Pluto in Capricorn & in Opposition – Pandemic & Retribution.

11.05.202109.12.2024 Arvin da BrghaLeave a comment

Last February as I made my way by subway to the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing arts, the season’s latest opera was on that night – of course, what I then did not know, was that the rest of the opera season would eventually be cancelled – the most jarring thing occurred. A young Amerindian male with the glossiest black mane, took two steps back on the TTC train platform and dropped his black gym bag. “Are you fucking talking to me? No bitch, I’m talking to you! Did I invite you into my country?” The rage and the booming power of his voice was arresting. The tall effete Caucasian male tried brushing him off as though he were so much raped and abandoned non-whitedom. Before I knew what next, The five-foot-nothing, proud Amerindian punched his adversary square in his girly man face. Crying out like a right candy-arsed sissy, the Caucasian weakly protested, all whilst rushing backwards. My proud Amerindian brother was just getting started. Of course, I, who have grown soft for making peace with being a black male in this racially suffocating society, cried out when the first punch landed. Bam, another punch to the face as the much shorter warrior defended his land, his people, pride and history. “Yeah you, did I fucking invite you to my country?” and another blow. Bloodied and cowering, the all-mouth, cowardly closet cocksucker was resoundingly handed his arse and put in his rightful place.

The opera, Hansel & Gretel, was beautifully staged – set in the stark isolation of Toronto condo living. I was, though, never fully engaged as I spent the next several days readjusting to having had that young warrior shaman heal my spirit by his very proud actions and the conviction of his words. The next several days, I kept returning to the incident with the proud Amerindian. My reaction at the time had stunned me and in hindsight, I kept revisiting why I chose to be so upset at the attack on the arrogant male, who was being pummelled. He had taunted and dismissed the Amerindian male – a socially aggressive behaviour from whites with which one was long familiar. I realised that so many times in situations as then, we as blacks are programmed to sublimate and ‘take it’ rather than defending oneself from the hideous ugliness of the spiritually stunted.

Then something quite remarkable happened, the murderous lynching of George Floyd in callously stark veracity that cell phone ubiquity has afforded in the modern age. The event was seismic; the raw brutality of the racial predator on the hunt was so glaring, so jarring that it set ablaze protests across the planet. Indeed, the cell phone, like the beating of Rodney King, has been able to capture the ugliness that is whiteness which prior to, meant that one could lie away and grin away with exquisite triumphant glee, fucking with the enemy – an enemy on whom one preys never having been preyed on by that enemy. Slowly, the exoskeleton with which one straitjackets oneself in order to make peace and to be a black man peacefully making it through one day to the next, began losing its grip.

Scenes like in the early days of lockdown 2020, I was in line at Pusateri’s at Yorkville Avenue and Bay Street to pick up a couple of bottles of VOSS water. Old, ugly as fuck, the woman in line ahead of me turned around and began screaming at the top of her hateful lungs in a scene that could easily have been played by her in South Africa. She demanded that I get the hell away from her because I was clearly not practising proper social distancing and remaining more than two metres apart. Of course, this had nothing to do with the coronavirus pandemic but everything to do with her seizing an opportunity to be a hate-filled racist boor. As much as I wanted to readily turn rapaciously vituperative and tell her to try 2 metres below ground; instead, I took two operatic steps back and coolly and eloquently boomed with scathing condescension, “Look at you! On your hind legs and everything! Seriously though…” With that, after having laughed a vulgar dismissive breath, I impatiently strode to the back of the line to be rid of the fugly parvenu boor. Everyone, staff and clients, froze. She, of course, squawked and grumbled as I focussed my discriminating attention to a conversation via Whatsapp video about dinner with my transitioning spouse at our art-filled home, who on the eve of Bob Marley’s birthday, two decades earlier, I wedded at Montréal’s Palais de Justice both decked in gold-threaded, crisp white linen Yoruba agbada with her a matching gele. As can be expected of cowardly fare, the anaemic-looking young couple now two metres in front of me, simply ignored the social dustup by hungrily face-fucking in their best escapist Bonobo turn. Naturally, the old harpy got from the line to kvetch to whomsofuckingever and when the cashier asked if I wanted a bag, I declined, telling her that I would rather be kind on the environment. Turning to leave the tightly spaced store, I paused and shot down her evil glare by raising both VOSS waters, one in each hand, and shouted, L’Chaim! That ought to have left her pissy knickers smelling louder on leaving the store.

Soon enough, the acts of racially predatory social aggression became more frequent and pronounced. There was the incident one cool morning where a hirsute covering of blond furred redhead stopped jogging in front of me, grabbed a hold of my bike’s handlebar and began screaming as though I were both blind and deaf as he demanded that I keep the hell off the sidewalk. It wasn’t enough that cell phones had exposed their murderous ugliness but as though to protest, whites have grown more emboldened with the affront of blacks and Black Lives Matter movement to demonstrate and demand change.

By early June last year, 2020, I had had enough, each morning on the ride to work through tony Rosedale, I was being accosted by various burghers of the beautifully tree-lined streets – then again, which Toronto residential neighbourhood street is not beautifully tree-lined. There was one Jew in particular, who caused me to go out and get the above bodycam. Each morning, as I am a creature of habit, he was in the habit of leaving the sidewalk to come into the middle of the street, approach as I bike-ride to pepper me with hideous racial slurs and demand that I keep the hell out of the neighbourhood. Good morning, Shithead! Good morning you black piece of shit. Get out of here! Finally, one morning, having quite had enough of him and his special brand of ugliness of spirit, I told him to go fuck himself to which he incredulously demanded at the top of his lungs, unlike his usually sotto voce delivered insults as he approached the bike, “Get back here! Get back here now! I’m talking to you. Come back here now!” The nerve of some people. That last incident occurred on a Friday and thank god for Jeff Bezos, by Monday, I had me a bodycam. So as my special kind of fugly, hairy back and arsed nuisance came bopping off the sidewalk, ready to be racial predatory white male asshole number 1 billion, 500 million and 99, he caught sight of my bodycam, lights on and all, and like the bipedal, über poilu Rottweiler-hybrid that he is, he readily retreated for the cover of the sidewalk. I have never seen him since and, of course, I had ignored everyone’s advice to take another route to work. What the fuck for? As I am born in the year of the Rat, I am no different to any other rat; we live firmly self-aware that rats fear no one.

