Hayden in 2023

[Hayden]

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the t and the e on my keyboard are giving out
so please forgive me if a word doesn't make sense
I will proofread this, and hope for the best—
but otherwise—

in light of watching Barbie and El Conde,
which, as you well know, share the same
coloured title-cards, despite being about
Augusto Pinochet (immortal, vampire) &
Barbara Millicent Roberts (immortal, plastic)
who, apart from this desire of PINK, are
not particularly similar, yet share one
common conundrum, I will refrain from
talking about this existential September,
in which I could not help but think about
*record scratch* what it will be to die—

my fingers hurt (just a little). I try to play
guitar as much as I can nowadays. it's not
much. maybe 4-5 hours a week. I mostly
play the blues as of late. I haven't played
jazz in quite some time. rock? even longer.
but I enjoy playing the blues. it's the music
of summer. of autumn. of winter. never spring.
in spring, I'll play jazz. for now? it is the blues.

it took me a long time to understand music.
from the age of 7, I have had terrible music teachers.
it took me many years to realize this,
and many more to erase everything they taught me.
I was taught music like math. like spelling. like physics.
it was all rather technical, finite, soulless— theoretical—
I was taught clefs and notes and shapes and symbols.
squiggles. mnemonics. how much a split reed costs.
by people who were too tired to care. or understand.
or, truly, even understand it themselves.
they just wanted to make it to their lunchbreak.
go home. get an oil change. see if there's some
staffroom cookies. I don't think they understood
what it meant to teach music at all.

time signatures confounded me. none of my
teachers could ever explain them to me. this
was possibly because I was taught music like math,
which, obviously, is quite numerical, and absolute—
'what is 3/4 time?' I would ask, 'what is the 3?
what is the 4?— to which they would stumble and
say something along the lines of 'those are the
numbers you count!' which, in hindsight, is arguably
a somewhat funny answer, but I can't say it helped.

chords! what on earth is a chord. I have never seen
one. can you please tell me what a chord is? all
of this sheet music you have given me over my
education has never had a chord. what is a chord.
what does it do. how do I play it. 'You play saxophone!
you do not have chords!' which, while true, was
not very helpful.

for some bizarre reason, I chose piano as a highschool
elective one spring. think it was grade 11. grade 11! starting
to learn piano. what a nut. there are prodigies half your age,
what are you doing? looking back, I think it's so odd I thought
of myself as too old to learn something new... so odd I was told
I was too old to learn something new... I was just the right age.
that is when you are learning. you are not done learning at 15, 16—
you have learned nothing at all. yet I felt late to the party. it was
long over. of course, over those slim month, what I was taught
about music was flipped around. chords exist! oh, look at that!
a FULL CHORD! right there on the sheet music I was meant to
replicate note-for-note like a robot in front of the entire class
because that's how you learn stuff. I will admit, my teach this
time around was a pretty good guy— piano player himself,
knew his stuff— was never the best at teaching, and he was
super awkward... all the time... but he was a good guy—

in 2023, I cannot play piano. I very rarely touch a saxophone.
or a trumpet. or a flute. I feel lucky to say I have played a bassoon.
a mandolin. xylophone. steel guitar. accordion. ukulele. just that I tried.
I have never played a sitar. or a harmonica. a trumpet. a harp. a cello.
but one day, I hope—
no, in 2023 I only play the blues. on an acoustic guitar. gifted to me
by someone who has long since passed away. and never knew what
I learned how to play. no— they will never hear me— and that is that.

I talked to someone this month (a colleague) who, growing up,
always wanted to play drums. be a drummer. be in a band. a professional!
how cool would that be. I asked 'how long have you played drums now?'
'oh...' they replied— 'I, well... actually, I have never. it was just a dream'.
I asked them, please, find a drum kit. and play it. just for a moment.
you do not need to know what 3/4 time means. you can still teach
elementary school music classes without that. I promise.

nowadays, luckily, I feel I know a little bit more about music. I
even know the names of all the fancy scales the people use to
make music sound like music. ionian. dorian. phrygian. mixolydian!
I even know major and minor scales are the exact same thing if
you swap around a letter or two. neat! but, yes, I recognize my
education was, excuse my language, a dismal kerfuffly turdsquomp.

