.

It is here where the tension takes place, the tension between living and existing. From the conception of a child until birth, from birthing to the development of consciousness, from puberty to adolescence and from adulthood to dying - the tension in-between is characterized by the conditions of waiting. For life is all about waiting and waiting is the essential condition of human existence.

In reality, man lives and measures existence through space and time. From the moment we become conscious of our life, we begin to anticipate and expect things to come or to happen. We anticipate the future, we wish and dream and hope for something, something that will make our life meaningful. It is about something that will give us reasons to live and exist at a particular time of our given existence.

The search and the anticipation of something is all about waiting and that waiting makes our life restless until we have found what we have been waiting for. Our restlessness gives us the reason to think and rationalize the meaning of human existence. However, between the tensions of restlessness is the tension of despair and anxiety, of joy and sorrow, of boredom and activity, of solitude and happiness, of victory and defeat, and so on and so forth.

The tension pulls us away from our expectations, purges our belief into doubts and confusions, and pushes us at the edge of our crucial responses to life's shortcomings and limitations. Consciously or unconsciously, we realize that life, amid our waiting, is harsh and desolate. We realize that it is stranger than our romantic notion of human existence.

At the heights of our disillusionment, we come to realize that life is a lonely journey which no one can traverse in behalf of "me". The harsh realities of human existence consume our desolate soul and bring us face to face with life. Eventually, bitterness and cynicism begin to dwell in our heart and mind until we see nothing but our "self" in front of others.

Pride, decadence, and egoism become our ardent ally, our armor to prevent others from stepping into our own delicate world. We barricaded ourselves from others by putting on different masks until we lose touch to ourselves and do not know "who am I anymore?"

On the contrary, was it not the tension of life that keeps us awake? Was it not the waiting that gives us hope to dream of something even if it is remote and distant? Was it not despair or sadness that gives us wisdom and understanding of humanity's weaknesses and imperfections?

The harshness of life is not a problem to be avoided, instead, like a broken child, it has to be embraced and accepted because that is the only way to come to terms with our broken existence.

Despair and abandonment are not a curse of humanity; they are, instead, the course to understanding the complexity of human existence. We cannot separate joy from sorrow or defeat from victory because each element is as important to the integral meaning in our struggle to live and find meaning in this lonely world. This is what it means to exist: to live is to suffer from the imperfections and the weaknesses of humanity. We can, however, transform these imperfections by finding meaning even in the most despicable condition of our life.

The condition of life is defined before us and we can do nothing about it. It is a given reality that, most often, we find it hard to reconcile in our search to justify the reason of our existence. Life is all about joy and sorrow, birth and death, frustration and happiness, defeat and victory.

No one can choose to live in happiness alone and neither one could live in despair either because life is the composition of both. Life is a given reality that leaves us no choices but to succumb to its own imperfection. The imperfection is what makes life life, no more, no less. How do we respond to life is our own subjective response and interpretation of human existence.

The condition of waiting can be analogically described between the two points: the waiter and the waited. The distance between the waiter and the waited is the duration of time where the action is expected to occur. The time between the two points of waiting is crucially indispensable because it is where the expected action occurs.

Could it be that the completion of waiting is about the passing of life from this ephemeral existence?

Conversely, Death is the summation of all the essence of our waiting - the completion of human existence.

15.1.05 | Permalink | | links to this post

17.11.04

Whe Punishment Becomes a Crime

MSNBC News Image

MSNBC NEWS: Scot Peterson Convicted of Murder:

First-degree verdict could bring death penalty

See related story at MSNBC News on Crime and Punishment:

More reactions at Waypath...

(When Punishment Becomes a Crime by Danny Sillada at CNET News.com)

In the absence of direct evidence and eyewitness, all plausible leads lead to Peterson who has the remote reason to vanish his wife (Laci Peterson).

Triple life sentence with no parole in his lifetime is a just and fair punishment for his crime.

Death penalty is not a punishment in philosophical and psychological sense. It is a painless compromise like an instant pain reliever where the criminal is relieved of his misery to suffer from the crime he committed.

