Cowboy Film Stills

So we did this series of photos and poems based on Cindy Sherman’s Untitled Film Stills. It was JANE’s concept, but I actually shot the pictures and he wrote the poems. He got all the credit of course, and they ended up selling for $15,000 each. He sold a bunch. But we got slayed by the critics. They were ready to kill, I swear. Since JANE was known for his music and the TV show, the art world didn’t want him coming around. It was like they were crouched in the shadows, waiting for him to step into their world with their old lady teeth bared and witchy claws raised. A bunch of bitter toothed cunts, full of venom, stagnant bile, old ideas bit down as hard as they could to make him bleed and hurt and hopefully die before he got too big.

They did it because they knew. They knew he would expand. He wouldn’t stop growing. He wouldn’t cease becoming. He was a birth of not only himself, but his wicked ideas. He was a nihilistic piper, who saw the hidden death drive pulsing in every young heart, like little red lights going on/off, on/off. He, like Emerson’s genius, said to them what they had all been thinking, but this time, coated it in the elegant sadness of his magic touch.

Look at these photos, and read, and think about him riding me on a motorcycle through the desert outskirts of Los Angeles, a hero and a heroine, listening only to the language of art. He had dared to enter the art world and dance with ideas of one of its reigning queens. And they punished him for it.

But was her work not the same? Did she not enter the film world and play a few jokes with her film stills? We don’t want people to go the other way? Why? Because art is more prestigious? More serious? While film is for the kiddies and money-men? Well, fuck you, we did it. You say that Cindy disappeared into her photos, and JANE was ever present, as if that were a criticism. Don’t you see that today it’s not about the character. It's all about the player? It’s the mind behind the puppets, not the little puppets themselves. That’s what JANE is, the puppet master, the showman, the ringmaster: dancing, and laughing, and pulling all the strings, out there in the dark, behind the thousand screens and projections of his personality. A thousand faces, a million songs, a billion reverberations in all the heads of all the children who listen to the messages woven like music in the air. We ride. My face pressed against the back of the blond wig, arms around his zipped-in leather chest, and forward facing, his great façade of glasses, too handsome face, and coolness, holding in all the ideas. Behind us, the red light of our tail, the only beacon of our zip around flight though the deserts of the night.

"Untitled Film Still #52"

I won’t, I won’t, I won’t. I won’t
Allow him to do it again, I will
Not put up with this anymore
I will leave if it ever happens

Again, and if he ever does that
Again, I will shoot the mother.
I’d like to stick a blade through
His thing and let his balls fall

Out; I’d cook ‘em in oil and eat ‘em.
The morning of March 23rd
They found her body spread eagle
On the bed, her abdomen stabbed

Twenty-six times, part of her entrails
Were pushed out through her
Vagina, and there was a furry white
Bear stuffed into her mouth, suffused

With blood; it was her son’s bear.

"Untitled Film Still #51"

The architecture and plants
Are gorgeous in the half light,
The foregrounded twisty stair
Emphasizes the potential energy

Of the descent into the lower darkness.
There is a Matisse-like block painting
Of an elephant on the wall just below
Her, the whole scene feels like the corner

Of an atrium in a museum or aquarium
At night, when only the guards and fishes
Fill the space with their silence.
But instead it’s a house at night.

And she stands in the upper light,
Her face half lit, half darkened
As she contemplates the sounds
Emanating from her kitchen.

"Untitled Film Still #50"

On the modernist couch in all black
A hat on her head and a drink in her hand
Three ashtrays on the low coffee table
And an African statue in the back

Reminiscent of the racist depictions
In Antonioni when Monica Vitti dances
In blackface with a spear; and the same thing
In Fellini in the club with Mastroianni.

But here the scene is more like The Big Sleep
– yeah, this bitch is in a 1940s scene,
She’s about to get popped.
There’s a scary, hairy guy

Off screen; he’s gonna stick it to her,
And leave her body hanging half off the couch,
Feeding blood into the white carpet

"Untitled Film Still #42"

For Phillip Marlow to find.
An old Mexican church, all white
With the lady in black out front;
Two lampposts as sentinels,
And three crosses on top.