but, no— music is none of that—
none of that matters. music is not music.
these notes? these twelve notes? this confinement?
this is not music. no. music is not music.
this is a piece of paper. it is nothing of music.
it is writhing ink.

and when I think of September, even now, I always think of school.
every year, always. no exception. September was the year anew.
a month to start again. a habit. a given. a condition. a fundamental
year-after-year tradition with promise sewn into its autumn sleeves.
this is, of course, no longer true as we age. all months are the same
(in a sense), and there is no scheduled anew. you create your own anew.
anew can be today. anew can be tomorrow. anew can be in the middle
of spring. anew is jazz. not always blues. anew is deciding to pick up
a harmonica and see whatever notes you can blow. pluck. strum. bang.

and it is this freedom, which is music.

and it is with this freedom, I am learning.

we are not here long—



September 2023

[Repo]

Lovely!

[Hayden]

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sitting in a barrel can either be a body, whiskey or a bullet.
(but it is still sitting in a barrel).

I didn’t used to listen to Hank Williams—
oldschool country (taboo of the youth)
it’s old, dust, flat, heard one you heard’em all—
No. Hank Williams, you do not bang at the club.

I think there comes a point you stop feeling older.
You become you, at some point, between your ears. Cement.
but
I believe nobody is who they are.
truly, in their heads.
saying themselves aloud. so
perhaps neither is true—

I have been, a lot. to the point I worry. it is not believable.
and yes, my tastes have changed. I have watched them change.
seen them change, heard them change. it is a development
from experience, time… repetition and the new—
but I did not used to listen to Hank Williams. Now… ?
… perhaps it is not so cement afterall—

I wrote a great intro in my head before I went to sleep last night
but didn’t write it down and have sadly forgotten it since
(perhaps it never existed at all). it consisted of a gunfight
and had a grit-tight chase scene (international), not to
mention a rewarding character arc and a guy who
smuggled rum— (til some form of hope fizzled at dusk).

I have replaced this intro with acetate Hank Williams.

/

Dia de Los Muertos / Townes Van Zandt & Jackson C Frank,
saxophone squeals of Fun House climaxes and the sound
of dried leaves crunching underfoot— autumn, is: a death.
a celebration of death. and a death of celebration.

‘I don't know one note from another’— Hank Williams

I am still, for better or worse, young. (In my head anywho)
despite being the only one at my office who put in the effort
(albeit minimal) of a Halloween costume today (I stuck
a small slip of guillotined cardstock in my dress-shirt pocket
and jotted in permanent marker ‘Boo.’ written where the thin
sliver at the top showed— it was just a pinch of youth.
what I would used to do. many years ago. when I was
someone who may or may not have been different—
when I was someone who did not listen to Hank Williams.
but, like Hank, I don’t know one note from another…

autumn is a time of cosiness, typically, golden warm tones
and a bold flourish of blots across the cityscape—
yet this year, I am discontent. frustrated. in an unrest.
I am uncomfortable. there is a distraught, a tenseness—
apple pies. light knit sweaters. thin scarves. squirrels.
linking arms as you journey through quilted leaves
kicked up in the breeze alongside laughter and wrinkles—
wicker. squash. acorns. the sun setting a little too cold.
it is a time of not proofreading your sentence. because
it always seems to get dark earlier than the years before.
I am antsy. restless. and as I seek why, I point fingers
at things I cannot seem to see or change—
yet, in this change I see, Hank Williams is on my iPhone.

the ‘things I used to like’ is a sad list—
it is a list of something lost. it is a pang.
yet… empty. it is the shoebox of a soul.

‘I just don’t like ya no more’— The Banshees of Inisherin

and I am compelled, but this unknowing.
I do not know myself, I say, to the voice in my head
as I listen to Hank Williams sing about the Ramblin’ Man
and I stare at trashbags leaking ooze on the sidewalk /
you are you, I say to someone who is not— you are you.
I have sought many atime to figure myself—
and in this, I am human—
and in this, I suppose, I am also the ramblin’ man.

it is not a secret I did not like Ys at first—
dismissed it, actually— I did not understand it.
so, perhaps, with this change I see, I am becoming me—
smidgen by smidgen by smidgen—
less pop. less indie rock. more folk. jazz. classical.
where notes land on a cloud just right,
albeit, it is a waste, for as Hank has kindly pointed out,
I do not know one from the other—











a balloon deflates /
a symphony squeaks out—











I’ve always loved October.
most of my life has happened in October.
and, as I write this, luckily,
there’s still some October left.











