This Bethesda Sea

2011-05-25T16:25:00.000-07:00

Something's changing, a storm is brewing. My Love is growing.

2011-02-25T06:41:00.000-08:00

It's a new day....a wonderful day. I told Dennnis (my partner) this morning that it feels like a sense of freedom to not have to log onto facebook and check out what's going on. I am enough for myself. I don't have any real plans for today aside from a shower, a shave and some breakfast. Life is beautiful, Love is plentiful. God is good.

2011-02-24T16:12:00.000-08:00

An epiphany today.....RELEASE.....

I need to release all of it. I hold on to every waking memory, every moment that brings me back to any happiness of my youth that is in any way connected to the Jesus People. My inability to let go is causing me to run in place, hoping that through my writing [on facebook] I will be finally understood. It's not gonna happen, and I need to find peace with it before I dig a hole with my legs.

Release.

2011-02-24T08:32:00.000-08:00

Im back...I've been away from this blog for far too long as I have been swept up in all things facebook. Facebook is useful, but as I continue an indeterminate hiatus, I realize that I can better describe where I am in my life here, as opposed to a familiar audience. I don't even know if anyone reads this page, and maybe I don't care, I just need a place for me right now.

2010-07-28T12:26:00.001-07:00

Give me breathless nights on your wings, my room of ten thousand things, my myriad of delusions of dreams. I would not falter. Give me my caves of water, my toppling boats, my Kathy and Miss Margaret afloat, I would not falter. Give me my sleepless dreaming, songs only my fingers are singing, I would not falter. Give me my unending thoughts, my Love in knots, I would not falter.

2010-02-22T16:10:00.000-08:00

I'm a fire, a comet, a birth of all the stars, a light of the known and the unknown. I've come to unearth the lies of men, to set them a part from the hypocrisies that consume them. I'm a fire, a comet, a howling gale, shattering your comfort zones, your lack of compassion, and your populist truths.

I'm a fire, a comet, a burning sphere. I've come to envelope you in the light of my love, in the dreams of your past, and the hope of your future. I'm a fire, a comet, a burning sphere, here to withstand the weight of your hatred, the chaos of your lives that's buried the innocent and murdered the pure. I'm a fire, a comet, a consuming love, a bed of down feathers riddled with knives should you be anything other then truthful.

I'm a fire, a comet, a searing pain, trapped beneath the epidermis of your lips, and the lies of your tongue. I'm a fire, a comet, a joyful noise loving you awake, singing you asleep, caressing the sweat from your brow. I'm a fire, a comet, purity among all things, may you enter the kingdom of my love, may you let go of that which pulls you downward.

I’m a fire, a comet, the hand of god.

J.M. Prater

2010-01-11T07:35:00.001-08:00

This is my goodbye to you, this is how I fly from you. May these last days be my love to you, our last moments a flood to you. This is my kiss back to the past for you. I sit here thinking of that street and in my mind I come to you. My church, I quietly walk away from you, my brothers and sisters I detach from you. This great tree I leave to you, it’s roots watered by tears I cry for you. May my footsteps be a path for you, I hope my life had meaning for you.

J M Prater

2009-12-23T16:39:00.000-08:00

Thou art a quiet storm on her gorgeous sea,
silently moving between the earth and her core,
between understanding everything and nothing.

I fell into thy arms and discovered that which made no sense,
that which I could not see.
Thy lulled me back aground from my lofty assumptions.

I wrestled night and day in fear of day and night.
I fought a gale, I cut it's strings and she moved across the water.
She set adrift and returned a quiet peace, a calm forgiveness.

Thou art of fury and female, of shards and knives, arsenic and apples.
I am taken through morning and then back to night.
But all of this, all of this...my love for thee.

This is my prayer to thee, my loyalty to thee.
Stay that I could drink from thy well until I mourn my thirst
Be still that I might count the strands of thy fabric.

Speak that I might ascribe the tones of thy voice
Sing that I might dissolve into the love of thy preciousness.
Give me life that every moment may be a record of thy goodness.

And with this I end in a garden of death and awe
in this time of pain and peace.
I love thee, I've always loved thee.

Give to the earth my body that she might light up the stars with the root my love.
I am but myself. I am a host of angels, a watcher of earth. I am but myself.

J M Prater

2009-12-12T10:02:00.001-08:00

The Nightingale's Prayer

Look at me my daughter, move your eyes up and meet mine and see that I love thee. Look at me my daughter and find forgiveness for all things in my smile. Look at me my daughter and know that it is in you that I live, in you that my heart dwells, in you that my spirit sings. Look at me my daughter and understand that in you the ocean moves, in you the seas sway, in you the rivers find their meaning.

Look at me my daughter and praise not just what you could be, but what you are. Look at me my daughter and know that you are enough, that your every breath is precious, your every emotion the truth. Look at me my daughter and see your reflection in my eyes. Look at me my daughter and realize that you are my beginning and my gorgeous end. You are the night that falls and the sun that rises again.

Oh my daughters, I have bestowed upon you all that was good in me, so that in each moment the joy I feel is you, the laughter I experience is you, the happiness I have is yours. Oh my loves, oh my women, you are the nightingale’s prayer, the light in the cellar, fresh water among the rocks. You are my hope and destination, my life without end, my joy without sorrow.

J M Prater

2009-12-04T15:46:00.000-08:00

You riddle your daughter with daggers, her flesh with salt, her spirit with darkness. You smother the life of her child with your judgement, you eviscerate the memory of her mother with your forked scalpel of a tongue. You riddle your daughter with daggers.

You Poison your sons with your genetic promise, their dreams with your guilt, and their sons with your toil. You tear from them any hope of a harbor, any semblance of peace. You poison your sons with everything.

In reply, your sons and daughters, they stake your heart with their knives. They bring down your house with mockery of your counterfeit love.

J M Prater

2009-02-13T09:43:00.000-08:00

I am nothing. I am a pillar in the temple of my god.
I breathe not air but fire, those flames that consume me
but do not extinguish my very existence.

There are tremors in this earth, there are floods in this field
my blood has spilled over the walls and have trickled down
to all who have seen me.

I am freedom, I am that which has experienced euphoria
and her rage but return with peace and her calm
I am bound no more

I experience the power of life through the smallest of silences
I exist not only to exalt but to uphold
to challenge and to testify of your secret transactions, your derelict love

Thee I charge, thee I assault with conviction
you have buried the hatchet of shame in your own flesh
and yet you seek to take apart and destroy that in which you do not understand

assail me not your religion, teach me not your limited understanding
for it is the perfect divine and not thee of which I drink
Hallelujah, behold the Bridegroom, behold that fire and fury

That comes to bring rebirth in it's fuel and oxygen, it's cinder and smoke.

J M Prater

2008-12-24T19:54:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend,

It’s Christmas Eve and I haven’t yet heard a word. Waves crash the shores and the light house searches for your ship in the harbor. The oil in my lamp burns low in this midnight hour. There remains a hope in me despite my impending loneliness. This is the first Christmas I’ve spent alone.