A few months back in between spells of too much snow, I abandoned my bike and elected to take a ride. On the way home, as I go from job A to job B, I told the unibrowed, wild-eyed driver that I was in a bit of a hurry and would show him a shortcut to my place. He again said nothing, just as he hadn’t as I got into his ride and said hello. Though, I wore a colourful silk mask over the daily disposable N-95 mask, his shitty ride I swear, smelt like what no doubt just-fucked camel pussy does. Told to take a left off Yonge onto Roxborough, finally not surprised was I when he proved a short-tempered fuck whose pointy fingers on that wheel had me dismissing him as so much forgettable small-cocked fare. He barked rather than spoke that he followed the GPS, which had called out to make a left onto Crescent so many metres ahead south down Yonge Street. Thus, we ventured, clearly grudgingly for him, along Roxborough and as we approached, I announced that I wanted him to make a right turn onto Wrentham to Crescent. Immediately, the über-poilu beast, which made me think Ursa hybrid, stepped on the gas drove east past Wrentham, down the hill and pulled onto Mount Pleasant without so much as having looked left in the process. As it was rush hour, there would be no left turns south of Bloor along Jarvis which Mount Pleasant becomes before Gerrard Street East or possibly Shuter Street East. To be sure, I was more than a little bit pissed off when telling the inbred, short-fused jackass to turn off of Mount Pleasant, onto Elm and turn right at Sherbourne North as had been intended. “You fucking idiots, who the hell are you people to talk to anybody like you own something?” Then he violently broke the car, just north of South Drive and demanded that I get out of his car. Coolly, I got out and left the door open and when he swore at me and demanded I shut his fucking door now, I told him I thought I would do him a favour and air it out, seeing as how it stunk of camel… the camel-fucker did not, of course, get the insult. Readily, I pulled out my camera and told him, ‘yeah come out here and get some of this.’ He got out of his shitty little car, cut the beady eyes at me, slammed the door shut, told me and my people to go fuck ourselves to which I replied, “happy black history month to you, too…” By the time I got onto Sherbourne North, my Samsung S20 had died. Naturally, thanks to coronavirus, I had no cash and there was no way to call a cab or Uber. In this neck of the woods, a random taxi was a nonstarter.

Foreground Bloor & Parliament in St. James Town, to right distance, Yorkville, Centre distance, One Bloor East currently tallest condo at 76 storeys, at Yonge & Bloor, Centre mid-distance Sherbourne to Church (east to west) Upper Gay Village or more pretentiously south Yorkville (ha!).

Doggedly, I decided to simply walk it home, just as I got unto the Sherbourne Street bridge, I began experiencing an anxiety attack. Years earlier, I had witnessed someone leap from the Jacques Cartier bridge that spans the St. Lawrence in Montréal. Suddenly, out of nowhere as anxiety attacks tend to function, I was in the grips of crippling fear. I knew that there was no way that I could cross the bridge, even to try and make it back seemed a feat, there was a sudden desire to start running, which I knew that I could not do. A young Amerindian couple in the city, for the first time it turned out, crossed the bridged, going south on the west side – same as me. I explained my dilemma and asked if they would call me a cab. The proud warrior-looking man, barely into his 20s insisted that I simply conquer my fear by walking beside him and his beautiful girlfriend. I tried…. I wanted to. I could not, though, as I began shaking… just the sheer weight of why I was there in the first place simply for being black and asking the driver to take a preferred route – it all seemed so absurd, yet it is an indignity that one endures at every turn in a million ways every frigging day in this society. The warmest eyes winked at me as he smiled and the Beck taxi came up the bridge made a U-turn and the young warrior closed the door on me, wishing me well. Eventually, I got home late and when I was done job B where I fundraise in the arts and remain unrivalled, I wrote a detailed account of my ride with the bigot who kicked me from his car and was summarily refunded. As if Jazz the blasted motherfuck were invented by unibrowed, camel-fucking, hairy back-and-arsed dreck.

Days later, and still black history month, I was riding my bike through the wet streets of Rosedale where the snow melted fast after the latest snowfall. As I emerged onto Crescent Road from the footpath which Scrath becomes, to cross the bridge that spans Mount Pleasant Road, a white female in a black, skin-tight, jogging suit was way in back of a group of jogging white males whom I had seen with fair regularity. She was clearly not part of their group. Jogging in the street as she was, she moved to the side as I approached and then with the arrogance of the truly somnambulant, aggressively called after me in a tone that was both accusatory and possessive as I moved past, “Excuse me, where are you going?” That morning, I happened not to be wearing my bodycam as when I got downstairs, realised that the snow had sufficiently melted such that I could actually ride my bike rather than take a cab. Without so much as missing a beat, I broke hard and stood straddling my bike when reaching into the shallow depths of her sphinctered psyche, “I’m going to your house to fuck your man!” She stood there arrested, catatonic as my use of language was both vulgar, rapacious. “That’s right, I’m gonna hog-tie that fucking cocksucker of yours and fuck him good… Yeah, you wanna come watch? Come on!” Arrested in place, her eyes welled up as mine remained unflinchingly enraged, her lizard-thin upper lip actually trembling. With that, I resumed riding my bike to job A to which I was already running late. In this the age of Trump, some whites at every chance, turn racially predatory at the drop of a hat.

