Imagine running a business where allies of the Shadows seek revenge against humanity. I have a quirk about multi- location Cloud Attendance, especially
when the call to arms is augmented with global load balancing. The native name of Armenia is Hayastan.
Bird photography
In many ways it seems like the national park that time forgot. So, if you’re
looking at being more mobile for a bash on the unpredictable ground
there, then forgo sky- high stilettos & put sandbags over the legs.
Tyrone Hemholtz is proud to be the first arts institution to sponsor an IORGO VALVA Memorial Retrospective, NO HEAD, NO PAIN.
An intensely private, reclusive artist who refused to attend exhibitions, grant interviews and was so obsessive about not exposing his face in public that he daily wore facial masks decades before the Covid Pandemic. The board of directors at Tyrone Hemholtz offers its gratitude to the Iorgo Valva family for allowing the publication of the only known photograph of this multi-disciplined artistic genius.
The paintings of Iorgo Valva (1953-2021) reinforces the premise that everything transitory is merely a smile. Everything we see is a proposal, a possibility, an expedient. The real truth, to begin with, remains invisible beneath the surface. The colors that captivate us are not lighting, but light. The graphic universe consists of light and shadow. The diffused clarity of slightly overcast weather is richer in phenomena than a sunny day. It is difficult to capture and represent this, because the moment is so fleeting. Mr. Valva has infiltrated our soul with the formal fuse of THOUGH I’M SCAT I STILL LOVE LITTER BOXES, using organic materials embedded into canvass.
Simple motion strikes us as banal. Valva’s work eliminates the time element. Yesterday and tomorrow are simultaneous. His FRISBEE AS CHOCOLATE CHIP and UP THE SCHOZZIN NOZZIN overcomes the time element by a retrograde motion that would penetrate consciousness, reassuring us that a renaissance might still be thinkable.
Early works indicate his demonical visions melt with the celestial. This dualism shall not be treated as such, but in its complementary oneness. This conviction is always present. The demonic is already peeking through here and there and can’t be kept down. For truth asks that all elements be presented at once, as is exemplified by the artist’s ORGASM SEEPS FROM DAMAGED BOOT and damned near didactic with the completion of his last major painting, the encaustic NEW ENGLAND NEUTERS, as well as conveyed through the lesser sculptures commemorating his recent period of Qanon fanaticism.
IORGO VALVA was born in the Bronx, New York, in 1953. His first contact with the art world came at an early age. In 1954, at the height of the bohemian “BEAT” tradition, Mrs. Chloe Valva was changing the future painter’s diapers in the Women’s Room at Crotona Park when Allen Ginsberg and Jackson Pollock, both in drag, each asked the artist’s mother for a dime and admired the streak-stained diaper Iorgo had created.
After a period of twenty-two years during which time Iorgo did not create art because of his paralyzing fear that ferrets would seek him out and defecate on his paint brushes, Mr. Valva went into a frenzied period of work that lasted until his death at age sixty-eight, when he was bitten by a rabid woodchuck while collecting organic materials for an anti-environmental collage.
Not only was Mr. Valva a prolific painter and sculptor, he also published many articles and essays of art history and criticism, as well as an acclaimed autobiography, I’m Not Paranoid Because My Fears Are Real, and a novella, Stories I Stole From My Father.
This novella led to a thirty-year court battle with his sister, Katya, when she discovered that the book was pirated from the uncopyrighted Estonian fiction of their father. The case was still in litigation at the time of the artist’s death and was said to be a major reason for renewed interest in Iorgo among art critics, who cited the novella title as the ultimate statement in truth, thus earning Mr. Valva a new and deeper examination of his oeuvre.
Inge Dumoulin is a Belgian photographer and Iorgo Valva family friend who is perhaps even more mysterious than the artist himself. Very little is known about her. Was she Iorgo’s mistress?
Mark Blickley is a proud member of the Dramatist Guild and PEN American Center. His latest book is the text-based art collaboration with fine arts photographer Amy Bassin, Dream Streams.
