55 Days of Occupy Philly: Days 25, 26, 27

Sunday October 30, 2011
Day 25
Weather 50 – 34

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.

       Before we came here, under the columns of City Hall …
              … Lenape people –
         men watching
                     women
         settling children for the night – 
         nothing brighter

         than moonlight
         the shower of sparks from cooking 

         fires
         
         rain
         of ashes

               the earth turns – centuries
         pass
    
         with open palms – we catch them as they fall

         return – returning
         letting go
         what was never ours to hold

———-
10/31/11 Day 26
11:42 PM
Monday
Weather 56 – 31 Fog
first night below freezing

Zombie Capitalism! Fake blood and tatters, march, City Hall to South Street—I cut off for home at 5th & South—up Passyunk.

Facilitated the 2:00 PM GA. Will I get Soc Sec tomorrow? Last month, deposit was made on the first—but not dated till the 3rd on bank statement (?)
So don’t know whether I’ll have money in the bank tomorrow or have to wait till Thursday

Tuesday November 1, 2011
Day 27
Weather: 59 – 42

Flocks of pigeons, starlings...
     ...over the plaza
   
     voices 	rise
     
     escape
     the many shapes

     our bodies take

     our less than perfect
     parts

     patterns

     in flight across the city square
     converge, disperse

     unite ... in fragile disarray

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Day 24

Saturday 11:17
10/29/11
Day 24 Weather 45 — 33, Snow

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.

My day off – 3 ½ hours standing in sleet, snow & rain—walking back from Temple with 17… of those who came to the “Silent-No-More” vigil. Clinton was to be on campus, but canceled cause of weather. Ache all over. Facilitation tent blew down. Tents sagging under wet snow—wind predicted for tonight. Haven’t heard how Scott Olsen is doing—fractured skull from rubber bullet [Oakland].

1:20 PM At Hidden River reading—have 5 Songs of Occupation now—have to be back for a process meeting (City Hall) by 3:00—likely six hours outside to end of GA. Dressed for that, so overdressed here. Bright crisp normal autumn day.

           Saturday, October 29, 2011: Temple University
           Rain -- Broad Street ...
                    …again
                Universe -- of learning
           cordoned off
            our feet cold
            ice pelting our cheeks
            mouths silenced
            logos -- Exxon
         PB       Bank of
                             America
            new
        word
            rising from the depths

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Day 23 Angela Davis pays a visit

10/28/11 Day 23 Weather 51 – 37 Rain

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.

Thursday GA—Difficult. Assaulted by a Lone Ranger. Last night—pouring rain, in Friend’s Meeting House—much better. Tonight—our Occupy Together meeting. Information & development pouring in faster than can assimilate it. Meeting at COSI—Friend’s Center closed.

Opened an account with TruMark Credit
Union. Will close my Citizen’s Bank account as soon as rent & Comcast checks clear, and I can restore my SKYPE number. [A sandwich board sign in front of TruMark with a Guy Fawks mask, and invitation to join].

Angela Davis will be speaking at Temple & Dilworth today.

I haven’t had a whole day off from OP since before the 6^th.
Friday October 28, 2011
				Angela ...
     ... arrives at City Hall
     		                 Advent
     at Liberty Plaza
     Broad Street 
     whistles in the rain
                         	  Chants 
     from another time

     so little changed since then
     so much – a chance

     of snow

     hangs overhead
     waiting, weighted, heavy
     with voices --

                    Annunciation!

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Day 22

October 27, 2011 Day 22
Thursday
Weather 64 – 42 Rain
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.

Candles windblown…
     … one to one
     each one a-flame, fingers 
     coated in wax
     our not so silent vigil

     tear gas wraps the little crowd
     gathered 

     where he lies black 
     
     jackets, masks
     helmets, trudgeons

     a continent away
     we see what they have done –
     our brother – Scott Olsen -- carried off

     across 15th Street 
     clouds of rain sweep the towers
     the lights we carry
     flicker & blow out

Youtube video of Scott Olson shooting

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Day 21

Wednesday
October 26, 2011
Weather
60 – 42 Partly cloudy

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.

Letter to City/State/Nation/World…Dear Ones …
     … among the stars, winding through back alleys
     boardrooms backyards fields plowed & fallow
     shattered glass we woke 

     last night we woke to a child’s cry
     to relieve ourselves     from dreams
     to the smell of smoke      to drums
     to helicopters in morning mist      to old men 
     foraging for rags and tobacco butts rich
     men setting the alarms lockstepping minds
     vaulting secret desires 

Dear World… 
     …last night we called 
     for clarifying questions, concerns of state amended 
     wings to woolen coats defied the northern wind 
     blew our tents like flags across the square, sang 
     songs unheard since the first
     king first 
     sent our children to slaughter our neighbors
     shackled our labor, heaped 
     wheat in towers while the people starved

Dear Wheeling Galaxies…
     … your billion sons & daughters
     on this speck of earth reclaim our commons
     throw off the shame of ownership, the prison state, release 
     love’s body, make all worlds 
     a home for all, hold 
     all in common – refuse!
     to end this song, refuse – to end
     this poem, this occupation – here
     begin again, here --
     here on the Commons of a thousand cities
     to begin again we rise, we rise again like 
     Adam in the garden of desire!