Then there are the casket fugitives; these blasted tiresome, overstayed boomers, who simply will not stop showing off and just crawl the fuck in their caskets. What other generation but boomers would find a new way to show-off in their smelly diapers and drug-wasted dotage? They, these lost souls forever hurrying about way off-piste, are ever bitching and at times raising their silly poles at me, demanding that I not ride on pathways but dismount and walk. Once confronted by a turkey-necked mannish boor, I leaned in and asked near-inaudibly, “Don’t you tire of breathing? Go on, go chill the fuck out in your casket”

And then November 3, 2020 turned into January 6, 2021 as that porcine pathological compulsive liar – America’s biggest loser and racist swine, finally left the stage with crooked tail between his fat thighs with the Eurotrash escort cum parvenu snob in tow. The cold-blooded murder of George Floyd, staged or simply instinctual racially predatory behaviour, like the big fat coward that he is, having miserably failed at leading and taking command of the pandemic, Trump latched on to the murder of George Floyd to win the vote. That’s right, it was all about not haemorrhaging the white vote; thus it became all about cops and law and order – all code language for white privilege and racist white supremacy. Well, it did not fucking work! Fuck you!

Not only did Trump fail to steal the vote by declaring Marshall law and leading an insurrection on the Capitol, he and his racist ilk’s poster boy for racially predatory murderous scum was convicted on all three counts. George Floyd’s murder occurred at the Pluto opposition in Capricorn and thus the past four hundred years of murderous racially predatory blood sport of blacks finally led to George being anointed as the One. That’s right, for the first time in 400 years, a cop has been found guilty of the murder of a black male. For blacks, America the past 400 years has been nothing but a giant game reserve where they are hunted with the arrogant impunity of police getting off time and again when murdering blacks. Let that sink in for a moment. America the land where whites can murder whilst dressed up in the hunting gear of the police uniform – all the while, other whites the world over perpetually on holiday having predatory sex with minors whilst everyone looks the other way. Thanks to his murder, and trophy-hunting racial predator Chauvin having been found guilty of murder, George Floyd became a martyr who has broken the long 400 year tradition of the justice system in America condoning the racially predatory murder of blacks at the hands of police. Pluto in Capricorn indeed. The hijacked American justice system where blacks are corralled to spike the profit margins for BlackRock shareholders… talk about genius, indeed.

Always… with every breath… it is quintessentially Jazz!

Recent ride through Rosedale because of whose venal classist/racist aggression, I have taken to wearing the bodycam. As ever, Jazz permeates my every breath; how could it not when my father’s first cousin, the recently deceased actor Cicely Tyson was wife of Jazz genius Miles Davis? A new friend with lots of past-life history, asked why I am always singing the same Jazz tune when cycling; it is a form of meditation, I shared, as I move from job A to job B. By vocalesing and singing a favourite Jazz tune, I am getting refocussed to the task next in hand – fundraising in the arts… at which I am damn good. In the above clip, at the 06:24 mark, one can clearly see the septuagenarian white female with bags in hand, walking north in the southbound bike lane. Likely she chose to do so to avoid being too close to persons on the kerb. Either way, her choice and no business of mine. Minutes as I got further down Sherbourne Street, at which point, I had stopped recording, as I was now going south in the northbound bike lane a total of 3 white female passing, violently yelled and called me every kind of asshole imaginable. White females are ten times more likely than white males to be verbally abusive in such situations; however, non-white, non-black males and females almost never engage in such predatory social aggression. The idea that I am going to time-waste by yelling at someone for simply going in the opposite direction of the usual flow of bike traffic in a given lane is beyond absurd. So fucking what? Last winter before getting the bodycam, there was a white male in early forties with about 4% body fat running north in the northbound bike lane along the Sherbourne Street bridge. As I approached at a leisurely pace, I could tell that he was wearing air buds and not wanting to surprise him simply rode pass saying and doing nothing. Shocked, though not surprised, was I when he upped his jogging pace and began running alongside on my right. Yelling as though a drill sergeant, he began calling me an asshole and demanded to know why I had not used my fucking bell when passing him. Not jogging on the kerb was he, nor was he jogging towards oncoming bike and vehicular traffic; yet, he and his perceptions had perceived me as being at fault for riding alongside and passing him without having given him warning of my approach. This world is overrun by truly blind assholes, very well-armed, truly blind assholes.

A few days ago as I hopped off my bike with time to kill between jobs A & B, I slipped into the reconstituted shrine to Canadian ice hockey which became the flagship store of Loblaws, another of the Weston family’s retail gems. On entering, there was a police officer just inside – a new pandemic feature. Tall, handsome and of South Pacific heritage, the male officer engagingly greeted me, willingly, I ambled over and he commended me on the bodycam. Said he, every person of colour ought to be wearing one; indeed, I agreed, it amazingly affords one peace of mind and a harassment free ride about town. He laughed when told of how hostile the burghers of Rosedale can be, adding that he was not surprised in the least at the account of in-your-face open bigotry.

With nimble vivacity me and my paniers whisked through the place, emerging minutes later with organic ginger, beautifully pungent organic turmeric, Ocean Spray’s Cran-Grape drink – this drink screams sugar is the drug y’all – and of course, the most exquisite cheddar cheese. Whether at tea, with pâté or dark chocolate, the President’s Choice (Loblaws house brand) aged 5 years crumbly cheddar cheese is as musky and satisfying as a full Moon night spent indulging rugged mansex in the moss-saturated bois of Vancouver’s Stanley Park. Slipping outside, as I loaded up my paniers on my trusty brown Schwinn Gateway, the four bottles of VOSS water made the paniers hard to close shut – larger than the VOSS available in Yorkville, who needs Pusateri’s and Yorkville’s parvenu pretentious bullshit anyway?

As ever, life is like a flying dream; if you look down, you’re fucked. Enjoy the ride and fear no one!