The stars are out and I can see homes lit up for miles. And yet, here I am, in this attic, beneath the firelight as warmth turns to cold, as love turns to loss. Make it home dear friend, sail your ship beyond the sea and let the anchor fall. I wait for you dear friend, I’ve been waiting for you since the moment of my conception.

I know not what is bestowed upon me, only what I have to bestow. My pockets are empty, but there are gifts for you yet. In my absence I give you love that you may sprinkle your days with the laughter of god. In my tears I give you joy that you might water the earth and let it bring forth all good things. In my sorrow I give you comfort that your beauty salt the earth, not by the outward, but the inward. Lastly dear friend, in the hour of my death I bestow upon you life, that you may live without ceasing.

Do you hear it? Do you hear the water on the rocks? The waves have calmed. Look, first the stars show the night. I hear a voice on the seas. Is it you?

“For I am going to lay me down
the fire is dying, the stars have come out
For I am going out to the sea
He’s waiting, he’s watching, he’s calling to me.”

J M Prater

2008-07-14T06:50:00.000-07:00

She’s krept into the daylight, gently infusing the air with her death
the sky is a false promise, the sunlight moves to beckon us and then
leave slowly as his brother the night takes over.

I’ve been infected, without cause or merit and it began with disinterest.
And now, the disease has taken hold wiping away the joy of all things known.
It’s metastasized beneath this flesh and fury, this alzheimers of the body.

The devil is a cunning warrior, his tactics the best of the worst.
I’ve denied him everything reasonable, leaving him to steal the unreasonable. Passion.
And there is nothing left, a hollow, a shell, an indifference, an agony of always.

I’ve been infected by a deadly strain, not knowing the night for the day, not caring.
My body is riddled with the passion of nothing.
This prison is a promise.

J.M. Prater

2008-06-19T15:43:00.001-07:00

Completed Pieces That I posted for sale on Craigslist

2008-06-15T09:53:00.000-07:00

Here is where my passions lie.
"For so great a treasure, words will never do."

2008-05-14T07:34:00.000-07:00

Well, here she is, the first in a CANCELED series of 4. Quite frankly, I hate how she's come out. I'm nearing an artistic meltdown. I feel like I can't do anything right, whatever right is. I'm at about the end of myself creatively.

2008-05-04T10:48:00.000-07:00

It takes me a while to update this page, I don't do it very often because ultimately I don't think anyone gives a shit. I don't say that as a bid for pity, I say it because it's true.

Here's a stage of my latest project, a doll, one in a series of 4. I'm retreating back to more personal work. I like my canvass work, but I'm not confident in it.

Here's the doll. Her name is EARTH. Now how fucking pretentious is that?

2008-01-28T07:24:00.000-08:00

I've been re-examining my work, and in some cases, re-fortifying them. I would say that as I continue to explore my ideas my tools get better, my paper mache mixes get stronger, and my frames become more square. In some cases the paper mache mix I used on some initial pieces wasn't the best, and in efforts to make my work the best it can be I've been going back over some weak spots, and, well, patching them up. I've also framed my work with red 1x2s but again, in some cases, I haven't been as detailed or as professional as I would like to be.

I am moving soon, and my art is a major reason why. I have this inferiority complex about my work, that it's second best, or it won't hold up to the work of other artists. I think, in some cases that may be true, but I know I can make my work the best it can be, and as I continue it will only get better and better. Right now I'm working on repairing and making stronger 3 of the first pieces of my work. It's definitely not fun, it's tedious, but hopefully, quite worth the effort.

2008-01-15T15:32:00.000-08:00

My finished pieces [more or less] I've two more that I'm working on as well.

2007-12-14T08:29:00.000-08:00

The above images are a direct inspiration to be found in my work today. I have a love for old, worn, used signs/wood. I like the idea of my work having a history to them, not feeling/looking new, which is why I use papier mache/newspaper to create a visual history. I've always loved audubon, and I remember, as a child, always drawing animals. Maxfield Parish will be a constant source of light for me. His images, whether produced as an illustration for a magazine, or a stand alone piece of art, have a sense of richness, passion and gravitas.

J.M. Prater

2007-11-26T12:09:00.001-08:00

I've been fascinated by the life of Francis Bacon for quite some time now. What attracts me to his work isn't so much his form but his darkness and the way he manipulates color. Clearly he's had a disturbing and difficult life and yet his work is on fire with emotion, pain and a myriad of other issues. I've decided to paint his portrait based around this photo of him. In this photo he is quite, well, strange, his face nearly disfigured.

2007-11-13T14:32:00.000-08:00

My latest piece [unfinished] entitled 'The Holy Kingdom'

The photo of it isn't the best, but again, it's a work in progress. I'm happy to be doing my work again. I'm in a bit of a fickle as I am becoming more productive again, yet I am moving soon and I have to bring these pieces with me, and my work tends to be quite large, so space may be an issue as I am packing my trailer, alas, we'll see.

2007-11-07T15:15:00.000-08:00

An epiphany, of sorts...

So here I've been, wasting a way my creative energies and for the longest time I haven't been able to figure out why. As I wrote in my last post, I've been living with my parents for quite some time, with plans on moving to Asheville NC, at the end of February.

As I've been sitting here at my computer for what seems like days on end, in attempt to find expression online, I've realized I've krept back in the closet, in a way. I am unable to be myself at my parent's house. I've had to lie about where I am going sometimes, not really talk about my personal life and live under the reality they've created. Because of this, my ability to express myself has been eclipsed. My photography has taken off because it's something that I can do out of the house, away from the end of their lives.

My art is my freedom, my complete freedom, and when I feel like I am not free, I unable to freely create. Just today as I sat around the house, I thought, "I'm going to get going on my work." The moment I started to prepare my space to work part of the house lost power. At that moment I had to suspend any plans and all the energy that I had just disappeared, and so hear I am, online being completely unproductive while the new pieces I have in my head, and the unfinished one on this easel lie in stasus.

I love my parents, truly, I'm not writing this to say, "it's all their fault." My parents are who they are. They've lived their lives, raised their children and are trying to just live day to day, work their jobs and enjoy a newly discovered happiness. The issue here is that the reality that they've created for themselves is far and away from the reality I live in, and yet, they are colliding and the result is a retreat to the closet, an eclipsed emersion from a cocoon that I lived in for most of my life.

My home, Asheville, NC, calls me.

2007-11-02T16:21:00.000-07:00

Here is where I have been for 3 months. I am unable to finish this piece. I moved in with my parents and ALL of the creative energy I had has been wiped clean. When I am driving in the country I feel it, I want to do it, but when I arrive home, I want to do NOTHING. My tools are in the garage which is not heated and so finishing this piece feels like scrubbing baseboards, a complete chore.

My work is strong, my work has focus, my work is damn good in my opinion. I love my parents, but living with them is KILLING my creativity, they live such different lives and it's sucking the life out of me.

On the flip side, I am moving to Asheville, NC at the end of February and I am VERY excited. I will be able to reconnect with my good friend Aaron Tucker, someone I can say, is a friend I've since we were both teenagers. I am soo excited about the future, my art and how my life will change AGAIN.