Perhaps this is New Mexico,
Taos, or the road to Taos,
Where a church just like this one
Sits next to the road and a bookstore.

We passed it on the way
To the town where D.H. Lawrence
Is supposed to be buried.
But the story goes that his ashes were tossed

In the ocean and replaced by other ashes.
During Easy Rider Jack and Dennis went
To his grave to be blessed, they took acid
And knew that humans were just insects.

The next day they made history on film.

"Untitled Film Still #36"

It’s bright outside
Behind the curtains
And I want to think
Los Angeles in the day.

Her angular figure in white
Underclothes, or maybe
It’s a dress, it’s hard to tell,
She’s in silhouette

Against the glowing backlight.
How many times have you laid
On a bed and watched such a
Beauty dress in the morning

And thought you were blessed,
As if the sun were conspiring
With you and all these affairs
Were scenes in the movie of your life.

"Untitled Film Still #64"

She worked as a nanny until 1980,
More like a maid, for a well-off family
On the upper west side.
The son had pinned his younger sister,

Age fifteen, in the park one night,
Held her screams and raped her.
Later, the mother didn’t listen
To the story, the daughter was ostracized.

She became a writer for children.
The maid stayed on
For one more dark year.
The son killed himself,

The other daughter became a hooker.
The maid lived near the Brooklyn Bridge;
For six months she met a man each Monday
At lunch in a stone park; her day off.

 "Untitled Film Still #63"

What? The boys from her youth
Had become silly, or faded into jail,
Or death from needle drugs – two
To suicide – but she kept the boots

That she wore in high school
The nine-holed ones she bought
In a period of rebellion and self
Definition that she still held onto

As a solid point of reference for who
She might still be, albeit one that was fading
Amidst the tall architecture of New York
And the featureless avenues

Of her working-girl life. She looked back,
The boy with the Mohawk had called
To her, it sounded like “Samson showser.”
“What?” but the group he was with laughed

And moved on, leaving her on the cement stair.

"Untitled Film Still #32"

Like one of the whores
From Nights of Cabiria,
Obviously not Fellini’s wife
The lovely clown,

But one of the others
Whose story isn’t told,
Who fades into the dark
After Juliet Massina goes off

With the handsome guy
And sneaks around the mansion
With the stairwell
Full of dogs.

Whores are romanticized
But what we should really see
Is how many men they are with
Each night; follow just one of them

Through the eight men at a go.

"Untitled Film Still #31"

This is my Nina baby,
In her busty t-shirt,
Her pale Bosnian skin
Bursting from the blackness

Of her hair and surroundings,
Her mouth slightly slack
To let us know that she knows
She is young, sexy and hungry;

But also vulnerable as a retard,
Dependent on the guidance
Of her guardian, me.
She is both vamp and idiot,

Loud and soft, a crying simpleton
That can turn into a raging gibbon;
There is nothing better than cradling
Her solid Mediterranean breasts

And knowing she could eat my soul

"Untitled Film Stills #30"

I’m not leaving, there’s nothing wrong.
I slipped and hit a doorknob, I swear.
Jim? He didn’t do anything, I bruise
Easily and we were having sex

And you know how it is
When you’re passionate,
Well Jim is passionate
And I’m his only source of pleasure.

It gets so damn hard working
At the factory, how can you blame
Him for coming home and wanting
More than just me and television?

Jim had big plans for life, I know
And I know me and the baby
Were not exactly part of those plans
So I can’t blame him for anything, really.

"Untitled Film Still #34"

What the fuck is she reading
While lying on those black sheets?
Mia Wallace with her pulp fiction
Fifteen years before Pulp Fiction.

She’s got nothing on but a white shirt
And panties so we can see the whole leg.
On the book there is a black haired vamp
In a nightgown, which is this girl all dressed up.

Maybe this is where she gets her style.
Her head is cocked away from us
So it’s hard to connect intellectually.
Instead the picture is all ass;

Everything from the contrast of the light body
On dark sheets to her positioning at the center
Of the photo make us focus on the spot
Where leg meets leg meets vag.