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4.3.4 = 11

08.12.201909.12.2024 Arvin da Brgha

Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex has the most masterful numbers. She does, indeed, have master numbers: 11. Look at those eyes, the eyes of Queen Mother, to HM King Henry VI, grandmother to HM King Henry VIII and great-grandmother to HM Queen Elizabeth I. She has staying power, thanks to those double 4s and with an attitude of 3, she is renowned for being most articulate and a skilled communicator of the message.

4 – focussed, solid, self-made, resolute, inner-directed, reincarnated with an agendum.

3 – attitude of 3 – gracious living, the great communicator, when one speaks others listen. There is only win-win, failure is never an option for these persons. Incidentally, Ben Mulroney is an attitude of 3, which is why he is a gracious interviewer – non-confrontational. Also, I have noticed that a lot of persons who planned a life in the public sphere tend to have 9 and 3 in their make up, as in both HRH Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and his lovely wife, Catherine, HRH Duchess of Cambridge. Incidentally, these three persons, Ben and the Cambridges would have been very relaxed in each others company and true to her 9 energy body, Catherine would likely have made a dig at her husband along the lines, ‘He certainly has a great head of hair…’ As it is perfectly naturally for straight men to be attracted to each other, they would not be human if they did not, both men would have been pleasantly warmed by the other’s make-up with their similar 9 and 3. Catherine and Ben both are 9 energy body; they would have found each other more than passingly fascinating. Catherine is a warrior which means that she will always be steely; as for Ben, don’t know his overleaves but I am guessing that he is more so on the expression axis rather than not – an artisan or sage soul. In my experience, whereas 9 women can be extremely rude and dismissive, 9 men are reserved and not given to readily passing judgment.

There is also the matter of Catherine, HRH Duchess of Cambridge being in perseverance mode, which is as unrelenting a foe as you can ever imagine, on top of which she is a warrior. This woman was born to be Queen Consort and that’s the end of that, there will be no Camilla rewriting the script. Interestingly enough, both Diana, Princess of Wales’ sons are wedded to very strong women – as well they should be. In both cases, both couples are entity mates, which is as good a partnering as one can hope for. Meghan, however, with double 4s and master number of 11 is here to rule as when previously she had as Queen Mother and Tudor dynasty matriarch.

Not only is 11 a master number but it also leaves all such persons lone wolves, regardless how popular they are. This explains why Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex will faster-than-a-sneeze dispense with persons when need be. And yes, she has every damn right to be done with the blasted dreck that do not know the meaning of family: honour, fealty, discretion. I am, where the master number 11 is concerned, just such a person… 2.1.8 = 11. Of course, like Catherine, HRH Duchess of Cambridge that attitude of 1 means that I am more inclined to be shy and reserved than ‘on’. At least that was the rule when Merlin was incarnate and we were together. Now, more of the 11 comes to the fore and I simply give two-fucks and sound off loudly and most articulately.

Recently, owing to a host of prickly transits, to say nothing of the mercury retrograde, I have found myself beset with some entanglements that have provoked the less polished side of my Venus/Uranus conjunction. This all began around the time that I wrote the blog about that blasted tarbaby frog finally showing his true colours. I had no less than 8 French Canadians getting up in my business, demanding that I delete aforementioned blog and that these were the indiscretions of youth. Bitch please! After having lived in Montréal for seven years with the best task companion/comrade-in-arms an equally seventh level mature soul, though, she a warrior, we gave as good as we got. Of course, said warrior became my wife at Palais du Justice on Bob Marley’s birthday in 1999. Today, we remain the best of friends and she now he, has a fully beard than I have ever sported…. alas, I digress. A couple of weeks ago, I was being regaled by my sister who lives in Nevis about my mother’s cousin whose funeral it was that day. She died at age 107 and was attended by quite the turn out with le tout Nevis’ elites in tow. Though I have never met, her great-granddaughter was part of the descendants who eulogised the grand dame; that great-granddaughter was Mel B (Scary Spice) of Spice Girls fame. I have though several times met my fathers cousin, the inimitable and truly regal, Cicely Tyson, wife of Jazz genius, Miles Davis a man who did not gladly suffer people who hate him or his race…. as well he damn ought to have.

As I entered the little school in my neighbourhood, a spry spirit who always is good for a laugh, beamed on seeing me as he sat on his scooter with equally situated mates and inquired, “And who will you be voting for?” to which I shot back, “You can damn well bet it won’t be for no blasted motherfucking, cocksucking tarbaby-arsed frog!” raucous laughter peppered the air as I went in and voted conservative for the first time in my life. Enough of that sissy-arsed twat, who is nothing more than Modi’s pappishow with his displaced femme au foyer, fag-hag frau, Madame Plotte-Visage herself, who looks more and more each day like Tammy Faye Bakker. You don’t like black people… go fuck yourself… god only knows, you did not invent Jazz!

Days earlier en route home with my little suitcase in tow, I got up off the bench to take the Wellesley 94 bus eastbound to my art-filled lair. The bus pulled in and queerly parked such that the back door was a good three feet away – I have never seen the appeal of metric… nothing beats knowing whether you are dealing with 9.5 or 10.5 inches! Though my suitcase was too heavy, I was prepared to step off the platform to make for the rear doors, yet, the doors did not open. Finally, I joined the Dravidian male who had been waiting to board the rear doors as well. When I got to the front door, noisily pulling my suitcase, I looked up stunned as the doors slammed shut just as I was getting ready to board. The doors then opened after the driver looked at me with a smug smirk creasing her lizard-lipped face. I got in and as ever, I said thank you. As I progressed towards the double seats by the rear door, the bus suddenly broke, causing me to lurch forward. Taking it all in stride, I opted not to assume anything by this trio of events which most blacks would see after the third incident as being racially provocative. Up the couple of steps I got with my heavy suitcase; this only made me realise my advancing years as suddenly the urge to pee came on. I had switched from Bleu par Chanel a couple of years back when senior leak suddenly meant that after five minutes Bleu fades and gives way to god forbid that most malodourous of bouquets: loud-smelling, dribbled piss. Now it is Christian Dior’s Sauvage as the scent lingers and dissipates any provoked thoughts of raunchy water sports.