2007-07-25T06:16:00.000-07:00

The Remnants of My Vanity

It was between day and night, a union of flesh and frustration,
I was filled, devoured, and regurgitated from all things.
I was a sorcerer’s apprentice, a warlock’s gatherer when the moon eclipsed
and the sun revealed to me an instant of forced pleasure.
Upon awakening amid a saturation of cells and sulfur
I saw the larger whole, a truth embedded in a path among thorns.

A fable and a feeling, a knife in the womb, this sacred text, this
sordid future, upon this trembling ground. Yet I broke the light,
discovering a garden of death and awe, a life of spirit and thought.
But this truth, this rock, this kingdom among garbage had its hold
as I fled the ground and scattered the lives in the wake of my feet.
The linens shredded, the fabric unfastened and slid away from me

As the remnants of my vanity fell away and the earth became enough.
I fell down the well, I fell into the depths of a life without want, a day
without desperation as sun the shone down the mountain revealing the
horse and the rider in white. I fell and continued to fall as night transformed
and then back again. She beckoned me with water this well, her smell
continuing my descent into the divine.

Water was all around me and yet I thirsted for it as my fingers slid through
its veil and back to my mouth dry as if never touched. I am still falling, thirsting
for that which is a promise, disguised by the sun, revealed in the night,
that mystery of flight.

J.M. Prater

2007-04-04T08:29:00.000-07:00

I just finished this piece today entitled "Lost & Found" my homage to Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece Vertigo.

I'm in an interesting place in my art life of late. I think I'm somewhat of a late bloomer. The three pieces you can see here are evident of my style you could say, or the nitch that I have discovered that I comfortable with. I'm always battling the idea of success or failure as an artist. My good friend Aaaron Tucker is quite successful, on his own terms, selling his work, finding a customer base, a gallery, etc... I'm not there yet, having moved back to the midwest and reconnected yet again with my own creative drive I've had to dig and dig and go through a rebirth, and I feel like I should be further along then where I'm at currently.

I recently put together a group of my latest work and started out on the gallery tour, without success, namely because most of the galleries were closed the day I chose to go to them. Suffice it to say I was really discouraged. I'm the kind of person that believes that some things should be easier then they are. I'm not a salesman. Becoming a businessman in terms of putting my work out there is one of the biggest hurdles I've had to climb. Thankfully, after re-thinking my tactics and looking at my rather small body of work, I've realized that I still don't have enough of one style to successfully market or push a showing.

So, lately I've had my head in my makeshift studio/apartment, [where I won't be receiving my security deposit due to the large amounts of paint in the carpet] I have the next 4-5 pieces in my head and I can barely hold myself in to not start building canvasses and creating these pieces simultaneously.

I'm a good road at the moment.

J.M. Prater

2007-03-27T09:27:00.000-07:00

"The Trapeze Act Was Wonderful"
completed 03.27.07

2007-03-19T15:17:00.000-07:00

The Death of Merle, March 19th, 2007

This piece ISN'T finished, her breasts are still undergoing treatment, ha!

2007-02-28T10:02:00.000-08:00

The last piece in the series of five which are my response to the American Church.

2007-02-24T20:20:00.000-08:00

2007-02-21T15:31:00.000-08:00

My two latest pieces. I decided to do a series of 5 pieces as a way of my response to the church.
If anyone reads this blog [which I doubt] then I'd love to hear what you think.

J.M. Prater

2007-01-10T10:46:00.000-08:00

2007-01-10T07:45:00.001-08:00

2007-01-10T07:39:00.000-08:00

I have no titles for these pieces, at some point I am sure they will reveal themselves to me.

Jaime

2007-01-10T07:02:00.000-08:00

I purchased a new camera, the Canon A540 to better show off my work and prepare a formal website. Here is the first of a few photos displaying my work of the past 6 months.

Jaime

2006-12-14T15:07:00.000-08:00

My latest piece.

Isabella, the Queen of Spain

2006-11-22T23:04:00.000-08:00

I wonder...

I sit here in this twilight, my life before me
I know of only what I have endured
and in the endurance have discovered that
life is only an afterthought, a breath mixed with the wind.

I bought 4 dozen roses for myself today
They sit arranged in a vase in the corner of my home
under this roof, in this field, in the middle of nowhere
I bought them for my own pleasure,
with the hope that they might be seen by my friends and admired

I don't know the course, I have never known where this ship would lead
I've ridden it aimlessly and it has returned me to the land of my youth
I have befriended many and yet know no one
This primordial existence, this hermit crab life, this aimless peace
This beloved loneliness

Flowers are midnight monsters without the light
Home is without cause, home is without boundaries
Home is void of it's warmth, if only to cradle one so
free of it and estranged from it that he falls, falls, falls to his death
Home.

And yet she moves, she stirs beneath this sea of skin and stone
she awakens in the belly of the beast, the riddle in the cave
I thought this as I drove at the twelth stroke.
I thought this as the wind blew the fields aside in my wake
Why can't my eyes see the way they did before?

Where has life gone? Where is the sun in stream in this cornfield afterbirth?
I calm myself, I find resolve, I discover a solution, and the ship pulls from this abandoned harbor.
I'm on the eve of a disasterous and wonderful begining.
I know this, that if it could be in human form it would be me
if it could walk down a road it would wear my shoes

I know that if it had a name it would be mine
The weight of the world has beckoned, the sadness of our destruction has spoken my name
since the dawn of time.
I cannot help but give what has been given. I cannot help but love those who seek its face
I only see a haze of red when these eyes unfold in morning's first light.

It's with the stars we dwell, it's in the rotation of the planets we begin
We are the love affair of the comet with the sun
Think of it, think of that silence, that vast nothingness and the stars sewn in their place
Picture it, picture those fields of endless weightlessness and then close your eyes
We travel, we move. We are hope and destination, we are what was meant to be with no set path.

Remember it, remember how it lasted and never ended. Remember how we can never understand such a void, such time and space.
Remember it and journey on.
Life was given to such bodies so we could remember that when we love, we express time and space, a beginning without an end, joy without sorrow, pasts without futures.

Hope and Destination.

J.M. Prater

2006-11-08T08:45:00.000-08:00

Tell me the end of all things. Tell me why I sit here as bombs explode in God’s ears. What do I benefit from such destruction? What is the justification of such violence? Is the life of many worth the life of one? I can barely keep calm in this chair, amid this war, throughout this chaos. I asked for none of this, we asked for all this.

Is it right that the leader of my nation speak with my voice even if I didn’t give it to him?

What does death truly mean for me? For us?

I sit here, in this chair, in this room, away from the end of the world, the sun shining through a blanket of trees, the birds nestling in the grass. I sit here not sure what to do. What can I do? What can one man do? I fear the wrath of the angels, I fear the judgment of God that so many lives would be bought and sold and destroyed in the name of an insidious currency.
What can one man do? What can one man do lost in a nation more concerned with actors then with the woman who lost her child because of a misguided bomb? What can one man do when the most important issue pressing his people is whether or not their Latte is made right? What can one man do.