Forgive me.
I need to look out the window.
I can see a leaf changing tones.




October 2023

[Hayden]

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cratedigging, somewhere on Ossington,
flipping through a stack of $100-a-pop
vintage hiphop records, secondhand, new,
and a copy of the Idler Wheel (used)
I spot a LP by Shakey Jake (little beat
around the edges) and a nice press of
Junior Wells' Hoodoo Blues for cheap—
zipping through the weathered $10 bin with
a fresh-Sharpied zero— heard none of'em,
not going to lie— remembering the
freshness of asking myself what I
thought The Pixies would sound like
as I stare at the haloed monkey, the
shadows woven tween Unknown Pleasures
and the cold bleakscape of painted peaks—
music tasted a little different. shapeshifting.

Yves Klein Blue (signature hue, ultramarine)
visually borderless, boundless, endlessly deep,
is a pigment of physical distance, unhuman,
a flatline, unmeasured, unfettered and free—
it is an ocean. it is sky. it is, in sense, an end—

in Canada, our milk comes in bags. this does
not stop the fact that at some point or another
'milk' (possibly Dairy Farmers of Canada, a very
powerful organization) decided crates needed
to become just a sliver smaller as so that a
12" record wouldn't be able to snuggly fit within
their walls (this, justly, was to stop audiophiles from
stealing milk crates, but it was undoubtedly the
decision of a grouch)— so, while I no longer house
records in a series of crates designed for bagged milk,
I recollect the first— stolen from whoknowswhere
by a guy, who, for some reason, I never learned the
name of, who vouched for Mahavishnu Orchestra,
Steely Dan and Weather Report, cigarette limping
out his mouth, handing me a slightly beat box
perfect for storing the five or six LPs I'd bought in
the previous weeks— it is what I think of when I
hear the name Derek Jarman. Yves Klein. Yves
Saint Laurent. Le Jardin Majorelle. Chefchaouen.
it was a box, deep blue, neutral— in a world of its own.

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a blue-screen (while, often associated with the death
of a beloved Microsoft product) was my go-to in lieu
of a green-screen when I began live production (news,
media, TV) longago, when I was learning what I could
and could not do— it reminded me of something free.
something which could be whatever it wished. it spoke.
existing, evoking... it was a muse which would never see the
screen— emotions of youth, ignorance, bliss and spring—
it was a canvas, reminding me— a solo can only exist if you say—

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when I began to consider form (I have, for better or worse,
always valued manner equal to substance) as a method
of everything— line, shape, texture, size, light, space—
I accounted sex, nature, found pattern, math and habit
(among other things) to assimilate, replicate, assess, construct
and criticize 'art'— what felt perfect, and why— in mirror—
truth became difficult— confusing, unclear— yet, magnificent.
a blemish is not a blemish. but a perfect note can be clutter.
there is no equivalent to a tree. there is no song that is a leaf.
there is no art that is the sea. there is no one piece which can be sky.
there is no story which mimics the honeybee's fractured wing.
a circle cannot be a circle. these things are mere theory.

and as I ran through jazz, blues and Motown 45s shelved
in a shipping-container-turned-record-shop, milk crates
stacked ceiling-high, it was so odd when I spotted a crate
the same shade as that one stolen a lifetime ago, when
I knew nothing, and a blur of all the faces along the way—
I did not look inside it. I could not. I did not want to know.
I have broken promises. I have made mistakes. I am I.
I know what Doolittle sounds like. Kid A. Loveless.
The vehemence of Braxton and Brotzmann and Ayler.
It is everything tied outside of it which makes me feel.
And I cannot unlearn.

Gustave Courbet painted L'Origine du monde twenty years
after Le Désespéré.

and it’s astonishing how much people care about parking.



November 2023.