Having made my way to the back seat, there were all told less than a dozen souls on the bus. On arriving at the first stop from the station, the driver got up at Church Street. I thought that there must be someone wheelchair bound, trying to board, hence she got from her seat to assist. As I was otherwise engaged in thoughts libidinal and what I’d like to do with that burly mesomorph at work, whose woman just upped and left him, I remained focussed on artisan channels 3 to 5 instead. Just then, I noticed the bus driver step up the two steps and make it towards me, seated at the centre of the bus’ long back seat. Leaning her, her nasty-looking perm straight out of the 90s, she gruffly barked at me in a manner that suggested that couth had ever been foreign to her. “Look, everybody has bad days okay. There’s no need to swear at me.” I said nothing, looking instead past her as the thought occurred to me that the bus was being driven by duppy incarnate. Since my name ain’t Shaneequa, I remained calm and looked up at a face warped uglier by rage, which I also found uncomfortably too close. I was hemmed in. “Get off my bus or I call the police!” As I chose to say nothing or move a single muscle, she got even more incandescent with irrationally unprovoked rage, “That’s it get off my bus now, I’m calling the police!” As she turned to walk away, it gave a good look at her flat-arsed, no-calved god fugly hideousness and I got up and began making it for the bus’ front doors. As I slowly strode for the front doors, I expertly memorised her bus ID and every detail of slender hipped, extra-vertebrae-looking alien body and realised that she was likely trans; either way, just then a definite non sequitur. For once, I said nothing on exiting and as I really needed to pee, thought of hailing a cab when noticing another bus directly in back of the scene of my misadventure. I got aboard, said hello to the driver, a guapo Filipino and grabbed a seat on the even less populated bus. Also, I memorised the ID information associated with his bus. On exiting the bus, as per usual, I said thanks and exchanged pleasantries. As soon as I got situated at home, with Buster on my lap purring away, I took to the TTC’s site and chose the tab that allows for filing complaints. In exquisite detail, as well you are I shared what occurred and confidently knew that at no point would any of the bus’ cameras capture me saying anything to the female driver. She is, as per her contract, never to leave her seat nor confront a passenger. I have never seen her since.

Well in the grip of Mercury retrograde, I strolled into one of many little joints which I love frequenting as I like chatting with the proprietors and in the process, giving them my business. On close to a decade of frequenting this particular store, where I picked up a lottery ticket or two, my bike was leaning against the row of sugary treats, I turned just in time to see an old weathered hag out on Yonge Street beadily gawking in and cutting her hateful eyes at me. Possessed of some right afforded her by god only knows fuck-all whom – the blasted motherfuck, she bounded into the store, well into her ninth decade and looking and smelling of ill-health and poverty, “Get that goddamn bike outta here.” I was wearing my helmet with lights attached front and back in broad daylight as one does. Without so much as missing a beat, I launched into her with a ferocity, she likely had never before encountered, which is why she felt perfectly entitled to take such liberties. “Get your fucking ugly arse out of here, go the fuck to Wal-Mart make your way to the back of the store and tell them I sent you to put a down paying on your fucking casket as you are obviously too fucking poor to afford to die all this time…” Never having had her racially predatory behaviour challenged before, she stood there suddenly catatonic. “Go on, here you go, start that fucking down paying today…” with that, I tossed the few coins in my pocket at her feet and barged on in full throttle loud, vituperativeness. “Pick it the fuck up, high time your fucking ugly, broke arse and casket were lowered into the ground. Come in here opening your motherfucking lizard-lipped mouth, barking at me. Pick it the blasted motherfuck up and crawl the fuck in your casket.” She tried to weakly say something to which I kept up my defense against being racially preyed on, “Shut up and die, go on… scoot. There’s no need for your fuck-all ugly, broke arse, smelly cunt hanging around… get the fuck off the planet.” Never ever during a mercury retrograde will this venus-uranus leo hold his tongue when being racially preyed on. Faster than the loudest sneeze, I rammed my fist up her rotting arse, yanked and ripped at her calcified soul, pulled it out, wiped arse with it, then slapped her silly in the face before making her gag on a soul being held hostage by her useless maudlin existence. I have become so less inclined to tolerate this perpetual abuse which we as blacks endure on a daily basis yet pretend as though it does not exist. There are, though, times when you need to protest. Back in 1988 after meeting Wayne Robson’s firstborn, as I moved south down the west side of Bond Street to go visit Merlin at St. Michael’s Hospital who was suffering his first bout of AIDS-related pneumocystis, I screamed at the top of my lungs at an old Caucasian female who on noticing me began hurriedly crossing to the east side of Bond, “I don’t want your fucking handbag…” Never ceases to amaze the arsenal of behaviour that non-blacks project onto us as they get their racially predatory fix: sniffing, outright ridicule, dragging feet, yawning, bumping into you, blowing cigarette smoke in your direction… those are the passive racially predatory acts. More often, it is like that act in the convenience store, so racially obsessed that one feels oneself perfectly entitled to project that ignorance in a malicious, accusatory, bullying manner towards blacks. Indeed, ever notice the inordinate number of overweight blacks; they like all persons who were sexually preyed on in their early years more often than not develop eating disorders.

With Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex’s lynching daily in print media, social media and just about everywhere else, I have become increasing intolerant of any and all such BS. Do not because I am black start, apropos of fuck-all nothing, braying about how much you hate and can’t stand that Meghan bitch as if the blasted fuck these arsewipes know the woman. Out of the blue someone whom I thought had long made the only logical move viable to her sorry arse and crawled into her casket, called up trying for the nth time to get me to start today and join that pyramid scheme of hers for which she is ever travelling to some rah-rah seminar and on the cusp of getting rich yet still ain’t and needs you to join this very day; this, I can assure you, is about as appealing as trying to get me to bed some moneyed old fuck with a micro penis and bad breath. Nah… I’m all about the dharma.

