slam-dancing and erratic trips toward closed caskets...

it started out so wonderfully. i met up with some friends and we went to an art opening at the MOCCA; (museum of contempary canadian art) big beautiful motorcycles, with sparkling glitter paint all over them. they spun magnificiently under the disco balls.

and then the party afterwards in kensington market--french new wave bordello film party. everyone was tarted up and the guests all found a warm mouth (or two, three etc.) to engage in sword play with. i guess this is the result of having harper as our fearless leader, now there will be mass balling in our streets!!! (my theory: the more conservative the leadership the more decadence in the populus) though i did exit the party, stage left, four fellows slipped in to examine my molars before my departure and i glided through the angry streets of dawn, accompanied by 'two gentlemen of toronto'.

so, flash forward to the next day, i am attending the tragic funeral of an old school punk rocker; steve banks (www.stevebanks.net) who died in the hospital WAITING ROOM of a torn aorta--so so sad, he checked himself into emergency 'cause he wasn't feeling well--46 years old...and i saw the terribly grief-striken mother, her head hung low with the weight of gravity's sadness--who has to unjustly put her own son into the ground--the place was packed with people spilling out onto the streets...local musicians sang and played his music. it was tender. he had touched so many of us with his fiercely intransigent style.

here are ten things you should know about 'the ministry of love' (by lynn crosbie)

I. They once had a drummer who left the band for another who “like my snappy style.” The guitarist, Dave the Cat, would play Closer to the Heart's power chord when vexed; the bass player, a sepulchral German named Chris who, so I hear, screamed “Ride it!” in bed; Steve, mon amour, the singer, who was passed a note by a cute blonde (bitch) at Larry’s Hideaway that said i want to fuck you so bad im going to explode.

II. One of their best songs was a beautiful ballad based on the crimes of Jack the Ripper.

III. They jammed at the Ministry of Love, a tinderbox loft on Queen and Clairemont, where William New lived, and where disgusting acts of sexual and narcotic misconduct occurred in the kitchen.

IV. In the washroom, someone wrote: HOPE FOR ME I HOPE FOR YOU. They loved cough syrup and Jacques Brel, other cruel intimacies.

V. Their songs are impossible to find or forget, shards .Keeping me silent, outside, silent, outside, keeping me silent.

VI. Steve Banks. He wore draped pants and two-tone shoes, a red velvet blazer, stunning. He’s like fuckin Jim Morrison, I once heard some girl say. He sings like that.

VII. The sea of bodies, surfing. Jumping. Jamming into the hallway with Neon Rome, Echo Papa: “I thought you had the dope?” Something is on fire.

VIII. The last show. Chris is breaking his guitar into splinters. Dave’s hair in the lights, a rising flare.

IX. And Steve was slithering on the stage like a snake, you missed it?

X. We did so many pills then. It felt like it was happening underwater; like a reflection there of a beautiful ruin. I did not know I would never see them again; that I would spend the rest of my life feeling this stab or that: and somehow you asked me to stay/but not to ask why. No, not to ask why.

Steve Banks went on to form "Trans-love Airways; "The Ministry of Love ended when Steve Banks left the band. The rest of the band, except for drummeer Kevin Hunter,who had joined Breeding Ground, went on to play a few shows as "Prayer Tower" with another singer.

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now, flashback to the horror-- two of my friends, after leaving the love nest bordello party, walking home, are jumped and beaten up. one is rushed to the hospital since his head was smashed on the pavement. when i arrive at the hospital, one of them is in intensive care due to internal bleeding in his head.

thankfully they let me in, all though i am not immediate family and he has the biggest shiner i have ever seen. we speak gently and he expresses regret over missing the funeral. i am shaken. too much despair for one day. after soaring to unprecedented heights the night before, this day has me crashing back down to earth.

both are out of intensive care now and cannot remember much of what happened to them, so it will be difficult to press charges or to find the fellows who did this to my friends @#$!!

this year of the dog is a bit rough thus far.

as father larry said at the service: go out and make peace with the people you need to, do it now, while you still have the chance.

music--jim carroll: 'people who died'.