"Untitled Film Still #35"

 . . .Wanna call me trash!
Oh, I see. G’wan ahead
I dun worked for my bread
Fur my house, fur my kids.

If you think thas easy
Or fun or anything glam’rus,
Ya’ll is wrong. But if ya’ll
Think I’z just anotha

Loafin’ welfare thang,
Feedin’ dem kids wif food-
Stamps an’ scraps
Ya’ll wrong. Dem kids

Is well brought up,
Healty and happy.
My boy ain’t raped ‘n’ killed
No twelve year old, he ain’t

But fifteen hisself, sheeeit.

"United Film Stills #24"

I come out to the docks,
It’s where the fags hang out
And fuck each other and tan.
It’s where Gordon Matta-Clark

Cut that crescent in the side
Of that building. The boards
Were loose on the docks
And people would fall through.

Sometimes bodies bobbed
Along the surface;
It’s where HIV festered
And spread and gay love

Died. Sometimes I think
I’d be happier as a man,
It’d be nice to go to a club
Where everyone was on the same team

And you could fuck all comers.

"Untitled Film Still #26"

The basement, O the basement
Of grandmother’s old Ohio mansion,
The mansion with the small statues
Out front: red lion and a white dog.

It was three stories;
When he was young my uncle
Burned it half down when he
Threw a book of lit matches

In a closet and shut the door.
In the basement cellar the dankness
Was earthy, the washing machine
And dryer kept things musty.

There was a pool table
With tons of tears in the felt;
We’d play and drink root beers.
When my parents were young,

Their cat, Stoney, got lost down there.

"Untitled Film Still #27"

Okay, this is it. Fine.
I knew it was coming,
Like a hurricane warning,
Your temper was boiling

On the horizon, even when I met you.
Clouds behind the sun.
See, I’m the star of a one woman,
Multi-man variety show:

A clown show with drama,
Laughs, and a lot of action.
Because I always pick wrong
–Or they pick me, like a casting call
Gone to shit. It always happens.

So, I’ll just sit here; no more
Trying to weather the storm;
I’ll close my eyes
And make a wish,

One, two, three.

"Untitled Film Still #27b"

Insane asylum, fire bucket, woman
In white. We had to send her away
Because she was doing bad things
To herself, sticking barrettes inside . . .

She got shock therapy at a young
Young age and it drove her deeper
Inside, a voice within an echo chamber
– Goddamn, it must be miserable

Living inside one’s skull and body
Unable to communicate with the outside.
Are we all artists or is a bunch just
Crazy and another bunch just boring?

Tennessee Williams’s sister Rose
Went nuts and was lobotomized
And Tenn put such material into his work.
Did he disrespect her or help us all

By giving us The Glass Menagerie?

"Untitled Film Still #28"

I think we’re starting to repeat.
The sex-crazed madwoman
Has escaped from the asylum
And she is standing in the hall.

She holds herself a bit like Nina,
My actress friend from NYU
Whose parents escaped from Bosnia
To Windsor, Canada and paid

For her school by working hard.
Nina has the spirit of a crazy girl
Trapped in a shell of a shy girl.
This is her if she was pushed beyond

Her limits, if she didn’t get everything
Her pop culture, neo riot girl, punk rocker
Sensibility desired and demanded.
She wants to be Meryl Streep, Patti Smith,

Marlon Brando, Kurt Cobain, Marina Abromavic.

"Untitled Film Still #19"

Passing in front of the factory
She felt a shudder and thought
Maybe that was a message
Meant just for her, that her life

Was meant to make a mark
On this earth. But she was a girl
In the factory, the biggest mark
She might make would be love

With the boss’s son, or a son
Of her own, who would grow.
She always wore colorful prints
Because it allowed her to stand apart

From the drab brick fronts
And the factory dust
And the smoke from the chimneys
And the other women

Who all gave in to their lots in life.

"Untitled Film Still #20"

As if on a stroll and we’re watching her.
The house is large with a majestic
Door, not seen anymore, embedded
In a brutish brick wall hedged

By manicured bushes, which frame
And mirror her stiff and finicky
Deportments. Where is she off to
In that headscarf and perfect neck-bow?