Last summer everyone called up, demanding to know if I were not going to the Raptors championship parade. Hell no! Crowds you say… not happening. The day of the parade, I kept being called up by excited friends, asking me if I was watching and wasn’t it phenomenal. Very matter of factly, I declared to one, “When these fucking Goys do Yom Kippur, they certainly do know how to go all out.” Of course, after having explained myself days later at a dinner party, the point was well taken. This is a country with soft ethnic cleansing of blacks: negative immigration and population growth, a entrenched history of employment discrimination, which sees blacks being ghettoised in casual positions in the work place, especially at crown corporations (government-owned) – I have worked at two: Canada Post and the Toronto Convention Centre; in the case of the former, I arrived in Montréal from Vancouver to find myself the first full-time black in the work place; as fighting is nothing but foreplay in my books, I organised a lone Haitienne and got her to file a Human Rights complaint which she won. This resulted in back pay and all the mostly Haitian blacks awarded full-time and back pay where they had served as casual for 5, 10, 15 years. Naturally, the messenger/lightning rod always comes into someone cross-hairs. At one point, where they tried firing me the local union president told me to go to hell and go back to Canada; thus, I ventured into my firing interview with a lawyer in tow – had never happened before and was not then fired after multiple frantic calls to Ottawa to find out how to deal with him. Before being fired, that blasted porcine pequiste fucker decided to avail himself of my tax dollars by running in the federal election, thankfully he did not win but when he tried two years later, I wrote to Jack Layton who had frequented our Cabbagetown home in the 80s when we lived next door to a rather parvenu and highly snobbish Alfred Sung and informed Mr. Layton that if he did not withdraw that vile racist, my lawyer and I would go to the media and expose him – the letter of course was cced to all the other federal party leaders. In the end, the Bloc Quebecois thanked me for the letter and ran a black Haitienne in the riding from which the union head was summarily dropped and that Haitienne, Ms. Bardot won her seat, only to be replaced in Papineau riding by that blasted, racist tarbaby-arsed frog… but I digress. Two million persons cheering on black excellence when this is a country that actively eradicates any participation of blacks in its cultural fabric – hello JazzFM where you would be dismissed as stupid for thinking that Jazz is black culture. Sure, there are window-dressing blacks in the TV medium but they are not the norm. Not a single prominent Canadian protested and demanded that the vile racist politician resign when his blackface past emerged. Naturally, his people stridently argued in his defense. Would that these ungrateful fucks who hold the country to ransom would finally fuck off and leave. No one outside of Québec, who does not work in the government, is remotely bilingual. Seven years of living in Montréal made one thing perfectly clear: theirs, by its sheer ubiquity is nothing more than a northern confederate flag… and they certainly are possessed of unapologetic xenophobia. The only people deserving of having a party in the Canadian parliament, which not all Canadians can vote for, are the First Nations and Inuit peoples.

Back in late 1982 whilst Merlin and I held up in the Trockadero loft in Manhattan’s Chelsea on Sixth Avenue below 23rd Street, I got in one evening after looking at rehearsal of the Nanette Bearden Dance Company, to find Merlin having dinner and strategising with Jim Henson. As they shared the same agent, Joyce Ketay, they were prepping and throwing around ideas for how to thematically film the series, Fraggle Rock which would be shot in the coming new year in Toronto at CBC’s studios. Merlin had made his favourite dish a chicken paprikash which John Hirsch had taught him. Joining them, I dug in to what was my favourite of Merlin’s prepared meals. I will always remember Jim saying, “first you start with a compliment and then you hang back and listen, listen to what’s said but most of all, what is not said…” Sage advise that I have always followed. What I love about us artisan souls is that we always reveal our nature and the fact that we input on five channels whenever we speak. Listen to Naomi Campbell in her acceptance speech for the CFDA Icon Award. Straight out of left field in the tenth minute, she remarks, “God my lips are dry… sorry.” No other soul but an artisan soul would shift subjects so abruptly so seamlessly and carry on without so much as missing a beat. This quirk of ours, mine, Naomi, Meghan and every last artisan soul who has ever breathed, makes for a master tactician and someone not easily understood or shaken. With a destiny number that proves master numbers like Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex, she is a 11 – she is a diamond through and through and why HRH Prince Charles, Prince of Wales refers to her as Tungsten.

As ever, life is like a flying dream; if you look down, you’re fucked. Enjoy the ride and fear no one!

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In Memoriam: George F. Hawken

26.12.201607.12.2024 Arvin da Brgha2 Comments

George F. Hawken – February 5, 1999, Montréal, Québec

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This past Friday, December 23, 2016, I went to my doctor’s to get my test results for HIV. The doctor whom I had not seen in long ages was unusually engaging. When he finally cut to the chase, never had he announced that my test result was HIV negative with so much pleasure; I thought it odd at the time. Brushing past all that, I then inquired of him how George Hawken was doing; after all, George years earlier on my return to Toronto had insisted that I have the handsome Sino-Canadian for a GP as well.

Marta. Intaglio on Paper. 1974 George Hawken

As he paused, I told him that I could appreciate his patient-client confidentiality considerations; however, forging ahead, I told him that I had sent George an email more than a week earlier and had not heard back from him. Pressing on, I inquired if George was doing well of late as I had last been in touch a couple of months earlier. In that way that the good doctor had mastered, he haltingly stammered back that yes, George was doing well… We then left it at that as clearly he did not want to pursue the matter further – he had actually stood up to conclude our visit.