If I were Peterson with bleak future ahead and my name destroyed, dignity broken, death would be my ardent ally and savior. I would lose my reason to live after those tumultuous court trials and the tragedy that beleaguered my life and my family.

Giving him, therefore, a death penalty is like giving him favor and instant relief of his shame and misery.

Every crime has a punishment whether material or immaterial, and the reasonable punishment must be carried out within this material world to purge and chastise the corrupt mind and soul inhabiting the human body.

Let Peterson suffer in his lifetime rather than giving him favor to suffer in seconds of dying, the immaterial form of punishment from which his mind, body, and soul would be spared to suffer from psychological and emotional torments.

Anguish and despair make a man come to his senses whether good or bad; the process is more dramatic and psychologically excruciating than facing one's death.

Death penalty, as punishment of the crime, glorifies the act of killing other human being and not really as a punishment itself. It is a blatant affirmation that killing is okay so long as it is warranted and legitimate.

The moral and cultural decadence of our society and the resentment against moral righteousness made him or us, in one way or another, vulnerable to apathy and indifference to uphold reason and moral responsibility in our destitute society.

17.11.04 | Permalink | | links to this post

4.11.04

Halloween Flare at Ayala Alabang Village, The Filpino Way

"...being trapped in the traffic jam at the most prestigious village in the country on a Halloween night, is like celebrating it twice without losing one’s sense of horror..."

Ayala Alabang Village, the haven of the rich and the powerful, thriving in its own sub-culture mixed with Western lifestyle, but very Filipino it its domestic management.

Janine, John and Danica

Even if you are an American or European living in Ayala Alabang, the Philippine culture is inescapable inside your luxurious home. You have either a Filipina wife or a Filipina housekeeper who, in one way or another, influenced the kind of food you eat or the manner of your dealings with people and tradition.

Kultura, tradisyon at paniniwala, no matter how foreign you are, you will feel at home with the Filipino style of hospitality and festivities. Although 75% residents of Ayala Alabang are Filipinos, some Western and European practices have found their way within the atmosphere of the village.

Conversely, the Filipino culture is the only culture that could adapt to any culture in the world. It is also the most friendly and hospitable culture regardless of your religion, the color of your skin or your political belief. Even if you are a fugitive or a criminal, the Filipino hospitality will treat as if you are an important guest, provided you are not caught in the act of doing your criminal activities, otherwise only your tongue will be spared of bruises from the ferocious bystanders.

Little white lady...

Halloween celebration is not foreign to Philippine culture because we have our similar celebration like the “Araw Ng Mga Patay” (Feast of the Dead) on the eve of November and the Todos Los Santos (All Saints Day) on November 2, a tradition we imbibed from our Spanish colonizers.

Li-an & Janine

The Halloween fête in some rich villages in the country especially in Ayala Alabang has found its new meaning - the Filipino ways. Albeit Western in origin, the celebration is very Filipino, where friends and distant relatives of the villagers would come and have a party while their children are trick or treating in the neighborhood.

Where are they...?

Some houses in the village have made their facades a tableau of horror with those mechanized freak creatures lurking and mesmerizing the passersby. Other households do not bother at all because theirs are already haunted enough to scare the trick or treaters.

Ayala Alabang is also known for receiving children coming from the squatter’s area, children from the street, and children in the neighboring low class villages. In this particular Halloween celebration, hundreds of children were queuing at the gates, the Acacia gate being the busiest of all from morning until evening.

This year, however, is not that festive and joyful for the children outside the village. The children were not allowed inside for some reasons, and one of them is alleged security. They were waiting at the entrances of the village, not minding the scorching heat of the sun, for their generous benefactors to give them foods, money or candies.

When the celebration was over, the relatives and friends of the villagers had to succumb to the unpredictable traffic jam along the Acacia street stretching toward the main gate. It was more than a horror being trapped in-between a snail-pace moving cars for almost two hours within the village.

Disturbed...

Patience and persistence are virtues inherent in Filipino culture, and being trapped in the traffic at a prestigious village in the country on a Halloween night, is like celebrating it twice without losing one’s sense of horror...

4.11.04 | Permalink | | links to this post