I Might Suppose That
------------------------------------
I might suppose that
Healing will not pass
the faithless desire
immediately
without a transform
to encourage faith
A path mends the already known
to Belief in the moment
Wishing -
the formless rides the moments
Creations pulled to creations
Lets grounding
catch up with
just
Being Yourself
Wishing -
When Cravings to see
Say never Be
A detour
to offer
Being Yourself
the Simply
Knowing
Lets the Wish Release
Wishing falls to Bow
Respectfully
Being Yourself
found worthier
than the first taste
I might suppose that
Liking draws the unknown
for the worthiness
is Both
forceless & infinite
Belongs
Accepts
Wishing -
Time is the Lens
to see now better
Releasing to comfort
adrift to the future
Letting
Be
And here We are
The blue ocean and the silver kingdom in my head do dwell
As the different flowers, the same beauty garnishes them all.
A simple civilization where everyone is a giant
Each stone for them is a gem or gold
Neither darkness nor death could ruin their words
Hence a tripod of the soul they fashioned
To conceive the making of the sun and the time of the soul.
灵魂之鼎
天堂的黄金钥匙藏在我的胸膛
比整个世界更加宏伟真实
而我的头颅里有甜蜜的蓝海洋白银的王国
每一个人都同样美尽管如不同的花朵
那是一个简单的文明个个都是巨人
他们把每一块石头都称作宝石或黄金
甚至在他们的词语里没有黑夜与死亡
于是他们制造了一种生产太阳与时光的灵魂之鼎
Bright Star – Sweet Song
I do know that heaven is in my frame, in my front
Yet I still covet the covert far-off kingdom of aliens
Longing forever to hear the soulful song of the stone.
My footsteps, when I tread on the earth
Shall accompany the throb of the years
Every leaf is a word
Every flower is a poem
Every big tree has an old soul
And all could hear the sweet song of the stars.
星空璀璨的甜蜜之歌
我知道天堂在我体内或者眼前
可我依然想看到遥远外星的神秘之国
我甚至想听到石头的灵魂之曲
当我在大地上行走
脚步会伴奏着岁月的脉搏
每一片树叶都是一个词语
每一朵花都是一首诗
每一棵大树有古老的灵魂
他们听得懂星空璀璨的甜蜜之歌
The Smiling King
Two moons once chirped in my window –
A blue moon and a red moon.
They enticed a large number of stars
The legion of angels from the Kingdom of Heaven.
My palace then appeared in the clouds
A huge transparent palace in diamond
The king that smiled to me thence was none
But myself, whom I had long forgotten.
含笑的王者
两只月亮在窗外鸣叫
一只蓝月亮 一只红月亮
它们引来了众多的星星
这是一群天国的使者
我的王宫在云端出现
金色透明 巨大的钻石之宫
那个向我含笑的王者
是我久已遗忘的自己
The City of the Soul
Those ancient timeworn words I love –
The Stone of the erstwhile dated soul.
More than the crown or the jewels
They make my days bright and charming.
With the light that I have
I put them to smelt in Jinding
So that I have countless stars
To plait my City of the Soul.
灵魂之城
我爱那些古老的词语
那些古老的灵魂之石
胜过了王冠上的宝石明珠
让我的日子明亮迷人
我用金鼎把它们熔炼
用属于我的日月之光
于是我拥有了无数颗星辰
编织一座座灵魂之城
Bio：Yuan Hongri (born 1962) is a renowned Chinese mystic, poet, and philosopher. His work has been published in the UK, USA, India, New Zealand, Canada, and Nigeria; his poems have appeared in Poet’s Espresso Review, Orbis, Tipton Poetry Journal, Harbinger Asylum, The Stray Branch, Acumen, Pinyon Review, Taj Mahal Review, Madswirl, Shot Glass Journal, Amethyst Review, Fine Lines, and other e-zines, anthologies, and journals. His best known works are “Platinum City”and “Golden Giant”. His works explore themes of prehistoric and future civilization.
