11/12/11
Day 39
Weather 62-41

I will be posting these for each of the 55 days of Occupy Philly on Dilworth Plaza, from October 6, 2011 to November 30, the night of our eviction.

To view all posts to date, click:  55 Days of Occupy Philly.
Most of the day fielding email–______ at CoCo, making an effort to behave… sort of. He wants to go to facilitation training. Not capable of keeping opinions to himself or calling out (hand signal) “point of process” when his only point of process is his disagreement with what someone has said. What it amounts to—a desire to make process work to support his opinion & deny those of any who don’t agree. We’re going to have to work through this shit.
This has been… difficult, yes, but a satisfying challenge—a challenge that’s been a test of faculties not much called on for a long time. Twelve years in front of a class room helped. And a more secure sense of myself as a poet, that I’ve won for myself the freedom to shed the last vestige of the need to appear ‘normal.’ … to be what other’s want, or what I might imagine others to want of me.

Sunday Day 40
November 13, 2011
Weather 71 – 54
11:09 AM Dreams of sailfish & sharks in the Outlet at Bass Lake. Occupation. Disorientation. Meeting at 3:00 Reading Terminal. 5:30, Reading at Giovani’s Room. Too dangerous to swim in the ocean. Occupy web correspondence till 1:15. Read –GA –Prepare my story, “Freedom Arms” for submission.

Nate believes it’s possible to work with politicians. Talks too long—shouldn’t facilitate. I hope he finds an opening for his dream of an experimental farm.

Walked from City Hall to 2nd, North to Brown, met the Occupy Wall Street marchers & escorted them back. One who walked the 90 miles barefoot. Escorted by cops there and back. Taunted by hipsters watching us pass. Food ready for the marchers when we arrived… and news of the attack and destruction on the Zuccotti camp.

The 99% mantra works as an invitation to the Big Tent, but as a facade of unity it is dangerously misleading.

Nutter’s news conference—he “doesn’t want confrontation” but says that the Occupation has changed, the “leaders” have changed… not so veiled threats.

There are many of the 99%, not just the police, who will fight us, who will try to destroy us, many who simply don’t understand how to transition from a hierarchical culture, who use intimidation to grasp for attention & power and work to undermine and betray the movement… sometimes with the best intentions. Others who are too intimidated by the prospect of disapprobation by authority figures whose smiles and vague promises make them forget whose interests they serve, forget that no matter how ‘nice’ a mayor or police chief might be, they are inexorably bound up in an essentially undemocratic power structure that exists primarily for the benefit of the few at the expense of the many.

Let’s not be overly distressed that when Authority begins to frown, many will scuttle to what they believe to be safety, many will turn their backs on us, others will seek to push us toward a defensive authoritarian response to the perceived threat.

What we have done is already part of history and they cannot destroy what has begun here–not from above, not from within.

Mayor Nutter said in his news conference that Occupy Philly had changed. That the “leaders” had changed. What he meant was, there is no select few who stand apart from the people and pretend to speak for us in our stead, who can be manipulated, cajoled, used for their own ends.

Let’s not be fooled. His complaint acknowledges that we’re making a difference. That’s why they will eventually try to destroy us–no matter where we move.

I will be posting these for each of the 55 days of Occupy Philly on Dilworth Plaza, from October 6, 2011 to November 30, the night of our eviction.

To view all posts to date, click:  55 Days of Occupy Philly.

Saturday Day 31
11/5/11
Weather 53 – 36
Anne-Adelle’s reading was wonderful. Came back full of wine and humus—to K-Mart for socks and briefs & a sweatshirt—back to city Hall—much encouraged by the discussions.

Sunday Day 32
11/6/11
Weather 56 – 35

Email from Plan-B Press this morning—they want to publish City of Crows as a chapbook, Spring of 2012.
Fucking Ron Paulers moved their black box ‘tent’ across JFK, set it up on the Municipal Service Bldg plaza. Talked into agreeing to have a team of Occupiers move it back before a confrontation. They pitch signs on NE corner of plaza—free advertising—don’t take part in any working groups, don’t go to GA. Fucking Ayn Randers.

And a Wedding!

Tents multiply at night… 
…  Wedding celebration
	Adam 
	bites the apple      
		slice
of sky over Market Street
livestreaming 

flights of pigeons, Labor’s head
shackled in cardboard stocks

a plea from Food
for cooking pans, tent thieves, yellow jackets
starving & angry
cigarette in hand – matchless

beauty of passing clouds
leaning tent of socialism
tremor beneath the pavement
passing subway electronic 

devices bring a price
in the underground economy
transit – transition – trains 
to nowhere

Mid-Day Music Mayhem