Pink Chair 1992 George Hawken (Arvin)

About a week earlier, I was feeling especially uneasy about not having had a reply from George to my last email; he would always answer within 36 hours at the latest. By then, it had been about a week; we hardly ever spoke by phone on my return from Montréal. Previously, when we spoke by phone our conversations back in the late 80s and through to mid 90s resulted in an invitation from George to immediately get together where our passionate physicality was intense beyond the norm.

Gordon and Janet in their Garden. Lithograph 2009 George Hawken

To still my worrisome mind, I began playing Joseph Haydn’s Paris symphonies; George favoured the Paris symphonies where I favoured the London Symphonies. George had actually introduced me to Haydn’s music; he insisted that I become better acquainted with the 18^th century composer’s works. When first I sat for George in 1986, at his Brock Avenue loft in the Queen Street West neighbourhood, he always played Haydn… I would always love the way, he would play imaginary keyboard whilst enjoying a cigarette break as I privately sat for him.

Franz Kafka – Kafka Suite. Intaglio 1982 George Hawken

One of the funniest memories of George is lying in bed with him after passionate play at the Brock Avenue loft and laughing hysterically whilst we listened to CBCFM and a Florence Foster-Jenkins performance. Afterwards, we indulged another round of Rottweiler style passion that was part Greco-Roman brawn. On my return to Toronto, George and I never resumed our physical relationship; though, I had at least hoped that I could serve as muse to him again. Alas, it was not to be.

Book Cover Illustration. 1980 George Hawken

One morning after work, with Haydn symphonies swirling about my mind as my apartment was sodden heavy with the Paris symphonies, I suddenly made a right whilst coming up Yonge Street and headed along Adelaide Street East. Then, I went one better and hung a left up Sherbourne Street for the morning ride home; never had I done this. Riding up Sherbourne, the familiar strains of Haydn’s Symphony No. 85 B flat major ‘La Reine’ spirited me along as I leisurely rode up the moderately icy, dedicated bike lane.

Fly. Etching. 1976 George Hawken

Just above Shuter Street, George suddenly fell into my mind and I crouched forward towards the handlebar to best face into the cold winds barrelling down the avenue. Whilst coasting up the bike lane opposite Allan Gardens Park, my mind as I whistled Haydn’s symphony began recalling moments of passion with George long years earlier. I thought of those glorious nights of noisy, sweaty passionate play at his McCaul Street loft; I crouched forward even more as my face warmed into a smile at pleasurable memories.

Beethoven Asleep. Etching. 1975 George Hawken

If only, I still had George’s numbers, I would call him on getting home; it was so unlike him not to have responded to the email that I had sent him on December 13, 2016. Peddling harder up the tough stretch of bike lane between Carlton and Wellesley Street East, I suddenly began slowing down as a large black hearse slowly negotiated its way from the Rosar-Morrison Funeral Home & Chapel property at 467 Sherbourne Street; it waited in the middle of the bike lane for northerly flowing traffic to ease up.

Pink Chair I/III AP. Lithograph. 1990 George Hawken (Arvin)

I rolled up and paused looking squarely into the hearse where a cardboard coffin was bound and en route to the St. James Cemetery and Crematorium over on Parliament Street. This was the same route that my father’s cadaver had taken after his funeral in August 2008 which George had attended. I was so appreciative of the fact that he had asked if he could attend my father’s funeral. After the lovely service, I had approached George and we hugged and he seemed really pleased to have made the outing.

Woman. Lithograph. 1980 George Hawken

Moments afterwards another of my lovers, Owen Hawksmoor came by to start lecturing me about the importance of having many friends; after all, said he, look at all the people who had turned out to my father’s funeral. Then said, Owen, as can ever be expected of him, “you should at least have six people who would be prepared to pall bear for you.” Brushing him and his big sex cockiness aside, I rebutted, “trust you to always make for a bitter after taste. What’s it to me, I’d be dead; it really wouldn’t matter anymore than it does now.”

Yonge Street Mask. AP Etching. 1971 George Hawken

I broke and hopped off the bike and intently looked inside at the brown cardboard coffin; it seemed an eternity waiting for the hearse to finally make it off the bike lane and into traffic. In those moments, I again thought of George and that was when it suddenly dawned on me that I was never going to hear from George again. Further, I had the distinct impression that what had prompted me to route-change for the first time, to be humming and whistling one of Haydn’s Paris symphonies: symphony No. 84 in B float major is because George’s corpse lay in the hearse before me en route to St. James Cemetery and Crematorium.

Myself (Self-portrait) AP Etching. 2008 George Hawken

Without doubt, this was why I was in this place in this moment before an austere black hearse straddling the northbound bike lane on Sherbourne which I had never used before en route home from work. With that, as the hearse slowly pulled out onto Sherbourne and then made a right turn onto Wellesley Street East, the traffic in the icy snowy street was sufficiently slow that I rode alongside the hearse along the side of the cardboard coffin and accompanied all the way to the black wrought iron gates of the cemetery on Parliament Street.

Baudelaire II. Etchin. 1975 George Hawken

After I got in, had a shower and had my lovely home infused with Hoju incense, Haydn’s symphony No. 104 in D major ‘London’ played on repeat as I grounded anew. Though it was not especially windy out, there was a loud noise on my balcony and wrapping up in my lovely woollen pea coat, I took to the balcony to investigate. The first sight that greeted me was a heavy plume of sooty black smoke from the crematorium’s chimneys as they were being swept southerly in the cold wintry morning air. I lost a tear and on returning indoors, though my Google search on coming home produced nothing for ‘George Hawken Obituary’ I still felt firmly that there was no coincidence to the sequence of events and synchronicity of the past several days which culminated in the black hearse across the bike lane.

Colin Campbell. Etching. George Hawken

As it is always tough to close shut, I gave the door to the balcony a bit of encouragement by heaving my right shoulder into it. On turning away from the door, I noticed one of George’s gifts to me “Woman” was titled off its hook on the cement wall where moments before taking to the balcony it had sat perfectly aligned. Yet another sign indeed. Finally, today at work, as I kept checking the folder which bore all George’s email correspondences, then did a Google search for ‘George Hawken Obituary’ alas there was confirmation. George had died the day before I had sent him my final email; it was one in which I offered to buy a copy of an illustration which he had done for an anthology of emerging Canadian authors.