[Hayden]

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images of my childhood are often dusty, rustic and worn,
(not in the means of a western— I am not a saloon baby—)
but they’re from a time gone— homespun, jagged, dim—
when colours didn’t pop as much as wane, limp, bunch—
there’s this thin blur behind my eyelids (years, memories, life)
lined with maple-tones and palettes creased with crimson and khaki,
listening to the timbre of autumn leaves and snow piled six-feet high,
ecru upholstery and polaroids dwindling from too much time in the light—

craggy shores and ice-cold water— peeling birch riddled with beetles—
jumbled puzzle pieces, in banal rooms, indescribably distinct,
opening odd boxes bursting with musty odours of too much time,
fireflies in dusk and the stuffiness of airless space, the taste of trout bones—

I cannot wipe clean the flecks of dust spread atop echoes—
they are there.
brushed with acrylic ,
ringing free,
tinged with pigments of laughter,
naivety, and fragments of thought—
it is cement in the air—

the first time I saw a Pollock I wanted to touch it.
just to graze it with my fingers. the slightest bit of pressure.
the textured brushwork of Van Gogh’s palette-knife.
thick globby smudges and streaks that looked so… pokable—
smears. daubs. raised dollops. Matisse with his scissors and glue.
perhaps if we put No. 5, 1948 neath the stylus it would sound like Ayler—
Irises like Debussy—
The Sheaf like Eno—

the first time I saw I record I held the grooves right up to my eye—
a canvas—
and those days of birch bark rushed back / a slight tickle to the grain—

the past few months I have delved into the works of Connie Converse,
Sibylle Baier, Blaze Foley, Robert Lester Folsom and Bill Fay— Townes
Van Zandt, Elyse Weinberg, Trevor Beales Jackson C Frank and Nick Drake—
many of whom (Fay aside) never quite saw their day in the sun—
whose work aged with dust, and attained something only time can do /
and as I stroll to the wispy delivery of Hazey Jane II, triumphant brass
pillowing like a cloud, or Townes taking on Lightnin’s Chauffeur's Blues
from the intimate Old Quarter in Galveston, candid and solus, I
reminisce of pumpkin tones, shades of peach and pear, the golden
rustle of a wheat field and the burnt rich burgundy of Wasaga’s sun—
the fuzziness of forest moss and sparkle of melted snow—
as the water bobs and wood splashes wet /
Neil Young, Joni, Lightfoot, Cohen /
family, friends— a campfire in the breeze—
a sense of being— tangible, free to be whoever—

as I age into the unknown (as we all do), lost mid this muddle,
something comes rushing back insisting you be you—
through the textures, shades and tones which carved a sense of self,
vivid youth in the rearview / I hear myself though these twelve devilish
notes and the gaps between them— sewn in some baffling shape—

snow on the ground.
snug in a cardigan.
blood on my lips.
circles neath my eyes.

I have watched myself sprint the other way from my youth,
sifting the scattered blotches of warm sienna, walnut and copper
into something that is more-or-less a jumble— and I have wondered,
for most of this year, is it possible, probable and worthwhile, to not be you?
(whether or not you have any say in the matter) and vice-versa—

oh… tomorrow, you fool—

I am, by nature, a troublemaker— ethically, of course (well, ish)—
which, as time goes on, I do not regret (actually, almost the opposite)—
which may be why I affiliated myself so closely with jazz—
always slightly fight shy of classical correctness (for better or worse)
and why I veered towards a comfort from the genre—
most terms for steering away from the norm are antonyms.
un. ir. dis. out. off. (without veering into strange and bizarre).
away from the norm, with sanity. not wacky, zany, freakish or mad.
just a couple inches to the elsewhere.
that place— not un. ir. dis. out. or off.—
that’s all I sought. a place, unlabelled, only familiar in theory—

and as I step into the fog of a Parisian neo-noir, knowing no place to be,
when I think of being who you are if you are only you, and where
that leads you how/where/when/and why— the compass doesn’t point.

I know they knew in the moment they were them— and no matter how
much the canvas has been worn, the canvas holds true—
and more and more, it's this truth I value, seek and hear—
just someone being them—






there’s an A.Y. Jackson painting, First Snow, Algoma,
which features a billow of smoke in the centre of the composition.
it is, in essence, a clock.
as is the snow.
as are the shades of rolling beech and pine.
and that slim, slim wrinkle of light—

that is all.
it tells the time.
and that is all it needs to be.






December, 2023.
(Final entry)