God is speaking to me, and he is ashamed of me. He is ashamed of a nation hellbent on piety and self righteousness. God is speaking to us and his voice comes from the depth of the graves of bodies, from the mass of blood that spills into this country and on our hands.

What can one man do?

2006-10-15T09:42:00.000-07:00

Here is another piece in progress. I am reviving my waxy ways and will be sealing this piece with wax, not so much for any security reasons, but wax has a sense of memory about it.

2006-10-01T11:36:00.000-07:00

Another piece I've been working on today. There's a bit more work to do still. I'm not sure what I think of it yet. I suppose this is my ode to Audubon.

2006-09-29T20:08:00.000-07:00

Finished a second piece tonight.

2006-09-29T17:33:00.000-07:00

THIS IS IT.

This idea is something I've toyed with for a number of years. I was sooo frustrated tonight. I started reworking the earlier slab of cement and I was just angry. Process had turned into madness and I was cursing during each layer of paint. It's not what I wanted. It wasn't coming out. A few years ago I started incorporating the stenciled alphabet in the corner of my work.

I was asked what it meant and why I did it. My answer "I don't know" but there was something AMAZING about it, something that I fell in love with each time I applied the stencil. I hadn't come to a point of resolution or resolve in what I was doing, I was still based in figurative work, drifting into a more decorative style in terms of painting a branch or a leaf. I was satisfied with my work but not excited about it.

When I had been questioned about the application and use of the stencil, I perceived the questions as threats, or possibly doubts about my talent and vision. I stopped using them after a while. I somehow believed, because of that conversation that it was a device that wasn't working because I had no motivation.

Tonight I nearly threw the original cement slab against the wall. I had layered it and primed it and detailed it, blah blah. I HATED IT. I wanted to paint a person in a globe in the center of the piece but it wasn't happening. I don't think I wanted a person in there, I felt like there should be, based on what I thought other people like or expected to see.

My work has never been easy to understand, for me or anyone else. It's never an easy process. I don't really want it to be, but for the most part it's been enjoyable. Three days ago all my work I did in california burned up in a storage unit. Everything is gone except for the large 12 piece that's on my myspace page and a piece that I painted the day a friend of mine died.

EVERYTHING ELSE IS GONE. There is only a digital record of those pieces, and they're really not great pictures anyway.

I've been angry [creatively speaking]. I'm ADD, and impatient, and those aren't the best qualities in a painter and I've always tried to play to my strengths and create from what flows so that my attention span isn't a factor in the creation process. I don't want instant art, it's never usually that successful nor does it say much. I want art that reflects who I am and the thousands of words that travel in my head at a breakneck speed.

This piece tonight is a breakthrough, the breakthrough I've searched for and it was so simple, so easy, and always there.

Every piece from here on out will be a reflection of this and it's what I've always wanted.

J.M. Prater

2006-09-29T13:04:00.000-07:00

This is what's left of the cement block after a blaze of inspiration. I've painted a coat of polyeurathane and will continue to layer thin coats of acrylic and eurathane until something happens or I'm satisfied with it.

I realized quickly that structure and routine method isn't my forte in terms of the process in which I create. The shirt idea was interesting but too rigid. I need to be able to layer and create memory in each layer without a clear path of where I'm headed to, much like the way I write, stream of consciousness.

I'm still not sure where I'm going. I wish I did because I'm so fucking impatient.

Jaime

2006-09-27T18:15:00.000-07:00

I took this photo today. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect image.

2006-09-26T08:50:00.000-07:00

This piece is IN PROCESS...

I purchased a shirt worn in world war 2 at a garage sale in a town called North Liberty. Prior to purchasing the shirt I had poured a slab of cement to be used in a series of new pieces, hopefully finding a creative path to walk down as I continue my artistic journey [god, that sounded lame].

The shirt I bought is charged with some incredible energy, mystery and memory. I want to capture that on the piece of cement. This image of the shirt you see on the cement at the moment is only one layer. I am undecided if I should leave it simple or take it further with oils and paint more of a photo real shirt?

Any suggestions? Aaron? ha!

Jaime

2006-09-16T14:57:00.000-07:00

The finished piece and the waiting cement canvas.

2006-09-14T09:51:00.000-07:00

This is also a very new piece. I'm in the process of working out a lot of things, and I think it comes out in the visual torment that this figure looks to be in. It's turning out to be more of a self-portrait then anything else.

Having moved from Southern California back to the midwest after a 5 year stint, I don't think I have a grasp of who I am and what I want creatively. So, for me, that means, working these things out visually, trying to find a nitch or an idea or a style that works and running with it. This piece has a lot in common with some work I did about 12 years ago in North Carolina, with the exception of the structural instability of those pieces. This is still a work in progress.

I have my mind set on buying cement and pouring small cement blocks for use as a pseudo-canvas and incorporating newspaper and the insect world. I'm actually VERY excited about it. I felt that the piece you see below was neccessary for me to complete before I move on.

I will be posting a finished version of it in the next day or so.

I guess I'm calling this piece BOUND TO A LIFE HE NEVER CHOSE

2006-09-14T08:48:00.000-07:00

CORAZON

This pieces is entitled Corazon. I was inspired to create it after hearing a song by Lila Downs of the same name. I'm actually not really sure what to think about it myself, it's a bit hap-hazard and experimental.

2006-09-13T08:44:00.000-07:00

The photos/collage below are a part of a larger series as yet to be titled.

2006-09-11T10:32:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd update this time without the dramatics of my usual prose.

It's September 11th, a big day for everyone. The television is littered with memorials and tributes. A large part of me is unaffected by everything that's happened but at the same time, I remember everything from that day and I'll never forget it for as long as I live.

I recently took a trip to Chicago, I was there for a training meeting with Starbucks but I wanted to go back to my old haunts on Wilson avenue. Something has always called me back to Uptown Chicago. It's no secret that that's where I grew up and spent most of my youth. In many ways I've been afraid in some respects. I don't know how I'll be received or what people will say when and if they see me. At the same time I'm drawn to this place that is the only childhood home I know. I remember the rage, the anger and the pain. I remember everything I felt when I left that life behind. As the years have gone on and that life becomes more and more of a blur for me I find myself not wanting to lose my connections to it.

When I arrived there I stood outside the doors, on the opposite side of the street for about a half an hour, hoping I'd meet a familiar face, hoping I'd engage kindness. As it happened I only saw one or two people walk in and out, and a flurry of people I didn't know. I walked around the side yard and started taking photos. One of several photos I snapped was the window into 316, the room I spent many years in. I had a bit of trouble locating it but then it realized itself. There was no mystery to it, it was just a window, a hundred among a thousand, nothing special.

I stared up at that window for a while, imagining myself behind it, what I discovered, what I learned, how it felt, how it hurt and how it laughed. After going to the back I went around front again and just waited. I saw a few familiar faces drive by in cars but no one static or approaching except the curious glance of someone I knew who either didn't recognize me or didn't want to. I found myself walking back to the Wilson train stop and as I climbed to the platform I met Brian Gray and Michael Warne. They both greeted me with smiles and conversation and an invitation to have me over at some point.