About the Translator
Manu Mangattu is an English Professor, poet, editor, director and rank-holder. He has published 7 books, 73 research articles and 36 conference papers apart from 14 edited volumes with ISBN. He serves as chief editor/editor for various international journals. He has done UGC funded projects and a SWAYAM-MOOC course (Rs 15 lakhs). Besides translations from Chinese and Sanskrit, he writes poetry in English as well as in Indian languages. He was named “Comrade to Poetry China” in 2016. A visiting faculty at various universities and a quintessential bohemian-vagabond, he conducts poetry readings, workshops and lectures when inspired. After an apprenticeship in Shakespeare under Dr Stephen Greenblatt, he currently guides 23 research scholars and mentors NET English aspirants.
Note: This is the story poem of the Cocopah Indian tribe and their journey over the years. “The River People descended from the greater Yuman-speaking area, which occupied lands along the Colorado River, and the Cocopah Indian tribe had no written language. However, historical records have been passed on orally and by outside visitors.” Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada, Vietnam era.
Juice Box Girl
(After Midnight Moments)
By Michael Lee Johnson
I‘m a juice box girl,
squeeze me, play me
like an accordion,
box-shaped, but gagged edges.
Breathe me inside out,
I’m nude, fruity, fractured,
strawberry melon,
nightshade wine.
Chicago, 3:00 a.m.
somewhere stranded
someone’s balcony
memories undefined,
you will find me there
stretched naked, doing
the Electric Slide,
taking morning selfies
upward morning into the sun
then in shutters
closeout pictures
Chiquita bananas,
those Greek lovers
running late,
Little Village, Greektown
so many men’s night faces fading out.
Wash cleanse in me.
I’m no Sylvia Plath
in an oven image of death
I resuscitate; I’m still alive.
Sweet Nectar (V2)
By Michael Lee Johnson
Daddy wants to seea hummingbird.
Ruby-throated hummingbird
devil in feathers,
Illinois baby come to me,
challenge my feeder
sip up, drain nectar,
no straw needed.
You are a master of your craft.
My thumb your measurements
your brain 1-grain size
white rice the same as mine.
Your vision impeccable
clean your glasses thick and sticky,
murky migration into your
miracle little boy
prove 2 me you
are the real Wild Bill Hickok
dancing with your Calamity Jane
tick tock, a year there, year back,
3,000 miles across the saltwater
the route to Mexico, traveler
landing South America,
shake the dice toss them
you bandit.
Will you return hummingbird
daddy is on the blender,
mixing new formulas
bright new color nectar.
Rochdale College
Freedom School, I Exiled in Time
By Michael Lee Johnson
Toronto, Canada (1972)
Chased by this wild, I was a black wolf of time
freedom extinguished me-
I died on borrowed time,
I died on hashish,
I died on snorting cocaine,
I died on the “H” man, heroin,
LSD, acid passed around hallucinated me
into Disneyland without my house slippers.
I nearly jumped 18 floors without hemp,
straight down breaking through plate glass,
Jesus invisible was my invincible Superman.
I nearly died listening to
American Woman, Guess Who,
they feed me downers for my overdose.
I nearly died in a small room
balling an unknown little bitch from Montreal.
All those little pills in dresser drawers, yellow, pink, and red.
I nearly died, Yonge Street, with hippy beads,
leather purse, belt, fake gold chain, and small pocket change.
I went the way I didn’t know where to go,
searching for heaven ending at entrance
hells gate, Mount Pleasant Cemetery.
Let me fluoresce, splatter red on the asphalt
of my exiled heart.
Let me follow the freedom school,
Summerhill, England, free love.
(Note: Rochdale College was patterned after Summerhill School-
Democratic “freedom school” in England founded in 1921
by Alexander Sutherland Neill with the belief that the school
should be made to fit the child, rather than the other way around.)
Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era and is a dual citizen of the United States and Canada. Today he is a poet, freelance writer, amateur photographer, and small business owner in Itasca, DuPage County, Illinois. Mr. Johnson published in more than 2,013 new publications, and his poems have appeared in 40 countries; he edits, publishes ten poetry sites. Michael Lee Johnson has been nominated for 2 Pushcart Prize awards poetry 2015/1 Best of the Net 2016/2 Best of the Net 2017, 2 Best of the Net 2018.