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Days 17, 19, 20

Weather Max and Min temps
10/16 – 66-50
10/17 – 57-45
10/18 – 53-38
10/19 – 55-35
10/20 – 71-47

Saturday
10/22/11
Day 17
If someone told me there was a full moon tonight I swear I’d start to take the folklore seriously.
…brought a proposal to the facilitation meeting—CoCo seems not to have met. With inexperienced facilitators, he virtually hi-jacked the GA—or tried to. A very frustrating, exhausting evening.

Already convinced, now doubly so, that we have to reconvene the noon GA—and get Tent City involved to bring us together.

Tomorrow morning—write for Tent City… newsletter—appeal to join working groups & help with the GA [which does nothing but generate petitions anymore].

Email concerns to Fac. list.

10/23/11
Day 18
Wrote piece for Camp newsletter.
12/24/11
Sunday
Day 19
First thing in the morning—begin day with email, gather info—correspondence—one to three hours. Did laundry. Red: Marx. Geo Oppen—wrote a poem. Back at City Hall at 4:00. Take the pulse. Talk. Listen. Gwen of Labor worried about losing Union Support if we oppose the construction. She goes to CoCo & takes the whole hour. No time to pee or get supper. Fac. super-efficient—15 minutes & we’re set for the GA. Time to pee—put no food left. GA went well. Discussed the arrests. Discussed the letter—a damn fine piece of writing & done by a committee—Droopy eyed young man grabs the Mic (the loud speaker Mic) goes on and on –after a woman hi-hacked it before him—when everyone else was doing People’s Mic. gonna propose for discussion—specially when not a big crowd—we turn off the Mic—NO mic, if someone has trouble with the rhythm of the People’s Mic—a facilitator goes out to help. Can’t let lone-rangers commandeer the mic for their personal agenda. Gives one person all the power.

Tuesday
10/25/11
Day 20
Down to my last $3.00—till next week. Another poem. Didn’t get off the computer till noon—not even time for breakfast–& lotta stuff I didn’t have time to read. Need to get up earlier.

Another poem. Came here (City Hall) at 2:30. About 20 after four now—crisp fall day, clear sky. Sitting at the Fac station. Rest for 30 minutes—go to Suburban Station restroom—Coco/Fac/… then GA.

Yes, we have made them…
the glass towers, the stone monuments
to every principle we have ever betrayed
a billion messages rising
invisibly…

what we choose
to ignore
has chosen us

the glass towers, the billions—
how they in turn
have made –
are making

us

their shadows
growing new powers

the planet turning
on its seasons

reaching hand to outstretched hand
raising
one another from our knees
taking up again the burden 
the terrible lightness of freedom

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.

The Media’s Obsession with Locating Movement “Leaders”

Interesting… a top down view needs access to a “leader,” that is, someone assumed, through organizational position, perceived popular acclamation.. or just magic (appearance in Top media venues), to have access to and therefore, to represent, the amorphous otherwise undifferentiated mass “down there” (I like the sexual play on this–that makes the unknowable Mass ‘feminine’ ) It’s only through the mediation of such a ‘leader’ that Top Down observers can know or understand that mass blob. He (less often, she) becomes the personification of what they are believed to represent… or .. um, “lead.”
Where power enters in–the leader, then, becomes the means of manipulating, using and controlling that mass. No wonder the upper echelons in the Chain of Being become so befuddled by things like Occupy… or the current not quite yet, because still leaderless) intifada–or Black Lives Matter!
In dealing with hierarchal organizations, this would seem to be weak point–a “lack” that can be occupied and developed–an inside-outside position, like a space between the walls, to attack and pervert striated power structures.

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Day 14: growing divisions

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.
Wednesday Day 14
10/19/11
Weather: temp max 66, min. 60.
rain – .93 inches

11:02 Slept late kicking last of cold. Dreams of eviction—Occupation from… where Where Job Chillaway Pottery used to be. ½ hour responding to Occupy email. Shower & breakfast.

Rain.

Need to check weather. Wrote in time of International meeting on remaining 35 or so fliers to pass out at GA tonight, and tomorrow afternoon.
Can I get in 15 minutes reading time before I go?
—
I did.
It’s a start

GA in Friend’s Center –rain. (This is the Friend’s Meeting House, but photo looks like it was take at the Dec. 10, Occupy Together Meeting. Very hard to match the photos with particular days or actions–I do it when I can.)