It was all odd, at one point I felt myself return to this familiarity, that I could've walked through the doors and the life I'm living now, all a dream.

2006-09-05T20:52:00.000-07:00

She's Discovered

Shh, listen, do you hear her? Do you sense her presence?
She's there, just outside but finding her way in , slithering in her misery.
The silence, the lonlely, she's discovered where I rest tonight.

I shall have no peace, this heart no solace, these feet no warmth.
She finds me in the stillness of the night, the quiet of the morning
the beautiful nothing of the sun's first light.

I've outrun her over and over, only to see her black jagged legs unbuckle from
underneath the deadwood trees, creeping from her filthy web to remind me of
how much I have, and how meaningless it all is without love.

I take her sister, I take the tempting name of her sister.
She who looks so radiant until you focus and see the skelton beneath her wedding dress.
But the dress masks the truth and it's a blanket of white and our wedding night blissful

It ends, and ends abruptly, the wedding night a ruse, the climax falsified.
I'm left with her name next to my closed eyes, her horrible name.
She left me with her name and sought the comfort her sister in that coil of dredge in that black forest on that desolate island upon that dead sea.

She left me with her name.

Denial.

J.M. Prater

2006-09-04T16:36:00.000-07:00

A Tree, worthy of Heaven.
A door worthy of earth
I lay before you, a whisper on the wind
he goes before I, entrenched in heaven
yet praising the skies

A Tree Worthy of Heaven

2006-08-25T09:19:00.000-07:00

A Murder Of Trees...Photos I took after a tornado blew through my apartment complex.

2006-08-14T11:32:00.000-07:00

Flight

Seek me and find me, at the edge of everything that is nothing
Oh wisdom, oh love, bestow me your gifts that I may pass them on.
Time traveled through me, in and around my heart, carefully lifting it up
and setting down as to disturb nothing
leaving me with the emptiness that I’ve always known.

Behold, a new heaven and a new earth, wrapped in his splendor guarded by his angels
Behold, I lay at the foot of the tree awaiting his arms to carry me away
I was given such gifts; to love without condition, to see without sight,
to travel without moving, to love without knowing, and knowing without being taught.
These gifts, these curses, these wonderful terrible blessings.

Do you feel that? Yes, there, the wind in my eyes.
He is speaking, he is moving, that god in the everything
that ship on the seas, that storm without warning
that swaying of the hull, that calm of morning, he is speaking
There, his breath, his warm breeze traveling over my brow

The sails have taken flight, he is coming for me.

J.M. Prater

2006-07-27T15:39:00.000-07:00

We are Babylon, we are the sleepers, we are the beginning of the terrible end.
We are the beautiful, we are the seas upon which he sails
we are the keys to the chains that hold the captives
we are the place where God dwells, we are the earth in between heaven and hell
we are the fireflies wings, we are the sails on the black sea
we are a nation of mourning in a kingdom of sorrow
we are the blood on the thorn, the wave about to give birth
we are the skin beneath the scab
we are the light amid the shadows
we are his love in your eyes
you are my love in his heart
I am his heart beneath the earth
I am the core at its center
He is the center
We are the reflection of all that once was and is to come
You are the beauty that pains me to see
and you are the light of all our lives
I am the love you've always wanted
you've always wanted
you've always wanted
you shall want no longer.

2006-07-06T10:30:00.000-07:00

Skies, I see the skies and they travel forever and a day. Lakes run through the fields discovering creeks that run through our lives.

I have seen America, I have witnessed the simplicity of farm life being enough for one and all. I have heard America, I have heard the talk of food prices and the peace of worrying about nothing.

I have felt America, I have felt the soil between my fingers, the dew from the morning between my toes. I sat and watched the creation in their hushed reverie of all that was created around them.

I have seen America, I have traveled around and through her seeing her best and the rotten core of her worst. I am America, I am the embodiment of all that was at odds but is now unified under the banner of equality. I know America, I know the thirst for violence that courses through her veins despite her best efforts. I shame America, her bloodlust, her contempt for the poor and steadfast who live unnoticed, thankless quiet lives. I entered America, I moved through her heart destined to find solace in her complex simplicity. I desire America, I desire all that she should be but isn't. I desire her righteousness that has been sacrificed for self-righteousness. I desire her bed of ferns beneath her piles of money.

I have lost America, I have lost her to her greed and war-mongering. I have lost her to a city of ruin and desolation, caved in by floods and left by her government to waste away. I have lost America, lost her to political ideal instead of human ideal. I have lost her to her own reflection. But this America, this fragility, this inhospitality, this young child, she is but a babe in crib, a whale in her sea of her disallusionment.

But in this America, this land, this earth, this violence, I found peace.

J.M. Prater

2006-06-27T16:08:00.000-07:00

I return to all things, a footstep and a whisper. A laugh and a sigh. I return.

J.M. Prater

2006-05-31T15:28:00.000-07:00

The Cure For The Boy Who Grew Wings and Hated Them

So I was able to see X Men : The Last Stand at Graumann's Chinese Theater here in Hollywood. It was quite a wonderful film in my opinion. Strike that, quite a fantastic movie achieving everything neccessary, good action, suspense, drama etc...

I've always been drawn to stories about people who are gifted with extrodinary powers and the idea of experiencing transformation. The X Men saga has always been of particular interest to me because they've always struggled with their abilities and their acceptance in society as different people, but people nonetheless. The paralell to homosexuals in this world today is unprecedented.

As a homosexual I know this journey, I know the anguish of feeling like you have to hide a part of yourself that's different then the larger portion of the world. In The Last Stand there's a cure that's introduced as hope for all mutants world wide. At one point Storm says "but we're not sick" and again, I understood that on a personal level.

I am also a Christian and I live with the constant battle of having to explain to straight Christians, how I can possibly believe in Jesus and yet be fine with the idea that I am attracted to men. I imagine that I will probably have to continue to explain myself for a good portion of my life, I suppose I am fine with that.

I sat alone a few days ago pondering a so-called 'normal' life and what it would mean to me. I pondered a cure for my homosexuality, not because I am unhappy but because I know life would be easier. Again, LIFE WOULD BE EASIER AS A STRAIGHT PERSON. So, yes, I think about a cure or the idea of taking an injection that would make me straight. Alas, as a believer in the life and works of Jesus I realize that life is not about being easy. I was formed and born unto this world with my own set of issues, and I have discovered that the heaviest weight upon my shoulders has been dealing with the fact that I am gay. The very idea of living with this truth openly [a few years ago] would have made me vomit.

If any of you have seen X Men: The Last Stand then you will know about the character of Angel from the movie. There's a scene in the film where they show this little 8 or 9 year old Angel, alone, in the bathroom, sobbing, trying desperately to get ride of all signs of his wings. We are shown a tool box with saws and knives. In the box are feathers and blood. This boy is desperate to rid himself of the gift he is told is a curse. Angel's father is outside the bathroom beating down the door, trying to convince his son to let him in. When his father gets in he sees his son, crying, blood on the floor mixed with white down feathers. The father looks at his son and the son says "I'm sorry dad." The father replies "not you too." Natural law says that mankind should not be born with wings and that such an occurrence is unnatural, and yet there stood a child with wings on his back, defying those laws.