George Hawken, 1970s.

Again, today after work, I rode up the Sherbourne Street bike lane and it all fell into place. Almost always when I went to our shared doctor, there would George be. Finally, when I saw him after a long spell of not having been in touch, he sat birdlike in the doctor’s office and he was just as stunned to have seen me walk in as I was to have seem him looking so gravely ill. George had said that it was cancer; we there and then made arrangements to get together and did. I was so pleased that he had finally met my lovely sister, Pandora and it was lovely going to George’s Camden Street penthouse suite for dinner with my lovely sister when she was in town from Ottawa.

Self Portrait 5. Etching. 1984 George Hawken
Today, whilst riding up the bike lane on Sherbourne Street, the doctor’s excitable congratulations to my testing HIV negative made so much sense. Too, his response to my query how George was doing of late and his response that he was doing well, indeed, made perfect sense. By Friday, December 23, 2016, George was doing well and in a better place no longer suffering from the wear and tear of his end-of-life monadal illness. Ours was a very private relationship and there were only two persons in George’s life with whom I enjoyed cordial relations: his son and his lover, Colin Campbell. I rather suspect that Colin is George’s task companion.

Grete. Etching. George Hawken

I will ever be proud of having been an inspiring muse to George and for having facilitated the energetic work that he did in the late ‘80s to mid ‘90s. Our passion fuelled his creativity; what’s more, our passion kept me focussed and grounded in this life as Merlin and his ravaging illness and the hideous ghouls who betrayed him in his illness made life at times more harrowing than already the illness made it. George and his compassion and support were invaluable for me and Merlin was aware of it and openly and unselfishly encouraged it; he knew that I needed that support as with his passing the vipers in his circle would readily dispense with me. Alas, all things being mutual, dispense with the ill-evolved lot I gladly did.

Hearts and Flowers. Intaglio. 1976 George Hawken

Sweet and blissful dreams my darling ennobled George; I am honoured to have fostered and enabled your creativity to have lotussed into greater flower. Yours was a most rare and beautiful spirit and yet again our love shall dance and soar to higher octaves. My heart centre is wide open to facilitate your journey in whatever capacity of our choosing in the dreamtime. Ever, will I love you more.

Hawken, George 9/2/46<O>12/12/2016, Owen Sound

This was a first level old artisan in the observation mode, with a goal of dominance, a spiritualist in the emotional part of intellectual centre.

George had a Mercury/Venus body type.

George had a primary chief feature of arrogance and a secondary of stubbornness.

He was sixth-cast in his cadence and his cadence is second in the greater cadence. He is a member of entity two, cadre four, greater cadre 7, pod 414.

He has a discarnate artisan essence twin and a scholar task companion who is alive and they do know each other but have not worked together in this life.

This fragment is an artisan with priest casting, so his art will always manifest a spiritual component no matter what the medium. This fragment was a well-known painter of placid rural landscapes in the latter part of the eighteenth century in England, and several of his works hang in noble houses.

You were once a student of this fragment’s, in a life in Amsterdam in the seventeenth century and you were lovers for a short time in that life also.

Twice this fragment has illustrated books written by his task companion and he was also an illuminator of manuscripts in the twelfth century of the Common Era.

He was an architect during the reign of Augustus Caesar and several buildings he designed still stand, although one was rather badly damaged by the volcanic eruption that buried the city of Pompeii in the first century of the Common Era.

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Prince.

21.04.201607.12.2024 Arvin da BrghaLeave a comment

Prince 7/6/58<O>21/4/2016

The fragment who is most commonly known simply as Prince has also had an illustrious past as a performing artist. However, his first life in the music world was as one of the many children of Johann and Barbara Bach.

This child was female and did not become a musician but was surrounded by the musical life. She was particularly close to her brother, Carl Philipp Emanuel, and this started the fragment’s interest in music as a vehicle through which one could perform.

Although this fragment has enjoyed many stellar performances as an actor, a dancer and a singer of opera, it is this fragment’s immediate past life that is most pivotal to his current endeavours.

As the composer/pianist Scott Joplin, this fragment popularised ragtime as an art form that did not have its foundations in European music and was uniquely American.

Prince is a fifth level mature sage in the passion mode, with a goal of rejection, mostly functioning in the positive pole of discrimination, a sceptic in the moving part of emotional centre.

He has a Mercury/Saturn body type.

Prince’s primary chief feature is that of impatience, with a strong secondary of arrogance.

He was sixth-cast in his cadence and his cadence is fifth in the greater cadence. He is a member of entity two, cadre four, greater cadre 43, pod/node 414.

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#OscarsSoWhite!

29.02.201607.12.2024 Arvin da BrghaLeave a comment

By far, one of the funniest Academy Awards Opening monologues. Leading up to last night’s awards, I was a bit apprehensive about how the whole race row would pan out. I think that Chris Rock did a fantastic job and steered the entire controversy in the appropriate direction.

The beauty of the monologue in 1999 is how pure and wonderful it was. So much has transpired since then and we are all a very different human race post 9/11, post Barack H. Obama’s presidency – racism has become since then so in-your-face and toxic… most of all, the problem of climate change is undeniably upon us. So very good of Leonardo DiCaprio to have spoken so eloquently as he did.

Finally, regardless the diversity controversy in Hollywood and the facts being what they are, it matters little when this beautiful world is slowly becoming less viable for human civilisation… Merrily we besottedly chug along like dopey lobsters denying that it is getting tepid under the collar.

Finally, Whoopi and her opening monologue got it right, it was the best #OscarsSoWhite! ever.

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Dreams are the poetic expression of the soul.

Tag: 1999