Deputy Mayor Negin [asshole of the first order] dropped by the Media tent & caused a bit of a stir. City not happy that it’s taking so long to set up communications. [this is classic colonizing strategy: it’s what the US did in dealing with First Nation peoples, bribing, cajoling, intimidating, forcing them to create internal judicial and governing structures that resembled the colonizers if they were to deal with them at all, weakening their own traditional structures by setting up competing power centers—the one’s authorized to negotiate with the outside power, and those that more closely followed their traditional roles. (The Nations Within: The Past and Future of American Indian Sovereignty. Vine Deloria Jr & Clifford Lytle, New York, 1984) Later, like following a script, people in Occupy took it on themselves to play the same game, becoming the Occupy Philly that the city wanted them to be, and creating distracting and artificial divisions like those endless debates about applying for permits]

Tomorrow—Occupy International (or Global) first meeting.
Need to address/acknowledge Messaging’s call for a Regional Assembly: concern that while a call for such a meeting is welcome—in absence of any concrete proposals for how this is to be done, by whom, & what it’s to look like—it remains a rhetorical declaration. This committee would like to join with Messaging, Tech and perhaps other WG’s to begin discussing/exploring what actual implications might evolve.

In this light—need someone to begin gathering info on what other Occupations are doing—establish communication (with help of Messaging) with corresponding WG’s.

Translation Team
This could be itself a cross-Occupation effort (Tech help)
Goal: establish regular exchange of bulletins/news—(an inter-Occupation News Service?) Multi-lingual!

Meta-discussions: transition from local consensus to representative assemblies—models for consideration, how this might work.

Set up on-line forums for meta-concerns—that might segue into conferences—emphasis, as local democracy depends for success on ample scope for conversation—open mics etc – before decisions can be made in assemblies,
so larger organs need space to sound out ideas preceding decision making bodies.

55 Days of Occupy Philly: 11 and 12. going global

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.
10/14//11

Monday
10/17/11
Day 11 Sick yesterday—much better today. Home early last night—watched GA live-stream. Went for a process meeting today at 4:00. Me & Alex. No one else showed up. Went to CoCo—facilitated, then came home. Watched GA again livestream–& monitored chat on the side—try to counter mis-information. Tomorrow a reading. Hope my voice is back. Expect I’ll be called on for facilitation team at GA.

Tuesday
10/18/11 11:04 AM Day 12
Two days ago felt quite sick. Yesterday (after a bad night—waking every 15-20 minutes to clear my nose), considerable improvement. Today—somewhat congested, but pretty much over it. Voice coming back. Leave in few minutes to confirm Friends Center for our inter-occupy meeting Thurs. at 6:00. Come home. Back for poetry reading/performance at 3:00, probably stay through the GA.

Make Glossary of Occupy Terms?

Proposal at GA: support requested from Occupy DC for a National Assembly [this turned out to be a can of worms… there were two groups claiming to be Occupy DC] –couldn’t respond in discussions cause I was on facilitation team—made announcement after proposal was over. Philly’s cross-Occupy working group taking on these same concerns. DC letter said nothing about how this was to be accomplished. Things moving so fast its hard to keep up. Occupy camps in Taipei, Tokyo, Iceland, Paris…how to build structure with so little time? Neither NY—nor DC should be World centers for this—maybe a rotating central point more consistent with horizontal power structures.

Skeleton team on facilitation. Need to extend education-outreach internally to get more peeps involved. We’re at a transition point—finding who’s in it for the long run. Why aren’t more campers involved in process? Why only Alex and me at Monday’s process meeting? Have to get there for the noon camp-site meet.
A proposal to restore noon GA—but for proposals specific to those living on the site & site conditions… We are all sanitation? No we’re not.

422 tents as of this AM. That’s nearly 1000 living on Dilworth Plaza now.

55 Days of Occupy Philly: Day 9

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.
10/14//11
10/15/11
Saturday
Day 9 Getting to be work. The celebrity fizz on the stage don’t last long—it’s a job to be done. 5 hours of meetings. Process at 5:00. Facilitation at 6:00. GA at 7:00… over early tonight—9:15. A scary proposal from CoCo—that they should relay proposals submitted by WG’s directly, no longer select which one’s were ready for prime time—all would come to the GA for the GA to vote on which ones should be presented for decision. Generated by criticism of the GA as elitist, lack of transparency. how can you get more transparent—anyone can go, sit in, vote on what the WG’s bring. Deep breath… relief. Proposal rejected. Only a handful were for it. GA’s would have gone on till midnight.
I did stack.
Very tired but less than last night—way less than night before. learning to find my pace.

Almost every day, Direct Action takes the streets.

Hundreds of Occupy movements across Europe. Sooner or later, the big crush will come. Power don’t give up power without a fight. Think they may be counting on winter to thin us out, wear us down. As though we’re gonna all go home & forget about it.

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