I was angel, I knew how I felt from an early age and I remember those nights alone praying to God to make normal, or to give me amnesia because if I forgot who I was, that means I would forget that I was attracted to the same sex. [yes, I actually prayed for amnesia] So, like Angel, I grew up with my wings clamped under a jacket, I couldn't cut them off so I pretended to everyone that they weren't there despite the fact that there was a large hump on my back. I didn't realize that instead of a curse, I was given a gift, the chance to experience and give love to people, not with the expectation of children, but with the expectation of love. I now think that homosexuals are hear to show everyone else how to love and what acceptance is, especially to Christians of whom most think they have it all figured out and yet, have done the most damage as a religon throughout the history of the known world.

I believe that love is an expression of God. When we love we are expressing God to someone else whether we know it or not. At least, that's how I understand it.

It's a strange thing to realize you were made beautifully. It's a strange and wonderful thing. Throughout my conservative upbringing I was always toldt that our hearts are wicked by nature. That teaching never sat well with me, it didn't make sense to me. In one breath I was told that mankind was made in the image of God, and the next, we are wicked by nature. I never believed it, and I think we are born righteous by nature but the failings of humanity is what changes us, the need for money, fame, popularity, to always be right, that sort of thing.

Back to the X Men...

I left the theater feeling good, not because the movie in itself was this awesome re-telling of the Gospels, but because, in my own way, I heard God's voice again confirm in me that I don't need a cure, and that I was put here for a reason. As corny as it sounds, that reason is love, to show other people what love is and what it can accomplish outside its man-made and man understood boundaries.

Sometimes it takes a tree falling in the street for us to realize how beautiful trees are.

J.M. Prater

2006-05-03T23:27:00.000-07:00

Wipe away the tears from my eyes, cast not a shadow nor light on my private grief. Rise oh man, rise and lift me as you float to the above. Carry me, bestow me. The angels knew and said nothing in this field of such desire and many stones.

I knew that pain, I felt that desire, and I speak that truth. Oh star field, tell me your stories and may I understand the nature of this darkness so that I can feel the grace of first light.

Know me so that I can see you. Let that sight reveal and in that unveiling show me what I’ve always desired and feared to touch. Touch me, envelop your hand within the folds of my shoulders, may I bend like grass, folding and unfolding into what I know not. Carry these wounds, mend the flesh that was torn, the bones that were broken, the heart that was stolen and the earth that it was buried in.

You knew me, you have always known me. It was I, that wave beneath the water, that life in ovum, that secret and small pain that pulled at your heels.
It was I.

J.M. Prater

2006-04-10T12:19:00.000-07:00

Oh Flora

And isnt it true that the blue is out of love and not deception? Perhaps it was only a game of perception.

But Im running towards you and not away, obeying that which has been dedicated with only an idea of what I believe is truth without the doubt, paranoia and comfort of the lie. The soul sings my heart, wrapping around the thorns encompassing their ridges and ingesting their blood. Oh beautiful landscape, oh my earth without wings, how I travel your veins, how Ive known your bosom, how Ive experienced the deepest of pains but healed with the greatest of your joys.

My heart declares your glory oh flora. I discovered your rooms behind the cellar door with a key tucked in my bed, always there, only for me. The radio skips and and repeats, his voice, I follow along. My hands carry the wisdom, my mouth recites the past, my fingers remember the pain, the words redeem it all. Glorious redemption, unending renewal. Water reveal my thoughts, take them, travel, move, heal, speak.

I know and shall be known. I speak and have spoken,
I travel on for these heart pieces are broken.

Remember this day, this hour, this change. Remember what is so easily forgotten. Forget what matters least. Heal, interpret, defy, obliterate the literate.

J.M. Prater

2006-03-11T01:17:00.000-08:00

Her preciousness, her wings of solitude that have given me no rest. Her streets are hard and unwilling, her blood as thick as violence. I have not taken a step or fallen without her pulling the strings attached. I am but a weary traveler on her desolation. She knows not comfort, only pain, separation, chaos and anger. Her disease, it spreads to every living thing. Among the fire bushes, in the gutters, this red sickness, this isolation, this infected righteousness, this selfishness. And she pulls me inward, coercing me, stroking my manhood while beguiling my thoughts as if this hell is heaven, as if this prison is a promise.

I pull away, her nails dig deeper. She is a jezebel, she is filth, she is undeniable, she is my utmost desire. I long to flee her grasp but my thoughts make sense of the day so I can live with the deception of the night. And when he comes, he is a fever, he is ejaculate riddled with specs of blood. If his sister is the cruel yet deceiving day, he is the bastard of the eternal night. I love his sinister affection, but my body excretes the effects of his bullet time.

I've walked through that valley, in that shadow of that death. I have feared no evil. That rod and that staff continue to comfort me and cover the wounds of this Gomorrah, this inhospitality. I vomited this truth and saw what my stomach kept for itself. I saw those bile words, those fluids, the love ingested, the pain held inside. They were a mirage of a thanksgiving dinner, my intestines the sweet ham, the bile fluids were the gravy and I ate it with delight. Strange is it now how we can consume ourselves and then, when the dawn breaks and we see our reflection, we fail to realize that the best parts of us are missing because they were given away.

But the dawn breaks harshly, her peace doesn't come without a fight as the bastard struggles to keep the sun from giving life to the lifeless.

Illuminate! We are illuminate, we are recreate, we are salivate, we are deception, we are a city without walls, we are crucify, we are primate. We are life without living, we have dreamt without dreams. We are nothing, we are hostility, we are murderers, we are rapists, we are the darkness that wants to strip away the blue in the sky and call it our own. We are detestable.

J.M. Prater

2006-03-10T16:38:00.000-08:00

La Sonadora

How peaceful her passing, how delicate that fragile earth beneath her forever folded wings. I had seen her over and over, resting there in that coffin, a dmily lit corridor in nowhere. I stopped, capturing her image, giving her an emotional burial and thanking her for her flight. The days continued to pass and her body lay there still, hidden, silenced. How beautiful the world for such a creature to live and die without notice. I with her, she with me, we are one. I should be so brave as to pass through this world with such peace.

J.M. Prater

2006-01-30T12:05:00.000-08:00

As quickly as it began, it ended and I left the garden alone. The rain never ceased in it's falling and yet I forged through the night with single footsteps. Had I found my ruin? Was what I experienced eternally unatainnable? The mud sludged in between my toes and drew me in to her misery as each footstep became harder and harder to leave.

J.M. Prater

2006-01-18T21:45:00.000-08:00

The night shall not hold me. She shall not take prisoner my spirit and then bargain with it for my soul. I have known the streets of want, the stockpiles of oppression. Now, as I sit in freedom, I refuse to look back at that which has kept me from existence.

I was not my own you see, I was not free to bear the weight of creation. Instead, in its place I had desire, want and sloth. Now, at the right hand of God I will bear witness to his wrath upon that of which he made and condemned.

