Some Words in Honor of the Passing of a Great Human Being; Piero Resta.

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Dog Poet Transmitting…….

We have come to the edge of it. We are on the edge and the edge is everywhere. Any strong wind will set it off. Every human being is an island of consciousness. When John Donne said, “every man’s death diminishes me”, he wasn’t talking about individual consciousness, although in a sense he was. What he was talking about and… I have no way of knowing if he knew this, was of the ocean of subconsciousness that connects us all. We are all inlets into this ocean and this ocean is tossing in all directions, with angry foaming waves …because irresistible change is coming and that is what is stirring the wide waters. You might think it has to do with collective fear; desire, confusion, runaway ignorance and denial that has hardened its resistance but which cannot last against the force of the sea. These are symptoms of our dis-ease as we have departed from any sense of harmony with the great sea and this once shining Earth we inhabit. In our lassitude and indifference we have allowed the very worst of us to turn this planet into a smoldering garbage dump.

We must find the garden within and those of us seeking with the greater intensity have attracted the less than tender ministrations of the enemy of humanity. Any resistance to the force of herding and perverting that is taking place worldwide brings the attention of his minions to annoy and frustrate us in our every day. I experience this on a regular basis and I know that many readers are having a hard time of it because not a day goes by that I don’t hear from one of them and I have the direct evidence of my own life. It ain’t easy (grin).

I am going to step away from the usual blog posting formula to celebrate the life of a man whom I considered a good friend and who was someone I was looking forward to reuniting with when I managed to visit Maui. I would have been there already except for my assault, yet one more thing this unfortunate event has cost me- 

I find, before even setting about the attempt to do so, that I will be unable to pay justice to this man and his remarkable life. All of us know someone who inspired us simply by being in the same room; who lit up the room when they entered it, someone who was so filled with enthusiasm and joie de vive that it proved infectious. Piero was such a man and he brought so many of us together by creating scenes where artists would gather and demonstrate their abilities and wares to one another. He was a uniquely humble soul and I cannot remember him ever spending any time promoting himself. He was all about bringing out the creativity in others. Piero always wanted to know what you were up to. He didn’t spend that much time telling you what he was up to. It might come up for whatever reason now and again and be dismissed with that sincere self deprecating shrug that I remember him for.

 

He was a real character. When you saw him it was obvious that he was an artist and he was an artist in the very best sense because he himself was his greatest work and he left an indelible impact on the lives of others. When I met him he was the proprietor of Piero’s Garden Cafe, which he ran with his mother who was a wonderful cook. This was in the 80′s when Paia was an outlaw town and you took your safety in your hands if you were to walk its streets at night We always used to make jokes about the green lasagna, which I will add here was top notch! He and his mother were fabulous cooks. Pretty much anything that Piero did, he did well.

Here is some of his art-

 

 

and some shots of his location in Kaupo

Piero put together the most dynamic environment I have ever been a part of. Performance nights were seriously memorable and there are many of us surviving today who will never forget those events and some of the outrageous spectacles that took place there. One might say that I was the source of a great deal of the outrageous side of it and I doubt that there were many places around that would have allowed someone like me to do the sort of things I did on stage. Let me just say that one of those events, a dinner and show evening with myself and Bud-the Birdman- Clifton led directly to my biggest arrest, based on the sort of much too real comedy and music we performed that night. Bud and I, along with Franklin Russell and Michael Madden were an inseparable quartet of mischief and madness there and Piero made it all possible.

Like I said, I can’t possibly communicate in any meaningful way just how dynamic a person Piero was, or convey a true illustration of how he touched the lives of others. That is something that will speak out of the hearts of others every time they remember him and talk about him among each other, which I am sure will happen with some amount of frequency. He is one of those people that will be sorely missed and you hear this sort of statement probably more often than is actually necessary or true because in the cases of many people they aren’t sorely missed. Someone just felt compelled to say it for lack of anything better. In Piero’s case it is a true statement. He will be sorely missed. He was many things but what I remember most is how much fun he was and how alive he was and how he made things happen, especially when it had to do with bringing people together in a celebratory atmosphere.

Since I am not equal to the task of accurately remembering him, let us segue back into the metaphysical for which this blog is most noted for and talk about the human characteristics that we would all be much improved by manifesting in our lives. Every day is a sterling opportunity to make a difference in the lives of others; a touch upon the shoulder, a kind word, a compassionate glance across the aisle of existence in passing, when we see the wounded hearts of others, as it looks out at us through their eyes. Besides the hurt, there is that anger and the frustration that we see in so many of the lives that pass by us. We have the chance to shine upon those lives if only in passing and if only for a moment. We have myriad opportunities every day to have an impact on life and to have an impact on that shared ocean of consciousness that connects us all. Piero did this. I watched him do this many times. He made you feel better about yourself.

I had a bad day today. It was one of those days where everything conspired to make my movements difficult. Everything stuck together or got in the way and the human side of the equation that I encountered was not helpful. In fact, I had to drive a hundred miles today through an endless repetition of highway construction zones, back and forth and it was all less pleasant and more difficult than it usually is and these days that is how it usually is (grin). The thing is that yesterday I had to do exactly the same thing and then hang out at the dentists, or in the area for some hours so that I wouldn’t have to come back again but I did have to come back the very next day because he left one single word off of the prescription that he wrote me. What was the word? It was ‘twenty’. When you write a prescription here you have to put the numeral in, like 20 and also spell it out. No one would honor it because one word was missing. How absurd is that? Very. What makes it more ridiculous is that this enforced stupidity is all the result of legislation put together by the biggest drug dealers on the planet; the DEA. The CIA, the pharmaceutical industry and the politicians who get paid to help all this global crime flourish and this isn’t speculation on my part. You and I know it is true. It’s all a part of that police state thing.

Piero never paid much attention to any of these things and he was the better man for it. I pay too much attention to these things. I imagine it is my job and maybe it is. Piero had his job too and that was to make the world a better place and to lift the spirits of whoever he met. No one can say that Piero wasted his life. No one can say that he didn’t leave this world a better place. He did and he didn’t have to make war on the armies of darkness in order to do this. He simply shared his love and spread his light and let his art speak for him and his greatest art was himself. I don’t know that I’ve done anything better by being in conflict with the larger world in an imagined effort to shake it awake. Piero woke many hearts without any conflict whatsoever.

I expect to be at his memorial service and I expect to say things similar to this and honor him with a poem and some songs. It won’t be enough but it’s what I’ve got. Enjoy the celestial light worlds, Piero! I know this is something you will be just as good at as you were at everything else you did while you were here. Piero’s death did not diminish me. His life increased me and made me a better person.

Here’s an article that mentions that location where many of these and other works got performed and all of which Piero made possible.

End Transmission…….

Radio broadcast still buzzing.