The way it’s all set up makes us aware
Of a pursuer. Like Laura Mulvey said,
We’re all looking with the gaze,
The male gazeand it’s whipping me up

Into a fucking frenzy, and there is a lot
To think about in prison. But I think Cindy
Just ran in front of an old house and snapped
The pic, dressed up like an old fashioned gal.

I wonder if she was ever stalked.

"Untitled Film Still #21"

Working girl in New York City,
I’ve come here from my Midwest
Heartland town; stalks of wheat
And rows of corn were my back

Yards and the single stop light
On Main Street became a familiar
Friend. There was a boy but he
Didn’t come and now he’s gone.

In New York every corner
Has a stoplight and every bar
Has a guy. I work long hours
Typing up memos and numbers

But I think I might make something
Of myself. At least I’m living
In the big city. And on the side
I have plans to start a business.

"Untitled Film Still #22"

Run, run, down the steps.
Are you in Paris? At the Palais
Royal perhaps. I remember
Being out there once, about 2am,

In a bit of rain; I was spending
The summer trying to learn French
Before moving to New York
And I had spent the night

With a young student who was
The friend of my girlfriend’s sister
And I rushed her to the metro –
Those art neuveau signs, like H.R. Giger’s

Design for Alien. Once I was alone and walking,
I got a text from a Stanford Professor,
A man who had taught my father
Back when he wanted to be a poet,

“Jack Scofield is dead, I know he loved you.”

"Untitled Film Stills #23"

She walked by the dog park
Every morning on her way
To the subway to go uptown
For her secretarial job

At Simon and Schuster.
For the past three months,
Since spring really started
To bloom, she saw the man

With the grey hat and brown
Terrier. And starting two months
Ago, he started to doff his hat
To her, his hair black-slicked,

As if a layer of lacquer had been set,
And his smile, a razor edged hole
Ringed with juicy redness.
A month ago he said hello,

And yesterday he got her information.

"Untitled Film Still #2"

What do you think? Still got it.
I got raped when I was thirteen,
By my boyfriend in Oklahoma,
But I never told anyone,

And then we moved away,
So I never saw him again.
But that action stays
With me, right here,

On my neck where he kissed
Me while he held me down.
Does he care?
Is he alive? What’s he done

With his life? Probably nothing.
He did nothing of note but injure
A young girl; he’s a virus
That infected and effaced and was effaced.

But I take showers and get clean.

"Untitled Film Still #13"

She pulled a book from the shelf,
She all in white, like I like;
It was back when her face
Was young and her straight nose

Stood out strong and innocent
On her smooth face.
The book she took,
Near the Maxfield Parish,

To the Right of American Art
Since 1900, was something
About a dialogue, but I couldn’t quite see
What. The book that stood out

Was Crimes of Horror: The Movies, ­
Just to her left – the title of her own life.
She knew she was in my bad books,
And thought she was being stealthy.

Untitled Film Still #16

She looks so heavy in this one,
Mediterranean – is that also her dressed
As FDR in the picture frame behind?
She’s a big momma with a fringe,

Unapologetic, smoking her cigarette
Like The Real Housewives of Sicily,
Or maybe it’s that show Mob Wives.
That’s real shit, right? Funny,

The way we accept crime
Within our midst. Mobsters
Are entertainment and the mobsters
Model themselves after entertainment.

I bet you five hundred bucks
That every east coast gangster
Watched the Sopranos, every episode.
The Godfather is the godfather is the Godfather.

"Untitled Film Still #17"

There is something so Roman about her,
Something that reeks of Anna Magnani
From Rome Open City and Mamma Roma
When she played a whore

Who tries to get her handsome son
To put his life in order. Or maybe it’s Magnani
From the Brando film, The Fugitive Kind,
When he played a man named Xavier
In another story by Tennessee.

Brando in the snakeskin jacket in New Orleans;
And that monologue in the beginning – wow –
About his guitar in hock, and a party on Bourbon Street
That he busted up because he wanted to puke

His life up. But no, it’s a young Magnani here,
Not the old one with experience who could look back
On a career and say, “Actors might be crazy,
Self-centered and very hard to deal with,

But I’d hate to live in a world without them.