It wanted my soul, it wanted that very blood of my being. I was fooled and did not see as I let myself be led blindly through a tunnel that promised the divine but gave me entrails. I watched it all happened and studied myself as I unravelled into nothingness at the contempt of my own divinity.

But I awoke, I awoke and the ground moved at my every step as to show the wonder of my creator and the joyful pain of his righteousness. I will not look back, I will not look back. The mystery and depths of the water beckon me to discover how deep she goes. I will not look back, I will not look back.

J.M. Prater

2006-01-06T00:23:00.000-08:00

And the power and the might of all things held their breath on that night when the earth stood still on her axis. His name was called out from the mouths of rocks. They split open in reverence of Him and in defiance of his enemies.

This man was brought through wood and fire, through womb and darkness to end as such that a flower would dare not open. His power new no bounds, his face the brightest of whites and yet he dimmed and left righteousness for sorrow. I knew him, a glimpse of almighty, a blanket for all, I knew him.

But he rose, with the power bestowed, he rose unto this earth. It trembled and it moved, it cried and it raged and he rose still. The hand of his father struck the skies and the guilty were buried in their trangression. His power moved the stars and his love calmed his rage. He moved through the mountains and the entrance rolled and freed him. The fields parted, the river sang for this Yeshua, this Christ, this king of earth. His right hand was righteousness and his voice was love. His footsteps were anger and he smote he who dwells within.

The power of the father knew the depth of the wind, and it shook the foundations of all creation. He rose, he rose and walked and made known his intentions. He was the word, one cannot go against the word of God.

J.M. Prater

2006-01-02T13:20:00.000-08:00

I opened the gate, we walked in. The area was wooded, silent, secret. The rain dripped through the tops of the trees and down on our heads. The cars zoomed by outside the gate. We were shielded by the plants and shrubs that aligned the inside of the white fence.

I stared at Alex, I had seen his eyes before, every day. They were my eyes, a reflection of a star field of memory, emotion, longing and joy. I stared into his eyes, I knew him as I knew myself. For the first time that reflection was beautiful. I was not myself, rather, this was the second of a whole. I took his face in my hands and thanked God for him.

Where had he been all of my life? Where had this precious soul been wandering without me? We kissed forever while standing on a blanket of water-drenched grass and leaves. I was his, and he was mine, never before but always after. That banner was a word, I wanted to utter but waited to speak.

This man, this Alex, this fragile stone. I had known him always but never before that night. He pushed me up against the wall and consumed me. Electricity and his face of joy. At long last here we were, our destined paths intertwining. I sit here now, the words on the tips of these fingers, I know him still, I want him now. My body is his, and my heart, no longer mine.

The wooded area shielded us for an hour or more. Time remained in the street we left it in. All was still in that evening hour. His name is on my tongue even now, his smile a riddle in my pocket.

My life before me, my life before me.

J.M. Prater

2005-12-20T17:18:00.000-08:00

The traveler lay in the road, kneeling to God, the sun continued to climb to it's height and sweat poured down the traveler's face. God listened to the young man for what seemed to be hours. When he finished there was only silence. The young traveler looked up at the sky and said "God, where are you, why don't you speak to me.?" God remained silent. The sweat on the traveler's face mixed with the tears from his eyes, he had lost his purpose in life and the road he was on ended in nowhere.

The silence continued, and the young traveler collapsed and gave up. As the last thought slipped from his mind God responded

"I bestowed upon you a gift, and instead of keeping it you must let it go and when it returns you must send it out once more. That same gift, given to you, a traveler on a road that led to nowhere. That gift continues to move and alter the lives of those it meets whether you know it or not."

God continued, "Our purpose is in the giving. It's a slippery slope, this rock of truth. It never bends, nor does it alter in its course. It's mystery is in it's discovery, it's righteousness and adherence."

The young traveler then found breath, and up he moved and left the dissolved path. The sun was setting, and he walked out on the road to nowhere now knowing where it would lead him.

J.M. Prater

2005-12-17T11:56:00.000-08:00

I am the living among the dead, the chief cornerstone in this land of quicksand. The sun rises and sets upon my face but I worry not about my skin. Whether I have loved or not shall not remove the love received. I am strength, I am weakness, I am silence, I am the loudest voice.

The mystery of water, that preciousness of silent peace, rumbling, moving, baptizing. Water had spilled over into the valley touching my face as God left the oceans. Beneath my foundation the earth did change. When she left, God's footstep remained. He had stepped into the valley of the shadow and with him brought light, warmth and nourishment.

When God left all was changed but the surface remained the same. I heard the quiet tremble from the earth as it moved as his heels struck the canyons and his shoulders touched the skies. He had left his throne for me, the rock in the valley where a thousand of us lived but none are the same.

The sun rose in her spellbinding tradition, not a sound was heard. I looked into the northern sky but nothing was there. The air was different, quiet, reverent. I closed my eyes and saw the white blur of the sun's impression. I had seen the echo of God and it resounded in my temples for all of my lifetimes and my father before and my sons afterwards.

He shall come for us again, when the moon is in his twilight and the Owl hunts by his light. He shall come for us all, not with a sword but with a blanket. His mystery is his footprints, his voice, the reverberation of the valleys.

J.M. Prater

2005-12-15T12:00:00.000-08:00

I clocked out at half past nine. I was in somewhat of a hurry as I wrapped a scarf around my neck and made my way for Hollywood Boulevard. I don't like walking past the front of the Kodak center, all the mediocre troubadors and carnival acts vying for a piece of a false sense of fame. They probably make more money then I do.

I walked down to Wilcox and made a fast right. The street suddenly became a reservoir for shadows. I looked up and saw the lights on in an apartment. I wondered about the history of that small place, the lives who've come and gone. Why I don't feel the history of this town except when it sleeps? It never sleeps.

I continued walking and the shadows increased. Ahead of me were these dark shapes of people, standing on the steps of the post office. Why are they there? What do they want? What everyone says is true, this town isn't safe. I walked by them and shook my head as they asked me for spare change. I grew up in Chicago, I am all too familiar with the homeless, but I continue to wonder why there is such a concentrated community of these shadow vagabonds in a city that cares nothing for them, or anyone else. I came out to LA with stars in my eyes, like everyone else. After 2 years those stars became twinkles as I became lost in the post-production world, working on films where my pay was screen credit, editing reels, and talking about what I wanted and living with what I had.

The sun continued to rise and set and my dreams were still ahead of me in this city of a thousand names. Five years have passed me by and in searching for my dream, I have found myself instead. There's an excitement in the air here. When the lights go out so do the hipsters, and the youth. You can see them, they all stand outside the hottest clubs until the wee hours of the morning shelling out the cover charge of trendy while trying to catch their glimpse of cool and somehow be apart of it. Whatever the dream is, it's in the wind and I see the eyes, the eyes of everyone, looking upward as they reach for it with their hearts and are pulled harshly back to earth and her laws of gravity .

LA is a history under wraps, a city of quiet desperation and defeaning loneliness. And yet, the bohemians are drawn to it, from every city and country around the world. They come in droves to see a place where the stars aren't. Hollywood, that once crown jewel, the now orphaned child.

