Saturday, November 8, 2008

PROLOGUE (Edit from "BUZZ AND THE RAMALAMAS")


…this world, your world, the world I write these words in, is awe-inspiring in the scope of its boredom and its lies and it is unacceptable by any human standard. As I have been left no choice but to leave it, I have constructed a newer, better world out of the detritus of this one, out of old Mad Magazines, Weird-Ohs model kits, and stoned half-memories of Northern California. The dialogue of this world was culled from Stan Lee’s “Bullpen Bulletins” in the back pages of Marvel Comics, the soundtrack made up of snatches of surf music and theremin stings from AIP monster movies, and its color palette is more limited than that of an early ‘70s Hanna-Barbera cartoon. That venerable fellow ROY G. BIV gets quite a workout over the next two hundred-odd pages, and if there is a chase down a hallway, you can rest assured that the exact same table, door, light and chair will be passed innumerable times. This world of mine is as fragile as a butterfly and as ephemeral as a soap bubble, but it is mine, nevertheless. Be thankful I only had to write it down on paper to make it real…


5 comments:

Anonymous said...

That is very cool, Jason. Those images zipped by and came alive and the cleverness of thought, word imagination double reversi at the beginning and the end frame the cartoon word poem imagery in the middle perfectly. Your presence in it makes our world less boring.

mark said...

This is super great. I learned all I know about life from Stan's Soap Box! This really flows quite beautifully, my friend... and I know thing about that G. BIV character as well.

Jason Gusmann said...

gentlemen, thank you both so much. your words mean a great deal to me.

Malialinda said...

I really liked this. I love the morbid element. and the "MY SUPER SWEET SIXTY-YEAR-OLD SAME-SEX PARTNER", hilarious. Thanks for being the first to post on my poem "Uses for a Fat Friend." I'd like to see what else you have written. I'm the managing editor of the Berkeley Fiction Review and looking for new, unique writing. If you have anything, submit it to me at bfictionreview@yahoo.com and/or malialinda@berkeley.edu. (make sure it is unpublished anywhere else, of course.)

Jason Gusmann said...

cool, thanks, i'll do that!