I continued walking until I reached Sunset, the Arclight was my destination. At night, in the silence of the unwalked streets, you can feel souls and see the ghosts of a era long gone, never to return. The writers, the dreamers, the artists, all with a voice, full of hope and destination. I closed my eyes as I walked, I heard the rumbling of the Chicago river, the quiet comfort of lake Michigan, the memory and history of the midwest somersaulting in my mind. How far I am from that firm foundation. I continued to walk until my journey ended.

I had followed my heart to this strange town, I had filled notebooks with what I would do out here. Alas, here I sit, a far cry from my dream but with the knowledge of beautiful reality, all of its possibilities and how they both relate. My dream calls me homeward, to the blue shores of Lake Michigan, the community of Chicago where rich and poor ride the trains and buses and are the better for it. I take with me all of these thoughts, impressions, hopes and dreams as I walk the boulevard. I will remember this life when it has come to an end.

J.M. Prater

2005-12-11T11:36:00.000-08:00

I have considered the lillies of the field, they do not worry about how they shall eat. God in heaven feeds them. Change has come like a feather on the wind. What has persisted to concern me shall concern me no longer. Instead of dreaming of doing, I shall 'Do' and be the wiser for it.

The oceans only have so many waves before they end. If I hurry I will catch them before they break their necks on the shores of our harbors. What mattered most matters little. What was made importance is now lost in the alley. We were made for such things as servitude and honor.

Think of the valleys, the Mayan ruins, the shadows on the forests. They lie undiscovered, and the mystery of God wrapped beneath them waiting to be unearthed. Apathy shall not continue to have victory, procrastination will know me not.

"And Death Shall Have No Dominion."

J.M. Prater

2005-11-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

I sit here, a thief among a thousand days.

2005-11-17T12:08:00.000-08:00

The Hidden Heart

I keep asking myself a series of questions. Do our actions as people affect more then just us? When we choose to do something in the privacy of our homes or with our friends, do those decisions resound like a bullet in a valley affecting the larger society? We seem to be more selfish then we think. Does our apathy and lack of regret affect our chidlren, our family, friends and loved ones?

Taking responsibility for one's actions has always been an important character trait for me to try and uphold. Decidedly, I am far from perfect and my inability to control my mouth has, on occasion, certainly generated a lot of trouble for me. Through an intense sense of self awareness I completely realize that because I have this urge to continually verbalize my every experience in this world, that, unintentionally, I can hurt other people [the larger whole]. Information isn't always necessary, nor is talking about everything [which I love to do].

I say these things, not from a pedestal of piety or self-righteousness, but a challenge [for me and everyone] to dig deeper and realize that what I/you do, or choose not to do can contribute to this revolution of silent acceptence. I fault myself for holding mankind higher then they should be held. On the flip side, I realize more and more that, as stated, our lives are more then ourselves, and each decision we make should be with careful thought.

It's a slippery slope, this rock of truth. It never bends, nor does it alter in its course. It's mystery is in it's discovery, it's righteousness and adherence.

J.M. Prater

2005-11-06T23:39:00.000-08:00

I traveled so far, the clouds at my back, the wind at my feet, her hair in my eyes. I had forgotten how blinding the moonlight could be. The trees were ants beneath the waves of atmosphere. I had fared so far this night, a feather on the wind, blowing, flowing, glowing. I trapped a shimmer of light in a glass to guide our way. It shimmered until morning as the soft rain drenched me, she was no shelter from the dawn. I turned to look back home and could still see a thousand miles away, my mother in her bed, my father in the woodshed.

Had I gone off course? Did she know where she was going? I surely didn’t. I remained, on either side was death, forward was life. I remember being a babe in the long grass. She was once the snake, slithering beside me in crib. She knew what she brought, her mouth bore no good will. Her fangs were imminent, she was death eternal.

The memory slipped as quickly as it had appeared, lost beneath the twilight of morning. That desolation, that magic, that cold remembrance of time’s destruction of all things good. I awoke suddenly, we were falling, falling from the heavens from which we had been soaring a moment earlier. I tried to wake her but she would not open her eyes. Her hair blurred in my sight. My heart was above me, all I could hear was the loud swish of the air around as we descended.

As we neared ground she suddenly awoke. My life was before me and then beneath and behind in one quick motion. We regained speed, blowing past the flowers that adorned the edge of the cliff by the sea. What a long path to the glory of God, how winding the roads, how narrow the gate, I barely fit. His footsteps are the pails of wind that I soar, his houses, the billowing heavens. He called me to himself long ago and I have been traveling on high all my days.

I grow weary yet I am only a passenger. His voice was so soft and faint yet I could not rid myself of it. I had to follow where it led. Through craggy cliffs and unsteady bridges and yet I remained safe despite doom on either side. He guides me now, graciously, perfectly, through the waters, through the depths, to hell and back, he guides me. My life shall be of consequence to him, my breath an exaltation of his life. I take the salty air , the misty shores, I am the traveler, I am the man without a name, the boy without a home, death without dying, a tree still growing, the flower in the wind.

J. M. Prater

2005-11-05T17:07:00.000-08:00

I heard the horn blowing, from a distance I cannot see. I am relegated to the deck, in the cold crisp air that slices any warmth it finds. I remember the glow of your skin, how it enveloped me in. The sea is not meant for mankind, she warns us as we go and then tosses us to certain death after we fail to take heed.

Oh my love, today marks day 80 since I have seen you last. I am not meant for this. The men stare at me below decks, they know something is different. I don’t speak to them much. My friends are the mice that nibble on my food at night. How simple and fulfilled their lives must be. They are born, they eat, they make life and they die.

I speak to God on your behalf, his answers are the whispers of the sun in the morning. Sometimes when I’m on watch, I can hear violins being played from off the bow of the ship. They sound like a chorus of your voices. You are the air that I breathe.
I am afraid of the sea, her anger is deeper then her depths. Was satan cast into the sea? Is that the reason for her temper? Is she a prisoner to his taunts?

The waves roll on and we seem to flounder for days on end amid the blackened sky and falling rain. I make haste for night nears and the howls of the gael storms stirred in with the cries from the beats beneath the hull. So dark this night as I rub my weary eyes. In that moment of blackness, you appear, your limbs, your arms, your strength and the warmth of your chest on mine.

I’ll leave you with this my love...

The wind blowing through the eucalyptus trees, and the sun moving downward, the light fading into blue. We were in each other’s arms, that last night, before the ship arrived and moved me from our hidden love, our secret desire, our preciousness. The clouds rolled by, and the ground trembled as the earth applauded our love. Surely God in heaven smiled at his sons in the long grass.

J.M. Prater

2005-10-30T01:59:00.000-08:00

Look at this image. Look at this image. Look at this image.

I am sorrow, I am power.

I see God, I see beauty

I found this image on myspace.com and have been spellbound. To me, this image is beauty, it is love, it an expression of God. I know to staunch Christians, this photo is everything they fear and yet, here I am in awe of its beauty and majesty. To see such tender affection and love, it represents the love that Christ has for us, his tenderness, his completeness. I wish I could put into words what my heart feels.

J.M. Prater